The Coffin (Nightmare Hall) Page 6

  Shrugging, Mark lay back down, deciding that if Charlie wasn’t willing to share his troubles, Charlie’s roommate might as well catch another forty winks. Wednesday … first class at nine … no rush … early yet …

  Mark was asleep again in less than a minute.

  Charlie, feeling as if he had just endured the longest night of his life, went first to Lester. Hurrying across the chilly, gray campus, empty of all but a few hardy early-risers, he thought about Tanner’s note.

  I can’t stay in this house alone. Tanner had written that?

  It was her handwriting. He knew it well. They were constantly writing each other little notes, full of silly things: remarks about a class or teacher, the latest joke, plans for the evening.

  But why would Tanner write those words? She had never, not once, expressed any fear about having that house all to herself. Tanner wasn’t afraid of being alone. As far as he could tell, she wasn’t afraid of anything, not even her father, a cold fish if there ever was one. Charlie liked that about Tanner, that she wasn’t afraid. Not an ounce of paranoia in her anywhere. He thought that probably came from practically raising herself.

  So why would she suddenly decide she couldn’t handle living alone, and take off to join her mother in parts unknown?

  She wouldn’t. She just wouldn’t.

  The note was crazy. It made no sense.

  But he had gone to the house and rung that doorbell until he’d thought his finger would fall off. Had heard the bell pealing inside the house, loud and clear. No answer. Even after he’d finally noticed the note, suspended from the mailbox by a clothespin, flapping in the wind like a miniature bedsheet, he’d continued to jab at the bell.

  But Tanner hadn’t come running, that great smile on her face, apologizing for taking so long to answer because she’d been in the shower and hadn’t heard the bell.

  Even if, for some bizarre reason, Tanner had decided she really didn’t want to stay in the house alone that first night, she would never have gone off to join her mother. Tanner loved Salem, loved being at college. She wasn’t wild about living with Dr. Chill, but she loved school and campus and everything that went with it. So she wouldn’t have left. She would have moved in with Jodie and Sandy, or tried to get a dorm room of her own.

  And she would never, never have gone anywhere without calling him first. No way.

  The whole thing was nuts.

  Jodie and Sandy hadn’t heard from Tanner.

  Charlie’s rugged, handsome face fell when Sandy shook her head and said, “Haven’t heard a word, Charlie.” She asked to see the note, held so tightly and for so long in Charlie’s left hand, the edges were crumpled like used tissue paper. Sandy read it and then silently handed it to Jodie.

  “She wouldn’t do this,” Jodie announced flatly when her eyes had zoomed over the words. “She wouldn’t! It’s a joke, that’s all. Where did you find this?”

  He told them.

  “Well, someone else put it there,” Jodie declared. “Tanner didn’t.”

  “It’s her handwriting,” Charlie said wearily, hating to admit it.

  “Maybe she got scared, being alone,” Sandy offered. “That’s a big house, and the housekeeper doesn’t sleep over.”

  “The housekeeper!” Charlie cried, striding over to the telephone nestled on a bedside table amid papers and books and framed photographs. “The housekeeper will know if Tanner got home okay yesterday. And if she wasn’t willing to spend the night there alone.” About to pick up the receiver, he stopped, a blank look on his face. “Only I don’t know her name. Tanner always calls her ‘Silly.’ You guys know what her real name is?”

  They shook their heads. “But someone at the administration building probably would,” Jodie said. “If you called and said you needed to know the name of Dr. Leo’s housekeeper, they’d probably tell you. I think the faculty’s domestic staff is hired through Butler Hall, just like the maintenance staff is.”

  Charlie quickly dialed the main office at Butler Hall, but there was no answer.

  “Too early,” Jodie pointed out. “Listen, Charlie, why don’t you go back to the Sigma Chi house and sleep for an hour or so? You look terrible, and we can’t really do anything until you get that telephone number. You didn’t sleep at all last night, did you?”

  He didn’t answer. But the faint shadows under his eyes and the beard stubble on his face answered for him. Still, he stubbornly shook his head no. “How can I sleep?” he asked miserably.

  Jodie nodded. “Well, then, let’s go downstairs and get you some coffee, okay? And maybe an egg or two wouldn’t hurt. Then we’ll call Butler Hall again. By that time, someone should be there.”

  Charlie didn’t move away from the telephone.

  “Come on, Charlie,” Jodie persisted, pushing her glasses back up on her nose, something she did constantly when she was frustrated, “you know what Vince always says. When in doubt, eat. He’s right. It always works for me. And if you won’t eat anything, at least come have a cup of coffee. Our coffee here is guaranteed to keep you awake for at least the next twelve hours. That’s a promise.”

  That worked, because Charlie knew he was going to need something to keep him awake. He wouldn’t sleep again, he vowed silently, until he had answers to all of his questions.

  “Okay, I’ll go,” he said, “but you’d better be right about the coffee.”

  Vince and Philip were already seated at a rear table in the small cafeteria in Lester’s basement. Although Philip reacted to Tanner’s note with the same disbelief that Jodie had, Vince wasn’t as certain that Tanner hadn’t written it.

  “She didn’t like living with old Stiffneck,” he said, stirring his coffee with a pencil, “She never kept that a secret. So maybe she figured this was a good time to pack up and leave, since he wasn’t there to throw a fit and try to stop her.”

  “In the first place,” Jodie said, “I don’t think he would have tried to stop her. He would have stood in the doorway with that supercilious look on his face and said something like, ‘Well, if this is your choice, Tanner, you’re an adult and I can’t stop you from making it.’ He’d do that before he’d ever admit that he actually wanted her to stay. And in the second place, Tanner wouldn’t have gone anywhere without calling one of us first, agreed?”

  The doubtful expression on Vince’s long, narrow face remained. “She might not have had time to call. Or maybe she tried and your line was busy.”

  “You’re missing the point,” Charlie said quietly. “I don’t think for a minute that she was trying to call any of us, because I don’t think for a minute that she was leaving. Not the house, not campus, not us. She wouldn’t, that’s all. She just wouldn’t.” He sipped hot coffee for a minute, then put the mug down and added, “We’re just spinning our wheels here. I don’t know what’s going on, but I don’t like it.” He glanced down at his wristwatch. “I’m calling Butler Hall. I need that housekeeper’s name and address.”

  Vince glanced up from his scrambled eggs. “You mean Tanner’s housekeeper?”

  Charlie nodded.

  “Oh, it’s Sills. Mavis Sills. She lives in that new apartment complex right along the riverbank in Twin Falls. I think it’s River Street.”

  Charlie looked startled. “How do you know all that? I didn’t know it.”

  “A friend of Sills, Sunshine Mooney, is the housemother at Lindy’s sorority house.” Lindy was Vince’s current girlfriend. “Lindy says Sunshine talks about her friend Silly a lot: where they’re going on vacation together, how when Sunshine retires she’s going to move into Silly’s apartment complex, that kind of stuff. I picked up on the name ‘Silly’, thought it was funny, and that’s when Lindy told me it was Tanner’s housekeeper and her real name was Mavis Sills.” Vince grinned. “Now there’s a pair of names for you, Sunshine and Silly. Sounds like a comedy act, doesn’t it?”

  “There!” Sandy told Charlie emphatically, “now you don’t have to waste time calling Butler Hall. You can call the
housekeeper and find out why Tanner left.”

  “She didn’t leave!” Charlie, dark eyes blazing, fairly bit off the words. “How many times do I have to say it?”

  Chagrined, Sandy mumbled, “Sorry. I meant, you can ask her where Tanner is.”

  But there was no answer at the housekeeper’s apartment. Charlie let the phone ring a dozen times, refusing to give up until Jodie urged gently, “Charlie, give it up, she’s not there. Come on! We’ll try something else.”

  They were all clustered around one of the pay phones in Lester’s lobby. “Why don’t we just hike on over to Tanner’s?” Philip suggested. “Maybe the housekeeper is already there. That could be why she isn’t answering at her place, Charlie.”

  Charlie quickly dialed the Leo home. “If Silly is there, why isn’t she answering?” he asked a moment later when, again, there was no response to the insistent ringing.

  “She could still be on her way,” Sandy said.

  Giving up, Charlie hung up the phone.

  “Let’s go over there,” Jodie said eagerly. “Silly will be there by then, and Tanner could be there, too. Maybe she stayed with someone else last night, although you’d think she’d call her best friends first, wouldn’t you? But let’s face it, Tanner has lots of friends to choose from.”

  “Well, let’s just go find out,” Charlie said, and led the way out of the building.

  But, though they rang the front doorbell at Tanner’s house, then went around to the back and pounded on the back door, and then circled the house on the outside, going from room to room and rapping on the outside of every window they could reach, the big brick house showed no signs of life.

  It was as still, as silent, as death.

  Chapter 9

  TANNER, IMPRISONED IN THE tall, dark narrow box, was completely unaware that morning of Charlie’s arrival. She couldn’t see the surveillance screens, couldn’t hear the insistent doorbell or the pounding on wood or rapping on glass. Her friends came and went without her knowledge.

  Tanner was aware only of the narrow confines of her tiny cell. Because the hastily constructed booth was not soundproof like the music room, she did hear her captor leave, heard him close and lock the door.

  Before she’d been angry, upset, and yes, afraid. Now she was desperate. There was barely enough room in the box to lift her arms from her sides, let alone turn around and face front. Even if she did manage to turn around, the door was barred against her. Hadn’t she heard, very clearly, the thick chunk of wood being twisted into place? There was no mistaking that sound. She was locked into this terrible place, like an animal in a cage. Worse. Cages had bars, and you could see out.

  Although there was air inside what Tanner had come to think of as “the coffin,” she knew it would quickly grow stale. It was already stuffy. Beads of sweat began to gather on her forehead, clinging to her hair. The smell of fresh-cut lumber was giving her a headache.

  It was dark, but there were tiny pinpricks of light slipping in between narrow gaps in the boards. There were more, larger gaps at the corners, where the walls had been joined.

  Tanner tried to peer through one of the small cracks, but could see only an edge of the fireplace mantel, which did her no good at all.

  She managed to turn around, facing the front of her narrow cell. She pushed against the door. Then pushed again, harder this time. Her breath came in shallow gasps. She wished that she were wearing heavy work boots so she could kick at the door. Bare feet were useless.

  She reached out to press against the walls on either side of her, as if by doing so, she could push them farther away, giving her more room. She was suddenly desperate for more room. The lack of space made her feel as if she were being squeezed like an accordion.

  It was hopeless. She wasn’t going to get out of here on her own. Hastily put together or not, the tall, narrow box made an effective prison.

  What was he doing to her? And why was he doing it?

  Her palms still pressing against the side walls, her back against the rear wall, Tanner sank slowly to the floor, where she had to bend her knees for lack of room.

  She placed her hands in her lap and let her chin rest on her chest. Maybe none of this was really happening. It couldn’t be real. How could it?

  She stared into the darkness, her eyes widening with hope. Maybe it wasn’t real. She couldn’t be sure exactly when, but at some point after she’d arrived home, maybe she’d fallen asleep. Maybe … maybe when she went upstairs to look for Silly.

  Yes … yes! That had to be it. Of course! She remembered standing in the middle of her bedroom when she hadn’t been able to find Silly. That must have been when she’d gone over to lie down on her bed, probably intending to just rest for a minute. And she’d fallen sound asleep instead.

  Which made everything after that a dream. A horrible, creepy nightmare but still, not real! So she wasn’t actually sitting in this narrow, airless box. She was lying on her bed upstairs, sound asleep. Silly was somewhere in the house or the backyard and there was no intruder who looked like something risen from the grave.

  Feeling much better, Tanner leaned against the back wall of the coffin and closed her eyes, deciding that the best thing to do was wait patiently for the dream to be over. Not that she had a choice.

  She didn’t hear the music room door open. Her first awareness that she was no longer alone came when a sudden burst of light told her the door to the coffin had been yanked open.

  Shielding her eyes against the light, Tanner raised her head.

  The repulsive gray mask stared down at her. “Well, how do you like it? Not much fun, is it? But then, it’s not supposed to be. It’s actually been proven very effective in disciplining those wild, unruly creatures whom society chooses to call ‘difficult’ or ‘wayward.’ Wayward youth, ah, what an expression. Implies that they’re going in the wrong direction, right?” He laughed bitterly. “Like the people in charge actually know what the right direction is! That hasn’t been my experience, I can tell you.”

  Tanner blinked. It hadn’t been a dream, after all? Disappointment washed over her, painful as an acid bath.

  “Yes, ma’am,” he continued, one hand holding the door open, “this is what we call ‘The Booth.’ Looks kind of like a coffin, doesn’t it? This is where people are sent when they break a rule, no matter how slight the infraction. Maybe they mouth off, or resort to a sharp kick or a punch to settle a dispute, or maybe they don’t make their bed one morning because they’re in a hurry, or they don’t hang up their clothes exactly the right way. So they have to go into The Booth.”

  “What are you talking about?” Tanner cried, struggling awkwardly to her feet. Her legs were cramped, and she had to stamp her bare feet on the wooden floor to restore circulation.

  “Never mind. That’s in the past. For me, anyway. Look, you said you were hungry,” he said flatly. “You can come out and eat. But if you give me any trouble at all, you’ll be back in The Booth so fast, your head will spin. And you’ll stay there until your hair turns gray. Come on out of there.”

  Tanner, her legs stiff, stepped out.

  “You’re lucky you’re alone in the house,” he said. “If there were lots of people here, they’d all hammer on The Booth when they walked by, and kick at it and yell things, so you’d never be able to sleep, even though that’s what you want to do more than anything, to make the time go faster.”

  Tanner was wallowing in the bitter truth that none of this was a dream. No nightmare, after all. She hadn’t fallen asleep on her bed upstairs. It had all happened, every last horrible second of it. And it was still happening. “It was bad enough without any noise,” she said. She was so glad to be out of that horrible box, she almost felt grateful to him. She had to remind herself that he was the one who had put her in there in the first place.

  Her teeth felt gritty, her hair was a mass of tangles, and she yearned desperately for a shower and clean clothes. Maybe, if she did everything he told her to, she could talk him
into letting her go upstairs alone for half an hour.

  How long was he planning on holding her here? Where was Silly? And why hadn’t Charlie come back, looking for her?

  “You can call me Sigmund,” her jailer said abruptly, as if she’d asked his name. “Just Sigmund.”

  “Sigmund?” When she was very young, her mother had called her father that when she was mad at him. Her voice had been sharp and sarcastic. “As in Freud?” Tanner asked just as sharply.

  “As in Sigmund.” He took her elbow, gripping it firmly, and led her out of the music room and down the hall to the empty kitchen.

  I don’t want to call him anything, Tanner thought, glancing quickly around the kitchen for some sign of Silly, and finding none. I don’t want him here long enough to have to give him a name.

  If she could only get a grip on what was happening. But it was all so unbelievable, so Twilight-Zonish. She was trapped inside some crazy video game, except that someone else had the controls.

  “You now have four minutes,” he said. “Why don’t you have a nice bowl of ice cream?”

  Out of the music room for the first time, Tanner was much more interested in escape than in food, although her stomach was pleading otherwise. This could be her only chance to get away.

  If she went with him to the freezer for ice cream, if she maneuvered her position on the porch cleverly enough, she just might be able to race out the back door and scream for help before he could grab her.

  It was worth a try. She had to get away from him. Out of this house and away from him.

  “Ice cream sounds good,” she agreed, and went to the cupboard to get a bowl, then to the silverware drawer for a spoon and a metal scoop.

  “I want some, too,” he said, sounding offended, and followed her steps to collect his own bowl and spoon. “It’s your favorite, strawberry ripple.”

  Tanner paused halfway between the sink and the kitchen table. “How do you know?” she asked, conscious of a new uneasiness beginning to slide up her spine.

  “What?”