by T. M. Wright
Janice stood abruptly. She smiled stiffly and stuck her hand out. Norm Gellis stood unsteadily and took her hand. She said, "Well, you have warned us, haven't you?!" She let go of his hand and nodded at the front door. "Thank you, Mr. Gellis."
He looked stunned. "Don't you wanta know what we should do? About these kids, I mean. I've worked it all out and I was thinking I could come back later, when your husbands are home, and we could all sit down and talk about it."
"My husband's going to be working late, Mr. Gellis," Janice said, the stiff smile still on her lips. "Every night this week, in fact."
He turned to Trudy. "And how about you? Is your husband going to be busy, too?"
"My husband's always busy, Mr. Gellis."
He stared at her a few moments, then, "We got a problem here, a big problem, and you females just sit around laughing about it!"
"Mr. Gellis," Janice said, "we really are not laughing at you—"
"Shit on that!" he cut in, and he moved quickly to the living room entranceway. He turned back: "Laugh!" he hissed. "Go ahead! You're all gonna die laughing!"
A moment later, he had slammed the front door behind him.
Chapter 23
Evening came quickly. It erased the green of evergreens, the yellows and reds of deciduous trees and autumn flowers, and transformed all of it to gray and black—a fuzzy and aged daguerreotype come to life. Except in Granada itself, thanks to the street lamps, and spotlights, and the blaze of lights in the houses.
No one had yet discovered the overturned bus, though several had passed it—Miles McIntyre, on his way home, Dick Wentis and Larry Meade, also on their way home. (Malcolm Harris had come down with a slight fever shortly after waking that morning and so had not gone to work.) They had missed seeing the bus for several reasons: the darkness, most importantly, and the fact that it lay a full fifty feet down the embankment and could only be seen by someone actually walking on the edge of the road. And exhausted, anyway, from a day's work, and in need of being home, each man had even failed to see the telltale skid marks on the soft shoulder.
Inside the bus, rigor mortis had stiffened Hog up; it would begin to fade by daybreak.
Just behind him, fifteen-year-old Eric Miller, Robert's tormentor, lay confused and in pain, and very hungry. He had suffered a slight concussion and a fractured wrist in the accident—and the resulting fall from his seat to where he now lay—and, for the three hours since, had been utterly afraid to move or speak.
At the middle of the bus, Loretta sat on a window, her feet against the bus roof, and sucked her thumb hard; the thumb had become shriveled and white. Every fifteen minutes or so she took it from her mouth and called angrily, her voice quaking, "You . . . You . . ." and then stuck her thumb back into her mouth.
Robert Graham sat up straight against the Empire fence, his legs outstretched, his hands folded on his thighs. He had come to realize, dimly and reluctantly, that his search for Robin was at an end, and he felt guilty for it, as if weak and unworthy; Robin would not have ended the search so quickly. He'd have looked until morning, for sure, maybe even until afternoon, because he was strong and heroic.
"Fuck you, Robin!" Robert said, and smiled uneasily, as if he had swallowed an odd kind of poison that was soothing him first.
And in the darkness, he felt something sit beside him against the fence and touch him, shoulder to shoulder. An elbow poked hard into his rib cage. "I don't know," he heard. "I guess she was thirteen or fourteen. And she had these great little boobs, like Mom has."
Robert turned his head very slowly, in stark disbelief. The face in profile beside him was little more than a pale half-oval. "Mom . . . is going to be . . . worried about us, Robin," he said haltingly, for lack of anything better to say.
"Get home, then."
"I can't." This was a trick! Some kind of trick! This wasn't Robin beside him. It couldn't be Robin! "Not unless you come with me."
Silence.
"She's taking those stupid pills, Robin."
"Those stupid pills."
"She takes them all the time. She walks around like she's made of butter, like she's a freakin' zombie!"
"A freakin' zombie."
"Yeah, Robin. She'll stop taking them if you come home." But it was Robin beside him. Jesus, it was, it had to be!
"Like she's made of butter."
"Bones and everything, Robin."
"Yeah. A freakin' zombie. Like she's made of butter."
"She misses you real bad. Come on home, why don'tch a?"
"Little boobs, just like Mom has." The voice changed pitch suddenly and became a woman's voice. "I can't do that, Clyde."
A game, Robert decided. Sure. This was a game. "Can't do what, Robin?" He smiled tentatively—games were supposed to make you smile.
"I can't go prowlin"round out there in the pitch dark."
"Then we'll wait till the sun comes up. We'll wait right here."
Silence. "Okay?"
"Right here."
"Uh-huh, till the sun comes up."
"Till the sun comes up. Right here. Uh-huh."
"Robin?"
The creature's hand moved very quickly in the darkness. Hunger moved it, and desperation. Its fingers touched Robert's windpipe, very gently at first, as if in a caress; and it was a caress, a kind of thank you from one creature to another for the gift of itself
Then the creature's fingers stiffened and came together on Robert's windpipe. Robert made several small, dry, hacking noises.
And felt great surprise that death could happen so easily and so quickly, like spilling a glass of milk at dinner. He had supposed that huge black clouds should have formed at the horizon, and that sad music should have been playing for days beforehand. At least in his head.
From The Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, November 25:
ONE DEAD, TWO HURT, ONE MISSING IN BUS CRASH
One man is dead, two children are hurt, and one child is missing following the crash Thursday of a Penn Yann school bus.
The bus, driven by Howard Welsh, 43, the dead man, was apparently traveling north on Reynolds Road, approximately ten miles north of Penn Yann, sometime late Thursday afternoon, when it skidded, flipped over, and careened down an embankment Mr. Welsh was killed instantly. One of the two injured children, Eric Miller, 15, of Bergen, New York, is still under observation at Myers Community Hospital in Penn Yann, with head wounds and a broken wrist. The other child, Loretta Marks, whose address was given as R.D. 4, Penn Yann, was treated for minor cuts and released.
The missing child, Robert Graham, 13, a resident of Granada—New York City entrepreneur Rowland Reynolds's newly built housing development near Penn Yann—apparently escaped from the bus through an emergency window shortly after the accident and wandered into the surrounding woods in search of his twin brother, Robin, who has been missing since November 15th. According to Penn Yann police, a thorough search is now being made for Robert, who is described as 5'5" tall, with short brown hair, brown eyes, and wearing tan corduroy pants and a green pullover sweater.
There is evidence that excessive speed may have contributed to the accident, according to Sharon Jarvis, media liaison for the Penn Yann police. Says Ms. Jarvis, "Skid marks and other evidence at the scene indicate strongly that Mr. Welsh may have been proceeding down Reynolds Road at a speed which was improper for road conditions and which may have markedly contributed . . ."
Chapter 24
December 5
Norm Gellis lifted his head slightly from the pillow and peered into the adjoining bathroom. Marge was sure taking a hell of a long time in there this morning. Christ, did she think she owned it?! "Marge, you crappin' in there? What're you doin'?"
Silence.
"Marge?"
"I'm okay," she called; it was obvious that she was crying. "I'll be out . . . in a second."
Norm Gellis swung his feet to the floor. He stood. He was naked. "What in the fuck are you crying about, Marge?"
"I've got a right.
"
"You've got a what?" He moved quickly to the bathroom doorway. Marge was sitting on the toilet—the cover was down—she was wearing her pink flannel pajama top, and a pair of white cotton underwear. Her legs were together, elbows on her knees, her face covered by her hands. Norm repeated, "You've got a what, Marge?"
She said nothing.
"Are you some kinda woman's libber, Marge?" He chuckled. "You gonna tell me why you're sittin' on the toilet there, cryin', while I'm standin' here in need of takin' a shit? Or am I gonna have to guess and go shit out the window?"
She said nothing. She continued weeping.
"Why don'tcha just get up offa there, Marge? Some of us got better things to do. It's a Saturday, you know, and these men around here are all gonna be home, and I got real important things to discuss with 'em." He waited a moment; Marge stayed where she was. "Hey, woman, I'm talking to you!"
She slowly took her hands away from her face; she looked up at him; her eyes were bloodshot, her face flushed and puffy from crying. She smiled a small, quivering smile. "Menopause," she said. "Hot flashes. That's all, Norm. Just hot flashes."
Norm chuckled again. "Yeah, well I got a hot flash for you, Marge—if you don't get up offa that toilet I'm gonna crap right in yer lap."
She stood. Head down, she moved past him and into the bedroom. "I'm sorry, Norm."
"Hey," he said, "women cry. I can't do nothin' about it, even if I wanted to."
Marge nodded slowly. She glanced at the window; the drapes were open, and the morning sunlight seemed much brighter than usual. She went to the window and looked out. She gasped.
Timmy Meade pushed his face briefly against his bedroom window. He stepped back and smiled. The first snow of the year was on Granada—two inches of white fluff on the roofs and shrubs and on the thinnest branches of trees, snow that was not yet corrupted by car exhausts, and by the dirt that always hung, unseen, in the air.
He moved back to the window. He squinted, as if that would help him to see better. Someone had been walking in that first snow, already, he saw—the tracks were everywhere, like a million wrinkles on a huge white bed sheet. Somebody had been walking around in it in their bare feet.
He scowled. Damn it! Why would they do that? Why would they ruin it for him?
He stepped back from the window.
He thought a moment. He remembered.
Then, puzzled by what he had just seen and disbelieving, he stepped back to the window and looked once more.
The Harrises' bedroom contained two windows. One faced west ("A very nice view," the real estate agent had explained. "And so it will remain for some time, because Mr. Reynolds doesn't plan to build any new homes out there until some drainage problems have been solved"), and the other window faced east; it overlooked the front porch roof.
Shelly Harris, dressed in a red and black nightgown, stood facing that window now, her eyes on the porch roof.
She was on the verge of a scream. She was seeing something she could not hope to understand.
Dick Wentis became aware that his mouth was hanging open, and he thought dimly that he had never imagined that that sort of thing ever happened—he had always assumed it was just a literary device.
"You've been standing there a long time," Trudy said. "Deep in thought?"
He glanced around at her. "Could you come over here, Trudy, and tell me if you see what I see?"
She smiled, confused, "What?"
"Just come here, please." He turned back to the window.
Trudy climbed out of the waterbed, threw a robe around herself, and walked over to him. She stood on her tiptoes and looked over his shoulder. "It snowed, huh?" she said.
Dick stepped to one side. "The footprints, Trudy. Look at the footprints."
She looked.
Lorraine Graham saw the footprints, and the new snow, and the frigid blue sky, and the cluster of houses around her.
She said, "Stan, it's really beautiful, really very nice."
She felt his arm around her waist; she smelled his aftershave; she heard him whisper something passionate, as he always did in the morning.
And she said, giggling a little, "But what about the boys, Stan?"
"To hell with the boys."
She thought about that a moment. "Yes," she said. "To hell with them." And she stepped very slowly away from the window, and the new snow, and the footprints.
Janice McIntyre turned from her window to face her husband, her eyes wide. "My God," she said, "they're everywhere! But that's not possible, is it? It's not possible!"
Miles was seated on the edge of the bed, elbows on his knees, hands clasped. "It's some kind of practical joke," he told her. "Somebody got hold of some ladders—"
"Those footprints are on the roof of the house across the street, Miles. And they're on the Wentises' roof, too—I can see them!"
"The carpenters have ladders tall enough, Jan. This is a construction site."
"Miles, the carpenters left a week ago."
He sighed, "Yes, I know."
"Then can you tell me what happened? Did someone drive in here while we were sleeping? Can you explain it, Miles?"
"No," he said immediately. "I can't explain it. Not right now, anyway. But I'm going to get my clothes on, and I'm going to go outside, and maybe then I'll be able to explain it. Okay?"
She stared silently at him a moment; then, "I'm scared, Miles," she said.
Chapter 25
Most of them were dressed in winter coats thrown over pajamas and nightgowns, and they gravitated, through the new snow, to the center of Granada (a half-acre size circle of open land which, said the brochure distributed to prospective home buyers, "will house a children's playground, decorative bandstand, and lush botanical gardens"), their eyes on the footprints all the while. Most stayed clear of them, as if stepping on them or in them would bring bad luck, or as if the footprints—strange as they were—were somehow inviolate.
Norm Gellis was there, and so was his wife, her face still red and puffy from crying, though the tears had long since stopped. Norm's gaze darted from one line of footprints to another, and he whispered "Jesus!" over and over again.
Timmy Meade and Sam Wentis—Timmy in pajamas and heavy winter coat, and Sam in jeans and a flannel shirt—stood quietly together. Dora and Larry Meade were nearby, also silent. Larry felt a dinner chill—a feeling he couldn't explain—and it scared him.
Dick and Trudy Wentis stood with Janice McIntyre. "Where's Miles?" Dick Wentis asked. And Janice, nodding toward her house, answered, "Checking for signs of a ladder."
"I've checked already," Dick said. "There are none." And he fell silent.
Shelly and Malcolm Harris—their infant daughter Serena bundled up in Shelly's arms—wandered over. After a long, clumsy moment of silence, Malcolm said, "This kind of thing happened once before, you know." And he made a bad attempt at a smile.
"Did it?" said Dick Wentis, without enthusiasm.
"Yes. Late in the nineteenth century, I think. In Pennsylvania."
"The Devil's Footprints," Janice cut in, at a whisper. And she found that all eyes were suddenly on her. "Well," she hurried on, as if in apology, "that's what they called them, anyway. Three-toed footprints, like a deer's, I imagine. Only larger. And they were everywhere. Like these footprints are. There was even some evidence that whoever—whatever—made the footprints had walked up the sides of houses."
Sound carried well in the chill, quiet morning air, and Dora and Larry Meade, not far away, heard what Janice was saying and came over. Timmy Meade and Sam Wentis followed moments later.
Janice looked from one face to another. Each face was alive with anticipation. Finally, she said, shrugging, "That's all I know. They were never able to explain the footprints, I can tell you that."
Miles appeared. He was shaking his head slowly, in confusion. "Weirdest goddamned thing . . ." he muttered.
"What did you find?" Janice asked.
"I didn't find anything," he answe
red. "No ladder marks, anyway." He paused; then, "Has anyone called the sheriff?"
"We don't need him," Norm Gellis called. He was at the back of the small circle of people. "I called him," Dick Wentis said.
Norm Gellis shouldered his way to the front of the circle. "We don't need the sheriff here," he said again. With agitation. "What good has he been to us, so far? No good at all—am I right or wrong?" He paused only a moment. "I'm right," he continued. "Because we've got two boys missing, we've got a damned bus crash, we've got kids breaking into our houses while we're asleep, it's happened to me twice!" He held up two fingers. "Twice," he repeated. "And now we've got this . . . this stupid, damned prank—"
"You're Mr. Gellis, aren't you?" Dick Wentis cut in, straining to sound cordial.
He nodded quickly, "Uh-huh," and stuck his hand out.
Dick took it; he let it go quickly. "Trudy told me what you had to say a couple weeks back, Mr. Gellis."
"Did she now?"
"The way she explains it, you're a bit of a hothead, aren't you?"
"Yeah, sometimes," he answered, grinning. "I admit it."
The response took Dick off guard; he was momentarily at a loss for a reply.
"Maybe we should listen to Mr. Gellis," Malcolm Harris suggested.
Dick said, "I don't think so."
And they all heard the wail of a police siren behind them.
Evening
