Ronnie's Mom answered.
"Hi, Mrs. McGiver. This is Lee. Is Ronnie there?"
"Lee?” Immediately he could tell she was surprised. “Ronnie told me he was going over to your house about an hour ago."
Lee thought quickly. “Uh, yes ma'am. He was just here. I was at the store with my dad. I just got home and Maggie—I mean my mom said he'd just come by."
"Well, he's not come home yet.” She sounded suspicious. She'd had years of experience with these two boys.
"Well, tell him I called, will you?” Lee said, hoping Ronnie had decided not to stay out too late tonight.
"Let me talk to Maggie,” Mrs. McGiver asked.
"Mom!” Lee called out and held up the phone. “Ronnie's mom wants to talk to you."
Maggie mashed out her Kool in the ashtray and got up and walked over looking at Lee reproachfully. He gave her his best innocent angel, it wasn't me look, and flung himself back in the chair, ignoring Maggie's steady glare, and trying to look like he couldn't care less what the two moms talked about. As it was the conversation was brief. Maggie and Ronnie's mom didn't get along too well either.
Again, tonight, his dad had turned on the big, central attic fan, so all the doors to the bedrooms were left open to allow the cool outside air to flow in through the screened in windows and up and out through the attic. The suck and flow was powerful, especially in the hall. The fan's vents in the ceiling were there and the air rushed in to the middle of the hall flowing from either side. The force of the air streaming past reminded Lee of a bad dream he'd had once in their old house. The dream was so powerful it had stayed with him, just like one of those odd memories he carried around. There was something awful in their house. He couldn't see it, but he knew it was there. The presence was hidden in a dark doorway, down low. He was being dragged along, slipping and clawing, but it was too powerful to resist, even though he was trying his best to hang on. Right as his foot had slid in to the dark, just as the fingers were about to close on him, he woken up, feeling all cold and shaky.
Lee lay in his bed, and let his thoughts concentrate not on the old nightmare, but on the new bike, its beautiful red paint, the chrome handlebars and the real headlight. His beat up old bike had been stolen from the bike rack at school, just a week past his birthday in February. He and Ronnie had looked everywhere and confronted a number of the usual suspects, but it was gone without a trace. He'd had that bike since before his dad had taken off the training wheels and taught him to ride like a big kid. It had just about grown too small for him, and over the years the paint had been scratched and scuffed until it was difficult to tell what color it had been originally. But it was his. None of the kids ever locked up their bikes when they rode to school, either. These past months he had never been able to figure out why it had been his bike that had been stolen amongst all the others.
One of the upper slats of the Venetian blinds picked up the strong breeze and began to vibrate, buzzing slightly in the near dark of his bedroom. Lee had decided it would be stupid to close the curtains, so he had left them open to billow out with the strong pull of the fan. As they filled and fluttered, it allowed him to see out through the slats to the vague, dark shapes of the trees outside. For a moment he allowed his thoughts to creep back to the other night. Had there really been something out there? He forced himself to look out into the dark, scanning the dusky shapes silhouetted against the shades of pitch and gray. The fireflies were out in force tonight. Little, yellow spots of light would bloom and die, then bloom again, moving and mixing about the branches and tree trunks. He looked deeper, actually even trying to see something, but there was nothing else there. Even now, he couldn't begin to convince himself that it had just been a foolish fright. Whether or not there had been something chasing him, the fear and its impact on him had been all too real. “The fear. That's what it's all about,” he reasoned. “Something doesn't have to be real. If you're afraid, then it's real enough."
Softly, the sound came down the hall.
Lee was wearing his briefs and nothing else. He was lying atop his mattress with only the sheet pulled up to his knees so his feet didn't feel exposed in the dark.
He heard it again, this time a little louder. It had definitely come from down the hall.
He strained his ears. “What's that?” he asked himself.
Nothing.
He pulled the sheet up under his chin and looked at his open doorway. It was really dark out in the hall.
There it was again, a low moan or disguised whisper. He laid still, his heart beginning to beat out loud. “It couldn't be in the house, could it?” flooded into his mind.
Something was moving, and it didn't want to be heard. He could barely make it out over the noise of the attic fan, but it was there.
A stifled giggle pierced the silence. It was Maggie. The sound was followed instantly by a deeper sound he knew had come from his dad. They were starting to make love; he'd heard it many times before.
Maggie let slip a louder cry, like the stifled end of a hiccup. Within moments he could make out the sound of the well-traveled bedsprings as the bed started to squeak in earnest as the couple down at the end of the hall began to find their rhythm.
Lee turned over, away from the window and tried not to listen. It was a sound he had grown all too accustomed to in their small, frame house a world away over on Keystone Street. Tonight was the first time he had heard them in this house. Ever since he had first become aware of what it was they were doing, hearing Maggie and his dad at their lovemaking had aroused a wide range of emotions within him. Sometimes, after his dad had been drinking or they had come home late from somewhere, Maggie forgot to try to be quiet. Those nights Lee would cover his head with his pillow and try not to think about his real mom had been Maggie's sister.
Sometimes though, he would find himself wondering what it would feel like to make love some day. To kiss a girl and be in bed together, the mere thought was intensely arousing. His imagination always translated this simple concept into powerful and uncontrollable physical sensations. He'd usually end up vividly recreating every nuance of the few occasions he had actually kissed, touched, or seen a girl. And once started down that road there was never any turning back.
Tonight though, the sounds from down the hall put him off; sometimes it just sounded so ugly with the bed springs creaking and the gasps and muffled moans.
Lee pulled the sheet up under his chin and let his thoughts drift back to the bike. He could see himself riding it over to Art's field on Friday and surprising all the guys. They'd all be begging for a chance to have a ride. Too, he could picture himself flying down the street kicking up clouds of dust from behind just like the big Ford. The spokes flashing and the wind tearing past, in his imagination he easily matched and then surpassed the speed of the cars out on the main highway. Fat Larry was chasing along behind with his siren wailing and the red light on top of the squad car flashing, but never had a chance.
Without ever sensing the subtle change, his imagination drifted into that blissful gray world of semi consciousness which lies between reality and dreams. Lee didn't hear the culmination of the efforts from down the hall when it came.
Later, when it had grown quiet, save for the incessant drone of the crickets and an occasional moan of a lost breeze trying to slip its way through the maze of mangled limbs, Lee tossed in his bed, mumbling something as his eyelids working flutteringly while he dreamed.
Outside the window the fireflies continued to swarm, moving aimlessly about amidst the hulking, black trunks, their intermittent flashes giving depth to the darkness. Out there, farther off, two were brighter than the rest and remained close together, appearing and disappearing as they came resolutely through the trees. Only an inch or two apart, each yellow glow was too large and too bright to be a pair of fireflies. The orbs emerged from out of the grove of ruined cherry trees and floated across his lawn, stopping but a few feet from the house.
Lee was sleeping deeply now, mercifully oblivious
to the wicked, yellow eyes peering in and then casting about warily just outside his bedroom window.
THE END OF BOOK ONE OF EVIL HEIGHTS
SF/F/H FROM PAGETURNER EDITIONS
FROM PAGETURNER EDITIONS
STEFAN VUCAK'S EPPIE NOMINEE SPACE SAGA “THE SHADOW GODS"
In the Shadow of Death
Against the Gods of Shadow
A Whisper From Shadow
Immortal in Shadow
With Shadow and Thunder
Through the Valley of Shadow
JANRAE FRANK'S #1 BESTSELLING FANTASY SAGAS
Dark Brothers of the Light Book I. Blood Rites
Dark Brothers of the Light Book II. Blood Heresy
Dark Brothers of the Light Book III. Blood Dawn
Dark Brothers of the Light Book IV: Blood Wraiths
Dark Brothers of the Light Book V: Blood Paladin
In the Darkness, Hunting: Tales of Chimquar the Lionhawk
Journey of the Sacred King I: My Sister's Keeper
THE COSMIC KALEVALA
The Saga of Lost Earths—Emil Petaja (Nebula nominee author)
The Star Mill—Emil Petaja
The Stolen Sun—Emil Petaja
Tramontane—Emil Petaja
JACK JARDINE'S HUMOROUS SF AND MYSTERY
The Agent of T.E.R.R.A. #1 The Flying Saucer Gambit
The Agent of T.E.R.R.A. #2 The Emerald Elephant Gambit
The Agent of T.E.R.R.A. #3 The Golden Goddess Gambit
The Agent of T.E.R.R.A. #4 The Time Trap Gambit
The Mind Monsters
Unaccustomed As I Am To Public Dying & Other Humorous and Ironic Mystery Stories
The Nymph and the Satyr
ARDATH MAYHAR'S AWARD-WINNING SF & F
The Crystal Skull & Other Tales of the Terrifying and Twisted
The World Ends in Hickory Hollow, or After Armageddon
The Tupla: A Nover of Horror
The Twilight Dancer & Other Tales of Magic, Mystery and the Supernatural
The Black Tower: A Novel of Dark Fantasy
Forbidden Geometries: A Novel Alien Worlds
HAL ANNAS’ COSMIC RECKONING TRILOGY
I. The Woman from Eternity
II. Daughter of Doom
III. Witch of the Dark Star
THE HILARIOUS ADVENTURES OF TOFFEE
1. The Dream Girl—Charles F. Myers
2. Toffee Haunts a Ghost—Charles F. Myers
3. Toffee Turns the Trick—Charles F. Myers
OTHER AWARD WINNING & NOMINEE STORIES AND AUTHORS
Moonworm's Dance & Other SF Classics—Stanley Mullen (includes The Day the Earth Stood Still & Other SF Classics—Harry Bates (Balrog Award winning story)
Hugo nominee story Space to Swing a Cat)
People of the Darkness-Ross Rocklynne (Nebulas nominee author)
When They Come From Space-Mark Clifton (Hugo winning author)
What Thin Partitions-Mark Clifton (Hugo winning author)
Star Bright & Other SF Classics—Mark Clifton
Eight Keys to Eden-Mark Clifton (Hugo winning author)
Rat in the Skull & Other Off-Trail Science Fiction-Rog Phillips (Hugo nominee author)
The Involuntary Immortals-Rog Phillips (Hugo nominee author)
Inside Man & Other Science Fictions-H. L. Gold (Hugo winner, Nebula nominee)
Women of the Wood and Other Stories-A. Merritt (Science Fiction and Fantasy Hall of Fame award)
A Martian Odyssey & Other SF Classics—Stanley G. Weinbaum (SFWA Hall of Fame author)
Dawn of Flame & Other Stories—Stanley G. Weinbaum (SFWA Hall of Fame author)
The Black Flame—Stanley G. Weinbaum
Scout-Octavio Ramos, Jr. (Best Original Fiction)
Smoke Signals-Octavio Ramos, Jr. (Best Original Fiction winning author)
The City at World's End-Edmond Hamilton
The Star Kings-Edmond Hamilton (Sense of Wonder Award winning author)
A Yank at Valhalla-Edmond Hamilton (Sense of Wonder Award winning author)
Dawn of the Demigods, or People Minus X—Raymond Z. Gallun (Nebula Nominee Author)
THE BESTSELLING SF/F/H OF J. D. CRAYNE
Tetragravitron (Captain Spycer #1)
Monster Lake
Invisible Encounter & Other Stories
The Cosmic Circle
PLANETS OF ADVENTURE
Colorful Space Opera from the Legendary Pulp Planet Stories
#1. “The Sword of Fire"—A Novel of an Enslaved World” by Emmett McDowell. & “The Rocketeers Have Shaggy Ears"—A Novel of Peril on Alien Worlds by Keith Bennett.
#2. “The Seven Jewels of Chamar"—A Novel of Future Centuries by Nebula Nominee Raymond F. Jones. & “Flame Jewel of the Ancients"—A Novel of Outlaw Worlds by Edwin L. Grabber.
#3. “Captives of the Weir-Wind"—A Novel of the Void by Nebula Nominee Ross Rocklynne. & “Black Priestess of Varda"—A Novel of a Magic World by Erik Fennel.
NEMESIS: THE NEW MAGAZINE OF PULP THRILLS
#1. Featuring Gun Moll, the 1920s Undercover Nemesis of Crime in “Tentacles of Evil,” an all-new, complete book-length novel; plus a Nick Bancroft mystery by Bob Liter, “The Greensox Murders” by Jean Marie Stine, and a classic mystery short reprinted from the heyday of the pulps.
#2 Featuring Rachel Rocket, the 1930s Winged Nemesis of Foreign Terror in “Hell Wings Over Manhattan,” an all-new, complete book-length novel, plus spine-tingling science fiction stories, including EPPIE nominee Stefan Vucak's “Hunger,” author J. D. Crayne's disturbing “Point of View,” Hugo Award winner Larry Niven's “No Exit,” written with Jean Marie Stine, and a classic novelette of space ship mystery by the king of space opera, Edmond Hamilton. Illustrated. (Illustrations not available in Palm).
#3 Featuring Victory Rose, the 1940s Nemesis of Axis Tyranny, in Hitler's Final Trumpet,” an all-new, complete book-length novel, plus classic jungle pulp tales, including a complete Ki-Gor novel.
# 4 Featuring Femme Noir, the 1950s Nemesis of Hell's Restless Spirits, in an all new, book length novel, plus all new and classic pulp shudder tales, including “The Summons from Beyond” the legendary round-robin novelette of cosmic horror by H.P. Lovecraft, Robert E. Howard, C.L. Moore, A. Merritt, and Frank Belknap Long.
OTHER FINE CONTEMPORARY & CLASSIC SF/F/H
A Million Years to Conquer-Henry Kuttner
After the Polothas—Stephen Brown
Arcadia—Tabitha Bradley
Backdoor to Heaven—Vicki McElfresh
Buck Rogers #1: Armageddon 2419 A.D.-Philip Francis Nowlan
Buck Rogers #2. The Airlords of Han—Philip Francis Nowlan
Chaka: Zulu King-Book I. The Curse of Baleka-H. R. Haggard
Chaka: Zulu King-Book II. Umpslopogass’ Revenge-H. R. Haggard
Claimed!-Francis Stevens
Darby O'Gill: The Classic Irish Fantasy-Hermine Templeton
Diranda: Tales of the Fifth Quadrant—Tabitha Bradley
Dracula's Daughters-Ed. Jean Marie Stine
Dwellers in the Mirage-A. Merritt
From Beyond & 16 Other Macabre Masterpieces-H. P. Lovecraft
Future Eves: Classic Science Fiction about Women by Women-(ed) Jean Marie Stine
Ghost Hunters and Psychic Detectives: 8 Classic Tales of Sleuthing and the Supernatural-(ed.) J. M. Stine
Horrors!: Rarely Reprinted Classic Terror Tales-(ed.) J. M. Stine. J.L. Hill
House on the Borderland-William Hope Hodgson
House of Many Worlds [Elspeth Marriner #1]—Sam Merwin Jr.
Invisible Encounter and Other SF Stories—J. D. Crayne
Murcheson Inc., Space Salvage—Cleve Cartmill
Ki-Gor, Lord of the Jungle-John Peter Drummond
Lost Stars: Forgotten SF from the “Best of Anthologies"-(ed.) J. M. Stine
Metropolis-Thea von Harbou
Mission to Misenum [Elspeth Marriner #2]—Sam Merwin Jr.
Mistress of the Djinn-Geoff St. Reynard
&n
bsp; Chronicles of the Sorceress Morgaine I-V—Joe Vadalma
Nightmare!-Francis Stevens
Pete Manx, Time Troubler—Arthur K. Barnes
Possessed!-Francis Stevens
Ralph 124C 41+—Hugo Gernsback
Seven Out of Time—Arthur Leo Zagut
Star Tower—Joe Vadalma
The Cosmic Wheel-J. D. Crayne
The Forbidden Garden-John Taine
The City at World's End-Edmond Hamilton
The Ghost Pirates-W. H. Hodgson
The Girl in the Golden Atom—Ray Cummings
The Heads of Cerberus—Francis Stevens
The House on the Borderland-William Hope Hodgson
The Insidious Fu Manchu-Sax Rohmer
The Interplanetary Huntress-Arthur K. Barnes
The Interplanetary Huntress Returns-Arthur K. Barnes
The Interplanetary Huntress Last Case-Arthur K. Barnes
The Lightning Witch, or The Metal Monster-A. Merritt
The Price He Paid: A Novel of the Stellar Republic—Matt Kirkby
The Thief of Bagdad-Achmed Abdullah
Women of the Wood and Other Stories-A. Merritt
BARGAIN SF/F EBOOKS IN OMNIBUS EDITIONS
(Complete & Unabridged)
The First Lord Dunsany Omnibus: 5 Complete Books—Lord Dunsany
The First William Morris Omnibus: 4 Complete Classic Fantasy Books
The Barsoom Omnibus: A Princess of Mars; The Gods of Mars; The Warlord of Mars-Burroughs
The Second Barsoom Omnibus: Thuvia, Maid of Mars; The Chessmen of Mars-Burroughs
The Third Barsoom Omnibus: The Mastermind of Mars; A Fighting Man of Mars-Burroughs
The First Tarzan Omnibus: Tarzan of the Apes; The Return of Tarzan; Jungle Tales of Tarzan-Burroughs
The Second Tarzan Omnibus: The Beasts of Tarzan; The Son of Tarzan; Tarzan and the Jewels of Opar-Burroughs
The Third Tarzan Omnibus: Tarzan the Untamed; Tarzan the Terrible; Tarzan and the Golden Lion-Burroughs
The Pellucidar Omnibus: At the Earth's Core; Pellucidar-Burroughs
The Caspak Omnibus: The Land that Time Forgot; The People that Time Forgot; Out of Time's Abyss-Burroughs
The First H. G. Wells Omnibus: The Invisible Man: War of the Worlds; The Island of Dr. Moreau
The Second H. G. Wells Omnibus: The Time Machine; The First Men in the Moon; When the Sleeper Wakes
Evil Heights, Book I: The Midnight Flyer Page 26