"Lou!"
"Think you could twist it off, Abe? Think you could for a moment tear my arm from its socket with your bare hands? Did you see that woman's severed leg? Did you see the old man's throat? No, as strong as you are, Abe, and as helpless as I am now, you couldn't physically separate my arm from my body. No man could, not even Lou Ferrigno. To wrench my arm out like it was a goddamned chicken leg? Answer that, Chief More, Abe. Answer that with your second sight!"
Stroud let Cage go and Lou found some peace in the car, closing his eyes on the horror of the day, laying his head back. He was completely frustrated by events and questions. Cage, like Stroud, couldn't abide a question without an answer. Stroud knew it would drive Lou to distraction, and that like Stroud now, Lou wouldn't sleep well until he got a usable answer.
"I'm calling in the paramedics now," Chief More said, turning from Stroud and going for her squad car. "Sounds to me like this has all been a waste of time."
Stroud's hands went up in a gesture of one part exasperation, one part confusion and one part anger. "Don't sell us short yet ... not until we've gotten the lab work done."
"Yeah, sure," she replied, and kept walking.
Stroud didn't want to leave her alone here with the macabre house and the black night, but she made him so angry, and he was tired, and Lou deserved a shower and a bed, even if he didn't get More's thanks. Stroud got into the Lincoln and backed from the drive, stopping beside her at the squad car where she was in the midst of the call to town.
"Would you like us to wait here with you until they come?"
"Sure, and you can hold my hand, too. Get the hell out of here," she shouted.
Stroud didn't bother buckling his seat belt or rolling the window back up. The Lincoln fired up rocks from the gravel drive, pinging at the oil pan and the muffler and the underside, each pellet's sound coming together in a stinging chorus for the Chief.
"Be damned glad you only had to spend the evening with her," Stroud said.
This made Lou's eyes open and his head turn. "Oh, I didn't think she was so bad; certainly not so flinty as McMasters in Chicago. What, you letting her get under your skin?"
Stroud recalled the bear of the Chicago Police Department that he'd worked under, Captain Phil McMasters. It gave him a moment's laugh. Lou tried to laugh as well, but it sounded hollow and forced.
"Not on your life is this Indian cop getting under my skin, Lou."
"Sure, and I can see that, too."
Stroud turned onto the highway, the dim light of the ghostly old farmhouse framed in his rearview mirror. He thought of her for a moment, there alone; he wondered if they shouldn't go back, but in the distance ahead he heard the racing sirens. "Tell you what, Lou. I'll just be glad to be rid of the Nomad Hotel, Merimac and the Chief tomorrow when we fly out of here."
"You can't blame the woman for being skeptical, Abe. Hell, what I said about a creature breaking in there and eating those people alive ... hell, I don't believe it myself ... don't believe my own findings."
Never in all the time that he had known Lou Cage had Stroud ever seen the other man so confounded. Stroud's words seemed feeble even as they left his lips, and he was a little sorry for having spoken them. "You need some rest, maybe, huh? Lou?"
Cage said nothing, the look of confusion still there.
Stroud tried to soften his words, hoping that his friend would not take them wrong. "Lou, soon as you have a lab to work in ... get that old magic working..."
"I'm no alchemist, Abe. I took scrapings on the feces left behind. I made all the usual tests--hair samples, fiber, nails, you know--but I'll be honest with you, Abe..."
"Yes?"
"I've never seen a crime scene like this. Something, I don't know ... is wrong. I know that sounds like a sick joke, an understatement to anyone hearing it--something wrong here!--but, I tell you, it's downright..."
He let it go. Then Abe said, "I know it's a weird case, Lou."
"Can't put my finger on that odor, rank like ... I don't know."
"Hey, when you get to that lab in Grand Rapids--"
"Don't count on the doctors in Grand Rapids to be any more excited about having us than those you found here, Abe."
"They'll cooperate. They'll have to once they know who you are."
He frowned at this, his round face pinching inward. He took down his glasses and rubbed his eyes with both hands, the spectacles dangling from his big fingers like an oversized praying mantis. Cage was clearly beat.
"And don't," Cage continued, "count on my findings confirming anything you've presupposed about this killer of yours, Abe. Jesus," he moaned. "Just got my ulcer under control, and now this."
Stroud sensed it was time to leave Lou to himself and ask no more of him tonight. The ride through the black countryside back to the sad little hotel finished in silence and frustration. Abe Stroud felt a great weight over him, pressing downward, and he realized it was the weight of not knowing.
Chief Anna Laughing More had stared after the big car with the two strange men inside, wondering once more if she had done the right thing. The Enquirer could do a lot with this Dr. Abraham Stroud and his traveling troupe of weirdos who came in Lear jets and helicopters in a mad rush to look over the goriest crime she had ever been associated with.
What's worse, she thought, was the pronouncement of the coroner from Chicago, Cage. Did he honestly think that she or anyone was willing to believe that Johnny Kerac had come into this old house and had torn these people limb from limb without the use of some kind of butcher knife or saw?
She had seen the same results at the prison. Somehow Kerac had gotten hold of some sort of battery-power tool that did the damage. There was no other answer. No one could pull a man apart, Cage had said, but in the saying of it, he had opened the door, left it ajar to the wondering mind.
"It sounds crazy," she said aloud to the surrounding night. At the same time, with the wind causing naked branches to scratch one another over her left shoulder, Anna Laughing More caressed the gun on her hip. The solidness of her .38 police special made her feel a little more secure.
She wondered how Stroud could just leave her here alone. The bastard.
-6-
Kerac had seen one too many state patrol cars along his route to remain long on the interstate. He had been on a county road for several hours now, going without sleep, when he saw unsteady lights in the distance. As he approached, the lights became flashers, strobing atop squad cars, and he realized it was a roadblock. Unsure of what to do at first, he continued toward the lights. There were several cars being held up ahead of him. They'd be looking for the pickup. They'd catch him and return him to Merimac, lock him up again.
He wondered if he should turn around, go back. But if he did so, he would have to go thirty miles out of his way and in the wrong direction, and there was no guarantee a roadblock hadn't been arranged elsewhere, and they must have a description of the missing truck.
But it was dark, and if he was cunning...
Kerac cruised easily toward the line of cars ahead of him, but the moment he got to within striking distance of the vehicle just ahead, he wheeled out into the opposite lane and put the gas to the old Ford, going directly for the too-small opening in the road. He saw uniformed men racing to get out of his path. He saw their eyes in his headlights, and he saw a flash of fire erupt when the truck tore into the front end of a squad car.
The truck threatened to run off the road as Kerac struggled for control. Behind him gunshots rang out and the rearview mirror was shattered by a bullet that continued through the windshield. He then heard the sirens blaring in pursuit. Perhaps two cars.
Kerac saw the steam rising over the hood where the punctured radiator spewed forth its hot liquid into the air. He felt the power of the truck draining away as he pumped and pumped with his bare foot, but it was useless. A tire blew, the result of a bullet from behind, and the truck careened off the road and into a thicket, where it came to a jolting stop, sending John
Kerac's head into the dash, causing a nasty wound.
Semiconscious, he heard the approaching cars, men jumping from them and clamoring down from the roadbed; he heard each stone as it skittered toward him ahead of the men with the guns who wanted to kill him, or worse, take him back. He found a reserve of strength he didn't know he had, along with an incredible sense of hearing and smell. The smell of his own fear, perspiration and blood lifted him from the cabin. The instant the door swung open, bullets rained into it, and he leapt out the other side, landing on all fours, dirt and debris pinging and exploding in his eyes as the gunshots continued.
He disappeared into the underbrush.
They were still coming.
Which way? What should I do? he wondered, no longer conscious of any conflict within him. No identity crisis now. Only one thing was important: survival.
He must either be killed or kill those who came for him.
He heard their voices, saw the moving lights, blinding in their intensity, freezing him in place. He saw it all in black and white, their forms complete and detailed in the surrounding darkness. Then he ran.
More gunshots, one ripping into his ankle, causing him to trip and roll down an embankment toward the sound of rushing water. He got up, fell with pain, rose and forced the weight on the ankle, making him howl. Gunshots responded. He stifled another howl that went guttural and choked in his throat. The searing pain in his ankle was worse by far than the self-inflicted wound to his privates.
He found himself standing in water--icy cold and paralyzing. But it stopped the pain in his ankle long enough for him to think. He had to use what he had; he knew where they were, each one of them. He could smell them. He could see them clearly in the night, and this amazed him. He could feel the displacement of air around these men. It was a kind of power he had never consciously known before.
He knew what he must do.
Kerac went across the water, leading them further into the woods. One of them would still be on the road. He didn't know how he knew this, but he did. He must get back to the road first, and there kill this sentry.
Kerac circled, moving on all fours, crouching, silent and at peace with the pain in his ankle. He then smelled one of them nearby, very close.
He leapt upward, caught a branch and silently pulled himself up. He lay there like a serpent, waiting. His patience was soon rewarded when one of them stepped beside the tree.
Kerac fell on him, using his own weight to crush the man senseless, flipping him over and tearing at him with his claws and teeth. It was natural and calm, a thing he had done before and would do again and again. He no longer questioned the hairy hands, the enormous claws or sharp teeth. This was him. He was not mad or a freak anymore. He held no such thoughts. He was a thing of beauty, a thing of nature, and the blood that matted his chest hair was what he lived for.
But he hadn't time to feast. The man he left bleeding to death was paralyzed with shock. He must get to the other on the road. He sensed that this one posed the greatest threat. The others were still beating about the woods. Kerac's attack had been swift and silent.
He made his way deftly back up to the road, but he came out some hundred yards from the strobing lights, skittered across the highway and came around from behind. He watched the movement of the large man who had remained with the two vehicles. The man went to the interior, got in and came out again. Kerac lifted from his crouching position and started across, the man's back to him. Just as he did so, two bright lights hit Kerac, and a car came right at him, tires screeching; in that same instant, the policeman wheeled, turned and was about to fire. But the driver of the car veered off Kerac and toward the police car. The car went straight into the lights of the police car, crushing the man who was standing before the grille.
Kerac, sensing more danger now than ever, silently disappeared into the woods on this side of the road. As he ran for deeper cover, his body felt powerful and strong and invincible. Behind him, he heard the sounds of human concerns at the site of the wreck.
He was on foot again, but he smelled water nearby and he'd kept Lake Michigan in sight most of the trip along the road he had taken. He knew there was another way to reach his destination.
Stroud was awakened by the telephone's insistent ring. It was a blessing, even at four in the morning, because it shook him loose from the nightmare of a re-creation of events at the farmhouse where the Maclins had died so violently. When he grabbed for the phone, it was like grabbing for a lifeline.
"Yes?"
"Chief More," she said. "Thought you'd like to know that Kerac has struck again."
"When? Where?"
"Broke a roadblock near the Indiana border."
"Any deaths?" He knew the answer.
"Two officers dead. Details are sketchy, but I'm going, and from there I'm going to Chicago," she said emphatically.
Her voice had taken on the timbre of a driven woman, Stroud thought. He worried for More. He'd seen enough carnage attributed to this Kerac fellow to fear for her life as well as the lives of anyone that might come into contact with him. Yet it was her job to come into contact with him, and to make every effort to either apprehend him or kill him if need be.
"Why don't we travel together?" he suggested.
"You're going to Grand Rapids."
"I can leave Cage there, and you and I can go on to Chicago ... together."
There was a silence at the other end.
"Come on," he urged her. "Why not? I've got the bird, and you've got the juice. When we get to Chicago, I may need a favor of you."
"Do you really think you can buy my favors, Dr. Stroud?"
"I didn't mean it that way."
"And how did you mean it?"
Stroud took a deep breath and chose his words more carefully. "It would be convenient for both of us--advantageous."
"I suppose you're right. I'll meet you at the airport."
She almost hung up. "Wait," he stopped her. "Cage, he's really fagged out next door."
"I can't wait for you, then."
"Hold on. Meet you at the airport in one hour."
"Done."
She hung up, and even in the dial tone, Stroud sensed her coolness toward him.
Stroud's chopper pilot had gone on a drinking binge for which he was fired. Stroud would pilot the chopper himself.
Cage slept in the car to the airport and later in the backseat of the helicopter. Chief More had made all necessary arrangements with the town and its mayor to make the trip in pursuit of Kerac. By eight in the morning, Dr. Louis Cage and his findings from the farmhouse outside Merimac were in a laboratory in Grand Rapids. There, Lou would also match up anything he could to the earlier killings attributed to Kerac. From Grand Rapids, Stroud and Chief More flew for Chicago's Meigs Field.
Already in Chicago, at least along the airways of the police band in Stroud's helicopter, mutilation deaths were being attributed to an escaped madman from the Merimac prison facility. But both More and Stroud doubted the reliability of the reports, since Kerac had been in Indiana at dawn. It seemed highly unlikely that a death the night before and one that morning could be the work of the same madman.
"Chicago has its own madmen," Stroud assured her, speaking through the com link between them. Both of them wore headphones so that they could communicate. "I've taken the liberty to book us rooms at the Palmer House."
"Christ, you do take liberties, Dr. Stroud."
"Please, call me Abe. I have a feeling we're going to be a while at this, and we might as well be friends as not."
Werewolf's Grief (Bloodscreams #2) Page 6
