Read Online The Link by Richard Matheson - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Richard Matheson
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it.
Sunlight refracts across his face, the seven colors of the spectrum playing on his cheeks. He grunts, staring at the crystal. He starts as the driver behind him honks impatiently for him to move on. He blinks and shakes his head like a man awakening. Then, driving off, he drops the crystal back into his pocket. “Wake up, Allright,” he tells himself.
He turns on his cassette player and listens to Mahler as he turns right toward the east side highway.
CLOSE UP on the sign outside a church called THE TEMPLE OF ETERNAL SPIRIT.
Sunday Healing and Devotional: 11:00 a.m.; Wed. Eve. Services: 7:30 p.m.; Message Meetings: Twice a month as announced: 6:30 p.m.; Open Séance: 1st Friday every month: 7:30 p.m.; Pastor: Rev. Ruth E. Allright
.
CAMERA PANS TO show Robert parking in the driveway of a cottage adjoining the small church. He approaches the board and looks at it, his expression bleak.
He looks toward the church. A service is taking place inside, Ruth’s VOICE faintly heard, the responding murmur of her congregation.
Robert has a momentary flashback to another church in Brooklyn, him five years old, sitting beside his mother and Aunt Grace.
Turning from the board, he walks toward Ruth’s cottage.
He is sitting on a wicker chair on the covered porch after the last of Ruth’s congregation has departed.
“Why didn’t you come in the church?” she asks.
His smile is his reply; does she really expect an answer to that?
Ruth pats him on the arm, her smile complacent. “You’ll come back to it,” she says.
He casts his eyes skyward as she moves to unlock the front door, his expression saying: it’s going to be a long day. He asks if Bart can come inside, he didn’t want to leave him home.
Of course, she says.
As he brings Bart in, Ruth asks what’s wrong with the dog.
Robert is briefly startled, then decides it is Bart’s obvious breathing that Ruth has noticed. He tells her and she says she’ll pray for him; if Robert wants, she’ll try to heal the Lab. Her “Spirit Doctors” have helped heal many animals. “They are most receptive.”
“It would be very nice if you prayed for him,” he says, not responding to the rest of it.
Ruth runs her hands along the length of Bart’s body about an inch above his fur. “I can see the problem in his aura,” she says casually. “Darkness in the lung area.”
Robert sighs.
“This may not work,” she tells him. If it is intended that the dog “pass on”, healing work would be “of limited efficacy.”
Robert frowns a little. “Come on, Ruth,” he says.
She smiles and shakes her head.
They talk over dinner—a small pot roast, a few over-boiled potatoes, some over-cooked frozen peas. She asks him how Ann is and he lies to her; “She’s doing fine.” To change the subject, he mentions their father’s Arizona project legacy.
At the mention of him, Ruth’s benign smile fades; it is clear that her attitude toward his memory is definitely unchristian. “That’s no surprise,” she says. “He never gave the family anything without strings attached.” Is Robert going to accept the legacy?
When he says he isn’t, she is unable to repress a look of pleasure. “It was typically selfish of him to assume that you would drop your entire career on his behalf,” she says.
This evokes a comment from her on how difficult it was for their mother to function as a Spiritualist married to a man of “gross material nature.” It is not inconceivable, she says, that seeing what their mother endured kept
her
from marriage.
“Not that I regret, for a moment, being wed to Spiritualism,” she adds firmly.
She apologizes, then, for being “mean” to their father’s memory. It is hardly fitting for someone in her position to behave that way. It’s simply that, being the oldest and a female, she saw, the most, how unhappy their mother had been made by her husband’s harsh belittling of her beliefs.
At any rate, it is not up to her to judge him;
Sunlight refracts across his face, the seven colors of the spectrum playing on his cheeks. He grunts, staring at the crystal. He starts as the driver behind him honks impatiently for him to move on. He blinks and shakes his head like a man awakening. Then, driving off, he drops the crystal back into his pocket. “Wake up, Allright,” he tells himself.
He turns on his cassette player and listens to Mahler as he turns right toward the east side highway.
CLOSE UP on the sign outside a church called THE TEMPLE OF ETERNAL SPIRIT.
Sunday Healing and Devotional: 11:00 a.m.; Wed. Eve. Services: 7:30 p.m.; Message Meetings: Twice a month as announced: 6:30 p.m.; Open Séance: 1st Friday every month: 7:30 p.m.; Pastor: Rev. Ruth E. Allright
.
CAMERA PANS TO show Robert parking in the driveway of a cottage adjoining the small church. He approaches the board and looks at it, his expression bleak.
He looks toward the church. A service is taking place inside, Ruth’s VOICE faintly heard, the responding murmur of her congregation.
Robert has a momentary flashback to another church in Brooklyn, him five years old, sitting beside his mother and Aunt Grace.
Turning from the board, he walks toward Ruth’s cottage.
He is sitting on a wicker chair on the covered porch after the last of Ruth’s congregation has departed.
“Why didn’t you come in the church?” she asks.
His smile is his reply; does she really expect an answer to that?
Ruth pats him on the arm, her smile complacent. “You’ll come back to it,” she says.
He casts his eyes skyward as she moves to unlock the front door, his expression saying: it’s going to be a long day. He asks if Bart can come inside, he didn’t want to leave him home.
Of course, she says.
As he brings Bart in, Ruth asks what’s wrong with the dog.
Robert is briefly startled, then decides it is Bart’s obvious breathing that Ruth has noticed. He tells her and she says she’ll pray for him; if Robert wants, she’ll try to heal the Lab. Her “Spirit Doctors” have helped heal many animals. “They are most receptive.”
“It would be very nice if you prayed for him,” he says, not responding to the rest of it.
Ruth runs her hands along the length of Bart’s body about an inch above his fur. “I can see the problem in his aura,” she says casually. “Darkness in the lung area.”
Robert sighs.
“This may not work,” she tells him. If it is intended that the dog “pass on”, healing work would be “of limited efficacy.”
Robert frowns a little. “Come on, Ruth,” he says.
She smiles and shakes her head.
They talk over dinner—a small pot roast, a few over-boiled potatoes, some over-cooked frozen peas. She asks him how Ann is and he lies to her; “She’s doing fine.” To change the subject, he mentions their father’s Arizona project legacy.
At the mention of him, Ruth’s benign smile fades; it is clear that her attitude toward his memory is definitely unchristian. “That’s no surprise,” she says. “He never gave the family anything without strings attached.” Is Robert going to accept the legacy?
When he says he isn’t, she is unable to repress a look of pleasure. “It was typically selfish of him to assume that you would drop your entire career on his behalf,” she says.
This evokes a comment from her on how difficult it was for their mother to function as a Spiritualist married to a man of “gross material nature.” It is not inconceivable, she says, that seeing what their mother endured kept
her
from marriage.
“Not that I regret, for a moment, being wed to Spiritualism,” she adds firmly.
She apologizes, then, for being “mean” to their father’s memory. It is hardly fitting for someone in her position to behave that way. It’s simply that, being the oldest and a female, she saw, the most, how unhappy their mother had been made by her husband’s harsh belittling of her beliefs.
At any rate, it is not up to her to judge him;
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