Night Chill

by Jeff Gunhus

  “Here’s to the truth,” Jack said.

  Max paused, then raised his glass slightly toward Jack. “The truth.” He slugged back the glass of bourbon with a satisfied moan.

  “I’m sure you know most of the story already, considering the company you’re keeping.” Max nodded toward Lonetree sitting behind Jack. “By the way, I met your brother a few times. He was a good man. Not that it makes any difference, but I was against removing him.”

  Lonetree’s face was a mask. Jack remembered the story about Lonetree’s brother telling him who had killed him. Lonetree gave no indication that he accepted Max’s assertion or knew anything to the contrary. He simply stared and waited. A professional soldier on mission.

  “Who else is involved Max? Who has Sarah?”

  “I’ll tell you what I can, but you have to understand Jack, I can’t tell you everything.”

  “But—”

  “But nothing. You don’t know these people. They’ll go after Kristi and the kids. They’ll punish me through them. Even if you kill me, if they think I betrayed them, they’ll still take their revenge on my daughters. I won’t risk that. Not for you. Not for Sarah. I’d rather die.”

  Lonetree stood up and raised his gun. “Sounds good to me.”

  “Wait,” Jack yelled. “He said there are things he can tell us.” He turned back to Max. “Right? There are some things you will tell us.”

  Max shrugged. “Sure, but it won’t do any good.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “Because it’s hopeless, Jack. You can’t stop these people. Make no mistake, they will kill Sarah. They’ve decided they need her and that’s the end of it. Nothing will change that now. The only question is whether or not you’re going to die trying to save her.”

  Rage tore through Jack’s system from hearing his daughter’s life dismissed so easily. The gun, still in his right hand, seemed to throb, begging to be used to punish Max for talking about Sarah in such a way. Jack felt the danger in such power. He carefully placed the gun on a side table. “You could help us, you know. Help us destroy them.”

  Max grimaced. “It’s too late for that. Much too late. Besides, if they thought I helped you, they would take my family. I won’t risk that.”

  Lonetree crossed the living room so Max could see his eyes as he spoke. “What makes you think your family is safe from me? You think I’ve never killed a woman? That I would hesitate to kill the child of a monster like you? Look at me and tell me if you think your family is safe.”

  Max stared at Lonetree. “What I’m worried about is worse than death. Much worse.”

  “All right,” Jack said. “Tell us what you can. After that, we’ll decide what to do with you.”

  Lonetree backed away and leaned against the fireplace mantle, a brooding statue waiting for his chance to take action. Max took a deep breath and told them what he dared.

  SIXTY-TWO

  “There were fifteen of us at the beginning. Only a few of us are still in Prescott City. There were others. Some moved on. Others…well, some of them are no longer around.”

  Jack didn’t want to turn this into twenty questions so he let the pause stretch out until Max continued with the story.

  “We were a pretty rag-tag group. We met up in Baltimore, by chance mostly. Men who didn’t have anything to lose. All willing to do whatever it took to make our fortunes. We figured there would be safety in numbers. You know, bargaining power for supplies, better in a fight, that sort of thing. Like in any group of men, leaders emerged. I was one of them. So was a big German named Hans Boetcher — you know him as Jim Butcher — our friendly Piper’s bartender. Janney was another, a personal favorite of the Boss.”

  “The Boss,” Lonetree prompted.

  “Yeah, he was the real leader. He was different from the rest of us. Well-educated, a society man from up north judging by the accent. No one knew what his story was and no-one was brash enough to ask. Without a vote or any kind of agreement we all started calling him the Boss and deferred to him on decisions. It was the Boss who brought a strange looking man named Nate Huckley into the group.

  “Even at the beginning there was talk about whether we were comfortable having Huckley along. You know what I’m talking about. That white skin and those pale blue eyes that wander around in his head like he’s watching everything at once. And his temper. Some men you can just tell have violence coiled up inside of them. Nate Huckley was the same back then as he is now. He had so much tension in him that you could almost hear his body hum if you stood too close to him.

  “But the Boss said he was in and that was the end of the story. The same reasons we were uneasy with Huckley also made him the best front man for the group when we negotiated with the supply stores. He was also the one who came across the old man with a mining claim to sell. Supposedly the mine was a producer, but that the old man couldn’t do the hard work anymore. The Boss organized us all to go in together and buy it. The plan was that half of us could work the mine and the other half trap furs until we struck a vein. With all of us working we thought that we couldn’t help but strike it.”

  “When did all this happen?” Jack asked.

  “I still remember the date we left.” Max shook the ice in his glass and poured the final drops of bourbon into his mouth. “I don’t expect you to believe me. It was September 3, 1819.”

  Jack reached into the breast pocket of his jacket and pulled out a yellowed photograph. He held up the photo so Max could see it. “Lonetree gave me this on the way over here. I’m not saying I believe you. Just that I’m willing to listen.”

  Max leaned forward, his eyebrows raised as he looked over the photograph. A group of men lined up in front of a clapboard shack. Burlap sacks were stacked up behind them. Some of the men were dressed in light colored suits, with waist coasts and hats, but most were working men dressed in coveralls. Scrawled across the bottom was the date, September 3, 1819.

  “Where’d you get this?” Max asked.

  “Lonetree showed it to me when I refused to believe you were part of all this. It was mixed in with his brother’s files. Of course, it could be a forgery, but given everything else that has happened, I’m willing to believe almost anything. That picture was probably why Lonetree’s brother was killed, right?”

  Max ignored the question and looked at the picture more closely. Jack figured he was picking himself out from the group.

  “Haven’t aged at all, have you?” Jack said.

  Max looked at the photo, his expression almost wistful. “No, I’ve aged. You might not be able to see it, but I’ve aged a great deal.”

  “Which one of these is the Boss?” Lonetree asked.

  Max smiled. “He’s not there. Even then he kept a low profile. Like he knew what was going to happen all along. In a way, I guess he did.”

  “Listen. I need to know what’s going on here. Sarah is gone. Nate Huckley is haunting me from a coma. And it’s like he’s getting stronger every time he makes an appearance. I don’t have time for games. I need to know who’s involved and how all this works.”

  Max nodded as if hearing that Huckley was haunting his friend was the most ordinary thing. “We’ve all had different reactions to the ritual over the years. Huckley was always sensitive, kind of a psychic, but nothing like he is now. I think even the Boss is afraid of him now. He’s a little off-balance.”

  “Tell me about it.” Jack said.

  “Still, Huckley won’t be quiet long. His body would have recovered by now. I imagine he’s chosen to stay in the coma for his own reasons. Out of body experiences would be his thing, that’s for sure.”

  Jack shook his head. “I still can’t wrap my brain around it all. How does this work? How did it start?”

  “You don’t know?” Max looked up at Lonetree. “We thought you already knew. I’m almost certain your brother knew the details or at least he suspected them. Unfortunately, he didn’t tell us much at the end. He was a strong. Huckley was very persua
sive but he refused to tell us what he knew or where his notes were. All that pain and still he kept his secrets until the end.”

  Lonetree looked away at the mention of his brother, his neck and face reddening. “Keep going Max,” Jack said, wondering if Max was deliberately antagonizing Lonetree.

  Max exhaled a long breath and shook his head. “The group left Baltimore the day that photo was taken and we headed up into the mountains to work the mine and try to make a go of things. Nothing much happened for over a year. During that time, the Boss and Huckley would disappear for weeks at a time to explore the area, but no one else knew what they were looking for. When they were in camp, they spent hours poring over maps and strange books. Then one day, they came back from a trip and you could tell they found something. They didn’t say anything but it was written all over their faces. The next day, the Boss picked six of us and we headed off due west, mules loaded down with shovels, mining lamps and rope. Two days later we reached a hole in the ground and the Boss told us we were going down to a deep cave where treasure waited all of us. That was the beginning of the nightmare.”

  “I know,” Jack said. “I’ve been in that cave.”

  Max arched his eyebrows. “Really? How did you—” He slumped forward in his chair. “I guess it doesn’t matter anymore. But if you’ve been there, you know how horrible it is. While the rest of us stood there in the middle of that dark graveyard crossing ourselves and praying to God that we could get out of there, Huckley and the Boss walked around with smiles on their faces. Then we found the Source and Huckley really got excited.”

  “The Source? The round structure in the center of the cave, right?” Lonetree said.

  “Yes, we didn’t start calling it the Source until later, until we finally understood what it was. At first we weren’t sure. The Boss and Huckley were fascinated by the carvings. Almost like they were expecting to find them. The rest of us wanted to get the hell out of there, but the two of them kept walking around the carved wall, holding their lanterns up close to the carvings and muttering back and forth. I edged closer to them, trying to hear what they were saying. I overheard Huckley whisper, ‘It’s talking to me. Shut up so I can hear.’ Then the real horror started.”

  “What?” Jack asked.

  “Huckley did it for the first time. Not the whole ritual, of course, we didn’t know anything back then. But he did a Taking.”

  “What do you mean Taking?”

  “How about another drink?” Max asked, raising his glass hopefully. Jack obliged by filling the glass from the decanter. Max downed half the glass in one gulp. He nodded appreciatively. “Taking is what we called it. I suppose it’s easier to digest that way.”

  Lonetree snorted. “You guys murder little kids but can’t stomach calling it killing?”

  Max winced but otherwise ignored the comment. “Anyway, the first sacrifice was one of the guys with us, a friend of mine actually, named Frank Jeter. Huckley discovered a loose rock on the stone structure. It was circular, not more than a foot in diameter. Huckley pried it loose and pulled it out, revealing a hole that went right into the structure. The Boss told Jeter to go throw a rock into the hole. He did and the rock bounced inside, confirming our hopes; the structure was hollow.

  We all thought the same thing. No one would go through all the trouble to build such a thing unless it was to keep something safe inside. Something valuable. Gold, we thought. I guess Jeter thought the same thing. The Boss didn’t even have to tell him to look inside. Jeter did that all on his own.

  “He wasn’t looking into that hole for more than a few seconds when it happened. Even now I can’t think about it without cringing. It was the shock factor, you know. None of us expected what was going to happen and that made it all the more terrible to watch.”

  Max tipped his glass back until the ice tumbled against his lips and the last of the booze dripped into his mouth. He sucked in one of the ice cubes and crunched it between his molars.

  “Whatever Jeter saw in there, it was the last thing he used his eyes for. No more than three or four seconds after he put his face up to the hole in the rock, Jeter’s body lurched forward like he was trying to force his face through the opening. He beat the palms of his hands against the rock, trying to push back. A few of us laughed. Jeter was always playing jokes. This one was in bad taste because we were so scared to begin with, but it was still funny. That is, until he started to scream.

  “Then his legs shot out straight under him, rigid like electricity was going through them. The scream became garbled as his face wedged deeper into the hole. I went to grab for him. But I was standing next to the Boss and when I moved forward he reached out and took me by the arm. His eyes never left Jeter’s writhing body, but I understood. Whatever was happening, the Boss wanted to see the thing play out.

  “Right then, Jeter’s feet jerked off the ground. I mean both of them, like he was levitating in some magic show. But he wasn’t floating. Violent spasms tore through his body as it rose up into the air until his legs were parallel to the floor.

  “Jeter’s face was still pressed into the opening, so as his body rose higher we could hear the pop-pop-pop as his spine cracked into pieces. Even so, he was still alive.

  “His torso suspended in the air, like a pole had shot out from the hole and skewered the length of him. That was exactly what it was like, a living piece of meat on a rotisserie, limbs flapping spastically in all directions.

  “Then, as if seeing him like that weren’t enough, I could see something moving under his clothes. Where it was exposed, I saw bulges moving under his skin. I thought whatever was underneath would rip through the flesh and pop through.

  “You what to know what I thought it was? Rats. Can you believe that? I thought maybe it was a bunch of starved rats that had crawled in through Jeter’s mouth and were going to town on the poor guy’s insides. Sounds nuts, but as horrible as that was, it was still better than the other option. If it wasn’t rats doing it then it was something outside of my understanding. Something evil and powerful. And sure to kill me just like it was doing Jeter.

  “Then, in the middle of my panic, without any warning, Jeter’s body went limp and slumped to the ground.

  “No one moved. We just stared at the man’s destroyed face, no more than a mushy plump with strands of his entrails hanging from his mouth. Janney turned and threw up at the sight. But not Huckley. And not the Boss. While we were scared for our lives and our sanity, they were enthralled. Like they had made some great discovery. Turns out this was exactly what they had been looking for all along. Seeing Jeter die just confirmed things for them.”

  “What do you mean they were looking for it? How could they know?” Lonetree asked.

  “They were just like your father and brother,” Max said. “They had done their research, pieced together the folklore and the Indian legends. They went searching for the lost tribe of the Sumac. And they found them. Or what was left of them anyway.”

  Jack cut in before Lonetree could say anything about the implied insult of his family being grouped together with Huckley.“So what was in the stone structure? You call it the Source, but of what?”

  Max looked at his empty glass and swirled the ice. Jack wondered how many drinks the man had before they arrived. Dark bags hung under Max’s eyes and his pupils were glazed over. When he started to speak again, Jack heard the slur in his voice.

  “Well, after watching Jeter die, we all wanted to get out of there. All of us except Huckley and the Boss, of course. They were pointing to the carvings on the walls and arguing back and forth. We couldn’t tell what the argument was, only that the Boss gave in and agreed with Huckley. Then Huckley walked back, ripped the clothes from Jeter’s body, pulled out a knife and started cutting. Piece by piece, he fed the body through the hole in the wall. None of us helped, not even the Boss, but none of us left either. We were too afraid and too awed by what we saw when Huckley cut into Jeter’s body.”

  Max paused. He knew he
had his audience well-salted and seemed to enjoy stretching out the moment. Finally, somewhat disappointed neither of his captors had begged him to go on, he continued. “You see, when Huckley cut into the Jeter’s flesh, there was no blood. Not a drop.”

  Jack clenched his hands into fists from frustration. He knew he needed to hear this but he couldn’t beat back his incredulity. Things like this simply were not real. There had to a rational explanation for it all. Jack couldn’t shake the sensation that everything that had happened to him was a massive practical joke and at any minute someone would jump out from behind a curtain, point to a hidden camera and laugh. You fell for that? What an idiot!

  A body drained of blood. This was the stuff of late night cable television not real life. But still, he ticked off the tangible evidence in his brain. There was the photograph of Max. Huckley’s appearance in the cave. The fact that Sarah had been kidnapped just like Huckley had said. There was too much evidence not to believe. And to believe part of the story meant he had to take all of it. Bloodless corpses, supernatural forces. All of it.

  What bothered him most about the story, he realized, was that Max was describing the same ritual Sarah would be subjected to if he didn’t save her in time. As Max described the grisly scene, Jack saw his daughter in place of the man. Thinking of her death was hard enough, but hearing the torture she would have to endure was too much to bear.

  He tried to refocus on Max. The slur in his speech was more pronounced now and his eyes drooped as if he fought off sleep. Jack wondered if he might have taken something more than alcohol before they had arrived. He hoped Max’s condition would loosen his tongue.