Outcast In Gray

by M. Glenn Graves

  “Sam’s got to be moving on fumes only,” Rosey said.

  “He’s made of the same stuff that allows you to behave in a similar fashion when need be, my friend,” I said.

  The blood trail stopped cold. It was as if someone had lifted the critter off the ground and transported it to another location. There was simply no more blood to be seen. And, as mysterious as that was, Sam lost the scent he had been tracking. He ran up and down the edge of the forest where it met the clearing for her place. He even ran over to the kennel to see if he could pick it up again. No success.

  “I don’t believe this,” I said.

  “Something swallowed them,” Rosey said.

  “If that’s true, then I certainly don’t want to meet whatever it was that swallowed them.”

  He smiled. “It was a metaphor.”

  “Well the fight that I watched between Sam and the wolf-thing was no metaphor. And the blood that issued from the wound where I hit the beast was no allegory. There should be blood here and some scent, unless the critter bled out completely. There would still be a scent if she made it this far.”

  I walked back into the woods just to see if I had missed something. I found traces of blood from the edge of the woods back into the woods. I followed for a good quarter mile. Sam was with me. Rosey stayed at the edge of the clearing and waited on us.

  I walked back with Sam.

  “I’m no Daniel Boone, but golly-gee, this is crazy. There should be a trail here,” I said.

  “I don’t dispute that, Sherlock, but you can’t manufacture one. It’s not here. The wolf-thing, as you call it, has disappeared. Gone back into the fairy tale.”

  I frowned at him. Miffed would be a good word to describe my feelings.

  “You don’t buy it,” I said.

  “You have to admit it’s a hard one to swallow.”

  “But you followed the blood trail with me.”

  “True, but that blood could have been left by any animal. You claim it was a large wolf, twice the size of Sam, maybe even larger. That’s a whopper by anyone’s standards.”

  “I can’t believe you doubt me, after all we have gone through together.”

  “I don’t really doubt you. I’m simply saying that there is no way you are going to convince anyone outside of your friends of what you saw this morning, what Sam did, and what happened when you followed the trail. No one will believe you, even though I believe you.”

  I felt a little better but I suddenly realized that Rosey was right. My adventure was a whopper, a fish story, soon to be a tale told by an idiot, by any stretch of the imagination.

  I called Starnes to see if she had enough strength to drive over to K.C. Higgins’ place to pick us up. She reluctantly agreed to come. I told her nothing of what had happened. I had a notion that a face to face story time would be best in this instance.

  While we waited on her arrival, we checked the house by looking in the windows to see if anyone might be home. No sign of Higgins could be seen. We walked around the kennel looking for any trace of her or the wolf. No luck.

  K.C. Higgins and her wolf pet had completely disappeared.

  58

  “I want rest, food, and a good night’s sleep,” I said when we entered Starnes’ place late that afternoon.

  “I’ll call the doctor and make an appointment for you as soon as she will see you,” Starnes said.

  “What doctor?” I said.

  “The psychiatrist in Asheville, Dr. Judith Ann Clinnard. She specializes in psychotic disorders and is a personal friend of mine,” Starnes said with a wicked gleam in her eyes.

  “Funny,” I said.

  “You have to admit that your accounting stretches reality a bit.”

  “I saw what I saw. I was there. I know what happened, at least I saw what happened. I can’t explain it any more than you guys can believe it. And you, of all people, have the audacity to question my sanity after what you went through.”

  “I didn’t see what you saw. I only saw your dog and my new best friend Sam attack something that was large. And there was no K.C. Higgins around giving kill commands for whatever it was that Sam fought against.”

  “That makes me the crazy one?” I said with mild frustration.

  “So, if I can’t make an appointment with my friend the psychiatrist, who would you like to see?” Starnes said.

  “Tomorrow we’re going to see Josephine Starling. I’ve got questions and she’s got answers. In the meantime, Sam needs to see the vet once again. I want his most recent wounds checked out thoroughly.”

  The vet allowed us to drop Sam off on our way over to see Josephine Starling once again. I was beginning to wonder why Aunt Jo didn’t charge us for her assistance on our cases.

  The rain was falling gently when we arrived at Aunt Jo’s tranquil spot at the end of Ivy Gap. There was an eerie light desperately trying to break through the cloud cover but the rain was still falling albeit much finer now. It was a cold rain at that. Her really early flowers and herb garden seemed to be enjoying the tender shower despite the temperatures. Dog stayed behind to get some needed R&R. Rosey agreed to remain with her.

  Starnes knocked on the door. No answer.

  We waited several minutes, knocked again, a little harder this time. Still no answer.

  “We can come back,” Starnes said.

  “Let’s wait.”

  “Wait? We have no idea where she is, nor when she’ll return,” Starnes said with some exasperation.

  “The woman has no obvious mode of transportation, she couldn’t have gone far. Let’s wait for her return. I want to speak with her today. I need answers now.”

  Starnes shook her head at me. “You’re a peculiar woman, you know that?”

  “So my mother says.”

  “Yeah, well, she’s got that right. Stubborn, too.”

  “I’d rather call it tenacious.”

  “I’m sure you would,” Starnes said and sat down hard in the middle of the porch swing. She pushed herself hard and began her porch-swing ascent. She obviously did not want my body next to hers as she moved back and forth with some force.

  “I’d prefer obstinate,” she said after a few minutes passed.

  “I wouldn’t trust that swing with such force,” I said. “It seems to have been hanging there for several decades judging from the rust and algae growing on the chains.”

  Starnes ignored me.

  “You’d rather be in Madison working alongside of Buster Murdock?” I said.

  “I’d rather be at home convalescing.”

  “You can convalesce here. This is not strenuous.”

  “It is emotionally disturbing. We’re wasting time.”

  “I have a hunch that Jo Starling will be coming home any minute now.”

  “What makes you say that?” Starnes said.

  “I can see her walking up the road as we speak,” I said.

  Starnes slowed her swinging and turned to look at what I could see.

  Sure enough Josephine Starling was walking slowly up the lane toward us. Her lime green umbrella was clearly discernible. She was wearing a white shawl to cover her shoulders. Her ankle length, floral print dress had some mud splotches at the bottom edge. What used to be white sandals covered her feet. She was also wearing white socks with her sandals. Not really a fashion statement, but Aunt Jo likely didn’t care much about that.

  “Good morning to you ladies,” she said as she closed the gate and stepped up onto the porch.

  “Morning, Aunt Jo,” Starnes said.

  “Kind of early for you to be out traveling,” I said.

  “Oh, my, child, I’ve been up since before five o’clock. Lots going on these days. Had a mission of mercy to attend to.”

  “Neighbor in distress?” I said as we followed her into the house.

  “You could say that. One that needed some immediate attention. Mercy undertakings have no specific time slots. You go when you need to go.”

  “Where’s K.C.
Higgins?” I said before she could invite us to sit in her living room.

  Starnes and I were standing by the front door. Aunt Jo was over by her couch. She leaned her lime green umbrella next to the side of the sofa and removed her white shawl. Her back was to us.

  “And why would I know where K.C. is?” she said with her back still facing us.

  “If anybody’s in need of mercy this morning, it would be her,” I said.

  “Yes, I suppose that’s true. She’s had a rather hard life.”

  “It’s getting harder. She’s making it harder on herself,’ I said.

  “Maybe so, but, well, sometimes we make bad decisions based on prior incidents in our lives. Isn’t that true, Clancy Evans?” she said and turned around to face us.

  “Always. Might be the fatal flaw of which Shakespeare wrote so often.”

  “Revenge is a natural thing,” Aunt Jo said.

  “Might be natural, but it is still against the law when murder is involved. We need to know where she is,” I said.

  “And you expect me to tell you.”

  “It would be beneficial.”

  “I’m her mother, I can’t just hand her over to you. But you already know that.”

  “I know that we will continue to track her. It’s a matter of time. We’ll find her.”

  “I wouldn’t bet on that if I were you. K.C. lived in the wild for several years before I found her. She came to live with me only because she wanted to. Through the years she has remained close to nature, to the woods…”

  “To the animals,” I added.

  “Yes, to the animals, to the one she feels the closest to,” she said.

  “She told me, just before she tried to use that monster to kill me.”

  “I am sorry about that. Sounds like a bad decision, but she knows that now. She promised me that it wouldn’t happen again.”

  “That’s not enough, Aunt Jo. We have to find her,” Starnes finally spoke.

  “And arrest her?” Aunt Jo asked.

  “That might happen as well. She has some questions to answer,” Starnes said.

  “I understand that you have a job to do, but you have to know that she is, as far as I’m concerned, my daughter, despite the absence of any common genes. I have loved that child for three decades, maybe longer. You might say that I’m a little vested.”

  “We could arrest you for aiding and abetting,” I said.

  “I doubt that you will do that. Besides, I am rather sure you would have a hard time making such an allegation stick.”

  “We won’t do that, Aunt Jo,” Starnes said as she looked angrily at me. “We just need to find K.C. before anyone else gets hurt.”

  “No one else will be hurt,” she said.

  “How can you promise that?” I said.

  “Her revenge is complete. It’s over. The last one responsible is dead.”

  “Who’s dead?” I said.

  “It’s a might stuffy in here, don’t you think. Let’s go out to the front porch,” Aunt Jo said and walked past us onto the porch. We followed. I noticed that this was the first time we had visited with Josephine Starling in which she had not served us tea. It was early, but still; it crossed my mind.

  She sat down on the left side of the swing and patted the position next to her as she looked at Starnes. Starnes joined her. I leaned against the post next to the two steps.

  “Let me tell you what I know,” she began. “K.C. was in love with Rufus, but she didn’t know that she was in love. She had strong feelings for him and she asked me what these feelings meant.”

  “This was 1984?” I said.

  “Actually, I think it was a year before that. Earlier than the year of the incident.”

  “The incident,” I said.

  “I’m coming to that. She and I talked about relationships, you know that birds and bees conversation, at least the early part of it, I should say. You could call it the introduction to it. I talked in general terms, what I thought she could grasp. She only knew that she liked Rufus a lot.”

  Aunt Jo began to swing and stare off into the drizzling rain. Some fog was rolling in and that seemed to captivate her.

  “You were saying, you talked with K.C. about boys,” I said trying to bring her back to the point.

  “I tried. We had many conversations. Almost every day it seems now that I think back on it. I finally told her that she needed to say something to Rufus. If she was so intent on finding out whether he liked her or not, she needed to speak with him.”

  “As in ask him if he liked her?” I said.

  “Well, in not so many words, but the idea was that, yes, to see if there might be a mutual attraction, so to speak. It was her first experience into that stuff. Despite my insight into certain things, I can’t be expected to know everything about human nature. I gave her the best counsel I could.”

  “Okay. So, what happened?” Starnes said.

  “She came home near the end of school, her fifth grade year and said that she had talked with Rufus a little and that he acted as if he liked her. She was overjoyed, of course. She might have misread him or misunderstood his behavior. It’s hard to say. I was not around when they talked. Still, K.C. was happy that summer as she was heading into the sixth grade. That summer was a good one for her except for not ever seeing Rufus until the Old Time Festival in Athens the first week of August. It was a week before school was to begin.”

  “They reconnected, so to speak, at the festival,” I said. It was more of a question than a statement.

  “Not exactly. The two of us went to the festival to have some fun and to see what folks were selling. There were lots of crafts and homemade goods on display. I was enjoying it, but I think that K.C. was bored until she spotted Rufus. But her joy didn’t last long. Rufus was with Dottie Higgins and they were holding hands. I saw them. It was an innocent kind of thing, but then, I wasn’t a fifth or sixth grader. It was hard on K.C.”

  “So, K.C. was going into the sixth grade and Rufus and Dottie were going into the fifth grade that year?” Starnes said.

  “That’s right,” Aunt Jo said. “I guess I was hoping that K.C. might forget about Rufus over that summer. She hadn’t mentioned him that I can recall, but when she saw him at the festival … and saw him with Dottie Higgins … well, something happened.”

  “I take it you mean in her case, life did not go on?” I said.

  “Not like I was hoping,” Aunt Jo said. “Life isn’t always good or pleasant. People can be mean or kind, good or evil. I sometimes we choose the wrong way. And when you combine that with the things I can see or know… well, it was hard on me back then.”

  “What did you see or know, as you say?” Starnes said.

  “I saw evil being planned,” she said.

  59

  I have had some strange experiences since I had the pleasure of knowing Josephine Starling. I have seen things that I could not explain. I have been told things by her which she had no possible way of knowing. What she told me was all accurate, all correct. She is a woman of great mystery and whatever the sight is, it is unexplainable. That’s if you ask me.

  When Aunt Jo told us that back in the eighties, that sixth grade year for K.C. Starling, that she had a vision of evil being planned, the ambience of that little front porch changed. As soon as she finished that sentence, the wind abruptly blew against us and a cold descended as if we had walked out of a balmy, cool day into some place in the Arctic.

  It was so very sudden. It was so very fierce. The drastic nature of this change caused both Starnes and me to jump to our feet so as not to be blown completely from the little porch. We were now facing this powerful headwind which had come from some dismal place far away from us.

  Aunt Jo was still sitting in the swing and acting as if nothing had changed. She was calm and seemingly passive. Starnes and I were anything but calm and passive. The cold had descended upon us like a terrible head-on collision. Aunt Jo seemed to be oblivious to the severe change in nature. Evide
ntly the loud, fierce wind had brought the cold from some other spot on the planet, brought it right to Aunt Jo’s front porch.

  I grabbed Aunt Jo’s hand and pulled her gently from the swing while Starnes forced open the front door and held it so that I could get Aunt Jo inside safely. Two of us were glad to be out of that cold, unsympathetic wind outside.

  “Where did that come from?” Starnes said to me.

  “Not my terrain. I don’t live here, you know. This is your world, not mine.”

  While we were satisfied to be on the inside with that wild wind still blowing outside and exchanging sighs of relief to each other, Aunt Jo had walked over and sat down in her red cushioned chair.

  “I was saying,” Aunt Jo began, “that you both have to remember that K.C. had a rather strange beginning to her life what with spending time in the woods with the wild animals when she was so young. I think that had an effect on her while she was trying to adapt to this more human society. And it lasted for several years.”

  We walked across the room and sat down on her sofa across from her.

  “So what evil did you see K.C. plan?” I asked.

  Aunt Jo frowned at me as if I had crossed some line and had asked an inappropriate question.

  “I don’t understand your question,” she said.

  “When you were sitting in the swing on the porch, just before the fierce north wind chased us inside, you said that you saw evil being planned. I simply asked what evil you saw in your vision that K.C. planned for her class mates.”

  “You assumed the wrong thing,” Aunt Jo said. “It wasn’t evil from K.C. I saw.”

  “Oh,” I said.

  “I think it came about as K.C. was trying to be accepted by the kids in her class. Because of her early life in the wild, she had an interesting relationship with animals, all animals. Some animals were afraid of her. They would run away as she approached them. Other animals seemed to be drawn to her and would respond by doing anything she asked them to do. There didn’t seem to be any pattern to it, except years later it was more obvious.”

  She paused in her recollections and seemed to be staring at something behind us. I turned to see what was there. The front window was directly behind us, so I concluded that she was looking at the tree branches moving rapidly back and forth due to the force of the wind.