by Guy Adams
He kept far enough ahead that I couldn’t talk to him. The pair of us trotted along in silence. I figured we’d stop for lunch, but he just kept on riding. The sun rose to the middle of the sky and then began to sink down again. I ate a little dried meat as I rode; whatever my problems, they didn’t stop me being hungry.
As the afternoon stretched on, the rocky landscape began to flatten and I could see a small town in the distance. I started to question my map. There certainly hadn’t been a town marked on it there.
As we drew closer, a plan began to grow in my mind. If I could convince someone there to help me, tell them that the old man was forcing me to ride with him at gunpoint... I bet I could shake him loose there. I still didn’t know the first thing about him, but it was obvious he was wary of company. Maybe he had a history with the law. If I could call on the town’s sheriff, I was sure the old man would soon be a cloud of dust on the horizon. The idea made me feel better.
We were maybe a mile away when he stopped his horse. The sky was getting darker, and it seemed obvious to me that we would spend the night in the town. Why camp out under the stars if you didn’t have to?
He stared at the town, watching tiny figures move around its streets. I wondered if one of them was the sheriff.
“No,” he said, turning his horse away. “That place ain’t right, we’ll ride on by.”
“What do you mean, it ain’t right?” I asked, furious at the thought that my plan was crumbling around me. He must have guessed what I’d planned to do.
“Just that,” he replied. “I can sense it from here. That’s no natural town.”
That said, he picked up the pace and began to ride off at an angle, skirting it by a mile or so.
The mule trailed on like before and I followed the town with my eyes, trying to decide what to do. If I made a run for it, would he just chase me down before I got there? It seemed more than likely.
Night was beginning to fall and we would camp soon. If I stuck with him, waited for him to go to sleep and then made a break for it, I might just get there before he noticed I was gone.
By the time we stopped we were probably five miles or so past the place: no great journey, even in the dark. My plan of action decided, I didn’t kick up a fuss as we prepared a fire. I’d be away from him soon enough.
That didn’t mean I didn’t want the answers to some of my questions, though.
“You talk about Wormwood as if it’s alive,” I said. “Saying it knows I’m coming.”
“I don’t know as I’d call it alive, exactly,” he replied, working over the stew, “but it knows, right enough.”
“That don’t even begin to make sense.”
“Only because you don’t know about the place. You’ll learn.”
We’d see about that, I thought.
“Why’s it so all-fired important I go there anyway?”
He thought about that for a moment. “I don’t know,” he admitted, “but it’s what you’re supposed to do.”
“That don’t make sense either.”
“We live in a world of choice,” he said. “The Almighty was good enough to give His creations that. Still, there are times when a thing just must be done. Lines converge, destinies are created and fulfilled. You’re meant to go to Wormwood; probably were from the moment you were born.”
“You know how crazy you sound when you talk like that?”
“You mistake me for someone who cares. Never live your life worrying about what others think of you.” He tapped his head. “Worry about what you think of yourself.”
“You’re a regular philosopher.”
“Just old. You don’t get to my age without learning the important things.”
I had nothing to say to that. I was so desperate to be out of the man’s company that I had ceased to care what he thought or said. He was mad, that much I had decided. All I had to do was get through the evening alive, and then I’d be on my way.
We ate in silence. The night dragged on as he sat and looked at the stars. We both smoked. The fire crackled. When would the bastard just go to sleep?
“Time to turn in,” he said finally. “Tomorrow always brings another long road.”
Only for you, I thought.
He stared at me for a moment and I suddenly had the weirdest impression that he was reading my mind, looking right in there with those old, pale eyes of his. It scared the hell out of me.
“’Night, then,” I said, turning away from him and bundling myself up in my blanket.
I lay there for a couple of hours, occasionally checking the time on my pocket watch in the fading glow of the fire. I listened out, hoping for the sound of snoring, something that would show he was asleep. Every now and then I thought about turning over and looking at him, but the idea terrified me. I imagined he would be looking right back at me, those piercing eyes of his staring right inside me.
Eventually I couldn’t help myself. I had to know if he was asleep or not.
I moved as quietly as I could, lifting my blanket and turning as slowly as possible.
He was facing away from me. I couldn’t decide if this was a good thing or not. On the one hand, he couldn’t see me as I carefully got to my feet; on the other, I couldn’t tell if he was asleep or not.
I could stand there all night wondering about it. The only thing to do was try.
I had left my pack on the mule. I figured I’d lead the animal away a short distance and then climb on. Assuming the stupid thing would move at all.
I walked around the fire, careful to try and avoid casting a shadow across where the old man lay. If he did have his eyes open, I didn’t want to make it too obvious I was moving around.
The mule was tethered to a tree a few feet away. I would have tied it up further off, but I didn’t want to cause suspicion.
I stroked its head, mentally begging it not to make a noise as I untied the reins.
I turned to check on the old man, and it was all I could do not to shout out in panic.
‘It was glowing!’ That’s what Thomas had said only the night before, explaining to his friend what it was that had so scared him he refused to stay in the camp a minute longer. It was glowing.
The old man’s mouth was open and light poured from it, light that was the same flickering hue as the flames behind him. It was as if someone had set a fire in his throat.
At that moment, his eyes opened and they were on fire too. To hell with the mule; I turned and ran, panicked, into the darkness.
At that point I wasn’t even aware of direction. I just wanted to put as much space as I could between myself and the demon I had been sharing the trail with.
“Come back,” I heard him whisper, and even though I knew it was coming from some distance behind me, it was as if he was whispering right over my shoulder. “Come back and I’ll explain.”
Explanations could just go and fuck themselves, I decided. All this time I had been travelling with something as inhuman and monstrous as those giant beetles.
He would be on my trail, I decided. There was no way he would just lie there. Now I was away from the fire, my eyes were adjusting to the moonlight. I moved between the cover of trees, wishing for the rocky terrain of yesterday. Once I had put a bit of distance between us, I hid behind the thick trunk of an acacia and tried to spot him. There! I must have got just enough of a head start; he was some way away, scanning the horizon, trying to see which way I had run.
I waited until his back was turned and then ran again, aiming for a line of bushes dead ahead. If I could keep the cover between us, I stood a chance of getting away, though I had no doubt he’d probably spend the night hunting for me if he had to.
At the bushes I stopped again and turned to look for him. There was no sign at all, and I could only hope he had headed off in the wrong direction. I took a minute to try and get a sense of my bearings. Which way was the town from here? It was no good. In my panic I’d got myself all turned around.
A few hundred yards awa
y stood another large acacia. If I climbed up it, I should be able to see where I was, and it would also make a good hiding place.
Checking around again first, just in case the wily bastard had been sneaking up on me, I made a run for the tree. During those long moments in the open I kept expecting him to appear, that ancient body pounding through the dust towards me, mouth and eyes on fire. Those eyes had seemed terrifying enough when they had appeared human, boring into me like drill bits. What would he do when he caught up with me? I imagined him lowering that blazing mouth towards me. One laugh and my face would be a blackened mask of burned meat and crisp bone. Hadn’t he said that he’d come from Wormwood? The more I thought about this mythical town, the more I began to believe in it. In the last day, I had seen giant bugs and a man with fire burning inside of him. My sense of what was impossible or not had taken a pounding. Either that or someone had been spiking the beans and I was out of my head.
A few weeks ago, I had seen a guy in Illinois running around the street screaming at demons. A shopkeeper had told me they’d all just got used to it. ‘Smokes some weird Injun shit,’ he had said. ‘At his best he’s fighting thin air, and at his worst he’s face down in the dirt smelling of his own kaka.’
It might explain things, but I knew in my gut that what I had seen wasn’t a hallucination. If I’d been given a dose of something, everything would have seemed weird. The tree I was climbing was solid, there was an ache in my ass from spending so long on the mule, I had a badly-timed need to piss. These were real, earthy sensations. Life was as solid as it had ever been; it just had some weird shit in it that I couldn’t even begin to explain.
I was never one to climb trees as a kid (of course not, I would always be put off by imagining the split head caused by falling out of one), but I scaled that acacia easily enough. Fear puts a spring in your step.
I lodged myself as high as I dared, the branches above me looking too thin to support my weight. Lying back against the trunk, I was covered by the leaves enough that I figured I was as hidden as I could hope for. I tried to get comfortable, not wanting to thrash around too much and give away my position.
From up there, I could see the old man. If he even was a man, which I was beginning to doubt. I mean, Christ, I didn’t know his name and now I didn’t even know what kind of creature he was. He was walking in a wide circle around the camp, staring out into the darkness trying to catch a sight of me. The moon wasn’t full, but it was big enough to turn the world into a photograph, a world made of thick blacks, washed-out whites and bland greys.
He clearly hadn’t seen me get this far, which was a relief. Hiding up a tree was one thing, being cornered up one something else.
His face must have returned to normal. He was climbing up a ridge some distance away, nothing but a black outline, moving against the stars.
I tried to relax. I was going to be stuck up that tree for some time, and I’d like not to be crippled by the time I climbed back down.
He began to walk towards me, and for a moment I thought he must have seen me. Maybe those eyes of his worked better in the dark than mine. Maybe he could smell me. Who knows?
Then I heard him talking, and I realised he was just working his way around, hoping I would hear him.
“I ain’t a danger to you, son,” he said. “I know it must seem that way, but I’m not. I understand you got scared. I know all of this seems too much. But sometimes a man has to face his destiny head on, and yours is by my side, taking the walk to Wormwood. Wherever you go, however far you run, you’ll always end up back on that path. And you don’t want to walk it alone, believe me. I can’t promise I’ll keep you safe, but I sure will try, and that’s the best offer a man can get in this world. So why don’t you come out and we can talk about it?”
It was the most I’d ever heard him say. Part of me wanted nothing more than to believe it, too. He had saved my life a couple of times, hadn’t he? Why would he do that if he meant to harm me? But I did not climb down.
He passed right beneath me, still talking, repeating the same kind of words, coaxing talk like you’d give to a child.
“Fearing the unknown is pointless,” he insisted. “There’s enough to be scared of in this world without being frightened of something that may never come to pass. Or something that ain’t what it appears to be. Let go of it, boy. Come out here and we can go on together...”
He moved away and I stopped listening, his words eventually lost in the faint wind that had begun to blow.
Once he was out of sight again, I shifted a little, trying to see if I could spot the town. Either it was further away than I thought or they had no lights burning, because there was nothing but open land and shadow. I’d have to stay up here until first light; hopefully then I’d be able to find my way.
Finally the urge to piss got so it was more than I could bear. There was still no sign of him, so I unbuttoned myself and let go of my bladder, the stream worryingly loud as it rained down on the dirt below. Once done, I was a lot more comfortable and I managed to wedge myself tightly enough I was able to close my eyes and nod off a little. The fear had kept me awake that long, but it had been a long day and night and my head wanted to close up for a while.
I woke to daylight. I checked my watch. A quarter of eight.
I looked around for the old man, but there was no sign of him. More importantly, the town was now clear, over to my left. It was closer than I imagined. If only I could have seen it the night before, I could have run there in less than half an hour and saved myself a night up a tree.
As my wise old mother had used to say: ‘If wishes were horses, we’d all be buried in horse-shit.’
I checked again for the old man. I couldn’t see the camp, but I hoped he might have moved on anyway. Having not found me, he must have guessed that I was long gone.
I climbed down and began to run towards the town. I did my best to stick to cover where there was some, constantly checking all around me in case the old man had been lying in wait.
There was no sign of him and I was soon at the edge of the town.
‘Wentworth Falls,’ a sign announced, hanging neatly from a wooden frame. ‘Population 403.’ Underneath someone had added an extra note: ‘No outlaws, gunmen or sporting ladies.’
Maybe that was why he hadn’t wanted to stop here the day before. If those eyes of his had been able to read the sign at a distance, he would have known that he fit two of the criteria for being unwelcome. Personally, I decided he could keep Wormwood. Wentworth Falls sounded like my kind of heaven.
I walked under the sign and down the main street. You would have thought that out of four hundred and three law-abiding men and women, I’d have heard at least one of them, but the place was utterly silent. The buildings were in good order. In fact, the town was one of the nicest I’d seen on my journey. Everything was fresh and brightly painted, the timbered homes showing no sign of wear. It was as if everything had only just been built, made as pretty as a picture book, and then nobody turned up.
I figured it was late enough that there had to be some people up and about, so I began to shout as I walked along. “Hello?” I called. “Anyone around?”
To my left was a general store. Its sign claimed it to be the property of James Hodgkins, and that it offered The Best Prices in the State.
That might be true, but it seemed to me that Hodgkins had slept late, as the doors were firmly closed.
I climbed up onto the boardwalk and peered through the window. It was too dark to see a thing.
I knocked on the door, in case the owner was inside. “Hello?”
There was no reply. Beneath my feet the boardwalk shifted slightly, and I had to lean on the closed doors to steady myself. Hodgkins may offer the best prices, I decided, but he should fix his damn planking before one of his customers broke their neck.
I stepped back down onto the street, walking on to a junction between a bank on one side and a dressmaker on the other. I looked both ways and felt a hug
e weight of relief when I could see someone standing on the boardwalk a little up to the left. I had begun to think the whole place must be empty.
“Hi, there!” I shouted, heading towards him. “Am I glad to finally see another face. I’ve had a couple of days like you wouldn’t believe.”
He had his back to me and I expected him to turn around as I was talking to him, but he just stood there, staring towards the far end of the street. Maybe he didn’t realise I was addressing him, though there sure wasn’t anyone else to talk to.
“Hey, feller,” I called again, “could you help a man out?”
He was wearing a plaid shirt and loose grey flannels. A derby was pulled down low on his head.
Still he wouldn’t turn to face me.
By now I was right behind him and all I had to do was reach out and touch his shoulder. It felt strangely cold and hard.
“Feller?” I asked.
Finally he turned to reveal a face of rough wood, the same heavy grain as the boardwalk we were stood on. There were small knots for his eyes and a larger one for his mouth, open in a lopsided ‘O’ that widened as he moved. He creaked like a fence in high wind, the wooden hole in his face groaning as it opened wide enough to let out a sharp, snapping noise like you’d get if you trod on a branch.
I took all this in in a matter of moments, so shocked at the sight of it that I hadn’t even thought to be frightened of him. It was so unbelievable I just stared, my jaw dropping as wide as his.
He reached out an arm and the fingers were long carpenter’s nails, slightly bent. They glistened a little in the sun. He was like a bad sculpture made from offcuts, an approximation of a man knocked up with saw, hammer and chisel.
My legs finally moved and I took a couple of steps back as those sharp, nail fingers flexed and tried to get a grip on me. That open mouth issued another loud snap and I turned to run, stumbled off the boardwalk and rolled into the dirt street.