Quoth the Raven(86)

Idiot.

She started to pick the papers up and put them in a single pile again—that was beginning to feel like all she had done with this day, stacking papers and unstacking them—and as she did she felt the phone next to her arm begin to hum. The phone system was new and didn’t work very well. Even the most rudimentary of the equipment seemed to come on line with an anticipatory growl, like a malicious computer. Alice raised her hand over the receiver and waited. Somewhere at the back of her head, she was counting mentally to three without really knowing she was doing it. There was something about the hum of the phone that was like the ash-gray of the air outside. It boded ill.

Idiot, Alice thought again.

The phone rang and she picked up, saying what she always said, thinking she must sound tired or out of sorts or both. God only knew, she felt both.

“Dr. Alice Elkinson here.”

There was a pause on the other end of the line and then a cough and then another pause. The second pause went on so long, Alice began to wonder if she had caught an obscene caller in the act. There were boys on campus who did that sort of thing, phoned at random and hoped to get a girl’s voice. All the phone numbers on campus were on the same exchange and nothing else in the area was. Alice had heard the talk at Faculty Senate meetings: the boy, the voice, the pause, the realization at the other end of the line that this was a mistake, the faculty was too quick to call security. Then there would be a click and a dial tone. It was the sort of thing that made Alice Elkinson’s skin crawl.

Idiot, she told herself, yet again, yet again, and the word echoed through her skull like a Ping-Pong ball in a cloud chamber.

She was just making up her mind to hang up when another cough came, and then a gargling sound that was surely someone clearing his throat, and then a voice,

“Dr. Elkinson? Dr. Elkinson, this is Chessey Flint.”

Alice had been so sure that the next thing she was going to do was slam the receiver into the cradle, she had to make a conscious effort to freeze her arm.

“Chessey?” she said. “Chessey, are you all right?”

Another pause, another cough, another gargle. Something seemed to be going on in the background: cars passing, small animals creeping out to greet the approaching dark. How could she possibly know something like that? Halloween must be getting to her.

“Chessey?” Alice said again.

“Yes,” Chessey said. “Yes. Dr. Elkinson. I’m here. I’m sorry.”

“What’s wrong?”

What’s wrong? Alice wasn’t sure, but she thought she heard Chessey laugh, not a good laugh, low and bitter.

“Nothing’s wrong,” Chessey said, “not now.”

“Then what is it?”

Pause, cough, gargle. Pause, cough, gargle. Pause, cough, gargle. It was maddening.

“Listen,” Chessey said, “Dr. Elkinson? I’m out here on the Boardman Road. On the way to Hillman’s Rock. Do you know where that is?”

“Yes, Chessey, of course, I know I—”

“I thought you would, because of the hiking. Dr. Elkinson, something’s happened—”

“What?”

“To me.”

Halloween, Alice Elkinson thought, closing her eyes. What was Chessey Flint doing out on Boardman Road?

“Chessey, listen to me, are you alone?”

“I am now.”

“What does that mean, you are now?”

“I’m bleeding, Dr. Elkinson. I’m sitting in this phone booth and I’m still bleeding and I don’t know what to do. I have to get out of here—”

“No,” Alice said. “Don’t get out of there. I’ll come with the car. Where on the Boardman Road?”

“At a gas station.”

There were two dozen gas stations on the Boardman Road. The road weaved in and out among the rising hills. Sometimes it seemed to be supported by gas stations. It was the longest and worst possible route to Hillman’s Rock. It was ten uninterrupted miles of curves and technological blight.

Alice was already reaching for her coat, bending over nearly backward, stretching until she thought it was going to break. The phone cord was short and the coat was all the way across the room, on the rack next to the door. Alice got hold of the coat and yanked it toward her, not really caring that the rack fell over in the process, hitting the floor with the hard ripping sound of splintering wood.

“Chessey, stay where you are. Don’t move. Do you understand me?”

“I have to move,” Chessey said. “I’m going to faint.”

“Chessey—”

But there was nothing at the other end of the line, nothing at all. Alice thought about running down the hall to one of the other offices and calling 911. With the phone line open like this, somebody might be able to trace the call. In the meantime, she could get in her car and start the search herself. Then she heard the one sound she hadn’t wanted to hear, had been afraid to hear ever since Chessey had said that she “had” to get out of there. Somebody hung the phone up.