This Present Darkness

by Frank E. Peretti

  And Marshall could feel it, just as strongly as before: that fierce, gut-wrenching terror he had felt that other night. He tried to shake it off, tried to ignore it, but it was there. His palms were slick with sweat; he felt weak. He looked around for a weapon and grabbed a fireplace poker. Keep your back to the wall, Hogan, keep quiet, look out for blind corners. It was dark in here, the shadows were very black. He tried to take his time, tried to let his eyes get used to the dark. He felt for a light switch somewhere, anywhere.

  Behind and above him, a black, leathery wing quietly repositioned. Leering yellow eyes watched his every move. Here, there, over there, all over the room, in the corners of the ceiling, upon the furniture, clinging like insects to the walls, were the demons, some of them letting out little snickers, some of them drooling blood.

  Marshall made his way stealthily to the desk in the corner and, using a handkerchief to prevent fingerprints, slid the drawers open. They had not been disturbed. Keeping the poker at the ready, he continued to move through the house.

  The bathroom was a mess. The mirror was shattered; the shards were in the sink and all over the floor.

  He moved down the hall, staying close to the wall.

  Hundreds of pairs of yellow eyes watched his every move. There was an occasional hacking from the throat of a demon, a short burst of vapor from its dripping mouth.

  In the bedroom the most loathsome spirits of all awaited him. They watched the bedroom doorway from their positions on the ceiling, on the walls, in every corner, and their breathing sounded like the dragging of chains through gravel-filled mud.

  From where he stood, Marshall could see just the corner of the bed through the bedroom door. He approached cautiously, making frequent checks behind and even above him.

  When he reached the bedroom door a single image, like a photograph, was instantly engraved on his mind. One second seemed like an eternity as his eyes darted from the blood-spattered bedspread to the bullet-blasted skull of Ted Harmel to the large revolver still dangling from Harmel’s limp hand.

  Shrieks! Thunder! Fangs bared to bite! The demons exploded from the walls, corners, every nook of the room and like arrows went for Marshall’s heart.

  A blinding flash! Then another, then another! The whitest hot light traced brilliant fiery arcs, a searing edge that cut through the flock of evil spirits like a scythe. Parts of demons tumbled into nothingness; other demons imploded and vanished in instantaneous billows of red smoke. Waves of spirits still poured down upon the one lone man who stood there in reasonless terror, but suddenly this man was surrounded by four heavenly warriors robed in glorious light, their crystalline wings unfurled like a canopy over their charge, their swords blurring into waving, swirling sheets of brilliance.

  The air was filled with the deafening cries of hideous spirits as blades met flanks, necks, torsos, and demon after demon was flung aside in pieces that instantly disintegrated and vanished like vapor. Nathan, Armoth, and two other angels, Senter and Cree, darted, feinted, spun, batted away one spirit and sliced another, thrusting their blades in a myriad of directions. The lightning from their swords flashed against the walls, bright enough to bleach out all colors.

  Nathan gutted one demon and sent it spiraling through the roof, leaving a red trail of vapor until it vanished. With his sword he slashed; with his free hand he collected demons by their heels.

  Armoth and Senter whirled in a high-powered blur, mowing through demons as through grass. Cree threw himself against Marshall and kept his wings spread to protect the stunned man.

  “Push them back!” shouted Nathan, and he began to spin his fistful of demons about his head, feeling the shock of their bodies striking other demons with the rhythm of a stick on a picket fence.

  The demons began to shy back; half their numbers were now gone, as was half their zeal. Nathan, Armoth, and Senter started flying a tight spiral around Marshall, their swords knifing through the fading demonic ranks.

  One demon shot straight into the sky with a wail of terror. Senter got right after it and quickly dispatched it like a slaughtered gamebird. He remained above the house for a time, containing any fleeing spirits very neatly and abruptly, swatting them out of existence as if they were fast-served tennis balls.

  And then, almost as suddenly as it had begun, it was over. No demon remained; none had escaped.

  Nathan alighted back in the hallway as his wings folded and the light around him faded. “How’s our man?”

  Cree was relieved to say, “He’s still very shaken, but he’s all right. He still has the will to fight.”

  Armoth came in for a landing and immediately checked Ted Harmel’s pitiful frame. Senter dropped through the ceiling and joined him.

  Armoth shook his head and sighed. “As Captain Tal said, Rafar can choose any front he wants, at any time.”

  “They have owned and tormented Ted Harmel for a long time,” Senter conceded.

  “Is Kevin Weed covered?” Nathan asked.

  Armoth answered with a little curiosity, “Tal sent Signa to watchcare Weed.”

  “Signa? Was he not assigned to guard the church?”

  “Tal must have a change in plans.”

  Nathan got back to the immediate business. “We’d best see to Marshall Hogan.”

  Marshall got a grip on himself. For a moment he thought he would really panic, and that would have been the very first time in his life. Nuts, I don’t need to get involved in this stuff, not now, he thought. He took a few more moments to ease up and think the thing through. Harmel was history. But what about the others?

  He went into the dining room and found the phone. Using his handkerchief again and a pen to dial, he called the operator, who put him through to the police department in Windsor, a town closer than Ashton, fortunately. Something told Marshall that Brummel and his cops were definitely not the ones to call on this.

  “This is an anonymous call,” he said. “There’s been a fatal shooting, a suicide …” He told the sergeant who answered how to get there and then hung up.

  Then he got out of there.

  Several miles further north, he pulled the Buick into a filling station and went into a phone booth. He first called Eldon Strachan’s number. There was no answer.

  He had the operator ring the Clarion. Bernice should be there by now. C’mon, girl, answer the phone!

  “Ashton Clarion.” It was Carmen.

  “Carmen, this is Marshall. Put Bernice on, will you?”

  “Sure thing.”

  Bernice picked up her extension immediately. “Hogan, are you calling in sick?”

  “Act normal, Bernie,” Marshall said. “I’ve got some heavy developments.”

  “Well, take an aspirin or something.”

  “Good girl. Brace yourself for this one. I just came from Ted Harmel’s place. He just blew his brains out. I got a call from him early this morning and he was talking crazy, talking about somebody coming after him, so I drove to his place and just now found him. It looked like he’d had an all-out fight with something. The place was a mess.”

  “So how are you feeling really?” Bernice said, and Marshall could tell this was the acting job of her career.

  “I’m shook up but all right. I called the Windsor police but chose to get out of there. Right now I’m up near Windsor on Highway 38. I’m going to head north and drop by Strachan’s place to check up on him. I want you to check on Weed right away. I don’t want any more sources dying on me.”

  “Do you—do you think it’s catching?”

  “I don’t know yet. Harmel was a little crazy; it may be an isolated incident. I do know I’ve got to talk to Strachan about it, and I don’t want you to wait to check on Weed.”

  “Okay, I’ll do that today.”

  “I should be back this afternoon. Be careful.”

  “You take care of yourself.”

  Marshall got back in his car and checked his map for the best way to get to Eldon Strachan’s place. It took him another hour t
o make the drive, but soon he was pulling up the same old driveway to the quaint little farmhouse.

  He slammed on the brakes and the Buick lurched to a halt, skidding on the gravel. He opened the car door and had another look from outside his car windows. There was no mistake.

  The windows were broken in this house too. Come to think of it, by now that collie would be barking, but the place was dead silent.

  Marshall left the car where it was and quietly made his way toward the house. No sounds. The windows on the side of the house were also broken. He noted that the glass was broken inward this time, unlike the Harmel house where the glass was broken out. He passed along the side of the house and checked the parking area in the back. No cars. He began praying that Eldon and Doris were gone and nowhere near whatever was happening.

  He went around the other side of the house, completely encircling it, then stepped onto the front porch and tried the front door. It was locked. He looked through the front window—the glass was mostly gone—and saw total chaos inside: the house had been ransacked.

  He carefully stepped through the window into the once quaint living room, now a pitiful shambles. The furniture was thrown everywhere, the cushions on the sofa were slashed open, the coffee table had been chopped in several pieces, some floor lamps had been thrown down and broken, everything was out of its place and thrown about.

  “Eldon!” Marshall called. “Doris! Anybody home?”

  As if I really expected an answer, he thought. But what was that on the mirror over the fireplace? He went for a closer look. Someone had taken red paint … or was it blood? Marshall checked closely. With great relief he smelled the unmistakable scent of paint. But someone had scrawled an obscene message of hate on the mirror, a very clear threat.

  He knew he would have to check every room in the house, and right at this moment he wondered why he didn’t feel the same terror he had felt at Harmel’s. Maybe this day was turning him numb. Maybe he just wasn’t believing any of it anymore.

  He checked the whole house, upstairs and downstairs and even the cellar, but there were no terrible discoveries, and he was very glad. That didn’t make him any less concerned, nervous, or perplexed, however. This was too much of a coincidence despite the basic differences. As he took a second look around the living room, he tried to think if there could be a connection. Obviously, both Harmel and Strachan had been sources for Marshall’s investigation and could have become targets for intimidation. But Harmel in his terrible fear could have done the damage around his house by himself, fighting off whatever it was, while this damage to Strachan’s house was clearly the act of vandals, of malicious characters out to scare him. That was one connection: fear. Both Harmel and Strachan were the brunt of fear tactics, whatever form they took. But why would …

  “All right! Freeze! Police!”

  Marshall stayed still, but he did look out through the broken window. There, on the porch, was a sheriff’s officer aiming a gun at him.

  “Take it easy,” Marshall said very gently, without moving.

  “Get both hands in the air, in plain sight!” the officer commanded.

  Marshall obeyed. “The name’s Marshall Hogan, editor of the Ashton Clarion. I’m a friend of the Strachans.”

  “Just hold steady. I’ll have to see some I.D., Mr. Hogan.”

  Marshall explained everything he did as he did it. “I’m going to reach into my back pocket here, see? Here’s my wallet. Now I’m going to toss it to you through the window there.”

  By now the officer’s partner had mounted the porch and also had his gun trained on Marshall. Marshall tossed his wallet through the broken window, and the first policeman picked it up.

  The officer checked Marshall’s I.D. “What are you doing here, Mr. Hogan?”

  “Trying to figure out what in blazes happened to Eldon’s house. And I’d also like to know what happened to Eldon and Doris, his wife.”

  The officer seemed satisfied with Marshall’s I.D. and relaxed just a little, but his partner kept a gun trained on Marshall.

  The officer tried the front door and then asked, “How’d you get in there?”

  “Through that window,” Marshall answered.

  “Okay, Mr. Hogan, I am going to ask you to step very carefully back through the window, and do it very slowly. Please keep both hands in plain sight.”

  Marshall obeyed. As soon as he got out on the porch the officer turned him around, his hands against the wall, and frisked him.

  Marshall asked, “You guys from Windsor?”

  “Windsor Precinct,” came the short answer, and with that, the officer grabbed Marshall’s wrists one at a time and slapped handcuffs on him. “We’re placing you under arrest. You have the right to remain silent …”

  Marshall could think of all kinds of questions to ask and it was all he could do to keep from disassembling these two, but he knew better than to say a word.

  CHAPTER 25

  BERNICE CALLED KEVIN Weed right after she got off the phone with Marshall, but there was no answer. He was probably working with the logging crew today. She dug through her file and found the phone number for Gorst Brothers Timber.

  They told her Kevin had not been in today, and if she saw him she’d better tell him to show up quick or he’d be out of a job.

  “Thanks, Mr. Gorst.”

  She dialed The Evergreen Tavern in Baker. Dan, the proprietor, answered.

  “Sure,” he said, “Weed was in here this morning, just like he always is. He was in a gosh-awful mood though. He got in a fight with one of his buddies, and I had to throw them both out.”

  Bernice left Dan the Clarion’s number in case he saw Weed again. Then she hung up and thought for a moment. It wasn’t out of the question to drive out to Baker, and besides, orders were orders. She went over her schedule for the day and tried to rearrange her jobs to accommodate the trip.

  “Carmen,” she said, grabbing her jacket and handbag, “I’ll be gone for the day, I think. If Marshall calls, tell him I’ve gone out to check on a source. He’ll know what I mean.”

  “Righto,” said Carmen.

  Baker was about seventeen miles north on Highway 27; the apartments where Weed lived were about two miles closer. Bernice found them without too much trouble, a sad complex of dry-rotting cubicles honeycombed into a sun-bleached old warehouse. Bernice’s nose told her the septic system was failing.

  She went up the plank stairs onto the loading dock which now served as a patio and entranceway. Inside, she was appalled at how dark the building was. She looked down one long corridor and noted many closely spaced doors; these weren’t apartments, they were lockers.

  She had heard some footsteps on the old planks upstairs, and now they came down the stairway just behind her. She turned her head just enough to see an unpleasant-looking character stepping down, a skinny, pimple-faced apparition in black leather. She immediately decided she had a very pressing appointment at the other end of the hall and started in that direction.

  “Hi there,” the man called to her. “Looking for someone?”

  Make it quick, Bernice. “Just visiting a friend, thank you.”

  “Have a nice visit,” he said, and he kept looking her over as if she were a steak.

  She walked quickly down the corridor, hoping it wouldn’t be a dead end, and though she didn’t look back she could tell he was still watching her. Hogan, I’ll get you for this.

  She was glad to find another stairway leading upstairs. Weed’s apartment had a two hundred number, so up the stairs she went. The stairwell was old weathered planks, illumined with one bare light bulb hanging from a very high rafter. Some thirty years ago someone had tried to paint the walls. She wound her way upward, ignoring the disgusting graffiti everywhere, her shoes making hollow thuds on the worn planks.

  She reached the upstairs corridor and doubled back, following the descending numbers on the doors. From behind some of the doors came sounds of soap operas, FM rock stations, marital spats.
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br />   She finally found Weed’s door and knocked; there was no answer. But her knocking nudged the door, and it drifted slowly open. She helped it quietly on its way.

  The place was an absolute mess. Bernice had seen the homes of messy people before, but how could Weed possibly live in a disaster area like this?

  “Kevin?” she called.

  No answer. She stepped inside and closed the door.

  It had to be vandalism; Weed didn’t own that much, but what he did own was thrown about, broken, spilled, and shattered. Papers and bric-a-brac were everywhere, the little cot in the corner was overturned, Weed’s guitar was facedown on the floor, the back stomped through, the bulbs were broken out of the ceiling fixture, the few secondhand dishes were in shattered pieces all over the floor in the little kitchen cubicle. Then she saw words spray-painted across one whole wall, an incredibly obscene threat.

  For the longest time she didn’t move. She was afraid. The implications were clear enough—how long would it be before they struck her or Marshall? She wondered what Marshall would find at Strachan’s, she wondered what her own home looked like, and she realized there were no police to call; the police were with them.

  Finally she slipped quietly out the door, wrote Weed a quick note in case he ever came back, and shoved it in the crack just above the doorknob. She looked this way and that and then went along the corridor and back down the stairs again.

  Just one flight below the second floor, a wall formed a blind corner between the two flights at the middle landing. Bernice was just thinking how she didn’t like blind corners in a place like this, and how the lighting was so poor …

  A black figure leaped at her from the flight below. Her body slammed into the old shiplap wall as her teeth clapped together.

  The man in leather! A rough, dirty hand grabbing a fistful of blouse. A violent, sideways jerk. Tearing cloth, her body reeling. An impact like an explosion in her left ear. A blurred, hate-filled face.

  She was falling. Her arms went out against the rough plank corner, they were limp, they buckled, she slid down the wall to the floor. A black boot blotted out her vision, her glasses were driven into her face, her skull thudded against the wall. She went numb. Her body kept jerking about—he was still hitting her.