Alec stood before the open window of his second-floor bedroom and stared into the night. It was a beautiful evening with a gigantic span of sky spread before him and a full moon just beginning to rise above the saw grass. To the southwest he could see the high humpbacked outline of a hammock which he believed was the captain’s objective, the home of Koví.
Certainly he did not believe any part of such a fantastic story! Yet he knew that his own vivid imagination made him very vulnerable to the captain’s ramblings.
He turned his mind to other thoughts, knowing he’d get no sleep otherwise. The seemingly endless miles of saw grass glistened beneath the star-spangled sky. He saw many hammocks studding the swamp, like islands in a watery wilderness. He stared at the moon and was conscious of the stillness. Such a world belonged more to night than to day, he decided. It was almost like being alone in the universe.
Here in the Everglades, nature would forever triumph over man, regardless of how many drainage ditches were dug. The swamp was vast and confident in its solitude.
Alec wondered why he had been frightened by the swamp during the day but not at night. Perhaps it was the great silence, that and the deep peace that seemed to accompany it. He listened. Any sound would carry miles with bell-like clarity on such a night. But he heard nothing, no shrill cries of distant birds or receding echoes. He was alone, the vast swampland calmly ignoring his presence or, perhaps, accepting him as a friend.
He believed he would be able to sleep. Leaving the window, he went to his bed and stretched out on it, fully clothed. He closed his eyes and kept his thoughts on the great silence outside the window, waiting for sleep to come. It had been a long, hard day and he was very tired.
He didn’t know how long he lay there or, actually, whether or not he had slept, when he saw a pair of eyes staring at him in the darkness. They were startlingly cold and dark—like obsidian. He believed it was the captain and asked quickly, “What are you doing here?”
He attempted to get up but found he could not rise from the bed. He struggled but could not move. It was then he realized that he must be asleep and dreaming. But no dream had ever been so vivid to him before.
He began struggling again and found he was able to wiggle his body across the bed but not rise from it. Nor could he tear his gaze away from the eyes that held him. He believed there was a living presence in the room with him but he did not know whether it was the captain or not. He wanted only to rise and run, yet he could not. And try as he might, he could not wake up to rid himself of the horrible dream.
He opened his mouth but nothing came forth although he shouted as loud as he could. He continued struggling, working his body from one end of the bed to the other in an attempt to rouse himself from his dream. Always the eyes followed him, moving with him, holding him.
He was able to think with a clarity he had not thought possible in a dream. He believed his subconscious was playing tricks on him, recalling in his sleep the captain’s unwavering hypnotic stare. He ceased struggling and sought to make out the face behind the eyes. He lay very still.
He stared into the depth of the darkness. An image of terror was vague but there! He made out a misshapen head with no distinguishable features, known yet unknown. He believed that the horror which had seemed a dream was not a dream but reality! The thought brought superhuman strength to his limbs and he tried to break the invisible bonds that held him to the bed while the misshapen head hovered directly above him. His lips moved but no sound came. A sweet, sickening odor filled his nostrils. He threw back his head, gasping from the overpowering scent and his efforts to break away. He twisted, squirmed, seeking escape.
Madness possessed him and he found that he had the strength to heave his body forward. His eyes bulged in their sockets as he sought to raise his hands from the bedsheets to strike back at whatever was above him. He succeeded in lifting his hands and, fighting for breath, tried to protect himself. Words poured forth from his lips for the first time. He did not know what he was saying, nor did he recognize his voice, which was distorted and unnatural. His hands sought to seize the fleshless face!
Suddenly, as if he had broken through a ghostly barrier, he was wide awake. The bedsheets were wringing wet and his breath came in great gasps as he gulped air into his lungs. He was alone in the room. The moonlight made it bright enough to enable him to see that no one was there.
He went to the washbasin and doused his head in cold water. There had been nothing, he told himself savagely.
It had been a dream, prompted by the stories of a man who believed in the supernatural. He had succumbed to them in his sleep, his own imagination giving way to what he had been told. It was an experience he never wanted to go through again.
Everyone dreamed, he told himself, and this one had been a nightmare to end all nightmares.
The room darkened as a cloud passed over the moon. He went to the window and looked out across the saw grass. A chill swept over him, which he attributed to the sudden cooling of the night and not to his fear. The moon emerged and once more the room was filled with ghostly light.
There was nothing to fear from a dream, even a nightmare, he told himself. Yet his heart continued thudding against his chest as he attempted to bring order to his thoughts.
Judging by the height of the moon, he had been asleep all of two hours. He had seen the frightening image in his dream because of the captain’s story of Koví and the horrible drawing. It made little difference whether or not he believed in Koví, he told himself. Known or unknown, real or not real, the monster now lived in his subconscious.
Alec’s heart thudded faster as he accepted this fact. He remained at the window, not wanting to go to bed lest he dream again. He wondered if it were possible to die of fear caused by a dream. Quickly he rid himself of such a thought by dousing his head in water again. He would remain awake the rest of the night. Tomorrow and during the days that followed, when normal life resumed, he would forget Koví. It would be as if this night had never been.
Meanwhile he sought inner peace and comfort from the tranquility of the swamp. The skies were clear and for a long while Alec listened to the stillness of the night. He felt absolutely alone in the world. There came to him the gentle sound of a breeze stirring the palm fronds and water.
His heart resumed its normal beat. Taut muscles relaxed. He responded to his freedom from the nightmare by walking across the room and back. Suddenly he came to a stop before the window again, every sense alert.
He had heard a sound outside. It was not the lapping of the water or the stirring of a palm frond. It was the soft stealth of moving feet, not those of an animal but a man!
His keen eyes searched the darkness for movement that would betray another’s presence. A moment passed, then a black silhouette stepped around the corner of the house into the moonlight. The figure stood still, legs astride. Was it Odin returning from the Indian village? The silhouette was too large and tall for him, more the size of the captain, Alec decided.
He waited for the figure to move, hoping the man would pass beneath his window so he might see him better. Finally the figure strode silently by and Alec had no trouble recognizing the captain.
Alec stepped back from the window. He had no intention of leaving the room. He cared nothing about what the captain did at night; it was no concern of his. The captain might well be off to his eternal quest of Koví. It made no difference. He would remain in the bedroom until dawn.
It was only as the moments passed that Alec’s resolution wavered. He wondered if he might not be doing exactly what the captain had planned. What if the captain’s story of Koví had been only a hoax to frighten him into keeping to his room, asleep or not? The captain coveted the Black for his mare. Perhaps he had no intention of waiting until the end of the racing season to breed his mare as had been agreed, not when he had the opportunity to do it now!
Distant, muffled snorts reached Alec’s ears and he went quickly to the door, his decision made. A cold anger swept over him as he ran down the stairs. The captain took what he wanted; he was as remorseless as he was powerful; he would stop at nothing to breed his mare to the Black!
Alec opened the front door and sped down the porch steps into the night. He ran across the yard, knowing what he had to do. No hands would touch the Black but his own. This he would fight for, regardless of the odds against him.
There was no caution to his movements as he approached the barn. He heard the Black’s shrill neigh, meant clearly for the mare, and he knew he was too late.