Rob stared at him incredulously.
Lucius said, “I don’t kid about shit like this.”
Fred shrugged and took the top off of his canteen and drank it dry.
“I’m going to fill this with creek water,” he said. He got up and stepped down the slope to the flowing water in the creek.
“You think it’s them?” Rob asked Bennett.
“I don’t know,” Bennett replied. “But if they’re trying to scare us, I’ve got some surprises in store for them.”
“Like what?” Rob asked.
“I’ll think of something.”
They all laughed.
It was raining harder now, and they all leaned closer to the fire. The bottle was passed around.
Bennett passed out granola bars he had in his pocket and the smell of dead fish drifted over the fire and they looked up.
“There’s that smell again,” Lucius whispered.
“What’s keeping Fred so long?” Rob asked.
Henry stood up and looked down to the creek. He could see nothing in the darkness.
“Give me your light, Bennett.”
Bennett handed him the flashlight and Henry shined it down the creek.
“He’s not there,” Henry said.
They all got up, Rob with his flashlight, Lucius with his, and they looked down onto the creek together.
“Where’d he go?” Rob asked. “I don’t know,” Henry said.
“Hey! Fred!” Bennett yelled.
Nothing.
“I don’t like this,” Lucius whispered.
“Why?” Bennett asked.
“I just don’t,” Lucius said.
Henry started panning the length of the creek with the flashlight. Rob and Lucius followed suit. Twice they covered the stretch of creek but saw nothing. Then Henry started shining the light on the opposite shore, back along the rocks, running the beam upstream until something in the fringes of the beam caught his eye and he moved the beam to it. He trained the light on the object and held it there for several seconds trying to cut through the rain and the cloud that was enveloping the mountains.
“What’s that?” he whispered.
There was a brief silence and Lucius whispered, “It looks like someone lying on the rocks on the other side.”
“Could it be Fred? Maybe he’s hurt.”
“Let’s go down and see,” Bennett said.
“Hey,” Lucius said, “I’m not going without a weapon,” and he picked up a three foot piece of wood, Rob and Henry each picked up a large rock, and Bennett took a hunting knife from his belt and the four went down, fording the creek by jumping from rock to rock in the glow of their flashlights, and climbing up on the other side. They approached the object in a huddled group and when they got close enough they saw it was a body wearing Fred’s clothes, but its throat was torn out, its head hanging by mere shreds of flesh, its left shoulder and arm were gone.
“Oh, Christ,” Rob said. Bennett started to retch, and when Lucius turned, they all turned and fled like a herd, crossing back over the stream without regard for the stones they had come over on, but wading through the knee-deep water until they were up on the other side in the safe aura of the fire.
“Who was that?” Lucius asked.
“Was it Fred?” Rob asked.
“Those were his clothes,” Bennett said.
“But was it Fred?” Lucius asked.
“Yes,” Henry said.
“What do you mean? How could it be Fred?” Rob asked.
“It was him.”
“What happened to him?”
“I don’t know.”
They huddled for another minute.
“What’s happened to him?” Rob shouted.
“I don’t know,” Henry said.
“That smell’s back.”
The stink had returned, thicker than ever, and hung over the campsite.
“We can’t leave him out there,” Henry said.
“What do you mean?” Lucius asked.
“We can’t leave him out there.”
“Who’s going to get him?”
“We are.”
“Not me,” Lucius said.
Bennett looked up and caught Lucius’ eye and shook his head. “If Lucius isn’t going, I’m sure as hell not going.”
“I’ll go,” Henry said.
“Are you crazy?” Rob asked.
He didn’t answer. He took Bennett’s hunting knife and flashlight and stood up. He walked back toward the creek and shined the light across onto the other side. He scanned the other bank for a moment while the others watched from the fire.
He said something.
“What?” Bennett yelled.
“The body’s gone.”
“What?” Rob asked and they all stood up and went to the creek where Henry was shining the light to the other side.
Rob and Lucius shined their own. The body was gone.
“Where’d he go?” Lucius whispered.
No one answered.
“Back to the fire,” Henry said.
When they got there, Lucius fed more wood into the pit.
“I want to get this fire bigger,” he said.
“Let’s sit down and think this out,” Henry said.
“What’s there to think about?” Lucius asked.
“We’ve got to figure out what we’re going to do.”
The stench was getting stronger.
“There’s nothing to do except build this fire bigger and wait until the guys get here with the gun,” Bennett said.
“Yeah, wait’ll the other guys get here with the gun,” Rob said.
“They’re not coming,” Lucius said.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, they’re not coming. We all know they’re not coming.”
The four sat in silence. Then Lucius’ voice started low. It had a primeval quality of ancient men over ancient fires.
“They’re not coming. Whatever got Fred, got them. All of them. That’s why we didn’t see Cory going up the hill. That’s why Mike and Tom didn’t come back. That’s why all that stuff was left at Cougars Camp. That’s why those three cars are at the top of the hill. It got them. It got them all. And the jacket in the stream with the keys? Those keys aren’t going to do anyone any good anymore. Some poor bastard made it all the way back to his car. And he’d have gotten away if he’d had his keys. But the keys were in the stream and all he could do was lock the doors. Then whatever it is that’s out there pulled him through the windshield. And now it’s out there waiting for us. If we’d have seen this clearly, we could have turned back when there was time.”
“How do you know all that?” Bennett asked.
“Did you see Fred’s body? Did you see those eyes? You tell me what you think is happening?”
Bennett didn’t reply.
“What is it, a bear?” Rob asked.
“I don’t know,” Lucius said.
“No bear smells like that,” Henry said.
“What’s it want?” Rob asked nervously.
“To eat?” Lucius guessed. “To hate? I don’t know.”
“It’s got Fred,” Rob whined. “Maybe it’ll go away.”
“No. It’s waiting. It’s out there waiting. It’s watching us now,” Lucius said.
“How do you know?” Rob hissed.
“Because of that smell. That stink means it’s out there.”
They all fell silent for a moment.
The rancid odor became almost palpable.
“It’s close,” Lucius whispered.
“But why so many?” Rob asked. “Why kill us all? It can’t eat them that fast.”
“Who knows?” Lucius asked. “Maybe it has a den and it takes the bodies to the den. That’s why we wouldn’t have seen any, except Fred’s, and now his is gone. That’s probably what the shoe was doing up on the trail. It fell off a body it was dragging.”
Bennett shuddered.
“Where’d it come from?” Rob asked.
Lucius gave him a long look and then he shrugged.
“What are we going to do?”
Lucius sighed. “Henry’s the hunter.” He looked at Henry. “What do we do?”
Henry said nothing. Instead he hung his head and stared at the ground.
“Well I’ve got a hand ax in my pack and I’m going to get it,” Rob said.
He stepped back to the packs and gagged on a scream that rose in his throat.
It was there, just barely in the shadows beyond the backpacks, its eyes reflecting the fire, its lips pulled back to expose its teeth, its hairless skin glistening with a coat of slime, and behind it, a thick, five-foot tail churned noiselessly in the ebony night. It stood on two muscular legs and at the end of two sinewy arms were claws and it lunged for Rob as he stumbled back toward the fire. It almost had him except it shrunk back from the fire for a split second, but it whipped out and hooked a claw in Rob’s pant leg and started dragging him away from the fire as Rob screamed, “Help me! Jesus, help me!”
Lucius rushed the thing. He grabbed it by its arm and with his prodigious strength wrestled it to the ground.
But almost instantly the beast was back on its feet.
“Go!” Lucius yelled.
The thing stared at him.
“Get out!” Lucius commanded.
Its skin seemed to ooze a noxious slime that smelled like the grave itself. It showed its teeth again and it took a step forward.
Lucius took a step back.
It lunged.
Whatever Lucius’ strength, the thing was ten times stronger. Only because Lucius lifted his arm did the thing not tear out his throat, but it raked a huge chunk of the triceps from Lucius’ left arm and deltoids from the left side his chest, exposing several ribs.
Lucius cried out.
Bennett and Rob recoiled back. The thing straddled Lucius and went for his throat to bring a quick acquiescent death. Except for the fire.
Henry had grabbed the cold end of a burning log from the fire and rushed the beast. The thing shrunk back, no longer concerned with the writhings of Lucius, but with its own obsessive fear of the flames. It was in the light of the torch that they got their best look at the thing, with its stone-grey skin glistening under the rain, and the rancid mucous that covered its body. It had a single white scar on its chest and shoulder, a reminder of a camper who had almost saved his own life by battling the thing with his campfire. A camper whose story they would have heard had he survived his encounter.
It faded back into the shadows and Lucius sat up looking in wide eyed disbelief at the flesh that hung in tatters from his body.
Henry helped him to his feet and led him to sit close to the fire. Bennett stood back looking blankly into the shadows where the thing had disappeared while Rob, standing instinctively as close to the flames as he could, started to babble. “Let’s get out of here,” he was saying.
“Sit down,” Henry said to Rob as he put a blanket over Lucius’ shoulders.
“Let’s get out of here before it comes back.”
“Sit down,” Henry repeated.
“What was it?” Rob shouted.
“Get me a first aid kit from one of the packs,” Henry told Rob.
Rob looked at the packs, barely visible in the shadows, and didn’t move.
“Get a first aid kit,” he said turning to Bennett.
“Not on your life,” Bennett said.
Grabbing the flaming log from the fire again, Henry went and got Fred’s pack and brought it back to the fire. From inside he took a first aid kit and realized how inadequate it was, but he had to try.
The lurid effluvium was on Lucius, but more of it hung heavily on the camp, meaning it was still there, waiting.
“We’ve got to get out of here,” Rob said.
“Sit down.” Henry ordered.
“I’m getting the fuck out of here,” he screamed, and grabbing his flashlight he turned toward the creek.
Henry jumped up and tried to stop him. “No, Rob,” he shouted. “We’ve got to stick together.”
But Rob wrenched loose and ran down to the creek and forded it over the stones. He was up on the other embankment and on the trail when the others heard the thing break loose from the trees on their side. With the flashlight Henry barely caught sight of it as it ran like a greyhound over the creek and up the embankment and onto the trail in pursuit of Rob.
They could hear Rob screaming as he ran down the trail in the dark, “No. No. Ma. Help. Ma.” Then there was silence and most of the noxious fumes drifted off of the campsite, meaning the beast was no longer nearby.
Henry tended to Lucius’ wound, but the big man was going into shock.
“Lie down,” Henry told him. The wounds were severe and it was difficult to tell how long he could last without medical help. He laid down on a sleeping bag Henry had spread for him.
“Do you think it’s gone?” Bennett asked.
“I don’t know,” Henry said and he threw more wood on the fire.
“What do you think it did to Rob?”
Henry said nothing.
“I’m getting cold,” Lucius said.
“Try to get comfortable and get closer to the fire,” Henry told him.
Bennett took the Pendleton and took a long draw on the bottle. He coughed twice and recapped it.
“Better take it easy on that,” Henry said.
“Why didn’t we let Cory bring that gun?” Bennett asked.
Henry said nothing.
“Oh, Christ,” Bennett cried. The smell was coming back. He picked up the flashlight and started to pan the trees and stopped when the beam rested on a pair of glowing eyes that stared back out of the darkness.
“There it is,” he whispered. “Hasn’t it had enough? Why won’t it go away?”
“Stay close to the fire,” Henry said. “Just stay close to the fire.”
Bennett sat on a rock at the fire’s fringe and took another drink of the bourbon.
“We can keep the thing away as long as we have a fire,” Henry said.
Bennett said nothing.
“We’ll be okay,” Henry added.
“How are we going to keep a fire going? We’re almost out of wood.”
“We’ll get more.”
“The only good wood is two hundred yards down the creek. Who’s going to go for it? It’s waiting for us. We can’t keep a torch going in this rain.
He took another drink and lowered his head. He tried to speak but his voice broke. Then he started to cry.
Three hours passed. The fire was struggling against the rain. Henry looked at the reserve of firewood. Even well husbanded it would be gone before dawn.
Across the fire from him, Bennett was passed out in a drunken stupor. Henry reached down to his feet and touched Lucius. He was unconscious now, his skin cold to the touch, his breathing barely perceptible.
He stared into the flames. Even if he kept the fire going until dawn, help wasn’t coming until Monday. Maybe not even then. And when they did, they’d go to the hot springs. No one knew they’d changed their plans and come up to Crawfish Creek Camp. In the meantime, the thing wasn’t going to go away.
He tried to summon a mental picture of his wife and children. But it wouldn’t come. He might never see them again. It didn’t bother him. He felt strangely relaxed even though the stench told him the beast was out there, just beyond the fringes of the fire’s light.
He stared deeper into the coals, their twinkling embers sparkling like jewels in the night. It was hard to believe that the grey ashes you find in the morning once glowed more beautifully than any gemstone.
He held his hand as close as he dared until he could no longer bear the heat. Then he took his hand away and fed the fire with fresh wood. He watched as the firebrands rose like phosphorescent insects from the disturbed coals. Then, using one piece of wood as a torch, he stepped out of the sanctuary of the campfire’s glow and got Rob’s pack and brought it closer. He emptied its contents
onto the ground. He found the skillet. It was large and deep, and taking the torch in hand as protection, he went down to the creek and bent to fill the skillet with water.
When he looked up, the thing was there, not twelve feet away. All that stood between it and Henry was the torch. They stared at each other for nearly a minute. Then Henry straightened up, took a step closer and extended the torch toward the beast.
It hissed, but it took a step back, never breaking eye contact with Henry. Slowly, Henry took one more step, the beast took two backwards. Henry took another step. The thing stood its ground and roared.
But Henry took one more. The thing slunk back into the trees and disappeared into the night.
Henry returned to the campfire and set the frying pan on the coals. Then he sat and watched as the flames licked at the pan’s bottom. By and by bubbles began to form on the floor of the skillet as the water first gave up the air dissolved in it. Then a silvery cloud of vapor started to form on the water’s surface. He put the last of the wood on and watched as the flames began to boil the water.
He picked up Lucius’ five-cell and played it on the trees around him, slowly passing it over the forest’s cover.
He saw nothing the first pass and started again, more slowly this time.
“Where are you, you bastard?” he whispered. “Come on out, shithead, I’ve got a surprise for you.”
Then he saw it, on higher ground, some twenty yards away, watching, ever-patient, waiting for the fire to die.
“It’s you and me, cocksucker,” Henry called to it.
It stared.
Henry had no idea how intelligent it might be, but he knew it understood the fire would eventually go out.
But Henry was waiting for it to go out, too. “I’m going to do a little hunting, now,” he yelled.
The beast stared.
The flames got smaller.
Henry turned the flashlight off and put it on the ground. Taking a shirt from Rob’s pack, he wrapped it around the skillet’s handle and lifted it off the coals.
Holding the skillet low, near his knees, he turned and walked in the beast’s direction, away from the fire, away from the only thing the monster feared. He stopped, peered into the darkness, and waited. Almost before he knew it, the thing rushed out of the night, and he brought the skillet up at the last moment, catching it with boiling water just before it knocked him off his feet. It was astride him, its face an inch from Henry’s own, about to kill him. But it hesitated, its eyes growing wider as the scalding water probed with its searing fingers of heat deep beneath the beast’s slime-covered, skin. Then it reared back and bellowed, filling the forest with its deep-throated rage. It reeled back from this unexpected torment.
Beast Page 6
