Stone Groove

by Erik Carter

  “Where’s the stone?” Dale called out to the sheriff, who stood about twenty feet behind him. The sheriff muttered, and Dale fought the urge to lash out. Brown needed to get over his consternation—and quick. This was a federal crime scene now.

  “All the way in the back,” Brown yelled back. Behind him, his deputies looked ready to jump on Dale like a pack of hyenas.

  Wilson and Dale ducked under the police tape. There was a hollow, empty resonance floating in the village. Dale carefully scrutinized the buildings as they passed. They were of simple construction with wood siding, black-shingled roofs, and square windows. Whitewashed and well maintained. There was a small porch on each building, and most had a chair or two on this porch.

  “Didn’t the Roanoke colonists leave some sort of clue behind?” Wilson said.

  “Not bad, Wilson,” Dale said. He thought he noticed a hint of a proud smile form on Wilson’s face. “The only clue John White found in the empty village was the word Croatoan carved into a fence post. Someone had also carved C-R-O-A into a tree, like they didn’t even have the time to finish a second message.”

  “What’s Croatoan?”

  “The name of a nearby island and also one of the Indian tribes. Some think the colonists fled to the island. Others think that they were absorbed into one of the tribes. Or that one of the tribes killed ’em.”

  “Whoever carved Roanoke on the stone could be emulating the carvings on the fence and tree.”

  “Maybe. But look around. Plenty of tree trunks he could have carved up. No, our copycat is making a double nod—to both the Croatoan carvings and the Dare Stones.”

  They reached the backside of the circular arrangement of buildings where there was a row of outhouses.

  “Supposed to be down here,” Wilson said and led Dale to the end of this row. There were foot-tall weeds surrounding it, and, at first, Dale overlooked it.

  It was a round stone about two feet across. Lines of blood zigzagged over its surface, like chocolate syrup drizzled on a dessert. The blood had dried into thick black goo. Rivulets ran down the sides to the ground. A half dozen flies buzzed about. ROANOKE was scratched into it in large, capital letters. The scratches looked fresh, the carved parts bright and clean looking against the dark color of the stone.

  The two men knelt down. Dale pointed toward the dirt where the rock entered the ground. “The stone’s been here a while,” he said.

  The earth met completely flush with the edge of the stone. The grass grew longer around the stone where the Marshallites had missed it when trimming. Dale pushed on the stone, and it moved slightly, some of the moist earth sticking to the surface of the stone.

  Wilson nodded his agreement. “We got a soil sample to the lab. They tell us the rock’s been here for at least two years.”

  “But the letters are fresh,” Dale said. “Any prints?”

  Wilson shook his head.

  Dale held out a hand as he continued to look at the stone. “Gloves.”

  Wilson scowled.

  Dale turned his attention to him. “Gloves … please?”

  “I’m not your lackey, Agent Conley,” Wilson said. He reached into his suit jacket and handed Dale a pair of latex gloves.

  “Thanks.” Dale put on the gloves and ran a finger along the scratches. “Not very deep. Definitely not done with a chisel or anything like that. Pocketknife, maybe.” He fished into his jeans and retrieved his own pocketknife. He stuck the blade in the scratches. Definite possibility.

  “Even a car key could have made those scratches,” Wilson said.

  Dale touched the blood on the rock with a finger. His glove stuck to its tackiness as he pulled away. “Had the blood tested?”

  “Results came back just before we left D.C.”

  “Not human, is it?”

  “Well … no. But how do you—”

  “Elementary, my dear Wilson,” Dale said. “There’s not another drop of blood in the rest of the village, none in the grass surrounding the stone. Just on the stone itself.”

  “Meaning?”

  “Meaning no one was hurt. The blood was put here on purpose. It’s just theatrics. Someone got some cow’s blood from a butcher shop and splattered it on this rock. They’re trying to scare us.”

  Dale stood up, and Wilson followed his lead. They headed back toward the buildings.

  When Dale tried to understand the type of person who would leave a bloody mess as a visual scare tactic, his mind kept flashing on one word. Immaturity. Chances were this rock was a prank from some damn punk teenagers who’d been learning about the Lost Colony in their American history class. Maybe the teacher decided to make the lesson flashier by mentioning the titillating mystery of the Dare Stones. Something happened to the folks in the village, of course, but the rock and the blood could very well have no connection.

  “What’s with the grin?” Wilson said. “Know something I don’t?”

  “Just a hunch.”

  There was a glint of light from the other side of the village, and Dale turned to look. A car was driving slowly along the solitary gravel road to the east of the village. He could just see it through the trees, little flashes of it appearing now and then.

  “What’s wrong?” Wilson said.

  The car was positively creeping by, and this sent Dale’s internal alarms into hysterics. If it went any slower, it would have stopped. It was some sort of late-model coupe. Light in color, probably white.

  “Does a lot of traffic come through here?” Dale said.

  “Brown said there’s about a dozen homes within a mile radius. It’s probably just a local getting an eyeful. They’re not used to crime scenes out here in the boonies.”

  The car drove past a small clearing in the woods, and for a moment Dale could just make out a figure in the driver seat—a man wearing dark clothing who seemed to be watching them as he inched by.

  “I suppose,” Dale said.

  Chapter 5

  The man peered at the police through the trees as he crept along the gravel road. A handful of the ignorant local sheriff’s deputies were standing behind the police tape. Walking from the back of the village was a different pair of men—one in a suit and one wearing a blue T-shirt and jeans. The latter would be the BEI agent.

  Presently the two men stopped and looked in his direction. He knew that they couldn’t see him through the trees, but he still cinched up the hood on the black jacket he was wearing.

  He continued at his slow pace, and soon the village grew fainter and was replaced by nothing but a tangle of green leaves. A single house down a long dirt driveway passed by on the right, and then the road began to curve to the west. When the road reached a dead end, he pulled the car over.

  Tall trees surrounded him, sunshine poking through the leaves. All was quiet except for the cicadas and other chattering insects. It was the kind of place a hillbilly would go to dump a broken refrigerator.

  The man looked out his window to the left. He knew that the village was straight through those trees, due south, about a quarter mile. This made him smile.

  He turned to the young girl sitting in the passenger seat. She stared straight ahead, right over the top of the dash. Her face was blank, and she hadn’t said a word during the whole trip. Of course she hadn’t. He hadn’t told her to. She did only what he asked. Whatever he asked.

  The man put his hand on her hair. It was silky and smooth. Young things always felt so fresh, so new. Children, saplings, baby animals. They were as clean as they were pure. He twirled one of the girl’s golden curls through his fingers. She continued to stare forward. Not budging. The nightgown she wore was pretty and white.

  She would do whatever he said. It was a power that thrilled him, and he never tired of it. But he knew that he could never use this power the way that Father had used it with him. That was where Father had faltered. He hadn’t respected the power.

  The man let the strand of the girl’s hair slide out of his fingers.

  “Look
at me,” he said.

  The girl turned and looked at him now, the first time during the whole excursion. Her eyes were large and blue, her skin satiny. She remained expressionless.

  “Are you ready for your task?” the man said and smiled.

  Chapter 6

  Dale and Wilson walked up to one of the houses and stepped onto the porch. The boards squeaked beneath their feet. Dale approached the front door and looked at the doorframe. He ran his hand along it. The wood was smooth, the paint fresh.

  “Sheriff’s Office found no signs of forced entry,” Wilson said.

  “And all the buildings have been checked?” Dale said as he looked at the hinges.

  “All of them. Every building is just like this. Not a single object out of place. It’s like they vanished into thin air.”

  When John White returned to the Roanoke Colony in 1590, there were no signs of a struggle. The colonists were simply gone. As Dale looked from the porch out into the pristine, empty village beyond, he wondered how someone in the 1970s could make such a large group of people disappear without a trace. There was a three-year gap between White’s departure and his return to find his family and companions missing. The Marshall Village, on the other hand, was seen on Monday and had entirely disappeared by Wednesday.

  At the beginning of a BEI investigation, the investigating agent had to decide if the case fit the BEI’s mission. Dale was trying to determine whether or not someone had actually been imitating the Lost Colony. His gut told him that it was just some prankster who put the carving on the rock. But the similarities between the two disappearances certainly gave him pause. Both groups had roughly 150 people. Both lived in the woods. Both vanished without a trace.

  They walked inside and into a kitchen, stark and plain. Like the outside, the walls were painted white. The cabinets, tables, and other furnishings were bare wood. No refrigerator, no running water. A wood-burning stove sat in the corner.

  The heat was even more oppressive within the walls of the house. Dale rubbed a finger along the countertop. His fingertip came up clean, not a speck of dust. There wasn’t a dirty dish or soiled rag in sight. The kitchen was spotless.

  They walked toward the rear of the house, where there were two other rooms, a smaller room to the left, and a larger room in the back. Neither doorway had doors, just a frame. They headed for the larger room.

  “What do you think, Wilson?” Dale said.

  “I’m at a loss.”

  “That makes two of us.”

  If every building was just like this, Dale didn’t know what to make of it. Every part of him was saying that if something terrible had happened to these people there would be some sort of sign. Wrecked furniture. Kicked-in doors. Misplaced rifles. But this house was pristine. Could they have all been killed? Some sort of poisoning? If so, could someone have gotten 147 bodies out without any of the locals noticing?

  They stepped into the back room. There was a bed, a dresser, and a small table with two chairs in the corner. Like the kitchen, all the furnishings were old-fashioned and made of unfinished wood. The mattress looked to be stuffed. Dale walked over to the dresser and pulled out one of the drawers. Inside were neatly folded, agrarian clothes of the type he’d seen in the photographs. He closed the drawer, and they moved to the next room.

  “I do wonder, though,” Wilson said, “about a connection to modern-day Roanoke. Maybe it has nothing to do with the colony at all. Maybe Roanoke on the stone is referring to Roanoke, Virginia.”

  “Too many coincidences for there to be no connection,” Dale said. “Whoever wrote Roanoke on that rock knew damn well about the Dare Stones. Of all the town names in all the world to carve on a rock, they chose Roanoke? And why the hell would they decide to carve anything on a rock in the first place? Sorry, Wilson, I’m not buying it.”

  “No offense taken. You’re the braniac.” There was blatant insincerity in his tone.

  They stepped into the second room. It was a child’s bedroom. There was a small bed and dresser, scaled-down versions of those they’d seen in the last room. Dale went over to the dresser and pulled out one of the drawers. Inside were more neatly folded clothes.

  He picked up one of the dresses in the top drawer and let it fall open. It was small, the right size for a girl of maybe six years or so. The cloth had an unmistakably handmade feel. Holding the dress suddenly felt eerie to Dale. Whoever this little girl was, she’d been here in this room only three days prior. And now she was gone. They were all gone.

  It’s funny how the smallest of things can have weight. The tiny dress in Dale’s hands felt very heavy now. He put it back in the drawer.

  They stepped out onto the porch and continued into the main grounds of the village again. The heat that had felt oppressive a few minutes earlier was a relief after being in the stuffy house. Dale pushed his bangs from his forehead. His sideburns were making his face feel even hotter. He’d considered shaving them before, but they looked too damn cool.

  “You had all the alone time you need?” Wilson asked as he looked across the village to the sheriff and his men beyond the police tape barrier.

  Dale had forgotten about the other men waiting on them. If they’d seemed perturbed when Dale and Wilson left them, they looked positively fuming now.

  “Yeah,” Dale said. “I wouldn’t want anyone to blow a gasket.”

  They stepped off the porch and into the main grassy area again. Wilson stepped aside, faced the other men, and waved his arms in the air.

  The deputies made their way under the police tape and into the village.

  Wilson sighed and took off his jacket. “Stinkin’ hot,” he said and gazed out over the empty village. “Does this place bring back a lot of bad memories?”

  Dale flinched.

  Wilson had a way of dredging up things that were best left unsaid. His detached objectivity was clearly an asset to his work as an agent, but it made him unable to realize when he was stepping on toes. He meant nothing personal by his obliviousness, but it was frustrating all the same.

  The truth was, the instant Dale saw the Marshall Village, the memories came flooding back to him. But he’d forced them from his mind to focus on his duty at hand. Leave it to Wilson to pull them right back into the spotlight.

  “Been trying not to think about it, Wilson,” Dale said.

  “You figure that’s why you were assigned this case?” Wilson said. “Because of your past?”

  And there he went again. Wilson could be more than a little oblivious. He had the tact of a dockworker.

  “I wouldn’t presume to guess why I’m given any assignment,” Dale said, though he knew Wilson was right. He’d been assigned this case because of his past.

  The sheriff and his men spread through the village around them, taking photographs and writing notes.

  “So, did the Roanoke Colony kidnappers strike again?” Wilson said. “Is this a BEI case?”

  Dale peeled off his rubber gloves. He inhaled and tried to calculate his response. “The verdict’s still out. But I don’t think so.”

  He had an inkling that his time with this case was almost through. And he was thankful for that. He was still worn out from the Willard Ledford case and the literal beating he’d received at its conclusion. Taft and Wilson had not only interrupted his celebratory pie at Rich’s Diner, but they also derailed his flirtation with fair Julia. He was anxious to get back to town for another chance.

  There was a loud snap of a branch from the woods. Dale, Wilson, and the sheriff’s men all turned and looked.

  There were a lot of deer in this area. Black bears, too. Not long after moving to Virginia at the age of ten, Dale encountered his first bear while hiking a trail. The best response his prepubescent self could muster was to simply freeze in his tracks. This had, unwittingly, been a much better alternative to running, which would have only increased the chances of aggression from the bear.

  He watched the trees for a moment. And saw nothing. Just the movement of a
few branches in the breeze.

  But then there was another noise, and he looked back again. Another noise. And another. Snapping branches, crunching leaves. Something was moving, and it was coming toward them.

  The men chattered. A couple of them joked about a venison dinner.

  The noises drew closer, and within moments a figure was visible. But it wasn’t a deer or a bear. It was a person.

  And the person was headed their way.

  Chapter 7

  Dale’s senses blistered, and he felt the reassuring weight of his Smith & Wesson Model 36 against his lower back, tucked into his jeans. His mind flashed to the car that had crept by moments earlier. He’d sensed that there was something not right about that vehicle, and now he had a strong feeling that his apprehension was warranted.

  Whoever was approaching was wearing white clothing, which made the individual readily visible, though the person was off in the distance. The woods obscured Dale’s view, but it was clear that the figure was drawing nearer.

  Sheriff Brown stepped up beside Dale and Wilson to get a better look. He cupped his hand over his mouth.

  “This is a crime scene,” the sheriff yelled out. “Stop where you are.”

  The person continued toward them.

  Brown kept on yelling. “This is Sheriff Carl Brown of the Augusta County Sheriff’s Office. Stop where you are immediately!”

  The figure still didn’t respond. The crunching footsteps drew closer.

  “I said halt!”

  The person continued toward them.

  Brown motioned toward his men, and they all drew weapons. Dale pulled his gun from its holster. Wilson did the same.

  The person was closer yet. Long blonde hair was visible. And feminine features.