After not being able to find the boys, the men decided to call a town meeting the next morning. Doctor George Carter came to the meeting. He was not yet a member of the community, but the mayor extended the courtesy for his small town. Many of the farmers were at the meeting and they were all riled up over the situation. The town’s mayor, Taylor Benaford, sat at the head of the council chamber and held a gavel in his hand. He banged his gavel on the top of the big judge’s bench the three council members sat behind.
“Order, order, I need order in this room.” Benaford kept banging his gavel until the chatter died down in the room. “Good. Now everyone get to your seats and we can begin the meeting.” He waited for those standing to sit down before continuing. “All right, folks, we are here to come to a conclusion about what is happening in our town and to come up with a solution to fix it. Sally Rodgers, you have the floor.”
The portly man banged his gavel again for quiet.
Sally Rodgers was sitting in the front row; she got up and walked to the microphone that had been setup for the audience to use. Sally was a woman of 48 years; she had short, blond, curly hair and was thin. She looked as if the life had been drained out of her as she came forward to tell her story. She looked out at the audience, touched the microphone to see if it was working, and then began her story. “Hello everyone. For those who do not know me, my name is Sally Rodgers and I live on Ridgemont Drive. I used to have a farm west of town but since I am alone now I sold it.”
She looked at them before continuing. “When I had the farm about two years ago strange things began happening. We lost two of our best cows and a horse, they were all mutilated and there was blood everywhere.” She started to cry as she relived the events. “I told my husband I saw something and so did my daughter, I know it. I can’t say what it was but it did move in the trees and I mean high above my head in the tops of the trees. I have never been so frightened a day in my life than I was that day.” Sally Rodgers stopped and a woman brought her a handkerchief and she thanked her.
“Three months ago, I lost my Kathy. She said she was having problems with some of the students in school and she swore up and down that she was being followed, even stalked. I regret today that I did not pay more attention and did not believe everything that she said. There is something going on in this town and I think it involves those kids. They got my Kathy and they will get your kids, too. We have to stop them; we have to stop them . . .” Sally broke down and cried uncontrollably and two men had to carry her off to the back of the room.
The crowd began to get out of control, yelling and screaming for action. The Mayor banged his gavel several times to regain control of the room. “Order, order, I will have order in this room.”
A man shot his gun in the air and the loud noise got everyone’s attention. They calmed down and sat back in their seats. “Now we all have sympathy for Mrs. Rodgers, Lord knows we have looked everywhere we could think of to find poor Kathy. But, we have to have proof. We are not going to charge off like a mob and do something crazy. I am the law in this town and I will have order in this place.” Sheriff Monroe stared around the room at the people, making sure to look all of them in their eyes. He was a tall man of six feet with fiery red hair shooting out beneath the brim of his sheriff’s hat. His eyes were deep blue and penetrating to the point of being uncomfortable. Not a single soul was spared from their menacing gaze. Most immediately looked down with a respect for authority, but a small number needed more intimidation to bring them in line.
“I got your proof, Sheriff; I got your proof right here.” An old man stood to face the lawman and he pointed to his son sitting beside him. He motioned to the crowd. “You all know my boy Mike. Everybody knows he is a crackerjack shot and he either missed when he shot at it or he hit it dead on and it didn’t faze the beast. Tell these folks, son.”
Mike Chambers stood and cleared his throat. “You all know I don’t go around lying about things. I win the shooting championship in Dearmont every year. Like my pa just said, I either hit it or I missed, and I don’t think I missed. I took dead aim at a man-like creature and I shot from my back porch at point-blank range. That means that whatever is out there is big and tough and will take more than one bullet to bring down.”
The Sheriff grabbed the microphone and interrupted him, “oh come on, Mike, you are starting to believe your own hype. You tell the same nonsense every chance you get. Nothing is out there that is bulletproof and you are just frightening a bunch of people who are already scared out of their minds. Now we need to calm down and get a firm handle on what is happening and rumors and wild stories are not going to cut it. We need proof!”
“Proof?” Mike said, “I was deer hunting with my friends a couple years back and I hit a deer. That deer ran for close to a mile before it finally dropped dead. Now I hit that whatever it was and it ran. I went three miles out from my back porch and I found a couple drops of blood and this.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a towel with bloodstains on it. The towel had writing on it that read ‘Lucient Central.’ “This is your damn proof right here. I tell you it was those kids or somebody from that damn school.”
Rumblings went up in the room from all sides. People moved frantically about, some yelling in support of the man’s story, while others thought it was a pack of lies.
Sheriff Monroe took the floor again. “Now come on, people, this ain’t fantasy land here. Something is wrong and accusing our children is a coward’s way out at best. I say we take a look at evidence and stop the gossip.”
Jenny Platt climbed to her feet and walked to the Sheriff. She took the microphone out of his hand so she could speak to the crowd. “Sheriff, I don’t have a story like they do but I do know something about animals. My husband Lester was mutilated by something. The doc was there and he said it looked like a bear attack. Sheriff, you know very well that we don’t have bears in this area, which leaves one possibility, people. If it was a bear that was attacking people, my husband would not have risked his life and confronted the bear head on. It had to have been people. My husband thought he could help so it had to have been people.”
The Sheriff took the microphone back from her. “We are not going to go out and form a lynch mob based on what you think your husband did. We start something like that and where will it end?”
“You are covering for your daughter, she is one of them,” someone shouted from the audience.
“Yeah,” shouted another.
“It is those children,” screamed a woman in the crowd, “they are possessed by Satan!”
“Kill them!” several screamed.
“I can’t believe you people would suspect your own children of something so horrific!” Sheriff Monroe looked at the crowd with shock.
“What about your daughter, Sheriff, is she one of them?” Another person shouted and infuriated the Sheriff.
Mayor Benaford banged his gavel several more times. “People! Calm down! Now listened to what I am telling you folks. Here is what we are going to do. We are going to form search parties; some will leave now while others will leave tomorrow night. We will go out searching for concrete evidence that we can bring back here and show everyone. If you do not join one of these teams then you must stay home. Anyone out alone or with others will be considered a lynch mob and subject to arrest. No action, I repeat—no action—will be taken until we have facts. Now Sheriff Monroe will lead a party today and I will lead one tonight. I want Bill Thomas to lead one tomorrow morning and Jeff Liddy tomorrow night. Let’s get proof, people, before the school year starts.” He banged his gavel again, “Meeting adjourned, let’s go home folks.”
Chapter Six: Resurrection
Vampires aRe ReaL Page 7