7 Steps to Midnight

by Richard Matheson

  He opened the passport and looked at it. The same photograph of him was in it. But now his name was Wallace Brewster and he was from Oklahoma City. He’d traveled to England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland, Italy, Greece.

  Chris put a hand across his eyes. How much more of this could he endure? he thought.

  He shivered. Had he actually thought, however briefly, that this experience was stimulating, romantic? “Sure,” he muttered. “As romantic as a funeral.”

  He lowered his hand and glared at the cassette player. “I’ll tell you what I’m going to do,” he told the faceless man. “I’m not going to fucking Lucerne. I’m not taking the ring to anybody. I’m heading for the nearest police station where I’m going to turn myself in and—”

  The vow broke off. He sighed wearily. No, I’m not, he thought. He couldn’t turn his back on Alexsandra.

  “Lucerne,” he muttered, dismally.

  ***

  He kept swallowing dryly, trying to clear his throat as he drove. He’d almost gagged on the Calan and Vasotec when he swallowed them without water.

  His bag was still the same except that his former passport was gone. Naturally, he’d thought with sardonic acceptance. I’m not Chris Barton anymore. I’m Wallace Brewster. What did he do for a living now? Plumbing? Distribution? Pornography?

  The countryside he drove through was stunning. He’d read that the French landscape was beautiful. That was an understatement. Maybe it was because he was from Arizona, but the vivid shades of green in the trees, the bushes, the grass looked so much richer than anything he’d ever seen before; no wonder so many famous French artists had used nature for their model.

  A pity he could take no pleasure from it.

  Fifteen minutes later, he was in the town; he went by the name sign too rapidly to see what it read. It started with P, that was all he knew.

  The railroad station was on the road he was driving along. Steering the car into a parking area in front of the wooden station house, he got out with his bag, leaving the key in the ignition; it felt odd to do that even though he couldn’t care less what happened to the car. The name of the town was Prienne.

  Entering the waiting room, he walked to the ticket window and asked, in French, when the next train to Lucerne was due. An hour and forty minutes, he was told. He nodded, then asked if there was a café nearby. The man said there was one several blocks farther along the road.

  Chris thanked him and left the station. He’d momentarily thought of asking if he could leave his bag with the man, then decided that, the way things were going, he’d do best to keep it in his possession.

  He got back into the car and drove down the road to the café. Parking beside it, he locked his bag in the trunk and went inside.

  He ordered orange juice, croissants, butter, jam and coffee and sat down with the food. Interesting, he thought—perhaps offensive was a better word—how regularly his appetite reclaimed its place in his attention. No matter what went wrong—now it was Alexsandra’s safety—he got hungry. He felt guilty for the almost voracious manner in which he drained the glass of orange juice, tore off pieces of croissant, thickly spread them with butter and jam, and wolfed them down, following each swallow with a sip of the strong, black coffee. I should be drinking decaf, he thought, but he felt as though he needed some caffeine at the moment.

  Eating, he recalled his vow to watch everything he ate and drank from now on. He hesitated briefly, then decided that he had to stop thinking, like a paranoiac, that everything he ingested was drugged. All right, they’d sent him to the railroad station. They couldn’t possibly have foreseen that he was going to get some breakfast in this particular café.

  With that, he continued eating.

  As he chewed on the warm, crusty croissants—the strawberry jam and butter on them tasted delicious—he was surprised to note that his brain, uncoerced, had begun to think about the project. That’s insane, he reacted. Unless, of course, he’d been away from it long enough, his attention distracted by other—albeit traumatic—circumstances and had therefore “rested” his mind.

  Amused, he let his mind have its way. That was how it functioned best. He would consciously “stand back” and let it generate on its own. Numbers and symbols fluttered across the screen of his awareness. He often visualized his brain as a computer screen operated by his subconscious. Or was it his superconscious? Whatever it was, when things were clicking and the “computer” was on, he had only to watch—sometimes bedazzled, even amused—as the formulas appeared on the screen as though entered by his autonomous operator.

  Xm both ax (s, y, z). He “saw” the symbols. The words scattering effect. More symbols: Ix (x, y, z). More words: due to significant extinction. More symbols, more equations.

  “Wait a second,” he muttered, superimposing his will on the “readout.” “Run through that again.”

  The screen flickered backwards like a VCR picture being rewound while played. He reviewed the numbers and symbols. Interesting, he thought. He’d never noticed that before.

  He looked around, returning to the quiet café, empty except for himself and an old man sitting by the window, sipping on a glass of wine.

  Abruptly, he stood and walked to the kitchen entrance, asking the man if he could borrow a pencil. The man gave him one and he returned to the table, sitting down again. Forgive me, he thought, turning over the menu. Well, it was obviously typed up daily, he saw; it was hardly as though he were desecrating the ultra-fancy menu on the Bateau-Mouche.

  He turned his mind-computer on again and started transcribing the equations appearing on its “screen.” If people only knew, he thought randomly, how simple it was when the “computer” was working on its own. Of course, it didn’t matter how the answers came, they were still coming from his brain; though, on some occasions, he felt more like an amanuensis than a mathematician.

  The world around him disappeared as the top of his pencil skidded rapidly across the paper. Yes, he thought, nodding to himself, unaware that he was doing so. Steady state clearance zone (for times t ≥ [d(x)]/u).

  He’d forgotten the croissants and coffee; they grew cold as he worked, totally absorbed.

  Until he reached a point where the screen began to flicker and the formulas repeated themselves. “Damn,” he muttered. He was back in the café again, himself, Chris Barton, fallible human being—not Chris Barton, secretary for the flowing dictates of his inner mind.

  He read over what he’d written. Not too bad, he thought. A hell of a lot better than the fumbling efforts he’d been putting out for the past two months. At least there was some insight here, some originality.

  But nowhere near an answer.

  He checked his watch and shook his head. It was incredible. He was always impressed by the vanishing of time when he worked. Lucky for him he had reached that glitch, the computer faltering. Otherwise, he might have been sitting here until dark. As it was, the train would be arriving in thirty-two minutes; he must have been in a trance for almost an hour. It is like a psychic trance, he thought. They popped off and disincarnates flowed through them, or so they claimed.

  He popped off and equations flowed through him, the source of which was no more apparent than the source of a psychic’s results. He stared at the back of the menu, wondering whether, under the circumstances, he should take the time to commit it to memory. It would take a concentrated effort but, eventually, it might be safer doing that than having everything laid out in black and white on a piece of paper. If he was in danger—and who could doubt it now?—his main protection would certainly be in having all the answers buried in his mind.

  ***

  Parking by the station, he saw that he still had twenty-five minutes before the train was due.

  Leaving the bag locked in the trunk, he decided to take a short stroll through the town. Crossing the road, he started up a street resembling an alley, four-story buildings on each side. The street angled steeply upward and it seemed as though the mustard-colored bui
ldings on each side were leaning toward him, threatening to topple.

  There was no one in the street. His footsteps made faint ringing noises on the stone pavement. He passed what must have been, at one time, a garden behind a wrought-iron fence. It was here now, as though its soil had died, its nutrients vampired by centuries of growth.

  At the corner was an archway of stone with a heavy barred gate in it. The grimy, faded brown stone reminded Chris of the dream he’d had about Alexsandra: the courtyard, her waiting for him in a pale white Roman gown.

  He shivered, wincing. Drop it, he told himself. There’s enough going on without that.

  He started walking along another narrow street; this one angled downward. Don’t get lost now, he told himself. He looked around uneasily. Where were all the people? Was it Sunday or something? He thought about it. As a matter of fact, it was; the shops were all closed. The residents were probably in church or at home.

  He stopped beside a shop and looked in its windows. They were filled with what appeared to be artificial flower arrangements. What are those for? he wondered. He stepped back and looked up at the sign. Across the tops of the windows, dark letters on a white background, were the words Fleurs Artificielles/Croix on the left-hand window, Céramiques/Plaques on the right. That wasn’t much help. He stepped back a little more and looked at the sign above the windows, faded gold letters on a black background: Articles Funéraires.

  “Oh, God,” he muttered, repelled. He turned away and started walking along the street again, then froze in his tracks.

  Far down the block, a young woman in a pale white gown was looking at him.

  Chris felt his shoulders jerk. He stared at the woman. She was too far away for him to see her features but she looked, to him, like—

  “No,” he said. He shook his head. He wasn’t going to let this happen to him. Reality slippage, his mind whispered perversely. “No,” he said, resisting it.

  The woman left the street and disappeared.

  Suddenly—he couldn’t stop himself—he was running down the angled street, moving faster and faster. He didn’t want to know and yet he had to.

  He reached the place where the woman had disappeared; it was an archway into an empty, shadowed courtyard. He hesitated for a few moments, then found himself moving into the courtyard. All the doors there were locked except for one; it stood ajar in a building with a wall that was stained and cracked, its second-story windows covered by grime, some of their panes broken.

  Chris moved to the doorway and looked inside. There was a narrow stairway leading to the second floor. He drew in shaking breath. Don’t go up, he thought. But it was as though another’s will controlled his own. Moving through the open doorway, he started up the steps, which creaked beneath his weight. The stairwell smelled of something foul, something rotten. He tried to make himself go back but couldn’t.

  “Alexsandra?” he called abruptly, the sharp sound of his voice in the narrow stairwell making him start. Go back, he pleaded with himself. Don’t do this.

  At the head of the stairs, there was a doorway to his right. He moved through it into an open room. There was broken glass strewn across the floor; it crunched beneath his shoes. The room was empty except for what appeared to be a very old armoire, its finish gone, its doors cracked and sagging on their hinges.

  He found himself moving toward it, trying again, in vain, to stop. He didn’t want to do this. Why couldn’t he stop? He imagined spectral hands pushing at his back, forcing him forward. The glass shards kept crunching underneath his tread. He drew in laboring breath. The smell was awful. It was the smell of death, he thought, shuddering.

  He stopped in front of the armoire, knowing that he had to open it. He visualized seeing the dead woman inside, the one he had embraced in his dream, white-faced, staring. Stop it, that’s insane! he ranted at his mind.

  He watched his hand slowly reach forward for the handle of one of the doors. Don’t! screamed his mind.

  He pulled open the door.

  And drew back, chilled, his heartbeat quickening.

  There was one item of clothing hanging inside.

  An old, white, rotting dress.

  “Oh, no,” he murmured weakly. It was a coincidence; it had to be.

  He couldn’t take his eyes off the dress. He knew that if he touched it, it would crumble into dust. It couldn’t be the same dress from the painting, from his dream. The same dress the woman was wearing when he followed her into the courtyard.

  He had to leave.

  He turned to go back to the doorway and gasped in horror, recoiling, feeling his heart leap in his chest.

  He couldn’t breathe. He stood frozen in the empty, fetid-smelling room, staring at the words scrawled jaggedly above the doorway.

  5 steps to midnight.

  6

  It’s going faster, he thought. The idea frightened him. Bad enough he had no idea what steps to midnight meant. Now the words—were they warnings?—were accelerating.

  What in the name of God was going to happen at midnight?

  And midnight when? Today? Tomorrow?

  He shivered, refocusing his eyes to stare at the passing countryside. The only sound he heard was the rhythmic clacking of wheels on the railroad tracks.

  He looked around the train car. It was not crowded with passengers; he counted nine. The car was modern, sterile in appearance, its seats hard, made of wood, metal and brown plastic. There were overhead luggage racks but he had the bag beside him on the seat, one hand holding on to it as though he feared someone might try to grab it from him.

  He looked out through the window again. His throat felt terribly dry; he needed a drink. He drew in trembling breath.

  In fleeing from the room, he’d tripped and almost fallen down the steep flight of steps, catching on to the banister at the last second. Maybe it would have been better if he’d fallen and been knocked unconscious, even—he genuinely felt it at the moment—been killed.

  He shivered again, uncontrollably. How could that woman know he’d follow her into the courtyard? How did she know he’d go up to that room, see those words above the doorway? Who had put them there? And what had happened to the woman? God, who was the woman?

  He closed his eyes. He’d tried, in vain, to shut down thinking since he’d boarded the train. It was impossible though. His brain kept spinning a web of unnerving fancies.

  Had Veering been, in fact, not merely an annoying hitchhiker, but a harbinger of something truly awful? Had his wager been authentic and, in accepting it so offhandedly, had Chris plunged himself into its nightmarish consequences? What other explanation for these outlandish things happening to him but that the fabric of reality in his existence had been torn apart?

  He grimaced scowlingly. And yet so much of it made perfect sense. The turbulence project, his replacement, his assisted flight to Europe, the perils he’d been exposed to—all of these seemed real and feasible, albeit terrifying.

  It was the rest of it…

  He was beginning to feel more odd with every passing day, his mind an increasing turmoil of anxieties. How long could he go on like this? Something had to snap finally; but when?

  Maddeningly, a segment of equation floated through his mind like a bubble. Fuck off! he screamed at it. The bubble popped and vanished. He glared out at the field.

  And saw—

  He felt as though he’d just been plunged into a vat of ice water.

  Far across the field stood the figure of a woman.

  Wearing a pale white gown.

  Chris felt tears of dread spring into his eyes. I’m going mad, he thought; I really am. It’s her, it’s Alexsandra. She wasn’t a real woman at all. She belonged in ancient Rome, yet there she was; standing in that field, watching the train.

  Looking at him, he knew.

  A sudden wave of nausea flooded his stomach and, lurching to his feet, he weaved along the aisle as quickly as he could, heading for the men’s washroom. Don’t leave the bag! a voice warned
urgently, but he couldn’t stop. God, don’t be occupied! he thought as he neared the washroom door.

  He slammed the door behind himself and locked it, turning just in time; the contents of his stomach burst from his mouth as he bent over the toilet, bracing himself against the wall with one hand. A spasm of repeating nausea hit him and he bent over more, body jerking as he vomited.

  As in a tear-blurred dream, he saw his new passport—he’d slipped it into his shirt pocket to make sure it was safe—drop into the toilet and out the hole through which he saw tracks rushing by, and disappear. “No!” he wheezed. Now he had no identity! He was nothing but a nameless body, throwing up his guts on a train to Lucerne, Switzerland. He did feel unreal now. It would not surprise him, if in straightening up, he cast no reflection in the mirror above the sink.

  At last, his stomach felt empty and, taking in a deep breath, he stood, avoiding the sight of the mirror, turning on the faucet and washing off his lips, then face, with cold water, rinsing out his mouth.

  At last he raised his eyes and stared at the reflection of his dripping features. Thank God, I recognize myself, he thought. I’m still Chris Barton.

  Or was he? When the train arrived at Lucerne, would Meehan and Nelson be there to apprehend him? Would his mother be there and his sister and Alexsandra and the man and woman from his house, all pointing at him and shouting, “Arrest that man? He’s an impostor!”?

  His fingertips felt numb. I’m really going, he thought; I’m falling apart. He’d never been so disoriented in his life. Was that the wager at work? Was that what was happening? Step by step, was he losing touch with himself? In four more steps would he be undone completely? Was that what those words meant?

  After a while, his pulse slowed down—he checked his wrist to make sure—and, opening the washroom door, he went out, half-expecting to see someone sitting in his seat, the dead agent from Montmartre maybe, that wouldn’t have surprised him.

  The seat was still unoccupied. To his surprise, the bag was there as well, untouched. His smile was devoid of amusement, as he imagined the bag having turned into a sheep playing a violin; he wouldn’t have been surprised by that either. He would merely have sat down beside it and requested one chorus of “The Swan.”