The Dead Zone (61 page)

I did it. Somehow I did it. I don't understand how, but I have.

He let himself drift toward that corridor with the dark chrome walls, not knowing if there might be something at the far end of it or not, content to let time show him that. The sweet hum of the voices faded. The misty brightness faded. But he was still
he
—Johnny Smith—intact.

Get into the corridor,
he thought.
All right.

He thought that if he could get into that corridor, he would be able to walk.

Portsmouth, N.H.

January 23, 1979

Dear Dad,

This is a terrible letter to have to write, and I will try to keep it short. When you get it, I guess I will probably be dead. An awful thing has happened to me, and I think now that it may have started a long time before the car accident and the coma. You know about the psychic business, of course, and you may remember Mom swearing on her deathbed that God had meant for it to be this way, that God had something for me to do. She asked me not to run from it, and I promised her that I wouldn't—not meaning it seriously, but wanting her mind to be easy. Now it looks as if she was right, in a funny sort of way. I still don't really believe in God, not in a real Being who plans for us and gives us all little jobs to do, like Boy Scouts winning merit badges on The Great Hike of Life. But neither do I believe that all the things that have happened to me are blind chance.

In the summer of 1976, Dad, I went to a Greg Stillson rally in Trimbull, which is in New Hampshire's third district. He was running for the first time then, you may recall. When he was on his way to the speaker's rostrum he shook a lot of hands, and one of them was mine. This is the part you may find hard to believe even though you have seen the ability in action. I had one of my “flashes,” only this one was no flash, Dad. It was a vision, either in the biblical sense or in something very near it. Oddly enough it wasn't as clear as some of my other “insights” have been—there was a puzzling blue glow over everything that has never been there before—but it was incredibly powerful. I saw Greg Stillson as president of the United States. How far in the future I can't say, except that he had lost most of his hair. I would say fourteen years, or perhaps eighteen at the most. Now, my ability is to see and not to interpret, and in this case my ability to see was impeded by
that funny blue filter, but I saw enough. If Stillson becomes president, he's going to worsen an international situation that is going to be pretty awful to begin with. If Stillson becomes president, he is going to end up precipitating a full-scale nuclear war. I believe that the initial flashpoint for this war is going to be in South Africa. And I also believe that in the short, bloody course of this war, it's not going to be just two or three nations throwing warheads, but maybe as many as twenty—plus terrorist groups.

Daddy, I know how crazy this must look. It looks crazy to me. But I have no doubts, no urge to look back over my shoulder and try to second-guess this thing into something less real and urgent than it is. You never knew—no one did—but I didn't run away from the Chatsworths because of that restaurant fire. I guess I was running away from Greg Stillson and the thing I am supposed to do. Like Elijah hiding in his cave or Jonah, who ended up in the fish's belly. I thought I would just wait and see, you know. Wait and see if the preconditions for such a horrible future began to come into place. I would probably be waiting still, but in the fall of last year the headaches began to get worse, and there was an incident on the road-crew I was working with. I guess Keith Strang, the foreman, would remember that . . .

Excerpt from testimony given before the so-called “Stillson Committee,” chaired by Senator William Cohen of Maine. The questioner is Mr. Norman D. Verizer, the Committee's Chief Counsel. The witness is Mr. Keith Strang, of 1421 Desert Boulevard, Phoenix, Arizona.

Date of testimony: August 17, 1979.

Verizer: And at this time, John Smith was in the employ of the Phoenix Public Works Department, was he not?

Strang: Yes, Sir, he was.

V.: This was early December of 1978.

S.: Yes, Sir.

V.: And did something happen on December 7 that you particularly remember? Something concerning John Smith?

S.: Yes, Sir. It sure did.

V.: Tell the Committee about that, if you would.

S.: Well, I had to go back to the central motor pool to get
two forty-gallon drums of orange paint. We were lining roads, you understand. Johnny—that's Johnny Smith—was out on Rosemont Avenue on the day you're talking about, putting down new lane markings. Well, I got back out there at approximately four-fifteen—about forty-five minutes before knocking-off time—and this fellow Herman Joellyn that you've already talked to, he comes up to me and says, “You better check on Johnny, Keith. Something's wrong with Johnny. I tried to talk to him and he acted like he didn't hear. He almost run me down. You better get him straight.” That's what he said. So I said, “What's wrong with him, Hermie?” And Hermie says, “Check it out for yourself, there's something offwhack with that dude.” So I drove on up the road, and at first everything was all right, and then—wow!

V.: What did you see?

S.: Before I saw Johnny, you mean.

V.: Yes, that's right.

S.: The line he was putting down started to go haywire. Just a little bit at first—a jig here and there, a little bubble—it wasn't perfectly straight, you know. And Johnny had always been the best liner on the whole crew. Then it started to get really bad. It started to go all over the road in these big loops and swirls. Some places it was like he'd gone right around in circles a few times. For about a hundred yards he'd put the stripe right along the dirt shoulder.

V.: What did you do?

S.: I stopped him. That is, eventually I stopped him. I pulled up right beside the lining machine and started yelling at him. Must have yelled half a dozen times. It was like he didn't hear. Then he swooped that thing toward me and put a helluva ding in the side of the car I was driving. Highway Department property, too. So I laid on the horn and yelled at him again, and that seemed to get through to him. He threw it in neutral and looked over at me. I asked him what in the name of God he thought he was doing.

V.: And what was his response?

S.: He said hi. That was all. “Hi, Keith.” Like everything was hunky-dory.

V.: And your response was . . . ?

S.: My response was pretty blue. I was mad. And Johnny is just standing there, looking all around and holding onto the side of the liner like he would fall down if he let go. That
was when I realized how sick he looked. He was always thin, you know, but now he looked as white as paper, and the side of his mouth was kind of . . . you know . . . drawn down. At first he didn't even seem to get what I was saying. Then he looked around and saw the way that line was—all over the road.

V.: And he said . . . ?

S.: Said he was sorry. Then he kind of—I don't know—staggered, and put one hand up to his face. So I asked him what was wrong with him and he said . . . oh, a lot of confused stuff. It didn't mean anything.

Cohen: Mr. Strang, the Committee is particularly interested in
anything
Mr. Smith said that might cast a light on this matter. Can you remember what he said?

S.: Well, at first he said there was nothing wrong except that it smelted like rubber tires. Tires on fire. Then he said, “That battery will explode if you try to jump it.” And something like, “I got potatoes in the chest and both radios are in the sun. So it's all out for the trees.” That's the best I can remember. Like I say, it was all confused and crazy.

V.: What happened then?

S.: He started to fall down. So I grabbed him by the shoulder and his hand—he had been holding it against the side of his face—it came away. And I saw his right eye was full of blood. Then he passed out.

V.: But he said one more thing before he passed out, did he not?

S.: Yes, Sir, he did.

V.: And what was that?

S.: He said, “We'll worry about Stillson later, Daddy, he's in the dead zone now.”

V.: Are you sure that's what he said?

S.: Yes, Sir, I am. I'll never forget it.

 . . . and when I woke up I was in the small equipment shed at the base of Rosemont Drive. Keith said I'd better get to see a doctor right away, and I wasn't to come back to work until I did. I was scared, Dad, but not for the reasons Keith thought, I guess. Anyway, I made an appointment to see a neurologist that Sam Weizak had mentioned to me in a letter he wrote in
early November. You see, I had written to Sam telling him that I was afraid to drive a car because I was having some incidents of double vision. Sam wrote back right away and told me to go see this Dr. Vann—said he considered the symptoms very alarming, but wouldn't presume to diagnose long-distance.

I didn't go right away. I guess your mind can screw you over pretty well, and I kept thinking—right up to the incident with the road-lining machine—that it was just a phase I was going through and that it would get better. I guess I just didn't want to think about the alternative. But the road-lining incident was too much, I went, because I was getting scared—not just for myself, because of what I knew.

So I went to see this Dr. Vann, and he gave me the tests, and then he laid it out for me. It turned out I didn't have as much time as I thought, because . . .

Excerpt from testimony given before the so-called “Stillson Committee,” chaired by Senator William Cohen of Maine. The questioner is Mr. Norman D. Verizer, the Committee's Chief Counsel. The witness is Dr. Quentin M. Vann, of 17 Parkland Drive, Phoenix, Arizona.

Date of testimony: August 22, 1979.

Verizer: After your tests were complete and your diagnosis was complete, you saw John Smith in your office, didn't you?

Vann: Yes. It was a difficult meeting. Such meetings are always difficult.

Ve: Can you give us the substance of what passed between you?

Va: Yes. Under these unusual circumstances, I believe that the doctor-patient relationship may be waived. I began by pointing out to Smith that he had had a terribly frightening experience. He agreed. His right eye was still extremely bloodshot, but it was better. He had ruptured a small capillary. If I may refer to the chart . . .

(Material deleted and condensed at this point)

Ve: And after making this explanation to Smith?

Va: He asked me for the bottom line. That was his phrase;
“the bottom line.” In a quiet way he impressed me with his calmness and his courage.

Ve: And the bottom line was what, Dr. Vann?

Va: Ah? I thought that would be clear by now. John Smith had an extremely well-developed brain tumor in the parietal lobe.

(Disorder among spectators; short recess)

Ve: Doctor, I'm sorry about this interruption. I'd like to remind the spectators that this Committee is in session, and that it is an investigatory body, not a freak-show. I'll have order or I'll have the Sergeant-at-Arms clear the room.

Va: That is quite all right, Mr. Verizer.

Ve: Thank you, Doctor. Can you tell the Committee how Smith took the news?

Va: He was calm. Extraordinarily calm. I believe that in his heart he had formed his own diagnosis, and that his and mine happened to coincide. He said that he was badly scared, however. And he asked me how long he had to live.

Ve: What did you tell him?

Va: I said that at that point such a question was meaningless, because our options were all still open. I told him he would need an operation. I should point out that at this time I had no knowledge of his coma and his extraordinary—almost miraculous—recovery.

Ve: And what was his response?

Va: He said there would be no operation. He was quiet but very, very firm. No operation. I said that I hoped he would reconsider, because to turn such an operation down would be to sign his own death-warrant.

Ve: Did Smith make any response to this?

Va: He asked me to give him my best opinion on how long he could live without such an operation.

Ve: Did you give him your opinion?

Va: I gave him a ballpark estimate, yes. I told him that tumors have extremely erratic growth patterns, and that I had known patients whose tumors had fallen dormant for as long as two years, but that such a dormancy was quite rare. I told him that without an operation he might reasonably expect to live from eight to twenty months.

Ve: But he still declined the operation, is that right?

Va: Yes, that is so.

Ve: Did something unusual happen as Smith was leaving?

Va: I would say it was extremely unusual.

Ve: Tell the Committee about that, if you would.

Va: I touched his shoulder, meaning to restrain him, I suppose. I was unwilling to see the man leave under those circumstances, you understand. And I felt something coming from him when I did . . . it was a sensation like an electric shock, but it was also an oddly draining, debilitating sensation. As if he were
drawing
something from me. I will grant you that this is an extremely subjective description, but it comes from a man trained in the art and craft of professional observation. It was not pleasant, I assure you. I . . . drew away from him . . . and he suggested I call my wife because Strawberry had hurt himself seriously.

Ve: Strawberry?

Va: Yes, that's what he said. My wife's brother . . . his name is Stanbury Richards. My youngest son always called him Uncle Strawberry when he was very small. That association didn't occur until later, by the way. That evening I suggested to my wife that she call her brother, who lives in the town of Coose Lake, New York.