Zod Wallop by William Browning Spencer Page B

chair—surprised by the pain in his legs—and joined Raymond at the desk.
    “It has been two hours,” Harry said. “Is there a problem of some sort? There don’t seem to be any other patients.”
    “No problem, sir,” the woman said. “It takes time to torture the truth from a stubborn child.”
    “I beg your pardon?” Harry stepped back, as though from a blow.
    The receptionist was eyeing him with hard, bright eyes.
    She sighed. “I said it takes time to get a resident down from the floors. They have other things to do, you know.”
    Harry turned. Raymond was gone.
     
    It takes time to torture the truth from a stubborn child . Lord Draining had said that, had said it while apologizing to the Closet Police for certain delays.
    Harry went back and sat down. He felt ill, overheated. The room was empty now, no Raymond, no Rene, no large, brooding giant. Where had they gone? He would have to find them. He felt an obligation here. He was the adult, the man in charge. The light in the room made a hissing noise, and as the receptionist bent over her typewriter again, she seemed, briefly, to undergo a transformation. Her flesh seemed mottled, iridescent, as though the light glittered on beaded scales, and her humped back seemed to sprout twin, knobby spines—for all the world like a feeding Swamp Grendel.
    Oxygen deprivation , Harry thought. I was underwater too long. It has done something to my brain. I need to…I need…
 
     
“What do you need, Dearie?” the Gorelord asked, and he grinned, revealing his red company teeth. “Ask anything, and you can have it. But don’t ask the price. That’s bad manners. Don’t ask what it costs.” The Gorelord giggled, which is a sound that cannot be described but is as memorable as a root canal.
     
    Harry got up and moved down the hall. There was a telephone in the hall, and he came upon it as a drowning man comes upon a floating spar, the last vestige of the ship that has gone down. He clung to it, feeling his legs liquify.
    I need to call Helen , he thought. She had wanted to come, but Harry had seen no reason for her presence. “We’ve got enough of a crowd,” he had said. “Raymond’s parents will be coming. Get some rest.” Now he wished she had come. Unflappable, wonderfully skeptical Helen. Thank God for the practical people in this world, those whose minds remained intact, whose hearts were brave, whose manner in the face of the irrational was one of gruff impatience. Losing your mind. Bah. We’ll have none of that.
    Harry put a quarter in the phone and heard it make that satisfying, elaborate rattle that wakes the forces of technology. He dialed his number and listened to the phone ring. It rang once, twice, three times. It was ringing as Harry saw the receptionist get up and move toward him, coming around the desk.
    Harry felt an impulse to bolt, to hang up the phone and run.
    Helen answered the phone.
    “Helen, it’s me, Harry.“
    “Harry. Listen, the boy’s mother is here with me. Not Raymond. The other boy, Allan.” Harry heard Helen shouting, “Mrs. Tate! Mrs. Tate!” Then, “Well, she must have gone out for a breath of air. She has asthma, poor dear, and it’s worse when she’s upset.”
    The receptionist had come out from behind the desk. It was a curious uniform she wore, the skirt came to the floor and trailed behind her and seemed oddly wet at the hem, and you might—if you were imaginative, if you had just suffered some physical assault on your nervous system—you might think that she moved with too undulant a motion, not the proper sort of motion for a biped, and if you were really nuts, if you were inclined to hallucinate the contents of grim, terrifying children’s books, you might think that she moved the way a Swamp Grendel moved, gliding on its plated belly, leaving a silver trail.
    On the phone, Helen was speaking. “...came as quick as she could.” Again, the phone echoed thinly as Helen put it down and shouted. “Mrs.