Deception Creek

by Ned Oaks

  He stepped out from behind the tree and stood at the edge of the forest. His breathing was faster now, his eyes riveted on the house. . . .

  Burton fell asleep early that night, after eating far too much dinner. He kept dozing in bed while trying to read a novel, but finally he surrendered to the inevitable, removed his glasses, and rolled over to sleep. Annie was still awake, reading one of her new books by the light of the lamp on her bedside table.

  When Burton awoke hours later, Annie was asleep. The house was immersed in darkness, although he could see moonlight shining on the trees outside through a small gap in the curtains. He lay thinking about nothing in particular for a few minutes and then realized he needed to urinate, and badly.

  He rolled out of bed quietly and crept into the hallway toward the back door. When he opened it, he shivered in the cold night air. He decided not to make the trek across the yard to the outhouse. Instead, he stood on the top step outside the door and relieved himself in the grass off to the side of the house, his teeth chattering uncontrollably by the time he finished. He stepped quickly back through the door and closed it. He continued to shiver, although he regained some measure of control over his teeth.

  He moved down the hallway into the living room and approached the fireplace. There were only embers in it now, glowing feebly. He built up a new fire and stood near it for several minutes, warming his frigid limbs. He was just about to walk back down the hallway to his bedroom when his peripheral vision caught some sort of movement in the shadows outside.

  Burton froze momentarily, then backed away from the fireplace into a dark corner of the room. He never took his eyes away from the place in the trees across the yard where he had seen something move.

  After a few seconds, he saw it again. A shadowy human form had moved there, rustling a large tree branch. Burton squinted through his glasses. He held his breath without being conscious of doing so.

  Then the branch shifted once more and a person stepped forward from behind the tree. A cold shock snaked down Burton’s neck as the moonlight revealed a man in a burlap mask with holes cut out for the eyes – eyes that seemed to be staring across the dark yard and through the living room window directly at Burton himself.

  The passing seconds felt like an eternity as Burton’s mind raced. Was the Phantom staring at him? He moved a little to his right, deeper into the darkness on the far side of the fireplace. The Phantom’s gaze didn’t follow his movements, and Burton concluded that the killer hadn’t spotted him. He began to breathe again, albeit shallowly.

  Logs crackled in the fireplace. Burton barely heard the sound over the roar of his heartbeat in his ears.

  The Phantom shifted on his feet, his eyes still taking in the cabin, hunting for any sign of movement within. Finally he walked rapidly across the yard toward the back of the house and disappeared from sight.

  Instantly Burton was in motion. He raced toward the bedroom and grabbed the Navy Colt from his bedside table.

  ‘Annie,’ he whispered loudly. ‘Annie!’

  She rolled over and looked at him with concern on her face.

  ‘The Phantom is outside.’ Her eyes widened in horror at his words. He reached into a corner behind his night stand and pulled out a shotgun. It was already loaded. ‘Take this,’ he said, handing the weapon to Annie.

  She took it from him and got out of bed.

  ‘I’m going to meet him at the back door,’ Burton said, moving across the room toward the hallway. He didn’t need to say anything further to Annie about the situation. She knew her way around a shotgun and wasn’t afraid to use it if she had to.

  He turned off the hallway into the small, dark passage that led to the back door. Adrenaline flowed through him and he could feel sweat dripping down his back. He stood with his back to the wall, watching the door and waiting.

  Burton tensed as a scraping sound came through from the other side of the door. He raised the pistol. The sound continued and then was replaced by the sound of wood creaking, as if the Phantom were using a tool to pry the door open. Then the door moved inward, ever so slightly.

  Burton’s finger lay against the trigger.

  Seconds passed, and then a full minute. Still the door didn’t move any further. Burton began to wonder if the Phantom had moved around the house to use the front door instead. Another minute went by. The tension swelled within Burton, whose heart was pounding so hard it seemed like it would burst through his ribcage. After another minute, he took a step back and looked down the hallway toward the living room.

  At that moment the back door burst inward toward him. A gust of freezing air hit his face at the same time, and he turned to see the shape of the Phantom in the doorway, no more than six feet away from the spot where Burton stood. The moonlight was bright behind the masked man, who took two rapid steps into the dark hallway before he stopped short.

  Burton pivoted again to the back door just as the Phantom stepped inside. He raised his pistol and fired without aiming. The shot missed the Phantom’s head by mere inches, exploding into the log wall nearby and sending shards of wood on to his shoulder. The killer released a strangled scream and lunged backward. He vanished through the doorway before Burton could get another shot off.

  ‘Ed?’ Annie Burton cried from the bedroom.

  ‘I’m going after him!’ he yelled to her. ‘You keep that shotgun handy!’

  ‘Oh, thank God,’ he heard her cry as he reached the doorway.

  He paused for a moment before leaning forward to look around. He saw the man in the mask to his right, running quickly toward the rim of the trees. Still barefoot and wearing only his long john underwear, Burton leapt from the back porch and raced after him.

  Burton had made it halfway across the yard when the Phantom reached the trees. By the time Burton entered the forest he could see his quarry running a few dozen yards ahead of him. He could hear branches snapping under the man’s feet and slapping hard against his body as he ran.

  Burton continued the pursuit, his face and torso lashed by the branches. Tree roots, fallen limbs, rocks, and pine cones raked across his feet; soon the soles were torn and bloody. A branch knocked his glasses off his face once and he stopped for a moment to pick them up and slip them back on before pushing on. Having thwarted the Phantom and come this close to catching him, Burton’s mind was focused solely on the task at hand; he wasn’t even aware of the searing pain in his feet or the blood that came close to making him slip and fall three or four times. He could still hear the Phantom’s frantic movements through the trees ahead of him. Occasionally he caught a glimpse of the man’s shoulders and the back of his hooded head.

  The Phantom was steadily increasing his lead on Burton. They approached the edge of a steep incline, where the trees were less dense. Burton was now limping, blood flowing freely from the soles of his feet. He could see the Phantom much more clearly now. He was wearing a white shirt and dark brown pants. Suddenly the killer halted and pivoted toward Burton, kneeling and aiming his pistol at his pursuer. Burton dove to the side just as he fired. The last thing he remembered was the sound of the bullet passing within inches of his head. Then his skull slammed into the wide base of a tree and he was enveloped in total darkness.

  Burton wasn’t sure how long he was unconscious. When he came to he could feel an intense, throbbing pain on the right side of his head, just above his ear. His wire-rimmed glasses lay on a tree root nearby, the lenses reflecting the moonlight. He picked them up and inspected them. They were bent slightly and he straightened them out and put them on. He looked through the trees toward the incline toward which the Phantom had been racing. There was nothing but stillness and silence in the cold autumn night.

  He reached up and felt the injured area on his head. It was swollen and painful but there was surprisingly little blood. From the way the blood had dried, however, he figured he had been out for quite a while. His feet, on the other hand, were torn to bloody shreds. He cursed himself for chasing the Phantom while b
arefoot. The sight of the rapist and killer in the flesh, preparing to attack him and Annie, had compelled him to act hastily. He pushed himself slowly to his feet and began to hobble back in the direction of his house, cursing with every other step.

  It took him nearly a half hour to get home. He yelled Annie’s name as he limped across the yard. She appeared at the back door, still holding the shotgun.

  ‘What happened?’ she exclaimed.

  ‘Bastard outran me,’ he said.

  She looked down at his feet. ‘What did you do to yourself?’

  Burton waved his hand impatiently.

  ‘Just get me some rags and I’ll wrap my feet,’ he said. ‘I’ve got to get into town and get ahold of Maynard.’

  He stepped up on to the back porch. Annie reached out and helped steady him with her hand. He sat down on the porch and she noticed the swollen lump on the side his head.

  ‘Your head!’ she cried.

  ‘It’s barely bleeding,’ he said. ‘Now please – bring me some clothes and my boots, after you bring me some rags. I don’t want to walk in there and get blood all over your pretty floor.’

  She didn’t smile at his half-hearted attempt at a joke. Within twenty-five minutes, Burton was dressed, armed, and ready to ride into Oakridge. He had just finished saddling his horse when Annie came back out of the house.

  ‘You’re not going to make it far with your feet in that condition,’ she said mournfully.

  He gave her a kiss on the cheek and mounted his horse.

  ‘Lock up and close the curtains. I don’t think he’ll be back, but in case he does. . . .’

  She interrupted him. ‘If he does, he’ll wish he hadn’t.’

  Burton nodded, turned his horse toward town, and touched spurs to the animal’s flanks.

  As Burton rode toward Maynard Blayloch’s house, his mind hurriedly assessed the events of the night. There were only a few days left before the one-year anniversary of the last attack. What had brought the Phantom back out of the shadows? Why had he chosen the Burtons? His thoughts turned back to Emerson Dodge. He wondered if the homesteader had come back from visiting his relatives in Salem. Then he wondered if Dodge’s absence really was because of a trip to his brother’s place. It was possible that he had never actually left the area – that he had been lurking around the countryside near Oakridge, planning his next attack. Burton was sure the Phantom watched people’s homes before striking. He might have been watching the Burtons’ home for days, waiting until he decided it was the right moment to attack.

  Burton urged his horse forward on the trail to the main road toward town. Within three minutes he had made it there. He turned left and raced toward Oakridge. The moon hovered above him in the black heavens, and a thick mist sifted its way through the trees on either side of him. He was cold despite his sheepskin coat. His head still throbbed, but he had so much adrenaline flowing through his veins that he was barely conscious of it. But his feet were killing him. The rags with which he had wrapped his feet had very quickly become blood-soaked. As he reached the edge of town, he forced himself to ignore the pain.

  He could see the drunkards’ shack up ahead on his right. He rode past it down Main Street, heading west. He turned off on to a rutted trail that led into the hills just north of town. He rode for nearly a half a mile and then turned left into the yard of Maynard Blayloch’s cabin. The house was completely dark.

  Burton stepped gingerly down from the saddle and tied the reins to a post near Blayloch’s front door. He winced as he climbed the steps, then pounded hard on the door. He could hear the deputy’s horse snorting and shuffling in the small barn to the side of the house.

  Receiving no response, Burton hammered his fist against the door. At last he heard movement within.

  ‘Who’s there?’ said Blayloch.

  ‘Maynard, it’s me – Ed Burton.’

  He heard the sound of Blayloch removing the plank from the door. The lawman stepped out into the night air.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ he asked anxiously.

  ‘The Phantom,’ Burton said. ‘I caught him trying to break in my house tonight.’ Blayloch’s eyes widened. ‘He might have got in, too, if I hadn’t gotten up to piss. I damn near got him with a shot to the head in the hallway at the back of the house. I chased him more than a half a mile. I ended up knocking myself out trying to avoid one of his bullets.’ Burton shook his head slightly, still stunned by the turn of events that had unfolded over the last few hours.

  ‘Here, come on in,’ said Blayloch. ‘I’ll throw on some clothes.’

  Burton followed him in and watched him light a lantern in the small living room. Blayloch lived in the same home in which he had been born. Despite its bachelor owner, the cabin was fairly tidy. Blayloch walked down the hallway to the first of two bedrooms. Burton could hear him dressing hurriedly.

  ‘Did you get a look at him?’ Blayloch called from the bedroom.

  ‘No,’ Burton said. ‘He had the mask on the whole time.’

  Blayloch came back into the living room, pulling his coat over his shoulders. He grabbed his Stetson off a table and planted it on his head. When he looked at Burton, his face was drawn.

  ‘You thinking what I’m thinking?’ he asked.

  ‘Emerson Dodge?’

  Blayloch’s mouth spread into a tight grin. ‘We’re thinking the same thing.’

  ‘I’ve had a bad feeling about that feller since the first time I laid eyes on him,’ Burton said.

  ‘He’s awful squirrely,’ Blayloch recalled. ‘Of course, that doesn’t mean he’s the Phantom, but that much hostility does make a man wonder.’ Blayloch leaned over and slipped his boots on. ‘Let’s head on out to his place and see if he’s back from Salem.’

  ‘Let’s do it,’ Burton said, his tone clipped. His desire to apprehend the Phantom was now intense. He had an inkling of what the victims had gone through, both those who had lived and those who had perished. A vision of himself and Annie flashed through his mind – their hands and feet were bound, their heads crushed in, their blood and brain matter festooned across the wall above their bed.

  He put the thought out of his head as he mounted his horse. Maynard Blayloch led his own horse out of the barn after saddling it. He swung up atop the animal and nodded toward Burton. Within a few minutes the men were out on the main road, heading west toward Deception Creek.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Ed Burton and Maynard Blayloch drew reins about a hundred yards from Emerson Dodge’s cabin. They sat in silence, watching. Burton raised a finger and pointed toward the thin wisp of smoke rising from the chimney. Blayloch had seen it, too.

  ‘You want to take the back?’ the deputy asked.

  Burton nodded. They moved into the trees nearby and picketed their horses. Then they split up, Blayloch creeping toward the front door as Burton slipped around and took up position near the woodpile near the back.

  He looked through a grimy window beside the door. He could see no movement within the cabin.

  Maynard Blayloch’s loud knocks reverberated through the front door.

  ‘Emerson Dodge!’ Blayloch called in a booming voice. ‘Come out if you’re in there. This is Maynard Blayloch.’

  Silence followed. Blayloch’s fist pounded on the door.

  ‘Dodge! We know you’re in there. Open up!’

  After another minute, Burton heard Blayloch’s footsteps approaching. He walked back around the woodpile and met the deputy.

  ‘I’m going to check the barn,’ Blayloch said.

  Burton nodded and waited while Blayloch crossed over to the little barn near the trees. He watched him enter the shadowy structure and then quickly exit and walk back toward the cabin.

  ‘He’s in there,’ Blayloch said quietly. ‘His horse is in the barn – along with another horse.’

  ‘Two people in the cabin?’ Burton asked.

  ‘Looks like it,’ Blayloch confirmed. He stepped past Burton and looked toward the back door. ‘What do you
suggest?’

  Burton opened his mouth to answer but, before he could utter a word, the back door was ripped open from inside and a shadowy figure emerged, gun raised and pointed at Blayloch.

  ‘Maynard, get down!’ Burton yelled.

  Blayloch turned quickly toward the back door.

  The words came too late. A deadly flame burst from the barrel of the gun, only about six feet away from the deputy. Blayloch groaned and clutched his chest before collapsing on to the ground.

  Burton stepped backward, taking shelter behind the woodpile. His Navy Colt was in his hand and it flashed twice in rapid succession. The man near the door released an agonized wail and fell back toward the cabin. Although he knew he had hit the shooter, Burton was unable to tell where his bullets had struck in the darkness. He leaned around to get a glance at the prone figure on the ground.

  ‘Rot in hell, Burton!’ screamed a voice from the darkness of the cabin.

  A pistol roared from just within the doorway and Burton fell backward. A bullet whizzed past him and he realized it was Emerson Dodge inside the cabin. He reached out and took Maynard Blayloch’s arm, then dragged the unmoving man back with him behind the woodpile. In the moonlight he could see blood seeping from a wound in the deputy’s chest. Blayloch was seriously wounded but still breathing.

  Burton heard movement on the other side of the woodpile. He saw the dark outlines of two men running across the short strip of yard to the barn. One was helping the other stay on his feet. Burton raised his pistol and considered shooting at them, but he couldn’t bring himself to shoot a man in the back – not even someone like Emerson Dodge.

  He looked down at Blayloch, who was still unconscious. He heard sounds from within the barn and fixed his eyes across the yard. Moments later, he watched two horsemen bolt from the barn and ride away across the pasture toward the distant mountains. He could only barely discern them in the darkness, but he noticed that the rider closest to him was slumping over in the saddle.