Night Chill (20 page)

FORTY-EIGHT

The elevator doors on the third floor of Midland General Hospital slid open. Sarah Tremont stood in the center of the elevator, her pink ball clutched with both hands. Even when the doors were open she hesitated to run out, though she wanted nothing more than to be out of the spooky elevator. All she could think about was how fast the doors had closed when she was locked in, how they had smashed together. What if that happened again? What if the doors slammed shut right when she was getting out and squished her in half?

She leaned forward to get a better look at where the elevator had taken her, too scared to move her feet. There was a nurse’s station, just like there was on every floor. But, as far as she could see, there was no one there.

“Hello,” she called out. “Anyone there?”

Silence.

Focused on looking for help outside the elevator, Sarah didn’t notice at first when the lights above her started to dim.

Then they flickered, as if surges of electricity were throbbing through the wires. A low hum filled the small compartment.

Sarah looked around nervously, but she couldn’t pinpoint where the sound was coming from. It seemed to come from everywhere.

The floor beneath her started to tremble.

Suddenly, the floor dropped from under her feet, throwing her off balance. The floor rose back up with a jerk. The elevator bucked wildly, as if it were a wild horse trying to shake a rider. The lights flashed off and on. Gears squealed, metal on metal.  A howl like angry wind through a tunnel filled the compartment. The noise rose until it was so loud that Sarah covered her ears.

Sarah screamed and ran to get out of the elevator, squeezing her eyes shut as she approached the door. She lost her balance as the bucking elevator floor dropped out from beneath her. She fell forward onto the floor outside the elevator, landing hard on her knees, scraping them both. Just as she cleared the door, the elevator slammed shut with a crash and the noise was gone.

Sarah picked herself up off the floor. She whimpered from fear, too scared to cry. Blood trickled from her knees and small droplets splattered on the floor, bright red against the green linoleum. Once she steadied herself, she ran to the nurse’s station hoping that someone would be there to help her. The desk was empty.

She called out in the loudest voice she could manage, “Hello. Is anyone here?” No answer.

Then she saw the phone.

She ran behind the desk and picked up the receiver, relief beating back her fear. Help was only a phone call away.

She held the phone to her ear and heard the dial tone. She typed ‘0’ for the operator, but nothing happened. The dial tone blared dully in her ear. She hung up and then tried punching some of the other numbers. Each time she pressed a button she heard the beep on the line, but the dial tone hummed over it. Frustrated, she put the phone back on the hook and slouched in the chair.

The silence made Sarah nervous. It was weird that no grown-ups were around. She couldn’t remember the hospital ever being so empty. The whole thing was spooky. She started to cry softly, too scared to make much noise. She never should have left her sister.

The phone rang. The bright peal of sound seemed to shatter the air around her. She jumped in the chair with a high pitched squeal. She stared at the phone, waiting for it to ring again. Nothing. The same eerie silence returned.

Tentatively, as if it were a hot iron she might burn herself on, she reached out for the phone. She picked up the receiver and held it to her ear. There was no dial tone.

“Hello?” she whispered.

“Hello,” the voice said.

 Sarah swallowed hard. “This is Sarah Tremont,” she said, managing to stop crying and use the polite tone she always used with adults she didn’t know. “I’m looking for my mom.”

“Where are you, darlin’?”

“I don’t know.” She started to cry.

“Shhh now, sugar. Don’t you cry. Look around you, what do you see?”

Sarah did as she was told. “I’m at a nurse’s station on the top floor.”

“Good. That’s good,” the voice flowed in soft tones. “Look at the doors, now. What numbers do you see?”

She leaned to the right to see around the desk. “I see room number 311.”

The voice chuckled. “Well, sugar. You’re just down the hall from your mommy. Only a few doors down.”

“Really? Where’s she at?” She felt like she might cry again, from relief this time. She didn’t care if she got in trouble. All she could think about was getting a big hug from her mom.

“You know the room you saw?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Go on over there and turn to the right. You know your left and right don’t you, sugar?”

“Yes.”

“Good. That’s real good. Go to the right and keep watching the numbers on the doors. They should be getting bigger.”

“What number is my mom in?”

“Room 320, sugar,” Nate Huckley whispered through the phone. “Hurry now. We’re waitin’ for you.” 

FORTY-NINE

Jack heard the rushing water even before he cleared the tight passage leading into the next gallery. The cave was wider than some of the others they had passed through, a good ten yards across. Jack noticed the water with interest, but the enormous missing section of the cave floor was what really caught his attention.

“Step to the side there,” Lonetree instructed. “The middle of the floor could collapse with too much weight.”

Jack nodded and crept along the wall to where the underground river came out of the rock. The water was moving deceptively fast. Shining his lamp on the surface it looked like a giant black snake sliding lazily past him, but reaching down and sticking a finger in the river let him know there was nothing lazy about the flow. Water splashed at him and his hands was knocked away by the force of the current.

“Hey, the water’s warm,” Jack called out.

“A natural hot spring feeds into it. Keeps it a reasonable temperature.  You can smell the sulfur.”

The river was only about twenty feet wide, but it transected the passage they were in. Jack looked over to Lonetree.

“It’s moving too fast to swim, how do we get around this? Swing over like Indiana Jones?”

“You got it.”

“I was kidding.”

Lonetree angled his light up to the rock ceiling over the center of the river. There was a metal hook embedded into to the face and a black nylon rope extended to the wall next to Lonetree.

“Isn’t that rust on that hook up there?”

“Yeah, don’t worry though. It held me so it’ll probably hold you too.”

“Probably?”

“Well, you never know about the longevity of these things. It might just give way one day. Just fall out.”

“Great,” Jack said. He shone his light down the length of the river until it disappeared into the opposite wall. “So if I fall in, where does this thing take me?”

“Well, that depends.”

“On what?”

“On your religious beliefs. Because if you fall in, you’re dead.” He held out the rope. “You want to go first?”

“No, why don’t you go ahead.”

Lonetree nodded. He removed his backpack and secured all the latches. Satisfied everything was intact, he tossed it across the river, easily clearing it by several feet. “There’s a smaller rope attached to the main rope. It’s there so we could still retrieve it if one of us accidentally let go of the rope after we cross,.” Jack understood that when Lonetree said ‘one of us’ he really meant him. “Just make sure it’s not tangled on anything before you swing across.”

“Check.”

No sooner was the word out of Jack’s mouth than Lonetree was airborne. He kicked his legs out at the lowest part of the arc and arched his back just in time for a perfect landing on the other side. Jack clapped softly for the acrobatics.

“Here, grab the rope,” Lonetree said.

Jack reached out as Lonetree sent the rope back over the river. He grabbed on to it with both hands. “Got it.”

“All right. Now, try to swing at an angle. The floor is weakest in the middle.”

Jack nodded. He tugged on the rope to test his grip, shining his headlamp at the metal ring in the rock roof. He rocked back on his heels and, not wanting to give himself time to change his mind, leapt forward over the water.

The rope had more give than he thought and he had to lift his feet up to keep from dragging them through the river. He tried to swing his momentum forward, aiming toward Lonetree’s light on the far side, but he could tell he was going to come up short. An image flashed in his mind of being swept away in the black waters beneath him. Down through the earth to God knew where. With a cry, he arched his back and stretched his feet out to the rock floor on the other side.

His feet hit solid rock but he was too horizontal. Momentum gone, he started to fall backward.

Lonetree grabbed his waist and pulled him forward. Jack let go of the rope and fell safely to the floor of the cave.

“Well, that was graceful,” Lonetree said. He recovered the swing by pulling in the guide rope. He attached it to a hook in the wall.

Jack dragged himself to his feet, realizing that Lonetree had just saved his life. “Thanks, I owe you.”

“No problem. Just know that I collect on my debts. Come on. This way.”

The passage made a ninety-degree turn and then continued on a downward slope. The going was easy and they were both able to walk upright down the trail. Jack checked his watch. Time seemed non-existent underground. He couldn’t believe they had already been in the cave for almost an hour.

Lonetree crouched by a fissure at the base of the rock face at the far end of the gallery. When Jack looked down into the narrow slit a nervous laugh escaped from his throat. The hole Lonetree pointed to was impossibly small. There was no way they would be able to fit through it.

“You can’t be serious.” Jack said

“It’s not as bad as you think. I’ll guide you through it. What we came for is on the other side of this wall.”

That made Jack stand up straighter. The downward climb had become an endless series of galleries separated by tight spots, or squeeze holes as he’d come to think of them. Each one presented its own challenge and its own sense of accomplishment after he pulled himself through it. Now there was only one more squeeze hole between him and the mystery that had brought him this far.

Still, the spot Lonetree hovered over was no more than a crack on the rock, a limestone rabbit hole. Worse, the hole went straight into the floor of the cave and then turned like an elbow joint. How could they crawl through that angle?

As if reading his mind Lonetree began his instructions. He jumped down and stood in the hole. Lowering himself carefully, he threaded his feet and legs into the crevice. “You have to go feet first to get through this bend here. Sit down in this hole and push your feet into the passage as you slide down, just like this.”

“Why feet first?”

Lonetree shrugged. “To get through this first curve head first you’d have to start upside down, doing a handstand. Besides, it’s possible to get stuck on this one. This way you’ll have more leverage to pull yourself out.”

Jack groaned, wishing his caving partner hadn’t felt the need to be so truthful.

“Now once in, you’ll need to rotate on your right hip and curl your legs. It’s an ‘S’ curve so you need to adjust back to the left side when you hit the other curve. Got it?”

“No. But let’s do it anyway.”

Lonetree curled his hand into a fist and bounced it a couple of times off the top of Jack’s boot, like an athlete psyching up his teammate when they needed a big play. Jack appreciated the gesture. He hated to admit it but he was starting to like the big man. Then, with a wide grin, Lonetree clutched the rock face around the opening and pulled his body into the wall.

FIFTY

Lauren couldn’t stop her hands from shaking. The trembling started with the call from the emergency room nurse. Usually an unflappable woman who was calm under the most extreme situations, Nurse Haddie’s panicked voice on the phone had been intense enough to make the bile rise on the back of Lauren’s throat.  The nurse’s words still crashed around in Lauren’s head as she ran down the stairs to the first floor of the hospital. Each word was like a nail being pounded into her brain.

I can’t find Sarah, Dr. Tremont. She’s gone. I can’t find her anywhere.

The doctor in her rifled through a hundred rational explanations for her daughter’s disappearance. A game of hide and seek. A trip to the bathroom. A fight with her sister.

The mom in her screamed the alternatives. She was hurt and couldn’t call out for help. She wandered outside and was hit by a car. And the worse fear. The unspeakable fear. Somebody had taken her. It happened thousands of times every year. But it couldn’t be happening to her baby. No, not her baby.

She thought about calling Jack but decided against it. Sarah could be around the corner, or pouting somewhere because she was in a fight with her sister. Why worry Jack until she knew what was going on? Besides, he might not be able to handle any more stress right now. The thought made her grimace. She had just gotten used to counting on Jack again. Now, she felt the old feelings of abandonment return. She suddenly felt very alone.

  Lauren shoved at the heavy metal door at the bottom of the stairs. She turned left and broke into a run toward the emergency room. She could hear voices down the hall, loud and with an edge of panic. Two male orderlies walked down the hall toward her, calling out for her little girl like they were looking for a dog that had run off. When they saw her, they shook their heads. Lauren recognized one of them, Ned Brickman, a kind old man, the resident grandfather. He had over a dozen young grandchildren and from the pain on his face she could tell he was living through the nightmare scenario with her, as if Sarah were one of his own.

“We’ll find her, Doc,” the old man reassured her. “Probably jus’ run off to play or somethin’. You know how kids get. Don’t you worry, now. We’ll find her.”

Lauren forced a smile but Ned’s concerned expression only made her hurry faster to the emergency room. The nurse was there, trying to calm Becky down and ask her questions at the same time. Becky shouted when she saw her mother and ran over to her, tears covering her cheeks. Lauren wrapped her up in her arms and squeezed her tight. She looked up at the nurse, “What happened?”

“I was watching them. I swear it. They were playing fine so I walked over to get my charts. Then the phone rang and I…” Her voice trailed off as she fought back her own tears.

Lauren didn’t have the patience to wait for the woman to pull herself together. “How long? How long were they out of your sight?”

“Five minutes. Ten tops. Then Becky came in and asked if I’d seen her sister around. I looked all over this floor, all the bathrooms, called the other nurse stations. No one’s seen her. That’s when I called you. I’m so sorry, I--”

Lauren shot her a look that ended the apology. She didn’t need Becky to hear any more panic. She hugged her daughter just long enough to calm her down, then she pushed her back and held her in front of her at arm’s length.

“Becky, we just need to find your sister. O.K.?” She waited until Becky nodded. “All right. Can you tell me where you saw her last?”

Becky made a few false starts, each time her voice catching in her throat as the tears continued to pour. Lauren rubbed the girl’s back and pushed back the stray hairs from her face.

“I dunno…she said she had to go potty…she wanted me to go with her but I didn’t. I’m sorry, Mom. I’m sorry.”

Lauren hugged her. “It’s O.K., sweetie. We’ll find her. She’s just somewhere in the hospital. It’s not a big deal, all right? I don’t want you to worry.” Becky nodded. “Good. Now I want you to stay here while I go look for your sister.”

“Noooo,” Becky whined, grabbing on to her mother’s clothes. “I want to stay with you.”

“Listen, I need you to stay here in case she comes back this way, all right? I won’t be gone long.” She hefted Becky into the air and sat her down on the padded receptionist’s chair. She turned to the nurse and snapped, “Watch her.”

The statement came out loaded with accusation. The nurse lowered her eyes to the ground and Lauren immediately felt a pang of guilt. She couldn’t help feeling angry even though she knew it was unfair. How many times had she left the girls alone for ten minutes while she worked down the hall from her office? A dozen times? Two dozen?

She made a mental note to apologize to the nurse later, but for now she had no time to think of anything except finding her baby. With one last smile at Becky she left the emergency room and walked back out to the main hallway. She could hear Ned Brickman and the other orderly still calling out Sarah’s name. Lauren wondered if Sarah would come out if she heard these men calling for her.

She tried to think through the likely scenarios that would make her daughter hide. Purposely, she threw up a mental wall to block out the image of her little girl being abducted, giving other possibilities top priority. But no matter how thick and high she built the wall to block out the thoughts, she felt them building force inside her mind. Kidnapped. Molested. Murdered. It seemed so unlikely, though. There were people everywhere in the hospital. Someone would have to be crazy to try to take her here.

 “Ned!” she called out, running down the hall until she caught up with the old orderly. “Ned, can we put someone at every door. You know, in case--”

“Already done it, ma’am,” he said, his eyes showing none of their usual good humor. It was obvious he was taking Sarah’s disappearance seriously. “I locked some ’a the doors an’ put nurses at the other ones. Jus’ being careful, you know.  Don’t think anything like that happened, you know. Lotsa good people ’round here to look out fo’ her.”

Lauren smiled. She appreciated his calmness. It was exactly what she needed. “You’re probably right. Thank you, though. For the doors.”

Ned nodded and continued his walk down the hall calling out Sarah’s name. Lauren headed the other direction and did the same. She’d go floor by floor. She knew by now there were nurses on every floor looking for Sarah, but she wondered if so many people calling out her name would just scare her and make her hide. Maybe she thought she was in trouble. Maybe she had wet herself and was embarrassed to come out.

She fixed on the idea. She had told her sister she had to go to the bathroom. If she couldn’t find one, or didn’t make it in time, that would explain why she might not come out from wherever she was hiding.

Lauren felt herself calm down. The more she thought about it, the more rational it seemed. Once Sarah heard her mother’s voice, she’d come out, all red-faced about having an accident. It was just a matter of getting within hearing distance of wherever she was hiding.

Lauren set off down the hall, struggling to hold on to her confidence that it would be a short search.