The Universe of Horror Volume 2: The Dark Cry of the Moon (Neccon Classic Horror)

by Charles L. Grant

  It began to walk toward him.

  The rain fell on its back, and slid off as if striking glass.

  Lucas ordered himself to move again, and felt his legs pressing along the hedge, twigs snapping at him damply, water dripping onto his trousers, into his low boots.

  Water splashed silently away from its paws; its claws scraped on stone.

  A trickle of ice slipped beneath Lucas’s collar, made him inhale, hissing between tightly clenched teeth.

  Its eyes sparked.

  It snarled.

  Its upper lip pulled back to reveal sabre fangs, and the snarl from its chest rumbled in tune with the thunder.

  Dark bright amber eyes narrowed and flared.

  He wasn’t going to make it. It would take three running strides to reach the gate — breach in the hedge, five or six more to reach the porch, and the safety of the door. By that time the creature would be on his back, and tearing. He wasn’t going to make it, and he wasn’t surprised.

  A look, then, and the front windows were dark, down the side at the back the kitchen window glowing; Maria was still up, waiting for him and praying, and he was within shouting distance, waiting to die.

  Patient.

  Stalking.

  The snarl to a low growl.

  He eased forward again, the trees passing like the bars of a cage, the hedge husking, the house looming so near he felt he could stretch out a hand and touch the door’s knocker. A pebble snapped from under his sole; a sodden leaf caused him a momentary slip that clamped the breath in his lungs until he knew he wouldn’t fall.

  Out of the street, onto the pavement.

  The head lowered until its muzzle was less than an inch above the ground; the teeth were bared fully; the eyes fixed on his, and would not release him.

  He almost stumbled when the hedge fell away, found himself backing toward the porch, furling the umbrella into a makeshift sword.

  The wolf reached the hedge and disappeared into it.

  A heel kicked against the steps, and Lucas climbed them backwards, still not daring to run, still not able to find the voice that would call Maria to the door. He reached behind him, and the door was locked. His eyes closed briefly. Grating sand filled his mouth.

  The wolf stepped around the hedge.

  And lunged without warning.

  Lucas cried out, and slashed at the ravening beast with the broadside of the umbrella as he fell against the door, shouting at the top of his newly found voice. The metal tip of the fragile, useless weapon grazed the creature’s head, the side thudded against its neck, and its leap was deflected, but only at the cost of the umbrella itself, which snapped in half with a gunshot crack, and sent a hundred stinging lances along the length of Lucas’s arm.

  The wolf landed neatly by the railing, and spun around while Lucas kicked back at the door, calling for Ned, for Maria; it watched him, almost smiling; white on the darkened porch, amber floating in the air.

  Behind him, Lucas heard muffled footsteps.

  “Ned, for god’s sake!” he shouted.

  The wolf leaned back, virtually sitting on its haunches, and raised its head.

  And howled.

  The cry made Lucas clamp his hands to his ears to stifle the sudden explosion of pain.

  Howling.

  His knees gave way, and he fell to the flooring, scrabbled at the door, weeping now and begging.

  Howling.

  And . . . silence.

  Blinking his vision clear, he saw the wolf bare its fangs again, saw the glint of its razored claws, saw it gather itself to leap.

  It growled in a ravenous frenzy, and leapt . . . just as the door swung open and spilled Lucas over the threshold.

  The wolf slammed against the wall, whirled to spring again, but Maria was there beside Ned, and as Lucas ducked to absorb the creature’s blow on his back, he saw her arm shoot forward, saw something flash over his head . . . and heard the beast scream in unearthly agony.

  The blow never came, and he hauled himself to his feet. Staggering back into his son’s steadying arms while the wolf leapt over the railing and vanished in a bound into the rain.

  Maria turned away.

  On the porch, rolling side to side, Lucas saw the candlestick Madeleine had given him on their wedding day; an unadorned candlestick made entirely of silver.

  Chapter 13

  When the stationhouse doors blew inward for the second time in an hour, Constable Farley Newstone came to a decision. He was alone in the front room when he yelled his disgust at the storm, alone when he bulled through the railing gate and slammed the doors closed, alone when he swiped at the rain on his trousers and muttered imprecations against the universe, Oxrun Station, and particularly Lucas Stockton.

  He had had it.

  First Charlotte had treated him as if he were a perfect stranger likeable only for his money, then poor Jerad all torn up like that in the brush, and then Stockton putting him on the desk for the night. All by himself. With orders to come running as soon as he heard the wolf.

  Sure. Just like that he was going to run out in the storm, run all the way to Stockton’s place, and knock sweet as you please on the door. Sir, the wolf is about, sir. Just following orders.

  Damn!

  He stomped back to the desk, grabbed his coat from the back of his chair, and shrugged into it.

  The hell with him. The hell with them all. Twice in the last four months his cousin in Boston had written to ask him if he wanted a job. It wasn’t police work; it was working with a private firm specializing in guarding the rich. It may be boring, but it paid better than this, and it didn’t include wolves running around tearing out your heart.

  The hell with them. The hell with them all.

  He clapped on his hat, snapped his fingers contemptuously at the desk, the cells, and stomped out again, slamming the doors behind him and not giving a damn if the station was no longer manned. It would serve them right if every crook in the country stopped by tonight. But Farley Newstone had had it up to here, and the hell with them all, by god and thunder.

  He took the steps to the pavement at a single leap, lifted his head to the rain . . . and never saw the teeth that tore out his throat.

  Johanna awoke with a start, wiping sleep away with the backs of her hands while her ears strained in the dark. She had heard something, a whimpering perhaps, or a muffled weeping. At first she wondered if her aunt was having at last a reaction to the dreadful news about the death of Uncle Jerad; that notion was dismissed the moment she recalled the look on the old woman’s face after she’d been told — it was one of resigned sorrow, shockingly laced with clear relief.

  Slowly, she eased her legs over the side of the down mattress and slipped into a flimsy peignoir whose satin belt she tied in a loop at her waist. Barefooted, she hurried to her door and opened it, listened, and heard the sounds again.

  They were coming from the room at the end of the short hall; it was Jeddy, and he was having a nightmare. Not bothering with a candle, she trotted down the hall and pushed open the boy’s door. A dim light shifted in through his window from the streetlamp outside, and she could see just enough to know he was lying on his side, covers balled and thrown to the floor; sweat had drenched him, and he was shivering even as he curled his knees to his chest. Whimpering sounds came from his tightly clenched mouth; his hands clutched at the mattress desperately; his legs suddenly straightened and made running motions, as if he were attempting to flee his horrid dreams.

  “Oh Jeddy,” she whispered, and rushed to his side, gathered him into her arms and rocked him.

  He did not waken.

  But the nightmare passed, and he snuggled as close as he could, his arms around her waist, his cheek pressed to her breast. He sighed. His teeth chattered until the chill left him. Once, he whispered his mother’s name; once, Elijah MacFarland’s.

  Johanna soothed him, stroked his matted hair, and stared at the open door.

  The rain increased.

  She
tried to concentrate on only good thoughts, to try somehow to affect the boy’s sleep so that he would not be deviled again by what he had witnessed; but she failed miserably. And in failing, fell to pondering all Maria had said that night, and tried to imagine what it might imply.

  She knew one thing: that this murderous beast had not drifted out of the woods and come to Oxrun Station by chance. As sure as she breathed, she knew it had deliberately returned here.

  Returned.

  She held her breath; knowing beyond doubt that the werewolf in human form was someone who lived right here in the village.

  And it took her less than five minutes to narrow the field to two names.

  Charlie Notting couldn’t sleep, not here on the horsehide couch, not here where the lightning flared dimly through the flimsy greying curtains. He tried to blame it on his wife, on the argument they’d had shortly after his return, panting, drenched, bursting through the door in a barely controlled panic.

  She began immediately. First she attacked the way he looked, then for his staying out so long without bothering to have a note sent around to let her know what he was doing, finally scoffing at his story of a supernatural creature stalking the village and letting him know in no uncertain terms that tonight was the last night she would spend under this roof.

  He’d said nothing during the tirade, only nodded, shrugged, tried not to look stricken when she lashed out her vow to be shed of him by dawn.

  And when she was done, she flounced out of the room, returned a few moments later and tossed a pair of sheets into his arms.

  He undressed numbly, lay down and squirmed on the couch willed to him by his father, looked at the furniture willed to him by his father, at the inherited house, at the gloom that seemed to be a permanent fixture of the corners.

  He tried to sleep, and blamed his failure on Charlotte.

  Finally, after three hours of tossing, thrashing, losing his temper and deciding to storm into the bedroom to take what was legally his, he threw aside the sheets and stood at the window. He wasn’t kidding anyone; it wasn’t Charlotte who had stolen what rest he needed. It was the beast.

  Every time he closed his eyes he saw flecks of amber.

  Every time he felt himself drifting, he heard the snorting of the creature as it fed on Don Barrows.

  Charlotte had been lost to him a long time ago, and tonight was the first time he was able to admit it. And able to admit that he felt nothing for her, aside from a deep and stinging sadness that they had somehow failed each other.

  A vague shrug, and a sigh.

  What did it matter? Tomorrow Lucas would ask him to help hunt the beast down, and Charlie wasn’t sure what he would say.

  He was afraid.

  Worse; he was terrified.

  He didn’t know where he’d get the strength to leave the house.

  Claude Drummond lay with his face to the bedroom wall. He was fast asleep. And he was dreaming.

  Lawrence Drummond sat in a creaking rocking chair and watched the rain smear the glass of his bedroom window. He dozed and dreamt of wolves, and on his lean face was the faint trace of a smile.

  Bartholomew Drummond lay on his bed. He was fully clothed, and his boots were still on. His legs were crossed at the ankles, his hands were cupped beneath his head, and as he stared at the ceiling his lips broke into a smile.

  Lucas awoke with a start, punched the air with his fists and kicked at his sheets until he remembered where he was. Five minutes passed before he was calm, and another five minutes before he rolled onto his side, sat up, and lay clammy hands on his knees. Breathing deeply. Shaking his head to scatter the last shreds of a dream.

  Footsteps in the hallway made his back rigid, made his head turn slowly as his left hand reached for the pistol on the nightstand. A flickering light. A shadow spilling along the floor. He held his breath, and waited, aiming at the doorway and listening, listening, until Maria paused at the threshold. Her robe was white and worn, her hair still unbraided. A candle in one hand, a tiny glass in another.

  “You cannot sleep,” she said softly as she padded barefoot across the room to sit down beside him.

  He shook his head.

  “You are afraid.”

  He nodded without shame.

  The glass found its way into his hand, and he stared at the dark liquid filled to its brim. A reluctant smile crossed his face; another one of her nostrums. For every ill, for every possible occasion, the old woman was able to brew a potion to cure it, or to make it more bearable. He never asked what was in any of them; he wasn’t sure he wanted to know.

  “You need to rest.”

  “My god,” he said without heat, “how can I? How . . . can I?”

  She poked his arm with a stiff finger. “Tomorrow you are needed, Lucas. Tonight you must find the strength.”

  “I don’t know, Maria. I don’t know what to do.”

  “Fight.”

  “Fight what, a ghost? With what, a silver candlestick? How? Shall I line up all the men in the village and touch them with a silver coin to see which of them flinches?”

  “Fight,” she said simply. “You can do nothing else.”

  He knew that as he drank the potion down, shuddering at the cloying sweet aftertaste, allowing her to push him down on the bed. The sheet, damp with the perspiration of his nightmare, drifted over him. She leaned down, and tenderly brushed the hair from his face.

  “You will do it,” she said with a smile, and kissed his forehead. “You will do it, because there is no one else who can.”

  He wanted to argue, wanted to smack her hand away and call her a meddling old fool; he wanted Johanna to hold him, comfort him, make him promise to do nothing that would cause her to lose him; he wanted to stay here in the dark and wait for the full moon to pass.

  The candle flickered away, back to the hall, back to her room.

  The rain rattled against the window.

  The wind sneered at him from the eaves.

  Fight, he thought; and she hadn’t answered any of his questions. And when he mulled over what she had said while he readied himself for bed, he wondered how the hell he was going to find out who in the village was responsible for his fear. A man had a pentagram on his palm, or a clutch of dark hairs, or his two middle fingers were of the same length.

  So he and his men would go door-to-door and ask to shake hands with everyone inside.

  Or he would station men on every corner after sunset, and shoot without asking questions every soul who stepped outside.

  Or he would . . .

  “Bah!” he muttered, and punched hard at his pillow. “Damn, Lucas, you’re not thinking, you’re just grasping for straws.”

  The potion began to work, blurring the edges of his vision, making his head feel light.

  Think! he ordered; damn you, man, think!

  Suddenly, just as Maria’s remedy was about to take hold, he sat upright with an oath so loud he startled himself into clamping a hand over his mouth. A finger rubbed thoughtfully the side of his nose, moved to the center of his forehead and pressed inward, hard.

  He had assumed from the moment of his belief’s inception that the werewolf had to be someone from Oxrun. It was a sound assumption, since other than the ruffs he had driven off the week before there had been no strangers or visitors brought to his attention, a matter he had always pursued from his first day on the job.

  No one came to the Station without his knowledge.

  But if Maria was correct, then the werewolf in human form was only recently arrived, otherwise there would have been killings long before this; none had occurred in any other place — that was something else he made a point of knowing.

  The finger moved from his brow to his temple, from his temple to his chin.

  That meant it had to be someone who had been away, and had just returned.

  That meant . . .

  He stopped himself before he could go further. It was, no matter how he looked at it, ridiculous. Impossible. Such
a thing could not happen, not to anyone he knew.

  amber eyes

  howling

  He lay back and closed his eyes, grunting once in an effort to rid himself of the lunacy that had crept into his mind.

  Lawrence Drummond had returned from the War only five days ago, and his hand from the beginning had always been buried in his sling.

  Bartholomew Drummond had returned from Middle Europe only five days ago, and his hands were encased in white leather gloves; an affliction, he claimed, a result of his trip.

  Lawrence was bitter; war changes a man, no question about it, yet it was clear the younger Drummond had more on his mind than simply overcoming his wounds.

  Bartholomew was uncharacteristically cold; always an affable if somewhat snobbish man, this new person baffled everyone, including Johanna.

  The potion’s grip strengthened.

  The rain steadied, and lulled him.

  And before he fell asleep, he knew who the beast was.

  Chapter 14

  Dawn, but no one saw the sun.

  The rain continued its pummeling, torrents of clear water spilling over the cobblestones, filling the gutters, flooding yards and lots and falling from roofs in shimmering silver sheets.

  The air lightened, but was not light.

  The clouds were invisible above the rain.

  The temperature continued its inevitable rise, and the bases of trees were the birthplaces of serpent-mists, winding over and around roots, slipping into hollows, rearing into the storm only to be beaten down again. Everything was slick and chilled to the touch. And the water drumming on the ground was so constant no one heard it.

  In the cellar of the Devon Street cottage Lucas paid no heed to the continuing storm. He was in the far corner reserved as his workshop, bending over a thick iron pot into which he had scraped shavings of the silver candlestick. Heat from the flame beneath bathed his face in perspiration, and the wavering light hollowed his cheeks, deepened the set of his watchful eyes. His expression was grim, his attitude grimly patient.

  Further down the table was his Colt Police Model, and a small velvet-lined box for the shells he was making.