by Pete Kahle
Secrecy was disquieting, but reality could be worse. Indeed, there was a dreadful early AM auto accident just days after I arrived, occasioned—police determined—by a vast, newly-gaping pothole caused by frost heaves. Specifically, two brothers were killed and a third boy injured, when their pickup hit the hole, then swerved into a stone wall just outside the village where the speed limit opened up. The dispatched ambulance had wailed like a banshee, bringing me awake past midnight.
If lonely, I kept busy writing letters to southern friends, trying to keep an eye on stocks my husband left me, and reading books I felt I ought to. For company I adopted a white stray tomcat who moved through the house like a silver ghost; dipped into North Country history, and very soon visited the elementary school. Having been a teacher till hard times cut my job, I knew principals always needed subs, especially in flu season. What better way to learn the nature of a place than through children? I must have made a good impression on the principal, for I was called in to take an art teacher’s place within a few days of my application.
Along with instructions, I was shown a pleasant room with a large supply closet at its rear which led to a second door and another room beyond. The morning passed smoothly. My skills were fresh, I was a novelty to the kids, and—unlike Melissa—enjoyed a paying job. However, during lunch break while searching out construction paper, I overheard voices in the farther classroom, and my sister’s name riveted my attention.
“Melissa was so eager, letting the kids roam around touching the rocks, plus allowed them to climb all over. But Jamey says he’s afraid of the frog since it winked at him.”
“He’s only five.”
“I’ve felt something,” the unknown voice continued. “Laugh if you like, but our house has a slant view with just a bit of that garden, if you call it one, but the stones beyond seem to watch with strange staring eyes. Why, Terry says something came right at them causing the accident,” the low voice continued, ‘Yes, a solid ton of stone. He claimed the police got it all wrong. Those boys didn’t hit the wall from the pothole. Instead, something blocked the road—a form immense and wicked—forcing them to swerve. Must have been an illusion, for nothing was there!”
The second voice snickered. “I suppose the kids hadn’t shared a few six packs and maybe smoked something funny?”
The first voice changed the subject. “It’s good that woman and her husband left, but now I’m told her sister’s here! Flatlanders act so superior, wanting to mess around and meddle. Leave nature to nature, I say.”
I put my hand to my mouth, biting my thumb nervously as I eased backward into my classroom. Melissa and her painted rocks disturbed the locals; that seemed plain. And what could a boy—the only survivor to tell the tale—possibly see that could resemble a ton of stone and block the road? Had drink or illusion caused such tragedy?
It occurred to me I should research Abenaki culture, so on my lunch break I consulted my laptop. What were their burial customs? Had Melissa disturbed sacred ground? The stony tangle did not seem suited for graves. However, I did learn this tribe’s bodies were wrapped in a birch bark shroud called buskanigan, and the remains were preferably interred in sandy soil. At the ceremony the living solemnly chanted, “Now our aged man is going to sing a dead song.” But what if the man deceased were young?
For a moment I was amused. If the dead proved buried amidst rocks and brambles in back of Melissa’s home, instead of in more yielding sand, no wonder they wanted out! But then I was ashamed of my reaction. Death was never amusing, and were their spirits still sentient? Why, perhaps whites had deliberately slaughtered them by offering infamous smallpox blankets, passing on a paleface disease under a guise of kindness! If that were true, surely their hatred was justified. In that case, perhaps they hadn’t even been buried—just left to rot in a barren area of rocks no one claimed!
Suddenly I found it singularly odd that for two months, in spite of scarce snow-cover, I’d never once ventured into the back yard or beyond. Of course the tangle was rough and unappealing at this time of year, and with that as an ongoing excuse, I saved my first excursion for a gusty late-April day. Clouds scudded above, scrubbing the air, and I hoped to clear myself of wintry thoughts. The rocks, now freed of snow, certainly seemed garish to my eye. Mel was a little pagan—but what could be malignant about a hobby of painting stones? Unless, of course, my darker speculations were true!
Close up, I realized how much more Melissa had accomplished since my first visit, and my complacence ebbed. The new beasts emerging from granite were unfamiliar; strange amorphous shapes seeming more out of necromancy than the grinning frog, bobcat, and wolf she first showed off to me. What was she thinking; and—before the baby’s tragic loss—had she planned on painting ever more ambiguous, nightmarish forms? Hobby or compulsion? I blinked. For a moment immense shapes appeared to shimmer and shift; an unsettling illusion which persisted until I rubbed my eyes
Later that day I set lawn furniture at the house’s front, though space facing the road was skimpy. I also relocated my bedroom to face the road, ignoring intermittent racket of trucks as they swept through town, gathering speed for Cotter’s grade, or, from the other direction laboriously groaning up the steep incline. I could hardly admit to myself, a sensible woman, I too felt a strange aura out back--some malign presence!
But I was not truly frightened until one mid-May evening. A full moon shone over the mountains as I spotted my cat Snowflake in a flashed glimpse of white, strayed far up in the stone garden. This seemed odd, for to my knowledge he didn’t venture there. Had he heard something? Grasping a flashlight, I stepped out. If the moon shed harsh light in slanting rays, it also left large blots of inky shadow. Toward the back of Melissa’s domain, the boulders were larger; ten and fifteen feet high—gross, glacial erratics, dropped like turds from the last ice age. The air seemed vibrant with unseen wings or presences, possibly bats out of hibernation? I shuddered. Evidently lightning had pursued some creature into this strange realm.
As I walked farther, fascinated despite unease, my sense of time and vision became distorted. The moon seemed first nearer then farther, and one moment I seemed to have progressed but a few steps, while at the next, glancing backward, I could not spot the reassuring backdoor light.
I stumbled on, flashlight barely touching darkness, seeming to enter a shifting nightmare. Indeed, ghastly shapes flowed past that, to my disordered thinking, appeared as giant stones! Yet I also sensed animal shapes—and above all vague forms like travesties of men. Had some primitive force made revenants out of long-passed Abenaki sachems? Indian zombies; dead Red?
My reading had mentioned the foul-tempered and fear-inducing spirit of Mekoomweso who became so heavy when enraged that he sank through stone! Was his spirit commanding the undead and disrupting nature? Surely superstition! If only my husband were alive to talk to and reassure me! But now wind rushed past my ears and a noisome stench invaded my nostrils. Shuddering, I stumbled backward and, while turning, saw a flash of white other than the moon, and there loomed my cat, puffed huge in fear. I scooped him up, ignoring his raking claws. He hissed in terror as, in front of us, a huge boulder wrenched loose from its socket, and I screamed, diving sideways, cutting a long jagged gash on my arm as I fell. But at least neither cat nor I were crushed.
Clawing free, Snowflake fled. Now my flashlight didn’t work though its battery had seemed strong. Thoroughly shaken, I stumbled downhill and homeward, imagining treacherous ground heaving beneath my feet. Gasping with effort, at last I reached the back door. What I had experienced seemed to go far beyond the speculations of small-town, superstitious teachers. Had I truly seen rock move against flesh? I shuddered again recalling the recent car accident, the two dead youths, and what the third lived to describe. I was now convinced that a malevolent and atavistic force of Red Man’s magic had crushed their car.
Yes, from that night on I believed the glacial stones were stirred to vengeful sentience by a reawakened ancient force. H
ad the spirit of Mekoomweso urged long-graved minions to fury because pale-skins had claimed tribal lands and, by means of horrid smallpox blankets, had killed them all, with the horrid deed now swept aside or sugared over?
Come daybreak, filled with both curiosity plus nervous superstition, yet I felt a justified loathing, I descended to Melissa’s workroom and carefully searched for the photos she had left on her computer. They were gone! I recalled the words of her husband’s letter; that she preferred her possessions not exposed to strangers. Yet I wasn’t a stranger, and she herself had showed them to me. But now they were missing, and perhaps her husband had erased them. Quite likely he didn’t realize I’d seen them.
Still, I possess a good memory, and mind’s eye replayed those strange scenes. Since then it seemed many rocks had shifted, and not just ones Melissa had painted. Surely New Hampshire wasn’t earthquake-prone! I fought a queasy feeling warning me that—with no intention to do so—my sister had indeed loosed some nightmare power. In a surge of fury, revenants of a destroyed tribe had somehow reached from the grave to claim her expected child, perhaps even her sanity, and the lives of two boys, wrongly blamed for their car wreck—with the third shaken so badly, it was whispered, he seemed deranged.
What might happen next, and why had I escaped? Abruptly I recalled the St. Christopher medal pinned inside my jacket lapel. My husband John placed it there when he gave me the garment for my birthday, as he retold the tale of the travelers’ patron saint. Did the charm protect me, allowing me time to escape? I chose to think so.
When I climbed up from the basement I was emotionally exhausted, but with a shaky hand I texted Raymond explaining why I could no longer live in his house, and asking if he had been candid about Sarah’s health. His reply came soon enough, but even before I received it, I’d packed, planning never to return. My brother-in-law responded:
Dear Sarah,
We have great expectations again, and my girl’s come slowly back to her sunny self. But what you tell me is indeed horrid, and I‘ll erase your message and this response. I’d not have Melissa upset again, as I’m sure you understand. Having said that, here is what I know.
She was five months along when she climbed on the back of the rock she calls the Unicorn. It’s only waist level with easy access, but somehow she slipped. She thinks she hit her head and was knocked unconscious. Later she declared, “Something pushed me!” But what? Ghostly hands? Then Melissa sobbed out that our baby was gone!
“Gone?” I asked my wife exactly what she meant.
“Sarah,” she screamed at me. “Taken! Taken!”
I got her to a doctor immediately. He was a soothing family consultant, but no gynecologist, who opined there was no fetus to lose; that Melissa had experienced a hysterical pregnancy. Yet I myself had felt the child kicking or thought I had! Is there a logical explanation—or are you correct that revenants; the land’s permanent occupants, still seek revenge?
Melissa appears to believe the doctor’s reassurance that she had too active an imagination and needed more company, plus now must follow a firm schedule of rest and meals. We don’t talk of what happened. But I’ve done some sleuthing and ordered aerial maps of Peterson, plus searched many legends of Coos County.
In colonial times, my acreage was the site of an Abenaki encampment until the white man’s smallpox plague wiped out multitudes, leaving even friendly redskins vowing revenge. So, are time-lost spirits raised from the dead? That, since evil was done to them, they repay it? What horror followed over centuries of beheading, scalping, plus scorching of flesh I care not—dare not—imagine! But it does seem now, from the grave, the head sachem has found a way to avenge his people!”
Pausing in my reading, I pondered. My brother-in-law had come to my conclusion. When Melissa, unaware of history, began her rock painting, a vengeful force re-surfaced, and who knows when (or if) that force can be satisfied? Yet fire is a traditional purge, and if paint covering the rocks blistered away to char, perhaps the wakened evil would ooze back into soil, leaving the living in peace.
So it seemed the buck was passed to me. My sister had inadvertently reawakened evil, but could I somehow negate it? What could I accomplish, and how? With quivers like hideous cobwebs touching my spine, and neck hairs astir, I set my brother-in-law’s letter down while my mind raced.
The garage held a container slosh-full of gasoline ready for the lawn mower, and Melissa had left paint cans behind. These would have a use now far from what manufacturers anticipated. I myself would spill the flammable paint, set alight the depraved rock garden, and hopefully banish those spirits that betrayed her, an innocent.
Precautions? Oh yes! My car is packed and parked far from here, while dusk is the hour of supper in the village, a time no one is apt to see me. God willing, later tonight, Snowflake--safe in his carrier--and I shall leave forever. Already it is late afternoon and I dare not wait. My St. Christopher medal is securely sewn into my clothing; Indeed, I finger it through cloth as I write. This letter will be posted when the deed is done, and I urge—once read—you destroy these words.
Twilight crept near. Holding terror in check, I picked my way through briars and soon as amidst the horrid stones. Wind blew briskly from the southwest to drive the fire I lit away from the village and into the winter-withered, dry tangle that swept up the mountain. By the time an alarm is called, (if so) and engines arrive, I pray the curse will be destroyed, the old revenant and his spirit-comrades dissipated or pinned once more in unmarked graves. I understood their fury, and could even hope they’d rest. Certainly personal fear wouldn’t stop me.
I have scattered the dry straw bale that Melissa left unused, and soaked the bits with gasoline. Luckily no one lives close enough to observe my actions with clarity if they do happen to look. Just at sundown I will light the conflagration, flitting as a dark shadow among shadows and then— pray God—can flee to safety. Twilight is a time suspended between light and dark, hope and fear, and I must not falter!
Now it is time. Striking a match, I smell its sulfur tang and toss it outward, hearing the swift crackle of fire, then flit away; a moth not drawn to flame. A whoosh flares behind me. Though a full box of safety matches rests potent in my hand, just one proved enough, and I dropped the box and watched it roar up; flames licking outward—yes, let the everything burn!
With snow melted away now, vine-tangled landscape is dry. My heart too is dry. I flee, feeling ravening heat spreading behind me. Fleeing, I exult as the conflagration spreads, roaring like a thousand beasts. I glance back only once to see brambles flare and hear the rising sap of scrub pines exploding. Writhing shapes loom silhouetted against smoke as I whisper comfort to distant Melissa, though I realize she cannot hear and perhaps would refuse to comprehend my action if she could. Before I turn away, something wails, a spirit-sound, high-pitched and eerie, in hatred and despair even as a spectral hand of smoke reaches for me, only to be dissipated by wind.
I run away, panting. I know my car is ahead, I wrench open the door, start the motor, rev it, and grip the steering wheel like Death follows me—as well may be! Snowflake is safe in his carrier, but cowering, terrified. Still, I allow myself a groan of relief to see the road stretch away.
Yes, I am still fearful of boulders bounding from their sockets, seeking to crush metal like I might step on an ant. But for the moments, in the fury of the conflagration, it seems nothing can reach me.
As I flee Melissa’s home my heart judders in my chest, I have a lifetime to lament the boys who died and the baby Melissa lost. How many others have perished; red or white, whom I will never know about? My hand leaves the steering wheel for an instant to finger my medal.
Will it protect me forever if those lost souls sense what I have done? I am not vengeful. May the Abenaki tribe rest despite us; too-arrogant and interloping palefaces. Native tribes did not ask us to come over the water, but we did.
If you doubt my tale, at least look up the story of the white man’s gift of germ-ridden
blankets. Lord above, forgive all our human trespasses! But is the curse really purged, and will brittle bones be found when brambles are consumed and embers turn to gritty ash?
I cannot stay, but where can I begin again? No story ends when the last word is set on paper. The horror of what was, of what I did, or what a priest might have done better, clings to me, and will forever. Must I always quail at lighting a simple match? Will I see Melissa once more; can we hug and move forward—or is too much lost and changed? And what, now, may dark nightmares bring?
Esther's fantasy and horror has recently appeared in ANTHOLOGY YEAR THREE: DISTANT DYING EMBER, CANOPIC JARS: TALES OF MUMMIES AND MUMMIFICATION, plus BUGS: TALES THAT CREEP AND CRAWL.
She presented her lecture IT'S ABOUT TIME to the New York Poetry Forum, NYC, Manhattan, on Saturday, October 10, 2015: "A World Poetry Day Celebration". THE POCKET ROCKET, her second fantasy book for children, will be out from Peony Press for Christmas 2015.
Esther writes a monthly online column for the e-mag EXTRA INNINGS from the University of Wisconsin, edited by Marshall Cook; prior to which she wrote poetry columns for WRITERS' JOURNAL for thirty years, along with illustrations. Esther has won and judged many poetry contests, and served as POET IN THE SCHOOLS for Putnam County, Tennessee.
She currently is appointed "Northern New Hampshire's Poet Laureate for The White Mountains Region".
WHAT ROUGH BEAST?
by Billie Sue Mosiman
Montgomery's ankle twisted when she stepped down from the tractor. The ground was too far away and a gopher hole was waiting for her misstep. She fell onto her side into dry grass, letting out a faint protest. Now what? She wondered.
