Phantoms

Tal closed the door behind the lawyer. “Bryce, do you know Dr. Jennifer Paige?”

“She set up practice in Snowfield sometime back.”

“Yeah. But what kind of person would you say she is?”

“I've never met her. I heard she's a fine doctor, though. And folks up in those little mountain towns are glad they don't have to drive all the way in to Santa Mira for a doctor any more.”

“I've never met her either. I was just wondering if maybe you'd heard anything about… about whether she drinks. I mean… booze.”

“No, I haven't heard any such thing. Why? What's going on?”

“She called a couple of minutes ago. She says there's been a disaster up in Snowfield.”

“Disaster? What's she mean?”

“Well, she says she doesn't know.”

Bryce blinked. “Did she sound hysterical?”

“Frightened, yeah. But not hysterical. She doesn't want to say much of anything to anyone but you. She's on line three right now.”

Bryce reached for the phone.

“One more thing,” Tal said, worry lines creasing his forehead.

Bryce paused, hand on the receiver.

Tal said, “She did tell me one thing, but it doesn't make sense. She said…”

“Yes?”

“She said that everyone's dead up there. Everyone in Snowfield. She said she and her sister are the only ones alive.”

Chapter 10 Sisters and Cops

Jenny and Lisa left the Oxley house the same way they had entered: through the window.

The night was growing colder. The wind had risen once more.

They walked back to Jenny's house at the top of Skyline Road and got jackets to ward off the chill.

Then they went downhill again to the sheriff's substation. A wooden bench was bolted to the cobblestones by the curb in front of the town jail, and they sat waiting for help from Santa Mira.

“How long will it take them to get here?” Lisa asked.

“Well, Santa Mira is more than thirty miles away, over some pretty twisty roads. And they've got to take some unusual precautions.” Jenny looked at her wristwatch. “I guess they'll be here in another forty-five minutes. An hour at most—”

“Jeez.”

“It's not so long, honey.”

The girl pulled up the collar of her fleece-lined, dinim jacket. “Jenny, when the phone rang at the Oxley place and you picked it up…”

“Yes?”

“Who was calling?”

“No one.”

“What did you hear?”

“Nothing,” Jenny lied.

“From the look on your face, I thought someone was threatening you or something.”

“Well, I was upset, of course. When it rang, I thought the phones were working again, but when I picked it up and it was only another dead line, I felt… finished. That was all.”

“Then you got a dial tone?”

“Yes.”

She probably doesn't believe me, Jenny thought. She thinks I'm trying to protect her from something. And, of course, I am. How can I explain the feeling that something evil was on that phone with me? I can't even begin to understand it myself. Who or what was on that telephone? Why did he — or it finally let me have a dial tone?

A scrap of paper blew along the street. Nothing else moved.

A thin rag of cloud passed over one corner of the moon.

After a while, Lisa said, “Jenny, in case something happens to me tonight”

“Nothing's going to happen to you, honey.”

“But in case something does happen to me tonight,” Lisa insisted, “I want you to know that I… well… I really am… proud of you.”

Jenny put an arm around her sister's shoulders, and they moved even closer together. “Sis, I'm sorry that we never had much time together over the years.”

“You got home as often as you could,” Lisa said, “I know it wasn't easy. I must've read a couple of dozen books about what a person has to go through to become a doctor. I always knew there was a lot on your shoulders, a lot you had to worry about.”

Surprised, Jenny said, “Well, I still could've gotten home more often.”

She had stayed away from home on some occasions because she had not been able to cope with the accusation in her mother's sad eyes, an accusation which was even more powerful and affecting because it was never bluntly put into words: You killed your father, Jenny; you broke his heart, and that killed him.

Lisa said, “And Mom was always so proud of you, too.”

That statement not only surprised Jenny: It rocked her.

“Mom was always telling people about her daughter the doctor.” Lisa smiled, remembering. “I think there were times her friends were ready to throw her out of her bridge club if she said just one more word about your scholarships or your good grades.”

Jenny blinked. “Are you serious?”

“Of course, I'm serious.”

“But didn't Mom…”

“Didn't she what?” Lisa asked.

“Well… didn't she ever say anything about… about Dad? He died twelve years ago.”

“Jeez, I know that. He died when I was two and a half” Lisa frowned. “But what're you asking about?”

“You mean you never heard Mom blame, me?”

“Blames you for what?”

Before Jenny could respond, Snowfield's graveyard tranquillity was snuffed out. All the lights went off.

Three patrol cars set out from Santa Mira, beaded into the night-enshrouded hills, toward the high, moon- bathed slopes of the Snowfield, their red emergency lights flashing.

Tal Whitman drove the car at the head of the speeding procession, and Sheriff Hammond sat beside him. Gordy Brogan was in the back seat with another deputy, Jake Johnson.

Gordy was scared.

He knew his fear wasn't visible, and he was thankful for that. In fact, he looked as if he didn't know how to be afraid. He was tall, large-boned, slab-muscled. His hands were strong and as large as the hands of a professional basketball player; he looked capable of slam-dunking anyone who gave him trouble. He knew that his face was handsome enough; women had told him so. But it was also a rather rough- looking face, dark. His lips were thin, giving his mouth a cruel aspect. Jake Johnson had said it best: Gordy, when you frown, you look like a man who eats live chickens for breakfast.

But in spite of his fierce appearance, Gordy Brogan was scared. It wasn't the prospect of disease or poison that occasioned fear in Gordy. The sheriff had said that there were indications that the people in Snowfield had been killed not by germs or by toxic substances but by other people. Gordy was afraid that he would have to use his gun for the first time since he had become a deputy, eighteen months ago; he was