Nights Towns: Three Novels, a Box Set

by Douglas Clegg

  Prescott reached into his coat pocket and pulled out his pipe. "Man needs a pipe on a day like this." He tapped the pipe against his knee and filled it with tobacco from a small plastic pouch. "I hope I didn't forget my whatchacallit." He patted various pockets in search of his lighter.

  But he had not; it was in the breast pocket of his shirt.

  "You're sure you're not too cold?"

  Cup smiled; it was the first time Prescott had seen him smile since he'd told him about Lily Whalen's death. Prescott also smiled, "You're a terrific liar," Prescott said, "has anyone ever told you that? I'm freezing my derri re off." He lit his pipe and puffed away.

  11

  According to Worthy's diary, the reason for the community's move from this side of the lake to the other had little to do with an Indian attack and the yearly flooding of this area. Why would these people move their families, uproot them from perfectly good land, to move less than a mile away, and the swampy side of the area? Even if the Indians had set the settlement on fire, as is still alleged to this day, why move to an area that was no better protected? It seems an illogical, arbitrary move, and has always disturbed me. It was illogical to Worthy's father, too, who felt a strong enough guilt to remain with his own family on this side of the lake.

  The settlement's move was precipitated by that fire, but it wasn't the local Indians who set it. This fire that was set in the middle of winter.

  The fire was set by the town's own inhabitants.

  It was a cleansing, Cup.

  You see, that winter, that fourth winter, more children died. If we are to trust Worthy Houston's account.

  Eighteen children died that one winter, all before New Year's.

  None of them died of natural causes.

  In late November, some of the children were missing from their homes, and soon families were forming search parties. The snow in these hills gets bad; you remember the storm of '75? People of my generation talk in awed tones about the storm of '41, how people actually froze to death in the hills. But in 1754, these men searched for days, in one of the worst blizzards they had ever faced. They did not return with their children.

  Now, that autumn something else happened. Tabitha Carson, the wife of Nathaniel Carson, died in childbirth. It would've been her eighth child. Nathaniel went mad with grief—quite literally. His neighbors had to restrain him one night when he went out into the snow half-naked "like a savage," Worthy wrote, and slaughtered more than a dozen of the domestic animals in this stockade. It was called the goat dance, but it contained more than just goats, it was their version of the community jackpot where all the horses, pigs, and chickens were corralled during the long winter. There was even a stable of sorts over there.

  Worthy wrote a twisted tale about the name, goat dance, actually being derived from an Indian source, a name known when trappers lived like nomads in the valley, cohabiting areas peacefully with the Indians. This field bounded by the Marlowe-Houston House was a sacred place, indicated by the forking of the streams. It was called the Ghost Dance, and it was where the Indians buried their dead in the belief that they became one with the Great Spirit. These were the Tenebro Indians—I believe you belonged to their namesake club? They were considered a fierce tribe, and would partake of a cannibalistic feast in the winter in which the spirits of the dead spoke through those who consumed their flesh. It was their shaman test—those who survived the ordeal became men of great wisdom and religious power. At the end of the festival, the Tenebro built a great fire and cast living human beings, usually prisoners-of-war, into it. Of course, many such abominations have been attributed to Indians so that we white folks can feel a little less guilty. But even the Tenebro abandoned this place; for them, also, it acquired a taint. Something more than just the coming of the white man. Soon after, the Tenebro were hunted by colonists and the southern Indians, into extinction.

  But back to those settlers. In the New Year, 1755, what is now called a False Spring occurred, but back then, it was called an Indian Summer. An Indian Summer wasn't then the wonderful hangover of summer that we see it as. An Indian Summer was a time of fear. Summer was considered a season of hard labor for people back in the 1700s, and also a time when the Indian attacks occurred. And when these bizarre changes in temperature came on, it meant that there was the possibility of Indian attacks on the homes.

  The snow melted within a week in January, water flooded the settlement.

  I suppose if it hadn't been for this unusual turn in the weather, the outcome might've been different. The settlers might have cooled down; their fears rose with the temperature. They might not have acted so rashly. But that is a small-town historian's hindsight, isn't it?

  The waters from this flood poured into the goat dance, and to save the livestock, men went in and brought the animals out of the enclosure to the higher ground. The place was filled with mud, and the earth gave up something in the water. Something very horrifying indeed.

  Eleven children's bodies emerged. Their faces looking upward. They had only been buried a few feet beneath the ground. The water brought them right to the top.

  Someone had murdered every single one of those children. And it had not been an Indian. It had been one of the town's own men.

  Within the hour, according to Worthy, townsfolk pointed the guilty finger at Nathaniel Carson. He was the most obvious lunatic after the animal slaughter in the fall, and small towns don't change much over the years, we all tend to look for a convenient scapegoat. He was also a sick man, physically, although the cause is unknown. Worthy believed he carried some plague, but perhaps by this he meant cholera. I suppose whether or not Nathaniel was guilty of murder doesn't really matter now. Within the hour, he was hanging from a tree.

  But this didn't satisfy the people. They wanted more blood.

  Carson was dead, his wife had died.

  What about his children?

  You must remember, Cup, that just about every family in this settlement felt they had lost at least one child to Carson's savage brutality, and then others to illnesses. Assuming that it was Carson. So, now these people are wondering: what about his own children? Why should Nathaniel Carson's name be allowed to trickle down through the years, when other names were almost snuffed out?

  Several of the men from the leading families went to the house where the seven Carson children were being held while their father was hanged. Worthy says that according to his father, the settlers used the excuse of disease, that Nathaniel Carson had brought some sort of infestation upon the settlement, that all his children must have it, therefore. If there was a disease I have no doubt it was a result of "sepsis." A kind of poisoning of the local water through the occasional emptying into it of some kind of pathological microorganisms—the beginnings of the taint of Clear Lake. But it's only a guess on my part, based simply on the fact that an old underground septic tunnel, one of the town's first sewers, really, collided with a stream that feeds into the present lake.

  But in that first settlement, the taint was clearly on the Carson family themselves.

  They gathered up the children and put them in the shack that served as a stable at the edge of the goat dance. They tied their hands behind their backs. They locked them in. The ground was still wet, but the townsfolk threw dry cords of wood all around the shack. They blocked up the entrances and windows with hay.

  And those people

  They set it on fire.

  With those children inside, ages three to twelve. All crying for help, screaming, Worthy Houston describes the scene almost sadistically. He keeps claiming in his diary that his writing is word for word the way his father described the event—his father was a little boy when it happened.

  The oldest Carson boy, Andrew, ran through the burning hay into the mob, his entire body on fire, trying to make it to safety.

  But Worthy's own grandfather, Cyrus, beat Andrew Carson over the head with a club and the boy died.

  The Carson name died that night in Pontefract, the Old Po
ntefract.

  And before dawn, the entire village was on fire, and that fire was blamed on the Indians—there had been attacks on other towns in the valley, so the settlers attributed this destruction to the various warring tribes. That spring, the Indian Massacre of 1755 was launched in southwestern Virginia. This coincided nicely with the French and Indian War that was brewing over the hills. Scapegoats were plentiful then.

  But of course, it was guilt that set that fire—guilt over what an entire community had done to those Carson children. They must've been out of their minds from finding their own children dead.

  I believe they set their own homes on fire as a means of absolution.

  This place, this side of the lake, had acquired a "taint."

  12

  Prescott caught his breath. "I hope this talk hasn't ruined forever your enjoyment of Maude Dunwoody's ham biscuits, Cup."

  "My God, Dr. Nagle—Prescott, that's the most bizarre story I've ever heard. It tops any horror movie I've seen," Cup gasped.

  "The past is often terrifying. Now you can see why those narrow-minded biddies at the Historical Society don't like this idea of the archaeological dig, never did like it. George Washington didn't sleep here, only the boogeyman slept here. Nobody wants to find out how bad it really was. Better to make it a soccer field for the school."

  "But you think there's more than just history, don't you?"

  Prescott nodded. "I found something here, in the field. Something that for the moment will have to remain a secret between you and me. You may have assumed that I found nothing but an old musket, some arrowheads, and broken chips from some plates. Those are all set in the glass cases at the Marlowe-Houston House. Trinkets from two centuries ago, but nothing substantial. But it was right here I found something, something that gave me a good strong shock, something that when I touched it was like sticking my hand down into a nest of copperheads."

  "What was it?"

  "Bones, Cup. Charred bones. Dozens of them. A burial mound. And something happened, Cup, when I touched them." The old man shivered, and it was from his thoughts as much as from the weather. "But, it's getting late, and I have quite a bit to consider." Prescott did seem very tired; Cup noticed that his skin, in the dimming light, was sallow and painted a look of defeat across his round face. The old man seemed on the verge of a terrible revelation, but was holding himself back. Cup decided not to push. "If I am even half-right in my assumptions, Cup " Then, wiping his eyes beneath his spectacles, Prescott said: "Forgive me if I'm incoherent. I was thinking about things; when you get to be my age you think about how things might've been too much." He looked off across the lake. The chilling wind came up. "You and I are in a similar boat right now, Cup. You see, I must be going crazy, because after years of research on this area, I think there is something to this taint, and not just the lake, but this field, and the land that the house occupies. I'm still not sure how or why. And I think your phone call from Lily is connected, too. Because I don't think it was some prank, or your imagination. I think it was Lily Cammack who has been buried for the past year. I knew you'd be coming back," he sighed, as if admitting a secret he'd kept well hidden for a long time, "because a little girl named Teddy Amory told me in October that you'd be here this winter. And God help us all, she was right."

  13

  Teddy Amory awoke, shivering. Salty tears stung her eyes. Torch was gone; he often left her when she was sleeping so he could get some food and things to keep them both warm here. She had been dreaming again, dreaming the happy dreams of her family before the nightmare world had begun. She was dreaming that she was six years old and her daddy was twirling her around like a windmill; her mommy was shouting at Jake to get his blessed hair cut, and Jake was turning his boom box up loud so that Iron Maiden was drowning her out. Through shimmering woods, summer bare, the lake blinded her every time her daddy swung her that way. Teddy's stomach felt funny, and she heard someone's cat meowing, saw the cat scratching at the car; now why is the kitty scratching at the car tires?

  Then Teddy woke up, because she knew it was not her daddy's car, or his tires, but the tires that were lined up against the door in the dark place where she lived with Torch. The black cat that she had helped bring back from the dead was scratching at the old, bald tires that blocked the way to the outside. To freedom.

  "You want to go home, don't you, Kitty?" Teddy asked. Her voice had become weak in the past month. Whenever she awoke from sleep, Teddy felt sticky and soaked with sweat; she didn't like to wake up anymore to this constantly candlelit, achy world. She felt like she had the flu, and she brought the hood up on the oversized sweatshirt that Torch had found for her.

  "Torch?" Teddy called out. "Torch?" Her throat was scratchy and dry.

  The cat now began yowling; it attacked the tires as if it would dig its way out.

  "Wait," Teddy said, "I'll let you out." She pushed herself up from the rag-covered mattress. Standing, she wobbled and had to clutch the edge of a table. Teddy took a few deep breaths. She told herself that she would not feel sick, that she would not cry. The kitty had a home and its own family, and she should let it go. It wasn't right to keep the kitty here in this dungeon. I am going to be strong just this once. I am not going to let the fit come on, I am not going to barf, I am not going to start crying again. Teddy looked up and caught her reflection in the paint-blackened windows. She barely recognized the little girl who stared hollow-eyed back at her. The wavy blond-brown hair draped greasily down from beneath the sweatshirt hood. There was only a trembling straight line where her lips had been, and her eyes were smudged with fever and sleeplessness.

  Teddy thought she was looking at a ghost.

  The cat yowled.

  I am dying, Torch. I am dying. I am dying.

  Teddy lifted a hurricane lantern up. Good. I am dying. I was supposed to drown in the lake. Good. Let me just die. And maybe all these Bad Things will die with me.

  Teddy went to the small door in the back of the dark place where Torch kept her. The cat came over to her and rubbed against her ankles.

  "We're going back home," Teddy told the cat.

  14

  "Hey!" Rick Stetson shouted down the alley, his voice echoing through the chilling afternoon wind. "Save some for the roaches, man!"

  "Shut up, Stets," Tommy Mackenzie said. The boys had been walking past the alley when Rick had spotted the guy near the overturned garbage cans. The guy had ripped into one of the Hefty trash bags and had some gunk in his hands.

  "Don't you know who the fuck that is, man?"

  "Stets, leave him alone, okay?" Tommy tugged at his friend's army jacket. He knew that the best way to handle Rick when he was in one of his "moods" was to joke around and pretend that Rick was being silly. "C'mon, if we don't haul buns I won't make it back in time for the second show."

  "Fuck your second show," Rick laughed. He reached down and patted some snow into a ball and tossed it hard down at the guy. It missed him, but just barely as it whizzed over his underwear-covered head. The guy didn't even flinch. "We got our own show here, don't you know who the fuck that is, man?"

  Tommy sighed. "Leave him alone, okay?"

  "Hey, Torch!" Rick yelled. "You just burn me up! You know that? You just fuckin' burn me up!"

  15

  Torch sniffed the air. His nostrils froze with the effort; a headache stung him just behind the eyes. It wasn't those boys who were yelling at him, and it wasn't the trash he was going through looking for food, and it wasn't even that gassy smell that meant They were near.

  "Tehh-ee," he bleated.

  16

  Teddy watched the black cat run down the alley.

  As if it was still her dream, Teddy walked barefoot down the alley in the same direction as the cat. Ice bit at her toes, and she stretched the red sweatshirt down over her knees. She felt like she was walking on a tightrope, and she was going to fall, but not if she rushed fast enough across the rope and reached the platform on the other side. And then she fe
lt less dizzy. The cold fresh air slapped at her, and she felt blood rushing to her face as she moved faster toward the street, faster toward the black cat as the cat ran toward the street, faster and faster until it was no longer a tightrope but a long tunnel out of her nightmares to her home, faster and faster, her blood was turning to a runny snow cone as she chased the black cat to Main Street.

  17

  "All right, that's it, Stets," Tommy said, "let's just go."

  "Wimp. Wuss. Pussy." Rick huffed. "Hey, Torch! I got some lighter fluid at home! You thirsty?"

  "You're not even funny," Tommy whispered. But Tommy didn't move. Torch was now running down the alleyway toward them, and for a second Tommy was afraid because this guy was supposed to be looney tunes or something, and there was Stetson probably triggering some psychotic response in the guy. Tommy tugged again at Rick's sleeve. "Jesus, let's get the hell out of here before—"

  "Let go, faggot," Rick snarled, "I want to see a burn victim up close!" Rick was laughing, and Tommy wished now that they hadn't snuck the six-pack of beer out of the Stetsons' refrigerator (but, hell, if my dad hadn't hit Mom like that I wouldn't need to have a couple of beers to get through the day today). When Rick had any alcohol in him, even if it was just a sip, he started to get belligerent and argumentative. And this afternoon, Rick had drunk four beers in the space of ten minutes.