“Then try and have faith,” Selena told him.
We went to the door. I got there first, but it opened before I could reach it. I found myself looking at a round fat man with a gray, stiff beard like a train’s cowcatcher. This was Clayton Crabbpatch. Three of his sons stood behind him. All of three of them wore overalls, and nothing else. His sons were bulging with muscle, with short brown hair and eyes a little too close together. They stood behind Clayton Crabbpatch, pickaxe handles resting on their shoulders. I wondered what the bludgeons were for. A rusty pick-up truck sat behind them.
“Candle,” Crabbpatch said, as he handed me a thick wad of dough. “Here’s your payment. You tried, you lost your partner, so I added in a couple more bills. You done as good as anyone could. You can’t be expected to do no more.”
“I’m afraid I will,” I said. I looked at the money in his hand. “A shamus doesn’t get far, taking his client’s money before the case is complete. Your daughter’s still in the Hollow, Mr. Crabbpatch. So is my partner. I’m going back there to get both of them.”
“Don’t go doing that now, boy,” Clayton said. “I’m telling you it’s done with and I’m trying to pay you!” His face went red. He looked back at his sons. “Now you take my cash and get the hell out of these hills, or things are liable to get nasty.”
“Things are plenty nasty already,” I said. “And I’m telling you — the case won’t be closed until I’m good and ready to close it. Until then, take your wad of cash and get out of my way.” Something was fishy and my detective’s instincts flashed to life. Clayton Crabbpatch was hiding something, which he was afraid I would find out if I went to Witch’s Hollow. Whatever it was, it seemed to be worth more than Charity’s life.
Crabbpatch shook his head and frowned, resting his hands on his guts like he had a stomach ache. He stepped back, and his three sons walked towards me. Selena and Reverend Sharp were in the church, and I motioned them to step back. I faced the three bruisers. The first Redneck raised his pickaxe handle. It was a stout piece of wood and the arms holding it bulged with muscle. It could crack my skull in a second.
“You do what my pappy says now!” the boy ordered. “Or I’ll drop you, you hear?”
“I hear fine,” I said. “And I’m waiting for you to try.”
He tried. He swung that pickaxe handle straight for my head. I grabbed it with one hand, the rough wood burning my fingers as I stopped its swing. I took my other hand, made it into a fist and cracked it against the hillbilly’s chin. He went down and I grabbed the pickaxe handle from his hand. Crabbpatch’s second son came towards me, his pickaxe handle above his head. I sidestepped it, and then used my own club to take the legs out from under him. He hit the ground hard, and I smashed out a couple of his teeth before tossing the pickaxe handle over my shoulder.
The third son got wise. He ran back to the pick-up truck, slammed open the door, and reached under the seat. He came up with a revolver, but I pulled out my automatic and fired a shot over his shoulder. He dropped the gun as blood pooled on his sleeve.
“The next one’s going in your brain, pal,” I told him. “Now raise your hands, nice and easy.”
He did just that. He looked to his father, who shook his head and gulped. I walked over to Clayton Crabbpatch, stepping onto the chest of his oldest son on my way. I let him have a nice long look at my .45. “I don’t know what you’re hiding and I don’t care,” I said. “I’m going to the Hollow, to get my partner and your daughter. If you want to stop me, you’d better be ready to fight and to fight dirty.”
“They’ll kill you.” Crabbpatch looked down at his bare feet. His sons pulled themselves up and started limping back to his automobile. “You go to the Hollow, you ain’t gonna be coming back. The witches will strip off your skin and eat your flesh. They’ll suck down your soul and rip out your bones for their playthings.”
“Let them try,” I replied. I brushed past him, motioning for Selena and Reverend Sharp to follow.
We got into my Roadmaster and started the engine. Selena sat next to me, and Sharp took the back seat, holding his bottles of holy giggle juice close. I didn’t trust him. I had plenty of heaters in the engine, but those hadn’t worked too well the last time. This time, I wouldn’t run. We were going to the Hollow, and we were coming back with Weatherby or not at all.
The dirt road to the Hollow had been unused since the days of horses and wagons. It got darker as we drove along, like the tall trees of the mountains were closing in over our heads, locking us in shadow. I could hear the sounds of the forest, from the screeching and hoots of owls to the endless chirping of crickets. It was like a strange, wild orchestra, building to a fearful climax. I ignored it and kept driving. Selena had her hands in her lap and stared ahead. She was thinking of Weatherby and I didn’t bother her.
Reverend Sharp kept quiet, right until we were nearing the patch of woods called Witch’s Hollow. “It was the Pullers what done it,” he said. “I heard the stories, told at prayer meetings, always in whispers, the story of how the Hollow got its name.” He paused.
“Go on,” Selena asked. “We should know.”
“The Pullers, they lost all their men in the War Between the States. Husbands, sons, brothers – all of them went right up into the war and were ground to nothing. Then the womenfolk were all alone, a mother, two daughters, and an old aunt. They were good people, and they walked in the ways of the Lord. But seeing all of their kin vanish just took the goodness right out of them. They pledged their souls to the devil. They called him here, and danced with him in the moonlight. And he gave them eternal life and power unimaginable, and the forest animals as their companions. And they’ve been here.” Reverend Sharp shivered. “Ever since.”
We rode on into the darkness. The road dipped, sloping downwards into a round valley, full of trees. I kept driving, my eyes darting from tree to tree. I felt like I had in the War, in a dozen cities and woods where the Nazis were lying in wait. This was like sniper country, where a death could come swiftly from any direction, with less warning than a change in the weather. When it happened, I wasn’t even surprised.
“Over there,” Selena said. “In the trees.”
She pointed upwards, and I saw one of the witches, perched on a thin branch that couldn’t possibly have supported her weight. She had discarded her skin, and was red and fleshy, glistening in the moonlight. Her dark hair was long, matted and tangled, her eyes were demon red. Long claws arched out from her fingers, and she rested them on her hips. Her figure was fine. If she had worn skin – and it looked decent – I wouldn’t mind staring at her.
Like a bird taking a dive, the witch leapt down. She floated through the air, swooping down to hover in the air above our automobile, light as a cloud. I stopped the car and reached back, grabbing the shotgun next to Reverend Sharp and resting it on my knees.
“What are y’all wanting?” the witch asked.
“The boy,” I demanded. “Weatherby Stein. And Charity Crabbpatch.”
“Ah. Stein’s a good one. He’s fun to have around. And now we can eat him. And make you watch.”
She swooped in for the kill, claws poised to smash through glass and drive into my throat. I raised the shotgun and fired. The shells burned past her face. It made her scream with a sound like a rusty hinge, and but it didn’t make her stop. She stabbed a hand through the windshield, grabbing my throat and hauling me half out of my seat. My head slammed on the dashboard. Everything went fuzzy and red. She pulled back the other claw. Her fingers tapered into razor edges. She could draw them across Selena’s pale throat and bleed out her life in an instant.
But Reverend Sharp smashed one of his bottles into her face. “Vile serpent!” he cried. “Foul fiend! In the name of Christ, I call you out and I damn you! I damn you to the blackest abyss of Hell!” Glass shattered and whiskey got into her face. The witch pulled back. Blood was running down her chest in rivers, and her face burst into bright and sudden flame. She pulled back, slamming onto the
hood.
I gunned the engine for everything it was worth and the Roadmaster shot forward. The witch went under the wheels. Her thin limbs snapped and cracked as I ran her over. I kept on driving, heading for the center of the Hollow.
“It worked…” Reverend Sharp whispered. “Dear Lord God. It worked.”
Selena smiled at him as she grabbed another bottle of Holy Water. “I did not doubt you for a moment,” she said. “I had faith. And now, it appears that you have the same.”
“Save your hallelujahs,” I muttered. “We ain’t out of the woods yet.”
All around us, the forest was coming alive. Witches started poking their fleshless heads out from behind trees, from within holes in the earth and the shadows on the forest floor. They ran for the auto, floating through the air and shrieking like banshees as their claws reached down. I started shooting with the shotgun, racking the pump with one hand, resting it on the dashboard and picking off the witches as they came down. Selena hurled a bottle of holy booze through the air, and it smashed into their ranks, showering them with liquid.
It clung to their bloody forms and burst into flame. They fell screaming from the skies, landing on the ground and writhing and thrashing, as the holy fire consumed them. The flames glowed blood red, rising and falling as the witches plummeted from the sky. Shadows danced madly as the auto sped down the road and crashed into their ranks. I kept shooting at their downed forms, one foot on the gas pedal. The smell of burning flesh and gun smoke was in me and I was back in the War, killing more men than I could count and filled with joy to see each one die.
“Mr. Candle!” Selena’s cry brought back my attention. We were heading for the center of the Hollow, and I saw a small rickety shack, resting in the clearing. I slammed on the brakes, and we kicked up streams of dark dirt before screeching to a halt.
Luck was the only thing holding that shack together. It was a rickety mass of wooden boards. The windows were dark and cracked, and the door swung open. Reverend Sharp recognized it. “The Pullers’ place!” he cried. “It’s gotta be!”
“And it’s the witches’ base of operations,” I said. If Weatherby hadn’t been hacked to pieces and gobbled up, that’s where he’d be. I opened the door, resting the shotgun on my shoulder as I got out. “Miss Stein, you stay in there. Reverend, grab some more of that holy whiskey of yours and come with me.”
“Mr. Candle, I won’t—”
I turned to face her. “Call me Mort,” I said. “And I know you can handle yourself. But Weatherby doesn’t think that and the kid would kill me if he knew I let you walk into danger.”
Selena slumped in her seat. “All right, Mort,” she said. “Get him out of there.”
“Sure.” I turned back to the shack and headed towards it.
Reverend Sharp stayed at my side, the Bible in his hands. We crossed the grass and made it to the porch. There were ravens on the roof, a whole carpet of shiny black feathers and beady black eyes staring down at me. I opened the door and they lifted off. I stepped inside, breathing in cobwebs and the scent of death.
I looked at the ground and saw a bloody pile of human skin there, lying like red rags inside a set of clothes. A worn checkered shirt and old skirt told me this wasn’t Weatherby. But it was somebody else. I looked at the blonde hairs, lying scattered on the worn floorboards. I recognized it from a photograph that Clayton Crabbpatch had shown me. The skin belonged to Charity Crabbpatch.
“Don’t you come further now!” I looked up, grabbing the shotgun. One of the witches stood in the back of the room, next to an old arm-chair. She had a long knife, a blade used for skinning, in her bloody hands. Weatherby Stein sat in the armchair, his eyes flashing to me. He gave me a quick smile, and I returned it. He had a black eye and a long jagged cut along his forehead. But he was alive, and that made it all worth it.
“I told you he would come to rescue me, you unspeakable demon,” Weatherby said, with his usual disdain.
“Hush now, boy, or I’ll spill your precious blood!” The witch’s arm tensed. “I am a loving servant of Satan, and I’ll kill in his name!”
“You’ve shed enough blood,” I said. “The Crabbpatch girl – what the hell did she do to do you? And you skinned her and carved her up. You’re gonna pay for that, witch. Believe me.”
Weatherby closed his eyes. “They didn’t kill her, Mort,” he said. He sounded almost bored, like he was lecturing a slow student. “They didn’t hurt Charity Crabbpatch at all.”
“The Hell you say. That’s her skin lying on the ground and…” I trailed off as I realized what had happened. I knew why Clayton Crabbpatch didn’t want me poking around about his daughter. The witches hadn’t taken her. She came willingly. Charity Crabbpatch was the one holding the knife to Weatherby’s throat, and she cackled crazily with the sheer madness of it all.
“Do I even want to ask why?” I wondered.
“I was tired.” Charity stepped forward. “Appalachia’s poorer than dirt and getting worse. Drink and beatings is all I got to look forward to. That damn preacher can talk about goodness and Heaven, but every member of his congregation is in Hell, and nobody’s doing a damn thing about it. I turned to the devil, and he gave me everything I wanted, and for such a small price.” She pointed to her skin. “That ugly old thing caused me nothing but trouble. I’m right glad to be rid of it.”
That’s when Weatherby made his move. He pushed his arm down, and something slid out of his sleeve. It was a small wooden cross, big enough to be hidden in the palm of his hand. Weatherby hurled the cross at Charity, and she flipped backwards, howling as steam rose in a torrent. Weatherby darted to me and I grabbed his hand. Reverend Sharp hurled another bottle of holy water, but Charity ducked low and it soared over her head.
She pointed to us with a clawed hand. “You’ll pay!” she cried. “My master will see to that!”
The floor of the shack shook. The windows rattled and shattered. The ravens came back in, a flocking swarm that headed past Charity and carried her along. The tide of ravens sped straight for us. Reverend Sharp and I ran for the door, and I didn’t know if we would make it ahead of the black swarm. Weatherby tripped on the rickety floor, and I grabbed his hand and pulled him along.
With the ravens right behind us, we jumped for the door. I hit the porch hard, and rolled over onto the dark earth. The ravens coursed out behind us, their wings fluttering as they soared off into the sky. Charity was with them, cackling madly. I looked up to see the dark cloud of birds speeding over us.
They moved like a cloud of smoke over our heads. Near the old shack was a tall hill with a cave in it, the entrance to a deep tunnel. I figured it for the old coal mine that used to be here. The ravens poured into that cave, and Charity went with them. They were gone in seconds.
I came to my feet. I tasted blood in my mouth and felt shaky on my feet. But Weatherby was safe and sound, and I allowed myself a smile. I clamped him on the shoulder. “Good thinking with the cross, kiddo,” I said. “That was a fancy move.”
“Thank you, Mort,” he said. “I had it at the ready and was simply waiting for the proper opportunity to use it and you provided one. And thank you for rescuing me.” He nodded to Reverend Sharp. “Father, I must thank you as well. Your weaponry appeared to have changed the tide of battle.”
Sharp shrugged. “Don’t thank me, young fellow,” he said. He pointed to the car. Selena was already out and running towards him. “Thank her.”
The Stein girl ran to her brother and they embraced. “Weatherby! Weatherby!” Selena cried. “I was so worried! Mr. Candle found me in a bar and told me what happened! But you’re safe! Thank all the gods, you’re safe!”
When they pulled away, Weatherby’s grin faded. “You shouldn’t be here, Selena,” he said. “It is extremely dangerous, and I won’t have you risking your life for me! I’m the patriarch of the Stein Family and—”
“You’re my baby brother,” Selena replied. “And that’s all I’ll say on the matter.” She looked
at the shack. “Did you find Charity?”
“Yeah.” I pointed to the entrance to the abandoned coal mine. “She just went down there. And I got a mind to follow.” I racked the shotgun. “Charity Crabbpatch has caused me plenty of grief. I want to give some back.”
Weatherby moved to stand to me, but Selena shook her heard. “You’re not going down there, Weatherby!” she cried. “God only knows what kinds of horror are lying in wait. I don’t want you experiencing them.” She grabbed his hand. “I won’t go. So you don’t have to go down either.”
It was fine by me. I headed for the entrance of the mine, when Reverend Sharp grabbed my shoulder. I turned to look at him. We both faced the cave. It was like the mouth of a predator, reaching out to swallow us both.
“Your crisis of faith is over?” I asked.
“It’s still going on, son,” Sharp replied. “But I can’t let you wander into danger all by your lonesome.”
I nodded. “Try and keep up,” I said. I held the shotgun, and he had his holy whiskey bottles and Bible. We left the Steins behind and walked into the entrance of the abandoned mine.
It got dark after a couple of steps. I pulled out my lighter and it flickered to life, showing dark earth and creaking wooden supports holding up the roof of the tunnel. Miners used to pack these tunnels, dying of black lung and cave-ins, working themselves to death for pitiable pay. Many of the people in these mountains worked in similar mines. It was no wonder Charity Crabbpatch was pissed off.
But Reverend Sharp was pitching for the other team, and pitching strong. He looked ahead, holding the Bible tightly to his chest. “Lot of men died down here,” he said. “And they died doing honest, Christian labor. That was never for me.”
“Yeah,” I said. “And Charity didn’t like it either.” I raised my voice, and it echoed down the tunnel. “You in there, Charity?” I asked. “Come on out! We’ve come all the way here, just to get a look at your beautiful face!”
The Stein & Candle Detective Agency, Vol. 2: Cold Wars (The Stein & Candle Detective Agency #2) Page 14