That Limp-Brain Gang Is on the Loose Again

    Last week, late one afternoon, a ringing phone snapped the quiet of a typical home in this town.

    The man of the house, who had just come in from work, answered it.

    But a voice didn't reply.  Instead, there were the muffled sobs of a girl.

    "Hello.  Who's there?" he repeated.

    The sobs continued for a moment.  He thought he recognized them, and when the girl's voice cried out, "Daddy!" he was sure."

    "Judy," he said evenly.  "What's the matter?"

    Judy was his daughter.  She was a student at SC. 

    "Daddy!"  The voice was hysterical now.

    "Judy," the man repeated.  "What's the matter?"  Judy was always such a levelheaded girl.

    "I'm . . . I'm sick," she blurted.

    "What happened?"

     She sounded strange, the man thought, like she'd been drugged.  "What happened to you?"

    The girl's reply was an incoherent, frightening blend of words and wails.

    "What is it, Judy?"  The man's voice was intense now.  "Where are you?"

    This time, the girl stammered out the numerals of an address on Sunset Blvd.  The man quickly placed the address as somewhere near Westwood Village — far from SC, where his daughter was supposed to be.

    "What are you doing there?" he asked, shakily.

    A jumble of words followed.  From them, he deciphered, "Some man took me."

    "Come and get me, daddy," she pleaded.  "Help me!"

    "I will," he promised.  He could feel his heart speed up.  "Don't worry," he added, trying to sound calm.

    But his mind was going wild.  The girl had never been in any trouble.  She was a smart girl.  How could anything have happened to her?

    Frantically now, he begged for the answers.  Frantically and fruitlessly.  She'd say nothing for what seemed like minutes.  Then, when she spoke, she was completely incoherent. 

    "I'll call the police," he promised.  "They'll get to you faster.  I'll leave right now, too.  Just stay there."

    The sobbing continued.  "Answer me," he shouted.

    Finally, the answer came.  The hysterical crying melted into an adolescent giggle.

    "What's the matter?" asked a young girl's voice.  "Can't you take a joke?"

    Then, the laughter still ringing, she slammed down the phone.

    Yesterday, I talked with the businessman who received the grotesquely unfunny call.

    He told me that he had contacted SC immediately, located his daughter, and, much to his relief, found her perfectly safe.

    "She had no more idea than I did who would have pulled such a vicious prank," he said.  "She was as shocked as I was."

    "My wife has a bad heart," he added.  "I'd hate to think what might have happened if she'd been the one who answered the phone.  What kind of a mind is it that would dream up that kind of torture?"

    I don't know.  But I know that every once in a while these weirdies break loose on an epidemic scale, and apparently that's what's happening now.

    Last week they were on the phone reporting freeway "accidents" to the police.  They had police cars racing red-light-and-siren all over town.

    They also call up private residences and announce that someone in the family's been hurt in a wreck.  Or they'll phone parents to tell them their children are in jail.

    Its got to be obvious to them that sooner than later they're going to cause a tragedy — whether it's a high-speed collision involving a police car or a woman with a heart not strong enough to cope with ghoulish humor.

    But they persist.

    Apparently, their grim antics give them some kind of satisfaction.

    But don't ask me what kind.  Stories like this make me realize that the longer I live on this earth, the less I understand some of the people who live on it with me.