Riders in the Sky - [Millennium Quartet 04]

by Charles L. Grant

  Nothing specific, not really.

  Just a feeling, and after all these years, his feelings, his instincts have seldom led him wrong.

  The farce with Hull and Chisholm was a sign of it, he was sure. That should have been a done deal, no problems, a simple matter of a few well-placed bruises as a taste of what might be in the old man’s future. But his boys screwed it up, and now he has to worry what Hull is going to put in the next edition. He had no doubts—there would be another edition, no matter what he tried.

  A shade less than six weeks to go; he needs assurances nothing else will go wrong.

  Trouble was, there was only him and Jasper, and Jasper was so damn sure there was nothing wrong at all that there absolutely had to be something out there aiming to gum it all up.

  Cutler doesn’t consider himself a superstitious man, yet he never deliberately tempts the Fates either. That would be stupid. It’s like going to church once in a while. Cover your ass. Just in case. You never know.

  So when things go without a hitch for as long as this deal has, he can’t help himself; he just has to worry. Not because there’s bound to be a disaster, but because the folks involved tend to grow complacent, and that’s when serious mistakes are made. Law of averages, he once told Jasper, it’s the law of averages.

  He isn’t sure yet how big a mistake Teague’s failure is, but he feels he has to do something, and do it soon. Just in case.

  He closes the cash register drawer.

  He opens it.

  He decides to get hold of Teague and tell him to hold off on what they’d planned for Senior Raybourn. Give it another week, maybe two. That would be cutting it awfully close, but everything else should be in place by then, and if Senior doesn’t sell... hell, ain’t no one around here gonna miss a fat old cook and his halfwit son.

  The drawer slams shut.

  He listens to the sea, and he smiles.

  Hell, if the ocean hasn’t gotten to him after all these years, why in God’s name should he be worried about some old fart’s newspaper that isn’t even heavy enough these days to kill a damn fly. He’s got no proof, and Jasper keeps reminding him they can always shut him down with a good old lawsuit.

  A laugh.

  A shake of his head.

  A puzzled frown when he hears something moving across the gravel parking lot in front. He moves away from the display case toward the window, wondering if he should get the gun in the register drawer, gets halfway across the room when the door opens, the wind slams inside and sets the light to shaking, and he sees someone standing on the threshold.

  “Closed,” he says. “Come back tomorrow.”

  “Don’t think so.”

  It’s an old man, kind of lean, wearing tired old jeans and scuffed old boots, an open vest with some kind of Indian designs on it, a low-crown western hat tied loosely under the chin by a beaded string, and his hair is in for God’s sake braids that hang down his chest.

  “Mr. Cutler?” The man smiles. A quick smile, here and gone. Not much else to see beneath the hat’s brim.

  “Who wants to know? I told you we’re closed.” He looks out the window, up and down the causeway. “Jesus, man, where’s your car? You walk the hell out here?”

  That smile again.

  Cutler wishes the guy would move closer; he can’t see much of his face, just that flash of a smile. He clears his throat. “Look, if you’re a salesman, I ain’t buying.”

  “I ain’t selling, friend,” the man answers. “But I sure could use some of your help.”

  He takes a step in—the sharp ring of spurs—closes the door behind him, and there’s nothing inside now but the sound of the sea, and the light above their heads almost too dim to cast a shadow. Shimmering a little, making the dead fish look as if they’re trying to twist off the walls.

  “Got a proposition for you, Mr. Cutler. Something I think just might ease your troubled mind.”

  Cutler wants to laugh, wants to throw this geezer out on his ass, wants to get home to Mandy and whatever’s she’s planning for him tonight, because for no reason at all, right now the last place he wants to be is in this place, right here.

  With the grizzled old man in the Indian vest.

  “I don’t get it,” he says hoarsely.

  “Oh, you will, Mr. Cutler. Believe me, you will.”

  * * * *

  12

  Kitra Baylor had known full well what she was getting into when she’d married Lyman. Her uncle had been a preacher, her grandfather, a close cousin. She’d known their wives and had seen firsthand what a fish bowl they lived in. Yet it hadn’t deterred her when she’d met that ordinary-looking guy with the thinning blond hair who burned to a crisp every summer before settling into a meager, hardly-worth-it tan, grew red-faced every fall when the Falcons blew another game, and whose moral outrage at every injustice had him pacing through the night, trying to figure out what could be done to make it right.

  When they’re alone in the rectory, she calls him the Lone Ranger, and she knows, despite his protests, that he’s secretly pleased.

  Tonight, in the kitchen, she stands back from the stove and draws a wrist over her forehead to clear it of perspiration. Another pie finished, one more to go. Tomorrow morning, after service, she’ll take most of them to those parishioners who don’t have a whole lot to be thankful for on the holiday; the remaining three are for her husband, who can eat a gallon of ice cream, or three pumpkin pies over the course of two days, and not gain a stupid ounce.

  “My Lord, you are beautiful,” Lyman says from the doorway.

  She blushes and waves at him—go on, tell me another.

  Once, in another lifetime, she had won a beauty pageant in North Carolina, and the experience had excited and terrified her so much she’d never done it again. But her looks had stood her in good stead, as a grade school teacher, and as the preacher’s wife. While it raised some minor problems, it smoothed over a whole lot more.

  “Listen, dear,” Lyman says, standing behind her, arms around her waist, hands clasped at her stomach, “I’m thinking of taking a look in at that Chisholm fellow up the road. I’m pretty sure he hasn’t seen a doctor.”

  “Ly, you worry too much.”

  “I can’t help it. I mean, Kit, he slammed into my car!”

  “I know, dear. You’ve told me a hundred times.”

  She covers his hands with one of hers and squeezes gently. “Leave him be, honey. Leave him be.”

  He sighs into her hair. “I suppose.”

  They stand for a long while, silent and still.

  “The horses,” she says at last, disengaging herself from him, fussing with her apron.

  “What?”

  “If you want to do something useful, find out who’s been riding those stupid horses up and down Midway all night. You know there aren’t—” She stops when she sees the expression on his face. “What, Lyman? What’s the matter?”

  So he tells her what he had seen after the collision with the big man, Chisholm, how he’d passed it off as a combination of adrenaline and shadow, a freakish spurt of imagination.

  “But that’s not the same,” she tells him, shaking off the shivers his story had given her. “What I hear is real, and I don’t like it.”

  “I know, dear,” he says. He takes a second. “I’ve heard them, too.”

  * * * *

  13

  The tide slams against the jetties, artillery fire from the mouths of deep-bore cannon that seem too loud to be natural. Foam bubbles in cracks; water boils over the boulders; the moon has turned everything a lifeless silver, except the black clumps of seaweed scattered across the sand at the farthest reaches of the waves. Sawgrass trembles away from the wind. Sand hisses down the slopes of the dunes. A candy wrapper bounces and twists along the beach until it bumps into a shoe torn at the toe, coming apart at the heel.

  Dub Neely reaches down, picks the wrapper up and stuffs it clumsily into his coat pocket, and walks on, into the trees and along
a narrow path worn by those who sought the sun in summer. His head is down, his gait unsteady, moonlight reaching the ground in fits and starts as bare limbs sway and pine limbs quiver, and it isn’t long before the off-and-on light makes him dizzy, makes the beer in his empty stomach begin to work its way up to his throat.

  He doesn’t bother to fight it; it’s only a matter how far he can get before he has to stop.

  Ten yards before he grabs hold of a bole with one hand and vomits, closing his eyes as his throat turns raw, wiping his mouth with an already stained sleeve. Ten minutes before he moves on, shuffling, ignoring the tiny knife points of sand that dig into his soles through the gaps in his shoes, thinking only of the cot he has waiting in the empty house near the swamp and the blanket that will cover him and protect him against the cold. Nearly tripping over an exposed root. Scraping his shoulder against a trunk that has no business being where it is, so he slaps at it angrily, snarls, spits, and walks on, concentrating on not stumbling, because if he falls he knows he won’t get up until the sun rises again and his bones will ache and his head will swell and he’ll be in no condition to beg for Thanksgiving dinner. Which, if he’s lucky, will be more than a few scraps. And when he stumbles again, he decides the hell with it, the hell with Thanksgiving and the hell with food and he might as well die now because there’s no sense anymore, there’s just no sense. He’ll end up as he should, like that tiny skeleton over there, the skeleton of a small bird that lies beside a pile of other tiny bodies, more birds the insects and crows have cleaned to the bone.

  When they move, he isn’t surprised.

  He’s more drunk than he’s been in months, so it makes perfect sense that those little skeletons can move, can rise on skeleton legs and skeleton claws and waddle and hop toward him. In and out of the moonlight. No eyes. Just beaks and bone. A fascinating example of biology gone mad, and he grins as they gather at his feet and begin to peck at his shoes.

  It isn’t until the first one draws blood that Dub Neely begins to scream.

  * * * *

  PART 3

  * * * *

  1

  1

  I

  t had been a long time since Casey had been in a church, and it wasn’t nearly as uncomfortable as he’d feared. A little strange, perhaps, but not uncomfortable. At least there were no signs of impending lightning or other manifestations of Divine disapproval for his absence. For which, he supposed, he ought to be grateful, all things considered.

  The church was crowded, and experience had taught him to arrive early so he could sit at the far end of the back pew. Unfortunately that allowed him to become the target of curious stares, a few cautious nods and, to his guilty delight, three outright glares of hostility as the three Teague brothers filed in, each wearing a blue serge suit a good full size too small. Mayor Cribbs and his family were there, Norville Cutler and Mandy Poplin—the woman from his town office—Hull and his daughter and a young man Casey didn’t know, but from his gait appeared to be more at home on a boat than on land.

  The others, most of them, were just faces. Faces he recognized but had no names, or names that did not come readily to mind; faces of strangers; but the faces he enjoyed the most were the faces of the children. Clearly most of them didn’t want to be here. It was Thanksgiving. They were supposed to be home, taking in the smells, stealing nibbles from platters, annoying mothers in kitchens, ready to eat and watch football and maybe play a little touch or tackle in the yard before the sun went down. They definitely weren’t supposed to be in a stuffy old church.

  He smiled to himself, and now and then lowered his head to hide the pain memories set upon him.

  For the life of him he couldn’t explain why he was here. It had just happened. He’d awakened, showered, and found himself dressing in the best clothes he had. Not a suit, but decent grey slacks and a white shirt and dark tie, and shoes he hadn’t worn in... too long. Too long. A dark wind-breaker, not the denim jacket, and the next thing he knew he was outside in springlike sunlight, walking south, taking his time, standing for a long while outside Baylor’s church before sighing, shrugging, and finally going in.

  Candle wax and polish; a vaulted ceiling whose thick exposed beams represented the hull and keel of Noah’s ark; several tall windows down each side—frosted, not stained glass; above him, a gallery for the organist and choir; whispers and coughs and the creak of wood.

  As he sat there, alone despite the couple squeezed in beside him, he tried to remember the last time he’d been inside a church; two years, at least. He tried to remember the last time he’d held a Bible; two years, at least.

  I don’t belong here, he thought suddenly, but suddenly it was too late.

  The organ sounded the first note, the congregation rose, and the service began. The hymns, some familiar; the prayers, some familiar; the faces of the strangers, and the faces of the children. Sprays of wheat and trays of fruit and gleaming vegetables; warm sunlight through the high, wide window behind the simple wooden cross suspended from the ceiling; autumn flowers and a large pumpkin and the faces of the children.

  I don’t belong here.

  Reverend Baylor was a curious, pleasant contradiction. He seemed stiff, almost formal, until he sang; he seemed uncomfortable until he climbed into the pulpit, looked out over his congregation, and gave them such a smile that Casey nearly wept.

  I don’t belong here.

  Lord, he thought, I think I know what You’re doing, but You know as well as I do that I don’t belong here.

  Not anymore.

  The sermon held no admonitions, no threats of hellfire and brimstone, although Casey had to admit that’s exactly what he had expected; it was brief, humorous here and there, somber in a plea to pray for those souls under attack physically and otherwise. No mention of the Millennium, but he didn’t have to say the word, just caution his flock that a little introspection as the year comes to an end would do no harm, a little acceptance of the man who had hung upon the cross would help in the coming times.

  Casey didn’t know the hymn that ended the service, knew only that it was anything but solemn, a loud and joyous prayer of thanks that in a smaller church in another place would have had the congregation clapping and swaying in time to the music.

  He was out of the pew before the last note had faded, out of the church and into the fresh air before anyone else thought to move. He hurried down the walk toward the street, breathing heavily, deeply, trying to decide if he should go home for his bike or just head on into town to take advantage of Gloria Nazario’s kind invitation. There was no temptation not to go; she had offered, and he would accept, and with luck be able to apologize to Junior for scaring him like that.

  He looked right and saw Midway Road stretch too far north. Nope; no bike. By the time he got home he’d be sweaty and unfit for civilized company, and a shower and change of clothes would get him to the restaurant too late. Better just to go on; it wasn’t all that far, maybe he’d get lucky and someone would offer him a ride. And if he was too early, it was a beautiful day; he could stroll around a little, take in the sights, check out the seasonal decorations.

  Behind him the chatter of the congregants leaving the church, the cries of impatient kids to hurry up, some laughter, someone clapping an order to a child. He didn’t turn to look; he didn’t want to see.

  ”Mr. Chisholm!”

  Damn, he thought, but he couldn’t ignore it.

  As he turned, Reverend Baylor waved from the top step, a request to wait a while, until he’d finished greeting his people. At the same time a young woman strode toward him, stunning and blond, a smile just for him.

  “Mr. Chisholm?” she said, holding out her hand.

  He took it and nodded. “Yes, ma’am.”

  The smile broadened. “I’m Kitra Baylor. My husband almost killed you the other day.” And she laughed.

  Casey couldn’t help staring, and couldn’t help noticing that she didn’t seem to mind the rudeness; he realized immediate
ly she was used to it.

  “Are you all right?”

  “Yes, ma’am, I am,” he said, just barely stopping himself from scuffing a foot on the ground. “A little bruise on my shoulder, that’s all, nothing serious.”