31
The Georgia State Troopers, to a man, all stood in awe as the sun came up. Kipling came to the mind of one of them. The Bible came to the mind of another. One of them said a silent prayer. Another crossed himself. Yet another thought it would be a hell of a day to go fishin’.
It was the most glorious sunrise any of them could ever remember witnessing.
Suddenly, none of them were tired. The grainy feeling left their eyes.
They all heard the sounds of an approaching vehicle.
“That’s a Sheriff’s Department car,” Al said. “Maybe now we’ll get some answers.”
“B. C. Williams,” Carl said. “Good solid man.”
The chief deputy sheriff of Edmund County stopped his car and stepped out. “I hope to God you boys can tell me what the hell is goin’ on around this place,” he said.
“We were hopin’ you could tell us,” Al said.
“Your radios conk out?” B. C. asked.
“Yes. And we can’t back our cars up or turn them around,” Carl said.
B. C. leaned up against his car and filled one side of his mouth with chewing tobacco. He chewed for a moment, rubbed the back of his neck, and said, “This is weird enough to make a hen quit layin’, you know that?”
“That is one way of putting it,” Al replied.
B. C. was known statewide for his homespun sayings. “Any of y’all seen the sheriff?”
The troopers shook their heads.
“I can’t turn my car around, either, boys,” B. C. said.
“When did you try?” Al asked.
“ ’Bout five miles down the road. I tell you what, boys. I ’bout had me an accident in my shorts when I tried to back up and turn around.”
The highway cops knew that feeling very well.
“How come there ain’t nobody stirrin’ around in this town?” B. C. asked.
Carl briefed the chief deputy.
B. C. nodded his head. “You ever get the feeling you’d just like to go back home, pull the covers up over your head, and pretend something bad just didn’t happen?”
They all knew that feeling, too.
“How come you were heading this way so late at night, B. C.?” Al asked.
“Tuesdays,”B. C. replied.
The highway cops glanced at each other. B. C. picked up on the looks and smiled. “Y’all put it together, too, huh?”
“Yes,” Carl said. “We were heading up toward the Bowers’ Plantation house, B. C. Care to come with us?”
“Seein’ as how my car won’t go but in one direction,” the deputy drawled. “I don’t see I got much choice in the matter. Lead on.”
* * *
Jackie was awakened by a voice whispering in her head. “Evil cannot create, Jackie. It can only repeat. When the evil has fully sated its gluttonous appetite, when it has caused you all enough pain, the evil becomes bored, and can be driven away. Evil cannot be killed, Jackie. But it can be temporarily beaten.”
The voice faded.
Jackie cut her eyes, looking for Johnny. He nodded his head.
Jackie looked at her wristwatch. Seven o’clock. She waved for her brother to follow her.
In the hall, she whispered, “You heard that voice?”
“Yeah. But what does it mean?”
“I’m not sure.”
“I’m hungry.”
“Me, too. Come on.”
But before the kids could walk down the hall to the kitchen, the sounds of several cars pulling into the drive stopped them. They turned and went into the center room of the mansion, looking out the window.
David stood looking out a window. He turned and smiled at the brother and sister. “Help has arrived, kids.”
“Jesus Christ!” Carl said, his eyes taking in the charred lump of the old man; the broken windows of the mansion; the bodies that littered the lawn. He flipped on his speaker.
“Kyle! You in there, Kyle?”
Kyle came to the door, looked out, then stepped onto the porch.
“Christ!” Hunt said to Scott. “He’s got a spear in his hand.”
“Come on in, Captain,” Kyle called. “But get ready for the shock of your life.”
* * *
“Sheriff Pugh is dead?” B. C. asked. “You killed him?” He looked at Lucas.
“And I killed Lancer last night,” Kyle said. “His body is out back. Or at least it was.”
Captain Denning walked to the rear of the house and looked out. Lancer’s body was lying where Kyle had tossed it. He looked at Kyle. “Have you seen O’Brian or Watson?”
“No, sir.”
“I’ve got three out, too,” Al said. Quickly he explained what he and Carl had put together.
“666,” David said. “The Mark of the Beast.”
“You used a chain saw on some men last night?” Al asked Lucas.
“Look in the front room,” Lucas said. “The one with the boarded-up doors.”
All the highway cops looked. A couple wished they had not.
“Board it back up,” Carl ordered his men.
“Gladly,” Davis said.
That done, Captain Denning asked Kyle, “All right, Kyle. Where do we stand?”
The rocking horse laughed and whinnied on the landing above them.
“What in the hell was that?” Captain Johnson asked, looking around him.
“Get a firm grip on your emotions, Captain,” Lucas told the man. “ ’Cause you’re about to hear the damnest story you’ve ever hard.”
“I knew I should have stayed in the Navy,” B. C. said.
* * *
The highway cops sat with their mouths hanging open as first Kyle, then Lucas, then Louisa, and finally David finished the story.
When David told of the professors’ efforts to call forth the Dark Gods, B. C. swallowed his chewing tobacco and had to leave the room.
Captain Denning pulled his pistol from leather, checked the loads, and stood up. Then, realizing his gun was useless, he reholstered the weapon. “Give me that spear,” he told Kyle. Kyle handed it to him. “I want to see this damned rocking horse.”
“I wish you wouldn’t, Captain,” Kyle said.
Denning ignored that and walked toward the curving stairs. Al took a spear from George and followed his friend.
“I feel like a flipping idiot!” Al said. “And I don’t believe any of what I just heard.”
Carl said nothing as he climbed the steps. Halfway up, he realized the horse’s eyes were moving, following him as he climbed. “Look at the eyes,” he told Al.
“It’s a trick of some sort. I’m not denying these folks were attacked and defended themselves. But the rest of what we were just told is ridiculous.”
The men stood on the landing and looked at the hobbyhorse, looking at them. The horse rocked and whinnied and laughed at the men.
Al swore and kicked the horse on the rump with a boot. The horse spun around and bit the captain on the leg, drawing blood and tearing his trousers.
Al grabbed his bleeding leg and stared at the wooden horse, horror in his eyes.
Carl jabbed at the horse with his spear. The horse howled and charged the man, knocking him down the stairs. Carl grabbed a railing and held on. He watched as Al backed slowly off the landing, surrendering the initial round to the horse. He helped his friend to his feet and the two of them hurriedly went down the stairs.
The horse’s taunting laughter followed them.
Trooper Hunt was standing in front of a door that led to the ground level of the mansion. He could smell the foulness that emanated from the floor below
“Go on,” a voice filled his head. “Open the door. What’s the matter? Are you afraid?”
Hunt looked around him for the source of the voice. He could see nothing. He put his hand on the door knob, then hesitated.
“Help me, honey,” his wife’s voice filled his head. “Help me. They’re hurting me. Please, honey. Help me.”
He jerked open the door.
“No!” Jan screamed to his back.
Hunt felt himself being sucked into a raging vortex. His body spun wildly in the air. His clothing was shredded on his body until he was naked. Wild laughter filled his head. Then, unconscious, he fell heavily to the ground-level floor.
The door slammed behind him.
The newly arrived highway cops beat at the door and slammed their shoulders against the unyielding wood.
They stopped their frantic poundings as the house took a deep breath. They looked around them, utter disbelief in their eyes. The house emitted what sounded like a belching, chewing sound. The awful cadence of bones crunching came to the horrified men standing by the door.
“What in God’s name is going on?” Captain Johnson screamed the question.
“I think,” Lucas said. He cleared his throat. “I think the house is . . . eating your man, Captain.”
The crunching continued. It stopped. The house sighed contentedly. The rocking horse laughed. The house belched. A window of the house cracked with a pop. Hunt’s pistol, handcuffs, belt buckle, loose change, and badge were puked up from the ground level. They lay shining in the bright sun, slick with blood.