by Brom
“THERE. AT LAST, my Belsnickels . . . they return!” Krampus lifted his ear from the stone and stared up the shaft, pulling against his chain like a hound awaiting a feeding. The light above now bright enough that he knew it to be dawn. He could see their shadows approaching.
It was nearly fifty feet to the top of the narrow shaft; he wrung his hands together as they clambered down. Where is it? He searched their silhouettes for some sign of the sack.
Makwa, the big Shawnee, dropped down first, landing on all fours, his bear fur and buckskin garb torn and soiled, his flesh scraped and bloody. He stood and Krampus clutched his shoulders. “Do you have it?”
Makwa pushed back his hood, shook his head. “No.”
Three more Belsnickels slipped down: the brothers, Wipi and Nipi, also of the Shawnee people, and the little man, Vernon, his long, bristly beard full of pine needles. They, too, appeared to have suffered dearly. They’d obviously been in a desperate battle with someone or something. Krampus looked from one to the next; none would meet his eye. “You do not have it? None of you have it?”
“No.”
“No?”
They shook their heads, continued to stare at the ground.
No. The word cut through him like a shard of ice. No. His knees threatened to buckle. He grabbed the wall to steady himself. “Was it him? Was it Santa Claus?”
“Yes,” Vernon answered and the three Shawnee nodded.
“Where is he? Where is the sack?”
“We did our very best,” Vernon said. “He was terribly strong and crazed . . . it was unexpected.”
Krampus slid to the ground, cradling his head in his large hands. “There will never be another chance.”
The girl, Isabel, dropped down. She flipped back the hood of her jacket, looked from Krampus to the four men. “You didn’t tell him?”
No one answered her.
“Krampus, the sack might still be out there.”
Krampus looked at her, confused. “The sack?”
“Yes, the sack. It’s out there somewhere.”
Krampus found his feet and grasped her arm. “What do you mean, child?”
“We had it. I mean almost. We were in the sleigh, fighting the old man for it, and— Ow! Dammit, Krampus. You’re hurting my arm.”
Krampus realized he was pinching her in his distress and let loose.
“It was crazy. Santa Claus went berserk. Biting and clawing and . . . and . . .” She trailed off, a look of intense sorrow fell across her face. “He kicked Peskwa out of the sleigh. We were so high . . . I don’t know it he made it or—” She hesitated, glancing at the others.
“Oh, he’s most certainly a dead little Indian,” Vernon put in.
“We don’t know that,” Isabel shot back.
“Unless he sprouted wings, he’s dead. I see no reason—”
“Enough!” Krampus cried. “Isabel. What happened to the sack?”
“Well, when Peskwa fell, he took the sack with him and—”
“So, the sack . . . it is still out there?”
“Yes. Well, maybe? I mean when—”
“Maybe?”
“You see, after the sack fell, the sleigh went spinning out of control. It was all we could do to just hang on. A few seconds later we slammed into some trees. We were all—”
“And Santa Claus? What happened to him?”
“Well, I’m trying to get to that.”
“Well, get to it.”
“I’m trying. You keep interrupting me.”
Krampus threw his hands up in frustration.
“Okay, see . . . hell, where was I? Oh, yeah, when we hit that first clump of trees, we were slung out, but not Santa, he clung on. You should’ve seen him, completely out of his gourd . . . ranting and raving at us and at them deer. Them reindeer were all tangled and spooked, and off they shot. Up, up and away. Went spinning across the hollow, into the part of the hill where there’s nothing but boulders and drops. Slammed into them rocks so damn hard the sound echoed all up and down the valley. None of us seen exactly where old Santa ended up. But I can tell you sure as shit he didn’t walk off from that. Ain’t no way. He’s dead.”
“Dead?” Krampus snorted, then laughed. “Santa Claus dead. No. As sweet as such tidings would be, it takes much more than a hard slap to kill such vileness.” Krampus tugged the stringy hair sprouting from his chin. “But it is encouraging that his sleigh and the reindeer are lost.” He began to pace. “Means there might still be some chance to get to the sack . . . to find it first.” Krampus’s heart began to race. “Yes, certainly there is! You say the sack fell with Peskwa, did you not?”
Isabel nodded.
“Do you remember where he fell?”
“Yes. No.”
“Which is it, child?”
“Hard to say. I mean there’s no telling. The sleigh was spinning and—” Isabel glanced at the others. They shrugged.
“The sack will be somewhere near the body.” Krampus’s voice rose with excitement. “You need to find the body, or where it landed. Should not be that hard to do. Begin your search there. Split up and spread out, and—” He stopped pacing, stared at each of the Belsnickels. “We must beat Santa to it. He now knows I live . . . knows about you. He will be sending his monsters. The sack is the prize. It is everything . . . if he should find it first then . . . well, then we are all as good as dead.”
He snatched up one of the Shawnees’ spears, handed it to Makwa. “You still have your knives? Good. Take the rifle and pistol as well. You will need them should his monsters find you.”
“We lost the pistol,” Isabel said.
“Wipi shot him,” Vernon added. “At least three times at close range. I was right beside him. He hit him every time, right in the chest . . . didn’t so much as slow him down.”
“No,” Krampus said. “No, I wouldn’t think it would. Now hurry, make haste. Every second counts.”
The Belsnickels snatched up a couple of spears and an old shotgun with a broken stock from a pile of tools. They scrambled away up the shaft, one after another. Krampus shouted up after them, “Keep a sharp eye out for his monsters. You will know them when you see them. You will feel them.” Then, under his breath. “As they will feel you.”
JESSE PULLED INTO the drive of a small old house with peeling white paint. Linda and Abigail had been staying with Linda’s mother since the breakup. He glanced at his watch. He’d overslept and it was going on noon.
He peered into the camper where two garbage bags full of toys sat waiting for Abigail. He grinned, couldn’t help himself. Santa’s crimson sack sat on the floorboard next to him. He stroked the thick, rich velvet. He had a good feeling about that sack and didn’t intend to let it out of his sight. It was magic, and he felt sure that somehow or another it was going to bring him good fortune. He just hadn’t quite figured out the somehow yet, but at the very least he figured he could always sell it, had to be someone out there who needed a toy-making sack. He started out of the truck when something in his jacket clunked against the door. He pulled the pistol out of his pocket. “Shouldn’t need this,” he said, then snorted. “Of course, there’s no telling with Linda.” He stuck the gun back in the glove compartment.
Jesse knocked on the front door and waited. When no one came, he knocked again, louder.
“Hold your beans,” someone yelled. “Be right there.”
He heard shuffling feet, then Polly opened the door and stared at him through the screen. She gave him a pitying look.
“Are they here?” Jesse asked.
He thought she wasn’t going to answer him at all, when finally she sighed. “Why you wanna go and do this to yourself?”
He tried to peek past her into the living room.
She looked back over her shoulder. “I ain’t hiding ’em under my couch. They ain’t here, Jesse. Not one of ’em.”
“Over at Dillard’s,” Jesse said. It wasn’t a question.
Polly said nothing.
“
Damn it!” Jesse stomped his boot on the doormat. “Tell me something, Mrs. Collins. Just what the hell does she see in that son’bitch?”
“I done asked her the same thing about you once.”
“The man’s pushing sixty. You think that’s right? For Linda to be going out with a man near about your age?”
“Linda’s never been real good at picking men. At least Dillard’s taking care of her. That’s more than some folks can claim.”
Jesse cut her a hard look.
“Comes home after work like he should. Has a nice truck. Nice house.”
Jesse turned his head and spat loudly. “That house was bought with dirty money.”
Polly shrugged. “Better than no money.”
“I gotta go.” Jesse turned and started down the steps.
“If you’re wise, you’ll steer well clear of that man.”
Jesse stopped, turned around, and looked Polly straight in the eye. “Linda’s still my wife, y’know. A little fact that everyone seems to have forgot but me.”
“I’m just saying don’t go stirring him up. You don’t need that kind of trouble. No one needs that kind of trouble.”
“Well, if he thinks he can just take another man’s wife, then it’s my job to set him straight.”
She laughed, a mocking sound that set Jesse’s teeth on edge. “Jesse, you wanna think you’re mean, but you just ain’t. That much I do know about you. Now Dillard, on the other hand, now there’s a man cut from mean stock. His daddy was shot six times in his life and is still here to tell about it, while them men who done went and shot him—every one of them’s lying beneath the stone-cold ground. And his granddaddy, well, that man was so mean they had to hang him before he was twenty-two. Dillard’s got deep roots in this county, got the law on his side. Can send you away, one way or another. So you need to dial it down a notch while you still can.”
Jesse’s face flushed. He didn’t need Mrs. Collins to lecture him about Dillard Deaton, or Police Chief Dillard Deaton, which sounded much more important than it really was, as there were only two full-time police officers in Goodhope. It wasn’t the badge that troubled Jesse but the fact that the man was ear-deep with Sampson Boggs, better known around town as the General. Boggs and his clan ran every sort of racket: gambling, dog fighting, prostitution, welfare fraud, and could sell you any drug you could name. Chief Deaton’s sworn civil duty seemed to include keeping the law off the General’s back in return for a cut on the take—been that way as long as Jesse could remember.
Dillard’s ties ran deeper still: the Boggs clan and Dillard’s kin had a long, crooked history together. Dillard’s old man had taken those bullets Mrs. Collins had spoken of running moonshine for the Boggses back in the day. Blood ties meant something in Boone County, and feuds and disputes were more often than not settled outside the law. And a man needed to be careful who he messed with, because blood always came first. Jesse, on the other hand, didn’t have much kin left to speak of, and the few he had were of no account. Without kin to back you up you didn’t matter much; that was just the way things worked around here.
“What’s going on between me and Dillard,” Jesse said. “Well, that’s a different sort of thing. When a man messes around with another man’s wife, it’s personal. It’s understood he’s crossing a line and what happens after that is between them and no one else. You won’t find anyone gonna argue me on that.”
The stubborn left Polly’s face, leaving her looking old and sad. “Jess, Linda’s finally got something. Don’t you go spoiling it for her. Just you leave her be. You hear me?”
“Mrs. Collins, you have yourself a Merry Christmas.” Without another look back, Jesse got in his truck and drove away.
JESSE SAW NO sign of Dillard’s patrol car and let out a breath. He pulled into the police chief’s driveway, parked behind Linda’s beat-up Ford Escort, and cut the engine. The house sat on a couple of nicely secluded acres backing up against the river, just on the outskirts of town. Everything had been recently renovated: new bricks and wraparound porch. A late-model white Chevy Suburban sat in front of the three-car garage. “Nice house. Nice car. Amazing what a man can afford on a townie’s police salary these days.”
Jesse opened his door, started to get out, then hesitated. What the hell am I doing? He realized it was easy to talk big in front of Mrs. Collins, but now that he was here he didn’t feel so cocky. He glanced up the road keeping an eye out for the patrol car. Abi’s gifts could wait. Always another day. He shook his head. “I don’t think so. She’s my daughter and this is Christmas. I’ll be goddamned if I’m gonna be cowed by some old limp dick.”
He got out and felt naked, exposed. He glanced at the glove compartment, but something in his gut told him bringing the gun would be a bad idea. Instead he walked around, lifted the gate on the camper, pushed his guitar aside, and pulled out the two sacks of toys. He walked up the pathway, stashing the two bags behind the hedge, then mounted the porch. He pushed his hair back out of his face, straightened up his shirt, and pressed the doorbell. Deep chimes echoed from inside.
A minute later, Linda opened the door with a big smile; the second she saw Jesse, her smile fell. She wore a plush lavender robe. Jesse noticed right away the frilly lingerie peeking out from beneath the robe.
“Santa bring you that?”
Linda shot him a cold look and tugged her robe closed. “What’re you doing here?”
“Merry Christmas to you, too, honey.”
“You shouldn’t be here.” She glanced behind Jesse, her eyes anxious. “He’s gonna be back anytime.”
“I’m here to see my daughter.”
“Jesse, you can’t be making trouble.” Linda lowered her voice. “He’s just looking for an excuse. He’ll take you in this time. You know what that’ll mean.”
He did. There were times, when the gigs were slow, that Jesse picked up odd jobs to fill in. On more than one occasion he’d run contraband for the General. The Boone County sheriff was an honest man, wasn’t on the General’s payroll, didn’t care much for Chief Dillard Deaton either. One night, the sheriff pulled Jesse over during a run and that contraband turned out to be three kilos of weed. Jesse ended up in jail. Since it was Jesse’s first offense, the judge let him off with probation and a stern warning that any more trouble and he’d serve hard time. Chief Deaton liked to remind Jesse about his probation, about what would happen if Jesse were to get out of line.
“Last I checked,” Jesse said, “it wasn’t against the law for a man to visit his little girl on Christmas.”
“Jess, please go. I’m begging you. If he finds you here it’ll be bad.” And Jesse caught a note of panic, understood that she didn’t mean bad just for him.
“Linda, you’re twenty-six. What are you doing with that old creep?”
“Don’t you do this. Not here. Not now.”
“Well, okay, fine. But I’m still Abigail’s father and as such I got some say on her welfare, and it don’t set well with me one bit that she’s living under the roof of a man in cahoots with the General.”
Linda looked at him as though he’d lost his mind. “Really? Are you kidding? I can’t believe you even said that.” She laughed. “Weren’t you the one sitting in county jail a couple months back? And for what? What was it, Jesse? Running drugs I believe. Who exactly were you in cahoots with?”
Jesse flushed. “That ain’t the same and you know it.”
She just stared at him.
“Besides, I didn’t know it was drugs.”
Linda rolled her eyes and let out a snort. “Jesse, I happen to know you aren’t that stupid. Well, okay, I tell you what. I could move her into that little trailer of yours. That’d be a wonderful place to raise her. Don’t you think?”
“Doesn’t the fact that Dillard murdered his wife bother you at all?”
“He did not,” she shot back, a noticeable edge in her voice. “That’s just talk. Dillard told me what really happened. She emptied his bank account, took his c
ar, and run off. That’s all there is to that. He was shattered by what that crazy woman did to him.”
“That’s one side of it. Too bad Mrs. Deaton ain’t around to give her side. Too bad no one ever found hide not hair of her after all these years.”
“Jesse, what are you trying to do?”
“Linda, don’t move in with this guy. Please don’t. Go back to your mama’s. Let’s give this one more chance. Please.”
“Jesse, I’m done waiting for you to grow up. There’s gotta be more to my life than watching you pick at that damn guitar of yours. I don’t want to be raising a child by myself while you’re off playing at some scuzzy honky-tonk. That ain’t no kind a life.”
“What happened to you, Linda? You used to believe in me . . . believe in my songs.”
“How’s that demo coming along, Jess?”
“It’s coming.”
“Have you sent off any of your songs? Did you ever follow up with that DJ from Memphis, that Mr. Rand, or Reed, or whatever his name was? As I recall he was real keen on your sound.”
“I’m still working on it.”
“Still working on it? Jesse, that was over two years ago. What’s the excuse now?”
“Ain’t no excuse. Songs just aren’t quite ready yet. That’s all.”
“How many years have I been hearing that? What you mean to say is you aren’t quite ready yet. Because them songs . . . they’re good songs. But nobody’s ever gonna know it if you don’t let them hear ’em.”