She also was right that D-O-G-S didn’t fit anywhere. “Let me help you out,” Doc offered. He selected a few letters and placed them on the board under the N in RUN. “The rescue must be completed before dawn, that is, at N, I, G, H, T—NIGHT.”
He turned to Rae. “Now, your DOGS.”
Rae lined her tiles along the G in NIGHT:
She continued the story: “Then Gil and I will round up Penny and all of the DOGS—from the barracks and—”
“And,” Gil interjected, “get them all to the back D,O,O,R — DOOR—where they’ll crawl out to freedom!” He and Rae exchanged high fives.
Vigil’s tone turned serious. “It won’t be easy, kids. You’ll be operating under strict time constraints. Saving every one of them is unrealistic.”
“But, Dad, we can’t leave anyone there. They’ll die.”
“Honey, shh. We’ll do our best. But we cannot promise a hundred percent success. Gil needs to get home before anyone misses him. And you both need to show up at school as usual.”
Gil was rearranging more letter tiles. “Seriously, Dad? Can’t you call in sick for us?”
He shook his head slowly. “I don’t think that would be wise.”
Doc Goodman agreed. “Remember, the night shift ends at seven o’clock, so the morning guards could arrive as early as 6:30.”
“Good point, Ken.” Vigil continued, “So you two must get back to the car by six o’clock at the very latest.” He shifted a stern eye from Rae to Gil. “No exceptions.”
“But we will rescue them all,” Rae insisted on the final word.
As it turned out, it really was the final word of the meeting, because just as she said it (a bit too loudly), the doorknob turned.
All four stared at her mother, Nurse Joan Robin Devine, in hospital scrubs. Gil and Rae’s jaws hung open like broken toys. Vigil’s hand instinctively slid Angie’s map under the Scrabble board.
“Mom! What are you doing here?”
“Um, I live here?” She surveyed the scene, suspicious. When was the last time they’d invited the veterinarian and an unfamiliar boy over for a game of Scrabble on a Wednesday night? “What’s going on here?” she demanded of her husband.
“We’re playing board games,” he replied, hoping it would be obvious. “Joan, this is Gil.”
“Nice to meet you, Mrs. Devine.” His voice was hoarse.
Doc Goodman slid the chair out next to him. “Care to join in?”
“No, no,” she said, “really.” She was studying the Scrabble Board. “Let’s see, what have we here? CUT, DOOR, NIGHT, DARK, DOGS, RUN, FAST, CAR. Interesting.” She looked directly at her husband.
He tried to change the subject. “You got off work early. That’s terrific.”
“It is terrific, isn’t it? Fortuitous, even.” She smiled ominously at each of them and locked longest on her daughter with the nearly shaven head. Rae swallowed hard. Then her mother turned to Gil. “Gil, is it?” Her eyes shifted to the row of tiles in front of him: “T, H, U, R, S—THURSday. Those can go right. . .here.” She moved her finger horizontally from the T along the column that spelled NIGHT. Gil tried to mutter a thank you, but there was no sound.
No one had a response to this wholly unexpected encounter. As complex as the rescue plans were, this confrontation by Ms. Devine was the most challenging moment yet. She spelled T-R-O-U-B-L-E. What had she meant that her arrival home was “fortuitous”? Why the sinister smile? All four of them suffered the same dreaded thoughts: Would she turn them in? She wouldn’t really have her own husband arrested, would she? Or Doc Goodman, who had risked his life for them only months ago to save Penelope from the fate she now faced?
Then again, Daffy County had gone mad. Neighbors turned on neighbors, friends turned on lifelong friends. And yes, family members not uncommonly turned on their own relatives. Vigil alone knew that, regrettably, his wife had done it once before—to her own son, no less.
Or, they wondered, would she keep their secret, look the other way? Rae recalled her mother sobbing, turning the pages of Penny’s photo album that first night amid a carpet of used tissues. There was no telling. One thing they did know was that they couldn’t count on her. Vigil made an executive decision. Their rescue mission could not wait until tomorrow night. It had to happen before sunrise.
CHAPTER 17
Plan “B”—A Gutsy, Illegal, But Necessary Adventure
I DREAMED I WAS DYING. The hospital room was overtaken by beeping machines, and a bright examining light shone down on me. “It won’t be long,” said a woman who listened through a stethoscope. She wore a long black robe and a flowing headpiece. Someone nearby was praying in a language I didn’t recognize.
Suddenly, the examining light overhead became infinitely brighter. Blinding white rays from the center bulb cast an intense, powerful glow.
“She’s gone,” the robed woman whispered. At that very instant, I floated upward and my perspective shifted: I was looking down at the bed from suspended whiteness high above the ceiling. I watched, hovering there from that telescoping place as I saw my small body lying on the bed among folded sheets. The woman kissed my forehead, and her stethoscope became a rosary. I heard a sob from this woman, who had become my mother, and chanting from the corners of the room. Next, I was sucked by tremendous force into the euphoric light. I became one with It.
I understood! But they did not.
I awoke startled in my own bed. I clung to Iggy, rocking myself through an indescribable fear. Had I just died? Was I alive? I pinched myself hard and bore down on the mattress to keep from flying away like a magic carpet. I wept in silence—but as frightened as I was, my tears were of unspeakable joy. It was the strangest, most marvelous moment of my life.
I never told a soul about this dream, except my mother years later. She was reading a book about death after my grandmother died. “Isn’t it fascinating?” she exclaimed. “People who’ve been pronounced dead but are revived all describe a similar experience: They’re met by a bright light and a feeling of extreme happiness. Even if they don’t believe in God.”
“I know. That happened to me once. I saw that light,” I told her.
“Don’t be silly,” she laughed.
HOURS BEFORE DAWN, Rae and her father tiptoed through the dew to the driveway. An upstairs curtain rippled. When they got to Gil’s house, his small, dark silhouette appeared from behind a tree. The three drove off, exchanging whispered greetings tainted with dread. They were three human hearts pounding, a percussion of raw nerves.
It was a short ride through the town Rae had known all her life, but nothing looked familiar: Jefferson Elementary School, the library with the Historic Site marker in the front, the firehouse and the strip of dollar stores and gas stations. The car was warm, but her teeth chattered. Gil sat beside her in the back seat.
Her father dropped a letter addressed to Chief Ollie Jerkins into the mailbox on the corner of Spring Street. The instant the engine stopped, Rae panicked. Her knees began to spasm uncontrollably, and the knot in her stomach tightened. She had no hair to hide behind. She let out an anguished cry.
She had never felt such fear before. Not on the way up the Rebel Rouser roller-coaster, not at the tipping point looking down at what could only be described as her death, the whole ride only ninety seconds but long enough for an entire life to pass by. Not the moment when Jackson was whisked away behind an iron door, her legs buckling, and those same short cries stifling themselves in her chest. Those had been child’s play compared to now. Now, she was staring Terror dead-center in the eye.
She gasped for air, on the cusp of hysteria. Gil remained motionless beside her. Her father pivoted from the driver’s seat. “Raelyn. Rae. Listen to me.” His command wove its way through internal echoes, each word hanging in isolation: “You. Don’t. Have. To do. This.”
He was right. She could back out this very instant. She could go home, light and breezy, and dive back under the covers. Yet at the same time, something in his words stirred her. A
memory arose from years before. . .an ailing Penelope in her lap, proud faces, encouraging voices off stage: “You rose to a difficult challenge. . .you could have quit, but you didn’t. . .ninety percent of life is showing up.”
She knew at that moment that she would never retreat. She had a promise to fulfill. This was her mission, her calling. Penelope was waiting for her. It had been nearly six months in the works to get her there—a preordained destiny she only vaguely understood: The sign at Blundertown Park, the nasty neighbors. Doc Goodman’s midnight visit after the night of broken glass. The collar reducing Penelope to a number, the fake postcard. The buckets and the Mystery Tower, the unexplainable A+ with poodles wearing ribbons. She had tried everything: the Pet Lovers Club, the project in technology class, the risky photographs, the “F” in civics. But she wasn’t done yet.
Her terror, she realized, was not about the abstract, unthinkable things that might happen if they got caught. It was about getting caught itself. Someone said there is nothing to fear but fear itself. It had never made sense to her before. The solution was simple: Don’t overthink, just do it. Fear itself! Ninety percent!
With this new voice, the shaking knees and spasms stopped.
Penelope was calling!
She and Gil received a final lecture at the driver’s window. “Synchronize your cell phones. It’s now 3:48 a.m. You have two hours. You must be back here by six at the latest. No exceptions. Is that understood?” They nodded. “I’ll be waiting. Any delay would be. . . .” His voice trailed off. Then he looked at his daughter. “One hundred percent is not an option. I need your word.” She promised. The skin under his eye twitched. “Good luck, you two.” As she was about to leave, he reached out, grabbed her hand, and squeezed it with all his might.
“Ow, Dad.”
She and Gil hiked a few steps in the dark before breaking into a sprint. Gil was instantly ahead of her. “Hey!” she called in a throaty whisper. He reached back and grabbed her hand, propelling her forward into, for her, a very swift pace. They only stopped when they reached the far corner of the Compound. They searched the back fence with their flashlights until they located the cut in the wire, courtesy of Doc Goodman. They manipulated the wire, bending it up and to the side. Then they got down on all fours and crawled in.
What had not been discussed at the meeting (thanks to the untimely interruption by her mother) were the critical details of detaining the Night Guard before rescuing the dogs. But Rae and Gil formulated a vague plan. It was fraught with disastrous possibilities, but it was the only one they could think of. They made their way silently, clearing a diagonal through the spacious field. She kept right up with him, their phones bobbing unsteady light in front of them beneath a canopy of stars.
“Watch out!” Rae called. He saw it, too, inches in front of his sneaker: a wide, open pit smack in the middle of the meadow, camouflaged by darkness. Its depth was unknown.
“Whoa.” He stopped right at the edge. “Where did that come from?” They guided each other around it and continued more cautiously through the field and between the buildings. They reached the Security Station where they hoped the Night Guard would be sleeping, as Officer Budd had said. The only light on the grounds came from the office window on the second floor. She inched the front door open and listened. It was the joyous sound of snoring! She flashed Gil an “A-Okay.”
They removed their shoes and tiptoed up the stairs. The snores came from Her Room to the right, where she had been held under lock and key as Angie Quinn. The door was wide open. The light from the hallway revealed an intimidating mound on the front cot, the bearded face snoring directly at them.
In the office, the guard’s cell phone sat on the desk, and the key hung in place on the wall hook. She grabbed it, shuffled back to Gil, and gave him a nod. He closed the door without a sound. She turned the key full circle until it clicked. They hurried downstairs and into the chilly darkness. The Night Guard was locked in.
She took a breath. “Whew. That was easy.”
“Yeah, but it could have been—”
“But it wasn’t.”
“I know. But he could’ve been—”
“But he wasn’t.”
“I’m just saying—” Gil waited for an interruption—“that we’re lucky, that’s all.” It was only a matter of time before the guard would awake and realize his predicament.
Only then did they acknowledge the smell. It was the same stench that had overcome her the last time she was there. They’d been so consumed by their fear and risky business that the traces of decay and burning had gone unnoticed.
Gil gagged and covered his face. “Ugh! What is that?”
“Not now. Let’s focus, okay?” she said, blocking her nose as well.
The next phase of the Rescue was, of course, the rescue. Neither of them was prepared for the emotional impact Phase II would have. She’d been there before, but for Gil, it was like he’d stepped into a foreign land, eerie and deserted. He stayed unusually, even rudely, close to her, his arm rubbing her shoulder. In the real world it would’ve been a boundary violation, “getting into her space.” But neither of them even noticed.
“What do we do now?” he asked, as if they’d just landed on Mars by complete accident.
She surveyed the grounds, at a loss herself where to begin. All the details they’d gone over had completely vanished. The beam of her flashlight traveled slowly, left to right, highlighting the structures opposite them: The Groom Room, the Storage Shed, Barracks I (Barracks II was out of view), and further back, the Mystery Tower looming high above. She switched off the light. Neither spoke. The gray buildings blended beautifully with the dark, charcoal sky like two-dimensional cookie-cutter outlines, a child’s simple drawing. It looked like the map she would have drawn. Or a respectable artist’s work, Study of Silhouettes, Pre-Dawn, Charcoal on paper. None of it seemed real. Her brain was strangely vacant.
She searched overhead, perhaps for a hint of divine guidance from the heavens. But all she found there was a giant question mark, the tilt of the Big Dipper: You Are on Your Own.
“Um. . .okay,” she directed, “you take Barracks I. I’ll take Barracks II. We go in and—” she paused—“and we don’t think, got it? And we get the dogs out. And we find Penelope.”
“Do you think they’re—”
“Gil!” she shouted. “I just said, ‘We don’t think,’ and then you say something about thinking. We just go in and do it. Like robots.” She glanced at her phone. “We’re wasting time.” She attacked him with a commanding bear hug, fists clenched around his shoulders and heels off the ground. A warm comfort engulfed her but vanished in an instant. She ran off past Barracks I to the building behind it. She stopped at the door of Barracks II and held her breath.
The door creaked as it opened. She scanned the interior with her flashlight. The shaft of light met one sight, then another, then another: Dogs. Dogs everywhere. Emaciated, lying on top of one another, large black orbs staring at her, bewildered and nearly lifeless on the bare floor. Everywhere she looked, they were there. There must have been well over a hundred of them.
“Penny?” She heard a thin, quivering voice. Whose voice was this, what was this hellish place? “Penny, come,” the voice called again, this time louder. A general stirring began, some shifting here, some rustling there. As her night eyes began to adjust, the floor became a sea of fluttering movement. She heard her own heart pounding. “Come, guys,” she urged. “Come!”
Then they came. First just a handful, limping, dragging themselves across to her, stepping over each other. She heard an awakening of light breathing, low moaning. Someone sneezed in the far corner. Someone whimpered. Next thing she knew, she was surrounded by dozens of four-leggeds. “Come!” She recognized a measure of hope in the voice as the entire floor seemed to swell up at once. It was a mass movement of weakness that rolled toward her, like a salty tide seeping into the sand beneath her feet, caressing her toes, hugging her thighs. Salt trickled dow
n her face. She was on her knees, her arms and lanky elbows extended everywhere, caressing the uncaressable skin and bone.
She was the Pied Piper. She beckoned and coaxed them out the door, and they followed her. Behind Barracks I, behind the Spa and the Mystery Tower and to Doc Goodman’s secret door, lay their pathway to freedom. The small herd tried to keep pace. A few tails even fluttered, and the wails and barks grew stronger.
When they reached the opening in the fence, they stopped. Some lay down, already exhausted.
“Go,” Rae commanded. “Go on. Now!” Confused faces studied her. “Fetch!” She pantomimed tossing a stick high into the darkness beyond the fence. “Fetch!” She made more throwing motions. “Go get it!” A wave of panic crept through her; every second was critical. “What’s the matter with you?” she cried. She began steering them through the fence, one by one, careful to avoid their protruding hip bones. So far, none of them was Penelope. They reached the other side in painfully slow procession, but it was working.
When she finished the line, she turned back to gather more. Dogs were wandering aimlessly all over the place, stumbling, wailing, whimpering. She worked tirelessly. Back and forth, she relayed from the dorm, rounding them up and pushing them out. Some began to follow each other out the door, but this was going to be a race against time—and she had noted that some of the freed dogs were merely lingering on the other side instead of galloping off into the forest and toward their second chance of life. That would be the last phase of their mission, if they ever made it that far.
Barracks II was finally empty. The black sky had become a deep violet gray. She had not seen Gil. She had not seen Penelope. And dawn was only a gradual curve of Earth away.
As she ran to check on Gil, a voice boomed and cursed from high. It was the night guard, his hairy face large in the shattered window, his fist violently pounding the air. His torso looked about to leap out of the window frame when he spotted her. He shouted, among obscenities, “This is an order! Cease and desist! You’ll pay for this,” his arms flailing about from his helpless post.
The Thing at the Edge of Blundertown Page 14