The Grave - An Oxrun Station Novel (Oxrun Station Novels)

by Charles L. Grant

  A scream for a whistle, and he spun around to stare, his eyes narrowing for clarity, widening in fear: the engine was a locomotive, coal-bearing, not diesel. The cowcatcher was painted bright red, the bulging sides of the engine sleek, black, and spouting brilliant white steam. Pistons churning, the rails talking back, the light like a comet whose tail was in darkness. A locomotive, not a diesel. And the Buick so old.

  He swallowed, wondered if it were really the engineer he saw leaning out of the cab and staring in horror at the car stalled on the tracks. Wondered if he really heard the sudden shrieking protest of the brakes as they were applied, steam and smoke reaching to the stars, to the trees, to the roadbed . . . to the car. Wondered how it would feel when the locomotive stopped barely an inch from the door and saved him the embarrassment of explaining why he was there.

  Then he stopped wondering.

  And the locomotive didn't stop.

  Chapter 21

  He knew he must have dreamt something, down in the dark, but none of the images (if images there were) returned to him when he bid them, nor did any of the sensations of fear or relief or terror or death. He knew he wasn't dead. He also knew he could not prove it. For all his rationalizations he might very well be in some actual limbo where souls waited for judgment, assuming judgment was to be had and there was someplace else to go. But he didn't believe it. He couldn't believe it. Not when there was all this pain—spirals and lances of it, tides of it, throbs of it. Not when he could feel without moving each portion of his body on some bed and reclining.

  Not when he could still see the locomotive bearing down on him.

  Alive, then. Somehow he had managed to escape the collision with at least his brain intact, and somehow somebody had found him and dragged him out of the wreck . . . he tried to move, to shift, to see if he still had both of his arms. He thought he did. He wasn't sure, but he thought so. And suddenly he did not feel quite as safe as he had. Suppose he wasn't in the hospital on King Street. Suppose whoever . . . whatever . . . he shook his head violently though he didn't feel it move . . . suppose whoever had found him was the same who had taken the tourist and the women. Suppose he was entrapped in someone else's nightmare.

  Alive; but there was no way to tell how long that would last.

  The spirals, the lances, the throbbing increased. He heard himself groaning as though standing at the lip of an immense and deep well. There might have been an added pain then, though he could not be sure, and the throbs and the lances and the spirals receded. He was alone. He was drifting. And he was glad he was alive.

  The jungle had changed. Where there had been trees so high they obliterated the sky, now there were monoliths of black iron and white steel; where there had been colonies of wasps that thrummed through the air, now there were robins whose necks were all broken and flew nevertheless with wings tipped with blood; where there had been grass and shrubs and cooling deep shade, now there was sand and spikegrass and no shade at all. He was astonished he was not afraid, eventually chalked it up to a fascination with the strange that had dogged him all his life. The problem was, he could not remember living that life at all. As hard as he strained and as much as he delved, he could recall nothing of what had happened before the jungle had changed. There were only the black iron and the white steel, and after a century or so a series of ventings that blew steam at the robins, fogging them, drenching them, weighting them until they dropped to the ground and were speared by the spikegrass while he watched in fascination. Always in fascination. Always without thinking. He watched only, and observed, and could not help but wonder at how the jungle had changed. With only the black iron and the white steel until all the birds were dead and the steam had become fog and there were women in the fog who strolled briskly past him, eyes straight ahead, arms rigid at their sides, soft smiles on their faces that had been softened with age. He made no attempt to speak to them. He did try, once, to reach out and touch one, but a sudden shriek of metal crawling against metal stayed the hand in midair, and all he could do safely was watch the odd parade and wonder with a bemused smile at how the jungle had changed. But at least, he thought, all the wasps were gone.

  The locomotive stopped a handsbreadth from the Buick. The engineer clambered down from the cab and ran over to the hood, slamming a huge fist onto the maroon metal and shaking his head in shocked disbelief. Josh yelled at him, demanding the oil-stained man find a way to let him out. There was a spell, he screamed without making a sound, a spell on the Buick and he could not get out. But the engineer evidently couldn't hear him, couldn't see him; he only pounded on the hood until his hand turned red. Then he stopped and mopped his face with a huge red handkerchief, pulled at his soiled cap, and walked around the car as though, in his whole life, he had never seen such a thing in front of his train before. He touched at it and stroked it and whistled his admiration. Shrugged and beckoned to his companions in the cab. There were four of them, and they hunkered down in front of the Buick and pushed it back off the tracks. Josh refused to stop shouting, leaping around the inside of the car like an ape demented by torment, like a man attempting to escape a glass prison. But none of them heard him; or if they did, they ignored him. All they wanted to do was remove the obstruction and carry on to Hartford where the next crew would take over so the train could go to Boston. Josh sagged, and shrugged, and once the car was off the rails and the locomotive gone by—with no coaches behind it—he reached out and touched the ignition key. Turned it. The engine started. He laughed, rocked, threw the car into gear, and headed out to Andrea's. Or tried to, at least, until the tracks stopped him and the locomotive reappeared and the engineer screamed and the engine didn't stop.

  Though he could see no texture, he could have sworn he was looking at a solid black curtain. It felt right, the curtain; there was no sensation of depth to the blackness he saw. And he grinned in vindication when he realized a glow had begun on the other side. Faint. Somewhat distant. A glow unmistakable. Increasing slowly, and he was in no hurry to goad it. He thought—quite naturally, he thought—of the light on the locomotive, and he did not want a repeat of the incident that had landed him . . . wherever.

  Eventually he could see folds in the black, folds like thick draperies. And the black itself began to fade into a deep velvet green, a deep velvet green that rippled as though a giant were breathing somewhere to one side.

  He was fascinated. He watched it. He saw the glow diffuse and he knew it wasn't the train; he saw the green begin to separate and he knew it wasn't a drapery or a curtain or a wall; he saw the green vanish, saw a series of pale green squares each pocked with holes that were shadows in themselves.

  He blinked, and heard someone in the room gasp.

  The spirals and the lances were gone now, no traces, but the throbbing remained and he tightened his jaw against it. Shadows in white drifted in and out of his vision, limbs were moved gently, the snug sheet across his chest drawn back and something done to something below his waist. He tried to speak, but his throat was too dry. A hand cupped his chin, and he felt moisture at his lips. When he tried to swallow too quickly a gag reflex took over and the hand snapped away. Waited. Returned. He smile his gratitude, and the hand tapped his neck.

  He drank until the water was taken reluctantly away. Smiled again. Saw a face he didn't recognize break out of the blur and stare down at him, thoughtful and solemn, while hands did other things to other places around him. He licked at his lips. The face nodded expectantly. He let his head roll slowly on the pillow, and saw through the dim haze a dimmer room and bright light. Someone was with him, but whoever it was did not approach whatever bed he was on. He wanted to ask where he was, what was wrong, but he recalled—dimly, fearfully—what his choices were, and he was afraid.

  A voice; it was the face: "Mr. Miller, can you hear me?"

  He nodded, though he kept his expression wary.

  The face looked away, grew onto narrow shoulders encased in white. A person. Josh sighed.

  The
doctor looked back. "Mr. Miller." He spoke softly, but not quietly. A normal tone for conversation with a man who should have been dead. "Mr. Miller, how clear is your thinking?" The doctor grinned suddenly, laid a mocking slap to his own cheek. "Stupid question. I apologize. Is the pain bad? It has been, you know, but I don't want to give you any more medication of that strength if I can help it. Can you talk, Mr. Miller? Can you tell me how you feel?"

  Josh licked his lips again. He felt himself drifting, but it was suddenly important that contact be established. "Yes," he said, and felt utterly exhausted.

  "Yes what?"

  "Yes. There's pain. I can't tell you where. Hard to feel. I'm not dead."

  The doctor grinned again. "A long way from it, Mr. Miller. You weren't even close." He sat on the edge of the mattress and laid a hand on Josh's arm. Lightly. Very lightly. "No casts, as you may be able to tell. You're very lucky. You only broke a few ribs, which is why you may feel a certain constriction around your chest. Bruised worse than a rugby player everywhere else."

  With the injuries vocalized he began to feel the throbbing return to his system. His smile was strained.

  "I know," the doctor told him. "But I expect you'd rather know it all before you fall asleep again. It'll help with the nightmares."

  Maybe, he thought; then again, maybe not.

  "You were also cut up pretty badly. A fair number of stitches on your face, legs, and arms. Not a record, by any means, but for a while you're going to look like Frankenstein, I guess."

  He licked at his lips. "The monster."

  The doctor looked puzzled.

  "The monster," Josh said. "Frankenstein was the scientist. It was the monster who was stitched up."

  A voice muttered something beyond his hearing, and the doctor turned around. "Yes, you're right. He does seem better. If, that is, this is what you call normal." The second voice again. The doctor clapped once and stood carefully, adjusting the replaced sheet as though filling time to the next stage. Then he fingered the pens jammed into his breast pocket. "There are a number of people who have been trying to get to see you, Mr. Miller. We've kept them out, because of your condition." Pensive again. "Perhaps tomorrow. Right now, though, you're going to sleep."

  Josh shook his head. He didn't want to sleep now. He wanted to know what miracle had saved him.

  Instead: "How . . . long?"

  The man seemed surprised. "Oh, a few more days. All the pictures are clear, no internal injuries or concussions. Your system just had a nasty shock, Mr. Miller, and we want to be sure you don't jar loose those stitches. You were quite active while you were out. You must do a lot of jogging."

  Josh had an immediate image of himself trying to run while he was flat on his back. He laughed, heard himself croaking, and laughed even harder. There were tears in his eyes. He choked, and water was given to him again. As he lifted his head to take it he noticed the IV stand, and the clear tubes, and the bandages. He grimaced, and the doctor misunderstood.

  "They do tend to pull when they're healing, don't they. Don't worry, though. As long as you promise not to get back into your sweat suit for a couple of weeks there should be no problem." He patted Josh's shoulder. "You take it easy, now, all right? I'll be back before I leave, just to see how you're resting." His smile became less professional, almost envious. "You have a lot of friends, Mr. Miller. Every one of them has been demanding I take care of you and forget the rest of my patients. You're very lucky. I'd be proud just to have one of them."

  Josh could think of nothing to say, nor could he imagine who had been so insistent. He was a loner. He . . . He swallowed and lifted a hand weakly. "The Buick."

  The second voice again, and this time the doctor shook his head in gentle exasperation. Shrugged, and stepped to one side. Josh waited, holding his breath, closed his eyes slowly when Felicity grinned into view. Pale, her face lined, an umbrella in one hand.

  "Miller?"

  "Hey."

  "Fool."

  He shrugged as best he could. "The Buick?"

  "I told you he was all right," she said to the doctor. She turned back. "King's already working on it. He says he'll have it good as new by the time you hit the streets again."

  "Impossible."

  Felicity frowned. "What are you talking about? He's good! You keep telling me he's the only one around here who understands that car as well as you. It was the first place I thought of to take it, for god's sake."

  "Miss Lancaster." The doctor touched her arm.

  "A minute," Josh said. Looked to Felicity, bewildered. "It . . . the damage . . ."

  "The grille, the hood, the fenders. A few lousy scratches."

  "All right, Miss Lancaster," the doctor said, taking hold now. "You can see him tomorrow. Mr. Miller, please get some sleep."

  "Fel," Josh said as they reached the door, "the train—"

  "Huh?" She frowned at the doctor, at him, at the bed. "What train, Miller? You plowed into a tree."

  He slept without wanting to. Woke again when it was dark and suffered the humiliation of having his bedpan changed. Was bathed with a sponge and warm water. Slept again. It was light. Dozed off and on, aware that at one point during the day there were people in the room waiting to talk to him. But he could not find the energy, could not find the will. He could do nothing but see the astonishment and concern on Felicity's face, could hear nothing but her saying something impossible about a tree. He may have been banged all to hell, but he knew what he saw—there had been a locomotive, and it had struck the Buick broadside, and there was no possible way the grille and the fender and the hood could have been the only things damaged by the collision he'd suffered. No way at all.

  So he decided there was something seriously wrong. Something so terrible that whoever was in authority, with the complicity of his friends, had decided not to tell him about it. His first thought had been that they'd lied about his limbs, and he spent hours making sure that arms and legs were still there; then he considered the possibility of brain damage, something done to his reasoning processes that would drive him out of business forever, perhaps even into a home where he would be "taken care of," like a child. But once he had swept through the multiplication tables, to ninety-times-ninety, he dismissed that avenue, too. During the second or third evening after his awakening, he sat up groaning, wondering if someone had been killed through his negligence. That, too, would be hidden until he was emotionally stable enough to handle the guilt. And that, too, was discarded because there had been no one else but him, and the Buick, and the train.

  On the fourth day he was sitting up with his lunch when Felicity walked in, kissing his forehead lightly before saying a word. He grinned, felt himself blushing, and finished the meal while he told her how Dr. Anderson had been slowly but surely prying loose the stitches. Seeing them scattered over his lower body had been only mildly disconcerting; what had bothered him the most, though he would not admit it, were those laced over his cheeks. There would be scars, he was told, because the depth of the glass' penetration; scars, however, that could easily be taken care of with cosmetic operations once all the flesh had healed and had grown as sturdy as the rest of him. He remembered, or thought he remembered, talking to the man about Frankenstein. He couldn't recall the context, but the name was enough. Dark lines, angry pink and healing skin—enough, he thought, to scare off the bogeyman.

  "It'll give you character," Fel told him then, pulling up a ladder-back chair and sitting close to his hip. "I take it you're feeling better?"

  "Still stiff," he said. "But they have me walking around so I don't get rigid." He pushed the tray away and folded his hands at his waist. "Fel, about the accident—"

  "I know," she interrupted quickly, with a cautious glance toward the closed door. Then she touched nervously at her hair, at the collar of her flower-print blouse. Looked at him with a slight cast of suspicion. "How are you?" she asked, and held up a hand. "I mean, you look okay, but how's your head? Can you think straight?"

&nbs
p; "I guess so." He did not push her. The barely perceptible narrowing of her eyes, the attitude of her seating kept him from exploding with the questions his mind demanded.

  "I hope so," she told him flatly. "You know, you raved a hell of a lot while you were damned near in coma all that time. I was here. I . . . I heard all about the train and what you thought was happening."

  "I didn't think the accident, Fel."

  "I can see that," she said, no humor in her tone. "I can see that, Miller. That cop, Tanner, he says you fell asleep while you were driving and ended up in the tree. That's what it says on the report. I told him you weren't all that tired when I saw you last, but he . . . it doesn't matter. He's got his report, and he's happy."

  Josh plucked at the sheeting. "You're not?"

  "Andrea's been here a couple of times, too."

  He didn't remember, but his smile told her he was glad she'd let him know. Somehow, even long after the fact, it was a comfort. "Did, uh, she hear me babbling?"

  "Sure. We all did. We had a long talk a couple of days ago—her father's still pretty bad. I understand—and . . ." A pause for reluctant admiration. "She thinks a lot of you, Miller, god knows why. But she doesn't understand where you got the idea about that train."

  He eased himself back onto his pillow, the bed cranked almost ninety degrees up. He did not want to say anything now because the tone of her voice told him more than her words—that Andrea may not understand, but she certainly had a damned good idea. And if that were true, it was more than he knew right now. Bad enough he had lost two weeks in this place, most of it slipping in and out of consciousness and nightmares; the whole world could have gone up in smoke and he never would have known about it.

  Finally, when he could no longer allow the silence to continue, he nodded to her. "Okay. Okay, Fel, tell me what you think."