The Box: Uncanny Stories Read online

  “Pardon me,” she said.

  The man kept moving. Jean hurried after him and touched his arm, her fingers twitching at the feel of the hot, damp cloth.

  “Excuse me,” she said.

  The man turned and looked at her with dull eyes. His breath made her stomach turn.

  “Did you see my—my husband in there?”

  “Huh?”

  Her hands closed into fists at her sides.

  “Was my husband in the washroom?”

  He looked at her a moment as if he didn’t understand her. Then he said, “No, ma’am,” and turned away.

  It was very hot in there, but Jean felt as if she’d suddenly been submerged in a pool of ice water. She stood numbly watching the man stumble back to his booth.

  Then she found herself hurrying for the counter, for the man who sat drinking from his water-beaded bottle of beer.

  He put down the bottle and turned to face her as she came up.

  “Pardon me, but did you see my husband in the washroom before?”

  “Your husband?”

  She bit her lower lip. “Yes, my husband. You saw him when we came in. Wasn’t he in the washroom when you were there?”

  “I don’t recollect as he was, ma’am.”

  “You mean you didn’t see him in there?”

  “I don’t recollect seein’ him, ma’am.”

  “Oh this—this is ridiculous,” she burst out in angry fright. “He must have been in there.”

  For a moment they stood looking at each other. The man didn’t speak; his face was blank.

  “You’re—sure?” she asked.

  “Ma’am, I got no reason to lie to you.”

  “All right. Thank you.”

  She sat stiffly at the counter staring at the two sandwiches and milk shakes, her mind in desperate search of a solution. It was Bob—he was playing a joke on her. But he wasn’t in the habit of playing jokes on her and this was certainly no place to start. Yet he must have. There must be another door to the washroom and—

  Of course. It wasn’t a joke. Bob hadn’t gone into the washroom at all. He’d just decided that she was right; the place was awful and he’d gone out to the car to wait for her.

  She felt like a fool as she hurried toward the door. The man might have told her that Bob had gone out. Wait till she told Bob what she’d done. It was really funny how a person could get upset over nothing.

  As she pulled open the screen door she wondered if Bob had paid for what they’d ordered. He must have. At least the man didn’t call after her as she went out.

  She moved into the sunlight and started toward the car, almost closing her eyes completely to shut out the glare on the windshield. She smiled to herself thinking about her foolish worrying.

  “Bob, wait till I—”

  Unreasoning dread pressed her insides into a tight knot. She stood in the pounding heat and stared into the empty car. She felt a scream pushing up in her throat. “Bob—”

  She started running around the side of the cafe looking for the other entrance. Maybe the washroom was too dirty; maybe Bob had gone out a side door and couldn’t find his way around the shed that was attached to the cafe.

  She tried to look through one of the shed’s windows, but it was covered with tar paper on the inside. She ran around to the back of the cafe and looked out across the wide, empty desert. Then she turned back and looked for footprints, but the ground was as hard as baked enamel. A whimper started in her throat and she knew that in a few seconds she was going to start crying.

  “Bob,” she murmured. “Bob, where—?”

  In the stillness she heard the front screen door slap in its frame. Abruptly she started running up the side of the cafe building, heart hammering excitedly. Stifling heat waves broke over her as she ran.

  At the edge of the building she stopped suddenly.

  The man she’d spoken to at the counter was looking into the car. He was a small man in his forties, wearing a spotted fedora and a striped, green shirt. Black suspenders held up his dark, grease-spotted pants. Like the other man he wore high-top shoes.

  She moved one step and her sandal scuffed on the dry ground. The man looked over at her suddenly, his face lean and bearded. His eyes were a pale blue that shone like milk spots in the leathery tan of his face.

  The man smiled casually. “Thought I’d see if your husband was waitin’ on you in your car,” he said. He touched the brim of his hat and started back into the cafe.

  “Are you—” Jean started, then broke off as the man turned.

  “Ma’am?”

  “Are you sure he wasn’t in the washroom?”

  “Wasn’t no one in there when I went in,” he said.

  She stood shivering in the sun as the man went into the cafe and the screen door flapped closed. She could feel mindless dread filling her like ice water.

  Then she caught herself. There had to be an explanation. Things like this just didn’t happen.

  She moved firmly across the cafe floor and stopped before the counter. The man in the white ducks looked up from his paper.

  “Would you please check the washroom?” she asked.

  “The washroom?”

  Anger tightened her.

  “Yes, the washroom,” she said. “I know my husband is in there.”

  “Ma’am, wasn’t no one in there,” said the man in the fedora.

  “I’m sorry,” she said tightly, refusing to allow his words. “My husband didn’t just disappear.”

  The two men made her nervous with their silent stares.

  “Well, are you going to look there?” she said, unable to control the break in her voice.

  The man in the white ducks glanced at the man with the fedora and something twitched his mouth. Jean felt her hands jerk into angry fists. Then he moved down the length of the counter and she followed.

  He turned the porcelain knob and held open the spring-hinged door. Jean held her breath as she moved closer to look.

  The washroom was empty.

  “Are you satisfied?” the man said. He let the door swing shut.

  “Wait,” she said. “Let me look again.”

  The man pressed his mouth into a line.

  “Didn’t you see it was empty?” he said.

  “I said I want to look again.”

  “Lady, I’m tellin’ ya—”

  Jean pushed at the door suddenly and it banged against the washroom wall.

  “There!” she said. “There’s a door there!”

  She pointed to a door in the far wall of the washroom.

  “That door’s been locked for years, lady,” the man said.

  “It doesn’t open?”

  “Ain’t got no reason to open it.”

  “It must open,” Jean said. “My husband went in there and he didn’t come out this door. And he didn’t disappear!”

  The man looked at her sullenly without speaking.

  “What’s on the other side of the door?” she asked.

  “Nothing.”

  “Does it open on the outside?”

  The man didn’t answer.

  “Does it?!”

  “It opens on a shed, lady, a shed no one’s used for years,” the man said angrily.

  She stepped forward and gripped the knob of the door.

  “I told you it didn’t open.” The man’s voice was rising more.

  “Ma’am?” Behind her Jean heard the cajoling voice of the man in the fedora and green shirt. “Ain’t nothin’ in that shed but old trash, ma’am. You want, I’ll show it to you.”

  The way he said it, Jean suddenly realized that she was alone. Nobody she knew knew where she was; there was no way of checking if—

  She moved out of the washroom quickly.

  “Excuse me,” she said as she walked by the man in the fedora, “I want to make a call first.”

  She walked stiffly to the wall phone, shuddering as she thought of them coming after her. She picked up the ear piece. There was no di
al tone. She waited a moment, then tensed herself and turned to face the two watching men.

  “Does—does it work?”

  “Who ya call—” started the man in the white ducks, but the other man interrupted.

  “You gotta crank it, ma’am,” he said slowly. Jean noticed the other man glaring at him suddenly, and when she turned back to the phone, she heard their voices whispering heatedly.

  She turned the crank with shaking fingers. What if they come at me? The thought wouldn’t leave her.

  “Yes?” a thin voice asked over the phone.

  Jean swallowed. “Would you get me the marshal, please?” she asked.

  “Marshal?”

  “Yes, the—”

  She lowered her voice suddenly, hoping the men wouldn’t hear her. “The marshal,” she repeated.

  “There’s no marshal, ma’am.”

  She felt close to screaming. “Who do I call?”

  “You might want the sheriff, ma’am,” the operator said.

  Jean closed her eyes and ran her tongue over dry lips. “The sheriff then,” she said.

  There was a sputtering sound over the phone, a series of dull buzzes and then the sound of a receiver being lifted.

  “Sheriff’s office,” said a voice.

  “Sheriff, would you please come out to—”

  “One second. I’ll get the sheriff.”

  Jean’s stomach muscles pulled in and her throat became taut. As she waited, she felt the eyes of the two men on her. She heard one of them move and her shoulders twitched spasmodically.

  “Sheriff speaking.”

  “Sheriff, would you please come out to the—”

  Her lips trembled as she realized suddenly that she didn’t know the name of the cafe. She turned nervously and her heartbeat lurched when she saw the men looking at her coldly.

  “What’s the name of the cafe?”

  “Why do you want to know?” asked the man in the white ducks.

  He isn’t going to tell me, she thought. He’s going to make me go out to look at the sign so that he can—

  “Are you going to—” she started to say, then turned quickly as the sheriff said, “Hello?”

  “Please don’t hang up,” she said hurriedly. “I’m in a cafe on the edge of the town near the desert. On the western edge of town, I mean. I came here with my husband and now he’s gone. He—just disappeared.”

  The sound of her own words made her shudder.

  “You at the Blue Eagle?” the sheriff asked.

  “I—I don’t know,” she said. “I don’t know the name. They won’t tell—”

  Again she broke off nervously.

  “Ma’am, if you want to know the name,” said the man in the fedora, “it’s the Blue Eagle.”

  “Yes, yes,” she relayed to the mouthpiece. “The Blue Eagle.”

  “I’ll be right over,” said the sheriff.

  “What you tell her for?” the man in the white ducks spoke angrily behind her.

  “Son, we don’t want no trouble with the sheriff. We ain’t done nothin’. Why shouldn’t he come?”

  For a long moment Jean leaned her forehead against the phone and drew in deep breaths. They can’t do anything now, she kept telling herself. I’ve told the sheriff and they have to leave me alone. She heard one of the men moving to the door but no sound of the door opening.

  She turned and saw that the man in the fedora was looking out the door while the other one stared at her.

  “You tryin’ to make trouble for my place?” he asked.

  “I’m not trying to make trouble, but I want my husband back.”

  “Lady, we ain’t done nothing with your husband!”

  The man in the fedora turned around with a wry grin. “Looks like your husband lit out,” he said blandly.

  “He did not!” Jean said angrily.

  “Then where’s your car, ma’am?” the man asked.

  There was a sudden dropping sensation in her stomach. Jean ran to the screen door and pushed out.

  The car was gone.

  “Bob!”

  “Looks like he left you behind, ma’am,” said the man.

  She looked at the man with frightened eyes, then turned away with a sob and stumbled across the porch. She stood there in the oven-hot shade crying and looking at the place where the car had been. The dust was still settling there.

  She was still standing on the porch when the dusty blue patrol car braked in front of the cafe. The door opened and a tall, red-haired man got out, dressed in gray shirt and trousers, with a dull, metallic star pinned over his heart. Jean moved numbly off the porch to meet him.

  “You the lady that called?” the man asked.

  “Yes, I am.”

  “What’s wrong now?”

  “I told you. My husband disappeared.”

  “Disappeared?”

  As quickly as possible she told him what had happened.

  “You don’t think he drove away then?” said the sheriff.

  “He wouldn’t leave me here like this.”

  The sheriff nodded. “All right, go on,” he said.

  When she was finished, the sheriff nodded again and they went inside. They went to the counter.

  “This lady’s husband go in the lavatory, Jim?” the sheriff asked the man in the white ducks.

  “How should I know?” the man asked. “I was cooking. Ask Tom, he was in there.” He nodded toward the man in the fedora.

  “What about it, Tom?” asked the sheriff.

  “Sheriff, didn’t the lady tell you her husband just lit out before in their car?”

  “That’s not true!” Jean cried.

  “You see the man driving the car away, Tom?” the sheriff asked.

  “Sure I saw him. Why else would I say it?”

  “No. No.” Jean murmured the word with tiny, frightened shakes of her head.

  “Why didn’t you call after him if you saw him?” the sheriff asked Tom.

  “Sheriff, ain’t none of my business if a man wants to run out on—”

  “He didn’t run out!”

  The man in the fedora shrugged his shoulders with a grin. The sheriff turned to Jean.

  “Did you see your husband go in the lavatory?”

  “Yes, of course I—well, no, I didn’t exactly see him go in, but—”

  She broke off into angry silence as the man in the fedora chuckled.

  “I know he went in,” she said, “because after I came out of the ladies washroom I went outside and the car was empty. Where else could he have been? The cafe is only so big. There’s a door in that washroom. He said it hasn’t been used in years.” She pointed at the man in the white ducks. “But I know it has. I know my husband didn’t just leave me here. He wouldn’t do it. I know him, and he wouldn’t do it!”

  “Sheriff,” said the man in white ducks, “I showed the washroom to her when she asked. There wasn’t nobody in there and she can’t say there was.”

  Jean twisted her shoulders irritably.

  “He went through that other door,” she said.

  “Lady, that door ain’t used!” the man said loudly. Jean flinched and stepped back.

  “All right, take it easy, Jim,” the sheriff said. “Lady, if you didn’t see your husband go in that lavatory and you didn’t see if it was somebody else drivin’ your car away, I don’t see what we got to go on.”

  “What?”

  She couldn’t believe what she’d heard. Was the man actually telling her there was nothing to be done? For a second she tightened in fury thinking that the sheriff was just sticking up for his own townspeople against a stranger. Then the impact of being alone and helpless struck her and her breath caught as she looked at the sheriff with childlike, frightened eyes.

  “Lady, I don’t see what I can do,” the sheriff said with a shake of his head.

  “Can’t you—” She gestured timidly. “Can’t you l-look in the washroom for a clue or something? Can’t you open that door?”

>   The sheriff looked at her for a moment, then pursed his lips and walked down to the washroom. Jean followed him closely, afraid to stay near the two men.

  She looked into the washroom as the sheriff was testing the closed door. She shuddered as the man in the white ducks came down and stood beside her.

  “I told her it don’t open,” he said to the sheriff.

  “It’s locked on the other side. How could the man get out?”

  “Someone might have opened it on the other side,” Jean said nervously.

  The man made a sound of disgust.

  “Anyone else been around here?” the sheriff asked Jim.

  “Just Sam McComas havin’ some beer before, but he went home about—”

  “I mean in this shed.”

  “Sheriff, you know there ain’t.”

  “What about big Lou?” the sheriff asked.

  Jim was quiet a second and Jean saw his throat move.

  “He ain’t been around for months, Sheriff,” Jim said. “He went up north.”

  “Jim, you better go around and open up this door,” the sheriff said.

  “Sheriff, ain’t nothin’ but an empty shed in there.”

  “I know, Jim, I know. Just want to satisfy the lady.”

  Jean stood there feeling the looseness around her eyes again, the sick feeling of being without help. It made her dizzy, as if everything were spinning away from her. She held one fist with her other hand and all her fingers were white.

  Jim went out the screen door with a disgusted mutter and the door slapped shut behind him.

  “Lady, come here,” Jean heard the sheriff say quickly and softly. Her heart jumped as she moved into the washroom.

  “You recognize this?”

  She looked at the shred of cloth in his palm, then she gasped, “That’s the color slacks he had on!”

  “Ma’am, not so loud,” the sheriff said. “I don’t want them to think I know anything.”

  He stepped out of the washroom suddenly as he heard boots on the floor. “You goin’ somewhere, Tom?” he asked.

  “No, no, Sheriff,” said the man in the fedora. “Just comin’ down to see how you was gettin’ on.”

  “Uh-huh. Well—stick around for a while, will you, Tom?” said the sheriff.

  “Sure, Sheriff, sure,” Tom said broadly. “I ain’t goin’ nowhere.”

  They heard a clicking sound in the washroom, and in a moment the door was pulled open. The sheriff walked past Jean and down three steps into a dimly lit shed.