“Just because a network television show will go to any lengths to promote a Halloween special, doesn’t mean anyone has been vindicated.”
“Gabriel,” Harrison said uneasily, “I took the liberty of calling the hospital where this caretaker’s boy is.”
Kennedy put his half-eaten sandwich in the bag and then looked up. He held his right hand over his brow to shield his eyes from the sun.
“Of course they wouldn’t tell me anything at the nurse’s station, so I used an old trick. I spoke with one of the elderly volunteers at the reception desk. She said that the boy is comatose — and then she told me he’d been scared nearly to death. Of course there is no such thing as being scared almost to death, clinically speaking, but we all know what shock can do to higher and lower brain function.”
“I met that boy, you know. I really liked his mother and father.”
“From what I’m hearing, this helps your story.”
“No, Harrison, it just adds to it,” Kennedy answered sharply. He stood and tossed his lunch bag into a nearby receptacle.
“Did Good Morning America inform the public that this crazy producer is going on with the Halloween special?” Lumley reached down and picked up the newspaper.
Kennedy slowly took the paper from his friend’s hand, looking him in the eyes as he unfolded it.
“What do the police have to say about that?”
“Doesn’t say.”
“If they keep fucking around with that house, it will kill them all.” He scanned the paper for the article.
Harrison turned away and started walking back to his office. “Then if I were you, I’d make sure they understand just what they’re getting into.” He stopped and looked back at Kennedy. “For your own peace of mind.”
Gabriel closed the paper. “I will never in my life go back to Summer Place, Harrison.”
His friend smiled at him sadly and walked away. Opening the paper once more, Kennedy quickly found the headline.
Old Nightmares Churn Once More in Pocono Mountains.’
“Jesus,” he mumbled, scanning the article.
All around him, the hot fall day went on its merry schedule of classes and first semester finals. Kennedy stood riveted to his lunchtime spot, and read. As he lowered the paper and let it slip from his hands, an old familiar chill coursed through his body, defying the heat of the Texas sun.
Kelly Delaphoy had been expecting a boardroom full of suits, but instead she found herself facing only two men. One was nodding his head like a grandfather, his heavy jowls almost covering his ever-present bowtie. His thick glasses made his dark eyes larger than they actually were, giving him a cartoon-ish look. The other man had the smirk and dead eyes of a circling shark about to feed.
Abraham Feuerstein looked at Kelly calmly and silently. He had taken over a company a thousand times smaller than General Electric, and one with negative fluid capital, and turned it into a manufacturing juggernaut. It allowed him smaller, but just as profitable, playthings — playthings such as movie studios and television networks. He was the only man to claim a Chairman of the Board position, along with being CEO.
On the other side of the table, sitting and smiling like the Cheshire cat, was Lionel Peterson, fresh from his morning shower at the Waldorf Astoria. His grin lingered as he opened a folder in front of him. His hair was combed back so severely that it mirrored the soft lighting of the chairman’s office.
“Let’s open this little get-together with a few numbers,” he said, looking from Kelly to Feuerstein. “There’s only one good number here. It’s the that says Kelly and her crew actually stayed within budget for the broadcast test. In fact, she came in under budget. Probably only because the test was terminated thirty-five minutes in.”
“Were we supposed to keep going after—?”
Peterson held up his hand, cutting her protest short.
“We have two people missing, and after two full days it seems the Pennsylvania State Police cannot locate them. The house, Summer Place, has been searched with the proverbial fine toothed comb. The network is being accused of hiring a known child molester and exposing a teenager to that danger — a teenager who, by the way, is in a near comatose state. I say near because every few hours he awakens and screams for a solid thirty minutes. Then when he can’t continue, he passes back out.”
“You’ve seen the tape, what—”
“One of the hosts of the show is missing, probably with the child molester Kelly brought to the house without network knowledge. Now your other co-host has resigned.”
“The show will—”
“There is no show, Kelly,” Peterson said, closing the file.
“Mr. Feuerstein, am I going to be allowed to talk, or am I to be cut off by Mr. Peterson every time I open my mouth?”
“I believe Lionel has said what he came here to say,” the chairman said. He stood up and poured a cup of coffee at the large credenza, then turned and slowly paced back to Kelly’s chair at the table. He placed the china cup and saucer in front of her. “You may now have the floor, Ms. Delaphoy,” he said, returning to his large chair.
“No matter what the State Police are saying, you saw the tape, the eight frames of footage. Something came out of that vent and took Kyle. I know the same thing took Paul. It’s the same thing Professor Kennedy claimed happened to his lost student.”
Peterson cleared his throat. “Our best, most experienced technicians don’t know what they’re looking at on that tape. They say the image was recorded at such a slow speed, due to the loss of battery power, that the image may have been created by dust caught up in the night-vision and infrared optics.” He smiled at Kelly, and then looked at the chairman and shrugged his shoulders.
“You have got to be fucking kidding me!” Kelly stared a hole through Peterson. “The goddamn image was blue, which according to the infrared scan means it was cold! Loss of battery power or not, the FLIR camera was operating. It was drawing power from a source other than the batteries or the outside power grid. Fucking dust? Is that the best you can do?”
“Ms. Delaphoy — Kelly — please. I think we can get through this without resorting to profanity. Mr. Peterson proves the point that everyone who sees the images will interpret this thing differently. You can’t beat their heads together to get the result you want. Being from the electronics business, I know how rarely engineers and technicians agree on anything. Now, we also had to turn the tape over to the Pennsylvania State Police, who — I may add — are threatening charges against you, Mr. Dalton and Mr. Sanborn for withholding evidence.”
“If we don’t capitalize on this free publicity for the special, it would be unforgivable to the stockholders.”
The chairman let his face drop for a brief moment before looking up at Kelly. “Young lady, I and I alone answer to those stockholders. You do not.”
“You see what I have to deal with here, sir?” Peterson asked.
Feuerstein held up his hand for Peterson to be silent.
“However, I am a business man, and did not rise up to be the head of this corporation by being blind to opportunity.”
Kelly closed her eyes and allowed her heart to settle back into its normal position in her chest.
“Now, we have a mess on our hands. Wallace Lindemann has recovered some of the bravado he lost in front of our attorney, and has filed an injunction to have our lease cancelled before Halloween.”
“I’m sure we have legal recourse to—”
“Kelly, you have a bad habit of jumping the gun before people have finished.”