Ghost Road Blues pd-1

by Jonathan Maberry

  (2)

  The Bone Man walked out of Dark Hollow and stepped onto a hill on A-32, not three miles from where Crow and Mike stood. Walking slowly with a lanky gait that made his body look as if it were all bones and rags with no meat at all, he strolled to the center of the road and then stopped, turning to lift his face to the brilliant moonlight. Moonlight glittered on the strings and keys of his guitar. A cloud of bats whirled and danced above him, their tiny bodies looking like torn scraps of shadow in the flickering light from the distant storm. The Bone Man stood and watched them, absently reaching up a thin hand as if anxious to join their carefree gavotte. The bats knew him and did not fly away; all the things that moved in the night knew him, knew the pale shadow of a man who cast no shadow of his own.

  All of them knew the Bone Man, the sad-eyed wanderer, the boneyard refugee. After a while the bats flitted off into the night and he stood alone in a cold wind.

  Then a night bird with a bloody beak came flapping out of the east and circled him once, twice, three times before wheeling and flapping off into the west, where a lonely farmhouse stood amid a sea of corn. From where he stood on the hill, the Bone Man could see the tiny squares of yellow light dotting two sides of the distant house.

  He considered the house, looking far and long and into it, reading its fortune in the call of the crickets and the rustle of the corn. He smelled blood on the wind, and some of it, he knew, was not yet spilled. There was still so much of this night left.

  The Bone Man turned his rake-handle-thin body to the east and listened to the wind. There were sounds on it. Laughter, the cries and gasps of young lovers, the screech of tires, the lonely and distant drone of a tractor-trailer whining along the back stretch of the highway, the call of owls, the deep barking of a dog. The high, sharp wail of a man in absolute terror and unbearable pain, a sound that faded and then abruptly stopped with a wet, guttural gurgle.

  Long and dark blew the night wind around and past and through the Bone Man.

  His eyes glistened with anger and fear and frustration. The tide of the night was already strong, moving the flotsam around faster than he could keep up. The gray man felt a hopeless surge of sickness in his empty stomach as he sensed the thing in the swamp, the evil presence that he had slaughtered with his own hands and buried thirty years ago, stir and flex its power.

  Such power…

  The Bone Man stood for a long time in indecision. The calls of the night birds told him much that he needed to know, told him too much. Now he didn’t know which way to turn. Whose life mattered more? Which of the innocent ones needed him more than the others? Which innocents ones would he have to sacrifice to save the rest?

  Thunder sniggered in the east.

  The Bone Man turned north and began walking toward Pine Deep, his stick legs swishing, his stick arms swinging, and his white face gleaming like polished marble. In his eyes, cold storms raged.

  (3)

  “I thought you were making supper for Crow.”

  Val didn’t look up from her crossword puzzle. Her father lifted the lid and stuck his whole face into the aromatic vapors and took a deep breath. “Smells pretty good.”

  “Don’t sound so surprised. I can cook, you know.”

  Guthrie didn’t choose to reply to that; instead he sniffed the soup again, amazed that it really smelled like soup and not sewage. Val’s previous attempts at cooking were spectacular disasters. Maybe she’d had a culinary epiphany. He found his mouth watering despite all of the warning klaxons ringing in his head.

  “Leave it be,” Val said. “You had your dinner.”

  “What is it?”

  “Turkey soup and get your nose out of it, thank you very much.”

  Henry Guthrie sighed and set the lid back on the pot. “There seems to be an awful lot of it for one skinny little fella like Crow.”

  “I made enough for his lunch tomorrow.” Val finished a clue and then looked up. Her father was still loitering by the pot, trying to look earnest and hungry. She shook her head but she was smiling. “Pop, if you’re really that hungry, just take some. You go wandering all around a thing hoping it’ll jump at you.”

  “Well,” Guthrie said with a smile, his curiosity getting the better of him, “maybe just a little. I wouldn’t want to steal food out of Crow’s mouth, you understand.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  He fetched a dish and a ladle and scooped a brimming bowlful, an amount that scarcely dipped the level in the heavy spotted black pot.

  “There’s crackers in the cupboard.”

  “No dumplings?”

  “Pop…”

  “Crackers it is, then.” Guthrie took down a box of saltines, rummaged in the fridge for a bottle of spring water, and sat down at the table across from his daughter. A discerning eye could see the kinship between them. She had his strong bones and dark hair, but her coloring and her laughing mouth were from her mother’s Irish stock, not her father’s brooding Scottish blood. The elder Guthrie had heavier features and his once jet-black hair had gone silver since Val’s mother had died two years before. His nose was hawked and beaky and he had a thick mustache that dipped into his spoonful of soup as he blew on it and sipped.

  “How is it then?”

  “Just like your mama’s.”

  Val smiled. “Her recipe.”

  Guthrie’s eyes crinkled into a warm grin that softened his dour face into an expression of great love and humor. Val loved him and he knew it, even if she sometimes nagged at him to eat right and take better care of himself. He had slipped a little after Margie had passed, but Val had hounded him until he had begun to take regular meals and even cut down on his drinking. Now she was trying to get him to switch to decaf, but she was going to have a damned hard fight of that. Unleaded coffee was obscene.

  He ate the soup, which was thick with fresh turkey, corn, celery, potatoes, and green beans. He didn’t dare put salt in it: Val would never let him do it without a familiar and long-winded lecture on high blood pressure. Besides, the soup was good enough not to need it.

  Val sat and watched her father eat, enjoying it. Playing the domestic role was new and somewhat out of character for her, but she did it now for her father with no regrets. Left to his own devices, her father would live on pizza and Glenlivet, black coffee and Big Macs. She couldn’t bear the sound of his arteries squeaking shut. Still, she was no kitchen girl, not like her sister-in-law, Connie, who seemed blissfully happy to cook, clean, and beam vapidly at her husband, Mark, Val’s only brother. Val worked on the farm, out in the field, driving the tractor, harvesting the corn, bartering with wholesalers, doing valve jobs on the Bronco. Connie had her little herb garden and made adorable little needlepoints with poignant scenes of kittens with balls of yarn that made Val want to vomit. Connie always wore a dress, even when weeding her prim little garden. Crow often whispered to Val that Connie was a Desperate Housewife waiting to pop, and that she had some deep dark secret; but after knowing her for years, Val still couldn’t see any trace of depth in her sister-in-law, just as she was totally unable to see what Mark saw in her beyond a purely superficial prettiness.

  Watching her father eat his soup, Val felt a little wave of acceptable domesticity waft over her. Lately she’d been trying out that domestic angle on Crow, and she found she liked that, too. Of course, she planned to teach him how to cook because hausfrau was definitely not how she viewed herself. A dash of domesticity here and there was fine.

  Guthrie dabbed a cracker in his soup and watched his daughter watching him. “Something on your mind, pumpkin?”

  Val shrugged. “Not really.”

  “Meaning there is.” Guthrie stifled a grin. “Not really” meant the same thing to Val as it had to her mother.

  “Oh, it’s nothing…”

  “Something with Crow? So…you guys have a fight? He seemed pretty chipper when he bounced out of here this morning. Whistling and grinning, and I won’t ask why.”

  “Oh no, nothing like that. I’m
just concerned about him, that’s all.”

  He lowered his spoon. “In what way?

  She drummed her fingers on top of the crossword puzzle for a moment, looking down, then glanced up at her father. “He’s doing something that might be very dangerous.”

  “Oh? He’s not…?” Guthrie made a gesture as if he were knocking back a shot.

  “Dad!”

  “Just asking.”

  “Crow doesn’t drink anymore.”

  “Hey, don’t get me wrong — I care a lot for Crow, but alcoholism isn’t something you just grow out of.”

  “Well, it’s not that,” she said with just a touch of frost. “It’s something he’s doing for Terry.” She explained what was happening and about Crow’s mission to shut down the hayride.

  Guthrie ate a cracker, dry, munching thoughtfully. “Are you afraid he’s going to go back on the cops? Is that it?”

  “Oh no…no, he would never do that.”

  “Well then, don’t let it worry you. Terry has always had an annoying way of putting people on the spot, getting them to do things they don’t really want to do.”

  “I know.”

  “He and Crow have always been pretty tight, and you know how persuasive our dear mayor can be.”

  “Mm.” Terry and Crow had been best friends since preschool, which meant that they’d known each other even longer than Val had known Crow. The boys had met Val in second grade, when they were all eight, and by the time of the Black Harvest two years later they were thick as thieves. Five of them — Val, Crow and his older brother, Billy, and Terry and his little sister, Mandy. By the end of that autumn two of them were dead — Billy and Mandy — victims of the Reaper, Terry was in a coma, and Crow and Val were clinging to each other, their worlds shattered.

  The memory of that time flickered in Val’s eyes, and Guthrie could see it. He smoothly but quickly changed the subject. “Besides, you know Terry,” he said. “He likes to make everything seem dramatic. I think he imagines that being the mayor of a town this size actually means something.”

  “Yeah, him and Rudy Giuliani.”

  “Like that. He builds things up to be something they ain’t. Hell, he’s the kind that calls going over to Crestville for pizza and a movie a Regional Fine Dining and Cultural Arts Junket.”

  Val smiled. “Yeah, I guess.”

  “If there really is something going on around here, Terry’s not going to be doing much about it. You said that Crow told you there were some Philly cops coming in?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “So Terry is going to be standing around looking important but not actually doing anything, and he’ll have Gus Bernhardt hustling around getting them coffee and asking to polish their badges. Terry’s one of those guys who needs to be in charge in some visible way, and he loves to give orders — and Crow happened to be there, and your boy can’t hardly say no to anybody.”

  “Except me.”

  Guthrie gave a comical snort. “Not so’s I noticed. He’ll be by here, you watch.”

  “I shouldn’t have let him go at all.”

  “Not yours to say, pumpkin. No more than it’s his to speak for you. This is the twenty-first century, my lass.” Guthrie took another mouthful of soup, winking at her as he did so. “Soup’s really good.”

  “Don’t say it like you’re shocked.” Val crossed her arms. “Well, I just wish he wouldn’t jump whenever Terry says to.”

  “You think it’s really that bad?”

  She shook her head. “It’s just that he spends so much time with Terry, and Terry is such a pain in the ass.”

  “You think he should stop hanging around with our fair mayor?”

  “Mm.”

  “Why is it you don’t like Terry? You never really have. Even as kids you two were always at each other’s throats.”

  “I don’t know. Bad chemistry, I guess. There was just always something…off about him. I don’t know how to describe it. I just wish Crow wouldn’t hang out with him so much, that’s all.”

  “Now, now, darlin’, don’t be trying to tell your young man who his friends should be.”

  “Mm.”

  “Just like your mom. One grunt is worth a thousand words.”

  “Mm,” she said again, but smiled.

  “Crow can take care of himself. Hell, we’ve all seen that.”

  “I know, Daddy, but you know what it did to him. He probably wouldn’t have even started drinking if it hadn’t been for that job.”

  “Yep, and I also know that he pulled himself up by his own bootstraps and put his life back together—while he was still in that job. Not a lot of men could do that. He fixed himself, as my pappy would say. He saw that his life was broken, and he fixed himself.”

  “Mm.”

  “Will you stop that?”

  “Mm-hm.”

  He threw a cracker at her, which she surprised herself by catching. She ate the cracker and stuck a crumb-covered tongue at him.

  Connie Guthrie whisked into the room, all fresh and cute in her floral-print dress, sensible pumps, bouncing blond curls, and brilliant smile. She favored them with an airy wave of her hand and then made a beeline for the stove.

  “Ooo! We have soup!”

  “It’s for Crow,” Guthrie said quickly as if he didn’t have a spoon halfway to his mouth.

  “Well, you have some. Maybe I’ll just try a little.” She looked quickly at Val, as if for approval, but neither wanting nor expecting any. Without another word she took a bowl from the cupboard and began ladling soup into it. Guthrie gave Val an apologetic look, but she waved it off. “I didn’t even know you could cook.”

  Connie had just finished arranging her side of the table with a frilly place mat, precisely folded napkin, soupspoon set just so, the soup bowl positioned perfectly in the center of the plate with five crackers laid out overlapping each other around the rim, when the doorbell rang.

  “Ooo, there’s the door!” Connie said, as if that were a hilarious joke. “Just when I was sitting down.” Then she actually sat down. Val exchanged an amazed and exasperated look with her father.

  “Shall I get that, then?” she asked dryly.

  “Oh, would you, dear?” cooed Connie. “I wouldn’t want this fabulous soup of yours to get all cold and nasty.”

  “Heaven forbid.” Val stood up, waving to her father to remain seated just as he began to rise. “I’m up, I’ll get it.”

  She moved toward the door, crossing behind Connie, who was delicately blowing across the surface of her first spoonful. Val paused and mimed strangling Connie. Connie saw none of it, and Guthrie had to pretend to cough to hide his laughter. Sighing audibly, Val walked out of the kitchen, down the long hall, and into the living room. The visitor knocked again. A hard, insistent rap.

  “I’m coming!” Val called as she reached for the knob, turned it, and opened the door.

  A man stood there, tall and thin and pale of face. He had dark hair greased back from a widow’s peak, black eyes, and a wide, friendly smile. In his right hand he held a small, almost delicate-looking pistol. The barrel was pointed at Val’s stomach.

  “Trick-or-treat,” whispered Karl Ruger, and pushed his way into the house.

  Part II

  Mr. Devil Blues

  Gypsy woman told me I’ve got to walk the night Like a fallen angel, I’m blinded by the light.

  Whitesnake, “Nighthawk (Vampire Blues)”

  There’s a darkness deep In my soul I still got a purpose to serve.

  Santana, “Put Your Lights On”

  Well, I ain’t superstitious, black cat just cross my trail Well, I ain’t superstitious, oh the black cat just cross my trail.

  Willie Dixon, “I Ain’t Superstitious”

  Chapter 9

  (1)

  Tow-Truck Eddie made no move to get out of the cab. For fifteen minutes he just sat there, looking at the blood on his hands, amazed. Doubt had plagued him for most of the drive home, but as he sat there and stared at
the blood, he could feel his fears fragment and fall away, leaving only a clean, shining belief.

  “Thank you, God,” he whispered. The gratitude welled up so suddenly and fiercely in his breast that tears sprang from his eyes. “Thank you, my sweet Lord God!”

  Finding that man back there by the wrecked car, deep in the corn…how wonderful it had been. He marveled at the subtlety of God’s intricate design, and how he — humble Eddie, the Sword of God — was guided in such sure but secret ways so that hints and clues of the great plan opened up to him bit by bit.

  It had been years since his first epiphany, since that day years ago when God had first whispered to him. An actual voice in his head, not just words on the pages of a Bible. A real voice. The voice of God.

  Eddie had been twenty when it happened. It was only days after Eddie’s first encounter with the Beast. Back then the Beast had taken a different form—Satan is the Father of Lies—and Eddie and a few men from the town — Vic Wingate, Jim Polk, Gus Bernhardt, and others — had tracked the monster down and killed him, ending the string of murders that had been destroying the town.

  After that night the voice of God started speaking to him during his prayers. Not often, at least not at first, and there were long stretches of months when no matter how fervently Eddie prayed there was no response from heaven. Then a few weeks ago God had begun speaking to him almost daily, sometimes several times a day. Then this morning he had been shown the new face that the Beast wore, and Eddie was filled with such holy purpose and glory that he felt he would burst. He kept looking in the rearview mirror to see if light was coming from his eyes and nostrils and mouth. Not yet. Not yet.

  He had been cruising A-32 looking for the Beast, unsure if he had actually been killed or not back there. When Eddie had gotten out of the cab to look, there was no sign at all of either boy or bike. Was that how it was when the Beast, in this guise, was killed? Would he just simply dissolve, returning to the corruption from which he was formed? Eddie wasn’t sure and God had not spoken to him to tell him. So, he was prowling the road just in case when either some instinct or perhaps the subtle nudging of God’s hand directed him to the spot near the Guthrie farm where a car had gone off the road. Eddie had immediately pulled over and gone to investigate. Was the Beast here? Had the car struck the Beast and then both of them gone off the road? That thought gave him a pang because he wanted to kill the Beast. He — not anyone else — was the Sword of God.