Devil's Kiss d-1

by William W. Johnstone

"Well—no, Sam. But someone obviously has, or the place wouldn't be fenced off for public safety."

  "Karl Sorenson owns the land?"

  "That's right. Been Sorenson land for—oh, over a hundred and fifty years. Maybe longer."

  "And the Sorenson's came from—where?"

  Wade shrugged. "Scandinavia, I guess."

  "Uh-huh. Got a dictionary, Wade?"

  "You're asking a newspaper man that?" he grinned. "Sure." He flipped open a large dictionary on his desk, cleverly hidden under a pile of out-of-town newspapers. "What's the word, Sam?"

  "Black."

  "Black? Just Black?" He received a stare for a reply. "Okay." He thumbed through the pages. "Got it."

  "Check the Icelandic spelling."

  "Blakkr."

  "Now look up wild."

  A curious stare, then Wade thumbed through the W's. "All right, got it."

  "Icelandic spelling?"

  "Villr."

  "Put them together in English."

  The editor was thoughtful for a moment. "Black Wild. Black Wilder; that what you're getting at? So what?"

  Sam told him of the book he'd read. Of Jane Ann's suspicions. Of his own.

  "Duhon," Wade muttered. "Yeah, I recall reading about him. He isn't exactly one of the heroes of early Americana, but he did trap this area two centuries ago. Let me think back to my history classes at the university. All right. Duhon, along with a Father—" he stumbled over the word, "Dubois, helped set up the First Catholic Church in what is now Nebraska. Dubois! Father Dubois is our parish priest now." He forced a smile.

  "Interesting, isn't it?" Sam returned the forced smile.

  "Have you spoken with Father Dubois?"

  "Not lately. And not about this, but I plan to—today."

  Wade nodded absently. He rose to his feet, walking to a wall lined with books. He selected a slim volume of Fork County history. "Yes, things are coming back to me. Sam, do you know what is purported to have happened to Duhon and the original Father Dubois?"

  "No."

  "Real fairy tale stuff." He flipped a few pages of the book, found the passage he sought, and read, The log cabin church was destroyed in the late 1700s. Folklore has it that the church was destroyed by huge, foul-smelling, hairy beasts, who, after destroying the church, ate both Duhon, the trapper, and the priest, Dubois. He laughed. "Pure hogwash."

  Sam said nothing.

  "The truth," Wade read on, will probably never be known, for their bodies were never found, nor was any grave site ever located.

  He skipped a few pages. "The church was originally built near what is now the town of Whitfield, in an area known locally as Tyson's Lake. The lake was named in memory of two young children, Abe and Martha Tyson, who disappeared near there in the mid-1800's, and were presumed to have drowned.

  Trappers have long avoided the area known as Tyson's Lake, because of the bad smells coming from the small stand of timber, and because of the frequent howling and snarling from the woods.

  The author goes on to say the smells probably came from bad water in some of the holes, and the howling and snarling pure imagination and the wind.

  "Sure," Sam said. "Right."

  This time the editor's smile was not forced. He openly chuckled. "Come on, Sam! You're not going to sit there and tell me you believe in ghosties and ghoulies and things that go bump in the night?"

  "Do you believe in God, Wade?"

  "Certainly, I do!"

  "Then if you believe in God, you have to believe in the devil."

  Wade nodded, but refused to elaborate further. He sat behind his desk, a slight smile on his lips, his eyes amused.

  "Why did the radio station close down, Wade?"

  He shrugged. "I guess because it wasn't making any money. Town's too small. It was always marginal."

  "Who owned it?"

  "Oh, it's changed hands several times in the past ten years. A media group out of Omaha owned it for years. Then about three years ago—" he paused, his eyes lifting to meet Sam's, "Karl Sorenson bought it."

  "And ran it until a few months ago. That's interesting."

  "Maybe," Wade was thoughtful. "But I know something that is more interesting, I believe. You know Karl Sorenson?"

  "Unfortunately. He's perhaps one of the most profane men I've ever had the misfortune to encounter. Why do you ask?"

  "Karl's been spending a lot of time with Otto Stockman."

  "That is interesting. And odd. The most profane man in the county spending time with a Baptist deacon. Stranger still, when one recalls it was Otto who urged the new man, Farben, to break with the Ministerial Alliance a couple of months ago. I heard Farben called the M.A. the most useless group in town."

  "I remember you telling me about that. I didn't pursue it because I know you don't care for Otto." He grinned. "Or is that putting it too mildly?"

  "No, it isn't. I prayed for guidance, Wade; prayed for help and forgiveness because of my dislike for Otto. I recall what Father Dubois told me about Stockman. He said Otto was too Christian! He said anytime a mortal man sets himself up as a pure model for others to follow, he's in real trouble. Dubois said he'd known Otto for years and the man had always been a pompous ass. He allowed himself to be placed on a pedestal. Dubois told me a couple of years ago he thought Otto was heading for a bad fall. He didn't elaborate."

  "You think Otto has something to do with—whatever you believe is happening here?"

  Sam lifted his shoulders in a shrug. "Maybe. Something else, too. Jane Ann told me Annie Brown has disappeared."

  "What do you mean, disappeared?"

  "Gone. Vanished. Departed. Dematerialized—"

  Wade held up one hand. "Enough, Sam— spare me. 1 know the meaning of the word. I withdraw the question. How do you know she's disappeared?"

  "Because Jane Ann checked it out. No one has seen her. Not at church, not at the movies, nowhere. She's just gone."

  "Her stepparents?"

  "They told Jane Ann she'd gone to visit relatives in Bradville. That's a lie. The girl has no relatives." He related to Wade what Jane Ann had told him. The editor's face expressed his disgust at her stepparent's actions.

  "Have you talked with the sheriff?"

  "Wade, the sheriff is in this thing up to his neck," He told the newsman what Chester had overheard; all his personal suspicions. "You will recall that Walter has dropped out of the church. Has he been friendly toward you lately?"

  "No. No, he hasn't. He's been acting strangely of late. Sam, three-quarters of the people in this town are behaving—well, not normally. Damnit, Sam!" he slammed his open hand on the desk. "Come on straight with me—say what's on your mind."

  "Just calm down, Wade. I want to know more about Tyson's Lake."

  "Now, what?" he asked irritably.

  "Your father was a newspaperman. What did he have to say about that area?"

  "My father died when I was was seven years old, Sam. I don't remember much about him."

  "I'm sorry, Wade. I didn't know."

  He shook his head. "No, I'm the one who should be apologizing, Sam. I never told you about him. Sorry I lost my temper. But this . . . thing—this town; it's got me upset and confused."

  "Does it bother you to talk about your father?"

  "Oh, no."

  "Was your dad killed in an accident?"

  "Sort of, I guess you could say." Wade seemed evasive.

  Sam pressed on. Like a cop who had just picked up a strong lead, Sam felt a tingling in the pit of his stomach. "Sort of an accident, Wade? Where did the accident happen?" He knew the answer before Wade opened his mouth.

  The small office was very quiet. Wade's sigh was audible. He kept his eyes downcast. "Not far from Tyson's Lake," he said softly.

  "How did he die, Wade?"

  Wade's dark eyes lifted to meet Sam's. "You know, preacher, you're beginning to spook me a little. Just a little."

  "1'm waiting."

  "Sam, from all I've been able to piece together, my
dad was a very virile man. Kept himself in excellent physical shape. He ran, he boxed, did calisthenics. The whole bit, and he wasn't afraid of a living thing.

  "It was just about this time of the year. Yeah, almost to the date. Dad had been working on some hush-hush story. No, don't look at me like that or ask me what—I don't know. I've torn up this building, looking for a lead of some kind—any kind. Nothing. No journal, no notes, no nothing.

  "Anyway, mother told me, just before she died, that dad had started carrying a pistol whenever he went out there. No one knows why he did it. And no one really knows what happened. Lord knows, I don't. I just vaguely remember the funeral. Closed casket. When I grew older, mother told me dad had been horribly clawed; mangled. Blood everywhere, and not just dad's blood. She said whatever it was that killed him—and the theory at that time was a bear or a puma—had to have died later. Dad's pistol had been fired several times, and he was an expert shot with that .44."

  He sighed heavily, as if the telling troubled him. "This is the strange part: dad had dragged himself away from the fence—it was fenced off even then—barbed wire. It's been replaced several times. Dad dragged himself almost a half mile, to an old road. Doctor King—not Tony, his father—told me years later that dad's face was grotesque; so horribly twisted as to be almost macabre, as if dad had been frightened out of his wits. But I can't believe dad would be frightened of anything, or anybody.

  "You see, Sam, mother went to her death, seven years ago, still believing dad had been killed by a . . . a . . . whatever it was! That's not true; dad killed himself. Shot himself through the heart. Only two people knew that—until now. Doctor King and me. Now you."

  Sam was silent for a moment, thinking of the author's reference to the Beasts. "Could your father's face have been swollen with—oh, infection, perhaps?"

  "Well, yes, Sam. You see, that's one of the dark secrets about Whitfield. Very tragic after dad died. Two of the men who helped load dad in the wagon to bring him into town—you couldn't get a car out there—not then, not in those days, had been working on the fence all day. Barbed wire. They had cut themselves on the hands and arms several times; just little cuts, nothing serious. But in handling dad, it seems dad's blood got into those cuts. This is Old Doctor King's theory, remember. Anyway," again the heavy sigh, "the cuts became infected. The men went crazy, Sam. I didn't see them, of course, I was only a child. But I remember the shooting that night. The shouting and the screaming. The townspeople killed them. It was never reported as such, of course. Whitfield, you see, does have its secrets, Sam."

  "Who else, Wade?" the minister asked softly.

  "You're smart, Sam," the editor's smile was grim. "You put things together real quick, don't you? Yeah, sure, there were others that following day and night. A dozen people—men and women."

  "They were all found and —disposed of?"

  "No. Two of them ran away into the prairie. They were never found."

  "Which way did they run, Wade?"

  "Boy! You're like a bulldog, aren't you, Sam? You never give up. They ran toward Tyson's Lake—so I'm told. They were tracked to the fence by bloodhounds."

  "And?"

  "And? And? There is no 'And?' That's the end of it. They fell in a cave or a hole and died. Period."

  "And you believe that crap?"

  Wade's reply was soft, almost inaudible. "No." He lifted his eyes. "But, if not that, then what?"

  "The Mark of the Beast."

  "The Mark of the —what? I beg your pardon, Sam?"

  "Let's count it down, Wade. How many people have died, or been killed, or disappeared in that area known as Tyson's Lake? Jane Ann's mother and father. Ex-Chief of Police Kramer. The young kids the lake is named after. The original Father Dubois and the trapper, Duhon. Your father. The two escapees that night, after they were infected. And a dime will get you a dollar that's what happened to Larry and Joan and Annie Brown. Far too many people for coincidence. Some were torn, others mutilated, marked."

  "What is the Mark of the Beast, Sam?"

  "I don't know, Wade," he said, then hesitated for a moment. Then Sam bared his thoughts and all his suspicions to his friend, taking it from the beginning. He told him everything.

  When he came to the part about Michelle bending down to kiss him, and the stink of her breath and her reaction to the Holy Cross, Sam almost lost control. He paused for a short time, getting his emotions under control.

  Wade didn't know what to believe or how to react. Coming from another man, the editor would have openly laughed. But this was Sam, one of the most level-headed men he'd ever known. He ran a shaky hand across his face. "Good God, Sam!"

  "Yes," the minister said, his voice firming. "I think God is about all we have to count on in Whitfield."

  "We'll call the authorities," Wade reached for the phone.

  "No, we won't!" Sam said. "It's too late for that."

  Puzzled eyes lifted to touch the minister's hard gaze. Wade pulled his hand from the phone. "What do you mean, Sam—too late?"

  "I—I believe there is just a handful of Christians left in Whitfield, in this part of Fork, and we're growing smaller in number with each passing hour. I think right now, Wade, we'd better go see Father Dubois. Perhaps he can shed some light on what's happening around here."

  Wade's usual demeanor had returned; the reporter's attitude on nearly everthing: cynical, doubting. "Sam? You really believe all you've told me, don't you? All this body snatching that's been going on—where are they? Do they prowl the streets at night? Come on, Sam, you're a grown man who is under a terrible strain at home. Now all things can be explained. Surely you don't believe—?"

  "I don't know what I believe, Wade. And that's the truth. I need some answers; you need some answers. So let's go find them."

  Wade stood up, his ears doubting what he'd heard but willing to go along with his minister—for a time. "Next thing you'll be telling me is that Frankenstein is lurking outside Whitfield."

  "Frankenstein is not mentioned in the Bible, Wade. The devil is."

  Ten

  Father Dubois opened the rear door of the rectory. He did not seem surprised to see either Sam or Wade. The old priest smiled. "Come in, gentlemen." He looked at Sam. "I've been expecting you."

  The preacher and the editor followed the priest into his small living quarters. Lucas Monroe of the Methodist Church and Father Glen Haskell of the Episcopal Church sat on the couch. They smiled their greetings.

  Sam said, "Is this it? The sum total of Whitfield's faith? Us?"

  Father Haskell smiled knowingly. "You're here, Sam, so you must have put it all together. You know the answer to your question."

  Sam remembered seeing several ministers in that parade of cars the night before. "I know about Jack Anglin and Bert Justis. But the others?"

  Lucas slowly nodded his head. "Yes, so do we. Roger Owens and Leon Carson have also joined—Them."

  "Them?" Wade sat down without being asked. "You people seem as calm and as certain about this as—death!" He lost his temper. "What is going on!? You people act as though you've known about this . . . this . . . whatever the hell it is all along."

  "Calm yourself," Dubois urged him gently. "Now is the time for unity, not panic. As to your question, yes—I believe we all sensed something at about the same time. Except for me, of course—I've known it was here for a long while. What I didn't know was when it would surface."

  Wade fumbled in his shirt pocket for a cigarette, lighting it with fingers that trembled despite himself. "This is all a bad dream. Pretty soon I'm going to wake up and return to reality."

  Dubois smiled. "Not likely, son. This is reality. I assure you of that."

  "May I use your phone?" Sam asked.

  "Certainly."

  He decided not to call Chester—not yet. He didn't want to let the women in on all of this, not for a while. And if they were being watched—as Sam suspected they were—he didn't want to alarm the watchers. He dialed Miles' number at the store.r />
  "Miles? I think you better come on over to the rectory. I want you to sit in on this. Five minutes. See you then."

  "I'll make more coffee," Dubois said.

  "A Jew in a Catholic rectory," Miles said, taking the cup of coffee offered him by Dubois. Miles smiled. "My father always said I had a strange sense of humor."

  "Sit down, Miles," Dubois said, returning the smile. "I really don't wear a tail and horns. '

  "Who does?" the Jew countered.

  "Ah," Dubois said. "But for a time, just before the Christian era, do you doubt Jews took Satan seriously?"

  "Never too deeply rooted," Miles sat down, sipping his coffee, smiling.