Deadman's Crossing

by Joe R. Lansdale

“Who are they?”

  “They live deep inside the earth. Like men, they like silver. I do not know why. Maybe for the same reasons men like it. I know very little about them, outside of what I’ve read about them in The Book of Doches.”

  “The what?” Flower said, wrinkling her brow.

  “A tome of wizardry, witchery, and demonology.”

  “All that, huh?”

  “Yes.”

  “And they come up from down deep in the ground?” she said.

  “Yes. That is all I know.” What he was actually thinking was that is all you will understand, at least at this point. No use trying to explain they also mined silver and had a queen of some kind. In fact, he didn’t understand all he knew about it. But that’s what he had read.

  “Look,” he said. “It does not matter. They are up here and they have come up from deep in the earth and they do not like men. In fact, for them men have two purposes. Slaves, and food.”

  “Food?” she said.

  “That is correct.”

  “They eat people?”

  “Correct again.”

  “What do they look like?”

  “They’re short, and they have tails,” the Reverend said. “Or some of them do. These in this area do. As to their personal features, I can only speculate.”

  Flower lifted an eyebrow. “That right?” Flower said. “Tails, huh?”

  “I know. It sounds crazy.”

  “Not at all, Reverend.”

  “Do not humor me.”

  “Okay.”

  “You will see, lady,” he said.

  “Okay.”

  “You are humoring me,” the Reverend said.

  “Just a little,” Flower said.

  They tied the horse to a spindly tree near the mine. The Reverend made a strap for his Henry with a cut of rope and slung it over his back. Flower did the same for her double barrel shotgun. They walked the rest of the way up. At the opening of the shaft they found the remains of a miner. He had been dead for some time. His head was missing, the rest of him had gone to bones inside his shirt, pants, and boots. A pick lay nearby, and a wooden box.

  “You still think dogs are chewing off the heads?” the Reverend said.

  “Well, if they eat men,” Flower said, “they sure do waste a lot of the good meat.”

  “Way I read it, they like the heads, sometimes the feet.” The Reverend pulled the boots away from the pants. Only juts of bone poked out. The feet were gone. “See.”

  “That is right peculiar,” Flower said.

  The Reverend was examining the wooden box. He cracked it open with his knife. “Dynamite,” he said.

  “I ain’t fond of that stuff,” Flower said, taking a step back.

  “No problem long as it is not lit,” the Reverend said.

  “That’s what the last person got blowed up would have said, had he not got blowed up,” Flower said.

  The Reverend took out four sticks and stuffed them in his coat pocket. He found wicks in the box and stuffed those in his other coat pocket. He took one more stick from the box and one more wick and stuck the wick in the dynamite. He poked that one in his pocket so that it was easy to reach. He checked his pocket to make sure he had a box of matches.

  “Maybe I’ll stay out here,” Flower said. “Midgets with tails don’t scare me, ’cause I don’t think there are none, but I know there’s dynamite, and you got it on you.”

  “I am not going to get blown up,” the Reverend said. “I have handled dynamite before.”

  “That’s what the fellow would have said, had he not got blowed up,” Flower said.

  “You coming?”

  “Oh, all right. But don’t fall down.”

  “I told you. It does not blow that easy.”

  “That’s what the fella—”

  “I get it,” the Reverend said. “I get it.”

  He lit his lantern. Flower lit hers.

  “Keep that lantern away from that stick of dynamite,” Flower said.

  “The flame is not going to jump out and light the wick,” the Reverend said.

  “That’s what—”

  “I said I get it.”

  Inside the mine the lanterns gave little light. The Reverend and Flower followed the shaft along a narrow railway that had been built to push out carts of rock and ore. As they went deeper into the mine the shaft narrowed and the rail ceased to be. A little deeper in, they discovered there were pieces of the rail against the wall. It looked to have been ripped out, bent and twisted, as if it had been nothing more than wet licorice.

  Flower held her lantern up high and looked at the twisted metal.

  “That there ain’t right,” she said.

  “Still think it is just men?” the Reverend said.

  “Well, I still ain’t got my mind worked around it being midgets with tails yet.”

  They continued. The mine came to a wide stop.

  Flower held her lantern high. “Hell, ain’t no midgets with tails in here. But what’s that stink?”

  The walls moved. At first, in the lantern light, it was hard to discern. But the walls were trembling; it was because there were creatures the colors of the walls standing tight against them. The lantern light hadn’t picked them up at first, but as they moved they were easier to see. They appeared rocky themselves, but it was the coloring of their skin. Moving, their skin changed as well, seemed to grab up shadow and wear it. They were about four feet tall and had wide almost lizard-like tails that dragged the ground as they went. Their eyes were yellow, like massive fire-fly asses. They were without clothes, and one thing was blatantly obvious. They were all male. A glance up revealed they clung to the high walls and ceiling like lichen, scuttled across the rocks like roaches.

  Flower said, “Okay. I’m right there with you on the midgets with tails.”

  The Reverend and Flower turned left and right, holding their lanterns high. There were many Kobolds, and they were coming right at them.

  The Reverend said, “Do not wait to see if they are friendly. Because they are not.”

  Flower set the lantern to her side quickly. She swung the shotgun from behind her back, to her shoulder. It roared. Kobold meat flew back against the mine walls. The Reverend’s revolver barked. Now Flower’s Colt spoke. One of the Kobolds threw a rock, knocking Flower’s lantern for a loop, sending it spewing flaming oil all along the floor of the mine. Then more rocks were flying. The Reverend’s revolver emptied and he set his Henry to work. Kobolds dropped, but still they came. The Reverend kicked them back, grabbed up his lantern where he had placed it on the ground, and backed away. When the Henry was empty, the Reverend dropped it, snatched the wick stuffed dynamite stick from his coat pocket, and pushed the wick through an open spot in the lantern. The fuse hissed.

  “Goddamn,” Flower said, and beat at the Kobolds with her Colt, frantically trying to retreat from the dynamite. She was so animated, it almost seemed like there were two of her in the flickering light of the wick.

  The Reverend threw the stick into the crowd of Kobolds. When it hit and sparkled, all movement stopped. The Kobolds paused, watched the hissing stick of dynamite with curiosity.

  The Reverend backed.

  The wick burned down and—

  Nothing.

  Just a sound like a mouse letting out a poot.

  “A dud,” the Reverend said. “Run, Flower.”

  Flower bolted. The Reverend tried to do the same. The Kobolds rushed him, grabbed his legs and brought him down, knocking the lantern from his hand, spewing its oil-lit contents across a cavern wall.

  The Reverend glimpsed the fire burning along the side of the cavern. He felt hands grabbing at him. A foot kicked him in the side. Another caught his shoulder. Then he saw a short bulky shadow leaning over him.

  A Kobold with a rock.

  The rock came down.

  The Reverend went out.

  When the Reverend awoke his head felt huge and it throbbed and ached and his nostrils were filled
with a stockyard kind of stench. There was a grunting sound and a sound of picks and shovels striking rocks and dirt. There was light, but it was a different kind of light than the lanterns. It was a blue glow and it filled the air. The Reverend sat up. He was bound by silver chains, between ankles and wrists. He saw a group of men; miners from the little town below. They were scrawny and shirtless and shoeless, and in some cases, without pants. They had picks and shovels and were hard at work on the walls of the mine. A large number of Kobolds with whips lashed out now and then, cut the backs of the workers, screamed out something in voices as harsh as bleats from a bent bugle.

  The Reverend determined the soft blue light was radiating from small lamps hanging on chains from the ceiling or tucked in crannies from one end of the cavern to another.

  He looked about for Flower. Nowhere to be seen. She must have died when the Kobolds rushed them.

  Then he saw something even more amazing at the rear of the cavern. At first he thought it was part of the cavern, some natural formation. Now he saw it was in fact a pile of living flesh. It was in a somewhat triangular shape, wide at the bottom, flowing across a vast patch of the cavern floor. It was as gray as ash with dark patches within, along with strips of what appeared to be cracked ores of silver. It looked almost like an enormous snotty booger, but due to the silver, expensive.

  At its triangular peak was a small, human head with yellow, darting eyes and gray hair sprouting from it, tumbling over where a human would have had shoulders. The thing had none, just a head that tapered into a thin, short neck, and then a spreading pile of goo. The Reverend noted something else. There were mounded shapes at the front of the pile, not far below the neck. Breasts, dripping what the Reverend had to believe was milk. It trickled down the misshapen body like pus from a sore. From time to time one of the Kobolds would approach the pile reverently, climb up on the vibrating mass of flesh, and suckle at one of the tits.

  The queen. This thing had to be their queen. They not only ate human flesh, but they gained sustenance from this. It was the Reverend’s guess she was in fact the non-sainted mother of them all.

  A Kobold that looked angry enough you might think he was forced to eat dung for breakfast grabbed the Reverend’s chains and jerked him to a standing position. A pick was shoved into his hands. The Reverend’s first thought was to plant it in the top of the Kobold’s head, but considering he was more outnumbered than before, and he didn’t have a firearm or a knife at his disposal, he concluded that, at least temporarily, this was not the best course of action.

  The critter tugged him by the chain to a place along the wall. The Kobold grunted and pointed at the wall. The Reverend understood what it was indicating. Dig.

  He swung the pick into the wall with a clank, and began to mine for silver.

  The Reverend had been at it for only a few minutes, when the man beside him sagged and fell, his pick clattering to the floor of the cave, attracting the attention of the Kobolds. They were on him like bees on honey. They pulled him away. The Reverend turned and watched as the man’s head and feet were literally pulled from his body by a batch of Kobolds. They fought over the treats, wrestling about on the floor, chewing and biting both the man’s remains and each other.

  When the Reverend noted they were watching him, he went back to his work. He had no sooner planted the pick in the wall then he heard:

  “All right, all you midgets, and you too, you big pile of nasty-looking horse shit, here’s your warning. I don’t like you. I ain’t showin’ mercy. And I’m gonna blow you up. So there.”

  The Reverend saw Flower standing at the opposite end of the cavern, standing near the narrow exit. She had a torch in one hand, a stick of dynamite in the other. It was dangling a fuse. She had gone back for the dynamite, and then come back for him.

  The fool.

  She touched the fuse to the torch even as the Kobolds rushed her. She threw the stick in their midst, and the Reverend waited for it to sputter out.

  But it didn’t.

  It blew, knocking rock and dust and Kobold meat in all directions.

  The force was so terrific it knocked the Reverend down and started a ringing in his ears. He got to one knee and remembered: He had sticks of dynamite and fuses in his coat pocket. He glanced at Flower as he pulled them out. She was swinging the torch, about to be overwhelmed by the surviving Kobolds, which were plenty.

  The Reverend shoved the fuses into the sticks and pulled out his matches and lit the sticks. A man nearby said, “What the goddam hell?”

  The Reverend said, “Run.”

  The man dropped his pick and tried to do just that.

  The Reverend tossed two sticks with one hand at the Big Mother, even as he watched her melting to the floor, going almost flat, her head poking up like an island in a mass of puke. She was flowing away, toward an exit at the rear of the cave. But the dynamite landed in her mess of flesh, and even as he launched the remaining sticks with his other hand at the Kobolds hastening toward him, the first sticks thrown blew.

  There was a great blast of rock and dust and flashes of blue as the blue lights were blown out. The next thing he knew he was on the ground, trying to breathe. Rocks and bodies were on top of him. He couldn’t see anything but blackness.

  And then he saw a light coming toward him.

  It was Flower and her torch, fresh lit he presumed.

  She grabbed him by the arm, “Come on, Reverend. We got to hook ’em up and ride ’em out.”

  “The other men?”

  “Every man for himself, Reverend. Anyway, looks like them others done sailed on across the river, so to speak. Dynamite got up.”

  “Damn.”

  “Ah, I knowed all of ’em and wasn’t a one of ’em worth the powder it took to blow ’em up. Come on, let’s get your big ass out of here.”

  “I’m hung.”

  “I’d have to be the judge of that at another time.”

  “My foot.”

  She let go of him and waved the torch about. “Yeah, you got rocks on your legs. Here, hold the torch. I think I can move them.” She handed him the torch, and he lay on his back, holding it up as Flower went about removing the rocks. After a moment, he felt the pressure on his legs relieved. He sat up.

  Flower took the torch and waved it over his legs. “Look there,” she said.

  A Kobold had his teeth around one of the Reverend’s boots.

  “Dove for your ankle. I guess I blasted him just time.”

  The Reverend kicked his foot free, and Flower helped him up. With his arm around her shoulder, her torch to guide them, they moved toward where Flower had entered. As they went, the Reverend could see in the torch light that The Big Mother was sprinkled liberally about the walls. Closer to the exit, his foot kicked against what remained of her head, part of a jaw, half a face with a leaky eye in it.

  “Damn,” Flower said flashing the torch close to the head. “She makes me look pretty damn good.”

  “Flower,” the Reverend said. “You are beautiful.”

  When they exited the cavern, into a narrow shaft, the Reverend was strong enough to stand on his own. He turned, looked at the gap. He said, “Flower, you got anymore dynamite?”

  “Couple of sticks.”

  “Give them to me.”

  She did. She said, “I got a ringing in my ears like someone’s beatin’ a bell, so I’m gonna mosey ahead there. You finish up, look for the light from the torch.”

  Flower hurried away. The Reverend lit the sticks and tossed them, started moving as quickly as his injured leg would allow. Behind him the dynamite blew, hurled him forward to land on his belly. He got up and looked. He could see Flower’s torch light. He scrambled to his feet and went after it.

  When he caught up to her, the dust from the blast was flowing up the shaft toward them. They coughed for a long time as they went through the narrow shaft, then up a rise, and into a wider part of the mine.

  “How did you find me?” the Reverend said.

/>   “Well, one thing I got is a good sense of smell.”

  “You smelled me?”

  “No. That thing. That woman, or whatever it was. She smelled, and them Kobolds, they was no nosegay neither. I just followed the stench. Figured anything stunk worse than me had to be them.”

  The air freshened as they went, and finally they could see a bit of light. As they moved toward the exit of the cave, Flower tossed the torch aside. They stopped at the mouth of the mine and sat down on the ground.

  It was daylight. Early morning. Birds were singing.

  “Look here what I found,” she said and from inside her coat she pulled the Reverend’s .36 Navy.

  “Thank you, Flower. I am fond of this gun.”

  “You think they’ll follow us?” Flower asked.

  The Reverend shook his head. “Not in the daylight. And they won’t be back tonight either. Or any other night. Not this pack of Kobolds.”

  “How can you be certain?”

  “Well, guess I cannot be certain. But the way I remember the text is the queen is their source of power. They may eat flesh, but they have to suckle at her tits. Actually, the book did not say that, but that makes sense to me, and I am going to take a flying leap and predict that I am correct on that.”

  “Are you usually correct about these sort of matters?” she said.

  “As a matter of fact, I am. And since I say they have to suckle, and she no longer has tits—”

  “Or a head. Didn’t never have no feet that I could see.”

  “Yes. So, it is over.”

  “What about the little fellas?” Flower asked.

  “They will die off, if they have not already. She is their source of power. She dies, they all die. All that’s left of them by now is the dark down there. They are done, Flower. At least they are in this small part of the world.”

  They spent the night at Flower’s rigged-up home. The dog lay silent at the back of the cave, and the lantern was out. It was nice and cool and dark and comfortable. The Reverend drifted slowly off to sleep.

  In the middle of the night, Flower called out to the Reverend, awakening him.

  “Reverend?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did I save your life?”