CHAPTER 12

Wyatt took Opal upstairs and settled her in bed. Returning to the office, he wrote a note for any customers who might wander in, saying he’d be back at the desk in fifteen minutes. He taped it to the front counter. Fifteen minutes would be long enough for what he needed to do. He put on his jacket, crossed the highway, and started walking along the gravel shoulder. Wind swirled snowflakes around him. He was intending on checking out those flashing lights at the Totem Lodge. He also wanted to get away from the motel for a while. Opal barging into Mr. Caul’s room. Wyatt was embarrassed, and angry. Her damned visions. She was going to drive away the few regular guests they had, acting hysterical like that. He lit a cigarette and trudged ahead through the falling snow.

The Totem Lodge was Henry Genz’s place.

Like everyone else in American Rapids, Henry had been horrified by the Pie Stop shooting. He took a special interest in the Larkins’ recovery. When he discovered they were considering buying the Rendezvous Motel, he encouraged them, going so far as to open his books and tutor the young couple in the pitfalls of the hospitality business. He was a decade and a half older than his brother, Jesse. A devout man, Henry viewed his support as atonement for the suffering wrought by his brother’s unspeakable crimes. Over the years, he’d become one of Wyatt and Opal’s closest and most loyal friends.

As Opal climbed into bed, she pointed to the window.

“Go help him,” she said.

Wyatt looked out and saw the lights at Henry’s. There was too much snow to tell what kind of vehicles—police, fire, or ambulance— they were.

“It’s across the street, Wyatt... that dog I heard.”

He put an extra blanket on her, tucking it around her slim shoulders.

“Don’t be silly. You didn’t hear anything. I know I didn’t.”

“The Pitch are coming. Henry needs our help.”

“Stop talking like that. You sound . .. you’ll feel better if you rest.”

“Promise me you’ll go check it out.”

“Jesus Christ! Opal, you’ve got to quit this—”

“Promise me?”

He sighed. “I’ll go and check it out.”

She stared at him.

“I promise.”

He stepped onto the Totem’s sidewalk.

One of the policemen tipped his head in Wyatt’s direction.

“Hey there, Wyatt.”

“Bill.”

Bill Eppers was five years older than Adam. He liked to stop in and talk to Wyatt about police work. It was hero-worshipping from the get-go, plain and simple, and Wyatt hadn’t liked it. He did nothing to encourage the conversation. But he wouldn’t be rude to a fellow lawman. Their talks evolved into a kind of informal mentorship.

“Bit of a situation over here this morning,” Eppers said.

“What’s up?”

“We got a call from Henry. He thought he might have a prowler snooping around outside. Says he heard nothing, but his dog was antsy. The pooch kept looking out the window and growling.”

At the mention of a dog Wyatt’s eyebrows arched.

“Did he see anybody?”

“Nope, but he let the dog out just in case.”

“Sheba? That old girl wouldn’t chase a squirrel dipped in Jif.”

“Henry says all he wanted to do was scare them off the property”

Opal had been right about the dog, yet a doubting man might be willing to write it off as coincidental. Weird coincidence though. He couldn’t decide if he would tell her when he got home.

Thick, silver dollar snowflakes cascaded down. Eppers moved aside to let Wyatt stand under the canopy overhanging the office drive-up. From his new vantage point Wyatt saw a clutch of officers near the rear of the lot. At their feet was a blue tarpaulin, its color a bright flag tossed against the concrete.

Eppers said, “Henry found her there. Somebody chopped off her head with an ax, or a damn big knife. Henry’s steamed. The collar and tags were laid out on top of the body. The head is missing. We’re looking for it.”

Wyatt was stunned.

“Killed her in the parking lot?”

“Guess so. I can’t imagine they hauled the dog off, removed the head, and then brought the carcass back. When she didn’t respond to Henry’s whistle, he followed her outside. It was only a couple of minutes at most. We picked up a bloody towel from those bushes.” Eppers pointed to a side entrance. “A rock was wedged under the door, propping it open.”

“You think he went into the lodge?”

“We’re searching. It might be a guest who put the rock there. Might be a guest killed the dog. Henry said he didn’t argue with anybody, nothing like that. This thing happened fast. Somebody was outside, waiting. And whoever it was already had the weapon. They didn’t think twice about using it, either.”

“Why take the head?”

“That doesn’t figure. Prowlers, junkies, or whatnot, those types aren’t going to stick around and hack up your pets. They’ll run.”

Wyatt thought about the dog lying under that tarp. It was more than Opal’s uncanny prediction bothering him. He remembered Sheba’s brown rheumy eyes, gray whiskered muzzle, and the arthritic roll of her narrow, furry hips as she came over to greet him when he visited; a soft lick tickling against his knuckles while he and Henry sipped Cokes on an August evening.

“What kind of person does a thing like that?” he wondered, not realizing he spoke the words out loud until Eppers responded.

“Somebody who doesn’t like dogs, I suppose.”

Behind them, the glass doors swung outward. Henry stood there unshaven. He looked at both men and said, “You’d better come with me.”

Eppers went in and Wyatt followed.

“A young lady,” Henry said. “She’s pretty upset.”

Inside Henry’s office, the woman sat, exhaling the ragged breaths of someone who’d been crying. Henry had gone into his linen chest for the Hudson’s Bay point blanket wrapped around her shoulders. She trembled. He asked her if she wanted coffee. She said no thanks. He put a cup beside her anyway. She smiled at him. She had on a flannel nightgown, printed festively, with vertical rows of dancing candy canes. Bare feet tucked away under the chair. Her hands were dimpled, small as a child’s. She pulled tissues, one after another, from a Kleenex box that had mountain scenes pictured on the sides.

Eppers sat on the corner of a rustic log desk.

Wyatt stayed back.

Henry said, “This is Christine Lucy. She’s from Milwaukee. She booked a fireplace suite with us for two nights. Her husband is returning from a business trip, up in Thunder Bay. They’re meeting here for the holiday. He’s due in a couple of hours. They were planning on going to a restaurant for breakfast, then hanging around the lodge, building a nice fire, relaxing ... is that right, ma’am?”

Christine Lucy nodded.

“She had intruders in her room,” Henry added.

“You tell us the rest,” Eppers said, edging closer.

That brought tears from Mrs. Lucy.

Wyatt said, “Take your time. And remember you’re safe now.”

She drew in a deep breath and began.

“There were two of them. Like brothers. Similar, I mean . . . they didn’t resemble each other ... I didn’t get a real good look at their faces. The way they acted—I’d call it brotherly. They had this light. A white, white light. Not a flashlight but more like a spotlight. I had to shut my eyes it was so bright. My door was locked when I went to sleep. I never heard them break in. I woke up. They were on either side of me. Looming. Maybe it was because I’d been asleep, but at first I thought they were animals. They shined the light in my face. Only one brother talked. The other had a huge knife. The one said, ‘She’s awake.’ His partner poked the knife into me. I felt it.” She touched her stomach. “The light got closer. After a minute, he said, ‘It isn’t her.’ He told me to keep quiet. Asked did I ever see a deer field dressed? Yes, I have. That would be me if I moved. He said I better not watch them go. I didn’t want to, but I closed my eyes. I don’t know when they left. They were silent. I was thinking that and I started to sing the song to myself in my head, Silent Night, Holy Night . I didn’t want to think about what might happen to me ... it wasn’t until I noticed the police lights on the ceiling ... I decided to come out.”

She touched her stomach again.

“What’s that in your hair?” Eppers asked.

“Pardon me?”

Christine blew her nose. She turned her head around so the men had a better view. The hair was matted into tangles of red.

“Looks like blood,” Eppers said. He didn’t touch her.

“What do you mean?” she asked, her voice rising.

Awkwardly, she dabbed at the sticky wetness with her Kleenex. She took one look at the tissue, jumped up from her seat, threw

the Kleenex down on the carpet, staring at it in disbelief. Then her expression changed. Her eyes widened as if something unspeakable were climbing up through a hatch in the floor. Christine Lucy started screaming.

Henry, wary of smudging fingerprints, turned a master key in the door of Christine Lucy’s presumably unoccupied suite.

The lock clicked.

He paced off one, two, dramatically tiptoed steps, giving Patrolman Eppers the opening he needed to take over.

“Stand back,” Eppers said.

After they determined that Christine Lucy had no wounds, Wyatt urged Eppers to inform his superiors about their gruesome discovery. The senior officers were milling in the parking lot. Another guest might, indeed, be hurt. The possibility existed that the pair of dark intruders had never left the lodge. They might’ve hidden themselves. Under a bed? Inside a shower stall? Christine admitted she hadn’t seen them go. She clearly recalled releasing her door’s deadbolt in her rush to escape. They couldn’t have gone out that way. Wyatt advised caution and numbers. Bill wanted a quick look-see. A first crack at finding glory, too, Wyatt suspected. He let it pass. This wasn’t his business, not anymore. He was a motel manager. A citizen. That’s all.

He moved aside as Bill unsnapped his sidearm holster.

Bill Eppers took a deep breath.

And he pushed open the door.

Heat blasted.

A choking smell. Black curls of acrid smoke crashed softly against the ceiling. Glad for the onrush of oxygen, burning furniture crackled in the gloom. Smoke alarms, throughout the lodge, wailed.

Eppers shouted, “Fire!”

He reached for his gun, realized the futility. He let the door slam shut.

Henry ran for an extinguisher hooked to a recess in the wall. “Why, those monsters!” He yanked the door handle and shouldered his way past Eppers toward the consuming flames.

Wyatt followed with a hand on Henry’s back, ready to pull him away from hazards unseen. Fire engulfed the queen-sized bed. The mattress bared a mass of twisted blackened springs. A hole gaped in the center of the bedspread. Tentacles of orange flame darted out of the hole and thrashed about the room.

Gasoline fumes lingered.

Wyatt noticed a star shape radiating on the carpet under the bed’s edge.

An incendiary device. Set to a timer. Blown.

Henry discharged the extinguisher.

Wyatt grabbed the nozzle from his friend’s hand and guided it downward.

The fire shrank.

It was then that Wyatt saw the wall. First he thought the surface of the varnished logs had sustained smoke damage in the blaze. But it was only one wall, above the bed, that was discolored. The lines were graphic, man-made.

Like a cave painting.

Primitive and yet filled with meaning.

A hieroglyph.

In blood.

After the fire truck pulled away, and the last patrol car swung out of the lot, Wyatt started his walk back to the Rendezvous. It wasn’t the story of the dark brothers that scared him the most. Neither was it the firebomb left under the bed, nor even the pitiful sight of Sheba’s severed head sneering from atop the pillows, displayed beside the spot where Christine once laid in fear; Sheba’s tongue stretched out in an act of desecration as lewd as it was monstrous.

It was the image.

Drawn crudely in dog’s blood above the bed. Unblinking, solitary. An arched brow with two strange lines—a tear and a lash- scrolled underneath.

An ancient all-seeing eye.