Emerald Hell

by Tom Piccirilli

  “What?”

  “It’s the big red fella walkin’ down this mud track toward us.”

  Duffy frowned and took another swig. “He’s Jester’s worry, none’a ours.”

  “‘Less he spotted our faces when we tried to run him over.”

  “It was too dark out, but just to make sure, let’s go sit inside for a while with the others, have us some more food and get another jug.”

  “I like that idea, but what if Jester gets irate that we ain’t on the job?”

  “We still don’t know what the job is except Jester needs him somebody to keep him from sailing off into the sky when that black evil is upon him.”

  “I do wish he never stumbled onto us,” Deeter said.

  “Well, who knows how this will turn out? There may be somethin’ to gain here before it’s all over. I recognize some of these swamp folk from Enigma. They come into town for their pension checks and supplies. And they ain’t got no sheriff out here, no sir. Seems to me we could walk through this town and take just about anythin’ we might want, and if anybody speaks up about it, with one mouth or possibly two or more, well, I figure that might be the last thing they ever do say on this green earth.”

  Deeter smiled and said, “They got some catfish and taters set out on the table. Let’s go get us a dish, and then we’ll go a’visitin’. Ask around about Jester’s girl that he wants so bad, just to keep on the safe side of his ill will.”

  “Good idea.”

  As thunder snarled overhead, they stepped up into the house where the folk milled about, grabbing food and drink and whooping with laughter. The Ferris boys had catfish with sugar beets, and wandered about the large living room looking at the various freakish natures of some of these people.

  There went a dwarf with two huge feet who bounced along doing his best not to get stomped on or tripped over. And here came a squirming worm gal who inched along like a caterpillar, which tickled Deeter’s imagination in ways it had never been excited before. And in the corner stood two young boys—no, just one young’un who had nearly two complete faces right there stuck on his head, one mouth chewing and the other swallowing down a cup of goat’s milk. It did fire the mind, thinking about what these folk were all about here in the deep swamp, and what their days and nights must be like.

  Over the years the Ferris boys had done a bit of work for industries near and far, helping bring in chemicals and waste, showing the northerners what the safest places were to dump. Now, as they each finished up a plate of catfish, they wondered if they shouldn’t have held off on eating as much as they had, considering the state of the local waters and dirt. Then they shrugged and ate a bit more and grabbed hold of the nearest jug, which wasn’t moon but a sweet warm cider.

  Eventually a couple of the band members decided on a break and two others took over their instruments, continuing on with the music. Even a hootenanny usually had a quiet moment or two, but these folk, they just didn’t know how to settle down it seemed.

  The banjo player came inside to have a plate of greens and a tap of dandelion wine. The man who replaced him on the porch wasn’t nearly as talented, plucking at the strings like he was scratching a tomcat. The song didn’t sail anymore, didn’t really move into the center of you the way it had before.

  Deeter felt an odd twist at the back of his head and approached the musician sipping his wine. “You sure can play that banjo,” he said. “Our daddy knew a chord or two, but he needed to have a few taps of moon ‘fore he could play worth a damn. A’course, a few taps too many and he couldn’t hardly find the strings no more and he’d come chase us with the rake.”

  The banjo strummer blinked a couple of times, sizing Deeter up, keeping his lips peeled back and his teeth on show. “Why, ah, thank you for them kind words, son, I surely do appreciate them.”

  “That new boy out there can’t hardly bend a string without it screaming.”

  “He’s new to the village and fancies himself a self-taught geetar player. He figures if a banjo looks near the same then it ought to play near the same.”

  “Figures wrong there, eh?”

  “Sure does, but he was a botherin’ me to play, and I wanted myself a plate of greens, so we’re both happy.”The musician swallowed back more wine, looked at his heaped plate, and said, “Well now, you give your daddy my best. Maybe he and I can strum a song or two together someday.”

  “Naw, he’s dead,” Deeter told him. “Long while gone now.”

  “Well, that’s a damn shame, I’m sorry as hell to hear that there.”

  “Don’t be, he was a mean son of a bitch, and he deserved twice what he got, but I was only a young’un and couldn’t hardly swing the ax handle all that well. Though it was fun shootin’ his toe off.”

  “Pardon?”

  Deeter grinned and said, “We’re lookin’ for Sarah.”

  “Sarah who?”

  Duffy, who’d been watching the big red fella through the window, stepped closer and said, “Sarah the pregnant girl who come through here last night with two other pregnant girls after they landed in a skiff, I’m’a thinkin’. That Sarah. You recall her now?”

  “No.”

  “You are one contrary cuss, now ain’t you?” Deeter said.

  “No, I just ain’t seen no pregnant girl come through, much less three of them.”

  “I think you must be lyin’.”

  “And what right do you have to say that to me?”

  “This,” Deeter told him, yanking his Bowie knife from its sheathe and plunging it into the banjo player’s throat.

  Duffy said, “Well, we’re back in it now,” and stuck a hand out. He grabbed hold of the three-eyed gal as she came through the door and drew her close, kissing her hard on the lips while she tried to yell.

  “Looks like the picnic’s over, folks,” Deeter said as the rest of the folk screamed and cried out, and the catfish hit the floor, “and the ruckus is about to start.” He reached over to grab the last bag of hog cracklins but some fat old boy wouldn’t let them go, so taken with the sight of the dead banjo player he was. Deeter picked up the shotgun and blasted the chubby coot through the gizzard, and then the Ferris boys stepped outside into the cool rain and leaned against the porch railing wondering which girl to go after now.

  Like Brother Jester had said, at least they were good for murder.

  Chapter 22

  Hellboy heard the shouts and shrieking and ran up to the house where the band had been playing. People poured out into the road. The party lights gave off a sickly blue, red, and green cast in the swamp. The moon crawled out from cover and then slid back in.

  Up on the veranda, two yahoos were terrorizing a woman who looked like she had a third eye in the middle of her forehead. A fiddle player had been caught in the corner and couldn’t decide whether he should run and jump the rail or just stand there cowering. A woman with no limbs inchwormed along down the stairs and Hellboy gestured for the fiddler to follow. He clutched his bow to his chest and ran.

  Hellboy got up on the first step and saw the dead man lying on the floor inside, blood still bubbling from his mouth. And beside him was another catfish.

  Always back to the catfish.

  There wasn’t any cool way to say it, so he just let it rip. “Okay, you two creeps, let the girl go.”

  It sounded even dumber than he’d been expecting.

  One of the mooks waved a shotgun around without really pointing it and said,”Hellfire, son, I s’pect your mama drank herself more than a jug of poisoned moon in her time.”

  The other said, “And ate herself too much fried goat, I’m thinkin’. Now, you git on away from us, big fella.”

  “So let me guess. You’re the Ferris brothers?”

  “That’s right, I’m Deeter and this is Duffy, and we’re lookin’ for Sarah.”

  “Why?” Hellboy asked.

  That stopped the brothers. They looked at each other unsure of how to answer. They still didn’t quite understand what the hell
Jester wanted with her.

  So Deeter just said, “That ain’t none’a your concern now, friend. You get on with your evenin’ and we’ll get on with ours. Yours is waitin’ for you down the creek.”

  Hellboy glanced at the water rolling onward. “That where this Jester is?”

  “He most sure and truly is, and he’s talkin’ to God or the dead or maybe he’s floatin’ two three feet offa the ground, but he surely is waitin’ on you.”

  “Terrific.”

  Nodding, Hellboy figured one good punch and he could bring half the porch roof down on these two mooks, but he was afraid the girl might be hurt in the process. He couldn’t leave her to them, and finesse wasn’t exactly his strong suit. He had to keep these two talking and was about to ask another question, find out what this Jester was really all about, when the woman smiled at him and shook her head.

  “You don’t have to worry about me,” she said. “They won’t hurt me or anyone else.”

  Duffy said,”Darlin’, much as I like gazin’ into them three limpid pools of yours, you givin’ this good ole boy here some bad advice all around.”

  The woman stared at Hellboy, ignoring the Ferris brothers. “Trust me, I’ve had a prophetic flash and already seen how this is going to end. That’s my gift. Leave them to me for the time being. You’ve got your own trial awaiting you.”

  “I think that’s enough out of you,” Duffy said, and got out Mrs. Hoopkins’s cutting knife and tapped her on the cheek with it. “Say no more or your bloodlettin’ begins.”

  “You’re going to croak and scream.”

  “You done tole me that already tonight. I just gotta say, this was one fine hootenanny until you had to go and spoil it with all that strange talk. Can’t a good ole boy just kick up his heels and have himself a plate of greens without so much bother?”

  Hellboy had met precognitives before, and she had the same sense of calm that the others had, who had learned to accept the inevitable. On a couple of different occasions, in Brazil and the Himalayas, he’d tried to change the course of events and soon found that he’d played into the hand of fate, directly bringing about what he’d been trying to alter.

  It still went against his gut, doing nothing, but he’d gleaned a thing or two about believing in others who might know more than he did.

  He nodded to her and she nodded back and said, “Your true heart is your strength, remember that.”

  “Sure,” he told her and turned toward the green darkness.

  ———

  “You see yourself drawin’ your own last breath?” Duffy asked the three-eyed lady, genuinely curious.’”Cause I’m a figuring that ain’t much of a gift, knowing your own ending. Which way you get it, in the chest?” Tapping her over the heart with the cutting blade. “Or the belly?” Moving the knife down her chest to her stomach. The excitement lit his eyes.

  “Neither.”

  “I was always partial to the neck,” Deeter put in. “Plenty of gushin’ but it’s over early, and if you sidestep quick enough you don’t get no thin’ on your clothes. Oh, and don’t forget to ask her where this Sarah is.”

  “That’s right,” Duffy said, now that he’d been reminded. “Where’s this pregnant girl Sarah? Your extra peeper see where she’s currently at?”

  “As a matter of fact, it does.”

  “Where then?”

  “I won’t tell you.”

  “You don’t tell me then you gonna die screamin’ and croakin’.” Duffy let out a laugh at that, feeling glad that he’d finally had the chance to turn around some of that spooky talk she’d been giving him.

  “I’ll take you to her,” the three-eyed woman said, gazing deeply at the beautiful Ferris boys, and then far beyond them.

  “Stay close to the woods,” Deeter said. “I hear lots of whisperin’ out there. We run into anyone, and we gonna let loose a lot more blood.”

  ———

  Hellboy wandered down the creek and got turned around in the dark. The water ran on his right but, somehow, after he moved around a loblolly bush and got caught in some briar, the creek was suddenly on his left, or at least sounded like it.

  He turned and saw the lights of town still burning behind him. He hoped this wasn’t another game like with Granny Lewt’s shack just moving around and the swamp coming with her. He wondered if the best course of action wouldn’t be to start calling for Jester and see if the guy actually answered.

  Sometimes you just wanted to ask some troublemaker, Exactly what the hell is your problem, buddy?

  Stray flickers of lightning lit the far-off skies. Above, the moon continued to claw through the clouds. Hellboy smelled the fragrance of night-blooming flowers. He raised his stone fist and wondered what Jester’s shadows had discovered about him, through his own dreams.

  Did they know things he didn’t know himself? The rain covered his hand and dripped off. He called into the night, “All right already! Come on, let’s get to it!”

  Only silence except for the slap of the creek and the bull gators roaring; in the distance.

  When there was no response he wheeled back through the thistles, found out exactly where the creek was, and eventually made his way back to the village. Maybe it was a setup and he’d been lured away on purpose. He moved fast, shouldering aside the brush, keeping his eye on those colorful lights.

  Oddly enough, he didn’t feel lost or even particularly anxious. Perhaps he’d picked up on some of that prescient tranquillity. Even Lament appeared to have a touch of it, all this acceptance and belief in the big Kahuna.

  Enough was enough. Hellboy picked up his pace and made it back to the main street of the village. He started walking up it like Wyatt Earp doing his thing. No one else was about. They were hiding in their houses, waiting for resolution. He didn’t blame them for inaction. The most tranquil places were the ones always thrown into misery when strangers stepped in. They’d welcomed, fed, and tended to him. Now it was time for payback.

  Hellboy stopped and listened for the sound of children but heard nothing. He called out to Jester again, “You’re slick with shadows, even hiding in them. How about you step out and we get on with this thing?”

  Sometimes it worked.

  From down the road appeared a figure in a frock coat, who started forward toward Hellboy. He even had a black hat on. Hellboy watched this old guy coming at him, so gaunt that he looked like a strong breeze would carry him sailing away. But you couldn’t judge troublemakers by their size. Some of the worst he’d ever tangled with had barely reached his knee.

  He could tell right off there was something about Brother Jester you couldn’t take lightly. It was there all about him, even in the darkness—the writhing shadows that contorted in greater blackness.

  Jester walked down the dirt track between shanties and smiled the only smile he probably knew. The one that spoke of death.

  “I know your secret heart,” the dark preacher said in his blighted voice.

  “Now that would be a really neat trick,” Hellboy told him.

  “You believe so?”

  “Yeah, ‘cause I don’t even know it. I go out of my way not to know it. That’s how I manage to get up in the morning.”

  “I’ll show you then. It is my gift to you.”

  He reached into his pocket and then withdrew his hand, which he held out to Hellboy.

  It was empty.

  Not exactly the showiest gimmick Hellboy had ever seen, but he figured more was coming, and it was bound to be bad. So he said, “Screw this,” and hauled off to give Brother Jester a good smack in the chops.

  The mad preacher caught Hellboy’s wrist in his own thin, frail hand, and stopped it cold. He brushed over the knuckles gently with his fingers, almost lovingly, the same way that piece of shadow had.

  “Hey now,” Hellboy said, “that’s just not possible—” and watched as Brother Jester’s own pale fist began to turn red and grow thicker and change into a great stone hand of doom.

  In seconds
it was no different from Hellboy’s fist, which Jester drew back with a crazed leer, his teeth turning black and crackling with energy as he began to laugh, and then punched Hellboy through the nearest shack.

  It hurt like hell.

  Chapter 23

  Shadows rose from Brother Jester and slid forward, racing around Hellboy, veiling him, and entering him.

  This was a different kind of darkness. It was his nightmare come alive. He felt his own history being drawn up from him and dispersed. His memories, his hurts, his knowledge, anger, the lessons learned, his love, even the confusion. And everything else that made him what he was.

  He struggled to grab the forbidding wraiths, feeling them beat and flap against his chest like wings. But they were insubstantial, ethereal, and he couldn’t grab bold despite what they bled from him.

  Luckily the shanty was empty. He was on his back in a child’s bed. The frame, made from cut logs and lashed together with twine, had been crushed to kindling beneath his weight. A smiling rag doll with pearl-button eyes had flopped off a shelf into his face. On the floor lay a smashed chalkboard slate covered with a kid’s drawings. A Hellboy-sized hole had been torn through the front wall.

  He reached for the shadows again and said, “Hold it, you’re not taking any pieces of me away with you—”

  They slid across the floor and ceiling, the grand forms of archangels turning their faces toward him, nodding, their lips moving to speak words he couldn’t hear. Divinity taking a cheap shot at you for no reason you could name. Didn’t everybody already have to put up with that enough?

  When the shadows receded back to Jester, who stood just outside the hole in the wall, the preacher almost seemed frightened for a moment before he began to laugh. Hellboy clambered out of the kid’s busted bed thinking how awful it could have been. A child dead by his own hand. He clenched his teeth and climbed out of the wreckage.

  “Let’s try that again,” Hellboy said, rushing from the shack and swinging his fist once more at the dark preacher.

  Jester caught him by the throat in one super/humanly quick movement, then yanked Hellboy off his feet until they were nose to nose. The boiling motes of energy leaking from Jester’s eyes burned into Hellboy’s brain. Blood leaked from his nose and mouth. Hellboy clubbed at Jester but he couldn’t move the emaciated codger an inch. Not only was he in trouble, but considering Jester weighed about eighty-two pounds, this situation was damn degrading. About the best he could do was knock the hat off. It didn’t make him feel any better.