that noon, another door opened and the memory did c(gene.
"He said that sometimes the world is full of colors," Ralph told his empty apartment, "but that at some point they all started turning black. I think that was it."
It was close, but was it everything? Ralph thought there had been at least a little more to Ed's spiel, but he couldn't remember what.
And did it matter, anyway? His nerves suggested strongly that it did-the cold line up his back had both widened and deepened.
Behind him, the telephone rang. Ralph turned and saw it sitting in a bath of baleful red light, dark red, the color of nosebleeds and (cocks fighting cocks)
rooster-combs.
No, part of his mind moaned. Oh no, Ralph, don't get going on this again-Each time the phone rang, the envelope of light got brighter.
During the intervals of silence, it darkened. It was like looking at a ghostly heart with a telephone inside it.
Ralph closed his eyes tightly, and when he opened them again, the red aura around the telephone was gone.
No, you just can't see it right now. I'm not sure, but I think -you might have willed it away. Like something in a lucid dream.
As he crossed the room to the telephone, he told himself-and in no uncertain terms-that that idea was as crazy as seeing the auras in the first place. Except it wasn't, and he knew it wasn't. Because if it was crazy, how come it had taken only one look at that roosterred halo of light to make him sure that it was Ed Deepneau calling?
. That's crap, Ralph. You think it's Ed because Ed's on your mind... and because you're so tired your head's getting funny. Go on, pick it UP, you'll see. It's not the tell-tale heart, not even the tell-tale phone.
It's probably some guy wanting to sell you subscriptions or the lady at the blood-bank, wondering why you haven't been in lately.
Except he knew better.
Ralph picked up the phone and said hello.
No answer. But someone was there; Ralph could hear breathing.
"Hello?" he asked again.
There was still no immediate answer, and he was about to say I'm hanging up now when Ed Deepneau said, "I called about your mouth, Ralph. It's trying to get you in trouble."
The line of cold between his shoulderblades was no longer a line; now it was a thin plate of ice covering him from the nape of his neck to the small of his back.
"Hello, Ed. I saw you on the news today." It was the only thing he could think of to say. His hand did not seem to be holding the phone so much as to be cramped around it.
"Never mind that, old boy. just pay attention. I've had a visit from that wide detective who arrested me last month-Leydecker.
He just left, in fact."
Ralph's heart sank, but not as far as he might have feared. After all, Leydecker's going to see Ed wasn't that surprising, was it? He had been very interested in Ralph's story of the airport confrontation in the summer of '92. Very interested indeed.
"Did he?" Ralph asked evenly.
"Detective Leydecker has the idea that I think people-or possibly supernatural beings of some sort-are trucking fetuses out of town in flatbeds and pickup trucks. What a scream, huh?"
Ralph stood beside the sofa, pulling the telephone cord restlessly through his fingers and realizing that he could see dull red light creeping out of the wire like sweat. The light pulsed with the rhythms of Ed's speech.
"You've been telling tales out of school, old boy."
Ralph was silent.
"Calling the police after I gave that bitch the lesson she so richly deserved didn't bother me," Ed told him. "I put it down to...
. well, grandfatherly concern. Or maybe you thought that if she was grateful enough, she might actually spare you a mercy-fuck. After all, you're old but not exactly ready for Jurassic Park yet. You might have thought she'd let you get a finger into her at the very least."
Ralph said nothing.
"Right, old boy?"
Ralph said nothing.
"You think you're going to rattle me with the silent treatment?
Forget it." But Ed did sound rattled, thrown off his stride. It was as if he had made the call with a certain script in his head and Ralph was refusing to read his lines. "You can't... you better not...
"My calling the police after you beat Helen didn't upset you, but your conversation with Leydecker today obviously did, Why's that, Ed?
Are you finally starting to have some questions about your behavior?