Halloween (13 page)

At length the girl uttered something about it having been the wind and closed the door. He could still hear the muffled baritone of the dog. He remained pinned to the wall, waiting for the barking to die down, but it went on ceaselessly. The dog knew he was there.

Suddenly the kitchen door opened again. "Lindsey," he heard the girl say, "Lester's driving me crazy. I'm going to let him out, okay?" An instant later the dog roared out of the house, clamoring and pacing the yard in a jerky search pattern as his nose picked up the confusing scents of the intruder's path. He crouched beside a rhododendron bush, braced for the leap he knew would come.

And come it did. The dog seemed to find the fresh scent and make his move in one fluid motion, emitting a chilling snarl as it arched through the air with bared fangs focused on the man's arms. But the man was prepared. Displaying a quickness and strength that some might have called supernatural, he dodged the charge and grabbed the dog from behind, clamping its jaws shut with one forearm and crushing its body to his chest with the other. The dog snarled and dug at his arms with the claws of its hind legs, but with its fangs ineffective it could do no serious harm. He clutched the dog tighter, his cablelike forearm closing its windpipe, his other arm pressing its spine against his ironlike ribs until he heard the satisfying crunch of shattering vertebrae. The dog emitted shrill squeals that subsided into puppyish whimpers as the life drained out of it. Its hind legs clawed feebly and futilely at his arms, then twitched several seconds more before going completely limp.

He held it a minute longer, then, certain it was dead, he dropped it into the rhododendron bush like a sackful of meat.

"Lester? Lester!" Annie's voice filled the night and was joined by the reedy voice of the little girl.

"What do you suppose happened to him?" the little one asked.

"I suppose he found a hot date, the lucky dog."

"What's a hot date, Annie?" he heard the kid ask as the doors closed again. He did not hear Annie's answer.

"Where's your laundry room?" Annie asked. She'd donned one of Mrs. Wallace's robes and stood before Lindsey, who was propped in a sofa before the television set, eyes fixed hypnotically on the opening credits of
The Thing
.

"Lindsey, did you hear me?"

The child was in a video trance.

"Earth to Lindsey, Earth to Lindsey, do you read me?" She stepped in front of the child, blocking her view of the set.

"Huh?"

"Where's your washing machine?"

"Outside."

"Outside," Annie mused. "I see. And I guess the dryer is in a tree."

"No, they're both outside in the little house in the yard."

"Why, may I ask?"

"Mommy didn't like the noise."

"Uh-huh. And she liked the inconvenience, I suppose?"

The kid shrugged her shoulders and pushed Annie out of the way. "I can't see the movie."

"I'm teddibIy teddibly soddy," Annie said in her best British accent. "Okay, I'm going to carry this stuff out to the laundry house or whatever you call it. Will you be all right alone?"

The child gazed at the television set, unseeing and unhearing except for what was emitted from the flickering tube.

"Jeez," said Annie, shaking her head. "And I thought religion was the opiate of the people." She stepped between Lindsey and the television set again. "I'll be back in five minutes after I put this in the washer, okay?"

"Uh," Lindsey said, straining to see the program around Annie's legs.

"I can't believe this," Annie muttered aloud as she crossed the flagstones to the little cottage in the backyard. A gust of wind whipped through the folds of her thin robe and blew it open. Annie's "Goddamn it!" echoed across the yard.

Freeing one hand from the load of laundry and the box of soap, she opened the door and stepped inside, dropping everything on the flat top of the dryer. She reached for the light switch that should have been placed just inside the door, but the Wallace family seemed to function on a logic all its own, for there was no switch there. "Terrific."

The door slammed shut.

Annie's heart leaped through her ribcage. She put her shoulder to it and with difficulty managed to open it, then turned her back to resume her search for the light switch. As she did, a face loomed outside the door, its rubbery features made more ghastly by the moonlight that made its sunken eyes and large nostrils absolutely black. The intruder's hand reached for the doorknob as he stared at the robed figure blindly groping for the light switch. Suddenly she found it and flicked the lights on. He jumped back into the cover of darkness, crunching the brittle dead leaves of another rhododendron.

The girl's head peered out. "Hello?" Silence. "Who's there?" More silence. "Paul? Is this one of your cheap tricks?" Silence again, save the soughing of the wind through the leaves of the trees. "I guess not," she said, disappointed. "No tricks for Annie tonight." She studied the dials on the washer, talking to herself to keep her jittery nerves under control. "Let's see, place the clothes inside, that I can do pretty well. Add soap or detergent, got it. Add fabric softener or bluing in reservoir where indicated, fuck that. Close door, turn left-hand dial to cold, warm, or hot, I think I'll do warm to melt the butter. Flip switch to small, medium, or large load, let's call it small. Jesus, they ought to give a course in laundry at school. Turn right-hand dial to wash, select number of minutes. Well, Annie, how does eight minutes sound to you. Wonderful. Pull dial out and get the fuck out of there."

The washing machine kicked into action as water poured into the drum.

Slam!

A tremendous gust of wind blew the door shut with window-rattling force. Annie rushed to the door and pulled the knob. The door didn't budge. She shook the door with adrenaline-triggered might, but even that didn't budge it. "Lindsey!
Lindsey!
Come out here! Sure she'll come out here. She wouldn't pull away from the television set if a nuclear missile scored a direct hit outside her house. Lindsey, Goddamn it, I'm stuck in the laundry!" She pounded the glass panes of the door, tempted to smash them, but decided instead to try the window over the dryer and spare herself the hassle of explaining and repaying the Wallaces for the damage.

She boosted herself up on top of the dryer and opened the window. It was small and she gauged its width against the size of her hips and decided it was going to be a near thing. But what else could she do?

She tried going out legs first, but her hips jammed and she decided they'd slide out better if she went out head first. As she pulled her breasts through the window frame she heard a phone ringing in the main house. "Oh, great," she moaned.

She also heard a sound in the hedges. It was not the wind. Her pelvis jerked forward in fright and her hips wedged tightly in the window frame. She heard a second sound, louder. Something was lurking in the bushes around the corner of the little house. It was closing in on her. "Lindsey! Lindsey! Oh God,
Lindsey
. . ."

"Annie?" Lindsey's voice tinkled on the windy night air. The thing in the bushes, whatever it was, retreated into the shadows as the little girl emerged from the darkness around the main house. "Annie, what are you doing?"

"What am I doing? I'm trying to widen this window with my hips, that's what I'm doing."

"It looks like you're stuck."

"I . . ." Annie drew a deep breath and overcame her fury. "Look, just try to open the door. Then pull me back inside, okay?"

"Okay."

Annie heard the rattling of the glass panes as Lindsey shook the door unsuccessfully. Then apparently the child put all of her strength into the effort, and Annie heard the satisfying surrender of the door and felt the cold night air on her feet. The next thing she knew, a pair of little hands was tugging her legs, and Annie got the leverage to twist her hips out of the window frame. She pulled her torso back into the laundry room and jumped down.

"Thank you, Lindsey. What made you come out here?"

"It was a commercial. And Paul called you. He's waiting on the phone."

"Paul? Paul is on the phone? Oh, God. Uh, Lindsey, run back up there and tell him I'll be right with him. And don't say anything about my getting stuck in here, okay?"

"Okay." Lindsey tramped down the flagstone path while Annie hastily transferred the wet laundry to the dryer, setting it for a half hour. Then she gathered her robe around her and raced across the yard, arriving just in time to hear Lindsey say into the phone, "She was stuck in the window, she'll be right here." She put the phone down and returned to her precious horror program.

"Hello, Paul."

"Hi, Annie. Listen, next time you want to leave the house, try this new invention I just heard about, much better than windows. It's called a door."

"All right, cut it out. I got stuck because your wonderful invention the door slammed behind me and I couldn't get it open. It can happen to anyone."

"Anyone with
your
figure."

"Yeah, well, I've seen you stuck in other positions!"

"Okay, okay. Now, here's the good news. My folks accepted a last-minute invitation to a party. They've just left."

"Well, to borrow a phrase from Linda, that's totally fantastic. Why don't you just walk over?"

"I have to stick around here. My parents said they'd call in just to check up on me. Can you believe that? So how about you coming here?"

"How can I? I'm sitting for Lindsey, remember?''

"Yeah." There was a pause as Paul thought it through. "Maybe you could drop Lindsey off with Laurie. She's sitting right across the street, right?"

"Not a bad idea. But my clothes are in the wash. I can't come now."

"Come without them."

"Shut up, jerk. I've got a robe on. That's all you think about."

"And you don't?"

"That's not true. I think about lots of things." A sly grin brightened her face. "Why don't we not stand here talking about them and get down to doing them? All right, See you in a few minutes." She hung up the phone and stood considering the matter. Then the scheme dropped into place, and she snapped her fingers.

Lindsey was watching the television set with both hands clamped over her eyes. "What are you doing?"

"I'm scared," the child said.

"Then why are you sitting here with the lights off?"

"I don't know."

"Well, come on, get your coat."

"My coat? Where are we going?"

"Across the street, to Tommy Doyle's."

"I don't like Tommy Doyle."

"That's tough. Tonight you're going to like Tommy Doyle, because tonight I'm going to love Paul."

"Do I have to?"

"Look, Lindsey, I thought we understood each other."

"Can you find out if Tommy is watching the same movie?"

"He will be. All you little masochists are watching the same movie."

"Oh, all right," the child finally said with obvious reluctance. "At least wait till the commercial.''

Annie went to the coat closet and got Lindsey's parka and borrowed Mrs. Wallace's tweed coat. They waited for the next commercial, then Annie hustled the kid out the door, and they ran across the street.

In the tangle of a wisteria vine at the side of the Wallace's porch, the prowler stood, holding his knife. He watched the two girls cross the street and stand in front of the door of the house where the other girl was staying. He didn't risk going across yet, so he stood his ground, waiting to see what they did, feeling a throbbing between his legs and a painful pounding in his temples. The voice was getting louder. He had come close a few minutes ago, when the girl was stuck in the window, but the child had foiled it at the last second.

That was all right. He had all night. Opportunity would present itself again . . .

Annie rang the doorbell for the third time. At last the door opened a crack and Annie stepped back as the blade of a wicked-looking knife appeared in the door. "Who is it?" That was Laurie's voice, behind the knife.

"It's me, fool."

"Oh, Annie, thank God. I've been so jumpy." Laurie opened the door wide, lowering the blade, which glistened with orange pulp. Beside her stood Tommy Doyle.

"We're making a jack-o'-lantern," Tommy said to Lindsey.

"I want to watch TV," Lindsey said, zipping past the boy and into the television room.

Laurie looked at her friend's bizarre get-up, a brown tweed coat over a long blue robe. "Fancy," Laurie said.

"This has definitely not been my night," Annie replied, following her into the kitchen. "My clothes are in the wash, I spilled butter down the front of me, I got stuck in a window . . ."

"I'm glad you're here, because I've been thinking it over, and I have something I want you to do. I want you to call up Ben Tramer right now and tell him you were just fooling around."

"I can't."

"Yes, you can." Laurie gazed at her earnestly, her breast heaving with agitation.

"He went out drinking with Mike Godfrey, so he won't be back until late. You'll have to call him tomorrow; that's all there is to it. Besides, I'm on my way over to Paul's."

"Huh? Wait a minute."

"Tell you what. If you'll watch Lindsey, I'll
consider
talking to Ben Tramer in the morning."

Laurie shook her head in a combination of admiration and exasperation. "You've got a deal." They slapped palms.

"Hey, I thought Paul was grounded," Laurie remembered.

"He was. But his parents are going out. Listen, I'll call you in an hour or so." And before Laurie could say anything else, Annie rushed out the door.

She trotted across the street, the hem of her robe trailing after her like the gown of some regal bride. She went directly to the backyard and opened the door of the laundry room. This time she was smart, leaving a box of soap powder inside the door frame so that the door couldn't slam shut again. "Oh, Paul, I give you all," she sang, flinging open the door of the dryer. She grinned. The clothes weren't fluffy dry, exactly, but they were dry.