All The Bells on Earth Read Online Free PDF Page A

just like he had in the past. But that couldn’t go on forever. Ivy had a deep suspicion of logic. She said it was a leaky boat. Last night she had told him that there was nothing logical anyway about starting a family, and so trying to apply logic to it was illogical.
    Even now the argument looked irrefutable to him, and he had the vague notion that he’d been defeated. Well, he was safe for the moment anyway, there among the sacks of planting mix and tools and clay pots, watching the heavy branches of the avocado tree shift in the wind, and listening to the swish of its big green leaves and the sound of the rain pelting down. A haze of mist rose from the shingles of the garage, and he could hear the drops pounding on the tin roof of one of the storage sheds, nearly drowning out the sound of the church bells. The bellringer was a hell of a dedicated man, out in weather like this in an open tower, yanking on soggy ropes whether anyone could hear the bells or not: art for art’s sake, or more likely for the glory of God, like the old Renaissance painters.
    Walt listened closely. It took him a moment to recognize the melody. It was “In the Bleak Midwinter,” one of his favorites, and it really needed a big church choir to do it justice. He recalled the words to his favorite stanza, and was just on the verge of singing along when the bells broke into a clamor that sounded like a train wreck, the discordant echoes finally clanging away into silence.

4
     
    T HE KEY TO THE third drawer was taped to the back side of the old metal desk. There was nothing in the drawer but the red telephone, and it hadn’t rung for nearly ten years. Unless the phone rang, the drawer stayed locked. There was a phone jack behind the desk, and the phone cord exited through a hole drilled in the back of the drawer. Most of the time it was unplugged from the wall, the cord shoved back into the drawer. It was only when Flanagan was in the building alone that he plugged it in. And it was only when the phone rang that he called himself Flanagan. He had plugged the phone in religiously for the ten years that the phone hadn’t rung at all. It was like walking along a sidewalk: once it occurred to him to avoid stepping on cracks, it became a small obsession. And until he arrived at his destination, he was a careful man.
    As far as the phone was concerned, he hadn’t arrived at his destination yet, but there was something in the rainy winter air this morning that made him fear that he was close. It was twenty years ago that he had helped send three men off in the general direction of Hell, and by now he understood that the pit he had dug for these other men was deep enough to contain him too.
    So when the phone rang now, inside its drawer, it wasn’t really a surprise, despite the ten years. He put down his pen, letting the phone ring four times before he reached behind the desk and pried the key out from under its tape. He unlocked the drawer, still counting the rings, and picked it up on the tenth.
    “Flanagan.” The name sounded idiotic to him.
    There was a silence. Then a voice said, “Is it you?”
    “It’s me.”
    “We have to talk.”
    “We’re talking.”
    “I don’t mean over the telephone. This kind of business can’t be conducted over the telephone. I think … I believe something’s happening.”
    “I’m certain it is.”
    “What do you mean by that?”
    “What do
you
mean?”
    There was a silence again, as if the man was forcing himself to be patient. His voice was urgent; something had happened to frighten him. “I mean I want out,” he said at last.
    Now it was Flanagan’s turn to be silent. Was this what he had expected? He looked around at the old paint, the exposed extension cords, the water dripping in the sink that Mrs. Hepplewhite optimistically called her “kitchen.” He didn’t have to do any calculations now; he had already done them a hundred times—how much hard cash he needed just to keep the church