The Late Caller

Tessa Cooper had been the late-night presenter at Harbour Radio for exactly six days. The station was tiny. It had two rooms above a fish-and-chip shop in Seacombe, a heater that never worked and a sign on the door that said “98.4 FM – Your Town, Your Voice”. Most nights only a few people called. One man wanted a song for his dog. A woman complained about the bins.

On Friday, at twenty to midnight, the studio phone rang again. Tessa pressed the button. “Harbour Radio, you’re on air. Who’s calling?” There was a long pause, and then a man spoke slowly in a low, rough voice. “I won’t tell you my name,” he said. “I only want to read you something.”

He read two sentences. “The lamp on the pier went out on the last night of September. Nobody in Seacombe could remember who had lit it.” Then he stopped. “Tomorrow, the second page,” he said, and the line went dead.

Tessa looked at the clock. She had ten seconds of silence to fill, so she played a song and checked the phone display. It showed no number. “It must be a joke,” she told herself. But the voice had not sounded like a joke. It had sounded like someone who was afraid of being heard.

When she arrived at the station the next afternoon, Walt Pearce was already there. He was the oldest member of the team, and he had started Harbour Radio forty years earlier. Tessa told him about the call. Walt was putting sugar in his tea, and his hand stopped. “What was the first sentence?” he asked. She repeated it. He put the cup down so quickly that some tea spilled on the desk.

“Do you know that story?” Tessa asked. “No,” said Walt. “And don’t answer that phone after ten o’clock tonight.” Then he walked out of the room. Tessa wiped the desk and smiled. If Walt wanted her to stay away from the phone, she was sure that she would have to answer it.