The Oath

by Frank E. Peretti

  Now Steve hesitated. Was Levi superstitious or wasn’t he? Where did fact end and superstition begin in that gray head? “So tell me about the dragon, Levi. What is it, exactly?”

  Levi’s voice was suddenly very quiet. “We better keep our voices down. We’ve got company.”

  Steve turned and looked down the road to the edge of Old Town and caught sight of two heads just ducking behind a ruin. “Who are they?”

  “The guy with the white bandage around his head is Phil Garrett. He got his ear almost bit off in a fight, and the doctor had to stitch it back on. The other one may have been Carl Ingfeldt. He looked kind of small.”

  “Carl Ingfeldt. He was outside your place when Tracy Ellis and I were there.”

  “Yeah, probably.”

  “What do they want?”

  “Well, I’m sorry, Mr. Benson, but I think they were following me. Seems I can’t go anywhere without Harold Bly knowing about it. There could be trouble now. This here is Harold Bly’s land.”

  Steve looked at him. “What is?”

  “Most all of it. It used to belong to Benjamin Hyde, and Harold’s a direct descendant. He inherited all this.”

  “Harold Bly owns Old Town?”

  “And most of the new town. Well, the mining company does, actually, but Harold owns the mining company, so—there it is.” Levi looked in the direction where the two men had briefly appeared. “They’re gone now, probably gone back to report us being here. We’d better leave.” He rose from the rock, and they started making their way out of Hyde Hall and into the street.

  “Levi,” Steve said in a hushed voice, “I think you said others have been killed here. Did I hear you right?”

  “You did.”

  “How many?”

  “No one knows, and no one tells. But it’s been going on for a hundred years.”

  Oh boy, here was more legend and superstition. Steve hoped he could probe around all that and get to the heart of the matter. “What about Harold Bly? Does he have anything to do with it?”

  Levi winced. “Harold likes to think he’s the cause of it all, that he’s in charge of everything, but it’s the dragon’s doing, really.”

  It was time to humor the old guy, at least to get a few clues. “So tell me about the dragon.”

  They stopped in the middle of the street. If they left Old Town they would have to go separate ways, which meant Steve wouldn’t get an answer to his question. Steve was willing to remain long enough to hear it, but Levi looked around, obviously a little nervous.

  By now, Steve’s curiosity was piqued. He prompted, “I understand the dragon is a popular superstition around here.”

  Levi looked at the ground, and even scraped it around a little with his toe. “No, not really.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “There’s some superstitions about it, things that might be true and might not.” He looked down the road again.

  “So what is it really?”

  “Oh . . .” Levi could have been describing a pet hunting dog, his tone was so calm and straightforward. “It’s a long, snaky, lizardy flying creature. From what I can gather, back around the turn of the century he wasn’t all that big, but I guess now he’s up to, oh, maybe forty, forty-five feet long if you could stretch him out, with razor-sharp teeth and a mean streak that’s worse now than it ever was. He’s hungrier, too. But mind you, that’s only a general description.”

  Steve had to marvel at Levi’s matter-of-fact acceptance of such a preposterous idea. “Are you kidding?”

  “You asked me about Maggie,” said Levi. “You were there, up in my bedroom. You heard Maggie talk about your brother getting eaten and her getting killed the same way, right?”

  “Yes, I did hear that. I thought she meant the bear.”

  Levi shook his head. “No, she knew it was the dragon. And that’s why she came here. It’s part of the legend, the whole superstition. When it’s your time, the dragon calls you here, and you come, and—”

  “And what?”

  “Well, those who believe in such things would say she came here—” He pointed at Hyde Hall. “—and went in the hall. Then the dragon dropped out of the sky, grabbed her, and carried her off to its cave and ate her.” Levi could see he was losing his audience. “Now that’s what those who believe in such things would say.”

  Steve sighed and tried to get the impatient c’mon-get-real look off his face. “So that’s the traditional view, the superstition.”

  Levi nodded. “Hyde Hall is the traditional place where people meet the dragon. I think the dragon can take a person anywhere he wants, but tradition says it happens here.”

  “So Maggie, in her guilt, in her tormented state of mind, came here, thinking she had to meet the dragon, that it was—her time.”

  “If you don’t show up when you’re called, then the dragon comes after you or your family. That’s part of the superstition, too.” Then he added, “But I don’t believe that part.”

  Oh. That’s admirable, Steve thought. You’re superstitious, but not that superstitious. Great. I was beginning to worry.

  “Anyway,” Levi concluded, “I figured she’d come here to Hyde Hall, and that’s how I found her shoulder bag and her shoe.”

  And maybe you’re making up this whole miserable story, Steve thought. Maybe you know good and well what happened to Maggie Bly, and you’re part of the cover-up. “Levi, tell me something. Just why is it nobody else will talk about the dragon, but you don’t have any trouble talking about it?”

  Levi gave a little shrug. “I’m saved, that’s all.”

  “So with you it’s a religious thing.”

  Levi crinkled his nose as he thought about it. “It’s kind of a religious thing with everybody. They’ve got their dragon; I’ve got Jesus. Simple.”

  So okay, Benson, what kind of theory can you build from all this? Steve looked around the ruins and tried to apply legend to reality.

  “Levi, have there been several deaths recently?”

  He shrugged. “Depends on what you mean by recently.”

  “Oh, how about the last year or so?”

  “This year we’ve had more than the last year—well, two already, your brother and Maggie—and last year we probably had more than the year before that. And before that—well, nobody keeps records, nobody talks, and nobody asks, but every once in a while, some people just don’t show up for breakfast the next morning, you know?” Thinking about this troubled him. “Seems like it’s always been that way, but it’s been stacking up, speeding up, just getting worse and worse. Used to be it was legend, it was talk, it was stories from way back told by the old-timers. Now what’ve we got? First your brother on Wells Peak and then Maggie in Hyde Hall in just a few days, and I’ve got a feeling it’ll get worse from there.”

  “But traditionally, this is where they’ve always come—to meet the dragon, right?”

  Levi looked around at the sky. “Oh, this would be a good spot, I suppose. The trees just never do well here, so the sky’s open. The dragon could drop in here easy and grab somebody.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “It was tougher grabbing your brother, did you notice that?”

  Steve was starting to lose patience. “Levi, what are you talking about?”

  “The dragon had to crash through some trees trying to get at him, had to break ’em right off. I don’t think he prefers to do that. It’s better here.”

  Steve looked directly at Levi. He himself had noticed the trees the day he went to the site. “How did you know about those broken trees?” he asked slowly.

  “I went up to Wells Peak and had a look.”

  “When?”

  “Oh, right after you and Tracy Ellis came to see Maggie.” Levi could tell he was shaking Steve up. “You did notice those trees? The tops broken off, the branches on the ground?” Levi looked at the sky again. “Yeah. It was tough there. Too many trees. Plus having a righteous woman there to contend with, getting in the way, fight
ing it off with a knife.”

  Steve was beginning to feel uncomfortable with this man. Levi knew things, but he could weave myth and fact together so intricately Steve couldn’t be sure where one ended and the other began. “What does Evelyn’s being ‘righteous’ have to do with it?”

  Levi smiled at the thought. “She survived, didn’t she?”

  “I don’t follow you.”

  Levi didn’t get a chance to answer. Just then, someone else shouted at them from the end of the old street.

  “Hey!”

  They both turned to see Deputy Tracy Ellis coming their way.

  “Uh-oh,” said Levi. “We’ve been caught.”

  Tracy was looking stern, like a mother about to drag her kids home by their ears.

  “What’s the problem here, anyway?” Steve asked Levi.

  “Harold Bly again,” Levi whispered. “This land has all the people scared, so he doesn’t want people like us snooping around on it.”

  “Gentlemen!” said Tracy Ellis, striding up to them, completely in the role of deputy. “Just what do you think you’re doing here?”

  “Checking out the site of Maggie’s disappearance,” Steve answered.

  “Well, this is private property, and I’ve got a complaint from the owner. Levi, you ought to know better!”

  “Just trying to keep this man alive,” Levi said.

  “Well, so am I!” she snapped back. “Now you’ve got one minute to vacate the premises or face arrest!”

  She was sure talking loudly, Steve thought, almost as if she was performing for somebody.

  Levi took one last careful look at her, then walked up the street, heading back the way he had come. Tracy stood where she was and let her voice drop to tell Steve, “Let him get ahead. I don’t want you talking to him.”

  That was pushing it. “Does your authority extend as far as telling people who they can talk to?”

  “Today it does. People are watching us.”

  “So we noticed. Are they the ones who called you?”

  “They told Harold, and he called the sheriff. I was just a few miles up the road, and he knew it, so I had to show up. Come on, let’s walk.”

  “My camper’s the other way.”

  “Maybe I’ll impound it. That’ll keep you out of trouble.”

  They started up the street, well behind Levi. He was gone before they’d come to the edge of Old Town.

  “So what’s the game here?” Steve asked. “Are you arresting me or what?”

  She was irritated and angry, and it was no act. “Steve, I told you if you made trouble or broke the law I’d have to do my job. Well, I wasn’t kidding. You’re trespassing, and Harold Bly has a legitimate complaint.”

  “I’m just trying to do my job.”

  “You don’t have a job, Steve! Collins called it quits, remember? You’re not authorized to be here, and if you come snooping around Old Town by yourself, you’re going to have the whole town down your neck. Hyde Hall is off limits, it’s sacred; taboo, okay?”

  He stopped, indignant. “Why?”

  She grabbed his arm and gave him an authoritarian push. “Keep walking!” He kept walking. “It’s a long story. My prime concern right now is that you’re getting people upset, which means they’re going to be on my back, which means I have to be on yours.” Then she added, “And especially if they see you with Levi. They don’t like him, Steve.”

  “Well at least he’ll talk to me.”

  “Oh, he’ll talk, all right. He loves to preach.”

  “He wasn’t preaching,” Steve said, pushing his way through the tall brush. “He was telling me about the dragon.”

  She pushed a gnarled branch aside so she could pass. “For Levi it’s the same thing.”

  They reached the edge of the ruins and started down the unused road toward the highway.

  “So where does Harold Bly stand on all this dragon stuff?”

  Tracy made sure her voice was quite low as she answered. “If people are afraid of the dragon that’s fine with him.”

  “Especially when his adulterous wife vanishes?”

  “Especially.”

  Steve was tossing a new theory around in his mind. “Levi said that people come here to die, to meet the dragon.”

  She almost stopped walking at that one. “Steve, don’t believe anything Levi says! His head is full of that kind of garbage.”

  “But what if—” Now that he was about to voice his theory, it seemed a little silly. Maybe he had given Levi too much credence. “Just what if a predator of some kind was responsible?”

  At that, she did stop. “Do dragons need firewood?”

  “Excuse me?”

  Tracy hesitated, then admitted, “I just came back from Wells Peak. The area’s been sanitized, raked out, cleaned up. And those broken trees we saw? They’re all cut up into cordwood, bucked up and stacked right there.” She was incredulous. “A stack of cordwood with absolutely no way to haul it out of there!”

  Steve was stunned. “Levi told me about those trees. He knew about them.”

  Now she was interested, even if it was Levi. “What’d he say?”

  Steve chuckled a bit. “He suggested the dragon broke them off while attacking my brother.”

  Tracy allowed herself a small laugh. “Well, there you are.”

  “Another cover-up. I guess to do the dragon a favor.”

  She shook her head in amazement. “I can’t believe how idiotic this dragon thing can get. And I grew up here!”

  “This place was raked out, too.”

  “I’m not surprised. I’m sure it’s all for the same reason. It’s like I said. If someone wanted to pull off a murder, Hyde Valley has some old traditions tailor-made for the purpose.”

  Steve paused to think something through one more time, then asked, “So—what did break the trees off?”

  “The people who killed your brother know the dragon legends. Trees broken off by the dragon would really sell in Hyde River. It would be very persuasive.”

  But Steve still had a problem with it. “How did they break the trees off? You’re talking about snapping off an eight-inch trunk and several branches—without a machine.”

  She smiled knowingly. “Hey, this is logging country. Get some chain, some cable, a few come-alongs and some climbing spikes. The right people with the right tools could do it.”

  “So now we’ve got people defeating their own purpose: They break the trees off to stage a dragon attack, then cut the trees up to keep people from suspecting it was the dragon—”

  She shook her head. “It’s Hyde River, Steve. One thing follows another.”

  Steve gave her a teasing smile. “But you’re still looking, aren’t you? You didn’t have to go back to Wells Peak, not with Collins closing the case. What were you doing there?”

  Tracy shrugged off the question and said, “Let’s get out of here. I still have to lecture you and take you back to your camper.” They walked on. “Oh, and one more thing: Let me know if you get any weird phone calls.”

  The night of July 19th, we gathered with Benjamin Hyde in the main room of Hyde Hall and signed the new town charter.

  We regarded ourselves as the elite of Hyde River: the owners, the businessmen, the foremen and bosses. The future was in our hands to shape as we would, and we were drunk with the possibilities.

  It was to protect this future, this dream, that we swore a blood oath over the signed charter. Like everything else that had transpired in town, this was Benjamin Hyde’s idea, and just as he had provided a newly written charter for us to sign, so also he provided a small basin of blood—that of the day’s purged undesirables, he claimed—and required each of us to dip our fingers in it, paint a streak across our foreheads, and swear upon that blood that we would forever preserve, protect, and defend the town charter and never disclose what had happened on that day.

  There were at least a hundred gathered in that room: ourselves, our wives, our children. We were devoted to Ben
jamin Hyde. In the light of one candle, we smeared ourselves and even our children with the blood and swore the Oath.

  The Oath has been kept now for generations, by my children and their children and their children’s children.

  From a letter enclosed with the last will and testament of Stephen Morris Templeton, who died in Phoenix, Arizona, on January 18, 1942, at the age of ninety-four

  EIGHT

  HAROLD BLY

  “LEVI, COME ON, you know better than to trespass down there.” Reverend Ron Woods was tall and gangly, with a large nose and sad eyes that made him look like a tortoise without a shell. He was a patient man and once again, Levi Cobb had given him occasion to prove it.

  “Sure, I know better,” Levi argued, “but that Benson fellow didn’t. I couldn’t let him go traipsing around down there by himself.”

  It was Thursday evening. The day was cooling down, and the shadow of the west ridge had advanced up the opposite slope and shaded half the town. Ron and Levi were walking up the street toward the old steepled church, a short climb up the hillside from the main highway. This was the part of the new Hyde River that had first sprung up when Old Town began to fade early in the century. Its original log and hand-hewn timber homes had been restored, then restored again. The matronly old church, built of logs and tilting a bit, was a centerpiece for the neighborhood, and now it too was being restored with a new coat of weather sealer and a new roof. Ron and Levi were heading up the project, and that was the real reason for their being together now. This other subject had come up out of necessity. Word had gotten around town about the Great Trespass, and Ron had gotten word—a rather strong word—that Levi needed talking to.

  “But look at the cost,” Ron continued, hoping reason would prevail. “Not only is Dr. Benson in trouble with the law, but we’ve got people upset and talking about it. Levi, it’s a simple matter of respect for other people’s feelings and views and keeping peace in this town.”

  Levi gave Ron a sideways look, signaling that a disagreement was coming. “Kind of a one-sided effort, don’t you think?”