~ When The Wind Blows~

by

Marilyn A. Gardiner

As she drew into the driveway Molly could hear a radio blaring loudly. The sensation was eerie: a totally dark house and hard rock blasting as if a party was underway. She sat in the car and looked at the house. A shiver of unease quivered up her back. She wished she hadn’t insisted on coming alone. Had the Catlins gone off and left the radio on? They were more into Lawrence Welk, anyway, than this driving drumbeat that made the air quake.

Finally she got out of the car and walked up the path. Hesitantly she climbed the stairs and listened with increasing unease as the music got louder and louder, the pulse pounding like so many hammers at her head. The noise seemed to be coming from her apartment. It was from her apartment! Could one of the policemen who had stayed last night have left on the stereo?

Maybe it was Gilly! Maybe he was inside waiting for her! Hope leaped in her chest like a fish on a line and then dropped away in a sickening lurch. Gilly didn’t listen to rock. His kind of music ran to Barney and Sesame Street.

Whirling, she ran back to the car and with shaking hands grabbed the tire iron from the trunk. Wishing with all her heart she had allowed the policeman to accompany her, she climbed the stairs once more.

She tried the door. It was locked. Holding her breath she used her key and pulled open the door. How many times had she stood on that landing, juggling groceries and balancing awkwardly while trying to open the door? Never had it been as difficult as this.

All her senses strained to see, to hear, to feel. Her skin felt tight on her bones. "Hello?" she called tentatively into the darkness and then with more force. "Hello?"

No answer. She tried again, "Is anyone here?"

The music was deafeningly loud. Where was it coming from? The rooms were so dark she had a feeling of staring into a huge hole. Could someone be waiting in the dark? No, she thought, they couldn’t. The hard-driving beat would make them crazy.

Fumbling, feeling for the button, Molly tensed and switched on the light. Squinting in the sudden brilliance, she saw that the room was empty. Every hair on her arms prickled with tension. She was so frightened she was suddenly sick to her stomach, but she had to turn off the music. Had to find it and stop the terrible noise.

The stereo sat black and still in the corner, no red dot of light indicating the power was on. Not the stereo. A tape? No, a tape wouldn’t have lasted very long, and no one knew she would be coming, anyway.

Where was a radio? The kitchen. Holding the tire iron high, she made her way around the counter and gropingly picked up the tiny radio beside the toaster. It was off, but she yanked the plug from the wall anyway. Still the music jerked and pounded around the room, bouncing and skittering off the walls, boring into her head. Where was another radio? She didn’t have another radio, did she? The noise was so great she couldn’t concentrate. Oh God, make it stop. Why weren’t neighbors banging on the door or calling the police?

The apartment wasn’t that big. It didn’t take long for Molly to run through the living room, turning in a bewildered and desperate circle in the middle of the rug, trying to think where the music could be coming from, and on into the converted closet that was Gilly’s room. Not there either. It had to be in her bedroom.

At her door the wall of sound was so solid she stopped as if she had run into an oaken board. Her brain felt as if it were being scrambled. The radio had to be here. She opened the closet door. And closed it. No difference in the volume. Fearfully, she crouched and looked under the bed, ready to leap if anything moved. Nothing did.

She opened her bureau drawers one by one, flinging then wide and closing them again with swift abandon. The last drawer was already partially open. Four inches, maybe more. Her fingers faltered. Maybe Marcine hadn’t closed it tightly when she packed. Trembling, Molly pulled the drawer open farther. The music fairly leaped out at her. And there it was, a powerful battery-operated radio, complete with speakers, covered lightly with lace. Frantically, fumbling, she searched for the on/off switch.

The silence was as deafening as the music had been. For a full minute she stood thinking she’d never hear anything again, ever. The relief was enormous. Sweat broke out around her hairline, and she felt suddenly weak. And then a slow panic began to build. The short hair on the back of her neck became stiffly separate, and the sweat on her body turned icy cold.

Who had put the radio there? Among her most personal things, the lacy things she wore next to her body? Her stomach felt like it was full of snakes. Who could have gotten into the house and turned on the radio blastingly loud and then left without being seen?

Was he still there? Her heart kicked against her ribs, and her breath came in ragged, painful gasps. Why would anyone do this? Toward what purpose? If it was just to scare her mindless, they had certainly succeeded. Who?

And then from behind her there was a small noise or a movement of air. Afterward, Molly never knew just how it was that she was aware there was someone in the doorway, watching. Her breath stopped.

Slowly, terror yanking at her throat, she turned. He was standing in the bedroom door, unsmiling, his eyes hard on hers.

"Hello, Molly," Fred said. "My loving and loyal wife."