I couldn't explain it—at least not to him. Privately, I was totally convinced that the thing that smashed down my door had killed Mrs. Clendon just before it came back up the stairs. When the invader caught and enveloped her, she was an immediate vessel for all its disease and putrefaction. As these foci of hoarded infection poured into her, her body underwent the changes which, ordinarily, would affect a corpse only after weeks or months of corruption.
I knew it would be useless to express this opinion to Raiders and his cohorts. Even after I was released from the hospital, they returned to interrogate me. They finally decided that, without question, Mrs. Clendon had been killed weeks before by a maniac prowler who had broken into the house. My version was shrugged away. They concluded I had been undergoing hallucinations or some kind of brain fever.
Later, after I had bid farewell to Mr. Karda and Eats, and my prospects had somewhat improved, I did a little research into the history of the area where Mrs. Clendon's place was located. Again and again, that part of the city had been plagued by waves of deadly diseases—typhoid, diphtheria, yellow fever, smallpox, lethal "Spanish" influenza, and a host of other ailments. The rest of the city had not been immune, but that particular section, whether from sewer stoppages and poor sanitation, or from prevalent malnutrition on the part of its occupants, seemed particularly vulnerable.
The old rooming house which Mrs. Clendon took over must have sheltered literally hundreds of suffering victims over the years. Thrust to the bottom rung of society's ladder, many had undergone agonizing deaths alone in their shabby rooms.
I believe the psychic residues of these poor souls had at last coalesced, as it were, into the deadly thing which prowled the halls as Mrs. Clendon sat chill with terror behind her bolted door.
The revengeful remnants of these hate-filled, disease-racked sufferers apparently remained quiescent during the day. At night, when pain and despair had been most intense during their lives, they combined into the horrifying entity which took on awful life.
For years after my nightmare adventure, the house stood boarded and vacant. When it was finally sold and demolished, the dirt cellar was dug up to put in the foundation of a new building. Beneath the sour, damp soil, workers found the skeletons of six persons—four children and two adults. They were rumored to have been murder victims, but my own belief is that they were the remains of occupants who died of fatal diseases and were interred in the cellar by relatives to avoid the expenses of formal funerals.
The projected new building was never constructed—whether because of the resultant publicity or because of other reasons, I never learned.
When, out of curiosity, I returned to the neighborhood for the last time, I found only a brush-and-weed-covered lot where Mrs. Clendon's place had stood. Some small boys were playing in the adjacent street.
As I stood watching, an elderly codger strolled up and pointed the stem of his pipe at the empty lot.
"They never plays in there," he volunteered. "Says the weeds or somethin' makes 'em feel sick. Kids get a lot of crazy ideas!"
I wonder.
Road to Granville
(1985)
The boulder-strewn Connecticut hills, burned brown by August heat, shimmered in the blue haze of afternoon. Even in these high hills, the heat was oppressive. The only cloud in the brassy-looking sky appeared no bigger than a cotton boll.
He stopped the car in a small parking square just off the highway which the natives referred to as "the mountain road." Far below, in a natural valley, lake waters of the reservoir gleamed in the glaring sun. Small neat islets bearing laurel bushes and evergreens broke the smooth surface of the artificial lake.
Many years before, the valley, known as Hartland Hollow, had held a village: homes, barns, a store, a church, a schoolhouse, a cemetery. For nearly two hundred years people had lived, loved, hated and died down there. The village had been leveled as by a tornado, the cellar holes filled up and the debris carted away. Even the bones in the old cemetery had been dug out and reburied up on the other side of the mountain.
He got out of the car and stood peering down into the valley. Not a sound broke the afternoon stillness. Under that copper-tinted sky the valley seemed to be mesmerized, bewitched, gripped in a strange spell of time. Was it possible, he asked himself, that all those lives were utterly gone, all traces obliterated, all memory blotted away?
In absolute silence, the valley appeared to be etched on metal. Not a single leaf shook. Not a ripple broke the flat surface of the water. He imagined that he could see many feet down into the lake. Might an ancient wagon track be visible, a forgotten fence line?
An overwhelming eeriness pervaded him, a frightening sense of detachment. In his imagination he could see the waters recede, the forgotten village materialize out of the shimmering layers of August heat. He imagined lost voices trying to cry out, tongues long stilled striving to speak again.
He shook himself, as if the mood which possessed him bore a physical reality. With a disturbing conviction that he was not really himself at all, but an alien being in a borrowed body, he walked back to the car and got in.
As he drove slowly down the winding road, the heat intensified. Although there had been no semblance of a breeze higher up, the motionless air on the mountain top must have been at least a few degrees cooler, he concluded.
As he descended almost to the valley level and turned into the road which skirted the northern edge of the hollow, the heat became stifling, all but unbearable.
He touched the accelerator, with some idea of stirring up a small breeze. The car plunged ahead, bucked, slowed down and stopped. The radiator was boiling over.
He got out and stood watching the steam. After a few minutes, while he waited, perspiring in the sun beside the car, he found a thick rag, gingerly turned the radiator cap and jumped back. Water and steam shot into the air.
Grim-faced, he opened the trunk. Had he put the bucket back in or was it sitting on his garage shelf at home? He spotted it in a corner of the trunk and sighed with relief. Mopping his face with a handkerchief, he closed the trunk and looked about him.
His first impulse was to head off the road to the right, toward the adjacent valley. There was plenty of water there. But the stretch of land between the road and the reservoir was a forbidding tangle of fallen trees, thorn bushes and trailing vines. In addition, he noticed a "No Trespassing" sign.
Hesitating, he glanced up the road ahead, beyond the car. Heat waves were dancing on the blacktop, but he decided to walk along a little distance. Very shortly, he was glad that he had done so. On the left he saw the trace of an old, abandoned and overgrown dirt road. It looked relatively cool under the canopy of interlocking trees. Besides, he reasoned, there must be a few creeks, or springs, along that old road. Perhaps a forgotten watering trough.
After a backward look at the still steaming car, he turned off the blacktop and started along the grass-grown road under the trees.
It remained stifling, but at least he was out of the sun. He pushed ahead resolutely, stepping through grass which at places was shoulder-high. The disconcerting, heat-induced silence persisted. Even the shrill sound of a cicada would have been welcome.
As he advanced, he noticed a faded wooden sign nailed to a blackjack oak along one edge of the overgrown road. He could barely make out the faded letters: "Granville." The town of Granville, he knew, lay across the Connecticut border in Massachusetts. He had heard references to the abandoned road. Strange, he mused, that the woods had been permitted to reclaim it.
He felt as if he were walking through a funnel which led into the open maw of a blast furnace. The heat was like a palpable, cloying substance which might be cut with a knife.
The chuckling whisper of water over stone struck his ear like a benison. Had he only imagined it? He stopped to listen. No. It was a subdued but distinct sound. And it was not far off.
The old road bridged a small creek. The road had dropped here and the creek had to burrow and
sluice its way through accumulated mud and silt. On the far side, as if exhausted, it had formed a deep pool, where it rested before wandering off through the woods.
Angling from the road, he slid down the bank through a cluster of cattails. A redwing blackbird flashed away and was gone.
Setting down the bucket, he scooped up water in his cupped hands and sloshed it over his face. It was ice cold. The shock was delightful, but suddenly he felt dizzy and sat down on the bank. For a few seconds his heart thumped and the pool seemed to advance and recede. A touch of heat, he concluded, and sat quietly.
At length, when the pool stayed in one place, he got up, scooped more water and drank. Dangerous, he supposed, but delicious.
He submerged the bucket, drew it up brimming and began to climb the bank. He moved carefully on somewhat unsteady legs.
He started along the road feeling weak but refreshed. He'd rest after reaching the car. Once he got water back in the radiator, he'd drive on. Perhaps, by then, the heat would have begun to break.
He felt tired as he trudged along and he was surprised at his own lack of stamina. He was forty-seven, not overweight, and he had never been seriously ill. Perhaps he should take up jogging. He smiled wryly to himself—scarcely the right time or place to begin!
Walking was not easy on the overgrown road. Once he stumbled on a matted clump of swamp grass and lost water out of the bucket. Although he was beginning to feel light-headed, he doggedly plodded on.
The car seemed infernally far away. He felt as if he had covered the distance to the blacktop road at least three times over. Suddenly a disconcerting thought struck him. Had that dizzy spell at the pool got him mixed up? Was it possible that he was advancing up the road toward Granville, instead of back toward the blacktop?
Carefully lowering the bucket, he sat down near a patch of staghorn sumac and mopped his perspiring face with a handkerchief. Perhaps if he rested a few minutes, he would get his bearings.
He must have dozed off, because the boy driving the flatbed farm wagon sat regarding him for several minutes before he finally looked up.
He regained his feet somewhat unsteadily. "Hello there, son!" He grinned. " I guess this heat's too much for me!"
The lad lifted his wide-brimmed straw hat and set it back on his head. His round blue eyes were speculative. "Thought you'd passed out sure!" he said, adding a bit accusingly, "a-settin' there in the sun!"
The man had a vague idea that he ought to apologize. "Yes, that was foolish," he admitted. "I should have got in the shade."
The boy lifted his hat again. "Goin' to Granville?"
"Granville? Why, no. You see, my car overheated and I came down the road here for water. My car's just back on the blacktop."
The round blue eyes clouded with confusion and then lit up with obvious amusement. For the first time they noticed the bucket of water.
"You carryin' that bucket back for the engine?" the boy asked in mingled glee and astonishment.
The man nodded. "Exactly. Radiator overheated. This weather's bad on a car."
The boy studied him. A faint note of hostility entered his voice. "Ain't no cars run hereabouts. Nearest tracks over Granby way."
The man frowned. Some of these farm boys, he decided, were not too bright. "I know cars don't run on this road," he explained patiently. "My car's back on the blacktop road."
The round eyes regarded him with utter incomprehension. The heat seemed to press in upon him. He wanted to conclude the aimless conversation and get on his way, but he felt that he had to be polite.
"Where are you heading, son?"
"Headin' fer the Holler."
"The holler? Oh, you mean Hartland Hollow?"
"Hartland Holler," the boy replied stolidly.
Suddenly the man realized that he was indeed walking in the wrong direction. If the boy was heading for Hartland Hollow, then he himself must be advancing up the road toward Granville. That dizzy spell at the pool had mixed him up thoroughly.
He passed a hand over his eyes. "I'm hiking the wrong way. A bit light-headed, I guess. It's this infernal heat."
The boy picked up the veins. "If you ain't goin' to Granville, git on," he invited without enthusiasm. He waited.
Laboriously, the man climbed over the side of the wagon and sat down. The grey horse lifted its head and the wagon began to creak along the road.
"By the way," the man said, "my name's Finden, Henry Finden."
"How do," the boy replied without turning around. "I'm Jes Orcutt."
After some moments, he added, "Pa's name's Harley."
From his vantage point in the wagon, Henry Finden noticed that the road seemed less overgrown than formerly. Far less. Boneset and oxeye daisies grew along the edge. He hadn't seen any before. Also, the road seemed much less shady. Was it possible, he asked himself, that in addition to walking in the wrong direction, he had also strayed off the first dirt road onto another?
In his mind, he tried to retrace his footsteps in sequence. There was really nothing complicated about it. And yet, that episode at the pool had unsettled him a bit. And then he had dozed off . . .
He sat up abruptly. The wagon was turning off the road into a farmhouse dooryard. He must have fallen asleep again there in the wagon, he decided.
A big, unpainted clapboard farmhouse rose up not far from the road. He was sure he had not seen it before. How had he missed it? Surely, he concluded, he must have wandered off onto another road.
The horse plodded halfway up the dooryard drive and stopped in the shade of a big buttonwood tree. The boy jumped down.
"You wait," he instructed Finden. "I'll git Pa."
Carefully, Henry Finden climbed out of the wagon. His legs still felt wobbly. He walked over and sat down under the buttonwood. The farmyard was a hushed harbor of heat. He was grateful for the shade.
A tall, rawboned man wearing a high straw hat and faded blue overalls walked slowly down the dirt driveway, accompanied by Jes Orcutt. He came under the buttonwood and nodded.
"How do. Orcutt. Harley Orcutt."
Finden arose and shook hands, introducing himself.
Orcutt's eyes were blue, like his son's, but not round. They were shrewd, squinty, appraising, set in a wrinkled face of mahogany leather.
"Jes says the heat liked ta gotcha."
Finden nodded, smiling wryly. "Got to me all right, I guess. Left my car on the blacktop, headed the wrong way with a bucket of water and started toward Granville!" As he spoke, he suddenly remembered that he had left the bucket of water sitting in the road.
The shrewd eyes surveyed him with— Was it amusement, curiosity, or a mixture of both? He wasn't sure.
As Jes had done, Orcutt lifted his straw hat and set it back on his head. "Best you set inside awhile. You come on up. Jes, you tell Ma put on the kettle."
Jes loped toward the house.
As Finden followed Harley Orcutt slowly along the driveway, he inspected the farmhouse. It looked decrepit, dilapidated. Squares of heavy cardboard had been substituted for glass in some of the windows. The curling clapboards looked brittle, dried out with blistering heat. Finden could not decide whether their paint had all peeled away or whether they had never been painted at all.
Orcutt led him through a screen door into the kitchen. The room was stifling. A wood fire was burning in the iron stove, where a kettle had already been set.
A chipped deal table, four worn kitchen chairs, the stove, and a standup cupboard painted blue constituted the furniture. Two buckets of water stood on a shelf near the wooden sink. A dipper hung nearby.
Orcutt pulled out a chair. "You set down. Ma's probably primpin' up in there!" He nodded, grinning, toward the adjacent room.
Finden sat down and rested his arms on the table. "I think," he said, glancing toward the buckets, "instead of tea, perhaps just some cold water ..."
Orcutt looked startled. He grinned rather sheepishly and hurried to get the dipper.
"Heat's gettin' me, too!" he s
aid, immersing the dipper in one of the buckets. "Water's the first thing!"
Finden accepted the dipper and drank deeply. Well water, ice-cold, delicious, with no taste of chemical additives.
An enormous fat woman bustled into the room, wiping her hands on a blue cotton apron. Beneath she wore a dark green dress of some fusty taffeta-like material, trimmed with grease-stained flounces.
Harley Orcutt beamed proudly. "Ma, this is Mr. Finden. Heat give him a mite of a turn."
Mrs. Orcutt curtseyed. The gesture, although grotesque, was somehow touching.
"Tea be right up," she promised, her fat red face creasing into smiles. "Lan' sakes, Mr. Finden! No day fer trampin' the roads!"
Again Finden felt vaguely apologetic; explanation seemed in order. "Well, you see, my car overheated and I walked down the road for a bucket of water."
The Orcutts exchanged glances. There was a brief silence.
"No cars nearer'n Granby," said Jes who had come into the room.
Harley Orcutt glanced out the window and scowled at his son. "Jes, you water that horse and put the wagon in the barn. Now git!"
Jes scampered out.
Orcutt looked toward the sink. "Care to wash up, Mr. Finden?"
"Yes, thank you, I would."
There was a basin and a chunk of homemade yellow soap alongside the sink. Mrs. Orcutt bustled in with a fresh towel.
After he had washed his hands and sloshed cold water on his face, Finden felt better. He followed his hosts into the adjacent dining room.
It was a good-sized room papered with fading pink roses among which chubby cherubs cavorted. The floor was covered with worn yellow linoleum. Calendars and colored prints, obviously clipped from magazines, completed the decor. Four straight-backed walnut chairs were placed around a table covered with a white cloth. The room was less stifling than the kitchen.
The tea, served in chipped china cups, was strong and hot.
Collected Stories and Poems Page 15
