The Narrows(37)

The foundation creaked and she could hear the beams in the ceiling groan in the strong wind. Maggie held her breath. Across the room, she could see the hallway and, beyond, the closed door that led down to the basement. To the shotgun.

You do horrible things, this is what happens, said the voice.

She went to the basement door, pulled it open. A mineshaft of blackness appeared before her. Feeling along the stairwell wall, she found the light switch and flipped it on. Weak, yellow light appeared at the bottom of the rickety basement stairs.

Thunder boomed, shaking the house.

Maggie hurried downstairs two steps at a time and went directly to the wall where the shotgun hung from its lacquered plaque. She yanked it down and it was heavier than she would have thought. Turning it over in her hands, she looked at the wooden stock, the sleek black barrel, the sliding bit of metal that ran the length of the barrel. She had seen enough movies to know how shotguns worked, but when she attempted to slide the movable bit which opened the chamber, it wouldn’t move.

“What the hell,” she muttered.

She continued to turn the shotgun over in her hands. At one side of the trigger was a circular button that protruded. There was also a lever beside the trigger. She pulled back the lever and found that the slide engaged and she was able to move it up and down the barrel. Sliding it opened a chamber in which a shotgun shell could be loaded.

The shells—they were in the bottom drawer of Evan’s workbench. She set the shotgun on the floor and went quickly to the bench, pulling open the bottom drawer. There were two boxes of shotgun shells inside—one labeled Buckshot, the other marked as Slugs. Slugs sounded more dangerous, so she emptied the contents of the box onto the floor. About a dozen plastic tubes rolled out, each one capped in a helmet of brass. She had no idea what she was doing.

Maggie gathered up the shotgun slugs and dumped them back into the box. Then she took the box and, scooping up the shotgun from where she’d left it, carried both items back upstairs.

The house seemed like a different place now. She went to the crescent window in the back door and looked out upon a misty rain. The floodlights lit the grounds like a rodeo.

A blank-faced cadaverous figure crouched on the roof of the Pontiac.

Maggie shrieked and turned away from the window, throwing her back against the wall. The box of shells dropped from her hand, and a number of shells spilled out. A few rolled under the couch.

It fell out of the sky, Maggie thought frantically, bending down and snatching up a handful of shotgun shells. Crouching to the floor, she fumbled around until she found the lever on the gun again, depressed it, and managed to pull the slide back. The chamber opened on the side of the gun, just the right size and shape to accommodate one of the shells. How many of the damn things did the gun take? There were about a dozen in the box. Maybe she could load all twelve into the shotgun? Did they file down into the barrel? No, that didn’t make sense…

Rain lashed heavily now against the windows. Her breath came in panting, rapid gasps. She took one of the shells and slipped it into the opening at the side of the shotgun. It just sat there.

“Come on!” she shouted at it.

Think, she thought. Think about what makes sense here…

With her thumb, she shoved the plastic cylinder up into the barrel until she heard and felt a click. When she withdrew her thumb, the shell was gone, having vanished up into the body of the gun.

Yes. That’s it.

She tried to stick another shell into the chamber but the previous one prevented it from moving forward. She was doing something; she wasn’t thinking. Her hand on the slide, she jerked it and heard a solid clack. Suddenly, the gun felt dangerous in her hands.

She repeated the process, shoving shells into the gun, until it would take no more. Four, she thought. It holds four. Remember that.

Shaking, she stood and again peered out the crescent of glass in the door. Outside, the floodlights made the rain shimmer. The black Pontiac looked sleek as a shark.

The figure was no longer there.

Things from space can read your mind, said the head-voice. It knows you’re armed now and it’s being careful. It’s being sneaky.

“Shut the f*ck up,” she told the voice.

The sound of her cellular phone trilling from the couch caused her to jump and sob. Still holding the gun, she rushed over to it and answered it without checking the number.

“Hello?”

“Where’d you go, darling?” It was Tom. He sounded drunk and a bit irritated.

Maggie closed her eyes. Suddenly, the shotgun seemed to weigh about two hundred pounds. Around her, heavy rain played a tattoo against the living room windows.

“There’s someone outside the house, Tom,” she said into the phone.

“Who?”

“I don’t know,” she said, simultaneously thinking, It’s the thing that fell out of the sky, just like John Fogerty said. It landed in Stillwater and I hit it with my car and now it’s come back to get me.

“You want me to come out there?” Tom said.

She considered this. Maggie Quedentock, formerly Margaret Kilpatrick, formerly a pot-smoking high school student who had lost her virginity at the age of twelve to seventeen-year-old Barry Mallick. Maggie Quedentock, who had displayed a track record of poor decisions and self-destructive behavior…

Into the phone, she said, “Yes. Come over.”