by Jack Ketchum
"Just people talking," Garza said. "You know the way people talk. I figured if they used to live on my land, I wanted to know about it."
Delgado looked annoyed, or maybe skeptical. He said, "Well, that's the kind of thing I wish people wouldn't talk about. This area's got a lot of good, honest history. It doesn't need a scandal to make it interesting."
But Delgado seemed willing enough to talk about the scandal. After all the horrible things he'd read in that book, and the flies at his door, and the coyotes that seemed to leer out of every dark pocket of cedar, Garza found himself keenly interested in the tale.
Most of it revolved around a man named Oswald Kretschmer, who fled Germany in the 1680s with his family to avoid religious persecution and ended up in Mexico. He relocated his family again to the area around Worther Lake sometime in the 1690s or early 1700s.
"They pretty much kept to themselves out there," Delgado explained. "Of course, at the time there really wasn't anybody else around for them to associate with. Most of the area was a giant Spanish land grant to one of their local governors. Empty except for a few half-starved Indian tribes.
"After Texas got its independence from Mexico, settlers started moving into the area and founded this town. People avoided the Kretschmers, mostly. Though, I did read a diary once that mentioned them. It said you could always tell the Kretschmer family on account of their eyes."
"Their eyes?" Garza asked. He was leaning forward despite himself, like he was hearing dirty gossip about what the pretty secretary in the office looked like naked.
"Said to be the iciest blue you ever saw. Every single member of that family had those eyes, apparently."
"And so what happened to them?"
"Nobody knows," Delgado said. "The Texas government took a census of the area when they tried to enlist local boys into the Confederate militias, and there's no record of them in it. My guess is they packed up and went somewhere where they could still be by themselves."
Garza sat back and scratched his head. "I'm afraid I don't see the scandal in all that."
"Well," Delgado said, and he obviously found this detail distasteful, "there's the part about them all marrying each other. It was just the one family, you know. Over the space of a hundred years or so, you're bound to end up with what the law calls marriages of consanguinity."
"In-breeding," Garza said.
Delgado nodded. "You know how that kind of thing gets people talking. There's more than a few references to them doing devil worship—and witchcraft too—but I think that's just people embellishing an already sordid story. The records I've seen mention birth defects and deformities and all the other things you'd expect from generations of in-breeding. Given the nature of the time it's only natural stories of witchcraft and such would start up."
Garza said he agreed, but his mind kept turning back to that book.
And the flies.
***
"You did what?" Resendez said. "Robert, what in the hell's wrong with you? I told you I didn't want a bunch of historians crawling all over this place."
"He's not a real historian, Frank. He's just an amateur—"
"I know who he is, Robert. What I want to know is why you'd do something like that. Don't you realize how much is at stake here? We both stand to make a lot of money if we do this right."
"I was just trying to find out about the history of this place. Like you asked me to do. And I didn't say a word about the buildings you found. As far as he knows, I was just following up on idle gossip I'd heard around town."
"You mean about that devil worshipping crap you found in that book?"
Garza nodded.
"That's great," Resendez said, and then he turned and looked out the window of his study, his gaze wandering over the acres of cedar to the lake beyond. At last he said, "You know, this isn't what I wanted when I asked you to help me give this place an identity."
"You got the truth, Frank."
"Bullshit," Resendez said. "There's no truth in that book. And none in Delgado's amateur history either. The truth is what we make it."
Garza was appalled. In all the years he'd known Resendez, he'd never once heard the man say something to suggest slippery ethics. He felt like one of his boyhood heroes had let him down. But that wasn't all. For the first time, he realized that some small part of his orderly, rational mind actually believed the stories he'd read about devil worship. Maybe there was a kernel of truth in it, at least. People who isolated themselves for religious reasons usually did it because they had some off-the-wall beliefs, didn't they?
"So what are you going to do, Frank?" Garza's voice strained, his lips thin as razorblades.
"I don't know yet," Resendez said, and turned back to the window. "Go home, Robert. We'll talk later."
***
The next day was Monday, and work was uncomfortable. Resendez, never one to hold a grudge or let a problem bog him down, was unusually cold, and he and Garza went most of the day without speaking more than a few grunts to each other.
Garza left work about six and drove home, taking Farm Route 181 like always. As he passed the new Methodist Church just south of Bonheim, still a half mile or so from his usual turn off, he saw one of the coyotes with the rat-like gait go bounding across the road in front of him, then disappear into the cedar off to his left.
He put on the brakes. A feeling had festered in his mind ever since he saw that coyote watching him near Resendez's church that the coyotes and the flies and the church were somehow connected. His police training had prepared him to look for links between seemingly unrelated people and events, but this felt like a different kind of problem, like it wouldn't yield to conventional logic. He wasn't sure what the connection was, only that he believed one existed.
It was a cool night, and he'd been driving with the windows down. But watching the coyote shook him in a way he couldn't quite define, and he moved to roll up the windows.
He got the driver's side window secured, but when he reached over to roll up the passenger side, he stopped and jerked his hand back in horror. A huge humming mass of black, angry flies covered the whole door frame.
He backed against the driver's side door, fumbled blindly for the handle, and spilled out into the street, where he stood gaping at a living black carpet beating against his vehicle. They were actually rocking the truck with their attack.
After the shock wore off, he pulled out his fire extinguisher and turned it on the flies.
The chalky spray coated the insects, and they dropped to the road in powdery, white chunks. Their swollen bodies and still twitching wings disgusted him, but he mastered his nausea long enough to sweep the remaining flies onto the road with an old, greasy towel.
Something moved in the grass behind him. He turned, his right hand poised over the thumb snap on his holster, and saw a single coyote running with that familiar rat-like hop across the church lawn. It stopped about fifty feet away and watched him. Off in the distance, he could hear howling, a disconcerting chorus of yaps and long, mournful bays.
More coyotes came around the side of the building, moving fast. There was no point in pulling his gun. At the speed they moved, he'd probably empty the whole magazine without landing a single shot.
Instead of firing, he got back in his truck, dropped it into gear, and peeled out down the road as fast as the old Chevy would go.
When he looked in the rearview mirror, there was nothing but dust behind him.
***
When he arrived home, Linda was standing in the driveway. The look on her face said something was wrong. "She hasn't come home yet," Linda said.
"Sam?"
Linda nodded, near tears. "She was supposed to be home at four."
"Where'd she go?" But he had a sinking feeling that he already knew.
"She's out with Jenny and Margaret. They went horseback riding down by the lake."
"How long ago?"
"They left after lunch. I don't know."
Garza jumped back in his truck.
"Call Chief Delgado," he told her. "Have him bring shotguns and a couple of his men. Tell him to meet me on Resendez's property down by the lake."
"Robert—"
"Go!" he said. "Hurry."
He dropped the truck in gear and sped away.
***
Garza raced down to the lake on a narrow dirt road he and Resendez had cut with a tractor the summer before. He took it as far as he could, then cut through the brush toward the church, his truck ripping through overhanging cedar branches the whole way.
He reached a large limestone outcropping and had to slow so he could work the truck around it. When he did, he heard Sam and Resendez's daughters screaming for help.
Their voices came from the trails above the church, and it sounded like they were getting closer.
Not thinking about anything except his daughter, he punched the gas and took the truck straight through the cedar and down the slope of the limestone outcropping. The old Chevy yawed in midair, making him feel weightless for a painful, prolonged moment, and then hit the ground with a tremendous impact.
The truck bottomed out and stalled. It wouldn't start again. He jumped out, gun in hand, and scanned the trails on the hillside above the church.
"Daddy, Daddy," Sam screamed at him. He saw his little girl holding on to the horse for dear life. Resendez's daughters came up behind her.
He ran a few steps that way and stopped. Coyotes bounded down the hill on either side of the girls, moving through the brush so easily they seemed more like shadows than animals. In the gaps between the cedar trees he could see them snapping at the bellies of the horses.
"Samantha," he yelled. "This way. Come on. This way!"
The poor girl was barely holding on. She wasn't half the rider Resendez's daughters were, and as the horses jumped from the slope to the grassy ledge of limestone on the far side of the church, she nearly popped out of the saddle.
The coyotes snapped at her feet and at the horse's belly, but Garza couldn't risk a shot. Hitting a running, dog-sized target at sixty yards with a pistol would be next to impossible, and he stood a better chance of hitting one of the girls by mistake.
"Make for that cottage," he yelled at her, and ran that way himself. It only had three walls, but it would have to do. At least that way the coyotes could only come at them from one side.
The girls raced for him and they met at the busted cottage wall. Garza shot at the coyote snapping at the horse's hooves. He missed the first shot and fired three more times. The last two shots sent the animal tumbling backwards over itself.
More coyotes raced across the grass, coming for them. He yanked Sam down and folded her into his arms while the other two girls jumped off their horses.
"Inside here," he said, packing them into the cottage. "Hurry."
He glanced inside the cottage as he pushed them inside and did a double take. Most of the floor was grown over with meadow grasses and wildflowers, but toward the back wall, someone had dug up fresh earth. There was a large mound of gray dirt and rock there, and a sizeable hole in the ground beyond it.
"There," he said.
"Daddy—"
"Go," he told her, and turned back just in time to see at least thirty coyotes going after the horses. The horses neighed and kicked. They punched the air with their hooves, their eyes rolling wildly, their lips pulled back, slinging long ropes of spit.
The coyotes tore the belly out of one of the horses and Garza couldn't look anymore. Its dying screams were enough. He backed into the cottage, moving toward the girls, who were already getting into the hole.
"Mr. Garza," Jenny said, "there's a tunnel down here."
"Get in," he said. "All of you."
"Daddy—"
"Go, Sam. I'm right behind you, baby."
They got down on their bellies and crawled into the darkness. He went after them, backing himself in just as one of the coyotes appeared at the rim.
In the fading evening light, all he saw was the jagged rows of its fangs. He fired with one hand, killing it. He backed further into the hole. Behind him, he could hear the girls whimpering, saying his name. Sam tried to hold on to him. A coyote silhouette appeared at the entrance to the tunnel and more gathered behind it. He fired, putting it down, the bark of the Glock sounding like a cannon inside the tunnel.
"Get out of here!" he screamed at the snarling animals. "Get the hell away!"
He fired two more times. The coyotes outside the hole snapped and grabbed at their dead brethren blocking the entrance, and rather than drag the carcasses out of the way, they seemed more intent on ripping their way through.
But suddenly the cannibalistic tearing of flesh and the snarling growls stopped, and everything was silent, save for the panicked shallow breathing of the girls behind him.
"Daddy," Sam said.
"Shhh, baby. Keep quiet."
He listened. From somewhere above him he heard voices shouting and men running. Then, like thunder, shotgun blasts. Several of them. A battle raged above them. And then, after a long time, that noise too went silent.
They huddled together in the dark, the girls crowding as close as they could to him. The moment seemed to go on forever.
Then, from the entrance, a thick Texas drawl: "Sergeant Garza, it's Officer Boller with the Bonheim Police Department. Ya'll all right down there, sir?"
***
It was getting dark when they came out of the tunnel. Resendez stood there, a smoking shotgun in his hands. Chief Delgado was there, too. He had three of his officers with him. Resendez threw the shotgun on the ground and hugged his daughters. He steered them away from what was left of their horses, and then made arrangements for one of Delgado's officers to take them home.
When they were gone, Garza retrieved a flashlight from one of the other officers and pointed it down the tunnel where he and the girls had taken refuge. The light didn't reach the end of the tunnel. When he'd fired his pistol down there, the sound had carried a long ways, and now he knew the actual distance was farther than he thought.
Probably much farther.
The hole was fresh, the ground just recently overturned, but the tunnel was obviously much older. The earth was packed tight and dry. He crumbled it in his fist. It occurred to him the tunnel was probably the same age as the cottages and church.
He went back to the clearing between the buildings. Resendez stood there with Delgado and the other two officers. Delgado clearly had no idea what the hell was going on, but Resendez's face was set and unreadable.
"This tunnel connects all these buildings, doesn't it?" Garza asked.
Resendez nodded.
"How long have you know about this?"
Resendez looked away for a second, then said, "Since yesterday afternoon."
"And you didn't say anything about it?"
Resendez looked away again.
Delgado said, "Them coyotes. I've never seen so many in one place before. They're not supposed to act that way. Matter of fact, I don't think I've ever heard of a coyote going after anything bigger than a rabbit."
Garza glanced at him, but didn't respond. To Resendez he said, "What did you do?"
Resendez was silent.
"Answer me," Garza hissed. "What did you do?"
Delgado cocked his head in surprise. He glanced back and forth between the two of them.
"Watch your tone of voice with me, Sergeant," Resendez said, his face a mystery in the settling dark.
"Bullshit!" Garza shot back. "Don't you dare try to pull your rank on me. Not after what I just went through. Now you tell me what you fucking did."
Resendez glanced around. He drew a heavy breath and seemed to weigh the cost of telling what he knew. "There's a network of tunnels underneath here," he finally said. "They connect under the church. That seems to be the hub."
"What are they for?" Garza asked. "Do they go anywhere?"
Resendez nodded. "There's an entrance beneath the church."
Resendez just shook his head.
"It's that book, isn't it? It's all true."
Resendez hung his head in resigned acquiescence. The genie was out of the bottle, and they both knew it.
"What are ya'll talkin' about?" Delgado said.
Garza turned to him. "Do your men have enough flashlights and shotguns for all of us?"
Delgado still seemed uncertain. He looked to Resendez for guidance, but Resendez wouldn't look back.
Finally, Delgado said. "Yes, sir. We got plenty of fire power." He turned to one of the officers and said, "Bert, go and get the shotguns. Plenty of shells, too."
"What are you going to do?" Resendez asked.
"We're going down there. All of us."
"What good will that do?"
"I don't know," Garza said. "I really don't. But I think the book and those coyotes and these buildings are all connected, and I think whatever it is we're dealing with here is waiting for us down there beneath that church."
***
Resendez had done a lot of work in a short time. He'd peeled away the plank boards that made the floor of the altar and exposed a gaping pit leading down into darkness. Delgado and a young redheaded officer named Sturgis tried to light it up with flashlights, but only succeeded in casting an eerie, buttery glow on the ancient limestone steps.
"What are you fellas hoping to find down there?" Delgado asked.
Garza racked the shotgun, chambering a shell. "Let's go," he said. "Everybody stay sharp."
He climbed down the steps and made his way into the darkness, not even bothering to see if the others followed. The steps went down maybe thirty feet before leveling off into a tunnel. The flashlight beam hinted at other tunnels a short distance off, opening off the main passageway. Dried timbers were embedded into the walls like ribs, and he traced them with the light. Supports, Garza guessed, like the box frames miners use to prevent cave-ins. There was a faint, foul odor, like something lingering in the still air.
"Where do these tunnels lead?" he asked over his shoulder.