The Face

interior lock release, however, had proved this theory wrong.
        As his wheezing quieted, as breath came more easily, as the tightness in his chest loosened, Fric studied the hooks, the brushed-steel walls, trying to arrive at a third theory regarding the purpose of this place. He remained mystified.
        [128] He’d told no one about the pivoting section of closet shelving or about the hidden room. What made the hidey-hole so cool was less its exotic nature than the fact that only he knew it existed.
        This space could serve as the “deep and special secret place” that, according to Mysterious Caller, would soon be needed.
        Maybe he should stock it with supplies. Two or three six-packs of Pepsi. Several packages of peanut-butter-and-cracker sandwiches. A couple flashlights with spare batteries.
        Warm cola would never be his first choice of beverage, but it would be preferable to dying of thirst. And even warm cola was better than being stranded in the Mojave with no source of water, forced to save and drink your own urine.
        Peanut-butter-and-cracker sandwiches, tasty under ordinary circumstances, would be unspeakably vile if accompanied by urine.
        Maybe he should stock four six-packs of cola.
        Even though he wouldn’t be drinking his urine, he would need something in which to pee, supposing that he would be required to hide out longer than a few hours. A pot with a lid. Better yet, a jar with a screw top.
        Mysterious Caller hadn’t said how long Fric should expect to be under siege. They would have to discuss that in their next chat.
        The stranger had promised that he would be in touch again. If he was a pervert, he would call for sure, drooling all over his phone. If he wasn’t a pervert, then he might be a sincere friend, in which case he would still call, but for better reasons.
        Time passed, the asthma relented, and Fric got to his feet. He clipped the inhaler to his belt.
        A little woozy, he balanced himself with one hand against the cold steel wall as he went to the door.
        A minute later, in his bedroom, he sat on the edge of the bed and lifted the handset from the telephone. An indicator light on the keyboard appeared at his private line.
        No one had phoned him since he’d answered his [129] Ooodelee-ooodelee-oo in the train room. After pressing *69, he listened while his phone automatically entered the number of his most recent caller.
        If he’d been a brainiac trained in the skills required to be an enormously dangerous spy, and if he’d had the supernaturally attuned ear of Beethoven before Beethoven went deaf, or if one of his parents had been an extraterrestrial sent to Earth to crossbreed with humans, perhaps Fric could have translated those rapidly sounded telephone tones into numerals. He could have memorized Mysterious Caller’s phone number for future use.
        He was nothing more, however, than the son of the biggest movie star in the world. That position came with lots of perks, like a free Xbox from Microsoft and a lifetime pass to Disneyland, but it didn’t confer upon him either astonishing genius or paranormal powers.
        After waiting through twelve rings, he engaged the speakerphone feature. He went to a window while the number continued to ring.
        The billiards-table smoothness of the east lawn sloped away through oaks, through cedars, to rose gardens, vanishing into gray rain and silver mist.
        Fric wondered if he should tell anyone about Mysterious Caller and the warning of impending danger.
        If he called Ghost Dad’s global cell-phone number, it would be answered either by a bodyguard or by his father’s personal makeup artist. Or by his personal hair stylist. Or by the masseur who always traveled with him. Or by his spiritual adviser, Ming du Lac, or by any of a dozen other flunkies orbiting the Fourth Most Admired Man in the World.
        The phone would be handed from one to another of them, across unknowable vertical and horizontal distances, until after ten minutes or fifteen, Ghost Dad would come on the line. He would say, “Hey, my main man, guess who’s here with me and wants to talk to you.”
        Then before Fric could say a word, Ghost Dad would pass the [130] phone to Julia Roberts or Arnold Schwarzenegger, or to Tobey Maguire, or to Kirsten Dunst, or to Winnie the Wonder Horse, probably to all of them, and they would be sweet