Джонатан Крейг - Manhunt. Volume 1, Number 12, December, 1953

The only thing she heard — and she was sure that it was her imagination playing a trick on her — was the ticking of the bedroom clock, as it had ticked last night.

“Mike!”

She half ran to the nursery. Judy was in her play pen. But Mike was nowhere in sight.

“Mike!”

The front door was still locked. It didn’t seem possible that he could have gotten outside. Yet, he was nowhere in the house. It was strange. Unreal.

“Mike!”

The panic in her voice startled her. She tried to tell herself that there was a simple explanation for his disappearance. Perhaps he had gotten outside somehow. Perhaps he had gone to Imogene’s.

She went into the bedroom and called Imogene. She heard the phone ring a half a dozen times before she reluctantly hung up.

She went outside and looked around the house, then cut across the back yard to Imogene’s. She called Imogene and knocked on the door until her hand hurt. The house seemed dead. This entire neighborhood which she had known so intimately for the past five years suddenly became a stranger.

She went back to her house, feeling an acute sense of loss which she did not understand. But one thing she did understand. Something was wrong. Terribly wrong. And she needed help.

She went to the phone again. This time she dialed the police. She got no answer.

She dialed again and stood there, feeling a heavy nothing pressing against her. The clock was unbearable. She threw it onto the bed and covered it with a pillow, but it ticked on.

She dialed the operator.

“Operator,” she said, “I’m trying to get the police but they don’t answer. Would you please ring them for me.”

“I’m sorry,” the operator said. “That number has been discontinued.”

A wave of confusion flashed through Kay.

“You must have misunderstood me,” she said. “I want the police.”

“I’m sorry,” the operator said. “That number has been discontinued.”

Kay’s hand went to her throat. “But that’s absurd! Surely you haven’t understood me. I said the police. The police!”

“Just a moment, please,” the operator said. “I’ll connect you with Information.”

“Information,” another voice said.

“I want the police,” Kay said.

“I’m sorry,” Information said. “That number has been discontinued.”

“But—”

Kay dropped the phone as she had the sensation of being crushed by nothing. It frightened her and she wanted to run. She wanted to grab up Judy and run before the dike gave away completely. She wanted to run to a simple explanation.

She ran to the nursery.

Then she was frozen still by the sound of her own scream.

Judy was not there.

She started to scream again, and then she realized that someone was knocking on the front screen door.

It’s Joe! she thought. At last! She hurried through the house to the front door.

But it was not her husband. Mrs. Norbert, Kay’s next-door neighbor, stood there. And with her were a policeman and a woman whose dark blue dress was fashioned along the same general lines as the policeman’s uniform.

“Is it about my husband?” Kay asked.

“The poor thing,” Mrs. Norbert said softly.

The policeman shook his head. “Maybe you’d better take over, Sue,” he said to the woman in the uniform-dress.

Kay stared at Mrs. Norbert. “What is it? What are these people doing here?”

“You say it was a delivery boy who called you over here?” the policeman asked.

“Yes,” Mrs. Norbert said. “From the grocery store. He took Kay’s groceries in the back door, like he always does, and she was sitting right in the middle of the kitchen floor, moaning and crying to herself. He ran over to get me.” She lowered her voice. “Kay didn’t even know who I was.”

“Is this the first time anything like this has happened?”

Mrs. Norbert glanced at Kay, and then looked quickly away. “It’s the first time for anything this bad,” she said. “But... well, Kay hasn’t been quite right ever since her husband and children were drowned out at the lake last month. A boat turned over with them, and Kay was the only one who got out of the water alive.”

Kay felt the scream starting in her throat. She tried to choke it back but could not.

“The poor thing,” Mrs. Norbert said again. “I was with her all morning, helping her clean the house, and she was perfectly all right. I went back to my house just a few minutes before the delivery boy came running over to get me.”

The woman in the uniform-dress opened the screen door and stepped inside. She was smiling pleasantly as she took Kay’s arm, but her grasp was firm and her fingers were very strong. “We’d like you to come with us now, Mrs. Scott,” she said.

There was a sudden dull ache behind Kay’s eyes, and the sickening realization came to her that Mrs. Norbert was right. She remembered now; Mrs. Norbert had helped her with the housework, and she had gone back to her own house only a few minutes ago. But that had been before all these horrible things had happened. How could that be? How could all those things have taken place in only a few minutes?

How?

God, she thought. What’s happening to me?

The woman in the uniform-dress pulled her gently toward the door. “Come along, dear,” she said.