Evil Heights, Book I: The Midnight Flyer

by Michael Swanson

  Lee gave Ronnie his you're stupid face. “Naw, there's no way. I'm sure it was one of those things where the Sheriff just kinda looked the other way. Just like now-a-days, those guys who race their cars out on the highway to Manseville on Friday and Saturday nights, the Sheriff knows about it. My dad said the Sheriff back then sometimes rode the train on Saturday nights to keep it from being robbed and to keep the gamblers from killin’ each other. They might have had all kinds of stuff going on, but they wouldn't have ever let kids ride."

  "Yeah, but just think if they did,” Ronnie's eyes had glazed over. “Could you imagine sex with an actual, real live grown woman?"

  "A whore?” Lee interjected.

  "Yeah, so?” Ronnie was defensive. “It'd be better than nuthin'. You just plunk your money down and wham bam thank you ma'am. Man oh man, wouldn't that be the living end?"

  "I don't think I'd like to pay,” Lee replied.

  "Yeah, that's easy for you to say,” Ronnie shot back. “Girls are always chasing you around."

  "Oh yeah,” Lee looked at Ronnie like he must be crazy. “Girls chasing me around. Yeah right, I have to beat ‘em off with a stick. They're lining up ‘kiss me, Lee.’ What world do you live in?"

  "You know what I mean. Girls just seem to like you. Look at my stupid sister; she's ga-ga over you."

  Lee shrugged and pulled out his grin. “I probably get it from my dad."

  A breeze or a little gust passed through the still air, causing a ripple to run along through a row of the remaining tassels above a window of the empty diner car.

  Ronnie started. “What was that?"

  "What?” Lee ceased his grinning and listened hard. “I didn't hear or see anything."

  A feeling that hadn't been there a moment before, a kind of eerie quiet had suddenly taken hold.

  It was ever so still. There was no sound at all, like sitting in one of the listening booths at the record store with the doors closed. Just nothing.

  Ronnie jumped again as though stung, slapping at the air behind him. “Damn it! Shit Fire! What the hell was that? Did ya’ see that? Somethin’ touched me."

  Lee, in spite of not having seen or heard anything, was beginning to become caught up in Ronnie's fright. His fingers tips and feet had gone icy cold. “It wasn't me,” he said, looking around warily, lest the ghost of a dead gambler leap up from a dark corner and grab hold.

  "I'm tellin’ you,” Ronnie said, his face livid, “Something touched me on the back of the neck.” He put his hand back and tugged at the collar of his t-shirt. “Right here! It was like a fingernail!"

  "Maybe it was a girl ghost?” Lee replied. “Maybe it was one of those whores and she wanted to give you a hickey for free?” He laughed but it didn't ring very funny there in the dead air. Lee cocked his head toward the far end of the car, as it seemed he could hear the faint, far off tinkle of a piano playing a bit of ragtime. “Can't be,” he thought out loud, shaking his head. “It's just something in the wind,” he said.

  But there was no wind. It was as still as death, as though the entire world had just stopped and everything everywhere was holding its breath and waiting.

  "Do you hear something?” Lee asked.

  "Like what?” Ronnie was looking around, swiveling his head from side to side.

  "Music,” Lee answered. “Sounds like music."

  Ronnie jumped again, coming clear off the ground and twisting around. He panicked. “Oh, shit, something's in here with us!"

  The two boys looked at each other.

  Lee was sure he could hear the music; it was louder and there was no other way to describe the sound than to say it was coming from out of the silence, the very air itself.

  "Do you hear it?” he whispered.

  "Oh shit,” Ronnie called out. “I'm gettin’ out of here!"

  Without so much as a warning Ronnie bolted, crashing into Lee. Not waiting to see if Ronnie was right, Lee led the way, flying out of the back of the car and sprinted across the tracks flying in the direction of home.

  Lee was already in his back yard, trying to quiet down Flapjack, when Ronnie stumbled back to the fence. Both shoelaces were untied, flopping around his feet, and his round face was deep red and streaked with sweat.

  No sooner had Ronnie clambered over the fence and fallen to the ground, than they heard a yell come from back up at the house.

  "What in the world are you two boys doing back there? Don't you think I didn't see y'all come over that fence!"

  It was Maggie. They'd been caught. A few minutes later, Ronnie was on his way home and Lee was sitting on his bed having been sent to his room.

  She'd had him come out of his room right when his dad pulled into the driveway. The first thing Maggie did when Ted walked in the front door was pounce on him about Lee's trespassing in the train yard. “Of course, she had immediately sent Ronnie home. Of course, she had reminded Lee he had been told not to go over there.” Now she wanted to know what Ted was going to do about it.

  His dad, ran his fingers through his hair, while Lee, sitting on the couch, tried to look as innocent as possible. When Maggie made the mistake of looking away, Ted managed to give Lee a conciliatory shake of the head.

  Lee could almost hear the thoughts race through his dad's head. “Son, what have I told you a thousand times? What's our rule? Repeat after me: Don't—get—caught."

  "Okay, okay, I'll talk to him,” Ted said, when Maggie turned back to face him. He put his satchel down on the table near the door. Then he clapped his hands together suddenly, and quickly bent down and grinned at Patty who was lying on the floor coloring. “Isn't anyone here interested in what I've got out in the car?"

  "The T.V.!” she squealed.

  Patty ran up, and Ted snatched her clear off the ground twirling her around. “Who's the prettiest girl in the world?” he called out.

  Patty momentarily ceased her stream of giggles and stuck her thumb proudly in the center of her chest. Lee had seen this same act repeated a thousand times, and he still could never help grinning at the pure look of utter delight in Patty's face.

  His dad leaned back to look Patty squarely in the eyes. “That's right, you are.” He turned his attention to Maggie who was still standing tight lipped by the door. “Just like your mamma."

  Maggie tried not to smile.

  Ted let Patty down. “What's for dinner? I'm starved."

  Luckily, it was hard for Lee's transgressions in the train yard to be the main event of the evening, when the big news was the brand new Zenith T.V. out in the back seat of grandma's Ford. After dinner Lee helped his dad carry it in and they all tore apart the cardboard box and formally set it into place by the wall next to the fireplace. It was about the most beautiful, modern looking thing Lee had ever seen with its 19” green glass screen and silvery fabric over the speaker panels to either side.

  Patty yowled, wanting to watch it immediately. Though her dad was patient with her, sitting her down on his lap to try to explain that they had to hook up an antenna first, she scowled looking so very much like Maggie when she was mad.

  As he lay awake in his bed, where he'd been sent immediately after the unveiling, Lee had time to think about what had happened in the diner car. Every kid who visited the train yard had stories. One boy he knew swore that he'd been in there when the train had moved, actually rocking from side to side. Another said he and some other boys had once seen shadows moving about, then they heard screaming, and then blood dripped out of the walls. The truth he did know was all the kids told as many wild stories about the train yard as they did about the Ballard house. He remembered another saying from his dad: “Truth talks; bullshit walks.” He wasn't completely sure of what that meant, exactly. But he knew it applied more to what other kids had said about the train yard, rather than what had happened to him and Ronnie today.

  Lee picked up his “John Carter of Mars” book and searched for the bent page corner he had used to mark his place last night. He read the first few words, then stoppe
d, the lingering feelings from the diner car was hard to shake.

  Going back to his book, Lee decided he'd sleep a lot better if the next time he saw Ronnie, Ronnie told him it had all been a big joke just to scare him. Of course, that wouldn't be until at least a week from now, since he was grounded.

  He tried to read some more. John Carter was just about to save the incomparable Deja Thoris from the jaws of a wild Thoat. Last night he couldn't put it down, and now he couldn't keep his mind on the story.

  Scrunching with his feet to push the sheet back, he put the book down and stared momentarily at the cover illustration of a muscular man with a long sword, fighting something that looked like a saber toothed tiger, but had eight legs. Just behind the hero, a woman with a very ample bosom cringed in terror. The problem was, deep down he knew what he'd felt, and what he'd heard. Even now, like the lingering bad taste that remained for days when Maggie washed out his mouth with lye soap, the tinny sound of the music he'd heard seemed to sour in his head. There'd been something else, too. It wasn't just the oppressive silence and the music. Laughing, that was what he'd heard. Someone had been laughing. It was a woman's laugh, wild and for some reason more than a little obscene. Like maybe she was drunk and had heard a dirty joke. Lee remembered hearing Maggie sound like that once at one of Uncle Ed's pool parties. Like her mother, she almost never drank, not even a beer. But every now and then she would. Usually when she did, she'd either fall asleep or get real sloppy. But at that pool party two summers ago she'd gotten smashed. She'd stumbled about giggling and laughing, laughing and laughing. She couldn't quit. She'd kept trying to kiss Uncle Ed. To Lee, Maggie's loss of inhibitions had been totally hilarious, but he knew his dad and Ed's wife, Miss Laura, hadn't found it so funny. They'd left in a hurry right after Maggie had taken off the top to her bathing suit. That had been one heck of a party. Now that he thought about it, he knew that was what the sound he'd heard, the cackle of a woman, stoned to the gills and looking for love.

  Trying to force the memories of the train car from his mind, he picked up the book and searched for his place. “Maybe some other kids were running around the cars and had hidden below when we came up,” Lee thought. “Maybe it was all just a joke someone was playing on us?” He scanned the page, again looking for the elusive last sentence he'd read. He found it and held his finger over the first word so as not to lose his place again. It may have been a joke, but whoever else was doing the laughing had done a good job of scaring them. But the real scary thing was, it felt whoever it was, she wasn't laughing alone.

  CHAPTER FOUR: TERROR IN THE DARK

  Even though the new T.V. wasn't yet connected to an antenna, it had quickly become the feature attraction of the house. The old one, an Emerson, which didn't really work, having sound but no recognizable picture was now sitting out in the garage on the workbench. The new set's modern screen was almost twice as big, and the sticker on the cabinet promised, “True to Life Brilliance."

  In the evenings, under the tulip shaped lights of the whirling ceiling fan overhead, the whole family had gathered as they always had when they had lived on Arbuckle Avenue. That is, except for the many nights his dad was working late.

  Tonight, Patty was sitting cross-legged on the thick rug, coloring. Lee was lying sideways, his feet over the arms of the green overstuffed chair, still reading his “John Carter of Mars” novel. Ted and Maggie were together on the sofa, looking through a furniture catalog. Regardless of what any of them were doing, they all periodically looked up and watched the glossy, dark green screen of the silent T.V.

  The changes throughout the house were coming along rapidly as Maggie toiled like a woman possessed every day. It was like she was desperate to erase any trace of what the house had been. After cleaning and re-hanging all of the drapes and blinds, she had taken down most of the dismal, sepia-toned photographs of stern-faced people in dark, old-fashioned clothes. She had oiled and rubbed the rich knotty pine paneling until it shone with a brightness that reflected the new ambience she seemed almost frantic to establish throughout the house.

  From the very first day they moved in, Lee and Patty both enjoyed arguing over the patterns they could spy in the wood grain of the paneling. It had evolved into a sort of game, like when they were outside lying in the grass and looking up at clouds, imagining elephants and castles in the sky. Both kids could pick out a number of figures and images, some of which appeared so life like they almost to have been drawn into the natural grain of the wood.

  To Lee, the most distinct form was recognizable as the profile of a crouching Indian, complete with two feathers in his hair and what appeared to be a tomahawk in one hand. Patty insisted that the most realistic was the swirling pattern by the front window resembling a rearing pony with a flowing tail and mane. And, of course, she had declared that one was her favorite.

  This new subject for them to argue about had started that first afternoon. And tonight was no exception.

  "Mama,” Patty complained, pulling herself up on her elbows. “Lee said this morning that my pony in the wall looked like a donkey."

  Everyone looked up. Where that had come from so suddenly was anyone's guess.

  "It does,” Lee countered, pinching the corner of the page he had been reading so as not to lose his place. “Look at the big, floppy ears."

  "That's its mane,” Patty argued.

  Lee got up and walked over to the side of the big, bay window, tracing his finger around the outline, then glared back and said, “It's a donkey."

  "Mama, Lee's teasing me!” Patty yelled.

  "Cut it out,” Ted came back, looking up from the catalog, “Both of y'all."

  Patty sat up defiantly. “You're stupid Indian looks like a frog!"

  Lee quickly stepped over by the fireplace. “Mom, Dad,” he said drawing his finger around the crisp outline. “This is an Indian, right?” He pointed over to the window with his other hand. “That is a donkey."

  "You know, that's funny,” Maggie said marking a page in the catalog by bending the whole page over triangularly. “I don't remember the Indian before. But you're right Lee, there it is."

  "What do you mean, you don't remember it?” Ted asked. “That thing looks like it was drawn there.” He pointed at it running his hand around indicating the outline. “Look at the detail. He's wearing buckskin. You know, I've done prints at work that didn't look that good."

  Maggie lit up a Kool and tossed the pack back on the table. “Yeah, I know it's weird.” She pointed to one outline three quarters of the way up the wall by the hutch. “We always called that one the rose bush. See how the pine knots look like little rose blossoms? And over there is the one daddy always called the boat anchor."

  Lee looked to his dad, who raised his eyebrows questioningly.

  "That's because the old man was drunk most of the time,” Ted said flatly.

  Maggie cast him a sharp look. She held out her cigarette and moved it around tilting her head over a bit sideways. “No, it does, sort of anyway. It depends how you look at it.” She dropper her arm and flicked an ash that almost made it into the ashtray. Wiping it away with her other hand she added, “But that Indian, he almost looks like he's going to step out of the wall and scalp us all."

  "Mama,” Patty complained again. “That's not fair. You always take Lee's side."

  Maggie scooted away from under Ted's arm and reached down ruffling Patty's hair. “Do y'all want to really see something?"

  All eyes followed her curiously as she unhooked Ted's arm from around her shoulder and got up to walk around to the wall by the kitchen door. She stopped before one of the few family photographs she had allowed to remain still hanging in the living area. “Y'all see this picture?"

  The old photograph, a large sixteen by twenty, was of the entire Bonham side of the family, most of whom were all dead now or had long ago moved away. There were great aunts, great uncles, cousins, second cousins, the women wearing light summery dresses and the men in pleated slacks, and almo
st all the adults were wearing hats. It had been taken at a reunion, with a tiny, baby Maggie prominently propped up on her daddy's knee. This had been the only photo Grandma Bonham had hanging when they moved in which had included Maggie.

  Lee walked back to the chair and got in backwards kneeling on his knees and draping his arms down over the back, watching Maggie intently.

  "Well, y'all feast your eyes on this, and tell me what you think,” Maggie, grinning deviously, turned her back and lifted the picture up off its hook.

  Lee's eyes grew wide. He hadn't been expecting anything like this at all.

  Behind the photograph was the image of a grotesque face patterned into the wood grain. No leap of imagination or twisting of the head to get the angle right was necessary to see this for what it was. The monstrous face had horns and a snout. Two dark, coal-black eyes formed from pine knots, looked out, staring alertly, even hungrily out into the room.

  "Oh Mama,” Patty said, her eyes wide, “That's scary."

  Maggie let everyone have a long look, then rehung the picture, stepping back and taking great care to make sure she got the frame level. When she turned back she still had that nefarious cat-that-ate-the-canary grin, “Why do you think we keep it covered up, silly?"

  Maggie, obviously pleased with herself came back around and snuggled back in beside Ted. “We used to call it the wolf man. You know, like from that movie with ... oh, who was it?"

  "Lon Chaney Jr.,” finished Ted. Maggie never could remember names and things like that. “It looked more like a goat man to me,” Ted observed, obviously trying to make a joke out of it for Patty's sake. “Beelzebub. I don't blame you for covering that one up.” He stared fixedly at the picture, then added, “Amazing though, that the natural wood grain could look like something like that."

  "At least it's not a donkey,” Lee added grinning at Patty.

  "Mom!” she squealed. “Lee's picking on me!"

  "Cut it out, Lee,” his dad jumped in. “Leave your sister be."