The Summoning

by Bentley Little

  What should I do?"

  "Tell him we'll do the article, and set up an appointment

  Sue took her hand from the mouthpiece, told the man she would be happy to interview him for a story, and made an appointment for one o'clock.

  She scrambled around for some scratch paper, Rich handed her a pen, and she wrote down the address and phone number.

  "Good job," Rich said after she hung up.

  "That didn't sound like a story to me. I thought maybe we should just refer him to the Forest Service or the Department of Agriculture or someone who could help

  "This is one of the most important things you need to learn about the newspaper biz. In a town this size, you never turn down stories. No matter how dumb they might be. We have a tough enough time finding new things to write about each week. Sometimes we have to resort to rewriting press releases; sometimes even when we do find a legitimate story, the people involved won't talk. So when you get a guy offering you an interview, you jump on it." He pointed to a handwritten list on top of a pile of papers on the right side of his desk. "That's what you'll be responsible for this week. I'll still be doing all of the layout and most of the paste up I'll write most of the articles, but you'll have to take over the columns for me."

  Sue licked her lips, wanting, needing to say something, but not knowing what. She felt flustered, thrust into some thing for which she was totally unprepared.

  Rich smiled. "Relax. It's easy. The columns almost write themselves.

  All you have to do is collect the information when the sources call."

  He shifted the camera strap over his shoulder. "I'd better be going.

  You can sit at my desk if you want, use my VDT, but be careful that you don't erase anything. Use your own diskette"

  "Wait. Where are you going? When will you be back?" "The police station. I don't know when." "What about when I go to the interview?

  What do I do about the office?"

  "Carole will be here." He waved, walked around the partition, and out the front door.

  Carole walked back into the newsroom a moment later. "Don't worry, dear." The secretary smiled warmly. "He lives for things like this, and despite what he says, he'll be in here more this week than he usually is. He'sjust hyper right now." .

  "But I'm not sure what he wants me to do."

  "Just do what you always do. If you have any questions, ask him when he comes back." She looked at her watch, and her smile widened. "By my calculations, that should be an hour or two."

  "Are sure?" you

  "Positive. Besides, what's he going to do? He'll go out to the scene, talk to some people, talk to his brother, come back and write."

  "It sounded like he was going to be gone all week."

  "If he is, I'll eat this carpet."

  Sue met the old secretary's gaze, and started to laugh. Carole shook her head. "Don't take him too seriously." Sue suddenly felt much better. She glanced again at Rich's list, then put it back down on top of his pile of papers. From behind the front partition came the sound of the door opening, and, still smiling, Carole walked back out to her desk to see who it was. '.

  Sue sat down in Rich's chair and picked up the phone to call her parents.

  Lee Anne was seated behind the receptionist's desk when Rich walked into the police station. He pointed toward Robert's office, she nodded, and he stepped past her through the small gate in the front counter while she pretended to stare down at one of the typewritten pages on her desk.

  Rich walked into Robert's office. His brother was on the phone, obviously talking to someone of whom he was not overly fond. He was scowling, trying to speak, but not able to get a word in edgewise.

  Finally he said, "I'm still the police chief here," and slammed down the phone. "FBI?" Rich asked.

  "That bastard's trying to freeze me out. Pretty soon I won't be able to scratch my own nuts without asking his permission."

  "Talk to his superior."

  Robert paced around the room. "I can't think of anyone who isn't superior to that fascist fuck wad

  "I mean talk to his boss, his supervisor."

  "I've tried. He's supposed to get back to me. When do you think that'll be? The next decade?"

  Rich tapped his notebook-on his leg. "I'd like to sit here and chat, but it's getting late. Are you ready to cruise out to the ranch?"

  Robert nodded. "Yeah, sure. The body's gone, thoughl I think the horses are gone, too."

  "That's okay. I just want to get a few photos of the site and some quotes from you and a couple of employees. Hollis, if he's available."

  "Okay. Just let me make one more phone call, and then we're out of here."

  "I have to take a whiz. I'll meet you out front."

  Robert picked up the phone receiver, gave the "OK" sign, and started dialing.

  Rich walked down the hall, past the tiny locker room, and into the bathroom. He stepped up to the first urinal and, a second later, heard the door open behind him.

  Steve Hinkley stepped up to the adjoining urinal. "Nice day," he said.

  What was it about cops, Rich wondered, that made them want to talk to you while you were taking a leak? He never had any desire to chat while he was relieving himself, but it seemed that every time he'd been in here and a policeman had walked into the bathroom, the policeman had stepped up to the urinal, unzipped, whipped it out, and started a conversation.

  I don't want to talk, he wanted to say, I'm taking a piss. But instead he nodded, smiled, and said nothing.

  "You're a writer. Did you ever think about writing for TV or the movies?"

  Rich shook his head as he flushed, zipped up, and walked over to the sink .... ::!

  "I bet you could get a TV movie out of all this vampire shit. You'd make a fortune."

  Rich smiled as he wiped his hands on a paper towel and walked out of the bathroom. "I'll keep it in mind."

  I Robert was already waiting. He straightened up as Rich arrived, and the two of them headed out of the office.

  I'll drive," Robert said.

  Five minutes later, they were there.

  The Rocking DID.

  Has they drove by the entrance, Rich looked at the logo--the letter DID resting in the curve of a semi

  ClrcleIt had been carved into the sign above? the road in

  Udr a way that it appeared burned into the wood, like a ; brand. He shook his head. The idea of a dude ranch in

  Rio Verde, or, more precisely, a dude resort, since, no ranch work was done at the Rocking DID, still seemed stupid

  -and inappropriate to him, its artificial extravagance a mockery of the very real accomplishments of the town.

  As teenagers, he and his friends had referred to. the place as the Walking Dick Ranch and to Hollis as the Walking Dick. ' It was a sobriquet still used by a lot of those friends as adults.

  Robert bypassed the ranch's paved guest road and turned off on the dirt service trail. The cruiser bumped over ruts and chuckholes, and turned off on a side trail that led down to the stables. A brown state police vehicle was already parked in front of the long building, as was a Rio Verde car. Someone was taking photographs inside one of the horse stalls, the flashes, like baby lightning, brightening the interior shadows at irregular intervals.

  Robert grimaced as he pulled to a stop. "There may be fireworks. The state ad the FBI are pissed that I authorized Woods to take the body before they'd had time to see it."

  "You think that was such a good idea? Maybe---" "Whose side are you on? ...... Rich got out of the car, held up his hands. "I'm Staying out of it." He walked around the front of the cruiser and started toward the stall with the flashes.

  A state policeman he hadn't seen emerged from behind an open stall door. "Stop right there. Where do you think you're going?" ......

  Rich held up his camera. "Press."

  "I'm sorry. This is a--"

  "Let him through!" Robert yelled from behind. He pushed past Rich and stepped directly in front of the policeman. "I don't
know how things work in Phoenix, but here in Rio Verde, we have a free press.

  Understand?"

  "I have orders--"

  "Fuck your orders." .......o:

  "It's okay," a voice said from inside the stall. "I meant civilians.

  Keep out civilians."

  "I just need a quick picture of the outside of the stables, then I'll get out of your way." Rich nudged his brother with an elbow as he walked past. "I'm on your side. All the way."

  Mr. Overbeck was waiting for her on the porch steps in front of his house, and Sue recognized him from the restaurant as he stood up. She'd never known his name until today, but he'd come in quite often for lunch over the past year or so.

  He smiled as she got out of the car, obviously recognizing her as well.

  "I didn't know you worked for the Gazette." "I just started."

  "Are you still working at the restaurant?"

  "Yes. Both." "

  "That's great. Your parents must be very proud of you." "Yes," she said.

  "Well, come on in. You want something to drink? Coke? Water? "No, thank you, In fact, I'd like to see the trees first, if you don't mind.

  So I can get an idea of what you're talking about and take a few photos."

  "Okay. Let's walk around this way." Overbeck led the way around the side of the house.

  Sue looked down at the worn path as she walked. The jagged cracks in the sidewalk looked like horizontal lightning in a gray cement sky. The walkway ended abruptly at the back of the house, and they continued over hard dirt toward a low metal-roofed barn.

  "I'm mostly into livestock, but as I told you over, the phone, I got myself a little orchard back here. It's not much, I only got a few trees, but it keeps me in lemons, and I usually have some left over to sell. I've even sold some to your old man a couple times." They walked around the side of the barn, past an empty corral. "It's those ones there," he said, pointing toward a stand of citrus trees behind the building. "They just died over night.

  Yesterday they was strong and healthy, one of 'em just starting to turn. Now look at 'em."

  She saw what he meant. The trees, seven or eight of them, were dead, completely bare, although a circular hill of still-green leaves surrounded the base of each tree. As they moved closer, she could see that the trunks looked shriveled, the bark withered, dry, and peeling.

  She felt a wave of cold wash over her, moving from her neck downward.

  The trees dried up, her grandmother had said.

  Sue took off the lens cap of the camera, raised the viewfinder to her eye, focused, and snapped a picture. She moved the camera to a vertical position and took another.

  "Would you mind if I took a closer look?" she asked.

  "Go right ahead."

  "Do you have any idea what might have caused this?" Overbeck shook his head. "Disease is gradual, and even bugs can't do this much damage overnight. I did notice a weird kinda, notch on the side of one of the trees, though. I don't know if all of em have it. I haven't had time to look. I figure that might have something to do with it." Sue's heart was pounding. "Could you show me?" "Sure." He led the way over to the tree closest, to the barn. Up close, Sue could see that underneath the peeling bark, the wood was dull gray and as wrinkled as a dried apple. "It's right here." He pointed just above his head at a large nick on one of the two main brhe forking off from the trunk.

  No, not a nick. a t. " "

  She focused the camera, took a picture. Silently, walked over to the next tree. Looking up, she saw, at approximately the same spot, another bite. In the pile of.: leaves at the base of the tree lay two dehydrated lemons.

  She cleared her throat, took a deep breath, looked at him. "I think," she said, "that a vampire killed your trees. When she returned to the paper, Rich was at his desk, furiously typing on his keyboard. She heard the rapid fire clicking of keys from behind the modula wall as she walked through the front door. Carole knowingly toward the partition, smiled at her. Good afternoon, sweetie."

  "Afternoon"' Sue said, smiling back.

  Rich looked up as she entered the newsroom. She'd been pretty shaken by the sight of the decimated orchard, but she'd stopped off at Circle K and made herself a Cherry Suicide--Orange Crush, Hires Root Beer, Dr.

  Pep per, Sprite, and Cherry Coke--and had driven back slowly.

  That had given her time to compose herself.

  "How did it go?" he asked.

  "Pretty good," she said. She wasn't sure what she should say to him right now, how much she should tell. She thought it would probably be best to let him read it in the story. She'd felt foolish trying to tell Overbeck that she thought a cup hugirngsi had killed his trees, but the rancher had been surprisingly receptive to what she had to say, and though he hadn't wanted to come right out and say so in print, he had agreed to refer to the notches on the trees as "bites" and to state that they had not been there before the trees' deaths.

  She did not feel comfortable talking about vampires to Rich, though.

  The editor stood. "I was thinking. I may be very busy the next week or so, so I want to show you how to develop film so you can do it yourself. It'll save me some time and help me out quite a bit. Did you take a roll of the trees?" Sue nodded. "Yes "

  "Get the rancher with the trees?

  She shook her head, feeling the hot flush of embarrassment rush up her cheeks. "No. I forgot. I'm sorry. Ira"

  "No biggie. We may not use a photo with this one any way. But I will use your roll to show you how to develop film. You have fifteen minutes to spare?"

  "Yes."

  "Let's do it now then." He turned down the intensity knob on his terminal. "Carole?" he called. "I'm showing Sue how to develop.

  We'll be in the darkroom. If Jim stops by, have him knock. Anyone else comes by, tell them to wait."

  "Yes sir, bossI" :

  He grinned. "Knock it off." "Yes sir"

  "Carole "Okay, okay."

  Rich stood, motioned toward the darkroom. "Shall we?"

  Sue took the film out of the camera, put the camera-along with her notebook, purse, and pen---on her desk and followed Rich into the darkroom. He shut the door behind her, and for a brief second they were in complete darkness. He flipped on a red light. The illumination was bright compared to the jet-black of a moment before, and she found that she could actually see.

  "When you first take the film out and roll it, you have to do it with no lights on at all, not even this safety bulb. This red light won't hurt prints, but it'll still expose film, so until the negatives are in the can, you have to do everything in total darkness. It'll be tough at first, because you have to do everything by touch, but you'll get used to it

  "All right. This is what's wound up on your roll. In complete darkness, you pop open one side of the roll, feel for the end of the film, and clip it here like so." He placed the end of the film strip in the spool and clamped it with a delicate wire clasp. "Then you roll the film." He wound the strip around the inside of the spool. "You place the whole thing in this can here, and then you're set. You can turn the safety light on."

  "Do you have film I can practice on before I use a real roll?"

  "Of course." " He started explaining about the chemicals and demonstrated how they were poured into the canister through a light-right opening in the lid.

  Sue glanced around the darkroom. Hanging by a clothespin from a wire strung over the sink, she saw negatives of a woman, a tall woman with dark curly hair. Sue was not close enough to make out facial features, but she assumed the woman was Rich's wife. She continued watching the editor demonstrate the sequence of development while sneaking peeks at the roll of negatives out of the corner of her eye. In the top frame, the woman was out side, in front of a flower garden, pointing at the camera, but in all the other pictures she was wearing sexy black lingerie, positioned in provocative poses on a bare bed. In the final frame, she was naked.

  Sue looked quickly away. Too quickly, she thought. He had to have seen the movement. Bu
t, no, he was still concentrating on a plastic container of chemical solution. "Then," he said, "you take the negatives out, wash them in the sink, and, voila! they're done."

  She nodded her understanding. He probably didn't realize that he'd left the negatives there. She felt guilty for invading his privacy and was thankful that her blush of embarrassment could not be seen in the red glow of the safety bulb.

  But she also wished there were negatives of him strung up on the wire.

  She realized for the first time how small the darkroom was. And how hot. There was no air movement in here. Even looking away from him, she could feel his closeness, and she was afraid to move for fear that she would accidentally touch him, that her breasts would accidentally rub his back, that her fingers would accidentally brush his buttocks.

  What was she thinking about?

  There was a knock on the darkroom door, and Rich " called out, "Don't open it!"

  "Daddy?"

  "Just a minute!" He smiled at-Sue. "Anna."

  "Well, I think that's about all I can absorb for now anyway. Anything else would be overload. I'd probably forget what I just learned."

  "Good enough then. You ready to try developing your new roll , .

  "I may still have to ask questions."

  "That's why I'm here."

  "Daddy!

  "Coming," Rich said. He quickly scanned the darkroom to make sure no light-sensitive film or photo paper was exposed, then opened the door.

  Sue stepped out, blinking against the brightness, and saw Anna smiling up at her. "Hi, Sue."

  "Hi there." She felt so guilty that she was unable to look into the little girl's face. Nothing had happened, she'd done nothing wrong, but she had the strange feeling that her sophomoric thoughts had somehow been readily apparent to Rich. She glanced back at him, but he was smiling at his daughter and not looking at her at all.

  "Did you bring me any fortune cookies?" Anna asked. Sue looked down at the girl, and this time she could meet her eyes. "I forgot. But I'll bring some tomorrow."

  "Okay," Anna said. She smiled up at Sue. "I like you better than Mr.