The Strangers

by Mort Castle

  “No need to get up, pal. I’ll show myself out,” Michael Louden said to the dead man—and he left.

  — | — | —

  SIX

  MARCY AND Kim had their eggs, scrambled, and, as usual, Kim considered mealtime “time to talk.” If she was at all upset about the killing of the neighbor’s dog, she showed no sign of it. Instead, she had so much to tell her mother and father about camp. Camp PineTop was “Neat!” a “real blast;” it was “such a fun place!”

  The children were not yet dressed for the day. Kim, to Michael’s right at the kitchen table, was wearing her Star Wars pajamas; Marcy, across from her, had on Swiss dot shorties. While Kim rattled on and on… so then the canoe tipped over and everyone was screaming but I wasn’t afraid” Marcy fastidiously sliced her sausage’ links, her elbows off the table, her manners as refined as those of a child of the British Royal Family.

  At the stove, Beth, in her housecoat, slipped the edge of the spatula under Michael’s over-easy eggs and put them on a plate. Last night had brought a touch of terror to her life that she did not fully comprehend. Only Michael’s assurances and his arms about her in bed, as well as the brandy Michael insisted she drink, had enabled her to get to sleep.

  But now, this morning, Beth thought the kitchen had the golden-good feel of bright sunshine and she was working hard to convince herself that what had happened yesterday was…

  No, not impossible, but certainly the too horrid, too awful occurrence that brushes by you only once in a lifetime. Someone—some inhuman monster—had killed Brad Zeller’s dog. That was true, a reality. She would come to accept it, eventually, even if she never understood it. But it had to be the one inexplicable horror that filled the quota for the Louden family—That’s it, The End, thankyou—verymuch!—and now it was time to get on with living their normal life.

  “Here you are,” Beth said brightly, placing Michael’s eggs and sausages in front of him. Returning from Zeller’s last evening, Michael had said that Brad was in a bad way, as could be expected. They’d have to keep an eye on him; that was all they could do.

  “Thanks,” Michael said. “Looks great. This is the kind of breakfast that makes you think morning is a fine time to start the day!”

  Primly raising a bite of egg to her mouth, Marcy giggled at his comment. Kim said, “Oh, Dad! That’s stale! Morning’s when you got to start the day!”

  “Oh,” Michael said, “live and learn. I never realized that.”

  A moment later, Beth had her own breakfast and was seated opposite Michael at the other end of the table. Now, she thought, here we all are and everything is as right as it can be and there’s nothing to worry about, nothing to…

  … nothing to dread…

  She was ashamed of herself, an adult, preyed on by those vague and unformed terrors of children, waking them, shrieking, in the thick of night, with a cold, spider-crawl fearfulness that cannot be appeased even by the warm safety of MomandDad’s bed.

  Beth sipped her steaming coffee. The dog’s death—Funny, she did not want to think of the dog as Dusty—that would make it worse…

  The—dog—was dead for no reason, no reason…

  No! Not now. She would not allow herself to descend into a nail-biting, mind-whirling worry about this-and-that…and-everything. Oh, there was reason to be careful—real reason—and wasn’t there always—but she wasn’t going to go overboard, become a statistic on the “Percentage of Paranoids in Today’s Suburbs!”

  “…So I got in trouble,” Kim said. “All it was was funny, and they made such a big deal out of it.”

  “What did you do?” Michael asked. “Maybe it wasn’t so funny and maybe it was a big deal. That’s a possibility, too, don’t you think?”

  “Nah,” Kim said. She drank milk, nearly upsetting the glass. “There was this wimpy girl in our class, y’know. Her name was Alana. She was real scared of snakes, so I put this garden snake in her bed.”

  Kim laughed at the recollection of the wimpy girl named Alana who found a snake in her bunk.

  “Very nice,” Michael said dryly. “I’m really proud of you.”

  “Uh-huh!” Kim said. “Did she ever scream!”

  Yes, Beth thought, everything is just fine. There are some men who can’t even talk to their kids, but Michael? He’s just hanging on every word that Kim says…

  “And they found out what you did,” Michael said.

  “Nah,” Kim said, “Alana was such a wimpo, I wanted her to know who did it so I told her and she went and told the counselor.”

  “Well,” Michael said, “honesty is the best policy. Confession is good for the soul. Tell the truth and have no regrets.”

  Beth watched as Michael moved his hand ‘to his mouth just a half-second too late to hide his smile. Kim didn’t seem to notice.

  “So anyway,” Kim said, “I got punished. They made me clean up the whole camp. I had to use this stick with a nail on the end of it and pick up all the papers and everything.”

  “Sounds like you got what you deserved,” Michael said reflectively. “But do you think that was a fair punishment?”

  “I didn’t care, so you know what I did?” Kim said.

  “No. What?” Michael responded.

  “The next night I put three snakes in old Alana’s bed! And a toad, too!”

  Michael said nothing. Once more, his hand was over his mouth.

  Beth thought he was smiling, trying not to laugh at Kim’s mischievous adventures at Camp PineTop.

  He was not.

  Michael was remembering.

  There’s always a wimp at a summer camp.

  The wimp at Camp Bethel, when Michael was 12,—was named Alvin Burdell…

  It was a Tuesday night, forty-five minutes after lights out, and it was time to get Alvin Burdell, “Fat-Guts” whose inclusion on your team meant you automatically lost the race or the volleyball or softball game, the jerk who couldn’t do one thing right but knew how to do a million things wrong, who got you sick just looking at all that wiggling blubber, and who, just like a big fat baby! wet his bed and woke up everyone in Cabin Three with that rotten stinking smell and his crying.

  In his underwear, Steve Dawes led them, another boy aiming the penlight; they were the “Cabin Three Commandos” and the Target for Tonight was “Fat-Guts.” Steve had appointed himself chief of the operation and no one had opposed him. He was thirteen and tough, a schoolyard bully on vacation at summer camp, always ready to do what he could to make life miserable for anyone weaker than himself.

  More or less silently, the seven boys surrounded Alvin’s bed.

  Michael hung back as far as he dared. This wasn’t for him, not his way to get involved with these nothing people—he had started thinking of them in that way since his talk with Jan—but he couldn’t refuse to be part of it, either. He had to keep up the pretense, go on acting like everyone else, the nothing people! until…

  Alvin was asleep. The penlight threw a yellow circle on his open mouth; a thick shadow moved as if something were trying to crawl out of his throat.

  “Now!” Steve Dawes gave the order.

  It was a smooth surprise as a pillow pressed down on Alvin’s face, muffling his shocked cry, and hands held his arms. The blanket and topsheet were yanked down. Hands gripped Alvin’s ankles, pinning him totally.

  “Fat-Guts” was helpless.

  “Yeah!” Steve Dawes said. “Now we fix him!” Steve was holding a can of blue paint and a brush. He kept saying, “Yeah,” voice trilling with excitement, as Alvin’s pajama tops were unbuttoned, the bottoms pulled down to his knees.

  “Lookit that whale blubber!” Alvin’s breasts were as bulbous as an over-developed woman’s.

  Steve laughed. “Itty-bitty prick like that. Way Alvin pisses, he oughta have a damn fire hose!”

  Everyone was laughing, caution diminishing at the continuing success of the Cabin Three Commando raid. “Mowf, mowf!” came from beneath the smothering pillow. They laughed at that too.
“Sounds like a harelip dog!”

  “Move the light,” Steve said. He took the lid off the paint can and squatted by the bedside. “We’re gonna put a sign on you, FatGuts,” Steve said. “Right on your titties. It’ll say ‘Porky Pisspot.’ Then we’re gonna paint your itty-bitty prick blue and tie you to the flagpole so when they raise the flag tomorrow, there’s a big, fat surprise!”

  Alvin Burdell heaved; he looked like a giant sea slug. “Mowf, woaa…” was his inarticulate plea.

  The tip of Steve’s brush trailed blue, a shaky line P on Alvin’s right breast, then, next to it, an O.

  Suddenly, there was a piercing sound—Ahrkee—a clack and a rattle.

  “Now what the heck is this…?”

  Light descended in a sharp yellow instant from the single bare 75-watt bulb overhead and froze The Cabin Three Commandos.

  The boys scattered, backing to their own beds, turning and running, as Jan Pretre strode forward. The frightened excuses spilled out. “We weren’t…” “…not doin’ nothin’…” “It was just a joke, huh?”

  Then Jan Pretre had Steve Dawes and Alvin Burdell threw the pillow from his head and sat up, blubbering hysterically.

  “Hey!” Jan spun Steve around and Steve dropped the paint can. Holding Steve from behind, Jan cranked the boy’s arm up between his shoulder blades.

  Steve Dawes yelled, rising up on his toes, eyes bulging, his face as white as breakfast oatmeal. Then he started to peep like a starving baby bird, “Ohohoh…”

  “Steve,” Jan Pretre quietly said, “don’t you know it’s wrong to be mean to people? You shouldn’t try to hurt Alvin.” Jan pressed Steve’s arm higher still.

  “Ohohoh…”

  Staring, Alvin was pulling up his pajama pants. Tears ran down Steve’s cheeks and his face looked as if it were melting. “My arm, my arm, you’re breakin’…”

  “Now Steve,” Jan said, “you really ought to apologize to Alvin. Let’s hear you say you’re sorry and that you promise never to be so mean again, okay?”

  Each word of Steve’s agonized apology was on a frantically ascending scale. Then he was begging. “Oh, please, my arm, don’t hurt me, don’t hurt me.”

  Jan released him. Steve staggered. Then, head down, working his shoulder, he slowly made his way to his bed, not looking at anyone. He crawled under the sheets, lay on his side, and shook with sobs.

  “Alvin,” Jan said, “there’s an extra cot in the counselors’ cabin. Come on, we’ll get you cleaned up and you sleep there tonight.”

  When Alvin Burdell smiled, he looked like a jack o’lantern lit by a dozen candles.

  On Saturday, after breakfast, Jan told Michael that he was taking him along with their “good pal,” Alvin, on a special overnighter. Another counselor would take responsibility for Cabin Three that night. Jan told Michael that the overnighter would be a lot of fun.

  Then he told Michael how they would have fun.

  It was nearly sunset when they camped in the woods, far from Camp Bethel. Their site was near to a steep ravine, rough ground where the grass had lost the battle to stones and weeds.

  Jan built a fire. He cooked beans, the open cans heated in the flames, and they roasted hot dogs on sharpened sticks.

  “Having a good time, Alvin, old pal, old buddy, old chum?” Jan asked.

  “Yeah!” There was a mustard smear along side Alvin’s mouth, more mustard as well as ketchup on his T-shirt.

  Alvin’s hand splatted on the side of his neck. “Got that little stinker!” he crowed, reducing the mosquito’s remains to gooey pulp and flicking it in the fire. “Lot of bugs tonight.”

  “Hey, no problem,” Jan Pretre said, “You kill them. It’s easy to kill them, isn’t it?”

  Sitting with his legs outstretched, Michael saw a rock within arm’s length. He picked it up. It was egg shaped, the size of a baseball; he felt its weight.

  Nodding toward the ravine, Jan said, “Really a beautiful sunset. Let’s go take a look.”

  Alvin waddled beside Jan. They stood at the edge of the ravine. Jan pointed to where the pink ball of the sun seemed to rest in the V of a tree where two limbs joined.

  “That’s just like a picture postcard,” Jan said. “All that pretty color. It’s so fucking beautiful I could just shit.”

  “Huh?” Alvin said. He began to laugh. “Hey, Jan! I didn’t think you talked that way. Hey! Shit!”

  Michael got to his feet.

  “Sure,” Jan said. “I’m just the right kind of guy, you know, with the right language for the right situation. That’s the way it is, old pal, old buddy, old chum!” He patted Alvin’s shoulder. “You know what I mean, don’t you, you fucking ‘Fat-Guts’?”

  “Hey, Jan, I know you’re kidding around, but…”

  Michael was running. He held the rock tightly, fingers shaped to it, and his arm was back as though he were about to throw.

  Michael did not pitch the stone. Just as Alvin was turning his head, Michael planted his feet, locking himself to the earth. He swung his arm, snapped it forward.

  He smashed the rock against the birthmark over Alvin’s ear and there was a sound like a cantaloupe falling from a supermarket cart and smacking the floor. At the same time, there was another sound, similar to the crunching of the shell of a hard boiled egg.

  And there was yet another sound that might have been Michael Louden’s heart.

  Alvin dropped to his knees, swaying. He said, “Dowah…”

  Jan stepped in front of Michael, directly behind Alvin, and slammed his knee into Alvin’s back. Alvin rolled down the ravine.

  “Really a pretty sunset,” Jan Pretre said. He told Michael to follow him, warning him to be careful; if they didn’t watch their step, it would be easy to fall all the way down to the bottom of the ravine where Alvin lay.

  Alvin was on his back, left leg twisted sharply beneath his rump, a pointed splinter of bone shredding the pinkish, oozing flesh of his right forearm. His eyes were wide open. The left side of his head seemed to be covered with thick pudding.

  “You…hurt…me…” Each word brought a bubble of red spit to Alvin’s lips.

  “You are smart, old pal, old buddy, old chum,” Jan Pretre nodded. “You are fucking perceptive.” He laughed. “Alvin had a fall. Go boom. Looks like you broke your arm and your leg and cracked your little head so all your smarty-smart brains are leaking out.”

  Alvin’s mouth opened and closed. A bright red bubble popped.

  “What a bad, bad accident,” Jan said. “I’m afraid old ‘Fat-Guts’ broke his neck, too!”

  Jan bent, sank his fingers into the porridgy flesh under Alvin’s jaws, and, gritting his teeth, twisted and jerked. There was a series of loud cracks, like a string of ladyfingers, only louder, much louder.

  Alvin’s chest heaved once and his tongue shot out of his mouth. Then he let out a long, sputtering fart.

  “And I thought he liked the beans,” Jan Pretre said.

  For two hours afterward, Jan talked and Michael listened. Jan told him about aura. Jan could see auras; he understood them.

  Michael’s aura, that of Michael-The-Stranger, the real Michael! was very bright, very red. When Michael struck Alvin with the rock, Jan could not even see Michael’s face for the brightness of it. Michael had been transfigured by the reality of himself.

  And Jan told him what would happen next—and what would happen in the years to come—in the Time of the Strangers.

  Yes, Jan was correct about what happened next. The police were understanding. It was evident that poor Alvin had suffered a fatal accident.

  Because Alvin died twenty-three years ago, before it became fashionable and profitable for everyone to sue everyone else, the child’s parents did not charge negligence against either the “good Christian camp” or Alvin’s counselors. Oh, they knew how their boy had felt about Jan Pretre; all Alvin’s letters home had lauded the counselor who had been so good to him, so kind and protective.

  You could tell Jan Pretre was c
rushed; he could hardly stop crying. This was a terrible thing and he would feel guilty forever.

  And that young man who’d been with him… that Michael Louden… The way he carried on, he must have been very close to Alvin. The poor boy would probably have nightmares over this as long as he lived.

  That afternoon, when Kim asked if she and Marcy could ride their bicycles to the 7-11 Store in the “mini-mall” two and a half blocks away to get “Slurpies,” a concoction of sticky-sweet syrup and ice, Beth’s first thought was to say, “No.” Then she thought better of it. Rationally, she knew the world was full of dangers, but unless you sealed your children behind walls and denied them their childhood, there was only one talisman a parent could gave a child against peril, the caution, “Be careful.”

  That’s what she told the children.

  At the end of Walnut Street, Kim, in the lead, turned right.

  “Hey,” Marcy called, “7-11 is the other way…”

  Kim braked her bike, scooted off the seat, and, holding the handlebars, waited for Marcy to catch up to her. “I don’t want any Slurpy. They taste like yuck. That’s just what I told Mom so we could get out and do something!”

  “What do you mean?” Marcy asked. She looked worried. The “something” that Kim often wanted to do meant trouble. “Let’s just go to the 7-11 and get a Slurpy and then go home.”

  Kim looked at her sister unbelievingly. “That’s what’s wrong with you, Marcy. You never want to do anything fun.”

  “I do…”

  “That’s why you don’t have friends!”

  “I do so have friends!”

  “Oh, sure,” Kim taunted, “you have lots of friends, but you don’t have any best friends. You’re not any fun.”

  Marcy lowered her head, and then, when she looked up again at Kim, she said, “So what do you want us to do?”

  Kim smiled at her “trouble-in-mind” smile. “Let’s go see them building the new houses.’

  Despite the nationwide slump in the construction of new homes, Park Estates West, a new development owned by the firm responsible for Park Estates, was moving ahead, homes going up in the optimistic belief that there would be buyers, eventually, for them. The suburb in the making was on the other side of Highway 394.