The Hamptons stuck to tradition and tradition left them busted. The grist mill still stood by a silver creek, like the bones of a dinosaur that had died standing up and was too dumb to fall over. The Hamptons retreated back up into the hills, selling off their land, and generally ending up like Odus, either drunk or living hand-to-mouth.
Sarah changed with the times, too, and times lately had gone deep into the contrary. She convinced herself she hadn’t seen the Horseback Preacher, but Odus wouldn’t let her hold on to that pleasant deception. And Gordon Smith’s latest widow had been in today, buying the oddest assortment of goods the shelves could conjure. The last person to shop so impulsively was Gordon’s first wife, Rebecca, that pretty, black-haired gal with dimples.
Rebecca was magic in the kitchen, and every fundraiser in the park or volunteer fire department pot luck brought out a few of her finest offerings. It was a terrible tragedy for her to run off the road like that. The emergency responders stopped in the next day for Dr. Peppers and a pack of Camels and told Sarah all the gruesome details. The car rolled, and Rebecca’s head had been sliced clean off, her body bruised as if she’d been beaten with hammers. It was a closed-casket funeral. Sarah thought at the time the Jews had it right by burying their dead on the same day, the better to get it over with and move on.
Of course, after the Gordon Smith tragedy of last year, tongues wagged, and half the town was quick to blame the Horseback Preacher. Some even went so far as to call it revenge for Rebecca’s death. People just liked Rebecca that much. Angels shouldn’t die, but Sarah figured it was selfish of folks to want to keep them here on Earth.
A stack of cans fell over in the back corner of the store. It was the area where she kept the number 10 cans of vegetables, product that moved so slowly the cans often grew flecks of rust before someone bought them. She grabbed the broom, determined to addle the brains of any mouse that might be causing trouble. The store was empty of customers, not that unusual for mid-morning.
She moved past the black metal woodstove in the center of the store and through a few mismatched tables where the lunch crowd could enjoy their deli sandwiches. A sprinkle of black spots appeared before her eyes, but she told herself she wouldn’t pass out again. She’d rather go down with a stroke than have Odus Hampton haul her to the hospital again.
Shelves on each side of her were packed with jelly jars, mountain crafts, floral arrangements, mass-produced folk art, motor oil, ropes, boxes of cookies, assorted screws, Thanksgiving table settings, dinner candles, rubber gloves, and mouse traps. She figured her store was as general as they came, and she held to a pet theory that customers were more apt to buy things they didn’t want if they had to hunt hard for the things they did.
She turned the corner between the Coca-Cola cooler and a rack of picture postcards and came face-to-face with a goat. It must have been a wether—a castrated male—because she hadn’t smelled it. Billies with balls liked to piss all over themselves when they were in rut, and they didn’t smell too good any other time, either.
She’d never owned goats, though she sold stakes, chains, and collars for people who liked to use the animals as cheap lawnmowers. Sarah didn’t have any particular grudge against goats, but she didn’t want one messing around in her store leaving doodies the size of ball bearings.
“How did you get in here, you knot-head?” she said. Good question, one the goat didn’t answer. The back door was locked and Sarah had been standing by the front door for at least the last half hour.
“Bet you belong to a Ward or a Buchanan,” she said. “Nobody else would be sorry enough to let their critters roam wild.”
The goat’s mouth worked in that peculiar sideways twist, and Sarah looked around to see if it had chewed into any of the bird-seed sacks. The floor was clean, but the nanny goat was busy cudding up something. Sarah knelt and peered, not trusting her ancient eyes. She owned glasses but always left them by the register. Red specks dotted the animal’s lips, and a pink strand of drool ran down the crusty beard.
“I can’t tell what you’re eating, but it damn well better not be my pickled beets.” Sarah swept the broom around and gently swatted the goat on the shoulder. “Now get on out of here.”
The goat continued chewing as if relishing a handful of artichoke hearts soaked in molasses. Avoiding the curled horns, Sarah moved beside the animal and slammed the straw end of the broom against the goat’s rump. The nanny looked at her out of its nearest eye, and Sarah saw a small version of herself in the rectangular slit of its pupil. The reflection looked scared.
“Get on, get on,” she said, her voice nearly breaking. Because now something was crunching inside the animal’s mouth like peanut shells. She delivered one more blow, and the goat took a few steps down the aisle, hooves scruffing over the hardwood floor. It looked back at her and seemed to grin before it headed to the front of the store, pushed open the door with its horns, and sauntered off the porch.
Odus had scheduled a little meeting here tonight to discuss the strange carryings-on, and Sarah wondered if she would tell what she’d just seen. Dangling between the goat’s ochre teeth was a dark, wet string that looked for all the world like a mouse’s tail.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Alex surveyed the perimeter from the small glass windows along the front of his house. All clear for now, and Meredith was waiting tables on the night shift at the Ruby Tuesday’s in Titusville. He finally took time to ponder his encounter of the day before, not distracted by her silly needs.
Goats as government conspiracy. It finally made sense to Alex. That’s just how they would do it, come at him in the most unpredictable way possible. If only he had an Internet connection, he could go into some of the freedom organization chat rooms and learn from the fighters on the front lines. The government was tapped into every web server in the country, and in big underground caverns near Washington, D.C., NSA agents sat before banks of computers, monitoring every e-mail and phone record, surfing for people like Alex.
The enemy within.
If the government was behind the whole thing, then the man in the black suit must be some sort of genetic freak, the result of a secret experiment gone wrong. The fact that he was prowling near the Eakins compound meant only thing: they were on to him.
Four years of tax evasion wasn’t that serious of a crime, not when Congress was busy stealing billions, but it was the principle of the thing. They didn’t care about the money, they just didn’t want word to get out that the government could be cheated and was therefore vulnerable. What better way to catch your enemy off guard than to come disguised as a backwoods preacher?
Except this preacher had been eaten alive. Even if he was an FBI agent in disguise, such a stunt took some effort. Maybe they used some sort of hologram. Classic brainwashing technique involved challenging the subject’s notion of reality and eventually replacing reality with the desired set of beliefs. Alex nodded to himself, finished twisting a pinkie-sized joint, and lit up. He liked that answer better. Sure, he was paranoid, and like any free-thinking man, he had good reason. But he wasn’t crazy.
With the joint hanging from lips a la Bogart in “Casablanca,” he made his way to the back room, a space barely larger than a walk-in closet. He unlocked the two Case dead bolts and entered, searching for the candles he kept on an overhead shelf. Lighting one, he stood before his shrine: a wall covered with small arms firepower.
His pride and joy was an AKR submachine gun, a favorite deadly toy of the Russian special forces that held 160 rounds. Alex traded four pounds of seedless buds for the short-barreled gun, worth about eight grand on the street. The lethal and compact grace of the gun appealed to him as much as its country of origin. Not that the Russians could be trusted, either, but at least they were less cunning in their oppression.
Then there was the Swiss SIG 510 assault rifle. The good old Swiss claimed neutrality, but during every war of note, the country served as a clearinghouse for whatever loot happened to be pillaged
by the victor. The Swiss made their weapons with all the love and precision they invested in their watches and chocolate. With bayonet, the rifle made a nasty but sleek package.
A row of well-polished handguns were spread across a velvet-covered shelf. A Mauser C-96 was the centerpiece. No hidden arsenal was complete without a piece of German hardware. It was an older model, manufactured between the two World Wars, but it possessed a heft and sheen that justified its place in the collection, though he’d only been able to procure two ten-round clips for it. The Germans were arguably the most militaristic people in modern history, except perhaps for the Japanese, Montana freedom fighters, and Republican presidents.
He owned an Austrian-made Glock, a weapon currently in favor with police officers, although he preferred the proven accuracy of the Colt Python. Occasionally, Americans mustered up some pride in their craftsmanship, and the Colt had pedigree. The Beretta resulted from a sense of romanticism only, because he’d never bet his life on something Italian, unless it was manicotti or a young Sophia Loren.
He owned a few other sidearms, a couple of M-1 practice grenades a staff sergeant smuggled out of Ft. Bragg, and a Mossberg 20-gauge shotgun. The collection also included the Pearson Freedom bow, which retailed at around $600, unless you happened to be swapping grass for it. As for arrows, he went with Easton, mostly because he’d known a kid named Easton growing up in Chapel Hill. An array of knives completed the collection, though they were mostly for show. Alex wouldn’t have invested in all that hardware if he was interested in hand-to-hand combat.
The other walls of the room held posters, anti-establishment stuff, an Abbie Hoffman portrait, psychedelic posters of nothing in particular, an art print of Che Guevara, the Cuban revolutionary who was as famous for his beret as for his celebrity death photos. Richard Nixon, the patron saint of all latter-day paranoiacs, glowered down with his sharp nose and sinister eyebrows.
As he had in the well-lighted shed where his marijuana grew, Alex sat cross-legged before the wall that held his weapons. He sucked the joint down until it burned his lower lip, then he pinched it out and swallowed the roach. You couldn’t leave evidence lying around, not when they might be closing in.
He shut his eyes and enjoyed the silence, the Python cool in his lap.
When the government agents came, he’d be ready.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
The headlights swept up the driveway just as Katy was thinking about going to bed. She’d been dreading turning out the lights and laying there in the dark, listening to every little rustle and scrape while imagining Rebecca was prowling the house.
It was one thing to make peace with the notion of a spirit in your house, but it was another thing to accept the presence as normal. She hadn’t mentioned the mirror and hairbrush to Jett. No need for both of them to be jumpy and sleep restlessly if at all.
The vehicle bobbing up the rutted gravel road was a welcome distraction, even though she never had uninvited guests. She recognized the raggedy muffler noise, though. It was from Odus Hampton’s old truck.
Jett called from the top of the stairs, wearing her hopelessly uncool Hello Kitty pajamas. “What’s Odus doing here this time of night?”
“I’ll take care of it,” Katy said, tugging her plaid flannel nightgown around her and heading for the door. “You go on and get to bed.”
Outside, the night was beautiful, the crisp, cool air causing the countless stars to twinkle overhead. A goat gave an annoyed bleat from the interior of the barn. Frost already sparkled on the grass, and Katy’s breath tumbled from her mouth in silver clouds.
“Hello, Miss Katy,” Odus said, climbing out of the truck with a squeak of shock absorbers. “Sorry to barge in on you like this, but it’s important.”
“Who’s that with you?”
“Sue from the outfitters’ shop there by the river.”
Katy didn’t know Sue well, but she and Jett had once rented kayaks from her. Like Katy, Sue was an outsider who carved out a place in Solom. Another stray seed that had stuck and grown roots. “We were just getting ready for bed.”
“Turning in early for a Saturday night,” Odus observed, approaching the porch with Sue behind him.
“Country life. You know how it is.”
“Sorry to barge in,” Sue said. “I wanted to call first, but Odus said we needed to make this a personal visit.”
“Because you’d hang up otherwise,” Odus said. He glanced up to the lighted windows of the second floor and Katy wondered if Jett was watching.
“Okay,” Katy said, standing to one side and waving them onto the porch. “I guess we’re supposed to be neighborly now that we’ve settled here.”
Sue gave a look of apology as she passed, but Odus smoldered with some sort of anger and enough whiskey fumes that she hoped his teeth didn’t throw off any sparks. She settled them around the kitchen table and was about to ask if they wanted anything to drink, but she knew what Odus’s answer would be.
“I hate to drag you into this,” Odus said, “but the Horseback Preacher has come back around.”
Katy glanced at the cupboard where she’d occasionally felt Rebecca’s spirit, then out the window to the barn where a certain family scarecrow hung from a wire. “I’m afraid I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“You don’t have to play the ignorant city slicker,” Sue said. “Half the town believes it was Harmon Smith that attacked you and your daughter and killed Gordon.”
“That’s silly. Harmon Smith died a long time ago.”
“Gordon was real big on his scarecrow legend,” Odus said. “But he had an even bigger love for his ancestor’s legend. I never pressed you on it, but I know there was more to that night than what they put in the police report. Sheriff Aldridge likes to keep things buried. Keeps him in office and saves the retirees from worrying too much.”
“Sure, I’ve heard the legends, but—”
“He’s back, Miss Katy. I didn’t see him last time but I saw him yesterday, down by the river.”
The lies fell out of her mouth so fast that she almost believed them herself. “Lots of locals wear old-fashioned clothes. That’s more likely than a dead preacher coming back from the grave to seek revenge on Solom.”
“Sarah Jeffers saw him, too,” Sue said.
“I love Sarah to death, but she doesn’t exactly possess what I’d consider the soundest of minds—”
“Mom,” Jett said, coming in from the hall. Katy wondered how long she’d been standing there listening. Long enough, apparently. “Let’s not bullshit anymore. If these guys know something, we should listen. The Horseback Preacher killed Gordon, but he could have easily killed both of us. Dad, too.”
“That’s the thing,” Odus said. “He only takes one. But it’s usually about once a decade. Now he’s back at the same time of year as last year, like he wasn’t happy with his harvest.”
Katy put a protective arm around Jett’s shoulders. “What does it have to do with us?”
“The last kill was here on your farm. You’re in it whether you want to be or not. Hell, you might even be the next kill.” Odus nodded at Jett. “Or your daughter.”
That remark caused Katy to squeeze Jett even harder, but she ducked out of Katy’s grip. “Okay, so he’s back,” Jett said. “What do we do about it?”
Katy knew she should have been more accepting. The supernatural was part of her life now. But she’s obsessed over the things she could control—raising Jett, keeping ownership of the farm, maintaining a civil parental relationship with Mark.
But which of those DO you control? Are any of them more predictable than when the next Killer Goat Army rolls in with Harmon Smith leading the charge?
“Well, killing him is out,” Odus said. “That’s been done before and it didn’t stick too well.”
“What, then?” Katy blurted. “Make a creepy wax doll with a silly black hat and stick pins in it? Sacrifice a goat under the full moon? Recite Bible verses backwards to send him b
ack to hell?”
“We’re meeting on it down at the general store tonight,” Sue said. “That’s why we came. We figured your…experience…could help us.”
“Is this really happening?” Katy asked.
“We’re part of Solom whether we want to be or not,” Jett said. “You made that choice for us. Now you have to live with it.”
“Or die with it,” Odus added.
“Maybe we’ll be safer just sitting here and waiting it out,” Katy said.
“Except for one other thing. Harmon Smith’s victims always come back.”
Katy’s rib cage squeezed her heart with frozen ropes. “Gordon?”
“Could be.”
“Jesus, Mom,” Jett said. “No way am I waiting around for your Freddie Krueger ex in a scarecrow mask to come chop us up from beyond the grave.”
Katy sighed. “Okay. Let me get dressed.”
“Maybe we should call Dad,” Jett said. “He’s in on this, too.”
Katy spun with a suddenness that startled them all. “No way. We can’t drag him any deeper into this.”
“I’ve worked with him and he’s a good man,” Odus said.
“It’s either him or me,” Katy said.
Odus glanced at Sue and then nodded. “Fine. Let’s roll.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Sarah didn’t know what to make of this little get-together.
She’d locked the front door, but didn’t rightly know whether she was more afraid of whatever was outside or the people inside and of what they might tell her. Odus had made the invites, so he had pretty much staked a claim to being the leader of the bunch. Gordon Smith’s widow stood with her teen daughter by the counter, biting at her lip like she wished she could be anywhere else. The Chesterfield clock above the door showed a quarter ‘til ten, nearly her bedtime, but she had a feeling she wouldn’t be sleeping tonight.
The Narrow Gate: A Supernatural Thriller (Solom Book 2) Page 11
