Visions of Fear - Foundations of Fear III (1992)

by David G. Hartwell (Ed. )

  moment. How could this be happening? Just as he was

  set to get away! The slope ahead was long and gradual,

  with many curves. He knew he couldn’t stop. Could he

  Duel

  223

  U-tum unexpectedly and go back down? the sudden

  thought occurred. He looked ahead. The highway was

  too narrow, bound by hills on both sides. There wasn’t

  room enough to make an uninterrupted turn and there

  wasn’t time enough to ease around. If he tried that,

  Keller would shift direction and hit him head-on. “Oh,

  my God!” Mann murmured suddenly.

  He was going to die.

  He stared ahead with stricken eyes, his view increasingly obscured by steam. Abruptly, he recalled the afternoon he’d had the engine steam-cleaned at the local

  car wash. The man who’d done it had suggested he

  replace the water hoses, because steam-cleaning had a

  tendency to make them crack. He’d nodded,, thinking

  that he’d do it when he had more time. More time! The

  phrase was like a dagger in his mind. He’d failed to

  change the hoses and, for that failure, he was now about

  to die.

  He sobbed in terror as the dashboard light flashed on.

  He glanced at it involuntarily and read the word h o t ,

  black on red. With a breathless gasp, he jerked the

  transmission into low. Why hadn’t he done that right

  away! He looked ahead. The slope seemed endless.

  Already, he could hear a boiling throb inside the radiator. How much coolant was there left? Steam was clouding faster, hazing up the windshield. Reaching out,

  he twisted at a dashboard knob. The wipers started

  flicking back and forth in fan-shaped sweeps. There had

  to be enough coolant in the radiator to get him to the top.

  Then what? cried his mind. He couldn’t drive without

  coolant, even downhill. He glanced at the rearview

  mirror. The truck was falling behind. Mann snarled with

  maddened fury. I f it weren’t for that goddamned hose,

  he’d be escaping now!

  The sudden lurching of the car snatched him back to

  terror. If he braked now, he could jump out, run and

  scrabble up that slope. Later, he might not have the time.

  He couldn’t make himself stop the car, though. As long

  224

  Richard M atheson

  as it kept on running, he felt bound to it, less vulnerable.

  God knows what would happen if he left it.

  Mann started up the slope with haunted eyes, trying

  not to see the red light on the edges of his vision. Yard by

  yard, his car was slowing down. Make it, make it,

  pleaded his mind, even though he thought that it was

  futile. The car was running more and more unevenly.

  The thumping percolation of its radiator filled his ears.

  Any moment now, the motor would be choked off and

  the car would shudder to a stop, leaving him a sitting

  target. No, he thought. He tried to blank his mind.

  He was almost to the top, but in the mirror he could

  see the truck drawing up on him. He jammed down on

  the pedal and the motor made a grinding noise. He

  groaned. It had to make the top! Please, God, help me!

  screamed his mind. The ridge was just ahead. Closer.

  Closer. Make it. “Make it.” The car was shuddering and

  clanking, slowing down— oil, smoke and steam gushing

  from beneath the hood. The windshield wipers swept

  from side to side. Mann’s head throbbed. Both his hands

  felt numb. His heartbeat pounded as he stared ahead.

  Make it, please, God, make it. Make it. Make it!

  Over! Mann’s lips opened in a cry of triumph as the car

  began descending. Hand shaking uncontrollably, he

  shoved the transmission into neutral and let the car go

  into a glide. The triumph strangled in his throat as he

  saw that there was nothing in sight but hills and more

  hills. Never mind! He was on a downgrade now, a long

  one. He passed a sign that read, t r u c k s u se lo w g ea rs

  n e x t 12 m il e s . Twelve miles! Something would come up.

  It had to.

  The car began to pick up speed. Mann glanced at the

  speedometer. Forty-seven miles an hour. The red light

  still burned. He’d save the motor for a long time, too,

  though; let it cool for twelve miles, if the truck was far

  enough behind.

  His speed increased. Fifty . . . 5 1 . Mann watched the

  needle turning slowly toward the right. He glanced at the

  Duel

  225

  rearview mirror. The truck had not appeared yet. With a

  little luck, he might still get a good lead. Not as good as

  he might have if the motor hadn’t overheated but enough

  to work with. There had to be some place along the way

  to stop. The needle edged past 55 and started toward the

  60 mark.

 

  Again, he looked at the rearview mirror, jolting as he

  saw that the truck had topped the ridge and was on its

  way down. He felt his lips begin to shake and crimped

  them together. His gaze jumped fitfully between the

  steam-obscured highway and the mirror. The truck was

  accelerating rapidly. Keller doubtless had the gas pedal

  floored. It wouldn’t be long before the truck caught up to

  him. Mann’s right hand twitched unconsciously toward

  the gearshift. Noticing, he jerked it back, grimacing,

  glanced at the speedometer. The car’s velocity had just

  passed 60. Not enough! He had to use the motor now! He

  reached out desperately.

  His right hand froze in midair as the motor stalled;

  then, shooting out the hand, he twisted the ignition key.

  The motor made a grinding noise but wouldn’t start.

  Mann glanced up, saw that he was almost on the

  shoulder, jerked the steering wheel around. Again, he

  turned the key, but there was no response. He looked up

  at the rearview mirror. The truck was gaining on him

  swiftly. He glanced at the speedometer. The car’s speed

  was fixed at 62. Mann felt himself crushed in a vise of

  panic. He stared ahead with haunted eyes.

  Then he saw it, several hundred yards ahead: an escape

  route for trucks with bumed-out brakes. There was no

  alternative now. Either he took the turnout or his car

  would be rammed from behind. The truck was frighteningly close. He heard the high-pitched wailing of its motor. Unconsciously, he started easing to the right,

  then jerked the wheel back suddenly. He mustn’t give the

  move away! He had to wait until the last possible

  moment. Otherwise, Keller would follow him in.

  Just before he reached the escape route, Mann

  226

  Richard M atheson

  wrenched the steering wheel around. The car rear started

  breaking to the left, tires shrieking on the pavement.

  Mann steered with the skid, braking just enough to keep

  from losing all control. The rear tires grabbed and, at 60

  miles an hour, the car shot up the dirt trail, tires slinging

  up a cloud of dust. Mann began to hit the brakes. The

  rear wheels sideslipped and the car slammed hard

  against the dirt bank to the right. Mann ga
sped as the car

  bounced off and started to fishtail with violent whipping

  motions, angling toward the trail edge. He drove his foot

  down on the brake pedal with all his might. The car rear

  skidded to the right and slammed against the bank again.

  Mann heard a grinding rend of metal and felt himself

  heaved downward suddenly, his neck snapped, as the car

  plowed to a violent halt.

  As in a dream, Mann turned to see the truck and

  trailer swerving off the highway. Paralyzed, he watched

  the massive vehicle hurtle toward him, staring at it with

  a blank detachment, knowing he was going to die but so

  stupefied by the sight of the looming truck that he

  couldn’t react. The gargantuan shape roared closer,

  blotting out the sky. Mann felt a strange sensation in his

  throat, unaware that he was screaming.

  Suddenly, the truck began to tilt. Mann stared at it in

  choked-off silence as it started tipping over like some

  ponderous beast toppling in slow motion. Before it

  reached his car, it vanished from his rear window.

  Hands palsied, Mann undid the safety belt and opened

  the door. Struggling from the car, he stumbled to the trail

  edge, staring downward. He was just in time to see the

  truck capsize like a foundering ship. The tanker followed, huge wheels spinning as it overturned.

  The storage tank on the truck exploded first, the

  violence of its detonation causing Mann to stagger back

  and sit down clumsily on the dirt. A second explosion

  roared below, its shock wave buffeting across him hotly,

  making his ears hurt. His glazed eyes saw a fiery column

  shoot up toward the sky in front of him, then another.

  Duel

  227

  Mann crawled slowly to the trail edge and peered

  down at the canyon. Enormous gouts of flame were

  towering upward, topped by thick, black, oily smoke. He

  couldn’t see the truck or trailer, only flames. He gaped at

  them in shock, all feeling drained from him.

  Then, unexpectedly, emotion came. Not dread, at

  first, and not regret; not the nausea that followed soon. It

  was a primeval tumult in his mind: the cry of some

  ancestral beast above the body of its vanquished foe.

  Edgar Pangbom (1909-1976)

  Longtooth

  Edgar Pangbom was one o f th e most adm ired fantasy and

  science fiction w riters of the 1950s-70s. H e w rote tw o

  classic novels o f the genre, A Mirror for Observers, winner

  o f the International Fantasy Award (1 9 5 4 ) and Davy

  (1 9 5 4 ), and a num ber of highly regarded short stories,

  many o f them set in the sam e future world as the latter

  novel. H e also w rote historical fiction. His w ork is notable

  fo r its precise and polished prose style and for his ability to

  round characters, in a field w here either talent is comparatively rare. His few horror stories w ere mostly cast in the science fiction m ode, with the exception o f “ Longtooth,”

  his m asterpiece. A monster story set in the M aine woods, it

  is an unusual piece of pastoral horror in the tradition of

  Algernon Blackwood, with perhaps an adm ixture o f Theodore Sturgeon, a w riter who adm ired Pangbom and to whom Pangborn was often com pared. The m ixture of

  horror of, and compassion for, the m onster together with

  the suggestion o f a scientific rationale places “ Longtooth"

  firm ly in the tw entieth century horror tradition.

  My word is good. How can I prove it? Bom in

  Darkfield, wasn’t I? Stayed away thirty more years

  after college, but when I returned I was still Ben Dane,

  one of the Darkfield Danes, Judge Marcus Dane’s eldest.

  Longtooth

  229

  And they knew my word was good. My wife died and I

  sickened of all cities; then my bachelor brother Sam

  died, too, who’d lived all his life here in Darkfield,

  running his one-man law office over in Lohman—our

  nearest metropolis, pop. 6437. A fast coronary at fifty; I

  had loved him. Helen gone, then Sam— I wound up my

  unimportances and came home, inheriting Sam’s housekeeper Adelaide Simmons, her grim stability and celestial cooking. Nostalgia for Maine is a serious matter, late in life: I had to yield. I expected a gradual drift into my

  childless old age playing correspondence chess, translating a few of the classics. I thought I could take for granted the continued respect of my neighbors. I say my

  word is good.

  I will remember again that middle of March a few

  years ago, the snow skimming out of an afternoon sky as

  dirty as the bottom of an old aluminum pot. Harp

  Ryder’s back road had been plowed since the last snowfall; I supposed Bolt-Bucket could make the mile and a half in to his farm and out again before we got caught.

  Harp had asked me to get him a book if I was making a

  trip to Boston, any goddamn book that told about

  Eskimos, and I had one for him, De Poncins’s Kabloona.

  I saw the midget devils of white running crazy down a

  huge slope of wind, and recalled hearing at the Darkfield

  News Bureau, otherwise Cleve’s General Store, somebody mentioning a forecast of the worst blizzard in forty years. Joe Cleve, who won’t permit a radio in the store

  because it pesters his ulcers, inquired of his Grand

  Inquisitor who dwells ten yards behind your right shoulder: “Why’s it always got to be the worst in so-and-so many years, that going to help anybody?” The bureau

  was still analyzing this difficult inquiry when I left, with

  my cigarettes and as much as I could remember of

  Adelaide’s grocery list after leaving it on the dining table.

  It wasn’t yet three when I turned in on Harp’s back road,

  and a gust slammed at Bolt-Bucket like death with a

  shovel.

  230

  Edgar Pangbom

  I tried to win momentum for the rise to the high

  ground, swerved to avoid an idiot rabbit and hit instead

  a patch of snow-hidden melt-and-freeze, skidding to a

  full stop from which nothing would extract me but a tow.

  I was fifty-seven that year, my wind bad from too

  much smoking and my heart (I now know) no stronger

  than Sam’s. I quit cursing—gradually, to avoid sudden

  actions— and tucked Kabloona under my parka. I would

  walk the remaining mile to Ryder’s, stay just to leave the

  book, say hello, and phone for a tow; then, since Harp

  never owned a car and never would, I could walk back

  and meet the truck.

  If Leda Ryder knew how to drive, it didn’t matter

  much after she married Harp. They farmed it, back in

  there, in almost the manner of Harp’s ancestors of

  Jefferson’s time. Harp did keep his two hundred laying

  hens by methods that were considered modem before

  the poor wretches got condemned to batteries, but his

  other enterprises came closer to antiquity. In his big

  kitchen garden he let one small patch of weeds fool

  themselves for an inch or two, so he’d have it to work at;

  they survived nowhere else. A few cows, a team, four

  acres for market crops, and a small dog Droopy, whose

  grandmother had made it somehow with a dachshund.

  Droopy’s o
nly menace in obese old age was a wheezing

  bark. The Ryders must have grown nearly all vital

  necessities except chewing tobacco and once in a while a

  new dress for Leda. Harp could snub the twentieth

  century, and I doubt if Leda was consulted about it in

  spite of his obsessive devotion for her. She was almost

  thirty years younger, and yes, he should not have married her. Other side up just as scratchy; she should not have married him, but she did.

  Harp was a dinosaur perhaps, but I grew up with him,

  he a year the younger. We swam, fished, helled around

  together. And when I returned to Darkfield growing old,

  he was one of the few who acted glad to see me, so far as

  Longtooth

  231

  you can trust what you read in a face like a granite

  promontory. Maybe twice a week Harp Ryder smiled.

  I pushed on up the ridge, and noticed a going-and-

  coming set of wide tire tracks already blurred with snow.

  That would be the egg truck I had passed a quarter hour

  since on the main road. Whenever the west wind at my

  back lulled, I could swing around and enjoy one of my

  favorite prospects of birch and hemlock lowland. From

  Ryder’s Ridge there’s no sign of Darkfield two miles

  southwest except one church spire. On clear days you

  glimpse Bald Mountain and his two big brothers, more

  than twenty miles west of us.

  The snow was thickening. It brought relief and pleasure to see the black shingles of Harp’s bam and the roof of his Cape Codder. Foreshortened, so that it looked

  snug against the bam; actually house and bam were

  connected by a two-story shed fifteen feet wide and forty

  feet long— woodshed below, hen loft above. The Ryders’

  sunrise-facing bedroom window was set only three feet

  above the eaves of that shed roof. They truly went to bed

  with the chickens. I shouted, for Harp was about to close

  the big shed door. He held it for me. I ran, and the storm

  ran after me. The west wind was bouncing off the bam;

  eddies howled at us. The temperature had tumbled ten

  degrees since I left Darkfield. The thermometer by the

  shed door read fifteen degrees, and I knew I’d been a

  damn fool. As I helped Harp fight the shed door closed, I

  thought I heard Leda, crying.

  A swift confused impression. The wind was exploring