Grogo the Goblin

by Sackett, Jeffrey

  "And if it wasn't such hell living with you," Lydia interrupted, "we probably would both have been home! Why the hell'd you send Sarah out looking for Dork, anyway? She's a big girl. If she wants to go out somewhere and see some people or something, why is that any of your fucking business?"

  "Stop it!" Dorcas begged. "Stop it, please! I just can't stand it, not here, not now!"

  Her father's face mirrored his internal struggle between grief, love, guilt, and anger. "Why Sarah?" he asked at last, beginning to weep. "Of the three of you, why her?"

  "What are you . . . ?" Lydia began to ask, and then understood her father's words. Her face grew red as she spat, "You son of a bitch!"

  "Stop it!" Dorcas's breath was coming in short gasps, and her body was trembling from head to foot.

  Tears rolled down Ostlich's face. "Thank God your mother isn't alive to see this."

  "Yeah, sure," Lydia shouted back. "Thank God she isn't alive to have to go on living with you, looking at you every day and knowing what you are! That's why she killed herself, Dad. She killed herself because of what you did to me!"

  "Stop it!" her sister cried.

  "That's the truth, and you know it, you bastard!"

  Dorcas pressed her fists against her temples and screamed. Then she ran, away from her battling family, past her friends, and out onto Bennets Road. Peter stood dumbly and watched as she ran by him, and he looked from her disappearing figure to her sister and father and then back again. "Dorcas?" he said, and then called louder, "Dorcas! Wait a minute. Where are you going?"

  Ostlich glared at him angrily through his tears. "You keep away from her!"

  "But where is she going?" Peter asked. "What just happened?" He walked past Ostlich and began to follow Dorcas, but her father stopped him by grabbing his arm. "Hey! Get your hands off me!"

  "I don't want her to have anything to do with you!"

  Peter threw the hand firmly away. "I care a lot about her, in case you haven't noticed!"

  "Let's go, Clay," Lydia muttered as she walked briskly by them. "I gotta get away from him."

  "Yeah, sure," Clayton responded. "What about Dork?"

  "She'll calm down and either go home or meet us at the trailer." She sighed. "Come on. Let's get out of here."

  "Lydia!" her father pleaded. "Come back here!"

  "Fuck you," she spat, and continued to walk away.

  Clayton followed her, and Rebecca followed him. Peter remained for a moment and then said, "I'll meet you guys later. I'm gonna go after Dorcas."

  "Suit yourself," Clayton called back as he climbed into his jeep and started the engine. Lydia and Rebecca entered the vehicle and they then began to drive up toward the mountain. Peter began to trot in the direction Dorcas had been running, leaving Ostlich alone in the cemetery.

  Clayton pursed his lips, thinking as he drove. "Hey, Lyd, you think Dork's gonna go home?"

  "Beats me," Lydia replied.

  "What about you? You gonna go home?"

  "Only if you throw me out. Why?" Her heart skipped a beat as she began to worry that Clayton was about to begin distancing himself from her.

  "I just wanted . . ." He stopped and thought for a few more moments. "Look, the town still wants that land, right?"

  She shrugged. "I guess so. So what?"

  "So I think I know how they're gonna try to get it. And if they're gonna do what I think they're gonna do . . . well, then there's something I'm gonna do."

  They waited for an explanation, and when none was forthcoming, Rebecca asked, "You want to let us in on this, Clay?"

  "Yeah, yeah, sure," he said distractedly, still sunk in thought. "Look, you can't pay taxes if you're dead, right? And what happens if you don't pay your taxes on your land?"

  "I don't know," Lydia replied. "The bank takes it, I guess."

  "Only if you got a mortgage. I mean, what happens if you own it, no mortgage or nothing, and you don't pay your taxes?"

  She shrugged. "I have no idea."

  "It gets auctioned off by the county," he said. "You gotta pay taxes to the county, and if you don't, the county auctions it off."

  "Okay. So?"

  Rebecca laughed softly. "Clayton, you wouldn't!"

  He grinned. "Why not?"

  "Hey, come on." Lydia frowned. "Get to the point, will you? I don't feel like guessing what you're talking about. I mean, this hasn't been a really good day for me, you know?"

  "The town council is gonna bid on the land," Clayton explained. "I mean, I think they have to, for this whole factory thing. The deal was that the town would donate the land to Craigo, and they'd build—"

  "Yeah, yeah, I know all that," Lydia said impatiently. "What's that got to do with me going home?"

  "Your father is on the council. He'll know when and where the auction'll be, and I'll bet they'll manage to speed up the whole thing, have it sooner than they're supposed to."

  "So?"

  "So I want to know when and where, too."

  "Why?"

  He smiled. "So I can bid against the town and buy the Sweet property."

  Lydia digested this and then began laughing loudly. "Clay, that's hysterical! That is just so fucking funny."

  "Peter's gonna be happy as a pig in shit," Rebecca added.

  "They bid a hundred grand, I bid a hundred and fifty," Clayton went on. "They bid a hundred and fifty, I bid two. The land's only worth fifty, sixty grand anyway. The town's gonna have to sell bonds or something to raise the money, and they're gonna have to do it before the auction. They won't be expecting anybody else to bid, not up to the level they're willing to pay, so I doubt they'll raise more than a hundred grand, tops." He started laughing. "Can you imagine the look on old Alex's face? He's gonna shit in his pants."

  He was still laughing a few minutes later as he pulled the jeep to a halt near the path to his trailer. "I could use a cold beer and a hot pipe."

  "You and me both," Lydia said. "Jesus, what a week!"

  Soon thereafter they were all sitting on the floor of the trailer's living room, taking turns with the small brass hashish pipe. "You think Dork's okay?" Rebecca asked.

  "Sure," Clayton replied.

  "I mean, after what happened to Sarah . . ."

  "That was because of that fucking nut Grogo," Clayton said quickly, shaking his head. "Nothing bad ever happens around here. I mean, he's dead, so there's nothing to worry .about. "

  Lydia toked on the pipe and then handed it to Rebecca. "I just can't believe he would do something like that. I mean, there's no doubt he was screwy, but he just, I don't know, just didn't seem the type."

  Clayton shrugged. "So who's the type? Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain, you know? Besides, maybe it was an accident. Maybe he didn't mean to do it."

  "Yeah, sure, right," Rebecca said sarcastically. "He raped and murdered her by accident. Guilty with an explanation."

  "Well," he said, shrugging again and not really wanting to discuss it further, "whatever. It's all over."

  "I don't see how it can be all over," Lydia objected. "I mean, don't get me wrong, I'm not upset that you guys killed the nut who murdered my sister, but—"

  "Hey, include me out, man!" Clayton objected. "I just watched. I had nothing to do with it."

  "Okay, but I mean, you can't just hang somebody. I mean, it's against the law!"

  "You gonna call the cops?"

  She hesitated for a moment. "Well, no . . ."

  "Me neither."

  "But won't he be missed?"

  "By who?" he asked. "As far as we can tell, nobody knew he was here except the people who live here."

  She nodded. "Yeah, I guess so. But what about the other guy, Asher-what's-his-name? He didn't do anything wrong."

  "He said he helped hide the body," Clayton replied. "I heard him say that myself."

  "Yeah." She nodded. "But he didn't deserve to die."

  Clayton nodded in agreement. "Yeah. Bummer." She sighed and then nodded in turn. "Bummer." Rebecca tapped the pipe
onto the top of an empty beer can. "This is played," she said.

  "Play!" Clayton shouted, grabbing Lydia's hand and pulling her to her feet. "An excellent idea! Come, wench, let us play!" She was not at all in the mood, but inasmuch as she always made a point of giving Clayton what he wanted when he wanted it, she feigned laughter as he dragged her into the bedroom.

  Rebecca reloaded the pipe. I wish Sean were here, she thought as she smoked in solitude and listened to the laughs and moans and the pounding bedsprings, clearly audible through the thin walls a few feet away. He said he's going to try to get up here tomorrow, but that goddamn probation officer is on his ass every minute, checking up on him, calling up the people who are covering for him. She's not making it easy for him to get away. God, I miss him. I miss him so much. She heard Lydia cry out and then moan softly as Clayton grunted and the bedsprings ceased creaking. Well, that didn't take long, she thought. You're some lover, Clay.

  The phone rang in the small kitchen, and she jumped to her feet and ran over to answer it, hoping it was Sean. "Hello?" she said eagerly.

  "Hiya, Becky."

  "Oh, Peter." She sighed. "It's only you."

  "Hey, thanks a lot." He was making an effort to be humorous, but his voice was tense.

  "What's up? Where are you calling from?" She opened the refrigerator and took out a beer as she spoke.

  "I'm over in Redhook, at the hospital with Dorcas."

  She was suddenly very attentive. "Dorcas is in the hospital?"

  "What?" Lydia asked from the bedroom. "What'd you say?"

  "Hold on," she said to Peter, and then called out, "Pete's on the phone. He says Dorcas is in the hospital in Redhook."

  Lydia was off the bed in an instant, still wrapping a sheet around herself as she ran to the phone. She grabbed the receiver from Rebecca's hand and said breathlessly, "Peter, this is Lydia. What happened? Is she hurt? Is she okay?"

  "She isn't hurt," he replied. "But she . . . well, I think she's flipping out again."

  "What do you mean?" she demanded. "She didn't . . . hey, you didn't give her any acid. . . ."

  "Oh, don't be ridiculous!" he said angrily. "Of course I didn't give her any acid. What do you think I am, stupid?"

  "Well, what the hell happened?!"

  "I was trying to follow her," he explained, "but I didn't really know where she went. She got out of sight pretty quick."

  "Yeah, yeah, I know, go on, go on."

  "I was down near the River Road, and I saw her just as a state trooper was picking her up, so I ran over to them and—"

  "Goddamn it, Peter, I don't give a shit what you were doing!" Lydia shouted. "What happened to my sister?"

  "She was hallucinating, like maybe she was having a flashback from the acid or something. She was screaming, 'He's after me, he's after me,' and shit like that."

  "Who? Who'd she think was after her?"

  He sighed. "Grogo the Goblin. She said he was trying to drag her into the woods."

  Chapter Ten

  January 3, 1969

  The year 1968 had ended very much the way it had begun, with unrest at home and a seemingly endless war abroad. One president was coming to the end of his tragic tenure as another was preparing to take control of the nation's destinies in a few short weeks. Long-smoldering discontent erupted into sporadic violence in black ghettos, young whites marched and chanted and shook their fists on a thousand college campuses, and everywhere authority and tradition and convention were being challenged, attacked, rejected. It was as if all the old certitudes and assumptions had melted away, and the nation seemed to be either at the dawn of a new and better age, or on the edge of a precipice.

  Such things held the attention of most of the country; but the little town of Beckskill had other concerns, more urgent, more pressing, more immediate.

  At four o'clock in the afternoon of the day Clayton Saunders purchased the Sweet property for $250,000, an emergency meeting was held of the Beckskill town council. Alex Brown and Dr. Timothy Ostlich waited nervously for the others to arrive, and by 4:15 everyone was present except old Johann Schilder. Ostlich drummed his fingers nervously upon the desktop and said at last, "We can't wait for him any longer. We have to come to a decision about this, and I'm sure that Schilder will agree with whatever we decide on."

  "It's better to have a unanimous council vote if we're going to persuade the voters," Imhof pointed out.

  "We'll have a unanimous vote, I'm sure," Ostlich said. "We're all agreed in principle already. All that remains is for Walter here to lay out the details."

  Walter Rihaczeck cleared his throat. "Well, I'm sure we've all discussed this situation privately amongst ourselves by now. . .

  "Yeah, we discussed it," Alex shouted, "and I vote we take that son of a bitch out and shoot him!"

  "Calm down, Alex." Ostlich sighed wearily. Were the truth to be known, his enthusiasm for town politics had diminished greatly since he had buried his youngest daughter six weeks before, and his continued participation in meetings and planning sessions was little more than habit. It also served to distract him at least temporarily from the open wound of his loss. "What's done is done. We couldn't have anticipated it. What we have to do now is try to salvage the situation."

  Alex was not to be diverted. "Ever since that goddamn bum was in high school, he's been a problem in this town. We should have known, we should have known he would do something like this!"

  "Come on, Al," Bruno said. "We thought we had taken care of everything. We knew that when December first came and went without the semiannual taxes being paid on the Sweet property, it would be put into county receivership, and we managed to get that part of the plan done quicker than any of us thought possible. We persuaded the tax assessor to reduce the waiting period before the auction from sixty days to thirty. We floated a bond issue for two hundred thousand dollars, much more than the property is worth on the open market. We did everything we logically could have thought of doing. Who would have thought the boy would pull this stunt?"

  "It isn't a stunt," Imhof said pensively. "It's a very shrewd business move. He knows that nobody wants the land but us, and he knows that we're desperate to have it. He's got us over a barrel, and I'll be surprised if he doesn't bleed us for every cent we can raise."

  "Every cent we can raise!" Alex exclaimed. "What the hell's wrong with you, Mike? He doesn't want to sell us the land. Him and his goddamn communist friends want to keep the forest and the river for the goddamn squirrels and the goddamn fish! He ain't going to sell us the land, not for any price."

  Imhof shook his head. "I can't believe that, Alex. We're talking about big money here. If Saunders has to weigh some wildlife against, say, a profit of a hundred thousand dollars . . ."

  "A hundred thousand dollars!" screamed Alex, for whom last month's seventy-five-dollar utility bill had been hard to meet, who still owed the bank twelve thousand on the mortgage, who was one month in arrears with the beer distributor. "A hundred thousand dollars! We're supposed to give that goddamn son of a bitch a hundred thousand dollars?"

  "If we have to," Bruno said calmly. "And more than that, if we have to. Listen, Alex, Mike is right. Saunders has us over a barrel, and—"

  "What about the eminent-domain thing?" he asked, turning to Ostlich. "We were going to do that with Sweet. Why can't we do it with Saunders?"

  "Because," Ostlich replied, sighing again, "we don't have the time. Moving through an eminent-domain petition against a retarded freak and an uneducated Indian is one thing. It would be something quite different against Saunders. He may be lowlife, but he isn't stupid. And anyone with that kind of money must have lawyers."

  Alex was fuming. "It ain't right, goddamn it, it ain't right. That bastard has too much money now. Look how he behaves, look at how his sister behaves, that poor little girl, so young, so pretty, and she drinks the booze and she takes the drugs and she has sex with that bum she goes with, that lousy bum, he uses her like a whore, I know he does, that bastard, and sh
e should be with someone nice who'll take care of her, and she could have his children and make a home for him. . . ." He stopped, realizing what he was saying, seeing the embarrassed looks on the faces of the others present. He lapsed into silence.

  "No one here likes Saunders," Ostlich said uneasily. "But we have to face facts. He doesn't need the land, and we do. We don't have the land, and he does."

  "And that's the basis of business," Rihaczeck said, trying to bring the conversation back to his outline of the course of action to be pursued. "I figure that he bought a piece of land worth about seventy thousand for almost four times its value. If he can see a profit of say twenty percent, he'll think his investment a success. That means we'll have to be prepared to offer him three hundred thousand. But, as I said, we may have to go as high as three hundred and fifty."

  "And where are we gonna get another hundred and fifty thousand dollars?" Alex demanded. "It was a close vote for the two hundred thousand."

  Rihaczeck shrugged. "We have to push for another bond issue. We don't have any choice. Now, the way I see it, we're going to have to make a—"

  "So we offer him three hundred fifty thousand," Alex shouted, "and he asks four. So we do another bond? And then he raises it to four fifty?"

  "Alex . . ." Ostlich began gently.

  "No," he said firmly. "We don't pay that son of a bitch one goddamn cent. We take him to court, we sue him, by God, we sue him!"

  "Sue him for what?" Bruno asked. "For outbidding us at a public auction?"

  "Alex," Ostlich began again, "we don't have any choice. Let's make this a unanimous vote, for the sake of the voters, for the sake of the community."

  "No!"

  Ostlich sighed. "It'll be five to one if you insist on it, but the proposal will still have passed the council."

  "And I don't get asked nutting about dis?" old Johann Schilder asked angrily as he hobbled into the room. "Vhat is dis, you votink for me and I ain't efen here?"

  "Johann," Imhof said, "we weren't leaving you out. You're just a bit late, that's all, and we wanted—"