by Tom Reamy
“Why?” Dad asked a bit dumbfounded.
Weatherly shrugged. “I was ten years old and it seemed like an excellent idea.”
“What happened?” Poe asked in rapt fascination.
“My powers were quite strong,” he continued, “but my control wasn’t. I didn’t know at the time exactly what I had done, but I believe, now, that in some way I warped space. And something came through. It was ferocious. All fire and energy. It attacked me the same way it did Mr. Willingham. I tried to fight it but was successful only in saving myself. I ran out of the house and didn’t return for fifteen years.”
“He ran away and left his family to be destroyed.”
“There was nothing I could do, Mother.”
“Why did nothing happen to you, Mrs. Weatherly?” Dad asked.
Her head swiveled toward him. “I do not know why I was not destroyed, but I was not. It kept me like a souvenir. Like an insect in amber. I often wished I had been… destroyed.”
Dad inclined his head toward Lester Gant, still standing in the doorway regarding us impassively. “What about him?”
“Mr. Gant is in no danger,” she said with a slightly upward twist of the corners of her thin mouth. “Mr. Gant comes and goes as he pleases. It knows he will return. Mr. Gant is a worshipper.” I had the impression this was only a casual volley in an old war. Gant looked at her without expression.
“We were awakened by the commotion in Philip’s room,” Mrs. Weatherly picked up the story. “My husband and daughters reached it first. I saw them destroyed. I hid in the attic. When the neighbors searched the house, they didn’t find me, and the thing didn’t bother them. By the time I had recovered from my fright, it was too late. I was unable to leave.”
“I returned fifteen years later. I was much stronger and completely in control.”
“You should have seen the foolish expression on his face when he found me,” his mother said with a slight pucker of her thin lips.
“You were here fifteen years?” Mom said in confusion. “How did you live?”
“Insects in amber require nothing,” she answered flatly. “I do not eat. I do not sleep. I am not sure that I am even alive.”
“The thing I brought here has no physical existence as we know it,” the professor explained. “I think it sustains my mother with its own life energy.”
“Is it the same for him?” Poe asked and indicated Lester Gant. I looked at Gant, still standing immobile in the doorway. His eyes were slightly narrowed and focused on Ann. I didn’t think much about it at the time.
“Mr. Gant is here for other purposes,” Mrs. Weatherly said with that tightening of her mouth which seemed to denote amusement. “Mr. Gant is here voluntarily. Mr. Gant has secret appetites.”
Gant gave her a malevolent look and turned on his heel. She watched him leave, her porcelain eyes twinkling. She turned back to us. “Mr. Gant is blasphemed.”
“What did you do when you came back?” Dad asked Weatherly, getting back to the subject.
“I’ll tell you what the fool did,” his mother brayed as Weatherly opened his mouth. “He tried to destroy it. But it had grown stronger also. And he ran again. Then, rather than letting the house fall down as it deserves, he hired Mr. Gant’s father to keep it in repair.”
“I did it for you, Mother. I couldn’t…” She stopped him with a snort.
“What happened to Mr. Gant’s parents?” Ann asked. “Mr. Gant and I talk of many things, but that is not one of them. They moved into the house when he was a baby. It didn’t matter to me. I never left my room. When Mr. Gant was about that boy’s age…” she pointed a bony finger at me, “…the parents weren’t here any more.”
“What are you planning to do now, Professor?” Ann asked.
“My mistake was in trying to destroy it.” He frowned. “I know now it probably can’t be destroyed. But it must be stopped before it moves out of this house. I don’t know why it’s still here. I must communicate with it, find out what it wants. That’s why I brought you, Ann, to communicate with it. You can’t imagine the elation I felt when I found you. Thirty-five years…” His voice faded.
“How did you spot me anyway?” she asked.
“Tests.” He raised his forefinger. “That’s why I became a professor of psychology, so I could test students. Tests of all kinds, to thousands of students. Most of them had been somewhat altered to my purposes rather than the original author’s, of course.”
“What will communication accomplish,” I asked, “other than to satisfy your curiosity?”
“Isn’t that enough?” His eyes widened. “But I expect to learn much more. Much more.”
“If it can’t be destroyed,” I asked, “what do you plan to do?”
“I must warp space and send it back where it came from,” he said.
His mother looked at him speculatively. “Perhaps you are no longer such a fool.” Then she shook her head. “No. You could have done it without involving the girl. You are still a fool.” She stood and walked imperially toward the door. She paused and turned, both her hands resting on the silver-headed stick. “Do not let Mr. Gant know what you are doing.” Then she went out the door and up the stairs like a wraith to disappear in the darkness.
“Mom,” Tannie said droopily, “could I go back to bed, please? I’m sleepy.”
Mom put her hand on Tannie’s head. “Maybe you’d better sleep down here, dear.”
“Why?”
“Isn’t she frightened of anything?” Jud groaned.
Tannie looked at him, surprised at his ignorance. “My brother is here.”
Jud grimaced and sighed. “I wish I had your confidence, kid. I really do.”
“I guess we’re as safe in bed as we are here,” Poe said sensibly. “I’m ready myself.”
I started for the door and Ann met me halfway there. I took her hand. We went back to the porch while the others bustled around preparing for bed. The sky had almost completely cleared. The night was bright out over the Kansas pasture land. I couldn’t see Carl’s body, if there was anything left to see. We sat on the railing.
“Ben,” she said softly, “do you think we ought to be doing this? You know what happened to you when it killed Mr. Willingham.”
“I’ve been working on that,” I said and turned to face her. “Read me.”
She concentrated for a moment, then looked at me in surprise. “You’re completely shielded. I wouldn’t even know you were there if I couldn’t see you.”
“When Mr. Willingham was killed”—the memory made my skin crawl—“I got the full blast. I’ve always had a shield of sorts. I don’t pick up anything unless it’s especially strong or I want to. Background babble doesn’t get through at all. That’s why I didn’t spot you.”
She nodded. “I wonder how many others there are, how many we’ve passed on the street and didn’t recognize?”
“I’ve been trying to strengthen my shield,” I continued. “It was relatively easy. It just never occurred to me to try. Here, concentrate on me. I’ll let it down slowly. See how it works.”
I showed her how it worked and she tried it. We practiced it for a while until she was as good at it as I was. She was quiet then, looking at me.
She stood up and stepped in front of me, facing me. She put her hands on either side of my neck. Tannie has nothing on me when it comes to looking wide-eyed.
“Ben…” she said solemnly, “I know what you’re feeling about what you can do. You’ve never explored it before, never really tried to extend the limits of your ability. I know you’re strong, stronger than I. But… be careful. Don’t get in over your head with this thing. Don’t get overconfident. Just… be careful.”
I nodded, understanding. We looked at each other, not reading, just being physical. Then I slid my hands up her arms and interlaced my fingers behind her neck. I pulled her head down to mine slowly. She didn’t resist. I kissed her very lightly on the lips, still not reading, enjoying the purely physical sensatio
n. She pulled her head back and smiled at me. I stood up and let my arms slip lower down her back. I felt hers do the same thing. I kissed her again, harder. She kissed back.
We were sitting on the steps, not doing anything, not talking, just being together, when I felt it. It was like a hobnail boot in the groin. Fear and pain, but mostly rage and anger. Ann got it too. She jerked and grunted and looked at me with pain. We jumped up and ran inside. I knew who it was. I did a quick survey of the house. Only one was missing.
I stuck my head in the parlor where the professor sat meditatively before the dying fire. “Where’s Jud?”
He jumped at the sound of my voice and looked at me blankly. I repeated the question more insistently. “He’s sharing a room with you,” he said bewildered. “The second one on the right at the top of the stairs. What’s the matter?” He rose and moved toward us.
“He’s dead,” I said over my shoulder as Ann and I ran up the stairs. We found him in the bathroom, on the floor, face down. He was wearing only gold jockey shorts. Blood was still seeping among the crevices between the white floor tiles. His blond fairness was now a pallor. Judson Bradley Ledbetter wasn’t beautiful anymore. His shaving kit was scattered about as if he’d had it in his hands when attacked. I knelt beside him and turned him over. I shouldn’t have. His chest and abdomen had been thoroughly worked over with a large-bladed knife.
Ann gasped and Weatherly let the air hiss out between his teeth. “Who could have done it?” he whispered.
“Gant.”
“Why?”
“We don’t know. Perhaps your mother does. She’s in the hall.”
She was standing there watching us, looking exactly as she had earlier. Poe opened the door across from us and stepped sleepily into the hall wearing pajama bottoms. “What’s the commotion?” he asked, rubbing his face. Ann went to him arid talked quietly. He looked frightened and hurried into the room we had come out of.
“Mrs. Weatherly,” I said. “Jud Ledbetter has been killed.” She turned her porcelain eyes on me but said nothing. “We’ve read everyone in the house except Gant. He’s the only one who could’ve done it. We need to know why.”
She narrowed her eyes at me then turned to her son. “Your foolishness is catching up with you, Philip. Mr. Gant is also a fool. He killed the wrong one.”
“What?” Weatherly gasped.
“Don’t be an idiot,” she snapped. “Mr. Gant is protecting the thing.” She turned back to me. “Young man, Mr. Gant will undoubtedly discover his error.” She wheeled and walked away into the darkness.
“Ben,” Ann whispered. “He meant to kill you.”
“I’m trying to remember what we said while he was in the room. He knows that you and someone else are here to help the professor get rid of it, but you were sitting next to Jud when he mentioned it. That means he’ll be coming for you next.”
“We’ve got to find him,” Weatherly whined. “He could ruin everything.”
I gave him a disgusted look, but he didn’t really mean it the way it came out. “I’ll wake Dad,” I said. Poe came back into the hall looking a little sick. Ann and the professor went to him.
Mom and Dad were both asleep. Tannie was on a daybed screwed up like a worm the way she always slept. I put my hand on Dad’s shoulder and his eyes popped open. He started to say something, but I put my finger to my lips and motioned him to come outside. He got out of bed, careful not to wake Mom, and put on his robe, looking at me questioningly.
In the hall we explained everything that had happened. “Do you think Linda and your mother will be safe?” Poe asked.
“Wake Linda and put her in with Mom. Ann, stay with them and bolt the door.” She nodded.
Poe was worried. “Don’t tell Linda what happened to Jud. Not yet.” He went back in his room and closed the door.
“Professor,” I said, “you know this house. Where could he be hiding?”
He shook his head. “I don’t know. Lots of places. I suggest we start downstairs and work up to the attic. Ben, can you read him at all?”
“No.”
We started in the cellar and searched every hidey-hole. He wasn’t down there and he wasn’t on the ground floor either. Dad had his flashlight, and I had one of the kerosene lamps, so we could split up when necessary to prevent Gant from doubling back on us. Poe had a poker he took from the parlor fireplace. He grinned at me nervously and smacked it a couple of times in his palm.
We went back upstairs. Dad shone the flashlight down the hall. Gant was at the door of Mom’s room crouched over the doorknob. He had a large butcher knife in his hand. He looked up at us and ran off in the opposite direction, through a door. When we got to it, it was locked.
“That’s the stairway to the attic,” Weatherly said.
Dad rattled the door a few times, frowning at it. It had one of those old mortise-type locks that could be locked from either side, but only with a key.
“Wait a moment,” Weatherly muttered. The lock rattled and went snick. The door swung open about two inches with a lazy creak.
Dad glanced at Weatherly, then opened the door the rest of the way. He pointed the flashlight up the steep, narrow steps, but there was nothing except gloom and cobwebs. Dad took a deep breath and started up very cautiously. Poe was behind him with the poker, then the professor. I brought up the rear with the kerosene lamp.
The stairs entered the attic through a hole in the middle of the floor, a perfect place to get your head knocked off when you poked it up. Dad shone the flashlight around, keeping down as far as he could, ready to duck if Gant was waiting. When he motioned the rest of us up, I realized I’d been holding my breath.
The attic was a jumble of discards and had a fifty-year accumulation of dust. The floor was velvety smooth, disturbed only by Mr. Gant’s footprints leading into the pile of rubble, and little stitchery-like marks made by crawling beetles. Dad followed Mr. Gant’s footprints with the flashlight beam but we couldn’t see him.
Twenty people could have been hiding in all the clutter. I held the lamp high, trying to see into the darkness. It was practically useless; it lit everything beautifully—for three feet in every direction. And when one of us moved, he cast a shadow the size of Godzilla.
The rafters were draped with dusty cobwebs and spotted with little brown mounds made by mud daubers. The flashlight passed over a wasp nest the size of a dinner plate back in the corner. The yellow jackets stirred sluggishly, lethargic in the cool night air.
Dad kept swinging the flashlight around, covering as much of the attic as he could, but Mr. Gant was as invisible to my eyes as he was to my mind. He could have been hiding in any one of many places.
I was about to suggest we lock the attic securely and leave Mr. Gant to the spiders, when something toppled behind me.
We whirled in that direction. The flashlight caught Mr. Gant charging straight at us with the butcher knife drawn back. The whole thing couldn’t have taken more than a couple of seconds, but I suddenly had a sensation of slow-motion, of Gant running at me through a narrow aisle between stacks of cardboard boxes, of the knife glinting in the flashlight beam, of his shirt flaring out at each step.
I remember studying his face, remember feeling surprise that it was almost emotionless, surprise that he wasn’t slavering like a madman. All of this must have been only in my mind because my muscles didn’t correspond. I just stood there like a dummy, watching him.
Then he tripped. His toe caught in a picture frame leaning against the stack of boxes. A startled expression crossed his face as his body got ahead of his feet. Instead of getting me with the knife, he rammed into me bodily.
My arms went up and the lamp slipped smoothly from my fingers. I grunted as the wind was knocked out of me. Then Gant and I landed on the floor in a tangle, but the lamp stayed in my line of vision, arching up slowly, very slowly. The thin glass chimney hit a rafter and shattered, then the base, the wick still burning, smashed against the trunk engulfing one end of the attic i
n burning-kerosene.
Mr. Gant lost no time in getting himself untangled; he had landed on top. I was flat on my back. The next thing I knew he was straddling my stomach with the knife drawn back. I twisted as he brought the knife down, and I heard it thunk into the floor beside my ear.
Then good old Poe swung the poker with both hands as if he were chopping wood. It caught Mr. Gant across the shoulders. He yelled and arched his back, his face twisting with pain. He lurched up, gasping for breath, and staggered into the darkness, the knife still in his hand. He upset several piles of uncertain junk, bringing them down with a clatter. Poe and Dad helped me up and I grinned thanks at Poe.
Mr. Gant was out of sight again, hidden by the darkness and the smoke. We turned to the fire. The whole end of the attic was burning furiously. The heat was rapidly becoming uncomfortable. We edged toward the stairs, but the professor was staring at the flames, deep in concentration. We stopped and watched.
A mist began forming in the attic, like heavy fog rolling in. It even smelled like fog. It grew thicker and thicker, closing in on the fire until, finally, it was completely obscured by the bank of white. The crackle of the flames gradually changed to a damp hissing and then nothing. I could no longer feel the heat. Little beads of water stood on the hairs on my arms, like a heavy dew. The thick mist swirled away as if in a wind and the fire was out. The end of the attic was blackened and charred, shiny with moisture. Drops of water fell from the rafters, thumping against the boxes and trunks and other debris. Weatherly sighed deeply.
“You’re sure handy to have around, Professor,” Poe said with a certain amount of awe.
“Carnival tricks.” He perished the thought.
Dad swung the flashlight away from the burned area and started to say something. He stopped with his mouth open, looking at something. We turned. Gant was creeping toward us with the knife in his hand. Mr. Gant may have had his faults, but lack of determination wasn’t one of them. He stopped when the light hit him. His eyes glittered like marbles. Weatherly was concentrating again.
I heard a harsh buzzing, and the wasp nest almost directly over Gant’s head erupted in a yellow and black storm. I don’t know what Weatherly did, but the yellow jackets swarmed all over Gant. He screamed and stumbled back, crashing through a pile of discards, swatting at the stinging insects. He kept yelling and threshing, and I guess Weatherly couldn’t go through with it any longer because the wasps left Gant and settled back on the nest.