The Door To December

Porteau usually was optimistic, another Holmesian trait, so his pessimism in the current case was especially disturbing. Dan said, 'What about the scrapings from under the victims' fingernails?'

'Nothing of interest. No skin, no hair, no blood but their own under their nails, which probably means they didn't get a chance to claw at their assailants.'

'But the killers had to move in close. I mean, Felix, they beat these people to death.'

'Yes. But although they had to get close, none of them seems to have been wounded. We took scores of blood samples from every surface in those rooms, only to discover that all of it belonged to the victims.'

They sat in silence.

Porteau puffed clouds of fragrant smoke into the air above his head. A distant look came into his eyes as he pondered the evidence in the case, and if he, like Sherlock, had played a violin, he would have reached for it now.

At last Dan said, 'I assume that you saw the photographs of the bodies.'

'Yes. Horrible. Incredible. Such fury.'

'Do you get the feeling that this one is going to be really weird?'

'Daniel, I find all murder to be weird,' Porteau said.

'But this one seems weirder than usual.'

'Weirder than usual,' Porteau agreed, and smiled, as if pleased by the challenge.

'I'm beginning to get the creeps.'

'Look out for that falling boulder, Mr. Coyote.'

Dan left the SID lieutenant in his aromatic haze and rode the elevator back down, this time to the basement, where Pathology was located.

16

Still in a hypnotic state, the girl said, 'No!'

'Melanie, honey, take it easy, take it easy now. Nobody's going to hurt you.

The girl tossed her head, drawing the quick shallow inhalations indicative of panic. A half-born wail of fear and dread was trapped in her throat and issued only as a thin, high-pitched eeeeeeee. She squirmed and tried to push herself off her mother's lap.

Laura held her. 'Stop struggling, Melanie. Relax. Be still. Be calm.'

Suddenly the girl struck out at an imaginary assailant, flailing with both hands. Unintentionally she struck her mother on the breast, then on the face, two hard and painful blows.

For an instant Laura was stunned. The blow to the face was hard enough to bring involuntary tears of pain to her eyes.

Melanie rolled off her mother's lap, onto the floor, and began to crawl away from the couch.

'Melanie, stop!'

In spite of the posthypnotic suggestion that required the girl to respond to and obey Laura's commands, she ignored her mother. She crawled past the rocking chair, making pitiful animal sounds of pure, blind terror.

The calico cat stood on the rocking chair, ears flattened, hissing fearfully. As Melanie scrambled past the chair, Pepper leaped over the girl, hit the floor running, and streaked out of the study.

'Melanie, listen to me.'

The girl disappeared beyond the desk.

Her left cheek still stinging where the child had struck her, Laura also went behind the desk. Melanie had crawled into the kneehole and was hiding there. Laura stooped down and peered in at her. The girl sat with her knees drawn up, arms locked around her legs, hunched, chin against her knees, peering out with wide eyes that, as before, saw neither Laura nor anything else in that room.

'Honey?'

Gasping for breath as if she had run a long way, the girl said, 'Don't let it… open. Keep it… shut… tight shut.

Earl Benton stepped into the doorway. 'You okay?'

Laura looked at him over the top of the desk. 'Yes. Just… my daughter, but she'll be okay.'

'You're sure? You don't need me?'

No, no. I need to be alone with her. I can handle it.'

Reluctantly, Earl retreated to the living room.

Laura looked under the desk again. Melanie was still breathing hard, and now she was shaking violently too. Tears were streaming down her cheeks.

'Come out of there, honey.'

The girl didn't move.

'Melanie, you will listen to me, and you will do what I tell you. Come out of there right now.'

Instead, the girl tried to draw farther back into the kneehole, though she had nowhere to go.

Laura had never known a patient to rebel so completely during hypnotic therapy. She studied the girl and at last decided to allow her to remain under the desk for the time being, since she seemed to feel at least marginally safer there.

'Honey, what are you hiding from?'

No answer.

'Melanie, you must tell me — what did you see that you wanted to keep shut?'

'Don't let it open,' the girl said miserably, as if responding to Laura for the first time, although her eyes still remained focused on some horror in another time and place.

'Don't let what open? Tell me, Melanie.'

'Keep it closed!' the girl cried, and she squeezed her eyes shut and bit her lip so hard that she drew a small spot of blood.

Laura reached into the kneehole and consolingly put one hand on her daughter's arm. 'Honey, what are you talking about? I'll help you keep it closed if you'll only tell me what you're talking about.'

'The d-d-door,' the girl said.

'What door?'

'The door!'

'The door to the tank?'

'It's coming open, it's coming open!'

'No,' Laura said sharply. 'Listen to me. You have to listen to me and accept what I tell you. The door isn't coming open. It's shut. Tightly shut. Look at it. See? It's not even ajar, not even open a little crack.'

'Not even a crack,' the girl said, and now there was no doubt that some part of her could hear Laura and respond, even though she continued to gaze through Laura and even though she remained, for the most part, in some other reality of her own making.

'Not even a crack,' Laura repeated, greatly relieved to be exerting some control at last.

The girl calmed a little. She was trembling, and her face was still lined with fear, but she was not biting her lip anymore. A crimson thread of blood sewed a curved seam down her chin.

Laura said, 'Now, honey, the door is closed, and it's going to stay closed, and nothing on the other side will be able to open it, because I've put a new lock on it, a heavy dead-bolt lock. Do you understand?'

'Yes,' the girl said weakly, doubtfully.

'Look at the door. There's a big shiny new lock on it. Do you see the new lock?'

'Yes,' Melanie said, more confident this time.

'A big brass lock. Enormous.'

'Yes.'

'Enormous and strong. Absolutely nothing in the world could break through that lock.'

'Nothing,' the girl agreed.

'Good. Very good. Now… even though the door can't be opened, I'd like to know what's on the other side of it.'

The girl said nothing.

'Honey? Remember the strong lock. You're safe now. So tell me what's on the other side of the door.'

Melanie's small white hands pulled and patted the empty air under the desk, as though she were attempting to draw a picture of something.

'What's on the other side of the door?' Laura asked again. The hands moved ceaselessly. The girl made wordless, frustrated sounds.

'Tell me, honey.'

'The door…'

'Where does the door lead?'

'The door…'

'What kind of room is on the other side?'

'The door to…'

'To where?'

'The door… to… December,' Melanie said. Her fear broke under the crushing weight of many other emotions — misery, despair, grief, loneliness, frustration — all of which were audible in the wordless sounds that she made and in her uncontrollable sobbing. Then: 'Mommy? Mommy?'

'I'm right here, baby,' Laura said, startled to hear her daughter calling for her.

'Mommy?'

'Right here. Come to me, baby. Come out from under there.'

Weeping, the girl did not come but cried, again, 'Mommy?' She seemed to think she was alone, far from Laura's consoling embrace, though in fact they were only inches apart. 'Oh, Mommy! Mommy!'