by Ray Garton
“Oh, yeah, sure it is,” Byron said with a shrug.
Richie changed the subject again, but Ryan was no longer paying attention. He was thinking about Maddy, and that deep, gruff voice.
* * * *
Elliott Granger wanted to ignore the doorbell. He was immersed in his book, deeply involved, and it was coming along so smoothly. The doorbell couldn’t ring at a worse time. He typed to the end of the paragraph he was writing, then turned his chair toward his walker.
“Dammit,” he muttered as he stood and clutched the walker on each side. He leaned on it as he pushed it ahead of him out of the office and down the hall. The front door was open. His cats, Mona and Lisa, liked to sit there and look out the security door – it was like television for them – so sometimes he locked the security door and left the front door open. Sure enough, the cats were there on their haunches, staring up at Ryan, who stood just outside the door. As soon as Elliott saw the boy, he tried to get the scowl off his face.
“I hope I’m not bothering you,” Ryan said.
“Not at all, Ryan.” He shooed the cats away and unlocked the door. Ryan opened it and came inside, pulled it closed behind him. “What can I do for you?”
“I was wondering, um, do you have a tape recorder I could borrow?” Ryan said.
“A tape recorder? Well, I’ve got a few. What kind do you need?”
Ryan shrugged. “What kind do you have?”
“Let’s go take a look.”
Elliott led Ryan down the hall to his office. He sat in his chair at his large L-shaped desk. He opened the bottom drawer and removed two tape recorders. One used standard cassette tapes and wasn’t much larger than one, while the other was a small microcassette recorder.
“Wow,” Ryan said, “this one’s small.” He picked up the microcassette recorder. “Could I borrow this one?”
“Sure. You can use the tape that’s in it. I’ve got more tapes, if you need them.”
“Just the one will be fine,” Ryan said. “I promise I’ll take good care of it.”
“I know you will, Ryan. What are you using it for?”
“Well ... “ Ryan looked down at his feet for a moment. Then he looked at Elliott again and said, “Do you speak French?”
“No, I’m afraid not.”
“How about German?”
“No, not that, either. I have enough trouble with English. But I know people who are bi- and multilingual. Why?”
Ryan chewed on his lower lip a moment. “I’m going to record someone speaking another language with this recorder. If I bring it back to you, do you think you could figure out what that person’s saying?”
“Well, if I couldn’t, I probably know someone I can call who could. Who is this person?”
He chewed on his lower lip again for a moment. “Would you mind if I told you later, when I bring the tape back? It might be easier then.”
Elliott nodded. “Sure. Okay.” He smiled. “I’m intrigued. Does this have something to do with a story you’re working on, by any chance?”
Ryan frowned. “No, it doesn’t. I really wish it did, it would be so much easier then. But, no, it doesn’t. Thank you for the recorder. I’ll bring it back in a day or two.”
“Sure. No rush.”
Elliott followed him out, said goodbye at the door. He frowned as he made his way back to his office. The boy had looked so troubled when he’d answered Elliott’s question. He’d looked almost afraid.
* * * *
“You’ve been busy,” Maddy said in that deep, gravelly voice. She spoke just above a whisper. She sat on the edge of her bed as she had the night before.
It was just past one o’clock in the morning. Ryan had taken the chair from the wall again and this time sat on it backwards. He folded his arms across the top of the chair’s back and rested his chin on his arm.
“What do you mean?” Ryan said.
“You know what I mean. Don’t waste my time by playing dumb.”
“I haven’t been any busier than usual.”
“Don’t bullshit a bullshitter.” She cleared her throat. “Am I talking loudly enough for your recorder to pick me up clearly?”
Ryan silently cursed. He had the microcassette recorder in his shirt pocket. It was recording. How did she know?
“I’m not a show-and-tell item, kid,” she said. “Don’t fuck with me.”
Thumbs pressed hard over Ryan’s throat. He could not breathe. He sat up straight with a jerk, grabbed at his throat with his hands, but there was nothing there. And yet hands squeezed his throat. He stood up, and still clawed at his neck for a few seconds even after he’d started taking gasping breaths. There was no longer any pressure on his throat, nor did he have the sensation that any had been applied recently. Chest heaving, he put the chair back in its place against the wall, then headed for the door.
“Don’t leave, Ryan,” Maddy said in her normal little-girl voice. “Please stay.”
Ryan stopped and turned back. Maddy sat up straight on the bed, head cocked to one side, a sad frown on her forehead.
“Maddy?”
She lifted her head and smiled. The deep voice said, “She really likes you, Ryan.”
Ryan took a step back, reached up and touched his throat. “Are you going to do that again?” he said.
“Just making a point,” the voice said as Maddy relaxed her posture a little. Her shoulders and back slumped slightly.
“Making a threat, you mean.”
“No, I don’t make threats, really,” it said, very politely. “If that’s how you took it, I apologize, it wasn’t a threat, really. I was just making a point.”
He rubbed his throat with his right hand. “I don’t know if I want to talk to you anymore.”
“But I haven’t done any tricks for your recorder yet. Taw druck coe-nawsk agwinn. Glay urrum niece day-knee.”
“What?”
A bit louder and more clearly enunciated: “Taw druck coe-nawsk agwinn. Glay urrum niece day-knee. Idiots.”
Ryan hoped the recorder had gotten all that, because he hadn’t understood a word of it. It didn’t sound like any language he’d heard before.
Maddy looked directly into his eyes again and smirked as she said, “Votre pere etait l’un de trafiquants de la drogue de votre mere. Il l’a baisee dans une ruelle. Vous avez ete concu pres d’une pile des ordures.”
The door opened and Ryan gasped as he spun around. He expected to see Marie standing in the doorway, but it was Lyssa. She frowned at him as she stepped inside and closed the door.
“What the hell are you doing in here?” she said.
Maddy grinned and said in her normal voice, “Hello, Lyssa.”
“Hi, Maddy,” Lyssa said. “How ya doin’, hon?”
“I’m fine.”
“What have you and Ryan been talking about?”
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t know?”
Ryan reached into his pocket and turned off the tape recorder. “C’mon, Lyssa,” he said as he took her elbow. “Let’s go.”
There were questions Ryan wanted to ask Maddy, but the strangling incident had shaken him badly. Somehow, he would be much more comfortable talking with Maddy when there was sunlight pouring in through the three narrow windows high on the wall beside her bed. He took Lyssa’s elbow and led her out of the bedroom.
“I’ll see you later, Maddy,” Lyssa said over her shoulder, but the child said nothing in response.
Ryan pulled the door closed and used his penlight to get them down the dark hall and into the rec room. There, he turned on the long fluorescent light trays overhead. They sat on the couch and he turned on the TV with the volume low, tuned to the Cartoon Network.
“What’s the matter?” Lyssa said. “Something’s wrong.”
“What do you know about Maddy?”
“Nothing, really.”
“Hasn’t Marie said anything about her? Where she came from? What happened to her parents?”
“No, she hasn’t sai
d a word. I’ve only helped her dress Maddy a couple times.”
“What about the others – Candy and Nicole, Gary and Keith. Have they ever said anything about her?”
“The others don’t talk about Maddy.”
“She speaks French. And German. And some other language I don’t even recognize.”
“That’s impossible. She’s only nine. Maybe it only sounded like French and German.”
Ryan took the tape recorder from his pocket, rewound it, played it for a few seconds, then fast forwarded it. He found the spot where Maddy spoke in French and played it for Lyssa. He said, “Does that sound like it just sounds like French to you?”
“I’m telling you, Ryan, there’s something wrong with that girl. And I’m not talking about her handicap. I mean, there’s something ... something ... sinister about her.”
He nodded. “Yes, there is. I’d like to find out what it is.”
They decided to go to bed before Marie went on one of her patrols and found them in the rec room watching television. The rules were that the television went off at ten o’clock, and stayed off for the night. They kissed at the foot of the basement stairs, then went up to their rooms.
Ryan lay in his bed staring into the dark for two hours before sleep finally came.
Maddy scared him.
FIVE
Elliott was eating a bowl of Grape Nuts at his desk and reading the headlines when the doorbell rang. He hoped it was Ryan with the tape recorder – he was very interested in hearing the boy’s story.
Sure enough, Ryan stood at the door. Elliott let him in and led him down the hall to the office. “Have a seat,” Elliott said, waving toward the only chair in the office other than his own. It was stacked with magazines. “Just put those on the floor.”
Ryan removed the magazines and moved the chair closer to Elliott’s desk. He held the microcassette recorder in his right hand.
“Do you mind if I play something for you?” Ryan said.
“Please do.”
Ryan pushed the button and set the recorder on the desk.
A deep male voice said, “Taw druck coe-nawsk agwinn. Glay urrum niece day-knee.”
Something about the deep, whisky-voice made Elliott frown. He wasn’t sure why yet, but he didn’t like the voice. It made him feel ... uncomfortable.
Ryan’s voice said, “What?”
Then, louder and clearer: “Taw druck coe-nawsk agwinn. Glay urrum niece day-knee. Idiots” Shortly after that, the same voice said, “Votre pere etait l’un de trafiquants de la drogue de votre mere. Il l’a baisee dans une ruelle. Vous avez ete concu pres d’une pile des ordures.”
Ryan turned off the recorder with a click. “What did that sound like to you?”
Elliott felt tightness in his neck. The voice had made him tense up. It was an unsettling voice. The word “corrupt” came to Elliott’s mind.
“Well, those last lines were definitely spoken in French,” Elliott said. “Something about your mother and father.”
“What? Really?”
“That’s all I could make out, though. Like I said, I don’t speak French.”
“What about the other?”
“That sounded like Gaelic to me. I don’t know for sure, but I know someone who would.” Elliott took the cordless phone from its base on the desk. As he punched in a number, he said, “I know a writer in Los Angeles named Francis Feighan. He knows Gaelic, and I think he might know some French, too. In fact, Francis knows a little bit of everything.” He put the phone to his ear. Along with the purring sound of the phone at the other end ringing, he heard a crackle of static. He hit the Channel button on the phone a few times, but it didn’t help.
“Who’s this?” Francis said, as he always did when he answered the phone.
“It’s Elliott, Francis.”
They exchanged pleasantries and a little small talk.
“What’s with the connection?” Francis said.
“I don’t know,” Elliott said. “You hear that static, too?”
“Yeah.”
“I’m going to hang up and call you again,” Elliott said. He severed the connection, punched the Redial button, and put the phone to his ear. The static had not gone away.
“It’s still there,” Francis said.
“Oh, well,” Elliott said. “Look, Francis, I want to play something for you.”
Ryan rewound the tape a bit and handed the recorder to Elliott, who put it up to the phone’s mouthpiece. He hit the Play button. First, the Gaelic-sounding lines, then the French.
“Did you hear that, Francis?” Elliott said.
Francis said, “I couldn’t make out the first part, but I heard the French.”
“Can you translate?”
“Yeah.” Francis translated the lines.
Elliott frowned and looked at Ryan.
“Repeat that,” Elliott said. As Francis repeated it, Ryan wrote it down on a Post-It pad.
“Play that first part again,” Francis said. “It was Gaelic, but I couldn’t make it out through this damned static.”
Elliott rewound the tape a bit, then hit Play again. After the lines were spoken twice, he hit Stop.
Francis laughed through the static. “Is this some kind of joke?” he said.
“What do you mean?” Elliott said.
“It’s Gaelic, all right. It’s Gaelic for, ‘We have a bad connection. Call me later.’ And then, ‘Idiots,’ but that was in English. What is this you’re playing for me?”
It was a hot summer morning and Elliott had not turned on the air conditioner yet, but he felt a chill fall over him as if he were sitting in a cold draft. He looked at Ryan again. “I’m not sure. Let me get back to you. Thanks, Francis.” He put the phone back on its base and turned to Ryan. “Okay. What’s the story, Ryan?”
“What does that stuff mean?” Ryan asked.
“First, if you don’t mind, I’d appreciate it if you told me who’s on this tape and why he’s speaking in Gaelic and French.”
“Well ... “ Ryan looked at his lap for a moment, then around at the office. “I’m afraid you won’t believe me.”
“Why wouldn’t I believe you?”
“Because that voice on the tape isn’t a he. It’s a nine-year-old girl.”
Frowning, Elliott picked up the small recorder and rewound for a few seconds, then hit Play again. He listened to the deep, gravelly voice. It got under his skin and made him nervous. There was something ... bad ... about the voice – he could think of no better way to describe it. He put down the recorder, picked up the bowl of cereal, leaned back in his chair and said, “Okay. My mind is open. Let’s hear it.”
Elliott ate his Grape Nuts and listened as Ryan told him about Maddy. He told him about the things Maddy had said to him in that deep voice, the thing she knew about him that no one could possibly know, and about the man who’d beaten his baby to death then blown his brains out.
“You’re serious?” Elliott said when Ryan was finished. “I mean, about that being a little girl on that tape?”
“Well, she’s not so little,” Ryan said, “but yeah.” He rewound the tape all the way and played the whole thing for him.
Elliott heard Maddy’s slightly adenoidal little-girl voice as well as the deep, rich, smoky voice that spoke so knowingly to Ryan.
More than once, Elliott found himself gulping air. He felt a tightness in his chest. He wanted to listen to the tape again, but he had the feeling Ryan wanted to talk. The boy’s eyebrows were huddled above his nose and he kept chewing on his lower lip. He looked anxious, troubled.
Elliott took in a deep breath and let it out slowly. He said, “I don’t suppose there’s any chance Maddy has a police scanner in her bedroom?”
“I didn’t see one,” Ryan said. “Why?”
Elliott shrugged. “Well, it would explain her knowledge of the baby beating and suicide.”
“True. But I didn’t see one, really. Just a radio and lots of Barbie toys.”
�
��There’s a silent patch on the tape, and then you talk about the gir – uh, about the voice making a threat. What happened there?”
Ryan hesitated. “Something ... something closed my throat. It was like there were hands on my throat, and I couldn’t breathe. But there was nothing there. Then it stopped, just as suddenly as it had started.” Ryan sat forward on the front edge of the chair. “Did your friend translate what she said in French, Mr. Granger?”
“Yes, he did.” Elliott looked at the translation of the French lines written on the Post-It pad. Something made him not want to read them to the boy. A dull, distant alarm went off in his mind – he knew the words he’d written down would hurt Ryan. But he could hardly refuse to share them. “Well, the Gaelic translation – it turns out that it is Gaelic – was very strange. We had a bad connection on the phone, there was a lot of static, and I had to replay the Gaelic lines for Francis because he didn’t get them the first time through the static, and it turns out the ... the voice is saying, ‘We have a bad connection. Call me later.’ And then it refers to someone as ‘Idiots.’” Elliott felt another brief chill. “Now I know how strange this sounds, but I’ve got this feeling in my gut that that little jibe, that ‘Idiots’ at the end, there, was meant specifically for Francis and myself. Isn’t that crazy?”
“That’s what I mean, Mr. Granger. That girl, Maddy, she’s got me thinking all kinds of crazy things. She – “ Ryan leaned farther forward and lowered his voice near a whisper, as if he were telling Elliott a secret he wanted no one else to hear. “She knew you were going to have a bad connection.”
“Maybe ... maybe she’s somehow responsible for the connection being bad,” Elliott said, quietly, thinking out loud. His eyes met Ryan’s and he realized the boy thought that wasn’t such a crazy idea.
Ryan sat with his hands on his spread knees, body tilted forward, eyebrows suddenly high. “I wouldn’t be surprised. It says it doesn’t stay there in the basement all the time.”
“Wait a second, wait a second,” Elliot said. He put the empty bowl on his desk, leaned back in his chair, and locked his hands behind his head, elbows out. “What are we saying, here? There’s probably a perfectly good explanation for her behavior. She’s mentally handicapped, right? Maybe she has a personality disorder, maybe a multiple personality disorder. Maybe that’s why she’s kept to herself. We could be reading things into this and getting ourselves all worked up over – “