by Ken Douglas
“ I know that.”
“ Just making conversation.” She desperately wanted to believe there was no connection. She was sorry she brought it up. Sorry she even thought about it. This wasn’t the place to think about slimy things with big teeth that creep in the night.
“ We’ll cut across the cemetery. It’s safer than the street,” he said.
He took her by the hand, led her through the sea of tombstones, toward the white house. She felt the strength in his hand as she shivered. The clouds let through enough light to cast opaque shadows from the gravestones.
“ I feel like the shadows are reaching out for me,” she said.
“ It’s a little scary,” he said.
“ I’m twenty years old and I’ve never been in a cemetery before. I don’t like it.” She heard something, a scraping sound. She tightened her grip on his hand. He froze. “Did you hear it?” she whispered.
“ Yeah,” he said. She felt his palm, as sweaty as hers. “Did it sound like that thing last night?”
“ I don’t think so.” They remained in place, two statues, ears tuned to the night, but they heard nothing more.
“ Must have been the wind blowing some of these across the grass,” he whispered, bending down and picking up a bunch of artificial flowers. He tossed them back on the grave. “Come on.” He continued leading her through the graveyard.
At the side of the cemetery they found two obstacles between them and the house at 13 Church Street. A shallow drainage ditch and on the other side of the ditch, a four foot wooden fence. They found a plank across the ditch and beyond, a two foot gap in the fence. The Church Street residents must cut across the cemetery as a short cut to downtown Rio Dulce, she thought.
He stepped onto the plank, pulling her along behind. Then he squeezed through the gap, still holding her hand. Once through, they found themselves between the fence and the back of a two car garage. The fence was about three feet from the garage. They were in a dark area, perfect for one of those homeless beggars to hide in, she thought-or a slimy overgrown lizard.
She felt as trapped as the dead neighbors next door in their coffins. Her heart was pounding. She felt like she was being drawn out of a long dark tunnel when he led her away from the dark space. Then they were at the back door of the house.
“ At least we don’t have to worry about the neighbors calling the police,” he said.
“ Look at that.” She was looking at a new Red Mazda Miata, the price sticker still in the window. The car was parked in front of the garage. “I really wanted one of those, but I couldn’t afford one. I hope we find the keys.” She looked from the car to the back door. “How do we get in?”
He took the steps up the back porch and tried the door. It was locked.
“ That window is open,” she said.
He came off the porch and followed her pointed finger. It was open because of the heat, she thought, or maybe there aren’t too many burglaries in small town Rio Dulce.
“ I’ll get down on my hands and knees.” He started for the window. “You can stand on my shoulders and see if you can get the screen off.”
“ Careful,” she said, “don’t trample the flowers.” There was a flower bed along the side of the house. He stepped between two small rose bushes, careful not to cut himself on the thorns. Then he dropped to all fours. She stepped onto his back and tried to pry the screen off.
“ I can’t do it,” she said, stepping off. “I need a screwdriver or a knife.” She walked along the side of the house. “Aha!” She bent down in front of the flower bed and picked up a rusty garden trowel. “This will work.” Then she was on his back again, using the pointed end of the trowel to pry the screen off. “I’ve got it.” She tossed the screen onto the grass. Then, with a feeling of danger and accomplishment, she pulled herself up into the window.
Inside she found herself on the kitchen sink. She squeezed on in. She tried to turn once her rear end was through, but she slipped and landed on the tile floor with a quiet crash that echoed through the quieter house. She pushed herself up and opened the back door. Then she went straight for the refrigerator, pulled open the door and bathed the kitchen in a murky light full of hidden shadows.
“ Tupperware.” She took out a plastic container and checked the contents. “Tuna casserole.” She resealed the lid. “We’ll take this with us for later.” She took her laundry sack from Jim, dropped the leftover casserole into it.
“ Close the fridge. I found a flashlight,” he said, closing a drawer next to the sink. He turned it on as the kitchen lost the gloomy light from the refrigerator. “Let’s find the car keys and get out of here,” he whispered.
She nodded and they went through the kitchen. There was a key rack by the back door, but no keys.
“ We need shoes,” she said and he followed her out of the kitchen, through a living room. Redneck values at their finest, she thought, looking at the cheap sofa and chairs gathered around a large screen television and stereo rack. The walls were bare white, no art, no bookcases, no books. A sewing machine in the corner, positioned so the lady of the house could sew and watch the big screen while her husband lay on the couch.
Past the living room, they entered a dark hallway. He used the flashlight. The first door on the right was a bathroom, the door opposite, the master bedroom. He followed her in, lighting the way as she went to the closet and opened it. He lit it up for her as she looked through several pair of shoes, men’s and women’s. She settled on a well used pair of white tennis shoes and slipped them on her bare feet.
“ Tight, maybe a half size too small, but better than nothing.” She laced them up, then paced the bedroom twice. “They’ll do.”
“ At last.” He picked up a pair of new running shoes. “No more screaming feet. You might settle with half a size small, but I’ve been living with tight shoes for too long.” He stole a pair of running socks out of a bureau drawer and slipped them on, then the shoes. “Perfect,” he said standing.
The next door on the right opened on a second bedroom. A guest room, she supposed, and the one opposite was a bedroom turned into a sewing room. A large sewing table, with a second sewing machine, a quilting rack and piles of material filled the room. “She probably shuts herself in here while her husband drinks beer and watches football,” Jim said, “and when she has to watch with him, she has that sewing machine in the living room.”
“ I gotta pee,” she said.
“ What? Here?”
“ Can’t help it. Gotta go. Gimme the light.”
He handed her the flashlight and she went into the bathroom, closing the door after herself.
“ It’s spooky in here.” She unzipped, lowered her jeans, sat on the toilet.
“ Hurry up,” he said, from the other side of the door.
“ I’m going as fast as I can.” She finished, dried herself and flushed the toilet. She shined the light across the bathroom, illuminating the wash basin. She went to it and washed her hands, then started for the door, then she turned back toward the sink. She was thirsty.
She turned the tap back on, held the light pointed down at the sink and lowered her head, putting her mouth under the faucet. The cold water tasted good. The water at the dry cleaners had an aftertaste.
She sensed something by her cheek, the water didn’t seem to be going down the drain. She turned her head while still drinking. A gecko, less than an inch from her right cheek, its tiny beady eyes staring into her single wide right eye, was half out of the drain, clogging it and paying no attention to the water flooding around it.
She screamed.
The door burst open.
“ What is it? What’s wrong?”
“ I saw one of those geckos, coming out of the drain.” She was shaking, the flashlight was on the floor where she dropped it. He picked it up and pointed it at the sink.
“ Nothing there.”
“ I saw it. I did.” She was shaking.
“ It’s gone now,” he said.
“ Get a hold of yourself. You’ve got to keep it together, okay?”
“ Okay, okay. Just give me a second.” She caught her breath, then did a few deep breathing exercises. Part of her yoga training. “I’ll be all right now. Let’s get on with it and get out of here.”
“ Now you’re talking.” He squeezed her arm in a friendly gesture. “Let’s check out the room at the end of the hall.” The room turned out to be a den. A man’s room. Two oak chairs covered in brown fabric. A single bookcase full of magazines, no books. There was a large oak desk between the bookcase and the chairs. He went to it. The only thing in the top drawer was a forty-five automatic.
“ Does everybody in this town have one of those?” Then she saw the photo. “Hey, look at that.” She pointed and he trained the light on it.
“ Wouldn’t you just know it,” he said. It was a picture of a man and woman holding hands. The woman was wearing a blue formal and the man smiling down at her was wearing a police officer’s uniform.
“ Think it’s one of the ones from last night?” she said.
“ That would just be our luck.” He reached into the drawer to pick up the weapon, when a set of headlights swept through the window as a car pulled up in front. He flicked off the flashlight and closed the drawer. “Quick, we gotta move.”
They jumped into action.
“ Close the doors on the right,” he said, closing the door to the den as they went through it. She closed the door to the master bedroom and the guest room. He got the bathroom and the sewing room.
In the kitchen he picked up both laundry bags.
“ No time for argument. Take these, and wait behind the garage. I’m going to hide in the den till they go to sleep.” He was perspiring heavily.
“ But?”
“ Do it. I have to stay, we need those keys. And get that screen out of sight.” He forced the laundry bags into her hand and herded her toward the back door. “Wait for me, with luck I won’t be too long.” Her lips were quivering, he brushed the hair out of her eyes. “I’ll be okay,” he said. “I’ve had a lot of training. They’ll never know I’m here.”
She dropped the laundry bags and grabbed him behind the head with both hands. She felt his surprise as she pulled him to her lips and gave him a passionate kiss, full of longing and promise. She broke the kiss and picked up the laundry bags with trembling hands.
“ I’ll wait for you, as long as it takes.”
“ Be silent and careful,” he said.
She went out, taking both bags. She dashed to the screen, picked it up and took it with her as she headed for that dark place behind the garage.
She made her way along the garage to the back. She’d never been afraid of the dark, but she was afraid of this place. With the overhang of the garage roof, the area between the cemetery fence and the back of the garage seemed a dark tunnel to nowhere. Once in she dropped the bags and leaned against the garage.
It was quiet. No crickets. No night sounds. The sound of her breathing echoed in the dark, bouncing off the fence, then off the garage, making eerie sounds that skyrocketed her heart. Easy, she told herself, sit down and do your exercises. She sat in a half lotus and imagined a flickering candle. She took deep breaths and forced her heart to slow down.
Then she heard something.
She opened her eyes and her pulse screamed.
A scraping sound.
Sweat trickled under her arms.
Another sound, like a snake’s hiss.
A cold chill ran from the cold ground, from her buttocks to her tail bone, shooting up her spine like cold lightning blasting into the back of her neck. It felt like her hair was covered in snow. Then it felt like it was on fire.
A low growl.
She lost control of her bladder and wet her pants.
Another low growl. It was coming from inside the tunnel, coming toward her, coming for her. She whimpered, a lost little girl sound, and forced herself out of the lotus. She scooted on her rear, away from the thing creeping toward her.
Another growl. Louder. She wanted to turn away. To get away. To run. But she looked. She couldn’t help herself. She thought she saw something, its lizard shape in the dark. For a flash of a second the eyes lit up. A quick bright radioactive flash of yellow, then it was gone.
With her hands behind herself, legs in front, she scooted backwards, crab-like, dragging her backside on the ground. It came closer. She tried to go faster, but it was like she was caught in slow motion. For some reason the thing wasn’t moving any faster than she was. It scraped along the ground, toward her, and she scraped along the ground, away from it.
Then she was at the gap in the fence. The gateway into the cemetery.
The thing growled, louder. She could smell and feel its hot breath.
Diving deep within herself, she summoned up the will to move. She dove through the fence as the yellow-eyed thing dove for her. She went across the wooden plank on her hands and knees, crawling fast. She started to get up, but she hadn’t been paying attention to where she was going, more afraid of what was behind than ahead, and she smacked her head into a gravestone.
Stunned, she looked behind herself and saw the slimy green thing, halfway through the hole. It hissed at her, its yellow eyes burning bright. It growled and hot steam escaped from around its shark teeth. But it didn’t come through the hole.
She wanted to get up, but couldn’t. She was trapped, held down by those glowing yellow eyes. But the thing didn’t come for her. And looking at it through the opening in the fence, she was reminded of the gecko with those tiny glaring eyes, halfway out of the drain in the bathroom sink, and she knew they were one and the same.
But still it didn’t come for her and some instinct carried down from ancestors long dead told her why.
It was afraid of the cemetery.
“ Daddy, where are you?” she cried. Then she passed out.
Chapter Fourteen
Hugh Washington rubbed his hands in front of his mouth, but blowing on them was no help. Last night had been hot, tonight cold, but then he was much farther north and he was by the ocean. He should have known better. He should have remembered.
His breath was no match for the cold night breeze coming in off the sea. He cursed himself for not buying a warm jacket, but the shock of Walker’s death tore straight to his heart. That, piled on top of his worry about Glenna, cost him his sense of priorities. Five minutes after Kohler and crew left town he was in Power Glide, driving after them. It was like the old days, he was hunting again.
He sat in a thicket across from the gray house, eyes vigilant, ignoring the occasional bug crawling along his arms or down his neck. He hoped the car was okay. When he saw the gravel road a quarter mile past the Kohler house he turned onto it without thinking. He parked out of sight of the main road and locked the car. Now, sitting in the dark, he missed the car’s warmth and he wondered if anybody ever used that road.
Earlier, during the walk back to Kohler’s, he tried to push all thoughts of Glenna and Walker out of his mind. If he was going to find her, and avenge Walker’s death, he needed to keep full concentration on the job at hand. Time enough to mourn Walker after Glenna was safe and Kohler, if he was responsible, was dead and buried. He tried to push his worries about his car away. Either the car would be okay or it wouldn’t.
He had been sitting in the thicket since morning, over twelve hours. He’d been cold for four, very cold for two, and still no sign of Monday or Glenna. Maybe something happened to them, an accident. Maybe Monday had been caught. It didn’t matter, the smart thing for him to do was wait. He’d give it the night. If they didn’t show by morning, he would go to the police.
He opened a can of beef stew, keeping his eye across the street as he ate. He was on his third bite when the front door opened. Kohler, Mrs. Monday, the Weasel and a third man, big and stupid looking, came out, framed in the light. Big and Stupid locked the door an
d all four got into the Mercedes. Stupid and the Weasel in back, Mrs. Monday and Kohler in front.
He wondered where Stupid had come from. Had he been in the house all along? Was there anybody else in there? Where were they going now? Dinner? Following them was out of the question. He hadn’t counted on them leaving. What to do now? Sit back and wait. Or?
Or what? Go in, that’s what.
He stood, stretched and brushed the dirt from his clothes. He reached under the flap of the unbuttoned camouflaged shirt and checked the gun, an involuntary reflex, and started across the street toward the house.
The front was well lit and the windows were barred. It would be foolish to try and enter that way. The windows on both sides were barred as well. In back he found a large wooden deck set back about ten feet from the cliff. The doctor had a spectacular view. He took the stairs up the deck and found the rear windows barred also. The back door was deadbolted shut.
He wondered how he’d get in, maybe from below. He went back down the stairs. The house might have a basement, accessible from under the deck. The cloudless, star filled sky afforded him plenty of light. Enough to see that there was no basement once he was under the wooden deck. Nothing but a pile of wood and an ax.
“ Fuck it.” He picked up the ax.
He took the stairs back up two at a time. He swung the ax in a great arc, smashing it against the deadbolt. It was a good lock. It took five solid hits to bust the door open.
Enough light came in the windows so that he didn’t have to use the flashlight and it was a good thing, because he’d left it across the street, snugly tucked away in his backpack. Thinking of the forgotten flashlight brought his hand to his gun again. At least he hadn’t forgotten everything.
He spent a few seconds admiring the rich kitchen. Cobalt blue tile on the floor and counters, lots of brushed stainless steel. Professional range, oven, microwave and refrigerator. Tiled preparation area in the center, with a small digital television mounted on the wall for easy viewing while cooking. Every chef’s dream, he thought, leaving the kitchen. He wasn’t sure what he was looking for, but he knew he wasn’t going to find it among the pots and pans.