Enfield, Illinois, April 25, 1973
The night was clear and unseasonably warm for April in Illinois. Mrs. Garret smiled as her young son, Greg, ran by outside, probably on another imaginary adventure.
“Shouldn’t he be in bed by now?” Mr. Garret asked, hardly taking his eyes from the television.
“I’ll call him in during the next commercial. It’s such a nice night.”
Mr. Garret shrugged and returned his full attention to the program. Only a few minutes passed before the screen door swung open and slammed shut with a bang that pulled Mr. Garret’s attention from the television.
“Greg,” said Mr. Garret, his voice tight with irritation. “You can’t come in here slamming doors.” He turned to look at his son, intending to scold him, but the look on Greg’s face turned his irritation to concern. “What’s the matter?” he asked, his tone softening a bit.
“It … it … it …” Greg stammered.
“Are you okay?” Mrs. Garret asked, rushing to her son.
“There’s a thing. It had claws … and huge eyes. It grabbed at me.” Greg’s teeth began to chatter.
Mr. Garret strode quickly to the door and peered into the darkness. “I don’t see anything.”
“It ran that way,” said Greg, pointing. He buried his head in his hands.
“Let’s get you up to bed,” said his mother. She glanced at her husband with a shrug. It wasn’t like Greg to make up stories. She ruffled her son’s hair and bent down to help him with his shoes. “What happened to your sneakers?” she shrieked. They were torn, shredded across the top.
“It stepped on my feet!” wailed Greg.
“Look,” said Mrs. Garret to her husband, her voice a panicked whisper. She held up one of Greg’s shoes.
Mr. Garret took what was left of the sneaker. “I’m calling the police.”
In the background, their movie broke to commercial. A voice sang a catchy jingle.
Lil McDaniel sang along with the fun commercial song.
“When do Mom and Dad get home?” asked her brother, Henry, coming in from the kitchen.
“Not sure,” said Lil. She flipped off the television, shocking the room into silence. “Probably any minute, which means we should get ready for bed.”
“I can’t believe we wasted the whole night watching that stupid show. I should have gone to Greg’s house.”
“You know you can’t leave the house when Mom and Dad are gone. Quit complaining. Just hurry up and get to bed before Mom and Dad get home.”
“Why are you bossing me around? I’m almost a teenager,” Henry said.
“You’re only a year older than me,” Lil replied.
A bang from the bedroom startled them both.
“What was that?” asked Lil.
“I don’t know,” said Henry. He went down the hall and peered into the dark room.
“Turn on the light,” said Lil behind him.
He felt along the wall until his hand found the switch. The light revealed the mess that their mother had made earlier that evening, trying to find the right outfit to wear to the PTA meeting. But there was nothing in the room that could account for the noise they’d heard.
A soft scratching sound came from the window.
“Do you hear that?” asked Lil.
“Yeah,” answered Henry. “It sounds like something is scratching on the AC. It’s probably just a cat or a squirrel,” he reasoned as he neared the window that held the air conditioning unit.
“Can you see anything?” asked Lil.
“Turn out the light,” he instructed. He lifted the corner of the curtain to peek outside.
Lil hurried to her brother’s side and stood on her tiptoes. With their heads so close to the AC unit, the scratching sound rattled in their ears.
The scratching stopped. A creature’s face appeared on the other side of the glass, peering back at them.
“That’s not a cat,” Lil shrieked. She ran from the window. “It’s got big, pink eyes!”
“It’s trying to get in,” Henry shouted. “Quick, the other windows, close them!”
Lil raced to her bedroom and slammed her window with a bang that seemed to shake the walls around her. “Lock the front door!” she shouted.
Henry ran down the hall. Lil rushed to Henry’s room. Tripping on a baseball bat in the middle of the room, she clamored toward the window, reaching it at the same time as the creature.
Shrieking, she slammed the window shut as the monster’s talon-like claws reached up. The beast sliced through the screen and tapped at the glass.
Lil stared, her eyes fixed on the monster. Its hiss was loud enough to hear through the closed window.
“Call Mom and Dad,” she yelled as she ran to the kitchen.
Henry was already at the phone, looking for the number that his mother had scribbled into a notebook. The handset trembled in his hand as he twisted the first number into the rotary. The seconds it took to spin the numbers seemed to take minutes.
As he pointed a shaking finger clumsily into the next number, the knob on the front door began to shake. That was followed by a loud pounding.
Lil and Henry looked at each other in horror.
“It’s trying to get in!” Lil screamed hysterically.
“Open this door,” shouted their father.
“It’s Mom and Dad,” said Henry, dropping the handset as he ran to the door. “We have to let them in, quick, before it gets them!”
Tears blurred Lil’s eyes as her fingers fumbled with the lock. Henry shoved her out of the way and did it himself.
The door flew open, and their father stormed in with their mother behind. Both had scowls on their faces.
“Hurry,” said Lil. “Get in here, fast.”
She pulled her mother by the hand, and Henry shut the door and locked it again.
“Why was the door locked?” Mr. McDaniel demanded.
“What’s wrong, Lilian?” Mrs. McDaniel asked at the very same time.
“There’s something out there. Something that’s trying to get in,” said Lil.
Mrs. McDaniel turned her scowl toward her husband. “I told you not to let them watch that movie last week.”
“But this is real,” said Henry. “We both saw it. Something is out there, trying to get into the house.”
“You’re lucky you got in alive. It has sharp claws, and it hissed at me,” Lil whispered with a shiver.
“There’s nothing out there,” said their father.
The words were barely out of his mouth when the scratching came from the front door.
“What the …” Mr. McDaniel reached for the knob.
“No!” shouted Lil and Henry together.
“It’s probably just a cat,” their father said, ignoring their pleas. He pulled the door open.
Standing before him was a creature like nothing he’d ever seen before. Its clawed hands reached toward him as it hissed.
He slammed the door shut and secured the lock before running toward his bedroom. Lil and Henry stood rooted in horror beside their mother, whose body trembled as she wrapped her arms protectively around their shoulders, never taking her eyes off the door.
Their father returned with a pistol in one hand and a flashlight in the other.
“Henry, hold this light for me,” he said, extending the flashlight to his son.
Henry took it, flipped it on, and held it over his father’s shoulder as he stood terrified behind his dad.
Mr. McDaniel steadied the gun in his hand and pulled the door open.
The creature stood about 12 feet away from the porch. It turned and looked back at them. Its gray skin seemed to glow in the dim moonlight. Its wide, pink eyes were as bright as the beam of the flashlight.
The creature jumped forward with a hiss, its little arms outstretched and talon-claws scratching at the air. Henry recoiled at the full sight of the creature moving toward them, strangely, on three legs.
Henry’s father aimed the pistol and fired. Bang!
The creature jumped back with a howl. It leaned forward on its third leg and hissed.
Henry’s father fired again.
Bang!
The monster turned and ran, an awkward, loping, hop-run, as two more shots rang out.
The beast disappeared into the darkness. Mr. McDaniel slammed the door shut and turned to his wife. “Call the police,” he said, his voice unsteady.
“Tell me again what the caller said,” State Trooper James Masser asked his partner.
His partner laughed loudly. “You heard it right, Jimmy. A three-legged creature with glowing pink eyes tried to get into their house.”
“We always get the fun ones,” Jim said with a shrug as he pulled into the driveway.
Gravel crunched underneath the car as it made its way toward the house.
“See anything glowing?” asked his partner.
Jim shook his head and laughed as they got out of the car. He adjusted his belt and put his hand on his firearm. He wasn’t afraid of any monster lurking in the shadows, but he’d learned that, in odd calls like this, the caller was probably the one to fear.
Together, the troopers climbed the steps to the front porch. His partner rapped on the door. “Mr. McDaniel,” he shouted, “we’re here to talk about what you saw.”
The door opened, and Mr. McDaniel peered nervously over the men’s shoulders, a look of genuine concern on his face. “Come in. We don’t want to talk out here.” His voice dropped to a whisper. “In case it comes back.”
The officers stepped inside. Mrs. McDaniel gestured toward the tidy kitchen. A pistol and flashlight on the table were the only things that seemed out of place. “Come in, officers,” she said. “Can I get you some coffee?”
“No, thanks, ma’am,” said Jim, taking a small notebook from his pocket. “Do you mind if we ask a few questions?”
Mr. McDaniel sat in a chair beside his wife. In a small living room off the kitchen, Lil and Henry sat on the couch, frozen in place, watching the officers intently.
“Mr. McDaniel, why don’t you tell us what happened?” Jim said, still standing.
At the invitation, Mr. McDaniel’s words rushed out. “We came home from a meeting. The door was locked. We never lock the door. When the kids let us in, they said a monster was trying to get into the house. I didn’t believe them, at first, but then something started scratching at the door. I got my .22, and I shot at it. I know I hit it once, but it ran off.”
Jim made notes in his book. “Can you tell me what it looked like?”
“It had gray skin, no fur, and big, pink eyes that glowed like flashlights.”
Jim stopped writing and looked up. It took all of his effort not to smile.
“How did you get such a good look at it in the dark?” asked his partner. “Were the eyes that bright?”
“I had a flashlight, too.”
“About how tall was it?” asked Jim.
“Probably four to five feet.”
“Have you been drinking tonight?” asked Jim’s partner.
“No,” said Mr. McDaniel, the frustration evident in his voice. “We were at a school meeting.” He looked at his children. “They saw it, too.”
“It was trying to get in through the window with the air conditioner,” said Lil. “It had short arms, but it was tall enough to reach the bedroom window.”
“And it had three legs,” Henry added.
Jim flipped his notebook closed without writing anything else. “Okay, folks, we’ll go outside and take a look around.”
“Be careful,” whispered Lil. “It might still be out there.”
“Don’t worry, we’ll be careful.” His partner gave a wink.
They went to the front porch. Mr. McDaniel followed them out the door.
“Look here,” Mr. McDaniel said to Jim, “on the door. And here, on the side.” He pointed at the deep scratch marks etched in the door and the frame. “It did that.”
Jim traced his hand along the deep grooves. “Huh, look at this,” he said to his partner.
“Sure looks like something was trying to get in,” said his partner.
“Maybe it left some track prints,” said Jim. He took his flashlight from his belt. “Which way did you say it went?” he asked Mr. McDaniel.
“Toward the train tracks.” Mr. McDaniel pointed into the darkness.
“We’ll take a look and be right back,” said Jim’s partner.
Together, the officers crossed the driveway with Jim’s flashlight pointed at the ground. They hadn’t gone far when they saw the tracks. Jim bent to study them: two big prints and a single, smaller one just in front.
“Look,” he said to his partner with a shiver, “six toes on each. Do you know of any living creature that has six toes? And three legs?”
“No,” said his partner. “Maybe they weren’t making all of this up …”