“It’s like we’re completely cut off from certain wavelengths of the electromagnetic spectrum,” Matt said, “among other things.”
“Yeah, like that.”
“That’s what I’ve been thinking anyway,” Matt said. Lydia heard the fear in his voice as he shifted his weight on the sofa. “Cellphones not working, radios not picking up anything, the cold, the thing with lights—” His voice trailed off. Lydia thought of the match she had struck in the kitchen.
“Whatever it is,” Olaf said, “I figure we can go back to my house, get my wife and son, and belay down to the Blooms’ house.”
“What about your next door neighbors?” Gretchen asked.
“The Murrays? They flew out yesterday to visit his mother in Atlanta. Lucky for them, I guess.”
“Unless this is affecting everybody,” Matt said. “Everywhere.”
Lydia let that sink in. A worldwide catastrophe, she thought. What if they were trapped in this darkness forever? She swallowed hard. They could get out of here with Olaf. If something had really gone wrong, they would be better off in a group, She was pretty sure they had some rope in the garage to tie to Olaf’s, and she could throw in a couple of old sheets she had been meaning to tear up for rags.
“Well, what about it?” Olaf said. “I gotta get back to Vicky and Lars. Vicky has a thing about the dark.”
“I’ll go with you,” Gretchen said. “Can’t give you more rope, though. There isn’t any rope in my car.”
“What about you?” Olaf said, and Lydia knew that he was referring to her and Matt.
“Think I’ve got some rope in the garage,” Matt said.
“Think you can find it?” Olaf asked.
“Yeah. Just have to go through our kitchen and the laundry room, and it should be right next to the door.” Matt brushed against her as he stood up. “It’ll just take a minute.”
“Don’t get lost,” Olaf said.
“Don’t worry,” Matt replied, his voice farther away. “I’ll be back in a sec.”
“This blackout,” Gretchen said in a low voice. “It’s giving me the willies.”
“You can say that again,” Olaf said, also keeping his voice low. “I gotta tell you, before I came over, Vicky tried to light a candle, just so we could have a little bit of light, and—” Somebody emitted a loud sniff. “It wasn’t working.”
Lydia said, “The same thing happened to me.” She tried to repress the fear uncoiling inside her. “Your wife struck a match, but all she got was a small flame, a bit of light that didn’t illuminate anything else. I lit a match earlier, in the kitchen, and it didn’t give off any light at all except for this tiny flame.”
“Know what I’m thinking?” Gretchen said. “I’m thinking of something Ernst Mach once said.”
“Who?” Olaf said.
“He was a physicist,” Lydia murmured. “I’m a reference librarian,” she continued by way of explanation. “That’s how I know things like that.”
“Ernst Mach once said that gravity might be our experience of some large motion of the universe as a whole.” Gretchen paused. “So in that case, light might be affected if there was any change in that motion.”
Lydia said, “Maybe the change is in us.”
“What do you mean?” Gretchen asked.
“Paul Valery once speculated that our universe is the plan of a deep symmetry, one that’s somehow present in the inner structure of our minds.”
“Who the hell is Paul Valery?” Olaf asked.
“He was a French poet and philosopher,” Lydia replied. “Wrote that in his Cahiers—uh, his notebooks.” That was yet another piece of knowledge she had acquired that now had no function except to feed her fears.
Gretchen and Olaf were silent. Lydia strained to hear something in the silence, but the darkness seemed to have muffled sound as effectively as it had doused light. The air seemed thicker, too, as if a fog had formed around her.
Space was not empty. Their human senses deluded them into thinking space was empty when in fact it was full. Space and time were constructs of the human mind, and now their minds were failing them. Everything outside them was as it had always been; it was just that they could no longer impose their mental constructs on it.
She was imagining things again, being too suggestible. She pressed her hands together, trying to warm her fingers against the cold.
“Thought he said he’d be back in a second,” Olaf said. The words came from him slowly, and the pitch of his voice was even lower.
Lydia longed to call out to Matt, but restrained herself. She suddenly feared that if she opened her mouth to say anything, she would start screaming. She sat back, struggling to calm herself. Whatever was happening, there had to be somebody, somewhere, who was already trying to get help to anyone trapped in this darkness.
“Found the rope.” She could barely hear Matt’s voice. “And a couple of long cords, too.” He had to be talking about the electrical cords he used with his clippers when he pruned the hedge. “Must be at least thirty or forty feet in all.” He sounded closer now. “But—”
Lydia took a breath. The air had taken on substance; she felt as though she were inhaling a soft, cool mist.
“But what?” Olaf said, his voice now a bass.
“I’m not…going with…you,” Matt replied in a baritone.
Another long silence ensued. “You’re not…going with me?”
“We’re…staying…here,” Matt said.
That was like Matt, speaking for her as well as himself. Lydia wanted to object, but there was no point in arguing with him, and also no reason why she could not leave with the others and without him.
“You…sure?” Olaf asked.
Lydia stretched out her arms and hit an obstacle. “Matt?” she said. “Is that you?”
“Yeah.”
She felt around and touched something that felt like coiled cord. “Give me the rope.”
“What?”
“Give me the rope.” A long moment passed before the coil was thrust into her hands. She got up, working hard to stand, struggling with the weight of the rope. “Olaf?”
“Over here.” By the sound of his voice, he was still near the door. She moved toward him, bumped into the coffee table, stepped back, then crept toward the entrance. Something suddenly slammed against her arm. “Sorry,” Olaf said.
“Here’s the rope.” She held out the coil; the invisible man relieved her of its weight.
“Thanks,” Olaf said in an even deeper bass voice. “Now I’m heading outside. Got the end of my rope tied to the railing around your front steps.”
“I’m right behind you,” Gretchen’s voice, nearly as deep as Olaf’s, was closer. There was the sound of the door opening. Lydia stood still, uncertain, searching the darkness for some sign of light.
“Lydia,” Matt called out.
“Are you coming?” Olaf asked. She hesitated. “Well?”
“I can’t leave Matt,” she said at last.
“You there, Miz Duhamel?”
“Yeah,