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Back THE MAILMAN Save as PDF
Chapters (57)
  1. DEDICATION
  2. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
  3. 1
  4. 2
  5. 3
  6. 4
  7. 5
  8. 6
  9. 7
  10. 8
  11. 9
  12. 10
  13. 11
  14. 12
  15. 13
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  18. 16
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  28. 26
  29. 27
  30. 28
  31. 29
  32. 30
  33. 31
  34. 32
  35. 33
  36. 34
  37. 35
  38. 36
  39. 37
  40. 38
  41. 39
  42. 40
  43. 41
  44. 42
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  46. 44
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  48. 46
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  50. 48
  51. 49
  52. 50
  53. 51
  54. 52
  55. 53
  56. 54
  57. 55

The next morning the mailbox was filled with letters. Doug went out to the mailbox before breakfast, while Billy was still asleep and Trish was watering her garden. There were ten envelopes all together, and the sheer bulk of them in the mailbox was somehow ominously threatening. Glancing quickly at their faces, he saw that few of the envelopes bore familiar addresses, and he stuffed them down the back of his pants, letting his shirt hang over the top half of the stack. Inside the house, he tore up the envelopes one by one, without looking at their contents, shoving the pieces in an empty milk carton in the garbage.

Trish walked in just as he closed the top of the carton. “Any mail?” she asked, wiping her wet hands on her jeans.

“None,” he lied.

The next day there were no letters at all, nor any the day after that. It was almost as if he was being punished for tearing up the mail when it had arrived, as if he had rejected an offering and was to receive no more as punishment.

But that was crazy thinking.

Still, the absence of mail was somehow just as perturbing as its presence, and it made him feel strangely on edge. He had probably seen too many movies and read too many books, but he could not help ascribing a malevolent intent to this temporary respite. It felt to him like the calm before the storm, and he kept waiting for the storm to hit. He tried to finish the first wall of the storage shed, but he could not seem to concentrate and he gave it up after only an hour’s work.

At the store that afternoon, he noticed that many of the people with whom he came in contact seemed tense and testy. Todd Gold, owner of the deli next door to Bayless, did not even acknowledge his greeting. When Doug waved and called out “Hi,” Gold turned curtly away and retreated into his store.

But he told Trish none of this. She seemed to be much happier since the mail had stopped coming, and though this out-of-sight-out-of-mind mentality was not typical for her, was indeed entirely out of character, he did not want to drag her into what might simply be his own delusion. After all, perhaps there had been nothing strange going on, nothing out of the ordinary. Perhaps his imagination had overreacted to a bizarre series of seemingly interconnected occurrences that had really had nothing to do with one another.

Perhaps.

But he didn’t think so.

18

Tritia felt a little better today. For the third day in a row they had received no mail, and for some reason that cheered her up. The old no-news-is-good-news theory. Besides, she was going to see Irene Hill, and a visit with the old woman never failed to lift her spirits.