“RUN!” Peter screamed.
They pounded through the forest, crashing through vines, over logs, through branches, whatever stood in their way.
Twice Peter felt the brush of a hand at his back.
Twice, he pulled farther ahead in a burst of adrenalin and never looked back.
Dill was off to his right, looking like the devil was at his very heels.
Peter could see the sunlight up ahead through another two hundred feet of trees. The empty field lay just beyond the forest.
If only he could make it to the sun, it would be alright.
There was a swipe across his neck. He felt the rough touch of burned wood…or burned bone…scrape across his skin.
A hundred feet away…
Fifty feet away…
Ten feet away…
Something pulled at his shirt. Tugged hard.
It was dragging him back into the darkness.
With a prayer and all his strength, Peter flung himself forward, over the last shadow cast by the trees, and slammed down onto the ground.
He dragged himself to his forearms, panting, his chest heaving. Dill was a few feet away. His breathing sounded like a dying man in the hospital. Both of them looked back.
At the very edge of the forest, where the last bit of shadow ended and the sunlight began, thirteen men in black stood, their burned faces and their sightless eyes fixed on Dill and Peter.
Both boys screamed.
It didn’t matter how much their throats and chests burned, the boys got to their feet and ran and ran and ran.
27
They didn’t stop until they had passed the garden and reached the rose bushes.
Peter looked behind him to make sure they were safe. Five hundred feet of empty field stretched behind them.
He collapsed to his knees and tried to keep from throwing up as he gasped for air.
“Dude…hhhh…hhh…that was…messed UP,” Dill panted.
“Now…do you…believe me?” Peter gasped.
Dill rolled onto his back and nodded his head. “Yeah…oh man, I think I peed my pants…”
“Again?!”
“Just a little. I mean, not really, it’s just something I say,” Dill stuttered, then scowled. “Why the crap did you take me out there when you knew about those freaks?!”
“You didn’t believe me! Besides, I didn’t know they’d be waiting for us!”
Dill sat up, his face twisted in fear. “What do we do? They really could come after us tonight – what do we do?!”
Peter was at a loss. “I don’t know…I guess…we have to tell somebody, ‘cause we gotta get out of here. And we can’t leave our families behind to get eaten.”
“Pff, I can totally leave mine,” Dill scoffed. “Especially if they get eaten.”
“Well, I’m not leaving my mom or my sister, no matter what.”
“Nobody’s going to believe us,” Dill pointed out.
Peter squinted out into the garden, still empty and serene.
“I don’t know about that.” He stood up and dusted off his pants. “Go inside and get changed. I’ll give you a call soon.”
“Okay,” Dill agreed, then got mad. “Hey!”
“What?”
“Why would I have to change?”
“Because you…like clean underwear?”
“I didn’t pee my pants!”
“Okay, okay.” Peter started for the house.
“But maybe I’ll change ‘em anyway,” Dill called after him. “Clean underwear is good every once in awhile…”
28
The front door creaked open. Peter looked around the foyer. No sign of anyone.
He went to the right of the stairwell, through the cavernous dining room, and back into another hallway. He was almost to the kitchen when he passed an open door and glimpsed a room he hadn’t seen before.
It was an enormous study, thirty feet high and every wall a shelf full of books. Most of them were bound in leather, and though there were only a handful of colors – black, brown, red, blue, yellow, and white – the various shades seemed limitless.
There were no windows. A dozen or more free-standing shelves stood in the middle of the room, each one loaded down with ancient volumes. A glimmering chandelier with a million cascading crystals hung high overhead. The smell of old paper filled Peter’s nose, and the monotonous tick, tock, tick of an unseen clock was the only sound.
A giant mahogany desk sat facing the door. Its surface was clean and bare except for a pile of books and a stained glass lamp that cast a soft, multicolored light. And sitting behind the desk in a humongous leather chair was Grandfather.
He looked up from his reading, his eyes wild behind a tiny pair of reading glasses.
“Boy, come in here NOW.”
Peter tried to keep his stomach from turning inside out as he stepped meekly into the room.
This was it. Grandfather was going to spank him, and beat him, and tie him up and throw him out of the house for disobeying about the garden –
Grandfather returned to reading his book. “Your mother is out getting the car fixed.”
What? That was it?
“I…I know,” Peter replied.
“You do?” Grandfather cast a sharp look upward. “You were in the house before I got home?”
“Y-yes,” Peter gulped.
“No doubt you went and got into all sorts of mischief with that little idjit across the way,” Grandfather grumbled. “I’m telling you, that boy is no good. He will lead you down a path of ruin if you follow him.”
Grandfather went back to reading his book, and Peter stood there wrestling with his conscience.
Do I say anything about the garden and the woods?
If he did, Grandfather would kill him.
No, not really…but Peter had seen glimpses of the old man’s anger. He wasn’t looking forward to a full-fledged meltdown.
And maybe those burned men in the forest would leave him alone. Maybe they would never come back…maybe this would all blow over, and things would go back to normal, and mentioning it to Grandfather would only be inviting misery over a problem that might not ever happen.
But in his heart, Peter knew none of that was true. And if he didn’t tell now, and they did come back…maybe as Mom and Beth were opening up the front door…
Peter shuddered.
“I…I went…mmmmmarden,” Peter mumbled.
“What, are you still here?” Grandfather asked without looking up. “Spit those pebbles out of your mouth, boy.”
“I…I went…into the garden,” Peter whimpered.
Grandfather looked up but didn’t say anything. His face was empty of any emotion.
“And…and I went…into the woods,” Peter continued. “And…and I saw something.”
Grandfather was silent. There was only the tick, tock, tick of the unseen clock.
He removed his glasses, folded them, and laid them on the desk. When he finally spoke, his voice was quiet, almost a whisper.
“You fool. You young, idiot fool.”
29
Then the power surged back into the old man’s voice. “When?”
“When what?” Peter asked.
“When did you go into the garden and woods?”
Peter laid out the story with no interruptions from Grandfather. Saturday night in the garden, and the horrible burned man gathering vegetables there. Last night, Sunday, and the thirteen hobos pointing at Peter’s window. Today, less than an hour ago, and the horrible church in the woods, the chase through the trees, and the thirteen burned figures stopped at the edge of the shadowy forest.
The expression on Grandfather’s face never changed once.
“…I’m sorry,” Peter ended.
Without any indication that he had heard, Grandfather looked high above Peter, who craned his neck to follow the old man’s gaze. There was the clock over the entry to the study. An oak-framed piece of art, its gold hands pointed to Roman numerals th
at Peter had learned last year in third grade. The time was 5:50.
Grandfather moved with unexpected speed as he slammed the book, got up from the desk, and strode towards the door. Peter tensed, sure that Grandfather’s bony claw would grab his arm and drag him along through the forbidden door, where Peter would learn what ‘on pain of death’ really meant –
But Grandfather just swept right past him, into the hall, and on to the kitchen. Peter took a second to recover from the shock, then ran after him.
In the kitchen, Grandfather slid the old, beaten phone over the counter. It still had a rotary dial, which clicked and whirred under the old man’s stubby finger.
“Thaddeus?” Grandfather boomed. “This is Seamus Flanagan. My daughter brought a car into your shop today. Have you fixed it yet?”
Peter could hear the garbled voice that replied, but could not make out what it said.
“But you haven’t given it back yet? Good. Tell Melissa that you caused a problem, a serious problem, and she can’t drive the car till it’s fixed. Then tell her it will take three hours, and fix it while she waits.”
The voice sounded puzzled on the other end.
“I know there’s no problem. Make one up and stall for time. Send her and my granddaughter across the street to Lowman’s diner, and pay for her meal, since you caused the problem.”
Shouting, like a voice on helium.
“I don’t care about your reputation, and I know you go home at six – do it anyway. I’ll pay you 500 dollars above whatever you would normally charge, overtime included. No? Then how much do you want?”
There was a pause on the other end. Then, a few tentative words.
“Fine. It’s a deal. But whatever you do, DO NOT LET HER OR MY GRANDDAUGHTER COME HOME UNTIL YOU HEAR FROM ME AGAIN.”
Grandfather banged down the phone and turned to Peter.
“You’ve caused a hellfire amount of trouble, and now you’re going to cost me precious time making sure you’re safe.”
“What do you mean?”
“Safe! Safe! I have to get you to safety!” Grandfather bellowed. “What part don’t you understand?”
“What about Dill?”
Grandfather’s face got red. “Did that idjit do this?! Did he – ”
“He got me to go into the garden, but I made him go into the woods,” Peter interrupted.
“Why in heaven’s name did you make him go into the woods?”
“Because he didn’t believe me. He didn’t see anything in the garden.”
Grandfather shook his head. “I never thought I would see the day when that little fool showed more brains in his head than my own flesh and blood.”
“Is he in danger?” Peter asked frantically.
“Oh, yes. That’s putting it mildly.”
“Why?!”
“What do you mean, ‘why?’”
“Who are they? Why are we in danger?”
“We don’t have time for this, boy – ”
“Tell me!” Peter yelled, almost on the verge of hysteria. “If I’m going to die, I want to know why!”
Grandfather didn’t reach out, and he didn’t kneel down or anything like what they normally do on TV. But his eyes weren’t as angry, and his voice was the tiniest bit softer.
“We have a lot to do before sundown, boy. Get your friend over here, NOW, and I’ll tell you what I can while you both help me make preparations.”
Grandfather turned away and walked down the hall.
“So we’re not going to die?” Peter called after him.
“I didn’t say that,” Grandfather shouted back without stopping.
Peter waited a few seconds for the punch line, or at least a reassurance. None came.
“That was a joke, right?” Peter yelled. “Right?”
Grandfather’s feet faded away.
“Oh crap,” Peter fretted, and dashed out the screen door to Dill’s house.
30
The two boys stood at the wide entrance to the garage, which was ten times bigger than it needed to be to house Grandfather’s 1950’s Ford pickup truck. The building was falling apart, with more gaps in the weathered boards than actual protection from the rain. Inside, all sorts of junk hung on the walls. Grandfather was pulling items off, one by one, and stacking them on a rickety pine table: a pitchfork, a hatchet, and an assortment of jagged-looking cutting tools.
Peter looked up. The sun was high enough that the sky wasn’t red yet, but it would get there soon. Shadows stretched long on the ground.
Dill grew increasingly edgier the longer he stared at Grandfather. He shifted from foot to foot the way a trapped gazelle might as a lion paced nearby.
“Dude, do I have to be here?” Dill whispered to Peter.
“Yes, you idjit, you do,” Grandfather growled as he uncapped a metal canister of gasoline. “You both trespassed, you both committed acts I forbade you to do, and you have upset forces you know nothing of. So, in your possibly final few hours here on earth, I think a lesson detailing your stupidity and arrogance are in order.”
“Is he kidding about our ‘final few hours here on earth’?” Dill whispered again.
“I don’t think so,” Peter replied glumly.
“Greeeeeaaaaat.”
Grandfather pointed at Peter. “I told you specifically not to go in the garden.”
“But you didn’t say why.”
Grandfather shouted and shook so much that spittle flew from his mouth. “I shouldn’t have to say why! I should say, ‘Don’t do it,’ and you don’t do it! Period!”
“If you’d told us there were dead dudes in the garden, I think maybe we would’ve stayed away,” Dill pointed out.
Peter marveled at Dill’s calm collectedness as he spoke. Grandfather’s screaming turned Peter’s knees into jelly. Dill was normally frightened out of his skull by any mention of the old man, but here he was, being yelled at, and he had the presence of mind – or stupidity – to answer.
Grandfather grabbed the table and leaned way over, like a vulture. “Or maybe you might have wanted to go into the garden even more.”
Dill looked from side to side, considering. Then he shrugged. “Okay, that’s probably true.”
“Fools!” Grandfather pointed at Peter again. “And then you make the most egregious blunder of all, and actually go and disturb them in their cursed sanctuary!”
“What’s a sanctuary?” Peter asked, trying to fake coolness like Dill.
“What’s an egre – egre – egret?” Dill asked.
“That’s a bird,” Peter whispered.
“What’s a bird got to do with dead hobos?” Dill whispered back.
“First off, they are not ‘hobos,’” Grandfather snapped. “They are a family called the Todenhorns, and they died over two hundred years ago.”
Peter and Dill stared.
“I think I liked hobos better,” Dill said.
31
“They were a family of questionable character, a father and his twelve sons who came here from Europe – some say ‘escaped’ here, possibly because of a murder one of the younger sons was rumored to have committed. Peter, your great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather John Stephen Flannagan lived in this house at the time the Todenhorns arrived by boat and took a stake on the land, shortly after the American Revolution. ‘Took a stake’ – they did not pay, though the land legally belonged to John Stephen. He was a peaceable man, not inclined to confrontation. Besides, they built far enough from his house that he could keep his distance until the matter was resolved in court. A traveling judge made the circuit every five months, and the Todenhorns had arrived just after the judge’s last round. John Stephen was biding his time until he could get a legal notice of eviction, and then the elected lawman of the town could take over.
“Things were mostly unremarkable with his new neighbors until John noticed that the crops he tended were lighter than the previous year’s harvest. He had no proof, though he suspected the men were t
hieving from his gardens in the pitch black of night.
“He confronted the old man of the family once, out in the open field. He calmly told the father that he understood they might be in need of food, but John needed it to feed his own family. Since the Todenhorns had money for tools, surely they could afford to feed themselves. Or, if not, they should at least barter for John’s food – with meat they caught, or labor, or something.
“As John made his case, first one tall son walked up behind his father, then another, then another, until all thirteen men of the Todenhorn clan stood facing John Stephen. He was somewhat rattled by the display, but he finished speaking his peace nonetheless.
“The old man’s only reply was in heavily accented English: ‘This is from the land. It is our land. They give us the land. We take what we want. Not yours.’
“No one moved. John surmised the talks were over, and walked quickly back to his house. The brothers and father stood there, watching him go, and did not move until he had entered his home.
“They were an odd sort, and they kept mostly to themselves. Whatever else their faults, they were industrious – by their own hands they managed to clear the entire field of trees and build a house in the space of three weeks. They had a goodly sum of cash on hand to buy hammers and saws in town, which further fueled gossip of robbery and murder back in Germany, or the Netherlands, or wherever it was they came from.
“They were also hunters, or seemed to be, for they spent an inordinate amount of time in the woods. Hours at a time, and odd hours at that. John Stephen wrote in his diaries that he would see them trudging into the woods at dusk, lanterns blazing, and disappear into the trees.
“It was not until months later that a French trapper revealed the truth. He was in the woods gaming for beaver and fox pelts when he noticed a building back in the far reaches of the forest. He investigated and found what appeared to be a church, but one unlike any he had ever seen before. There were no crosses, no signs of Christianity…instead, there were animal skulls and bones, and strange bindings of plants and flowers that lined the walls. A wooden stump was the centerpiece of the building – the walls and floor had evidently been built up around it. On that stump was the evidence of dozens of knife marks, and perhaps what might have been burned sacrifices. Of animals or plants, the Frenchman could not say.
“In his state of amazement, he did not notice the man who entered the building behind him. He was young, with a scruffy beard and long overcoat. He carried an ax with him, and shouted in a strange, garbled language the Frenchman did not understand.
Peter And The Dead Men (Story #1) Page 8