Bellwether

by Jenny Ashford

  Martin rubbed his eyes, dimly aware of the sky beginning to lighten outside the dining room windows. So, Crandall worked on his weird “projects” in this very house. Projects he hadn’t even told his best friend about. This realization made Martin look at the old place in the new way; its mundane stucco walls and wooden joists were now imbued with mystery. Martin had never really believed in the supernatural before, and he wasn’t entirely sure he did now, but the events of the last few weeks were pretty hard to ignore. What if something really had come of Crandall’s experiments, whatever they were exactly? Mind control and immortality, thought Martin. I wonder what the old guy came up with.

  It occurred to him how James Morley, “The Magnificent,” might conceivably still be alive. If he were in his twenties when he knew Crandall, then he’d only be in his seventies or eighties now. Maybe he knew more about Crandall than he was willing to publish in a book. Martin thought it was worth a shot.

  The first few hits on his search for “Morley the Magnificent” were references to the same book he’d just ordered. He scrolled through them, blinking profusely to lubricate his eyeballs, which were drying out from lack of sleep and from hours spent staring at the screen. He could feel the nerves behind them humming like electrical wires.

  Near the bottom of the page, he stopped. For a second, he hoped that his vision was failing, that he wasn’t reading what he thought he was reading. His throat constricting, he clicked on the link.

  It was an archived newspaper article dated more than a year before, from a small-town paper in Kentucky. Martin skimmed the lines, his stomach coiling tighter and tighter with every word.

  “78-year-old magician James Morley, better known as Morley the Magnificent, was a much beloved figure around town, often putting on impromptu magic shows in the park near his home, which drew children and adults from the nearby neighborhoods. All his friends and neighbors considered him a kindly gentleman who was always quick to laugh and had no enemies in the world.

  “So the shock was enormous when a close friend of Mr. Morley’s—who had stopped by for their weekly chess game—instead discovered the butchered remains of the sweet old man who had delighted everyone who knew him with his pleasant demeanor and wonderful magic tricks.

  “Police are baffled as to a motive in the case. Robbery has been ruled out, as money and other valuables in plain sight were untouched. There was also no sign of forced entry, leading authorities to believe that Mr. Morley knew his attacker, or at least had no reason to fear him. It also appears that Morley was tortured prior to his death, though police are not releasing any further details at this point.

  “Forensic evidence suggests that Mr. Morley was killed between 3 p.m. and 9 p.m. on April the 14th. If readers have any information in this case, they are advised to call the local police tips hotline at 555-6795.”

  Martin sat in stunned silence for what seemed like an eternity. April 14th. Only a few months before Martin and Chloe had first seen the house. Morley murdered. No, tortured and murdered. Probably by someone who knew him. Crandall? Martin didn’t want to think about that. If it was Crandall, then what did he have against Morley? Martin didn’t know, but he did know that if Crandall was still alive and in a murderous mood, then it was likely he’d come back here. To his old home.

  Martin heard a creak on the stairs and nearly screamed, his heart speeding up until it sounded like the lightning beat of a hummingbird’s wings.

  The kitchen door swung open and it was only Olivia, her dark hair sticking out around her face like a jagged halo. She looked strangely at Martin, then lifted her hand in a half-assed salute before disappearing back through the kitchen door. A moment later, Martin heard a clink of coffee mugs and the whooshing sound of cereal cascading into a plastic bowl.

  He looked back at the screen, trying to calm himself down. Quickly, he searched “James Morley murder,” hitting the keys with undue force. All the articles that came up were variations of the story that had originally appeared in the Kentucky paper. The only follow-up Martin could see was a four-month-old article titled, “No New Leads in Morley Torture-Murder Case.” Despite its less than promising headline, Martin read through the article and discovered that, just as implied, there was no new information whatsoever. His brow furrowing into a deep V, Martin reached down and shut off the computer.

  * * * *

  He was still brooding and nervous two hours later, after Olivia had left for work and Chloe had gone to run errands. He was alone in a house that now seemed vaguely menacing. Even though he stayed in the dining room area, trying hard to concentrate on a new painting he was working on, the hole in the wall called to him; perhaps, he thought, with the voice of a murderer.

  After another anxious hour had passed, he couldn’t take it anymore and put down his brush. He pushed through the kitchen door, not really knowing what he intended to do. He did know that no one was literally calling him from the hole—after all, even if it was Crandall down there, the guy was as dead as vaudeville and past hurting anyone—but this whole mystery was beginning to consume him. The dreams, the invisible body (Crandall or one of his victims?), the torture and murder of Morley, the whole fiasco of whatever was going on with Ivan and that church—it was all tangling together like kudzu vines, becoming more and more intertwined and confusing. Even though Martin felt afraid, he wanted to slice the knots of the mystery, to get to the bottom of it so he could purge it from his life and the lives of his friends, so they could go back to being the way they were.

  The hole regarded him like a flat black eye. Martin swallowed. He didn’t like the idea of going in there alone, with no one in the house to hear him if he screamed for help. Another part of him didn’t want to wait. What if he and Chloe missed some important clue the last time they went down there? He didn’t know why, but he felt that the time for action was growing shorter. Forcing his trembling hands to still, he retrieved a flashlight from the drawer and began to climb into the hole.

  He heard a sound, very near.

  He instantly withdrew from the hole and stood frozen on the stair landing, every hair on his body seeming to strain with the listening. Where had that sound come from? Not inside the house, he was sure, but perhaps just outside of it. Neither Olivia nor Chloe was due back yet—he supposed one of them could have come back early, but somehow he doubted this was the case.

  Martin stood there for what seemed like hours, although the clock ticked a passage of only two or three minutes. The sound was not repeated, but Martin could sense that its source, whatever it was, had not gone away. Slowly, trying to move quietly, he crouched down and set the flashlight gently on the floor at his feet. Then he crept down into the kitchen, his ears seeming to twitch with the effort of scanning the air for further noise. He slid one of the drawers open, slipping a knife out of the profusion of utensils, wincing a little at the subdued clatter of steel on steel. Whatever had made that sound was out there, he knew, and he wanted to have the advantage of surprise.

  His bare feet silent on the linoleum, he made his way to the back door. He was terrified, but almost relieved at the same time; at last, he thought, he might finally be coming face-to-face with the thing he dreamt about, the someone, or something, who could perhaps make some sense out of all this. How he knew this might be so, he wasn’t sure—all he knew was that he did, most definitively.

  Martin opened the back door, sticking the knife into the waistband of his pants. The back porch was deserted, its narrow and shadowed space filtered through with dim afternoon sunlight. The cot that Ivan had slept on during his brief imprisonment was still there, the blankets disordered, as if someone had just left them and would soon return to wrap himself up in them. The sight made Martin immeasurably sad.

  A second door separated the porch from the steps outside, and it was closed and locked, as usual. He pressed his ear against it and listened, but heard nothing. Still, it was almost
as though there was some type of energy field humming beneath his skin—it came from everywhere, like the buzzing of a nearby transformer.

  The knife, a cold, comforting presence at his waist, Martin threw open the door.

  For a second, he couldn’t believe what he was seeing. There were so many of them that taken all together, they seemed a single unbroken mass of flesh and pale, slack faces. They were standing very close together, and even though Martin could only see a fraction of their number, he was somehow certain that they had formed a solid wall of people all the way around the house.

  After staring at them, blinking, for nearly a full minute, he began to discern individual faces from the moveless collective. There was Sammy, the manager of the coffee shop where Olivia worked. Farther back was Franklin, the boy from the punk band who changed forever on that night of their ill-conceived siege on the church. Also there was the beautiful girl, wearing her short pink skirt and an eerie smile.

  Right in the front of the crowd stood Ivan.

  Remembering the dreams, remembering that the house was supposedly his protector, Martin did not venture any farther outside. While it was true that Ivan was able to enter as far as the back porch, if not the actual house, Martin thought he could make it to the back door if the crowd made a run for him. In the house, he’d be safe—if Ivan couldn’t get in, then the others probably couldn’t either. He was staking his life on it.

  If they can’t get in, then what are they doing here?

  The thought disturbed him. Were they simply trying to intimidate him by making a show of force? Did they somehow not know that Martin knew they couldn’t get in? This seemed unlikely—Ivan knew, and he’d probably told them. Then again, what if he hadn’t?

  Martin pulled the knife from his jeans; it trembled a little in his hand, and he forced it to stop. He cleared his throat, which felt as if it was coated with sawdust. “Ivan,” he said, addressing his former friend directly, avoiding the probing eyes of the others. “What are you doing here?” It was on the tip of his tongue to add I know you all can’t get in, but he thought it better to keep this information to himself for the time being.

  For a long moment, he didn’t think Ivan was going to answer; his face remained as expressionless as marble. Then, suddenly, he spoke. “We’re waiting,” he said.

  The words sent a shiver down Martin’s back. Even though he was pretty sure he didn’t want to know, he asked, “Waiting for what?”

  There was a slight ripple in the crowd, as though they received a simultaneous low-wattage shock. Afterwards, it seemed to Martin they had grown—not in size or number, necessarily, but in some way he couldn’t put his finger on. It was eerie, and he didn’t like it one bit. He gripped the knife tighter, thinking of how it would feel to have to use it, to plunge it into the guts of one of these people. Into Ivan. He didn’t know if he’d be able to do it. “Waiting for what?” he asked again.

  Ivan looked almost dreamy as he replied, “To pass the threshold.”

  Martin paused. What was he talking about? Did they simply want to cross the threshold into the house, for whatever reason? Or was there more to it than that?

  He sensed they’d come to an impasse, and although he was still frightened, his patience with the whole situation was wearing very thin. “Well, if you’re going to come in, then go ahead,” he said. “Let’s get this over with.” His voice shook, but only slightly. He wished Chloe or Olivia would come home, but then it occurred to him what might happen to them if they were caught outside among the massed followers. Just as fervently, he then began to hope the girls would stay away.

  The expression on Ivan’s face hadn’t changed at all; in fact, no one’s had. They all appeared as though they were quite content to stand out there until doomsday. “They will tell us when it is time,” Ivan said.

  Martin assumed he meant those two wackos who ran the church. Were the leaders even here among their disciples? Martin scanned the faces again, but couldn’t see any sign of the shrouded woman or the hulking bald man. Keeping an eye on the intruders, watching for any sudden moves, Martin backed away from the door, back into the shadows of the porch. The followers all watched him, but stayed where they were. With one last glimpse at Ivan, Martin went back inside the house and closed the kitchen door. There wasn’t much point in standing outside staring at the slack-jawed mob, was there? Evidently, they couldn’t get in, or they would have rushed the house already. It occurred to Martin that he should probably check to see if the leaders were outside anywhere, perhaps around front. If they weren’t, then Martin assumed he was still fairly safe, since the woman looked like the only one who could do any permanent damage in the form of her instant conversion trick.

  Still clutching the knife, he trotted around the perimeter of the house’s interior, peering out the windows from all angles. Just as he’d suspected, the disciples had the place completely surrounded, but he couldn’t see the leaders anywhere. That was something, anyway.

  On the other hand, if those two weren’t there, then that led to the uneasy speculation of where exactly they were, and what they might be up to. Out indulging in a little laying on of hands, no doubt, Martin thought cynically. The idea made him shudder.

  Realization hit him so hard that he stopped dead in his tracks, one foot still suspended above the floor.

  Waiting to pass the threshold, he thought, his whole body going cold. When they get enough recruits, they’ll have broken whatever spell was keeping them out. They’ll be able to swarm the place.

  Why hadn’t he put it together before? He felt like smacking himself, but settled for slapping the blade of the knife flat against his thigh. He had to think fast. If the woman-thing was out on the town right now, touching people with her poisoned fingers, then there was no telling how soon she’d have enough power to allow the disciples to overrun the house. Martin’s breath chuffed in and out, and he realized he was beginning to panic. Setting the knife down on a nearby end table, he collapsed into a recliner and tried to make himself calm down. He had to think clearly. He had to do something, but what?

  Once he regained some of his reason, he started to consider the situation. He knew he was no match for the disciples. From the looks of it, there were a few hundred of them out there. Even if Chloe and Olivia came home and were somehow able to fight their way through the throng of followers, then it would still be only the three of them against a multitude. Martin finally faced the fact that he was all alone on this one.

  The first thing he thought to do was call Chloe’s cell phone. When she answered on the second ring, he described the situation in as succinct a manner as possible while trying not to freak her out. He told her to stay where she was for the time being.

  “The fuck I will,” she said, as he knew she would. “I’m not leaving you there all by yourself with those nutcases. They could kill you. I’m calling Olivia and then I’m calling the cops.”

  “Chloe, the church people aren’t technically doing anything.” Yet, his helpful mind added.

  “The hell they’re not. They’re trespassing, they’re threatening you. You said the two head wackos aren’t there, right?”

  “I didn’t see them.”

  “Good. Then maybe we’ve got a chance. Just stay put, the cavalry’s on its way.” She laughed, but it sounded forced and a little sad.

  “I love you, babe,” Martin said, but she’d already hung up. Now that he knew she was coming, he wasn’t sure how to feel. He’d thought he was protecting her by keeping her away from all of this—whatever it was shaping up to be—but now it seemed as though she would ultimately be the one saving him. As usual.

  He glanced out of the nearest window. None of the disciples moved, which he supposed was a good thing. He wondered what would happen when Chloe showed up with the cops in tow—the possibility of a riot seemed a likely one at this point. As soon as Chloe arrived, he’
d have to get her inside, and Olivia, too, if she came. Then the three of them could hole up in the house and hopefully let the police sort everything out.

  If the cops couldn’t handle it? Martin didn’t like to think it, but he suspected this could be the case. In that event, he and the girls would just have to crawl through the hole in the landing wall and hide out, hoping the entire house didn’t come crashing down around their ears.

  For now, the only thing to do was wait.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Ivan stood with the others, patient and silent. Every few minutes he felt a surge of energy coursing through his body, and he smiled. Mother and Father were apparently making rapid progress.

  He couldn’t help but feel sorry for Martin, who stood out on the porch brandishing his kitchen knife in a pitiful display of bravado. Ivan could not hate him, and in fact still fondly remembered the friendship they shared over the past several years. Despite this, though, he would not hesitate to do what was necessary to secure the wishes of his masters. If that meant killing his former friend, then so be it.

  Ivan heard the commotion only a brief second before the ripple among the disciples reached him. His first instinct was to stand his ground, but then he saw that the ring of people around the side of the house was beginning to break up. The followers were looking at one another, confused, and then looking toward the street with worried expressions on their faces.

  Figuring that someone needed to take the initiative in the absence of their leaders, Ivan broke ranks and began trudging around to the front of the house to see what was going on. Even though he had lived in this house in what he considered a former, faraway life, and even though the walk through the side yard felt familiar, Ivan nevertheless had no more sentimental attachment to the place than he would to the abode of a stranger. The pile of white stucco and dark gray window boxes was, after all, just a house, albeit one that was important to his masters, and therefore important to him, in a strictly academic way.