by John Russo
“Looks like he ain’t going to make it, poor little fellow.”
The baby was wrapped in a blanket and lying on the seat of an armchair, while Mr. and Mrs. Dorsey bent over it. Mrs. Dorsey gave up trying to get the infant to take just a bit of warm tea. She had the tea in a rippled bottle, the nipple wet with saliva from being refused again and again. She reached out with the hand which did not hold the bottle and pressed a palm gently against the baby’s chest.
“He’s still breathin’—I can feel it,” Mrs. Dorsey said in a low whisper heard only by herself.
Mr. Dorsey called out to his son, who was standing hunch-shouldered so his eyes would be low enough to peer through a crack between two window boards. “Any sign of ’em?”
The boy shook his head in a perplexed sort of way, as though the question had stunned him into trying to think of an answer he could not possibly possess. He had a rifle in his hand, gripped by the barrel so that the butt dragged on the floor. “Nope,” he said finally, after a length of time that almost took all the immediacy out of whatever the question had been.
Henry Dorsey took three quick steps toward his son and snatched the rifle out of the boy’s hand before the boy was quick enough to realize what was happening. “On second thought,” Dorsey said, “maybe ya better just sit down a while and give yer old man the gun before ya shoot somethin’ else that ain’t supposed to be shot.”
“Henry! He stopped breathing!” Mrs. Dorsey had spun from the baby and had a shocked look on her face.
Mr. Dorsey stared at his wife and the baby from the center of the room. From outside came the sound of a car turning into the driveway.
Dorsey’s son had his eyes to the crack between two of the window boards. “A car,” he announced triumphantly, as though he had supplied important information.
“Whose car?” Dorsey said angrily, as he shoved his son away from the window. He peered out, his hands clenched on the rifle. It was Dave, opening the car door and pulling out some shopping bags full of groceries. Dorsey looked inquiringly at his wife, who had the baby in her arms. “I can’t tell if he’s breathin’ a little bit or not. I don’t think he is,” she said in a tight, frightened voice, and began making rocking movements with her body, cradling the infant as if treating it normally would cause it to be normal.
Dave was pounding on the front door.
“Lay him down on the chair—maybe he’s sleepin’,” Mr. Dorsey said, implying that they could at least make it seem that way for Dave’s benefit, and he looked his wife in the eyes until she got the point. She did as she was told. She pulled the baby’s blanket up around his ears and sat on the edge of the chair to watch over him. In the semi-dark room, the scene did not seem alarming.
Dorsey undid the bolts on the door to let Dave in. The feeble-minded son had moved to the rocking chair in the corner of the room and was rocking squeakily back and forth, watching everybody.
“How’s the baby?” Dave asked, setting down bags of groceries and rummaging for a carton of milk.
“Fine,” Mrs. Dorsey said in a low voice. “I made some weak tea for him, like I said. He’s asleep now.”
“Think we should wake him to feed him?”
“Sure—bring the milk on in here and you can help me get it ready.”
Carton in hand, Dave followed Mrs. Dorsey into the kitchen.
Henry Dorsey secured the door, then came over to where the baby lay and looked down at it. He bit his lip. His face was taut and his eyes had a faraway look. He was thinking that if the baby died, coupled with the accidental slaying of the State Trooper earlier, it might become necessary to kill Dave also. Dorsey was committed to the survival of himself and his family; if they were able to make it through okay, he did not want to stand trial later for manslaughter.
The baby stirred, letting out a tiny whimper. Dorsey looked at it, not knowing whether to be relieved or more frightened. It was clearly breathing now, though its breathing seemed labored. He was alarmed that the baby’s breathing seemed to have stopped earlier. His wife was genuinely frightened that it was dead. Perhaps it was merely very sick and extremely weak from hunger; maybe now, with some warm milk and attention, it would make it through the crisis stage.
Dave and Mrs. Dorsey appeared with a bottle of warm milk. Dorsey turned away, presumably to check out the window while Dave and his wife tended to the baby. “He’s breathin’ weakly,” Dorsey said, letting his wife know. Her eyes lit up.
Mrs. Dorsey held out the bottle. The baby took the nipple and began to suck hungrily. Dave smiled. The baby continued to suck greedily at the nipple. “We can’t let him have too much at first,” Mrs. Dorsey said, “or he’ll get sick—poor little rascal.” She did not look at Dave nor at her husband, but kept her eyes riveted on the bottle and its disappearing contents.
A gunshot rang out, shattering the stillness of the room.
Dorsey had fired from his post by the window. Dave ran to the other window and looked out. Outside in the lawn, three ghouls were standing under the overhanging branches of large maple trees. “I missed,” Dorsey announced, and fired again after taking careful aim. One of the ghouls, hit in the shoulder, spun around and fell, then struggled to get up.
“Aim for the head—it’s the only way to stop them,” Dave said, wishing he himself had the rifle because Dorsey was obviously a lousy shot.
“Don’t you think I know that?” Dorsey said, and fired again. The ghouls had advanced to within twenty feet of the porch steps, and at such close range Dorsey scored a hit, blasting brains and blood from the side of a ghoul’s head.
Carrying another gun, Dorsey’s son ran to the window where Dave stood looking out and Dave took it from him before he could protest. Dave poked the barrel through a hole in the glass, took aim and fired. His shot hit the second ghoul between the eyes, and the dead thing went down heavily, knocked back by the force of impact.
Dorsey kept firing at the third ghoul, but it retreated behind a tree, whether by accident or design the men didn’t know. “Dammit!” Dorsey muttered, and in the absence of firing the two men had time to notice the acrid smell of burnt powder filling the room.
Deprived of the rifle which Dave had seized, Dorsey’s son had gone to his rocking chair to sulk, and the chair was squeaking again as he rocked back and forth.
Dave kept his rifle poised, aiming at approximately the spot where the head of the third ghoul would appear if the creature stepped out from behind the tree. The head appeared, and Dave fired, scoring a hit. The thing made an odd groaning noise and keeled over head first, its legs supported grotesquely in midair by a low bush through which it had fallen.
“Hot damn!” Henry Dorsey said in his enthusiasm over the three kills.
Mrs. Dorsey had stopped feeding the baby and was cradling it in her arms. The noise had not caused it to start crying, and it seemed to be asleep. “Poor thing’s too weak to be scared,” she said to no one in particular.
“I hope there are no more of those things out there,” Dave commented. He had retreated from the window after scanning the lawn and its environs carefully, and he still had his rifle in his hands.
“We got ’em all,” Mr. Dorsey said, showing more exuberance than Dave felt the occasion called for, and Dave settled his eyes on the man in an attempt to calm him down.
Dorsey cleared his throat and looked at his wife.
The sound of the rocking chair kept up.
“You said the Kingsley estate is over the hill to the north,” Dave said.
Dorsey sat in a chair, took the clip out of his rifle and began reloading it. “Can’t miss it. Four miles beyond the golf course and the clubhouse. Just keep going straight. Say…ya don’t figure on usin’ my car, do ya?”
“I was hoping you’d lend it to me again,” Dave said. “You’ve been so kind this far. The Kingsleys are in a lot of trouble. The gang of looters I mentioned is headed there, and they’ve got the two Miller girls with them. And Billy, Sue Ellen’s boyfriend.”
Mrs. Dorsey gasped. Henry let his breath out in a long, thoughtful sigh. “I guess I can let ya take the car,” he said. “But gimme the rifle back. I only got two rifles—one for me and one for my son. I’ll let ya have an ax and a knife.”
Dave could not help thinking that Dorsey would do better not to ever let his son get his hands on a gun, but he figured he had best keep his mouth shut and accept whatever help the Dorseys were willing to give. He leaned the rifle against the wall by the door, not wanting to take personal responsibility for placing the weapon in the son’s hands; whatever Dorsey did with it was his own business.
“You can leave the baby here,” Mrs. Dorsey volunteered. “Reckon I can take care of it till you get back.”
His rifle loaded, Mr. Dorsey hit the clip with the heel of his hand to make sure it was firmly seated. Then he chambered a round and clicked on the safety. “Like I said, I’ll let ya have an ax and a knife—and the car. You leave the baby with us. We’ll take care of it best we can.” He was thinking that if Dave did not come back nobody would ever find out about the Trooper his son had killed, and it would be an easy matter to find some way of disposing of the baby.
CHAPTER 21
Under a fusillade of gunfire, the remaining glass in the windows of the Miller farmhouse was being shattered to bits.
The barrage continued, the house surrounded by armed men firing away, concealed behind trees and shrubs. The men were members of Sheriff McClellan’s posse. They had come up on the house in their search of the area, not knowing what they’d find, had heard noises and issued challenges. In reply they had received a burst of gunfire and had run for cover. One man had been hit in the arm and was being attended to by a medic.
From behind a tree, Sheriff McClellan cupped his hands around his mouth and yelled, “Come on out of there or we’ll burn you out!” To emphasize the Sheriff’s words, a few more shots rang out, peppering the house. The posse had it surrounded on all sides.
The Sheriff yelled again. “Hold your fire, men! Give ’em a chance to make their minds up!” He peeked around the side of his tree, aiming his own rifle at the front door of the house.
For a long moment, all was still. Then, from inside the house a voice called, “Hold your fire! Don’t shoot!”
“Step on out with your hands high!” the Sheriff called.
He waited. There was the noise of the front door being unboarded, then the door swung open with a creaking sound and the leader of the gang of boys with bows and arrows stepped out, his bow slung over his shoulder and his hands held high above his head. Other boys followed, their hands held high also, having left their weapons inside the house.
McClellan lowered his rifle, knowing the rest of the posse would keep the boys covered, and stood with an exasperated look on his face. “Jesus Christ! Kids. What next? Step on over here, Robin Hood—okay men, frisk ’em and handcuff ’em.”
The posse was made up of policemen and civilian volunteers. One of the men in uniform stepped up beside McClellan and said, “We better move through the house—see what else is in there.”
The Sheriff nodded his head in approval, and the man whose suggestion it was rounded up a few other men and led them up the front steps and into the house, the men proceeding cautiously with their weapons ready.
Some of the posse members had shoved the gang of boys against the wall of the house and were pushing the boys around, searching and handcuffing them. McClellan watched this activity approvingly. Some of the boys looked scared or ready to cry, especially the younger ones, but the leader had kept his composure, a wry sarcastic look on his face threatening to erupt into a smirk. While he was being frisked, he eyed the Sheriff over his shoulder and spoke defiantly. “You can’t arrest us. We didn’t do nothin’. We saw this house, there were no things around, so we came in to hide.”
McClellan took time to give the boy a hard look before answering. “Yeah? What were you doing in there?”
The boy spun around as his hands were being grabbed and roughly shackled by two posse members. “There’s dead people in there, but you can’t pin it on us. We didn’t do it.”
“Maybe you did and maybe you didn’t,” McClellan said, his voice even and noncommital. “Right now we ain’t got time to find out. But you’re in plenty of hot water. It’s for damn sure you were tryin’ to rob this place.”
“Rob a bunch of dead people?” The boy smirked, looking at McClellan as if the Sheriff were an idiot, almost snickering at the end of his question.
“Dead people have relatives sometimes,” McClellan said. “Ever occur to you what’s left in here belongs to them?”
One of the men who had gone in to check out the house burst through the doorway yelling, “Sheriff! Hey, Sheriff—there’s a couple of dead girls upstairs—both with spikes in their heads. And I wouldn’t swear to it, but it looks up there the way it looked after my wife had a baby.” The man stopped in his tracks in front of McClellan, a perplexed look on his face as though he had said something incredible.
The Sheriff merely shrugged and shook his head. “Well, I guess any goddamn thing’s possible,” he mused aloud. “Come on, boys—let’s finish up here and move on to the Kingsley estate.”
One of the posse members finished shackling a boy and said, “Those rich bastards ought to be okay. They could afford a small army to protect their place.”
“Just ’cause they could afford it don’t mean they got it,” McClellan said, and stuck a cigar between his lips and lit it. He took a long drag. He expected to meet up with emergency vehicles out where the dirt road joined the highway, then the posse would be transported to the Kingsley place.
CHAPTER 22
Dave had found that Mr. Dorsey’s old car shimmied uncontrollably if he tried to go faster than forty miles per hour. On the open highway it would have been preferable to go faster, but Dave had to content himself with the slower speed. This made him briefly aware of an irony: that he might fail to save the Miller girls or the Kingsley family simply because of a decrepit old car that couldn’t go fast enough. Dave floored the gas pedal angrily and watched the needle climb to fifty and past it. The shimmy did not subside, as will happen sometimes, but merely got worse and worse. When Dave eased off the accelerator he had to wait through decreasing vibrations until the needle got down below forty again. He gritted his teeth against his impatience, and tried to think of what he would do once he got to where he was so eager to get.
Beside Dave on the front seat were the butcher knife and ax that Henry Dorsey had given him. He would have liked to have had a rifle, or at least a revolver. It was not going to be easy trying to capture or kill three fully armed men. The best way would be to attempt to surprise and disarm one of them, then use a captured gun to take the other two.
Dave thought of the baby in the Dorseys’ care. He supposed the baby would be all right. Mrs. Dorsey would take good care of it. She seemed to be the sanest one of the family. The old man was driven by fear and a single-minded determination to protect his own kin at whatever the cost to others, and the son was not worth thinking about except to watch out for the kinds of harm he could do by accident. In normal times, Dave thought, the Dorseys would not be bad people. They probably wished only to stay by themselves most of their lives, tending their poor farm and eking out a living, attaining the measure of dignity and self-respect that comes with being self-sufficient. Under normal circumstances, they were probably kind and decent, if a bit hardened by the severity of their mode of existence. That hardness would help them survive the present emergency; so far they were doing okay, keeping themselves alive against odds that were truly frightening. It was more than a lot of people could do. But they had killed Martinelli, mostly as the result of panic and short-sightedness. His partner’s death was pointless, meaningless; it should not have happened to Carl, especially after his having survived so much. His death seemed unreal and unbelievable, like most deaths, only more so because it was a death without a purpose.
The countryside was
so bright and sunny, it was hard to believe this was not a normal day. The sun had completely burned off the early morning fog. It was almost noon. Remembering that there would be a Civil Defense broadcast on the hour, Dave switched on the car radio and tuned the hum down so it would not be quite so disturbing; there would be nothing but a hum until the Civil Defense broadcast came on, as all regular programming had been discontinued. Outside of the subtly ominous buzz on the radio, a constant reminder to Dave of the sort of news he was waiting to hear, he could almost deceive himself into believing there was nothing much wrong, it was an ordinary sunny day and he was simply out for a quiet, leisurely drive in the country.
Suddenly he saw a corpse in the road and had to swerve to avoid running over it. In swerving the car, he caught a glimpse of its head and torso flattened by more than one set of tires. It was one of the humanoids struck by John Carter’s truck in the early morning darkness eight or nine hours earlier. Since then, other vehicles had run over it, either not seeing it soon enough or deciding it wasn’t worth avoiding. It was a grotesque bloody mess in the middle of the two-lane blacktop.
Braking fitfully as he came out of his swerving skid, Dave spotted a break in the metal guard rail on the right side of the road. He rammed the brakes on Dorsey’s car to the floor, found that the brakes began to hold though it took a long time to stop, and pulled over to the side of the road to have a look. He armed himself with the ax and tucked the butcher knife under his belt. Then he got out of the car and approached the break in the guard rail, gaining a view of a rather steep embankment and a State patrol car smashed against a tree. He immediately recognized the patrol car that had once belonged to him and Carl; he confirmed it was the same car after reading the numbers on the license plate. There did not seem to be any movement or threat of danger in the immediate vicinity; nevertheless Dave kept his weapons ready as he worked his way down toward the wreckage.
