Роберт Колби - Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 17, No. 4, April 1972

“No, I ain’t,” Garth said. “And I don’t hanker to.”

Jerry asked, “Have you?”

“Yes.”

“What’s it like?”

She thought back to that terrifying afternoon so many years ago. “It’s a black, whirling piece of hell, that’s what. They say the funnel’s wind moves so fast it can drive a splinter of wood into your brain like a high-powered bullet. And pieces of glass — God help you if you’re near a window. You’ll be cut to ribbons.”

Uneasily, Jerry glanced at the broad expanse of windows in the dining room. “Then it’s dangerous just sitting here. We should be down in the cellar, like the radio said.”

“It’s a little dangerous,” Karen conceded. “If a twister dipped down from the sky to exactly this spot, we’d be finished. But if it’s already on the ground and moving toward you, you’ll probably know it and have warning. Even if it’s night and you can’t see the twister, you can hear it.”

“I read about that,” Jerry told her. “They make a noise.”

“Yes. Like a freight train. The time I heard that sound I was in open country. I looked up and there it was, bearing down on me. There was a ditch nearby and I had enough sense to climb into a culvert. Even so, it’s a miracle I lived through it. You know what happens sometimes? The funnels pick people up and pull them so high into tire sky that when they drop down, they’re frozen solid. And then at other times they simply—”

“That’s enough.” Garth frowned. Apparently the talk about tornadoes was making him edgy. “I don’t wanna hear no more about it.”

Again, he looked around the house. This time his perusal was slower and more thorough. His gaze even paused briefly at the ancient shotgun before moving on.

He asked, “Any money around here?”

“Only the few dollars in my purse. My father never leaves cash in the house when he’s going out of town.”

“Uh-huh.” Garth turned to Jerry. “Get it. Then go through the rest of this place. See if there’s more stashed away.”

Rummaging through Karen’s purse, Jerry came up with a few bills and coins. “Four dollars and thirty-five cents,” he said in disgust. “That won’t take us far...”

He shoved the money into his pocket and began ransacking the house, sweeping shelves clean and pulling out drawers and dumping their contents onto the floor. It was part search and part pure vandalism, random destruction for its own sake. Karen compressed her lips to keep from crying out as the boy smashed the collections of porcelain, glassware and other fragile artifacts her parents had spent so much of their time assembling.

When Jerry was through on the ground floor he went upstairs. They could hear him tramping around, smashing more things.

Watching Karen while sipping from still another can of beer, Garth smiled humorlessly. Even the modest amount of alcohol in the beer seemed to be having a bad effect on his mood. Clearly she was dealing with a highly unstable psychopath likely to go berserk upon little or no provocation.

Jerry returned with only a few more coins for his efforts.

“I told you,” Karen said patiently, “my father didn’t keep money here.”

“Yeah.” Garth was looking at her in an odd way. “Too bad. If he had, we’d be more friendly-inclined. We need money to get out of the country.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Teacher, you just think you’re sorry. But before we’re through with you, you’ll really be sorry.”

He was tormenting her verbally before getting around to the real thing. She had to stall him as long as possible.

“Why would you want to hurt me?” She tried to sound friendly and reasonable. “I haven’t made any trouble. I’ve done everything you asked.”

“Maybe just because you’re a lawman’s daughter. We got an abiding dislike for lawmen and anyone connected with ’em. Matter of fact, we don’t much like teachers either. Do we, Jerry?”

The boy grinned at her vacuously. She’d get no help from that quarter.

“It wouldn’t make sense anyhow,” Garth went on, “leavin’ you here alive. The police think we’re a couple hundred miles north of here. But the first thing you’d do after we left would be to put ’em straight.”

“You could lock me in the storm cellar. That’d give you plenty of time for a head start.”

“Nope. Can’t take chances. We’ll lock you in the storm cellar, all right, but when we do you won’t be in no condition to climb out. Not ever. That way, we know we’ll have a head start. It might be a long time before anyone gets curious enough to bust in, to see why you ain’t been around lately.”

Despite the fear tearing at her insides, Karen managed a smile. “You’re just trying to frighten me. You’re playing games. Well, sure I’m scared. What girl wouldn’t be? But you know you don’t have to kill me, Garth. If you don’t want to leave me, take me along. I won’t try anything stupid. I’ll...” She paused. “Just a minute. You hear that?”

Garth stood up. “Hear what?”

“Shut up,” Jerry broke in, his grin gone. “I think I hear it, too.”

Then there was no doubt. They all heard it, far off but coming closer, a growing clatter and roar suggestive of an approaching freight train...

Karen rose. “I don’t know about you,” she announced, “but while there’s still time, I’m going into that storm cellar!”

She took a step forward but Jerry lunged ahead, shoving her aside. Garth hesitated a moment and then, as the sound mounted in intensity, he plunged after Jerry.

As they scrambled for the door in the kitchen floor, Karen climbed up on the chair. She lifted the shotgun from its rack, stepped down, cocked the piece, aimed it while shoving the stock tight against her shoulder, and braced herself against the wall.

As Garth looked up and clawed for his pistol, she squeezed one trigger and then the other...

At dawn, her face expressionless, Karen watched from a parlor window as Garth’s body was loaded into a hearse. The blasts had killed him almost instantly. Jerry had been seriously wounded but would live.

Standing beside Karen, a state police detective said, “I know how you feel. No matter how justified, it’s terrible to kill someone. But you had no choice. If you hadn’t stopped them, they’d almost surely have killed you and others.”

“I know. Thinking about that is the only way I’ll be able to live with this.”

“Anyhow, either you were mighty lucky or they were mighty careless, allowing you to get your hands on the gun.”

“Oh, that.” She smiled faintly. “At the time, they were trying to get into the storm cellar. I’d told them how a tornado sounded like a fast freight train.” Her gaze strayed beyond the yard to the other side of the hill and the main line of the St. Louis-San Francisco Railway. “So when the night freight came highballing by a little before ten, like it always does, I made out like it was a twister.”

Though the telephone saves much time and effort, there are times when it undeniably becomes a barrier.

“I’m sorry,” I said, “but I handle only messy divorce cases.”

Miss Ariana Morgan was mildly puzzled. “I thought that private detectives took just about anything that came their way.”

“In the old days, perhaps, but this is the age of specialization.” I smiled tolerantly. “Now, why don’t you simply go to the police and ask them to find your uncle? They have all kinds of personnel and facilities and webs of communication. I am just one very limited individual.”

She had violet eyes. “My uncle would never forgive me if I made such a big thing out of this. Going to the police and all.” And she smiled beautifully. “I have good reason to believe that he is somewhere here in this city.”