by Thea Thomas
“This is what I think we ought to do. Peter, I think you should go home for any clues that might manifest. Gail, you stay here and answer the phone. I’m going to go driving.”
“What will driving accomplish?” Gail asked. “You won’t just run into him.”
“You never know. Anyway, I can’t even think anymore, just sitting here. At least if I’m in motion, I’ll be able to think.”
Gail shrugged. “Well, whatever you feel is best.”
“I just need two things now, or I think I’ll go crazy, I need to be alone and I need to be in motion.”
“Go, go with our blessing,” Peter said. “But please be careful.”
Peter left, and Gail walked out to the garage with Elizabeth. “You’re in an extremely distracted frame of mind, please pay attention to your driving.”
“Don’t worry Gail, just stay close to the phone.”
Chapter XXVIII
Elizabeth started out crisscrossing the neighborhood, driving up one street and down the next. She knew this was no way to find Tony, but she felt that, at least, she was doing more than just sitting around the house, tense and unable to think productively.
Up and down and back and forth she drove, getting farther and farther from home. She got a call from Gail. Officer Timms had called to say that nothing had turned up.
Poor little Amy! Dusk was falling and with it the horrible dread stole over Elizabeth. Amy was out here, somewhere, a second night, alone. How could she possibly endure another night without her baby? It felt like ages since she’d seen her.
Elizabeth wanted to scream. She couldn’t recall ever having felt like screaming in her life. But she didn’t scream. She inhaled deeply several times and continued to drive.
She would not allow Tony to have such power over her. That was precisely what everything he’d done was about. Showing her he had the power to make her do his will. He didn’t see that he had attacked and injured her, he only saw that she had humiliated him by telling him to get out. She had hurt his pride, his fragile, sensitive, sick pride. And he’d retaliated by hurting her where she was must vulnerable.
Tony only wanted Amy as a pawn. Elizabeth was certain he’d have a raft of demands how he expected her to behave if she ever wanted to see Amy again. Why hadn’t he called?
A fog settled on the night. Elizabeth hadn’t even noticed it, and suddenly there it hung, dense and dream-like. No traffic at all. Elizabeth looked at the car clock. “Goodness!” she exclaimed. It was midnight and it had been three hours since she’d called Gail. How had the time slipped away from her?
She looked around. She didn’t know where she was, nothing was recognizable in the dense fog. The intermittent street lights made pools of light below them, the fog capturing their light. Everything was eerily light and dark at the same time. Elizabeth looked for a street sign to give her some bearing.
She came to an intersection and stopped at the red light. It felt absurd to sit patiently at a red light when there was not one other car anywhere.
Finally the light changed. As Elizabeth went through the intersection, still peering into the fog for street signs which remained oddly absent, she noticed a white sedan coming through the intersection facing her.
It came out of nowhere. A plain white car. The driver stared at her. Elizabeth couldn’t make out if it was a man or a woman. The person had short dark hair and large dark-rimmed glasses. Light reflected off the glasses and Elizabeth couldn’t see the person’s eyes, but she could feel the eyes on her. Then the driver waved at her, trying to make her stop.
Elizabeth’s car filled with an electrical charge and the frail hairs on her forearms stood up. A spiky feeling crept up the back of Elizabeth’s neck, and she tasted metal.
She slammed her foot onto the accelerator, racing to the next intersection, she glanced in the rear view mirror – the white sedan made a u-turn in the road and followed her!
Elizabeth turned left, speeding past houses that suddenly looked familiar. She saw that she was now close to home. Accelerating dangerously, she began pressing the garage door opener from two blocks away, driving madly. She tore into her driveway and through the open garage door.
As the garage door clanked shut, she peered out into the night, into the suddenly fogless street.
No vehicle could be seen.
Elizabeth stumbled into the house. Gail came rushing out of her room, tying her bathrobe around her.
“What’s wrong,” she cried, flipping on the light. “I could hear you burning rubber for blocks. Except I didn’t know it was you until you practically drove through the garage.”
“I was followed. The fog was so thick and this car just came out of the fog.” Elizabeth gasped for air and grabbed onto the kitchen counter. “It came out of the fog – the driver was staring at me and waving. I couldn’t find any street signs, I didn’t know where I was because of the fog. The car made a U-turn and started to follow me. I don’t know why I was so terrified. And the inside of my car was charged with electricity. I tore through the stop sign and suddenly I recognized where I was. I was right here! Close to home, after all that driving around.”
Gail led Elizabeth into the living room and planted her on the sofa. “I think, Elizabeth, you’ve over-extended yourself. You’re too stressed and pushing too hard,” she said calmly. “There hasn’t been any fog tonight. And I very much doubt someone was chasing you. It was probably some poor lost individual who’s been driving around for hours. You know how confusing these residential streets can be. You’re probably the only other person they saw in an hour, in the middle of the night like this. Calm down, Lizzie. I haven’t heard from you for hours. I’ve been worried sick.”
“I know. I’m sorry. But that’s another thing. I don’t know what happened, I was driving around and all of a sudden, three hours had gone by and there was this fog. I tell you, Gail, I ran into this pocket of fog, dense and white as wedding cake. A white car came out of the fog and the driver looked at me, but I couldn’t see the person’s eyes, light was reflecting off his or her glasses, and it made my skin crawl.”
“What light, if the fog was so dense?”
Elizabeth stopped, mouth open. “That’s it! Something bothered me at the first moment, but I was so preoccupied with the fog and the car. That’s what really scared me. Where did the light reflecting off the glasses come from? I had just noticed, before I saw that car, that the fog had the light from the street lamps all sort of captured. Oh, Gail....” Elizabeth shivered.
Gail took the comforter off the back of the sofa and wrapped it around Elizabeth. “Do you want me to make a fire?” she asked.
“No. I’m fine... I’m better. Did anyone call?”
“No. I mean, just Peter, once, to see if you’d come back. Apparently there was nothing more... unusual there. The police didn’t call, Tony didn’t call.”
The telephone rang. Both Elizabeth and Gail jumped. Gail grabbed the receiver.
“Hello?” A look of dismay and disgust crossed her face. She handed the receiver to Elizabeth. “Speak of the devil! Keep him talking!” she whispered.
“Hello?” Elizabeth said into the receiver. She began to shiver again.
“I’ll bet you’re sorry you kicked me out, aren’t you?”
Elizabeth took a deep breath. “Yes, Tony. I am,” she said sweetly.
“Yeah, well, your con act won’t work with me. I can see right through that saccharin voice.”
“What do you want?”
Tony started laughing. Elizabeth had never heard him so gleeful. “Oh, I’ll tell you what I want. Piece by bit. But not without the pleasure of watching you crumble. And you can be sure I’m watching you.”
“Okay, Tony. Watch me crumble and fall apart. But think about Amy, Tony. She’s a child, an innocent baby. Why hurt her when it’s me you want to punish?”
“Sometimes kids find themselves in the path of trouble,” Tony philosophized. “That’s life.”
“But, Tony, I’
ll do anything you say, anything you want. Just bring Amy back. Let Gail have her. You and I can work out our problems. But don’t let a baby suffer. Are you taking care of her, Tony? Are you feeding her? Keeping her warm? Are you doing her therapy, Tony?”
“Did you ever, for half a minute, care about me like that?”
“Of course I did, Tony. I loved you!”
“Loved. Past tense. That’s the key.”
A dial tone resounded in Elizabeth’s ear. She looked at Gail, and her shivering became almost convulsive.
“Oh, Gail, Gail, I CAN’T STAND IT! He wants to break me. I’m broken. I’m broken! He didn’t tell me anything about Amy.”
Gail picked up the telephone and called the police. Yes, they’d traced the call. It was a phone booth on El Toro Road. Of course by the time a squad car got there, Tony was long gone.
“I’ll make you a cup of hot cocoa,” Gail said. “The milk will help help you relax.”
They sat silently by the cold fireplace, sipping the hot cocoa, and slowly Elizabeth felt a warmth steal through her aching heart and limbs as if she’d had a couple of stiff brandys. Maybe Gail did put a bit of brandy in the cocoa, Elizabeth thought. She hated to think that she could slip into such a relaxed state with all that was going on. But maybe her mind and body were just giving way.
“Thank you, Gail. I’m relaxed now. I’m going up. “ She drug herself up to bed.
She awoke with a start when the telephone rang. She was sure it had only rung once. She snatched it up.
“Hello?”
There was crackling and snapping on the line like a bad international connection. “Hello?” Elizabeth said again, raising her voice.
Far, far away and faintly, Elizabeth heard a voice.
“What? I can’t hear you. Please, speak louder!”
The voice repeated itself. This time through the echoing popping sounds, she thought she heard it say, “I want to help you.”
“You want to help me? Yes, how?”
“I... want to... help... you,” came again.
“Yes,” Elizabeth said. “Yes, yes!” She didn’t know what else she could say to encourage the distant voice.
Again the voice repeated itself, but more faintly, “I... want... to... help... “ And it faded away.
Grandfather, and someone in a white sedan, and now a woman’s voice at some great distance were all trying to reach her, to tell her something, to help her. Why, oh, why had she run away from the white car? Why hadn’t she understood, as Grandfather had told Peter, that someone was trying to get in touch with her?
How silly her fears seemed when compared to the formidable powers persevering to contact her. She saw that she had to let go of even her instinctive fears if she hoped to have her precious daughter in her arms again.
Chapter XXIX
The next morning she woke before Gail. She went downstairs and out onto the patio, watching the lake, letting her thoughts reflect off its rippling surface.
She had been considering calling Martha, and the thought had led to some much deeper thoughts. What did it mean that she wanted to talk with Martha about the present, horrible problem? Martha was her friend, of course, and would want to know what was happening in Elizabeth’s life.
But, Elizabeth asked herself, what did she expect to get from Martha? Martha, by her own admission, was not very fond of children, so her sympathy would be general. Why disrupt Martha’s very busy life with something she would be unable to do anything about?
Elizabeth suddenly realized that Martha, despite however much she had referred to her as a girl friend, was a surrogate mother. Elizabeth was always inclined to go to Martha when she had a problem, like she probably would have gone to her mother... if she were around. But she usually did not call Martha, she didn’t want to bother her. Just like she’d always felt about her mother.
Now she saw that she didn’t need a surrogate mother, or even a real one. She was a mother now, and she had every bit of character fiber she needed to develop her own strength.
Of course she would tell Martha, sometime, about this period in her life. But afterwards, and as a friend only, without any expectations.
To be honest, she had to admit that the weaning was assisted by the presence of Gail in her life. But she felt she was in control around Gail. As if they were equals.
“Who called last night?” Gail asked, coming out onto the patio.
Elizabeth jumped. “You startled me! You heard the phone ring this time?”
“Yes, I did. It rang about three-fifteen, the same time that you said it rang the night before.”
“It sounded like an international connection.” Elizabeth stood up and went to the edge of the patio, leaning against the low fence, the fence she’d had built for Amy. “There was a great deal of noise on the line. Then, very far away, a woman said, ‘I want to help you.’ She repeated it several times. Finally her voice faded away to nothing.”
“Did you call the police to see what kind of follow-up they were able to do on it?”
“No. Not yet.” She went in and called. When she hung up, she turned to Gail. “They said it was like an international connection, except they couldn’t trace it to any country. They said they only heard my end of the conversation.”
Elizabeth tried to force herself to eat breakfast, but she couldn’t. She went upstairs to change and to get ready for her day of driving.
She moved around as if in a trance. Her intention was to go into her bedroom, but she found herself in her rug room, standing in front of the loom with the very nearly finished baby carpet. She stood staring at the little pastel rug, wondering why she’d come in here, when, slowly, the carpet changed to tans and browns and dark greens. Instead of the dainty little cottage and meadow, she saw two gigantic fir trees on either side of a rustic cabin. Three steps. Gravel path. Up, on a hill.
She stared intently at the image, and then gasped when she realized that this was not ordinary phenomena. She felt faint and reached out for the wall. The moment she touched it, the bright sunshiny room came back and the sweet pastel rug hung before her on its loom.
She went to her room, sat on the edge of the bed and put her head in her hands. Her heart was palpitating but she wouldn’t let that interfere with the image she just saw – she wanted to burn it into her mind’s eye. She didn’t know what it meant, but she was sure that it would become clear to her. She pulled on jeans and a sweatshirt and went back downstairs.
“I’m going driving now,” she told Gail. “Keep the home fires burning.”
“I always do.”
Elizabeth drove farther and farther away from home. She drove up and down El Toro Road, but no matter where she looked, nothing made her feel she was closer to Amy.
She went home for an hour after dusk, then got back in her car.
She drove back to El Toro Road, winding in the hills among the housing. Glancing at the car clock she saw it was nearly midnight. As she drove around a city park, a sudden dense fog came up off the grassy plateau of the park and seemed to practically walk toward her. She drove her car slowly. There was no fog at all among the houses across the street.
The fog stole across the road. Elizabeth stopped at a stop sign, glancing in her rear view mirror. Coming towards her through the fog in the street was a white sedan. Elizabeth refused to give in to the fear.
The car pulled up slowly on her right side. Elizabeth peered into it, but she only saw an unclear shadow of the person with short dark hair and wearing large, dark-framed glasses. The car pulled away from the stop sign and drove into the fog.
Elizabeth followed. Unlike the night before, the driver seemed to pay no attention to Elizabeth. They returned to El Toro Road and the white sedan turned right, toward the Santiago Mountains. Elizabeth followed.
The farther they went, the denser and whiter the fog became. The white sedan drove faster and faster, but Elizabeth kept following its red tail lights. She careened at sixty around curves that the small car ahead see
med to be taking in a leisurely fashion.
Suddenly, instantly, the car ahead disappeared, in the night, in the fog.
Elizabeth slowed down and looked around. The fog was stealthily lifting and she saw she was just a few feet from the Silverado Canyon turnoff. She had no idea what she should to, where she should go. So she turned around and headed for home.
* *
“Peter wants you to call the minute you get home,” Gail said as Elizabeth walked in the door.
“Oh? Did something....”
“No. He said no. He just wants to hear your voice.”
“He wants to make sure that I’m still in one mental piece.” She dialed Peter’s number. “Hi. It’s me.”
“Elizabeth,” Peter said, concern in his voice, “Gail tells me you’re driving all over the place and....”
“And that I’m acting a little coo-coo? I guess it’s true. But the... whoever it is, has been visible to me two nights now. I won’t let go. No one else has any information. Do you?”
“No,” Peter answered candidly. “Absolutely nothing has gone on here.”
“So, whether I’m crazy or not, I’m still the only one with any sort of lead. I think I’m hanging on pretty well, given... everything.”
“I think so too, Elizabeth,” Peter said. “But please, please,” he went on, “don’t do anything to endanger yourself. If you don’t get a good night’s sleep tonight, you should let Gail or me go driving with you tomorrow. It’s only logical. You won’t help Amy if you get hurt. Or even if you’re at such a low energy level that you can’t function well.”
Peter was absolutely right. “Okay, I’ll try to be reasonable tomorrow.”
“Should I come over so we can talk about what’s been happening?”
“Thanks Peter, but, no, not right now. I’m exhausted. And I don’t want to diffuse the energy.”
“Okay. But I’m coming over tomorrow. Gail invited me for dinner.”
“Excellent! We’ll see you then.”
The next morning Gail and Elizabeth were sitting quietly at the breakfast table after a quiet night. Neither Tony nor the mystery person had telephoned.