than just a random accident. This had all the makings of a crime scene, and whoever committed the crime seemed to have no interest in the costly bikes, but in the riders themselves.
But what could someone want with a pair of sweaty cyclists?
To the right of the path the ground rose to a high shoulder. Barney immediately attempted to scamper up it but his paws were unable to gain traction on the steep, crumbling dirt. Something was up there the dog was desperate to get at, and Christian was certain it was something they shouldn't confront. He leashed the scent-possessed animal, determined to pull him away from the shoulder and back down the path.
A low moaning caused them both to freeze, still as stones. The moan came again, soft and pained. Barney challenged it with a bark.
There was a person up there - alive and likely injured. Christian knew that it wasn't wise to investigate further; he should head back home and have his father put a call into the park rangers and the police. Let the proper authorities deal with it - that was the smart thing to do.
Then again, the injured party's life could be hanging on by a thread. What if, by running away, Christian was condemning them to die? What if there was something he could do to help? Was his instinct to run home to daddy good common sense, or was he simply a coward? His mettle had never been tested this way. If he went home and let his dad handle it, if the person was later found dead, could Christian live knowing that he might have saved their life?
One thing was certain - a hero like Indiana Jones or Conan the Barbarian wouldn't have run. "Man, you sure are stupid," Christian said out loud to himself. He looked down at Barney. The dog looked up at him, panting, tail wagging. "Alright dog, you win."
Taking the shoulder at its lowest point they climbed, and with his master's added assistance Barney was able to scale the grade. Christian kept his eyes and ears on alert, readying himself for whatever awaited at the top of the rise. With his free hand he reached into his pocket, feeling for an item he put there before leaving the house this morning. At first he felt nothing, panicked a bit, then his fingers brushed something long, cold and metal. It made him feel a little better just knowing it was there, even though he doubted his own courage to wield it.
For his thirteenth birthday, mere weeks before she died, Gram had gifted him a sterling silver jackknife. "Every boy ought to have one," she said as Christian snapped open the blade with great excitement. Mom was not so ecstatic about the gift. She feared that Christian would cut himself of course, but Dad intervened, assured her that their son was capable of handling a small knife, that it was a rite of passage for a boy. After much grumbling Mom ultimately backed off, and Christian was permitted to keep it. Now it sat there in his pocket, ready should he be heading into the den of some woods-lurking killer, like the ones in the slasher movies he wasn't supposed to watch but snuck whenever they were on late night TV. Maybe by granting him this means of defense, Gram really was helping from beyond the grave.
As soon as the grade leveled off Christian drew the knife from his pocket, and Barney resumed his barking. The moaning came again, louder, more pained, and as they moved over the forest floor Christian noticed spatters of blood on the ground, like a gruesome trail of breadcrumbs. A clear warning sign to stay away. Yet Christian pressed forward, fueled by adrenaline and the determination to not be a coward.
Barney pulled at the leash, nose straight as an arrow, pointing up ahead to movement in the trees. A few yards further and they were at a clearing.
Hanging from an oak, about a yard off of the ground, was a man, bound to the tree with bungee cords - the kind mountain climbers used. He wore tight-fitting exercise clothes, the bright blues and yellows of the spandex clashing against the earthen tones of the surrounding forest. But most striking was the ragged gash of red across his mid-section. Feeling the bottom drop out of his stomach, Christian approached, marveling at the wound with sickened curiosity. Inside the gash a pink wetness glistened, the color of ham, and a cluster of white tubing poked out. With a lurch of nausea Christian realized that he was looking at the man's innards. It took everything he had not to puke up Slim Jims all over the forest floor.
The man's head lolled at the sound of feet crunching on pine needles. His hazy, fading eyes focused on Christian. "Help me?" his voice quavered.
Quickly, Christian tied off Barney to a narrow tree, leaving the dog to strain at the leash and yip. The boy struggled with what to do next. During a first aid class last year, Mr. Moody the gym teacher had warned that an accident victim should never be moved. Christian couldn't see how cutting this poor guy down out of the tree could make his life any worse.
Circling around the trunk, he chose a strip of bungee at random and sawed at it with the knife. Moments later the cord snapped, whipping loose from the trunk and feeing the man to fall. The cyclist hit the ground and rolled on to his side, groaning and trying to shove his guts back into his stomach, but they kept popping out. Finally he gave up.
Christian's throat hitched. Great. Now I've done it. "Hey mister," he said, trying to sound calm, like an EMT or a TV cop. "You're gonna be OK. I'm gonna go find some help."
The man's eyes startled into focus. He grabbed Christian's arm, digging in with dirt-caked fingers. "He's coming," he gasped. "Took Amy and he's coming back for me."
This was not good, not good at all. Christian could only assume that 'Amy' was the owner of the other mountain bike. From the sound of it she had been attacked and dragged off somewhere, kidnapped or worse. More unsettling was that the attacker had strung this guy up with the intent to come back later and? what? Torture him? Finish him off?
Eat him?
The cyclist's eyes began to flutter, fighting consciousness. "Hey mister, stay with me," Christian urged, jostling his shoulders. But it was no use. The dying man drew in a final tortured breath, hitched forward, and stared wide into the face of oblivion. Then he fell back, still.
Christian rolled back on his knees and put a hand to his hanging jaw. This was the second dead body he had seen in his brief life so far. But Gram had been dead when he found her - this man had died right in front of him, expired right before his eyes. And aside from the blood and gore and evidence of violence, it had all of the drama of a television being switched off. Here, in the green quiet of nature, it was even serene. Life's forgone conclusion.
He sat there a while, caught in the strangeness of the moment. The sport accessories worn by the man - the high-impact watch, the fanny pack, the sneakers - seemed silly and inconsequential. It didn't even look like he had gotten much use out of them. What will I be wearing when my dead body is found? Christian mused darkly. Probably what I'm wearing right now.
Something caught his eye; a feathered quill sticking out of the cyclists' well-toned calf. Leaning over he pulled it out, recognizing it as something out of a jungle adventure movie like Raiders of the Lost Ark or Tarzan. A weapon commonly used by savage cannibal tribes.
A blow-gun dart.
Every town had a frightening character who was spoken of in whispers among the school kids, and for Winfield Massachusetts that character was Tippy Dewey. According to local legend, Tippy was the only son of a Vietnam vet who lived in a run-down house at the southern tip of the Fellsway. Soon after he was born Tippy's mother ran off to parts unknown, and father and son lived in their house as hermits, rarely venturing out and only when necessary - never to socialize. In a town as small as Winfield that made them pariahs, but that seemed to suit the Deweys just fine. Until the day Pa Dewey blew his brains out with a shotgun, leaving his son to fend for himself during a long cold winter. Even worse, Pa hadn't paid the mortgage for months, and Tippy found himself homeless and too old at seventeen to qualify as a ward of the state. So Tippy went off into the one place he could hunt to survive. The Fellsway.
Since then, sightings of Tippy were rare, but the rumors weren't. Legend grew of the Winfield madman, a maniac who lived in the woods, and the scariest of the stories took place during that first b
rutal winter. According to legend, that winter, Tippy all but starved trying to root out game, and the hunger had made him a raving madman. One afternoon, when a hapless cross-country skier wandered into Tippy's path, the starving lunatic brought the man down with a poison blow dart and took him hostage into the caves. There, Tippy kept his victim alive all winter, carving of bits of him at a time, eating him piece by piece, developing a taste for human flesh. When the thaw finally came the park authorities found a corpse that had been picked clean; not a single scrap of flesh left on the ivory-white bones, sucked dry even of the marrow. A search party went out to drive Tippy from the hills, but the newly-minted cannibal was never found.
Of course, Christian didn't believe any of this. A vagrant living in the woods - that he could believe, but the rest was spookhouse nonsense drummed up by kids to scare each another during afternoon hikes. Just a fiction of youthful imagination. A campfire tale.
At least that's what he had believed until now.
Christian dropped the dart as if it was hot. The shadows cast by the trees had grown long, and with a chill he recognized that the sun was preparing to set. Time had gotten away from him, and it wasn't wise to be out here after dark.
Full Moon Over Fellsway Page 3