Universe Twister - Keith Laumer [90]
"Ring, blast it," he groaned. He jiggled the hook, was rewarded by soft electrical poppings.
"Somebody answer!" he yelped. "You're my last hope!"
A draft of cool air riffled his hair. He whirled, saw that he now stood in a roofless chamber, empty of everything but scattered leaves and bird droppings. Even as he watched, the quality of the light changed; he whirled back; the wall against which the cabinet had been mounted was gone, replaced by a single post. There was a tug at his hand, and he continued the spin, made a frantic grab for the telephone, now resting precariously on one arm of a rickety windmill, at the top of which he seemed to be perched. Grabbing for support as the structure swayed in the chill wind, creaking, he looked down at what appeared to be a carelessly tended cabbage patch.
"Central!" he yelled through a throat suddenly as tight as though a hand had closed about it. "You can't leave me here like this!" He rattled the instrument frantically. Nothing happened.
After three more tries he hung the phone up with dazed care, as if it were made of eggshells. Clinging to his high perch, he stared out across the landscape of bramble-covered hillside toward a dilapidated town a quarter of a mile distant, no more than a sprawl of ramshackle buildings around the lake. The topography, he noted, was the same as that of Artesia—or of Colby Corners, for that matter—but gone were the towers and avenues and parks.
"Vanished!" he whispered. "Everything I was complaining about . . ." He stopped the swallow. "And everything I wasn't complaining about along with it. Daphne—our apartment—the palace—and it was almost dinnertime . . ."
The thought was accompanied by a sharp pang just below the middle button of the handsomely cut coat he had donned less than half an hour ago. He shivered. It was cold now, with night falling fast. He couldn't just perch here beside the dead phone. The first trick would be to get down to the ground, and then . . .
That was as far as his numbed mind cared to go for the moment. First I'll think about the immediate problem, he told himself. Then, later, I'll think about what to do next.
He tried putting a foot on the open-work vane beside him; it seemed remarkably limber, his knees remarkably wobbly. The rough wood rasped his hands. As he started out, the framework sank slowly under him, with much creaking. He had already worked up a light sweat, in spite of the chill wind. No doubt about it, the easy living had taken its toll, condition-wise. Gone were the days when he could rise at dawn, breakfast on sardines, do a full day's work over a hot drawing board, dine on sardines, and still have the energy for an evening of plastics experiments and penicillium cultures. As soon as he got out of this—if he ever got out of this—he'd have to give serious thought to reviving his interest in body-building, long walks, pre-dawn calisthenics, karate, judo, and a high-protein dieting . . .
The ring was a light tinkle, almost lost against the open sky. Lafayette froze, hearing the echo in his mind, wondering if he had imaged it, or if it had been merely the tolling of a bell down in the village; or possibly the distant ding-dong of a cowbell, if there were any cows in the vicinity and they wore bells that went ding-dong . . .
At the second ring, Lafayette broke two fingernails in his upward lunge; once his foot slipped, leaving him dangling momentarily by a one-handed grip, but he hardly noticed. A short instant later he had grabbed up the receiver, jammed it into his ear upside down.
"Hello?" he gasped. "Hello? Yes? Lafayette O'Leary speaking . . ." He quickly reversed the phone as a shrill squeaking came from the end near his mouth.
" . . . This is Pratwick, Sub-Inspector of Continua," the chirping voice was saying. "Sorry to break in on your leisure time in this fashion, but an emergency has arisen here at Central and we're recalling certain key personnel to active duty for the duration. Now, according to our records, you're