Ghost Road Blues (Pine Deep 1)

“Terry?” The voice was plaintive, sounding scared, but still distorted as if by a vast distance. “He’s back, Terry. He’s back and he’s going to hurt people again. ”

“Hurt who? Little girl…who’s going to be hurt?”

“He’s back…. ”

“Little girl, tell me your name. ”

Nothing.

“This is the mayor. Please tell me your name and where you’re calling from. ”

Still nothing. Gus Bernhardt was lumbering across the room toward him, a deep frown on his florid face.

“You have to stop him, Terry,” whispered the tiny voice.

“Where are you calling from? Little girl? Little girl?” He kept calling for her to answer, but the sound on the phone had changed. Now there was just dead emptiness. Gus reached out for the phone, held it to his own ear for a moment, then set it back on the cradle.

“What gives?” he asked.

“Weird call,” said Terry, shaking his head and scratching his red beard. “Some little kid called. ” He knew that voice, too, but he didn’t dare say it, and unconsciously tapped his pocket to make sure the pill case with the antipsychotics and the Xanax was still there.

“You heard a kid on that phone?” Gus asked, half smiling.

“Yeah, and she was going on about—”

“Uh, wait a minute, Terry, let me get this straight…you got a phone call on that phone and it was some little kid?”

“A little girl, yeah. ”

“On that phone?”

“No, on two other phones,” snapped Terry viciously. “Yes, of course on this phone. What, are you deaf? You saw me talking to her. ”

“Well, I’m not deaf, but you must have the greatest set of ears in the Western world if you got a phone call on that line. ”

“What the heck are you talking about…?”

Still half smiling, Gus bent and snatched up the cord that came out of the back of the receiver. He reeled it up, speaking as he did so. “Since we cut back on staff, we don’t use these desks back here much,” he said. “These phones have all been disconnected. ”

“Not this one, for Pete’s sake. I was just talk—”

His voice went flat and fell silent as Gus pulled up the end of the cord and presented it with a flourish. The plug stood up between his thick fingers.

Terry looked at it and then bent low and looked under the desk at the wall. He could see no wall jack, and eventually had to shift the desk and move a trash can before he found one. Slowly he straightened and looked at the plug.

Gus said, “No way this was even plugged into the wall. The cord was just coiled up under the desk. ”

“I’m telling you, Gus…I heard that phone ring and I heard that kid talking. ”

Gus stared at him for a long five count, then shrugged. “What can I say, Terry?”

Terry snatched the plug out of Gus’s hand and glared at it. He opened his mouth but couldn’t manage to say anything. He had heard the voice. Her voice.

Mandy’s voice.

The room started spinning around him and he almost turned and ran when Detective Sergeant Ferro’s voice cut through all the chatter in the room.

“It’s the officers at the wreck site,” he said tersely. “They found something!”