by R. R. Irvine
******
Boyd Jarman ran blindly. He knew that he shouldn’t be running, that he should be standing perfectly still. Blind men don’t run, they grope.
But he couldn’t help himself. He was fleeing the specter that he’d tried to kill with the .30-06, the same undying specter that had been haunting his nightmare for as long as he could remember—a specter of blindness.
Jarman’s face blazed with pain. Flashes, like the one that had erupted from the rifle barrel, spread like solar flares inside his head. He blinked frantically and rubbed at his face. Other than afterburn, like that from a faulty television camera, he saw only with his imagination: He saw the nightmare that was following him, a thing with bloody sockets instead of eyes.
“Please, God,” he prayed, “let me see. Otherwise . . .”
His mind veered away from the alternative.
His hands knuckled frantically until his eyelids felt raw. He blinked.
Thank the Lord. There were shadows. He saw shadows. Or was it some trick of his imagination? Some false hope to make him suffer all the more?
No, by damn, they were real. In fact, he could see shapes now. Colors as well. Even though the world was still out of focus, as if viewed through a smear of Vaseline, he somehow knew he was going to be all right.
His blink-rate rose with his joyous heartbeat. Tears flushed down his face, into his mouth, over his chin. More tears than he’d ever cried. And all at once those tears washed his eyes free of fear.
He saw perfectly—the tree branch with its twin spears, a sharpened fork. He saw it even as he impaled himself, skewering both eyes.
Pain, like nothing he’d ever experienced before, exploded red, then became an agonizing black as the awful knowledge descended upon him. Blindness was irrevocable now. No amount of tears would wash it away.
Jarman didn’t realize he was screaming until the strain of it broke something in his throat. Silence closed down around him like the snapping of a trap.
Mute, unable to voice his flaming anguish, he writhed like a bug on a pin. Even when his jerking legs gave way beneath him, he didn’t fall. The twin spears held him fast. He hung there like a dead leaf waiting for an autumn wind.
******
More than anything, Graham wanted to escape from the dead Indian’s presence. Yet fear held him where he was, partially sheltered by the banks of the stream.
Reason told him that he was being foolish, that there was no longer anything to fear. After all, Yeba Kah was dead.
But what if the Indian had been telling the truth?
Come on, don’t be a fool. You don’t believe in spirits, Indian or otherwise. Like hell.
Then something else occurred to him. Yeba Kah could have been taking orders from a confederate named Koshari. That would explain the scream after the Indian had already been mortally wounded. That would explain why Keene hadn’t come to Graham’s aid.
Graham hugged himself. He wanted to shrink, to hide from whatever was out there beyond the banks of the stream. Yet he knew the embankments offered no real protection. So he might as well stand up and make himself an easy target.
He did.
The sight of Jarman’s body almost made Graham lose control of his bladder and bowels. He had to force himself to approach the tree where the cameraman hung. Once Graham determined the man was dead, he turned away quickly and stumbled back toward Katie. There was no sign of Jimmy Keene.
“Southwest,” Graham told the burro, before he realized that she had been joined by Alfie and Clyde, whose nuzzling seemed to be all the medicine she needed. Her ears were cocked and alert and, most important of all, her wound had stopped bleeding.
Graham took a deep breath. The burros presence also meant the presence of food. And, though he had no hunger at the moment, he knew he needed nourishment for the trip back.
He moved out of sight of the bodies before opening a can of tuna and forcing himself to chew and swallow it. While eating, he kept hoping that Keene would return. But he didn’t.
“All right,” he said to the animals at last. “We’d better go find some help.”
The burros didn’t need urging. They trotted off eagerly, and in what looked like the proper direction. With luck, they’d take him home. All he had to do was give them their head.
They hadn’t gone far when Graham found Keene’s footprints. Judging from the tracks, the man had run off in a panic. Well, more fool him, because Graham had stayed put and as a result had all the food.
He peered back over his shoulder.
“And now that we’re all alone,” he told the burros, “there’s absolutely nothing to fear.”
But he didn’t believe a word he’d said.
36
GRAHAM HAD been lucky enough to find a small amount of dry wood to heat his beans. But searching for logs to keep the fire going all night had been beyond his endurance, although firelight would have gone a long way toward buoying his spirits.
The best he could do was roll out his sleeping bag right next to the tree to which he’d securely tied the three burros. They might step on him during the night, but that was better than being alone.
Just before sunset, birds began swooping overhead, looking for places to roost for the night. They called to one another, and one precocious magpie scolded Graham for dirtying the air with wood-smoke. After that, the bird complained about not getting enough food scraps.
Once Graham had zipped himself into the nylon bag, he felt more vulnerable than ever. Sleep was out of the question. All he could do was shiver and await the dawn.
Only the occasional hoot of an owl reassured him that life went on in the Uintas, no matter what.
******
To Keene, the bird sounds were, the beginning of his torment. With darkness, the forest had come awake. The trees above him rattled with life. Branches creaked under the weight of scuttling creatures, jostling for prime positions from which to watch him, while they themselves remained invisible.
Keene’s teeth gnashed. His neck muscles trembled as he fought to retain a semblance of self-control.
A strangled cry came from his throat when liquid began pelting him from above. One drop. Two. Then it rained down upon him, a steady patter.
In that moment, he knew what hell was like. The torments of the damned were no longer fairy tales with which to frighten children.
Droppings from a thousand birds soaked him. With the torrent, terror renewed itself within him, terror of birds, of decapitated fowl that refused to stay dead.
Instinct told him to hide. Like a soldier trying futilely to ward off an artillery barrage, he curled beneath a tree, head down against his knees, hands clasped protectively over the back of his neck. The top of his head rested heavily against the trunk, while his back remained exposed to the forest.
His scalp tingled as he sensed a tiny ripple of movement in the branches above him, as if a woodpecker had taken a single stab at bug-infested bark. Keene held his breath, awaiting the next strike. But there was nothing.
Finally he had to breathe again. As he did so, he felt another tremor. He eased away from the rough bark. Contact was no longer needed to know that there was real movement above him. Something was descending branch by branch.
More wetness fell upon him. He was slippery with it. Tentatively his body uncurled. Uncertainty had become his enemy now. Wouldn’t it be better to know what was coming?
The thought cheered him. There were no headless birds, only his overworked imagination. Strike a match and calm reality would be restored.
Keene wiped his fingers on his trousers before extracting matches from his pocket. The flare of light blinded him at first.
Then he screamed.
******
The frantic braying of the burros brought Graham bolt upright in his sleeping bag. The restrictive confines caused him momentary panic. He flailed wildly to free his arms before remembering the zipper. He grabbed for it, tore a nail, but his arms came free at last.
His thrashing had add
ed to the animals’ fright They stomped and snorted as they struggled to back away from the ropes that held them.
Awkwardly, Graham crawled from the nylon bag. His one thought was to calm the burros, to keep them from getting away. Without them, he would be lost.
He switched on his flashlight but its beam intensified their distress. Their glowing eyes rolled wildly; their heads whipped from side to side.
He doused the light and groped his way forward, hoping they wouldn’t trample him in the darkness. His left hand found one of the burros. His hook and forearm stroked another.
It was then that he heard what must have frightened them in the first place. It was a moaning sound that rose and fell in a crescendo of sobs. It struck a responsive chord within Graham, causing him to vibrate with fear.
Whatever it was, it was coming toward him. And with it, another sound, a great wacking noise.
There was no place to hide. All Graham could do was stand his ground, trembling and clutching the burros for comfort.
When the night sound became a fugue, with substance enough to feel, he could stand it no longer. He released the animals to switch on his flashlight once again. The sudden illumination was more than he expected, because the moon emerged from behind a mountain peak to add its own brilliance. And there, coming toward him, was Jimmy Keene. He wasn’t walking. He was clomping on bloody stumps where his knees should have been. And all the while his arms, what was left of them after the hands had been whacked away, flailed madly to keep his body balanced and upright.
To Graham’s horror, he saw that Keene wasn’t alone, that he was surrounded by dancers, a grotesque chorus that circled him constantly. There was the mayor, Hi Benyon, jigging to a tune set by rabid dogs as they slashed and ripped at his already tattered body. There, too, was Boyd Jarman, arms groping helplessly as if seeking a partner for his blindman’s fandango, while a step ahead of him in the macabre line of celebrants, Marilyn shuffled an arthritic two-step.
Bright moonlight emphasized every detail, while at the same time casting shadows so solid they seemed to double the number of dead.
Sheriff Fisk also danced, doubled-over as if searching for his lost manhood. Next came Sid Norris. A Polkalike fling was the best his fire-scorched body could manage.
And there was more. Councilman Del Timmons, his wrung neck canting freakishly, seemed to be listening to the beat of his own terrible music.
Yet most perverse of all was the dance of Lamar Mortenson. Cats clung to every part of his body, chewing and clawing, controlling his movements as if he were their puppet, condemned forever to a spastic tarantella.
And all of them moved inexorably toward the spot where Graham stood. His mind rebelled. With a gasp, he flung himself on Katie’s back. She needed no urging to run.
37
THE TOWN deputy didn’t believe Graham, of course, so he sent for the state police, who weren’t exactly fond of the story either. Even so, they organized search parties before calling in an assistant from the attorney general’s office in Salt Lake City. The assistant arrived along with a carload of highway patrolmen and two psychiatrists.
With so many jurisdictions represented, the questioning had to be moved to the council chambers in city hall. But location didn’t make any difference. They all doubted Graham’s sanity just the same. He could see it in their faces, especially when he told them about that final dance.
So after a while, he gave that up and told them that he must have been hallucinating. The psychiatrists nodded. The Indian’s drug, they said, could have been LSD, or a similar substance. Graham, they concluded, had taken a bad trip.
He laughed hysterically at that.
When the search parties reported back, half the cops wanted Graham charged with murder. The other half figured that even a maniac like Graham couldn’t have wreaked such havoc.
Finally, they had no choice but to settle on somebody, so they chose the Indian. The homicides were his, pure and simple. And since Graham now refused to say otherwise, they declared Yeba Kah a suicide.
Through it all, Harry remained steadfast. It was Harry who kept making journalistic noises, who forced an end to Graham’s protective custody.
Four days after his return to Moondance, it was Harry who personally escorted him from the confines of the city hall jail.
“The town has been swarming with reporters,” she told him. “From the wire services and television. Most of them are still at the Bridger House. You’re big news.”
“I don’t have time for them.”
“I hope you have time to come home with me,” she said as they crossed the street toward the Ledger.
“There’s something I have to do, Harry. Something important.”
Disappointment showed on her face.
“I love you,” he said.
“Now that you mention it, that’s what a woman my age wants to hear.”
He stopped on the sidewalk in front of the newspaper office to kiss her.
“That’s not exactly passionate,” she said. Her voice sounded strained, as if she didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. “It felt like a good-bye kiss more than anything else.”
“Harry, there’s nothing I want more than to spend the rest of my life with you.”
“But?” she prompted.
“But right now I need your help.”
Her answering sigh was one of surrender. “All right. What do you want me to do?”
“First, buy those three burros that brought me back. I made them a promise—it’s the good life from here on out.”
“We’re going to have quite a menagerie. In fact, if it weren’t for joint custody, you’d be losing man’s best friend. Shotgun and I have come to an understanding.”
“It’s like that, is it?” It was hard work for him to sound lighthearted.
Harry kissed him, passionately, yet his response was wooden. She broke contact to ask, “What’s wrong, Jack?”
He didn’t know what to say, so he merely shook his head.
“You’re keeping something from me.”
“You know what happened in those mountains. I told you the truth. Sure, I changed my story for the record, but you know it all.”
She squinted at him. “I have a funny feeling that you’re trying to spare me something.”
Graham looked away to keep her from seeing his fear. How could he explain what he didn’t understand himself? How could he tell her that it wasn’t over, that whatever was out there in the Uintas had yet another claim.
There were tears in her eyes now. He swallowed hard. He had to say something.
“I don’t know, Harry.”
He nodded up at the snow-capped peaks, so beautiful, yet so unforgiving. “It wasn’t Yeba Kah. I’m sure of that now. He drugged us, but that’s all.”
“Jack, it’s over. It has to be.”
He shook his head. “There’s something out there, something I don’t understand.”
She leaned against him.
“Do you believe me?” he asked.
She sighed. “I trust you, Jack.”
“I should have stopped them from going into those mountains.”
“What could you have done?”
Nothing, he thought. It had been out of his hands since the moment he arrived in Moondance. He clenched his good fist. A man didn’t like to think he had no control over his own destiny.
He touched her hair. There was a snap of static electricity.
Her trembling smile made him want to cry. He would have preferred to blame his own impending tears on the pain that was torturing his left hand, the same kind of phantom sensation that had plagued his stump for so long. And he knew this new pain for what it was— an omen.
“I hope this town is satisfied,” he said.
Harry closed her eyes.
“They must realize that the Hunting Ground is finished.”
Harry wouldn’t meet his gaze.
“Please,” he said, “tell me that the hunting is over for goo
d. It has to be.”
“The people around here are stubborn. They believe everything is all right now that Yeba Kah is dead.”
Graham winced. The pain in his left wrist grew until it was like a ring of fire. “Yeba Kah was dead long before Jimmy Keene.” He was panting.
“They say Keene died of a heart attack.”
“They’re fools,” he said through clenched teeth. “It’s time I left. Would you drive me home?” He rubbed his wrist. “No, I’d better walk. I need time to think.”
He opened the door to the Ledger and ushered her inside. “You take good care of those burros, and Shotgun too. Please.”
He was sweating with pain.
“Jack,” she cried. “You’re ill.”
“Please, Harry. I have to work. I have to paint.”
She was weeping freely now.
“I won’t be long,” he said.
He, too, was weeping. He didn’t want to leave her, but he had no choice. He knew what had to be done; he’d known it ever since witnessing that terrible dance.
Graham started walking toward home. There, he would paint. Put on canvas what the people of Moondance had to know. Maybe then they’d believe him. Maybe then they’d know enough to leave the Hunting Ground alone.
As he walked, the wind seemed to whisper death. Pictures formed in his mind, scenes such as he’d never painted before. They portrayed the innermost thoughts, the secret horrors of the mayor, the sheriff, of all those who’d died so violently.
Graham’s personal knowledge of those men was sketchy at best, but he sensed the validity of what his painter’s eye now saw.
He had no sense of time passing. All at once he found himself on the threshold of his house. Unbelievably, nothing seemed to have changed. The discovery brought a tinge of disappointment. When suffering changes a man, the world should alter accordingly.
As he touched the doorknob, he felt another emotion, doubt. How could he, a cripple, hope to reproduce the paintings in his mind? Even an inspired genius would need two good hands.
As if to mock him, his metal hook gleamed in the sunlight. He smashed it against the wooden panel, then threw open the door and stomped inside. Instantly, the images inside his head became more demanding.