Night of Reunion: A Novel

by Michael Allegretto

  Three blind mice, she thought, smiling grimly.

  As she walked back into the garage, she checked her watch and realized that this little episode had made her late for her first appointment.

  Even so, before she drove away, she searched the inside of the Wagoneer from front to back. But her search was fruitless; she did not find the heads.

  Lord Doom slashed down with the Sword of Power and struck the Queen of the Hill People across her battle helmet, knocking her to the ground. She lay there, dazed, unmoving. Lord Doom put his steel-clad foot on her back and raised the Sword in a gesture of victory.

  The Hill People dropped their weapons, hung their heads, and wept. Without their Queen they were defenseless against the forces of Lord Doom. Now they would have to submit to him. The Hill Planet would become a planet of slaves.

  At least for a while, Brian knew.

  Before the half hour was up, the Heroes of the Universe would fly in on their starship and save the Hill People and rout the forces of Doom, just as they did every week. And just as he did every week, Lord Doom would manage to escape, thanks to his Sword of Power.

  Brian knew that the Sword was more than just a weapon to knock people down with. Whoever wielded it could control people’s minds. It could make them see things that weren’t there, make them afraid. Sometimes even the Heroes were fooled by the images Lord Doom conjured up with the Sword of Power.

  A commercial for breakfast cereal came on just as Alex walked into the family room.

  “Are you ready to go, Brian?”

  “Where’re we going?”

  “Shopping, remember? We need to start looking for your mother’s Christmas presents.”

  “We do?”

  “Yes.”

  “Oh … Can I watch the end of Heroes of the Universe?”

  “Absolutely,” Alex said. “First things first.”

  He sat on the couch next to Brian and watched commercials. When they ended, the screen was filled with a figure draped in black, a figure with a hideous steel mask for a face.

  “Who’s that evil-looking character?”

  “Lord Doom.”

  “Oh, right. Is he as mean as he looks?”

  “He’s pretty mean, but mostly it’s because he has the Sword of Power. It’d be neat to have something like that, don’t you think?”

  “Something that made you mean?”

  “No, Dad, something that made you real powerful.”

  “Oh, I suppose. Is that something you’re going to ask Santa to bring you?”

  “No. He couldn’t.”

  “Why not?” Alex asked, interested.

  “Because they don’t make them yet. Eddy Teesdale said so.”

  “Oh, well, maybe we could make one.”

  Brian turned to face Alex, the TV show suddenly forgotten.

  “Really?”

  “Yes, I think so. Let’s see, we could—Now I don’t mean a real sword, you know.”

  “I know.”

  “Okay, we could cut it out of cardboard, maybe three or four thicknesses, and tape them together. I’ll tell you what: I’ll get you the cardboard, you draw the Sword of Power on it, and I’ll cut it out for you.”

  “I can cut it out.”

  “You mean with your little scissors? I don’t know, it might be too hard for you.”

  Brian hadn’t been thinking of his blunt-nosed scissors. He’d been thinking of the box cutter, with its rusty, sharp razor blade. He’d snuck it out of the basement last night while Alex and Sarah were carrying out the boxes of ornaments. Then he’d hidden it in a corner of his toy chest

  “I can cut it, Dad.”

  “Your scissors might not be sharp enough.”

  “I think I can do it,” Brian said. “I’m sure I can.”

  10

  ON SATURDAY NIGHT ALEX took Sarah and Brian to dinner at a seafood restaurant in Manitou Springs, west of town.

  Alex ordered Hawaiian spearfish, and Sarah decided on trout. Brian’s salmon steak had come from the children’s menu—guaranteed boneless—but Sarah checked for bones, anyway, before she allowed him to eat.

  While they ate, they talked about their party.

  A month ago they’d both felt that they were settled in enough to show off their new old house, and after some discussion, they’d decided to have a New Year’s Eve party.

  “That’s only three weeks from next Thursday,” Sarah said, reaching for her glass of Chablis, “and we haven’t even sent out the invitations.”

  “Can’t we just call people on the phone?”

  “Alex.”

  “Okay, okay, just kidding. So when are we doing the mailing?”

  “I’d say right away.”

  “Tonight?”

  “You can’t tonight, Dad.”

  They both looked down at Brian.

  “You promised you’d help me make a sword, remember?”

  “A sword?” Sarah looked at Alex and raised her eyebrows.

  “A Sword of Power, Mom.”

  “Oh?” Her eyebrows remained arched.

  “Like Lord Doom’s.”

  “Exactly like it,” Alex said. “Except made out of cardboard.”

  “Oh.” Sarah’s face relaxed in a smile.

  “But only because we’re fresh out of nova-hardened, laser-polished titanium. Right, Brian?”

  “Huh?”

  Sarah laughed. “Okay, so we’ll do the invitations tomorrow. And while we’re at it, we can do our Christmas cards.” Her eyes brightened. “Another first for us,” she said. “We can combine our Christmas-card lists.”

  “Mine isn’t very long,” Alex said. “Just a few friends back in Albany. And Joseph Pomeroy …”

  Alex frowned briefly and looked away. Sarah knew what he was thinking, and she realized that neither of them had mentioned Christine Helstrum since last night. They’d tried to carry on as if she didn’t exist.

  “Maybe they’ve caught her by now,” Sarah said.

  “What?” Alex looked at her, then smiled faintly. “Oh. Right. We can hope.”

  “Caught who?” Brian asked.

  “No one,” Sarah said. “Now how about some ice cream for dessert?”

  After they got home from the restaurant, Alex brought up an empty cardboard box from the basement.

  “Is that my Christmas-ornament box?” Sarah asked.

  “Only temporarily,” Alex said. “Soon it will be a Sword of Power.”

  “You’re going to cut up my ornament box?” Sarah asked with mock horror.

  “Sorry, babe. The good guys need weapons, too, you know. Besides, I forgot to pick up a box when Brian and I were out today.”

  “But shouldn’t you make it out of wood or something?”

  “This is quicker, cleaner, and easier. Besides, for wood I’d need a jigsaw, and even if I had one, I wouldn’t know how to operate it.”

  “Oh. But my ornament box?”

  “I promise I’ll replace it before we take down the ornaments, okay?”

  “Well …”

  “We need this cardboard to defeat Lord Doom. Right, Brian?”

  “Yeah!”

  “Well …”

  Alex kissed her on the forehead. “I knew you’d understand.” Then he said to Brian, “Where shall we do this, in the kitchen or in your room or—”

  “Not in the kitchen,” Sarah put in.

  “I guess we go upstairs, then,” Alex said, and Brian followed him up to his room.

  Brian’s room was cluttered but comfortable, with the bed and dresser to the left, a small desk and bookcase under the windows, and a large wooden toy chest in the corner near the closet. The walls were decorated with posters, Star Wars being the predominant theme.

  Brian knelt beside his father on the floor at the foot of the bed. Alex used a large pair of scissors to cut the flaps from the box, then slit open the box itself until there was a small stack of cardboard sheets. The sheets were in two sizes: one nearly square, the other much longer than wide
. Alex separated out the six longer pieces.

  “This should be enough,” he said. “Do you want me to draw the sword for you?”

  “I can do it.”

  “Okay. When you get it the way you want it, give a holler and I’ll cut it out for you, okay?”

  “I can do that, too.”

  “You’d better let me do it, Brian. I’ll—”

  They both looked up at Sarah standing in the doorway. Brian thought that she looked kind of scared.

  “Frank O’Hara’s on the phone,” she said.

  Without a word Alex followed her out of the room.

  Feeling rejected, Brian knelt there for a moment. Then he shrugged his shoulders, went to the corner of the room, and opened up his toy chest.

  The chest represented an archaeological dig into Brian’s life. The bottom strata consisted of forgotten infant’s playthings covered by a layer of stuffed animals and brightly colored plastic push toys over which was heaped a confused mixture of boxed games, plastic monsters, sporting equipment, and an occasional toy gun. Brian knew that his mother didn’t approve of guns, real or toy, and he remembered that she’d been reluctant to let him have these few, even after he’d pleaded, “Gosh, Mom, all the other kids have them.”

  Brian rummaged in his toy chest. Then he found what he was looking for: a small shoe box wrapped with a thick rubber band to hold the lid in place. He sat cross-legged on the floor and opened the box. It was filled with well-worn crayons, pencils, and nontoxic multicolored felt-tip pens.

  Brian picked out a black pen, then knelt beside a long piece of cardboard and drew the outline of a sword. When he was finished, he sat back on his heels and frowned.

  His drawing did not look anything like his mental image of Lord Doom’s Sword of Power. For one thing, it was too short—he’d used only half the length of the piece of cardboard. And the handle was all wrong.

  Brian set aside the drawing and tried again, using a fresh piece of cardboard.

  The second drawing left him only slightly more satisfied. The sword was certainly long enough, but it still didn’t look right to him.

  “The blade’s different,” he said out loud.

  He tried again. And again. After six drawings he still didn’t have it right.

  He looked back through all his drawings, thinking that maybe he’d missed something, that maybe one of them looked okay. But none of them did. He pushed them away in disgust, and one of the cardboard rectangles flipped over, revealing a clean brown surface.

  Brian smiled.

  Six more tries, he thought.

  But when he turned over the other five sheets of cardboard, his smile faded. Only one sheet was any good. Two were filled with large red letters and printed pictures of soup cans, and two more were ruined by crusty patches of old glue.

  Brian pulled the two “good” pieces toward him and picked up his black pen. He carefully drew the outline of a sword. But even before he’d finished, he knew it wasn’t right. He pulled the last sheet of cardboard toward him.

  One more try, he thought grimly.

  He held the pen above the clean surface, closed his eyes, and tried to picture Lord Doom with his Sword of Power raised high. He concentrated on the sword, on the way the edges of the blade tapered to a point. That’s what he hadn’t been able to get right—that long, smooth curve of the blade.

  Suddenly, Brian opened his eyes. His smile returned. He’d seen that curve before, right here in his own house.

  “I can trace it,” he said aloud.

  He went out into the hallway, passing his father’s den, where Alex was still talking on the phone. Brian went downstairs to the kitchen. He stopped short in the doorway. His mother was standing by the telephone, the receiver to her ear, a worried look on her face. Brian’s eyes shifted toward a certain drawer under the kitchen counter, then moved back to his mother.

  I’ll have to come back later, he thought, when no one’s around.

  Sarah followed Alex from Brian’s room. He stepped into his den and picked up the phone at his desk, and Sarah went downstairs to the kitchen. When she lifted the receiver, Frank O’Hara was speaking.

  “… wife said you both wanted to be on the line.”

  “I’m here,” Sarah said.

  “Oh, okay. I’m not sure how much of this you two would like to hear. A lot of—”

  “Have they caught Christine or haven’t they?” Alex asked, his voice abrupt.

  “No, I’m afraid not.”

  Sarah felt her chest tighten.

  “That is, not yet. But I’m sure it won’t be long before they do.”

  “That’s what you told me yesterday,” Sarah said, trying to keep her voice calm.

  “I know, but—”

  “So what exactly are the police doing?” Alex asked angrily.

  Sarah heard O’Hara sigh.

  “Look, Mr. Whitaker, I’m not in charge of things, okay? I’m not even a cop anymore. The only reason I looked into this and called you was as a favor to your wife. She sounded genuinely concerned on the phone yesterday.”

  No one spoke for a moment.

  “Okay,” Alex said, somewhat mollified. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to blame you for anything. I just want to know what’s being done.”

  “First of all,” O’Hara said matter-of-factly, “there’s a state-wide search for her. And on the off chance that she’s made it out of the area, her description has been sent to every state police agency in the country, including Colorado’s. The minute she shows her face, they’ll get her. But I’ll tell you something else: I doubt that she’s even alive.”

  “What?”

  “And I’m not the only one, either,” O’Hara said. “You see, on the night that she escaped, it was—”

  “That’s something no one’s explained to me yet,” Alex said bitterly. “Just how could they let her get out?”

  “Apparently she picked a lock that allowed her access to a maintenance tunnel, crawled through it for a few hundred yards to a building outside the main compound, then climbed a ten-foot-high fence and walked into the woods.”

  Sarah was gripping the phone tightly enough to make her fingers ache.

  “As I was saying,” O’Hara continued, “on the night she escaped, it was barely twenty degrees outside and snowing heavily. In fact, it snowed for several days after that. Now you have to realize that she escaped wearing nothing more than a hospital gown and slippers. She might have brought a blanket with her, but that was her only protection against the cold. Also, the Wycroff state hospital is surrounded by miles of heavy woods. A sane person could get lost out there.”

  “She might be insane,” Alex said, “but she’s not stupid.”

  “No,” O’Hara said, “she’s not. And I grant you there’s a chance she survived the woods. However, I strongly doubt it. But even if she did, I wouldn’t worry about it if I were you.”

  “Not worry? That’s easy for you to say.”

  “Yes, Mr. Whitaker, it is easy for me to say. I was a cop for thirty years and sent quite a few people to prison, and a lot of them threatened to get me when they got out. Well, here I am without a scratch on me. You know how many of them even tried to get even with me? Not one. That’s because your average criminal has a short attention span and—”

  “Christine Helstrum is not an average criminal,” Alex said grimly.

  Sarah heard O’Hara sigh again.

  “The best thing is for you two not to let yourselves get upset. Just carry on with your lives. It’s been nine days since Christine escaped, and there’s been no sign of her. The odds are she’s dead.”

  “The odds,” Alex said sarcastically.

  “It’s likely,” O’Hara said. “Eventually, maybe not until spring, but eventually, someone will find her body out there in the woods. I’m not just saying that to put your minds at ease. I’m saying it because I think it’s true.”

  No one spoke.

  “If I hear of anything more,” O’Hara said finally
, “I’ll give you a call.”

  “Thank you for your help, Mr. O’Hara,” Sarah said. “We appreciate it.”

  “It’s no problem. Just try not to worry.”

  Sarah set the receiver in its cradle and stared at it. She wanted to believe O’Hara. She wanted to believe that Christine was dead. But she kept thinking about how she’d escaped from the hospital. She’d used cunning and endurance and strength. Sarah wondered if a woman like that would allow herself to die in a snowstorm.

  Brian was tucked into bed that night with no further mention of making his Sword of Power. He wondered if his dad had changed his mind about helping him. Or if the phone call had made him forget.

  It doesn’t matter, Brian thought, smiling to himself, his eyes closed in the dark. Now I know how to make it myself.

  Later that night Brian dreamed that he and Eddy Teesdale were in the school playground, climbing an impossibly high jungle gym, trying to get away from a scary-looking woman with a huge knife. She held it between her teeth, as if she were a pirate, and climbed up after them. Soon Brian and Eddy reached the top of the jungle gym. There was nowhere to go. The ground was far below them, too far to jump. They could do nothing but sit and wait and watch the woman climb toward them. …

  Brian sat up in bed, his heart pounding.

  The room was dark except for the Mickey Mouse nightlight that glowed faintly above the light switch by the door. The dream was quickly fading—only a few traces remained: the jungle gym, the woman, the knife.

  The knife, he thought.

  He climbed out of bed.

  The room felt cold, so he put on his blue terry-cloth bathrobe over his pajamas and tugged his slippers onto his bare feet. Then he tiptoed down the hall. When he reached the doorway of his parents’ bedroom, he peeked around the corner. They were silent and still beneath the covers. Brian walked softly past the door and down the stairs.

  It was dark. The once-familiar articles of furniture were now black, vague, misshapen things. The doorways were shadowy openings, like the entrances to forbidden caves.

  Brian found his way to the kitchen and switched on the light, then squinted from the brightness. He took a few steps across the tile floor, then turned and looked behind him. The short hall beyond the kitchen doorway was dark—seemingly darker than when he’d walked through it a few moments ago. He felt exposed under the overbright kitchen light, as if someone were out there in the darkness, watching him.