Tick Tock (24 page)

Leaning forward in his chair, agitated, Tommy said, “I'm amazed that you just accept all of this so easily.”

“Why wouldn't I?” Mrs. Payne asked, clearly surprised by his statement. “If Del says there's an entity, then I'm sure there's an entity. Del is no fool.”

Mummingford entered the music room, pushing a tea cart laden with china, a silver coffee urn, and pastries.

To her mother, Del said, “Tommy suffers from an excess of scepticism. For instance, he doesn't believe in alien abductions.”

“They're real” Mrs. Payne assured Tommy with a smile, as though her confirmation of Del's stranger beliefs was all that he needed to embrace them himself.

“He doesn't believe in ghosts,” Del said.

“Real” said Mrs. Payne.

“Or lycanthropy.”

“Real.”

“Or remote viewing.”

“Real.”

Listening to them made Tommy dizzy. He closed his eyes.

“Though he does believe in Big Foot,” Del said teasingly.

“How odd,” said Mrs. Payne.

“I do not believe in Big Foot,” Tommy corrected.

He could hear the devilment in Del's voice as she said, “Well, that's not what you said earlier.”

“Big Foot,” said Julia Rosalyn Winona Lilith Payne, “is nothing but tabloid trash.”

“Exactly,” said Del.

Tommy had to open his eyes to accept a cup of coffee from the apparently imperturbable Mummingford.

From the old-looking radio on the faux-ivory coffee table came an announcer's voice identifying the broadcast as originating live from the fabulous Empire Ballroom, where “Glenn Miller and his big band bring the stars out when they play,” followed by a commercial for Lucky Strike cigarettes.

Del said, “If Tommy can stay alive until dawn, then the curse fails, and he's okay. Or at least that's what we think.”

“Little more than an hour and a half,” said Mrs. Payne. “What do you suppose are his chances of making it?”

“Sixty-forty,” Del said.

Flustered, Tommy said, “What? Sixty-forty?”

“Well,” Del said, “that's my honest assessment.”

“Which is the sixty? Sixty percent chance that I'll be killed or sixty percent chance that I'll live?”

“That you'll live,” Del said brightly.

“I'm not comforted.”

“Yes, but we're steadily improving those odds by the minute, sweetheart.”

“It's still not good,” said Mrs. Payne.

“It's
terrible,”
Tommy said, distressed.

“It's just a hunch,” Del ventured, “but I don't think Tommy is scheduled for unnatural extraction. He feels as if he has a full-life destiny with a natural departure.”

Tommy had no idea what she was talking about. Addressing him in a reassuring tone, Mrs. Payne said, “Well, Tommy dear, even if the worst were to happen, death isn't final. It's only a transitional phase.”

“You're sure of that, are you?”

“Oh, yes. I talk to Ned more nights than not.”

“Who?”

“Daddy,” Del clarified.

“He appears on the David Letterman show,” Mrs. Payne said.

Mummingford passed a silver tray of pastries to Del first, who took a plump cinnamon-pecan roll, and then to Tommy. Although Tommy initially selected a sensible bran muffin, he reconsidered and asked for a chocolate croissant. If he only had an hour and a half to live, worrying about his cholesterol level seemed pointless.

As Mummingford used pastry tongs to transfer the croissant to a plate, Tommy asked Del's mother for a clarification: “Your late husband appears on the David Letterman show?”

“It's a late-night talk show.”

“Yes, I know.”

“Sometimes David announces a guest, but instead of the movie star or singer or whoever it's supposed to be, my Ned comes out and sits in the guest chair. Then the whole program freezes, as if time has stopped—David and the audience and the band all frozen in place—and Ned talks to me.”

Tommy tasted his chocolate croissant. It was delicious. “Of course,” said Mrs. Payne, “this appears only on my personal TV, not all over the country. I'm the only one who sees Ned.”

With a mouthful of croissant, Tommy nodded.

Del's mother said, “Ned always had style. He'd never settle for contacting me through a fake Gypsy medium at a séance or through a Ouija board, nothing as trite and tacky as that.”

Tommy tried the coffee. It was lightly flavoured with vanilla. Excellent.

“Oh, Mummingford,” Del said, “I almost forgot—there's a stolen Ferrari in the driveway.”

“What would you like done with it, Miss Payne?”

“Could you have it returned to Balboa Island within the hour? I can tell you exactly where it was parked.”

“Yes, Miss Payne. I'll just refresh everyone's coffee and then attend to it.”

As Del's mother began feeding pieces of a cruller to Scootie, she said, “What vehicle would you like brought up from the garage, Del?”

Del said, “The way this night's going, whatever we drive is liable to end up on the junk pile. So it shouldn't be one of your most precious cars.”

“Nonsense, darling. You should be comfortable.”

“Well, I like the Jaguar two plus two.”

“It's a lovely car,” Mrs. Payne agreed.

“It has the power and manoeuvrability we need for work like this,” said Del.

“I'll have it brought around to the front door at once,” Mummingford said.

“But before you do, do you think you could please bring a telephone?” Del asked.

“Certainly, Miss Payne,” the butler said, and he departed. Having finished his croissant, Tommy got up from his chair, went to the tea cart, and selected a cheese Danish.

He had decided to concentrate on eating and not even try to be part of the conversation. Both women made him crazy, and life was too short to let them upset him. In fact, if reliable sources could be believed, there was a forty percent chance that life was very damn short indeed.

Smiling at Del, smiling at her mother, Tommy returned to his chair with the Danish.

From the radio, at reduced volume, issued Glenn Miller's “String of Pearls.”

Del's mother said, “I should have had you children change into bathrobes the moment you arrived. Then we could have thrown your clothes in the dryer. They'd be dry and warm by now.”

“We'll only get wet again when we leave,” Del said.

“No dear. The rain will be stopping in another four minutes.”

Del shrugged. “We'll be fine.”

Tommy took a bite of the Danish and looked at his watch.

“Tell me more about the entity,” Mrs. Payne said. “What it looks like, what its capabilities are.”

“I'm afraid that'll have to wait till later, Mom. I need to use the bathroom quick, and then we'd better run.”

“While you're in there, comb your hair, dear. It's kinking up now that it's drying.”

Del left the room, and for perhaps ten seconds, Julia Rosalyn Winona Lilith and the big black dog stared at Tommy as he ate the Danish.

Then Mrs. Payne said, “So you're the one.” Tommy swallowed a mouthful of pastry. “What does that mean—the one?”

“Why, of course, dear boy, it means precisely what it says. You're
the one.”

“The one.”

“Yes, the one.”

“The one. There's something ominous about it.”

She seemed genuinely baffled. “Ominous?”

“Sort of like a term that some lost tribe of volcano-worshipping South Sea islanders might use before they throw the virgin into the fiery pit.”

Mrs. Payne laughed with obvious delight. “Oh, you
are
precious. A sense of humour quite like Ned's.”

“I'm serious.”

“That makes it even funnier.”

“Tell me about—the one,” he insisted.

“Well, of course, Deliverance merely meant that you're the one for her. The
one.
The one she should spend the rest of her life with.”

Tommy felt a hot blush rising faster than the mercury in a thermometer bathed with August sunshine.

Evidently Julia Rosalyn Winona Lilith saw the blush, for she said, “My heavens, you are the sweetest young man.”

Scootie chuffed as if in agreement.

Blushing so brightly that he was beginning to sweat,

Tommy desperately wanted to change the subject. “So you haven't slept since Mud Lake.”

Mrs. Payne nodded. “Just south of Tonopah.”

“Twenty-seven years with no sleep.”

“Almost twenty-eight, since the night that my Deliverance was conceived.”

“You must be tired.”

“Not at all,” she said. “Sleep isn't a necessity for me now. It's a choice, and I simply don't choose to do it, because it's boring.”

“What happened at Mud Lake?”

“Didn't Del tell you?”

“No.”

“Well,” said Mrs. Payne, “then it's certainly not my place to do so. I'll let it to her, in her own good time.”

Mummingford entered the room with a portable telephone, per Del's request, and put it on the coffee table. He retreated without comment. He had to deal with a stolen Ferrari, after all.

Tommy looked at his watch.

“Personally, Tommy dear, I think your chances of living until dawn are a hundred percent.”

“Well, if I don't make it, Rosalyn, I'll visit you on the David Letterman show.”

“I'd adore that!” she said and clapped her hands to express her pleasure at the thought.

On the radio, Glenn Miller's big band was playing “American Patrol.”

After washing down the last of the cheese Danish with the last of his coffee, Tommy said, “Is this your favourite kind of music?”

“Oh, yes. It's the music that might redeem our planet—if it could be redeemed by music alone.”

“But you're a child of the fifties.”

“Rock-'n'-roll,” she said. “Yes. I love rock-'n'-roll. But this is the music that appeals to the galaxy.”

He mulled over those four words: “Appeals to the galaxy.”

“Yes. As no other.”

“You're so like your daughter,” he said.

Beaming, Mrs. Payne said, “I love you too, Tommy.”

“So you collect old radio programs.”

“Collect?” she asked, baffled.

He indicated the radio on the coffee table. “Is it a cassette player, or are they issuing those collectibles on CDs now?”

“No, dear, we're listening to the original program live.”

“Live on tape.”

“Just live.”

“Glenn Miller died in World War Two.”

“Yes,” Mrs. Payne said, “in nineteen forty-five. I'm surprised anyone of your age would remember him—or when he died.”

“Swing music is so American,” Tommy said. “I love everything American, I really do.”

“That's one reason you're so strongly drawn to Del,” she said happily. “Deliverance is so thoroughly American, so open to possibilities.”

“Back to Glenn Miller, if we may. He died more than fifty years ago.”

“So sad,” Mrs. Payne acknowledged, stroking Scootie.

“Well then.”

She raised her eyebrows. “Oh, I see your confusion.”

“Only one small part of it.”

“Excuse me, dear?”

“At this point, no one alive is capable of grasping the enormous dimensions of my confusion,” Tommy assured her.

“Really? Then perhaps your diet's deficient. You might not be getting enough vitamin B complex.”

“Oh?”

“Along with vitamin E,” Mrs. Payne explained, “a good B-complex supplement can clarify mental processes.”

“I thought you were going to tell me to eat tofu.”

“Good for the prostate.”

“Glenn Miller,” Tommy reminded her, indicating the radio that still swung with “American Patrol.”

“Let me clear up this one little confusion,” she said. “We're listening to this broadcast live because my radio has trans-temporal tuning capabilities.”

“Trans-temporal.”

“Cross-time, yes. Earlier I was listening to Jack Benny live. He was an enormously funny man. No one like him today.”

“Who sells radios with trans-temporal tuning capabilities, Winona? Sears?”

“Do they? I don't think so. As for how I got
my
little radio, I'll have to let Deliverance explain. It's related to Mud Lake, you know.”

“Trans-temporal radio,” Tommy mused. “I think I prefer to believe in Big Foot.”

“You can't possibly,” Mrs. Payne said disapprovingly.

“Why not? I now believe in devil dolls and demons.”

“Yes, but they're
real.”

Tommy checked his wristwatch again. “It's still raining.”

She cocked her head and listened to the faint drumming of the rain on the well-insulated roof of The Great Pile, and Scootie cocked his head as well. After a moment, she said, “Yes, it is. Such a restful sound.”

“You told Del the rain would stop in four minutes. You were so precise about it.”

“Yes, that's right.”

“But it's still raining.”

“Four minutes haven't passed yet.”

Tommy tapped his watch.

She said, “Dear, your watch is wrong. It's taken a lot of battering tonight.”

Tommy held the wristwatch to his ear, listened, and said, “Ticktock.”

“Ten seconds yet,” she said.

He counted them off, then looked at her and smiled ruefully.

The rain continued to fall.

At fifteen seconds, the rain abruptly stopped.

Tommy's smile faded, and Mrs. Payne's returned.

“You were five seconds off,” he said.

“I never claimed to be God, dear.”

“What do you claim to be, Lilith?”

She pursed her lips, considering his question, and then said, “Just an ex-ballerina with a considerable amount of enriching and strange experience.”

Slumping back in his armchair, Tommy said, “I'm never going to doubt a Payne woman again.”

“That's a wise decision, dear.”

“What's a wise decision?” Del asked as she returned.

Mrs. Payne said, “He's decided never to doubt a Payne woman.”

“Never doubting a Payne woman,” Del said, “is not just wise. It's
the
prerequisite for survival.”

“Although I keep thinking about the female preying mantis,” Tommy said.

“How so?”

“After she mates, she bites the head off her partner and eats him alive.”

Mrs. Payne said, “I think you'll discover that Payne women will usually settle for a cup of tea and a scone.”

Indicating the portable telephone on the coffee table, Del said, “Did you make the call, Tommy?”