The Repossession

by Sam Hawksmoor

  He returned with the stuff and placed it beside the dog. ‘I’m going out to find her.’ Mrs Tulane grabbed his arm.

  ‘Be careful, Rian. Remember this: what you feel about this girl right now, I feel about you.’

  Rian blinked, momentarily confused. He broke free and ran for the back door. All he could think about was Genie and didn’t need any weird stuff from his mother.

  He was in the long grass, sweeping it with the flashlight.

  He’d played a hundred games in this place when he was a kid, knew every square metre of it. If they’d hidden Genie anywhere, he could find her.

  ‘Genie?’ he called, not expecting an answer.

  He ran to the drainage channel, then the mound. From here he could shine the flashlight pretty much everywhere.

  Genie was nowhere to be seen. He was wasting his time.

  He should be out on the road looking for her. Where, he didn’t know, but he knew he was losing precious time here. She was long gone. He just hoped that Moucher had given whoever it was a lot of trouble.

  He checked the area by the fence where he’d nearly broken his arm once, checked too the clearing which was often used for burning stuff when no one was

  looking. Nothing. This was useless. She could be miles away by now.

  He ran back to the house, sick with worry.

  ‘Ma?’

  Moucher was splayed out on the kitchen table, his legs twitching as Mr Yates held him down whilst his mother finished off the stitching. The dog was flinching, making growling noises, but under sedation allowing it to happen.

  She had shaved the area where she was sewing and it was one hell of a gash.

  His mother acknowledged his arrival and pointed to a bloodied gold Celtic cross with a broken chain. ‘It was in his mouth.’

  Rian picked it up and realized instantly whose it was.

  The initials on the back confirmed it. Reverend Schneider.

  ‘Schneider. Reverend Schneider took her.’

  Mr Yates looked at Rian, taking an interest for the first time.

  ‘That’s quite an accusation, Rian.’

  ‘I know him. He’s the one who locked up Genie in her house. He’s the vilest man on the planet, Ma. He took Genie. He’s involved in all this, the Fortress, everything.’

  Mr Yates wasn’t impressed. ‘Why would he do that?

  Why is he interested in your girlfriend? Doesn’t make

  sense to me. It could be anyone’s cross. Anyone’s.’

  Rian just looked at Mr Yates and then at his mother.

  ‘And you wonder why I left.’

  Rian put out a hand to Moucher and touched his paw. The dog barely responded under the effect of her sleeping pill.

  ‘I’m going to find her, Mouch. I’ll get her back for you.’

  Rian turned to leave but Mr Yates blocked his way.

  ‘I don’t care for your manners, Rian Tulane. I don’t care for the way you have abused your mother and disrespected her. I understand this girl may mean something to you, but you are not going out covered in blood. Just how far do you think you’ll get?’

  Rian looked down at his shirt and hands and realized that Mr Yates was right. He looked back at his mother who was cutting the fine thread she’d sewn up the dog with.

  ‘I’m sorry, Ma. I’m sorry.’

  His mother looked across at him and nodded. ‘The dog will be sore and we’re going to have to stop him scratching it open again, but he’ll live. I’m going to give him the other half of the sedative. OK?’

  ‘I didn’t mean for everything to turn out like this,’ Rian told her, ‘but you have no idea what is going on out there

  and what Reverend Schneider is doing. I didn’t mean to disrespect you. I can’t think about anything except Genie right now. I have to find her. I have to try to save her.’

  Mrs Tulane turned around in her chair and fixed her eyes on him.

  ‘You’ll be saving that girl all your life, Rian. There’s something about a Munby girl that brings out chaos and pain in the world and I am desperately sorry you have fallen for her. I really am, but you have and you have to do what you have to do. Whatever comes, if you find her, keep her safe’ – she bit her lip as she said this – ‘bring her here so you both have a chance at a better life. Understand?

  I am not rejecting you. Find her and then come home.’

  She looked back at the dog twitching on the table.

  ‘Your dog will be waiting for you.’

  Rian made towards her, as if he was going to hug her, but she backed up in her wheelchair, putting up her hands. Rian suddenly remembered he was covered in blood. ‘I’m sorry, Ma. I wasn’t thinking.’

  ‘Shower and change. Mr Yates is right. If anyone sees you like this they’ll think the worst. Get going.’

  Rian turned and fled. His head filled with emotions.

  His mother had forgiven him. He didn’t know why, but she had. He raced upstairs to his bedroom. She was probably right; he had to get cleaned up. If he got stopped

  for any reason and they saw the blood, the cops would have him cuffed in seconds, never mind that the truck had no plates and he didn’t even have a driver’s licence.

  26

  The Good Man of Spurlake

  ‘It’s a shame your dog is dead, Genie. Could have used it at the Fortress, we have been making some useful experiments with dogs.’ He checked her reaction in the rear-view mirror. ‘But then you know that. You seem to know a lot of things about us. Never heard that curiosity killed the cat? Of course, if you’d stayed in your room, you’d be a lot better off than you are now.’

  Genie was quietly seething with anger. She was glad Moucher was dead; at least Reverend Schneider couldn’t do anything worse to him now. She was sat in the back of Schneider’s Mercedes, feet and wrists bound tight. She hadn’t seen him coming. One moment she’d been waiting for Rian to come out of his mother’s house, next moment a sack had been pulled over her head and he’d kicked her legs away from her and she’d fallen hard on the ground.

  She’d heard Reverend Schneider swear when Mouch took a bite out of him, then the dog’s final howl as he struck back.

  ‘Doesn’t bother me you don’t talk, Genie. I know what

  you are going to say anyway. But you know what? No one is going to listen to you. Especially a girl who everyone knows is possessed by evil. Your bad luck, I guess, to run into Mrs Garvey. You think she wouldn’t call me?’ He chuckled, slowing down for a T-junction. He turned off the highway and Genie briefly saw a road sign announcing Klaklacum First Nation Reserve. They were definitely headed for the Fortress.

  ‘I did a bit of research on the Munby family,’ Reverend Schneider said suddenly. ‘Hundred years ago the Munbys owned this valley. Actually, Alfred Munby discovered the gold back in 1888. He had a lot of run-ins with the First Nation natives who naturally considered this their territory. They say your great grandmother was Stó:lo-, one of the Siska Native band, a real beauty. It caused quite a scandal. Some claim the town was cursed because of old man Munby. He owned the mill, the general store, the dairy, the gold mine, everything.

  Lived until he was ninety. Left everything to his daughter, your grandmother.

  ‘But she was crazy. She gave all the money away and built herself a shack by the railroad. She hated her father.

  No one knew why. She built your high school. You didn’t know that, did you? Naturally, they changed its name when she killed your father. Of course you don’t know

  about that either. Happened when you were less than a year old. They called it an accident, gun went off by mistake, but I tend to think there’s no accidents with a Munby. Your mother’s sister, your Aunt May, met with an unfortunate end when she was fifteen, just like you will.

  Odd coincidence, don’t you think?’

  Genie blinked. Her mother had a sister? Her father had been shot by her grandmother? She knew none of this.

  Her mother had never once mentioned anything, ever.
/>   How could you never mention you had a sister? She suddenly thought of Renée, half-sister to Rian. No one had mentioned her either. What was going on in Spurlake?

  Why did this town have to have so many secrets?

  Genie’s eyes began to flutter. She began to feel dizzy, her head was swimming and she could feel she was going under, couldn’t stop it, she was floating away . . .

  She was flying. She was a bird on the wing, proud of her fine brown feathers. There were two men standing on top of a building, talking. She circled around trying to get her bearing. It was a tall building in the middle of nowhere. She looked at the forest beyond and understood that this was the Synchro building and there was a helicopter parked on the roof in a large painted circle.

  Reverend Schneider was listening to a small man with

  white hair in a shiny suit. She couldn’t understand what they were saying, but whatever was discussed was sealed by a handshake. They both looked up at her as she flew close and she quickly dived away to avoid their gaze. She wasn’t certain, but it was as if they knew she was there.

  She hadn’t liked the expression on their faces.

  She flew on, swooping down past all those glass windows and as she turned again she saw young faces pressed against the glass. Renée was staring at her, Denis stood beside her and Cary Harrison too. They were pointing at something on the ground. She turned again to look behind her. Reverend Schneider was opening the trunk of his Mercedes.

  She was trying to comprehend how he could be on the roof and simultaneously on the ground, when the banging on the glass got her attention again. Genie didn’t understand what it was they wanted. They kept pointing.

  She looked back at Reverend Schneider again and suddenly understood. He had a rifle in his hands, trying to find the range. She tried to fly away, flapped her wings, beat as hard as she could, but as she heard the blast of the gunshot, she knew he’d found her heart.

  She plummeted to earth. Landed hard, felt the air knocked out of her lungs. Three rats were running crazily in a circle in the dust beside her. So this is how it ends,

  she was thinking, as Reverend Schneider’s black shiny shoes appeared by her head. This is how I die.

  ‘You’re back?’ Reverend Schneider remarked as he saw her eyes flicker in his mirror. ‘I hope you enjoyed your sleep, Genie. We need you alert. Lots to do once we get there.’

  Genie’s throat was dry, she could barely speak, she was in pain. She couldn’t bring herself to look at those hooded eyes staring at her. She could still feel herself twitching in her death throes on the ground. She’d been a bird, he’d shot and killed her. How weird was that?

  ‘You’re next, Genie. One more volunteer for science.

  You should be proud. You’re a pioneer. One of the few who will make it possible for the many.’

  You’re next, Genie noted. Kind of heard that before.

  Was this fate then? Is that what her dream was? The thing you couldn’t escape. No matter what, she was going to end up in the Fortress.

  ‘It was you I saw in the Synchro building, wasn’t it?’ he asked, studying her in the mirror again. ‘I don’t know how you got in there, or how you got out, but you must know, we can’t overlook a thing like that.’

  ‘How many?’ Genie croaked. ‘How many kids have you killed?’

  ‘It’s God’s work, Genie. Transforming pathetic lonely kids into souls. I know you know them. Little Denis Malone and that red-headed girl, Renée. You think we can’t tell where they are at any time? Of course, we found a way to stop that. Can’t have our little souls escaping now, can we, scaring the nation. All stored safely now, can’t harm anyone. And your boyfriend Rian will be right behind you. He’ll have to follow. If he loves you at all, he’ll follow.’

  The worst of it was that Schneider was right.

  The moment he found out who had abducted her, he’d follow.

  ‘And my soul?’

  ‘You, Genie Magee are going straight to hell, where, incidentally, you belong. This is the end of the line for the Munbys. The absolute end of the line. As your friend Satan says, “Abandon hope all who deign to enter my kingdom”.’

  Reverend Schneider’s phone began to ring. He checked the number of who was calling and sighed.

  He pulled over and got out of the vehicle to take the call.

  Outside he seemed to be arguing with someone, pacing up and down beside the car.

  Genie frantically began to look for a way to escape but the doors were locked. She couldn’t move her arms or

  feet. She knew once he got her into the Fortress it would all be over for her.

  He got back into the car and swore, glancing back at her a moment. He looked annoyed about something.

  ‘Got to pick someone up on the way. Don’t get up any hopes, Genie Magee. You know where you’re going. Makes no odds if it’s an hour later, you’ll get there and you’ll be out of my hair forever.’

  27

  Pay the Ferryman

  The Ferryman gas station five Ks outside Cedarville was run down, a last outpost before Highway 1 that clung to life with a grim determination, with a flickering neon Coke sign in the window that always said Happy Holidays.

  It was the kind of place where old tractors came to be fixed but mysteriously always lay dead in the field out back, along with the old yellow school buses, gutted vehicles and abandoned pick-up trucks. Optimistically they stood ready in case a part was ever needed. The gas was overpriced and most people passed on by to fill up elsewhere if they could.

  Rian knew this place well. He used to ride out here on his bike in summer, always trying to improve his time.

  He’d buy an apple, maybe have a milkshake in the half-assed drug store tacked on to the side of the building.

  Then he’d ride home, uphill all the way. Best time: one hour and twenty minutes.

  It was eleven at night. He was exhausted, eyes red-rimmed. He filled up with gas and knew in his heavy

  heart that he’d set out too late. There was no way he could intercept Reverend Schneider or gain access to the Fortress. He’d let Genie down. At least Moucher had tried to bite the man, done some damage. But Reverend Schneider had her and could pretty much do what he liked with her.

  Rian felt empty and powerless. He did not want to admit that he was never going to see that girl ever again. He didn’t know how to stop the man, didn’t have a plan to rescue his girl. They didn’t train you for this kind of stuff in school. Equally he knew that if he didn’t go, didn’t at least give chase, Genie would never ever forgive him, and that was why he was filling up under the dim naked light of the gas station with the bugs swirling around his head.

  ‘Rian Tulane, ain’t it?’ the old man asked. Rian looked up, surprised anyone would recognize him or know his name. Then again the old man must have been there since they built the place in 1950, or whenever. Maybe longer. He stared at him and the jacket and scarf he was wearing. It was a warm, windless, stuffy kind of night.

  The man looked liked he’d been fixing something, his hands were covered in oil and his broken nails looked sore and infected.

  ‘That’s Marshall Miller’s vehicle you got there.’

  Rian nodded. ‘Marshall’s in hospital. His son asked me to run his truck back to the farm.’

  The old man didn’t look convinced. ‘Max said that?’

  Rian nodded. ‘You can check. Someone burned down the barn, left Marshall for dead.’

  The old man’s huge hairy eyebrows raised up.

  ‘Burned the barn? You don’t say. Bad business.

  Marshall’s one of the good guys. I am very sorry to hear that. How is he?’

  ‘In hospital. He’s got burns and breathing problems, but he’s conscious. Officer Miller’s been to see him.’

  ‘How old are you, boy?’

  Rian shrugged. ‘Old enough.’

  ‘You been coming out here few years now. Always on your bike. People reckon I don’t see ’em but I do. Shame about your si
ster. She was a good kid.’

  ‘You knew Renée?’

  The old man smiled, exposing extraordinarily white unnatural teeth. ‘Like peas in the pod you two. Only she’s ginger. You got the same nose.’

  Rian was staggered. Everyone knew he had a sister except him. Spurlake was like a . . . he didn’t know what it was like, but he knew he didn’t like it.

  ‘Your father did my accounts. You seen him lately, by the by?’

  Rian shook his head. He couldn’t get his head around the idea that Renée looked like him. No way.

  ‘Last place on the road and first place the cops look.

  Every missing kid comes by here. Never buy anything sensible. I tell them, stock up with water, take beef jerky, but they buy chocolate and Coke. They leave and no one ever hears from them ever again.’

  There was an awkward pause. The old man looked at him with penetrating eyes.

  ‘You’re not planning to disappear, are you, kid?’

  ‘I already did.’ He spotted a calendar on the wall. No nudes in this garage. It was pictures of Reverend Schneider and his flock on his wall with his disciples. He couldn’t believe that this old man was one of Reverend Schneider’s flock. Didn’t seem the type.

  ‘You seen Reverend Schneider today?’ Rian asked casually.

  The old man spat on to the floor. The sound of it nearly made Rian retch. ‘You don’t want to be messing with him. He’s the devil himself, that one. He keeps giving me calendars. God knows why people don’t see through him.’

  Rian frowned.

  ‘But he was here?’

  ‘Filled up about thirty minutes ago.’

  Rian’s heart began to rush.

  ‘Was he alone?’

  The old man narrowed his eyes, scrutinizing Rian more carefully. He wasn’t sure if he could trust this kid. His father was OK, but . . .

  ‘Smoked windows, can’t see shit, but he wasn’t alone.

  Had a girl in there, sat in the back.’