Hollow Tree

by Ian Neligh

  “Oh dear,” the doctor muttered under his breath as he turned and hurried back up the stairs, pistol in hand. With everyone distracted, Anderson darted out of the room, passing through the small dining room and into the semidark kitchen.

  He could hear the doctor’s footsteps running down the upstair’s hallway. Anderson opened the supply-room door. He would be damned if he would stick around this madhouse any longer. Murder, sickness, and now he was a prisoner.

  The damp smell of old boots and gardening tools reached his nose. He could see the old green door leading to the outside, still unguarded. Anderson reached his hand toward the green door’s brass knob, careful not to make any sound. It wouldn’t budge. With resolution born from panic, he tried again, and still it would not open.

  He prepared to kick it open, when he heard the rustle of fabric behind him. He turned and heard himself say, “Oh my.”

  Five

  Handenfitch reached the girl’s room too late. Blood and what remained of a body lay thrown about. But it was not the girl’s. On the floor near the door lay one of the young man’s hands, palm up. It was opening and closing. The rest of the body wasn’t as easily recognized through the doctor’s monocle. The girl, or thing that was once a girl, was now gone.

  Dr. Handenfitch was about to leave when he heard rustling on the other side of the bed. Holding the massive weapon in front of him, he reentered the doorway and looked into the gore-soaked room. The doctor was careful to avoid stepping in anything unpleasant.

  He made his way to the other side of the bed. Dark gore splattered the linen and plopped periodically to the floor around him. The doctor glanced at the other side of the room.

  Sensing that he was being watched, Handenfitch stopped and listened closely. For a long moment he didn’t hear anything, until a sudden movement under the bed caught his attention.

  Six

  Anderson was confused when he turned and saw the headless body in a woman’s riding outfit. In the near dark it stood rocking gently back and forth. It reminded him of a cobra mesmerized by an Indian snake charmer. He thought to say or do something more, but before his mind could come to a conclusion, her hand reached into his chest and pulled free his beating heart. The action was like a heron plucking a wriggling fish from a stream.

  Seven

  Growling, the doctor kicked the bed with his right boot, sliding it across the red-wet floor panels. The bed slammed up against the floral luggage on the other side of the room.

  Underneath was revealed an undead horror. The doctor pulled back the hammer on his gun, which complied with a well-oiled click. He aimed and fired. The gunpowder roar erased much of the creature and set it on fire.

  Mrs. Gamsbey and Mr. Smacer both jumped when they heard the firearm report from upstairs. Mrs. Gamsbey, quickly overcoming her fear and shock, looked at Rollister. “You’ll swing from the gallows for this.”

  Rollister began to smile when he saw Mr. Anderson reenter the room. Then—his smile washed away.

  Mrs. Gamsbey and Mr. Smacer turned and saw Anderson’s silhouette walking into the room. “You best take a seat, Mr. Anderson, until I can reason with these madmen,” Mrs. Gamsbey said.

  Mr. Anderson seemed to take no heed at all as he neared them.

  Mr. Smacer looked at the man and swore he was seeing things. The man moved like a marionette controlled by a gin-sodden puppeteer.

  He jerked and swayed this way and that but never fell. Mr. Smacer noticed he had a hole where his heart should be.

  “I daresay,” grumbled Mr. Smacer, stepping back.

  Mrs. Gamsbey, oblivious to the horror, began to walk up to the man, unafraid. At that moment, Anderson walked into the light, revealing his face. His eyes were white, and his mouth was open in a scream of silent agony.

  Hollering like a kicked cat, Mrs. Gamsbey was flung backward by Rollister, who stepped up to meet the thing that was Anderson. Rollister tightened one of his giant gloved hands into a fist and punched the thing in the face with the force of a mule’s kick. It stumbled up against the wall with a heavy thud, cracking the white plaster.

  The thing that was once Anderson lurched forward again. The big man kicked the creature back into the dining room, where it crashed over chairs and the large wooden table.

  Mrs. Gamsbey scrambled to her feet and turned to run past Mr. Smacer, then came face-to-neck with the headless woman. Rollister, seeing the new threat, moved to intercept it. He swung his fist once more, but the headless creature moved out of the way with a speed too fast to follow.

  His fist thudded into the wall. The creature grabbed his arm and swung him into the other room. As if moved by the force of a cannon, Rollister crashed into the bottom of the stairs. Bounding down them and over his assistant, Handenfitch began firing his pistol. Bullets tore the body ragged but showed little effect.

  Rollister, back on his feet, tore free the wooden handrail with a tremendous yank, and like a jousting champion of old, charged forward. Out of bullets, Handenfitch stepped aside as the big man came up behind and ran past him. The eight-foot-long section of splintered rail ran though the headless abomination. Pushing it ever forward, Rollister then pinned the thing that was Mr. Anderson. With a great heave, he pushed the railing into the wall, leaving the two pinned like butterflies.

  Eight

  When they were sure Tabson’s Abbey was quite properly on fire, the doctor, his assistant, and Mr. Smacer stood watching it burn down. Mrs. Gamsbey, who had quite lost her mind, stood filling the night air with shrieks of hysteria and rage at their act. Satisfied, the doctor put on his hat and picked up his medical bag.

  “You bastards! You bastards!” Mrs. Gamsbey shouted.

  As she continued to scream and howl, Mr. Smacer looked at the doctor and cleared his throat. “Er, hmm, my good man, is it possible that she’s one of, er, those things from inside?”

  The doctor’s eyeglass glittered in the firelight as he cocked his head to one side and considered.

  “No, it is not likely…” He paused for a moment, listening to her screaming, then allowed, “but it is a possibility.”

  Rollister, taking his cue, picked Mrs. Gamsbey up like a javelin and launched her into the raging inferno.

  Deadline

  Four dead bodies and a broken nose later, I’d found my story. It was Wednesday morning, and I was going to destroy an invincible man.

  The dark interior of Amco Plaza washed over me as I passed through the revolving door. Inside the police sirens on the street became muted. The lobby smelled like floor wax and money, neither of which I was well acquainted with. Limping up to the security desk, I waited till the guard acknowledged my presence and put down his Styrofoam cup of coffee. He blinked, waiting to hear what I had to say.

  “I have an appointment,” I said, clearing my throat and doing my best to look casual. I glanced at my watch and saw its dial was broken.

  “Your name?” he asked, taking out a pair of bifocals from the dry-cleaned interior of his uniform jacket. He squinted at a list of names in a leather binder.

  “Jack Norman,” I said, trying to will my sense of urgency into him. He began leafing through the pages with the enthusiasm of a man who works a minimum-wage job and has to wear a silly uniform to perform it.

  I rubbed my forehead and wished I’d been able to squeeze in another cup of coffee.

  “Norman,” he said tapping his finger in his book twice. “Reporter?” He looked me up and down, and it seemed like his eyes had some difficulty making the journey. My coat was stained and smelled like the inside of a dumpster, I hadn’t shaved, and my shirt collar still had blood on it. It had been a long couple of days.

  Taking the cotton ball out of my left nostril, which I prayed had already clotted, I grinned, trying to look less questionable. My bottom lip split open again.

  “He’s still in a meeting. Go ahead and take a seat, and he’ll see you when he’s ready,” he said, waving me away, hoping he wouldn’t catch whatever it was I had.

/>   “No problem, I’m early.” And I was, too. It’s easy to beat morning rush-hour traffic when you spend the evening in the alley across the street. My deadline was approaching. It was one I would not miss.

  “If it’s alright, I’m going to step outside and grab a quick cup of caffeine,” I said, picking up my briefcase.

  He may have said something, but I was already on my way to the giant revolving door, which granted mortals access to and from the building.

  The guard then yelled, “Hey, do you know what happened out there?”

  Turning, I followed the man’s outstretched finger across

  the street to the shifting crowd near the police barricades. “Nope,” I lied with a smile. “I’ll be right back.”

  The Marvelous Five

  Outside it was cold and threatening snow. Honking vehicles jammed up and down the street and provided little shelter from the wind.

  I looked around in the sky and saw that it was empty. The air made my eyes water, and I wiped their corners with a tattered sleeve. People already gave me more room on the sidewalk than I was comfortable with. Extra attention was really not something to seek right now. What I wanted most was a few missing pints of blood returned, some sleep, and a day off.

  My car’s secondhand police scanner said the cops had blocked off traffic on Sheridan and 23rd to finish arresting the members of a bank robbery. Bystanders, criminals in ski masks, and law enforcement went through the motions, occasionally looking up at the sky and waiting. One of the bank robbers held his stomach, moaning over a pool of blood as medics raced to get to him. Today there were no superheroes. Pulling up the collar of my jacket, I cut across the street, passed the barricades, and stopped by a news cart. The balding proprietor leaned over the stained counter, unlit cigar clamped in his teeth, and growled, “Hi ya, Jack.”

  Greeting him by way of nodding, I picked up a copy of the Daily Municipal.

  “Haven’t seen any of your works on the cover for what seems like forever,” he said. Funny how the comment felt like being stabbed in the eye with a pencil.

  “That won’t last long,” I said and shook open the front page.

  My eyes were unfocused; I hadn’t slept in two days. Squinting, I tried again. The main headline announced that there were “No New Findings in Raven Disappearance.”

  No surprise there. The top art was a photo of The Champion in his red-and-yellow uniform at a press conference. The byline was Eddie Lamb’s. Lamb, a backstabbing, story-stealing slime who couldn’t write his way out of a wet sack. The story was a waste, given it was the first time a cape had gone to the press for anything official. I sighed, thinking Lamb got his cape story after all. The text under the muscle-bound leader of the Marvelous Five was a badly written five-hundred-word story about his second in command’s recent disappearance. The Champion vowed to find him—and his other missing teammates. The Patriot, American Mistress, and The Flame had also vanished from the spotlight over the last few months. A car horn blared, and I shot a nervous glance over my shoulder.

  “Where the hell are they?” asked the vendor, chewing away at his cigar and squinting up at the sky. I followed his gaze, shrugging—another lie. I put the paper under my arm, looking again at my watch. It was still broken, but a clock on the bank across the street told me I still had time.

  Digging the steno pad out of my back pocket, I flipped through the pages covered in notes documenting everything that I’d learned over the last two days.

  I wouldn’t have long in front of the big man, and I needed everything fresh in my mind for the interview. Meeting him was taking a hell of a gamble, and I wanted to make sure there wasn’t anything missing. I started with the unusual death of Bill Mayweather.

  Fingers in a Bag

  The sun wasn’t even up and it was raining. Outside my apartment the water hit the windows like little angry insects. The drops beat an irregular tattoo on the window that kept me wide awake. Finding reasons not to sleep is one of my natural talents.

  While waiting for the alarm clock to go off, my phone beat it to the punch. Rolling over, I picked it off the cradle and said something unintelligible. It was one of the new guys stuck on the late desk. He told me the police scanner was reporting a death downtown, only a few blocks from the newspaper. There was a crime scene in place. As I hung up, the alarm clock went off. Rolling out of bed, I walked into the bathroom. Flicking on the light, I tossed water on my face, took a swig of mouthwash, swallowed, and got dressed. A car was waiting by the time I got outside. Not caring if I got rained on, I walked around to the passenger side and opened the door. Sal was in the process of squeezing in the last of a breakfast burrito.

  “You know, that’s like watching a birth in reverse,” I said. He nodded, still chewing, looking pleased. His camera gear was piled high in the backseat. I sat down, and with some effort, pulled the door shut.

  “Sure you don’t want to take my car?” I asked.

  “That piece of garbage? I’d rather walk,” he said, tossing the empty wrapper into the back with gusto.

  The six-foot-three American-born Sicilian sported an unfashionable mustache and short hair to disguise the fact he was balding, and had a penchant for getting into trouble just as quickly as he got out of it again. Sal was one of those guys who went through life like they were a bar of soap. He was constantly slipping from notice and always managing to avoid trouble at the last second, coming out squeaky clean. Honestly, it was unfair. I was the polar opposite. I tumbled, snagged, and got caught on everything.

  “How you feeling?” he asked as we pulled away from the curb.

  “Like a magical rainbow full of goodness,” I said.

  Sal drove us into the heart of the city. Before long he stopped near a dead-end alley next to an old pizza joint called The Pizza Pisan. The buildings making up the alley looked like two stone giants, tired and as old as the world.

  The space between them was alive with law-enforcement activity. Like angry blue ants, police swarmed under the portable floodlights. The water all around their feet looked red. Slipping out of the car, I walked up to a patrolman trying to tape off the area. He seemed to be having a hard time of it. While he faced the other way, I stepped around him and acted just like I belonged inside the alley with the rest of the non-uniformed officers. A camera flashed and I squinted at the light. They were trying to document the area before too much more was damaged by the weather.

  “For Chrissake—can we get a damn tarp or something?” a detective hollered over his shoulder. If they knew I was a reporter, they’d likely arrest me. I’d deserve it too. Sal was still getting his gear out of the car, but I couldn’t wait for him; he was on his own. Sometimes that was how it had to be. Someone walked by holding a baggie. I saw its contents for just a second under the bright lamps, and it looked like it was full of fingers. What the hell had happened here?Sal argued with a uniformed officer, then the cop turned and made eye contact with me. This had better be fast. Pushing past a group of detectives, I could just make out what they were looking at. Dazed, I realized I’d never seen anything like it before—I doubt anyone had.

  The Gin Blossom

  “Hey.” I felt a hand on my shoulder. I turned and saw the uniform, and my stomach dropped like a pair of cement shoes. “You need to get behind the goddamn tape.” I nodded, rain running into my eyes. “Let’s go, move,” he said, pushing me along with the beating end of his flashlight. Escorted back to Sal, I had trouble not tripping over my own feet.

  “Well?” he asked, reviewing the photos on the back of his camera.

  “Murder,” I said. “I think.”

  “You think?” He walked back to the vehicle, slinging his camera over his shoulder.

  It was hard to tell what had happened. The body was sitting on a turned-over trashcan. The head had been smashed in from two sides.

  “Maybe some sort of industrial accident,” I said, not knowing what the hell could cause that kind of damage. The force must have been incredible. The
body had a least one missing hand, which would explain the baggie full of fingers.

  In Municipal City, like in any pile of people, all manner of terrible things can happen. At that magic hour when the sun starts to pull the shadows away from the alleys and streets like a soupy tide, you never knew what you were going to find washed up and grinning at you.

  “Six o’clock,” Sal said, hitting me in the shoulder.

  Turning, I saw Joe Calhoun climbing from an unmarked police cruiser. Calhoun was the chief public information officer for the MCPD. He was a small-minded bully who confused his job of disseminating information to the press as personal power. To add to his delightful menagerie of winning characteristics he had a nose with the fiery red glow of a baboon’s ass at sunset. A gin blossom like that could only be earned the hard way—one shot of bourbon at a time. Calhoun had once been a homicide detective, but one too many closeted skeletons had earned him a desk.

  “I hate this guy,” I said out loud. He waddled his way over to us. It was dark and arguably hard to tell, but it looked like he was smirking.

  “Isn’t it a little early for you guys to be up?” he asked. “Or do vultures every really sleep?”

  “Crime scenes equal free donuts—what, isn’t that why you’re here?” I asked.

  “What makes you think this is a crime scene?” Calhoun asked, looking around in mock surprise. “Did you become a police detective without letting me know?”

  “I’m an imaginary cop, just like you—” I said.

  “What information do you have so far?” Sal asked, interrupting us both.

  After a moment, Calhoun fixed his bloodshot eyes on Sal. “The investigation is ongoing; we can’t release any information at this time,” he said automatically.

  “I bet by the time the cameras show up, you’ll think of something,” I said.

  “If you have any questions, you can direct them to my office,” he said, walking away and dismissing us at the same time.