Wrong Number

Wrong Number

I was surrounded by old housewares, arranged with no rhyme or reason on tall metal shelves. A rusty gramophone horn beside a 1950’s kitchen lazy Susan, beside a 1970’s National Geographic globe, beside a 1960’s Easy Bake oven. Then a shoe box full of tattered, off-white baby-shoes.

I was examining a ceramic gravy boat when a loud noise shattered the silence, and I nearly dropped it as I reeled back into a shelf, full of what sounded like dinner plates.

A fast-ringing brass bell, I realized, its shrillness amplified by the solitude of the antiques barn. Lasted two seconds, then reverberated into silence.

Where was it? What was it? It rang again. I spun ‘round, eyes scanning top to bottom. There – an old Bakelite telephone – chest level on the shelf before me. I placed my fingers against the phone’s base, and on the third ring, felt the bell’s vibration. Why was the damn thing ringing?

I lifted the receiver. Not to answer it, just stop the racket. The receiver felt so cold that my fingers began to hurt, turn numb. From six inches above the cradle, a hiss of breath emerged – sounding heavy, no, desperate. And a distant, tinny voice. I brought it to my ear.

The earpiece felt like ice, so I pulled it a half inch from my skin. The numbing cold spread from the phone to the air around me, and my breath condensed into a smoky vapor.

“Sam, this you?” It was a hushed man’s voice. Spoken as though he was afraid of being overheard.

“Hello?”

“Sam? Sam! Where’s Sam?” His tone began as hopeful, then turned angry.

Static buzzed briefly, then a low-level hiss.

“I’m not Sam. Sam’s not here right now. Who is this?”

Angry swearing.

“You know where’s he at? Listen, I need him at the house. You see him, tell him I need help! So we can both make it outta here alive. Before it’s too late, you got me?”

“Honest, I’d tell him, but I don’t know who this Sam is.”

“How can you not know him? He lives there, doesn’t he? Lived there for years now!”

“Maybe this is a wrong number. Check it and redial?”

I’d latched onto the pattern of clicks and pops through this shaky, intermittent phone connection. A very old one, like I was reaching far into the past. Perhaps each pop meant a bird just landed on a line strung between two old poles. A hiss might mean a gust of wind rushing along a wire, stroking bare metal worn free of insulation.

“Tell Sam I’m at Willow House, on Bog Road, beside the swamp.”

“Listen, I’m sorry, I can’t help you.”

And I hung up.

---

I bought the phone, of course, because I had to know what made it tick, how it could ring with no cord plugged into the wall. This had to be some kind of high-tech prank. Would I soon appear on a YouTube vid, clumsily trying to figure out how a ghostly voice could speak from a dusty, defunct antique?

I unscrewed the base unit’s bottom, checked all the innards three times over, until I remembered - this type phone should contain a dry cell battery, but the cell's compartment was empty. I measured for voltage with a digital multimeter. Nothing. Maybe the handpiece held all the smarts, including a battery and a cellular link. I unplugged its cord from the base unit, unscrewed both the mic and speaker covers. Nothing obvious. I lay the handpiece in the cradle, still unplugged, when it rang again.

“Hello?” I answered, quickly this time.

“Sam get back yet?” It was him again. The base was free of the handpiece, yet the bell still rang. So much for my battery-in-receiver theory.

“Listen, I told you, no one named Sam lives here. I have no idea who –“

“I know I got the right number! Listen, my fuckin life is hangin in the balance. So stop screwin around!”

My heart sped up as I heard, no felt the reality of his fear, his terror.

“What’s going on? You’re stuck at Willow House? Are you in danger?”

“Ain’t you got ears? Yes! I’m up in the attic, the only place he hasn’t searched yet. And the moment he steps up here, I’m dead. He’s got the shotgun!”

“Why is someone after you? And what’s your name?”

“I’m Cletus. Cletus Mims. He already killed my ma, now he’s after me. He wants all the money for himself. Oh, wait…”

The line was filled with pops, clicks, intervals of fuzz. In the background came the hollow sound of a boot clomping on wood. One step. Then a second…

“Shhhhhhhhit.” His voice became a whisper. “He’s coming. Oh God he’s coming! Help me!”

His pleading was edged with tears.

“There’s big cedar chest in the corner. I think I can fit.”

A loud click. And a deafening silence.

---

I lost cell reception on Myersville Road, but my phone had a clear view of the sky, so GPS continued directing me. There – Bog Road, unmarked, half overgrown with brush. I turned hard into it, scraped through the rough, sharp branches and twigs. I bounced hard over humps and potholes on the old dirt road.

My truck was becoming an unholy mess – scraped by branches and splattered by the soft clay mud of the road. A light drizzle fell, the landscape forested on one side, a huge swamp on the other. The air was thick with mist, suffused with a miasma of swamp stink laced with my own exhaust.

There was no Willow House on the map, but my phone indicated the road ended just a half mile ahead.

In the glove box was my thirty-eight revolver, freshly loaded. Beside me was a baseball bat, my church league slugger, though I’d stopped playing three years ago when Mary died.

And the old phone. I didn’t understand how it worked, or why. Sometimes weird things just happen, and I was now hip-deep in it. I was either being hoaxed, or someone was in big trouble, and I had to know which.

I’d considered calling the sheriff, but he was thirty miles off, me only four. Besides, I'd had a few brushes with him in the past - accusations and suspicions that bore no merit - and I wasn't keen on attracting his attention.

There were no tire marks on the road beside mine, but we’d had a hard, drenching rain for days, and the swamp was brimming at its banks, pooling onto the road in spots. I blasted through one foot-deep puddle after another, until the ground began to rise out of the muck, though it was still a slippery clay-brown mess.

Then the trees ended. A pit formed in my stomach, cold sweat broke out on my face and hands. A dark pall descended upon me, a moment of vertigo, then nausea. I saw the lines of a huge old house looming in the mist. The nausea became worse, so I lurched the truck to a stop, opened the door, and vomited onto the ground. It left me trembling, my jaw muscles tight as my teeth began to chatter.

There was evil in this place – I felt it in my bones – but I had to go on, had to see if Cletus was okay. I closed the door, switched off my lights, drove on, until I found a turnoff that lead through tall grass and toward the house. Made a right and looked about in all directions. No other vehicles were near the house. I wondered if Cletus were already dead.

I had to be careful. Couldn’t be naïve and think that only Cletus and I were here. I parked off in the grass, switched off the engine.

Silence. Like a graveyard, with all the spirits asleep in the cold winter. I grabbed the revolver and decided to leave the slugger behind.

I hurried toward the home’s huge, forlorn façade. The place had seen better days – like maybe a century ago. It had two full levels, then the attic floor, five tiny windowed dormers running its length. The place was gray – gray as death – old moldy wood siding, as far as I could tell from here, the enormous roof sagging in places. Three quarters of the front windows were smashed out. Gray planks covered the others. Only one window was intact and clear – on the second floor. I stared at it as I walked on, in case I might glimpse someone behind the glass.

My stomach churned as I drew closer, the revolver trembling in my hand. From what Cletus said, this guy had a shotgun and had already killed someone. But as I reached the set of rotten front and placed my boot on that first step – the urge to flee subsided. Somehow, merely touching part of this old wreck of a home had put me at ease.

Then curiosity bloomed, intensified, became a kind of obsessive inquisitiveness. I felt lighter on my feet as I climbed each step, the old wood planks propelling me toward something – what I didn’t yet understand, until I stood at the front door.

When I touched the knob, the door swung freely and silently inward several inches, its wood planking lighter-weight than I expected, probably pithed with age and the rot of moisture and termites. I stepped in with my revolver’s muzzle leading the way. The interior was well lit, given the large number of broken out windows, and was nearly vacant of furniture. Only a half-broken old-fashioned sofa, its two left legs missing, at in the middle of the large parlor that dominated this floor.

But there was something else. A crunchy texture to the floor. I stooped and found an inch-deep layer of dead, desiccated flies. And, then, atop that was a half inch of dust that puffed out around my boot soles as I stepped gingerly about. I moved slowly, to decrease the loudness of my feet crunching across the dead bugs. How did Cletus get into this place without leaving tracks? Besides my own footsteps, the layer of flies and dust appeared untrodden.

This was ridiculous. I’d seen no evidence that anyone was inside the house. My resolve fell away, and I finally admitted it to myself – I’d been had. Played patsy to some silly practical joke. Could the grounds outside, or perhaps the attic, be fitted with a camera system that was live streaming my foolishness, after the so-called Cletus had spoken to me through an ancient, disconnected telephone? Somehow or other, despite my disassembly and inspection of the phone, I hadn’t seen the ruse. But I was still curious, and after my hurried drive here, I’d at least have a look around.

Several minutes later, I stood in the attic, beneath the sharply peaked planks of the enormous roof, my cell phone adding to the dim illumination up here. Only a few dead insects lay scattered about, but numerous large, sheetlike cobwebs bridged every corner in the room, and enough dust that the gaps between the floor planks showed only as slight indentations atop a gray, powdery layer. There was a lot of old junk up here – three huge armoires, old chests of drawers, stacks of wood crates filled with housewares, clothes, and several children’s toys – all of it thickly gray with the dust. But I didn't see the kind of wooden chest he'd mentioned on the phone.

I went to the largest armoire and tried the door. The hinges swung open with a loud, rusty squeal. Something inside. What? I aimed the light inside and lurched back with a cry. A dead body – shriveled and desiccated beyond any hope of identification. Looked like an adult, and by the torn up, brown-stained clothing, a man. My heart took off like a shot, and I spun around, the revolver in front of me as I feared someone lurked behind me.

Silence – except for my own ragged breathing, sporadic whistles of wind rushing through the attic’s smashed out windows.

I opened the second armoire. This one contained two bodies – one a nearly bare skeleton, the other appearing older, more shriveled than the first body I’d discovered. Just a few dusty tatters of either skin or cloth, I didn’t know which. The jaw was craned open, half its teeth missing, as though frozen in the rictus of a scream.

“I'm glad you came,” a man said, and I instantly recognized the voice. I spun back toward the attic stairs. There stood a living, breathing man, dressed in overalls over a checkered shirt. A few inches shorter than myself, with a deeply lined, almost shriveled face. How could a guy this old have such a youthful voice – like someone in his twenties, maybe thirties?

“Who are you? What the hell’s going on?” I shouted, my voice hoarse and dry as I pulled back the hammer. “There’s bodies up here! At least three!”

Then I thought of the undisturbed floors, and I wondered how long he’d been up here. Alone.

“I’m Cletus,” the old man said, and I saw the long, white stubble on his gaunt cheeks, his scarred chin. Most of him was edged sharply in light and shadow. I couldn’t make out the color of his eyes.

“What’s going on? Did you kill all them, in those cabinets? Answer me, goddamnit!” The revolver’s muzzle was trembling. I held my position, unwilling to get any closer to Cletus, now only about eight feet away. So I backed up another five or six steps and felt relieved at the greater safety margin.

“I don’t have much time – that’s why I brought you here.” He looked so calm, his face radiating more warmth than I ever thought possible from the eyes of a savage killer, a monster. It made him all the more terrifying. I’d always thought I’d feel the hairs stand on the back of my neck if I were near such a man. I’d been mistaken…

“Get down on the floor! Now!” I commanded.

“You need to calm down. Enjoy the peace and quiet. That’s the way this is supposed to work. Willow House is home. Relax, look around. And put that thing down – you’re gonna hurt someone.”

When he chuckled, his words came out with a strained whistling breath. His eyes lost their light, and I sensed some waning in his energy, his strength, his own life force.

Then it happened.

He rushed at me with terrifying speed. I fired one deafening shot after another, the revolver kicking back, nearly flying from my hands. Bullets struck his chest, his head, again and again – as the momentum of each bullet slowed him in jerking movements, until my sixth and final shot, his body just two feet away, that toppled him onto his back with a muffled thud. I couldn’t hear a thing – my ears ringing from the gunshots, the acrid scent of cordite burning my nostrils.

Something touched my back, and I spun round. The blood drained from my face as the air went cold as ice. I was staring into the face of someone, or something. Bulbous, unblinking eyes, a face reminiscent of a man, but not really a man. Translucent, with veils of faintly visible gray light outlining its form. Perhaps it was just dust, clinging to some invisible presence beneath.

The apparition floated toward me. Into me.

And the world went dark.

Twenty Years Later

Ethan wasn’t impressed. Most antique shops were organized by era, or by décor. This place was a mish-mash of every kind of bric-a-brac imaginable. Still, perhaps he’d find some interesting vintage props for his next photo shoot.

Then a deafening metallic ringing sound made him jump. A bell. He spotted it immediately – the vintage black Bakelite dial telephone – probably over a hundred years old. It rang again, and he couldn’t help but answer it.

He placed the receiver against his ear, felt a numbing cold against his skin.

“Sam, this you? Sam?” said a frightened-sounding man. “Is Sam there?”