Sweet Dreams

by William W. Johnstone

  The music from the playerless piano picked up in tempo; now it was a crashing, ominous concerto, something surely written by a mad composer. It ended with a loud, lingering minor note.

  The rattling drew nearer; now it was clear to those on the ground floor that the sound of footsteps was mixed in with the rattling noise. But the footsteps were unlike any the travelers in time had ever heard. They sounded loose, hollow—and very dry somehow.

  When the rattling reached the second floor, it ceased abruptly.

  The house was silent. Then, from afar, came wailing sounds—young voices, crying out for mercy, for help. The Manitou’s heart began beating its drumlike cadence, the throbbing pulse louder and louder.

  A girl’s scream ripped through the house, the realness of it touching everyone.

  “Stop!” the voice wailed. “Please stop.”

  Everything did stop. The drumming, the rattling, the screaming, the mysterious voices.

  Laughter came from the second floor.

  Jerry walked to the base of the curving stairs and put one foot on the first step. Maryruth’s voice stopped him.

  Jerry turned. “No,” he said, responding to the alarm in her voice. “I’m confused enough without adding to it. This Twilight Zone business is getting to me. I want to face my enemy. Whatever it is up there”—he pointed to the top of the stairs—“I want to see it. So I’m going up.”

  “Well all go,” Janet said. “Kids in the middle of the line for safety—O.K.?”

  The dark laughter drifted down to them. The drumming echoed through the now-empty—or so it seemed—mansion. Jerry slowly began to climb the stairway, conscious of the others close behind him. Nervous sweat clung to him.

  He was the first to hear the low snarling at the level of the second floor. Jerry looked up. Fear closed his throat.

  Behind him, Maryruth started screaming.

  3

  “What have we got?” the sheriff asked, before he even got out of his car.

  Red-and-blue flashing and spinning lights from a half-dozen police cars, county and state, turned the area into a carnival of colors, giving it a false gaiety.

  “Lot of blood and no bodies,” Vanderhorn told him. “Chuck’s patrol car and no sign of Chuck. Scott Haswell’s Mustang and no sign of Haswell. Claire Bolling’s car is gone. No sign of her, either. For the moment, Sheriff, that’s it.”

  “I’ve got the search warrant in my pocket,” the sheriff replied. “Take the house apart if you have to.”

  Bob sent two deputies into the house.

  After a moment, one deputy came back out into the night. “I don’t think one person could bleed that much,” he said. “And some of the blood appears to be hours older than the rest.”

  “But whose blood is it?” the sheriff asked, as if someone there could give him an answer.

  After a few seconds of silence, Bob said, “That’s question number one at the moment. Since I didn’t need a warrant to search Chuck’s car, I did so while waiting for you people. It’s clean. No blood; no sign of any trouble.”

  “Sheriff!” a highway patrolman called. “Look at this.”

  The men followed his beam of light. A clear trail led from the side of the house to the driveway. The trail was marked by flecks of blood and pressed down grass, slightly dewy.

  “Three sets of footprints,” the highway cop said. “I don’t see how it’s possible, with all that blood in the house, but it looks like Chuck and Haswell are—or were—alive. They walked out here.”

  “But their clothes were found in the house,” Bob said.

  “They were naked,” the sheriff said, kneeling down and inspecting the ground. “Look here. That’s the clear outline of a bare foot. Not a woman’s foot, either. Unless she’s a damn giant.”

  Bob squatted down beside the sheriff. “That smallest print,” he said, pointing, “that one isn’t bare.”

  A very young cop staggered out of the house. He knelt down on the porch and vomited over the edge. Wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, he looked around and said, “Jesus Christ!”

  “Obviously,” a highway cop said drily, “that young man hasn’t earned his puke badge yet.”

  “I think he just did,” Bob said. “What’s wrong, Jimmy?” he called.

  “The two men, Chuck and Scott, I guess. Looks like they’ve been gelded.”

  The sheriff jumped to a standing position. “What!”

  “Two peckers and two sets of balls, sir. Found them in the garbage can on the back porch. And the closet off the den is thick with blood; all over the floor and on the walls, up to about three feet off the floor.”

  The highway cop crossed himself.

  The sheriff cursed.

  Bob Vanderhorn walked slowly toward the house. He stepped up onto the porch and said, “All right, Jimmy. Show me.”

  Scott and Chuck appeared to be asleep in the back seat of the car. They were slumped over, hidden from any outside eyes. Occasionally, one of the men would twitch his fingers or briefly open his eyes.

  Then, without taking her eyes from the road ahead of her, Claire would say, “Be still. Be patient. Soon your purpose will be made clear.”

  The bloody, tortured, naked men obeyed.

  She cut off highway 61, turning east on highway 80 and driving just west of East Prairie to cut south on a county road that approached the archaeological site from the north. At the dig site, she pulled in and cut the engine and lights. She got out of the car to stand alone in the center of the deserted site.

  Lifting her face to the sky, she said, “I am here.”

  For a few moments she listened intently to a voice only she could distinguish from the normal night sounds. Several times she nodded her head in understanding.

  “Yes,” she said. “I am certain I have a part of you growing within me.”

  She listened further.

  “I understand,” she said. “Others have a part of you growing in their bellies. That is good, for not all of us will survive.”

  She listened again.

  When Claire smiled, the curving of her lips was ugly and evil.

  “I hear, Sanjaman, and I obey.”

  She turned, started to order the men from the back seat of her car. A voice rang from the night. “Take the car. You will understand a mile down the road.”

  Claire got behind the wheel of her car and drove off, heading toward the Lancaster house. When she passed through the point of the Manitou’s control, the car faded, and she found herself driving a mule-drawn wagon. She did not find that odd. For in her mind, she had already been flung back many years. She now had no memory of her days as a teacher in high school. She was a servant of the Manitou. That was all. Her physical features had changed, become much coarser; her hair was thicker and blacker; her eyes were more obsidian.

  She gripped the reins in her large calloused hands and clucked to the mules.

  The dead and now reborn men lay on their backs in the rear of the wagon, looking up at, but not seeing, the stars high set above them in the velvet night sky.

  The men felt no pain from their horribly mutilated bodies. The slow breeze touched the flaps of skin that dangled from their nakedness. The jarring and bouncing of the heavy open wagon on the narrow rutted road did not bother them. They could no longer relate to the life they had once known. They had no emotions of any kind. They merely obeyed and served the master. Their reason for being would be revealed very soon. Very soon.

  The huge German shepherd stood at the top of the stairs, on the second-floor landing. His lips were curled back in a horrible snarl. Just the sight of the animal would have been enough to frighten anyone.

  The massive dog had been horribly mangled by a shotgun blast. One eye was missing and the hide and fur was gone from one side of its big head, exposing the whiteness of bone. Its stomach had been ripped open; a gray pile of intestines hung from the open cavity, dangling to the floor and leaving a bloody slimy ooze beneath the dog. Ropes of drool dripped fro
m the animal’s jaws. He tensed his legs to leap at Jerry.

  A roaring explosion filled Jerry’s head, momentarily deafening him. Black smoke hampered his vision, tearing his eyes. The dog was flung backward, hideous sounds of pain and rage erupting from its throat. Blood sprayed from its mouth. For a few seconds the animal kicked its legs, then it was still.

  Lieutenant Voyles stared in disbelief at the pistol in his right hand. Instead of his S&W .38 caliber Chiefs Special, the gun in his hand was an old-style single-action . 44. Whatever the make and model and caliber of the pistol, the heavy slug had done its work. The dog was dead. Dick felt in his left-hand jacket pocket and found a handful of cartridges for the pistol. Quickly, he reloaded, setting the hammer on an empty chamber as a safety precaution. Only a very inexperienced person carries a single-action with all six chambers loaded.

  “I don’t understand,” Voyles muttered. “I just don’t.”

  “Caught between life and death,” Janet muttered. “They . . . these people, these things—whatever—are not dead, yet they are not alive ... but they can be killed.”

  “Thank God for small favors,” Voyles said, as the rattling stopped. “To hell with the rattling. Let’s get back downstairs and see if there are any guns in this house. We know now that at least some of these—whatever the hell they are—are vulnerable. Come on.” He led the way back down.

  The children stood for a moment, watching the dead dog. Heather pointed a finger at the animal while Marc watched her, a strange and confused look in his eyes. She crooked her finger at the dead beast. Slowly the dog began to assume the shape of what it had been before it was mangled by the shotgun. It rose to its feet, shook its great head, and looked at the kids. It stared at Heather.

  “You . . . you brought the dog back to life!” Marc blurted.

  The dog walked to the top of the stairs. Heather stepped forward to face the huge creature. Gently she put her hand on the dog’s head and rubbed its fur. The animal whimpered softly and licked her hand. Marc hesitantly walked up the steps and patted the dog’s head. The animal playfully jumped about and then returned to the two young people.

  “How did you do that?” Marc asked her.

  “I don’t know,” she admitted. “I just had a feeling that I could.”

  “Wow!”

  “Come on, dog,” Heather said. “Let’s go. You can come with us.”

  Together, the three of them went down the stairs to the first floor, the dog following willingly.

  “Hey, look, everybody!” Heather shouted. “See our new friend.”

  She looked around.

  The dog had vanished.

  Captain Larry Rogers, Dick Voyles immediate commander, tossed in his bed. Sleep seemed unattainable that night. The curious phone call he’d received that afternoon lay heavy on his mind. That call—from Doctor Finley at the Cape—and the subsequent calls Larry had made following his communication with the M.E.

  “Crap!” Larry muttered.

  “Larry,” his wife finally said, amusement and exasperation in her voice. For an hour she had been lying by her husband’s side. His tossing and turning and mumbling was keeping her awake.

  Larry sighed and sat up on the side of the bed. “Sorry,” he said. “But Dick should have called in hours ago. That’s the way we agreed to handle it. And Vickie was supposed to call in with her prelims this morning. Something is wrong.”

  “And? . . .” She prompted him.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Come on, Larry. We’ve been married a long time. It’s that phone call you received from the M.E. at the Cape, isn’t it. Larry, you can’t be taking that old legend seriously.”

  Silence from his side of the bed.

  She clicked on the bedside lamp and looked at her husband. “You never believed in spooks and ghosts before, Larry. You’re a cop; you deal in hard facts. You know Dick. He doesn’t always play by the rules, and he’s like a bloodhound when he gets on a scent. You’ve said so many times. Remember when you sent him down to Poplar Bluff? He didn’t call in for almost ten days.”

  “Yeah,” Larry replied. He looked around for a cigarette until he remembered he’d quit last month. Hell of a time to quit, he thought. “But Martha, this is different. I’ve got that old gut feeling about it. Look, I spoke with the sheriff this afternoon. Lennox sounded ... well, he sounded spacy. He just wasn’t tracking. I don’t believe he had a firm grip on matters, and that’s just not like him. He’s been a cop for twenty-five years; and the sheriff of that county for term after term. He takes an active part in anything that goes down in his county. No, something is definitely wrong there. Then I called the chief of police. He’s a good level-headed man; fine small-town cop. Jesus, Martha—he sounded just plain goofy. I ...”

  The phone rang. Larry snatched it up and listened for a half a minute, grunting occasionally. Finally, he said, “Keep me informed. I’ll be down there at dawn. I’ve got a hunch this is part of a bigger package, so stay loose. No. I’ll explain when I see you.” He hung up and sat quietly for a moment, a reflective expression on his face.

  “What is it, Larry?”

  “A slaughterhouse just north and west of Sikeston, Looks like a civilian and a deputy have been hacked to death. Castrated too. Jesus! Claire Bolling? Now why does that name ring a bell with me?

  His wife remained silent, letting him work it out.

  He snapped his fingers. “Sure. Now I got it. She’s a schoolteacher down in New Madrid County. I lectured in her classroom two years ago. Drug lecture. When I passed the sample drug case around, one of the kids swiped a joint out of it. When I saw it was missing, I told them I was going to pass a paper bag around the class. Whoever stole the joint—which wasn’t smokable, by the way—just drop it in the bag and I wouldn’t ask any questions. When I retrieved the bag, the damned thing had nine joints in it.” Larry laughed at the memory.

  He stood up and looked at the clock. His wife knew what that meant.

  “Bad case,” she muttered.

  “Doctor Jerry Baldwin’s wife is mysteriously killed,” the captain said. “But now the sheriff and the chief deputy tell me she died of injuries received in a minor traffic accident. Doctor Finley, probably the best M.E. in the state, says he’s never seen anything like what was done to Lisa Baldwin in all his years of working. Horrible.” He told his wife what Doctor Finley had told him.

  “Good God!” the woman said.

  “Yeah. But there’s more. Then a mysterious fire destroys the lab where her body is being kept—a fire of such intensity the fire chief at the Cape says he’s never seen anything like it and doesn’t have the vaguest idea what could have started it. The fire burned the lab—and nothing else. The chief says it looked like the goddamn fire just put itself out. And if you tell me you believe that, I’m going to personally take you to the nut house in the morning.”

  “It is morning,” she reminded him.

  “Don’t interrupt. Doctor Baldwin’s receptionist, a perfectly healthy young woman, has suddenly dropped dead of a heart attack. Now that came from Sheriff Lennox and the chief of police. But Doctor Finley says the woman was raped and bludgeoned to death with some sort of tire iron, he thinks.”

  “Good word bludgeoned,” she muttered.

  Larry gave her a look guaranteed to curl the toenails of any young trooper. His wife ignored it.

  “My chief investigator for this district has not reported in, and neither has Vickie. To top that all off, now I understand that Claire Bolling might be involved in a double torture-murder.” He shook his head. “No way, honey. Too many things are happening in and around Good Hope for all this to be mere coincidence.”

  He jerked up the phone and punched out a number. “Who worked the Lisa Baldwin accident in New Madrid County? Yes, I am fully aware of the time. You just get me the information. Captain Larry Rogers. Thank you so very much, Sergeant.”

  He waited for several minutes. “Come on, come on,” he muttered. “O.K. Right. Voyles an
d Kowalski. Where is Kowalski? Goddamn it, Sergeant, I know he’s on vacation. I want to know where.”

  Another short wait.

  “Fine, Sergeant. That’s dandy. But I don’t care if Kowalski is coon hunting with the reincarnation of Rin Tin Tin. You order a chopper and get out to that lake and get him.” Larry cursed under his breath while his wife rolled over on her stomach and tried unsuccessfully to stifle a giggle. “Goddamn it!” Larry roared. “Not Rin Tin Tin—Kowalski! The damn dog’s been dead for years. I want Kowalski at the Holiday Inn at Sikeston at seven o’clock in the morning. You copy all that? Fine. Sorry I yelled at you, Sergeant. Yes. Fine. That’s right. We all have those days.”

  He hung up and reached for his pants.

  “I gather you are going to the Bootheel?” his wife asked.

  “You gather correctly,” Larry replied.

  “At twelve-thirty in the morning,” she said. “You know”—she turned to face him—“I could have married that minister.” She pulled the covers up to her chin. “And I could have married that football player. But no, I had to marry a cop.”

  Larry grinned at her. “Regrets?”

  “Hell, no!”

  Larry laughed, kissed her, and then slipped out of the bedroom. “I might get too busy to call, Hon. So don’t worry. You know how I am about losing track of time.”

  “Uh-huh,” she replied.

  Larry Rogers was about to lose a lot of time. About ninety years.

  4

  “But the dog was there!” Heather protested. “I patted him and he followed us down the stairs.”

  “She brought him back to life,” Marc blurted, the words tumbling out of his mouth in a rush. “I saw her do it. She just crooked her finger and the dog began changing.”

  “She brought that creature back to life?” Jerry said.

  “How?” Voyles asked.

  “I just felt I could do it,” Heather said. “Something—I don’t know what—came over me. And I did it.”