off the evil that was loose in the winter night, and he hoped it would
help him overcome his feelings of guilt and shame, which plagued him
because he hadn’t done anything to stop that evil from having its way in
the world. But the cards couldn’t distract him. He kept looking out
the window beside the table, sensing something unspeakable out there in
the dark. His guilt grew stronger instead of weaker; it chewed on his
conscience.
He was a Houngon.
He had certain responsibilities.
He could not condone such monstrous evil as this.
Damn.
He tried watching television. Quincy. Jack Klugman was shouting at his
stupid superiors, crusading for Justice, exhibiting a sense of social
compassion greater than Mother Teresa’s, and otherwise comporting
himself more like Superman than like a real medical examiner.
On Dynasty, a bunch of rich people were carrying on in the most
licentious, vicious, Machiavellian manner, and Carver asked himself the
same question he always asked himself when he was unfortunate enough to
catch a few minutes of Dynasty or Dallas or one of their clones: If real
rich people in the real world were this obsessed with sex, revenge,
back-stabbing, and petty jealousies, how could any of them ever have had
the time and intelligence to make any money in the first place? He
switched off the TV.
He was a Houngon.
He had certain responsibilities.
He chose a book from the living room shelf, the new Elmore Leonard
novel, and although he was a big fan of Leonard’s, and although no one
wrote stories that moved faster than Leonard’s stories, he couldn’t
concentrate on this one. He read two pages, couldn’t remember a thing
he’d read, and returned the book to the shelf.
He was a Houngon.
He returned to the kitchen, went to the telephone. He hesitated with
his hand on it.
He glanced at the window. He shuddered because the vast night itself
seemed to be demonically alive.
He picked up the phone. He listened to the dial tone for a while.
Detective Dawson’s office and home numbers were on a piece of notepaper
beside the telephone. He stared at the home number for a while. Then,
at last, he dialed it.
It rang several times, and he was about to give up, when the receiver
was lifted at the other end. But no one spoke.
He waited a couple of seconds, then said, “Hello?”
No answer.
“Is someone there?”
No response.
At first he thought he hadn’t actually reached the Dawson number, that
there was a problem with the connection, that he was listening to dead
air. But as he was about to hang up, a new and frightening perception
seized him. He sensed an evil presence at the other end, a supremely
malevolent entity whose malignant energy poured back across the
telephone line.
He broke out in a sweat. He felt soiled. His heart raced. His stomach
turned sour, sick.
He slammed the phone down. He wiped his damp hands on his pants. They
still felt unclean, merely from holding the telephone that had
temporarily connected him with the beast in the Dawson apartment. He
went to the sink and washed his hands thoroughly.
The thing at the Dawsons’ place was surely one of the entities that
Lavelle had summoned to do his dirty work for him. But what was it
doing there? What did this mean? Was Lavelle crazy enough to turn
loose the powers of darkness not only on the Carramazzas but on the
police who were investigating those murders?
If anything happens to Lieutenant Dawson, Hampton thought, I’m
responsible because I refused to help him.
Using a paper towel to blot the cold sweat from his face and neck, he
considered his options and tried to decide what he should do next.
There were only two men in the street department’s Jeep station wagon,
which left plenty of room for Penny, Davey, Rebecca, and Jack.
The driver was a merry-looking, ruddy-faced man with a squashed nose and
big ears; he said his name was Burt. He looked closely at Jack’s police
ID and, satisfied that it was genuine, was happy to put himself at their
disposal, swing the Jeep around, and run them back to headquarters,