BooksBarbecue
Back Whistle
Chapters (73)
  1. Cover
  2. Dedication
  3. Prologue
  4. Part IAnnie
  5. One
  6. Two
  7. Three
  8. Four
  9. Five
  10. Six
  11. Seven
  12. Part IIHarry
  13. Eight
  14. Nine
  15. Ten
  16. Eleven
  17. Twelve
  18. Thirteen
  19. Fourteen
  20. Fifteen
  21. Sixteen
  22. Seventeen
  23. Eighteen
  24. Nineteen
  25. Twenty
  26. Twenty-One
  27. Part IIIAnnie
  28. Twenty-Two
  29. Twenty-Three
  30. Twenty-Four
  31. Twenty-Five
  32. Twenty-Six
  33. Twenty-Seven
  34. Twenty-Eight
  35. Twenty-Nine
  36. Thirty
  37. Thirty-One
  38. Thirty-Two
  39. Part IVHarry
  40. Thirty-Three
  41. Thirty-Four
  42. Thirty-Five
  43. Thirty-Six
  44. Thirty-Seven
  45. Thirty-Eight
  46. Thirty-Nine
  47. Forty
  48. Forty-One
  49. Forty-Two
  50. Forty-Three
  51. Forty-Four
  52. Forty-Five
  53. Forty-Six
  54. Forty-Seven
  55. Forty-Eight
  56. Part VAnnie
  57. Forty-Nine
  58. Fifty
  59. Fifty-One
  60. Fifty-Two
  61. Fifty-Three
  62. Fifty-Four
  63. Fifty-Five
  64. Fifty-Six
  65. Fifty-Seven
  66. Fifty-Eight
  67. Fifty-Nine
  68. Sixty
  69. Sixty-One
  70. Acknowledgments
  71. About the Author
  72. Also by Linwood Barclay
  73. About the Publisher

Annie glanced down, assessed herself.

“Charlie, can you run upstairs and get my bathrobe? It’s hanging on the bottom of the bed.”

He was gone like a shot. Annie slipped off her shoes, peeled off her soaking socks. She would wait until she could wrap a robe around her before getting out of her pants and top. When Charlie returned, robe in hand, he told her the lights were all out.

“Yeah,” Annie said. “The storm. Don’t open the fridge. I don’t know how long it might be off.”

She unbuttoned her blouse, quickly took it off, then slipped her arms into the robe. Now covered, she got out of her jeans. She entered the house with her clothes rolled up into a ball and took them to the small laundry room off the kitchen. She dumped the clothes into the washer for the time being. With the power off, she couldn’t wash or dry them.

Charlie, in the kitchen, asked if he could make a peanut butter sandwich, since all the necessary ingredients were in the cupboard, not the refrigerator.

“Go ahead. I’m gonna put on some dry clothes.”

As she climbed the steps, she could hear the train continuing to make its circular journey. The power, she figured, must have just come back on. But when she looked back over her shoulder, she could see the front hall light remained off.

She went into the studio.

Chuffchuffchuffchuffchuffchuffchuff

Annie flicked the switch for the pot lights recessed into the ceiling. They did not come on. Next, she tried the lamp that hung over her desk. No joy there, either.

She walked over to the train layout, her bare toes inches from the edge of the track. She wondered whether the train was battery-powered, but there was the transformer, connected to the wall outlet by a black cord. It needed electricity to operate.

Chuffchuffchuffchuffchuffchuffchuff

It made no sense.

Annie knelt down, turned the throttle back to its starting position, but the train continued to run. She shuffled over to the outlet and pulled out the plug.

The train continued on its circular journey.

“Charlie!”

Still in the kitchen, he evidently could not hear her. She would take matters into her own hands. As the locomotive sped past, she grabbed it from above, lifting it from the track. Because the other cars were coupled to it, they all tumbled off the rails, creating a brief racket.

The room was suddenly very quiet. The locomotive in Annie’s hand seemed to tingle, sending minor vibrations up her arm and into her shoulder.

Outside, the thunder continued to rumble like a full-sized locomotive bearing down on the house.

Twenty-Four

That night, Evan came to visit her again.

It was Annie’s standard nightmare, the one that had plagued her for so many nights, but which, for reasons she did not know but was not about to question, had been recurring less frequently.