EQMM, November 2007

by Dell Magazine Authors

  They were the undertakers of this half-world landscape.

  This land of shades.

  She wanted to believe her lover, to trust his knowledge and judgment, just as she trusted her father and desired all her life to trust the men she loved. He will keep me safe. He knows better than I. I must have faith.

  In faith she returned with him to the Grizzly Maze. In faith she followed him up the bear path.

  "Never trust a man,” her aunt said. “Trust your instincts,” her mother said. “Trust in God,” her priest said. If you don't have faith, you are all alone, and what's the point of that?

  So she followed him up the bear trail and she helped pitch the tents.

  11.

  The forest erupts in an ear-splitting rage-filled roar, as if the earth itself were sundered in two.

  The bear's roar slams into her like an explosion in a tunnel, shooting daggers to her neck and ears, slugging her in the chest, chilling her blood, paralyzing her lungs. A sound that is a weapon.

  She freezes, her right hand on the lens cap of the camcorder, her left hand poised above the handle, ready to lift it from its canvas carrying case. The audio light blinks on. Red.

  Her mind becomes mush, her brain synapses frayed and useless. She sees black silhouettes rimmed with halos, her pupils pulsing as if blinded by light. The roar can't be real, a soundtrack piped in over a sound system, the shattering reverb a mistake, and a voice will pitch in, “Please excuse our technical difficulties.” The roar is the earth erupting, torn asunder, a volcano, an earthquake, a tsunami. It cannot be the sound of a living creature.

  The bear uses all of its air in its first wild and protracted roar, and, without seeming to take breath, roars again.

  Her eyes throb. A metallic gold flashes over the black image of a bear, bear teeth, a scrambled jumpy picture of jagged stalagmites and a black cave. Still she cannot move.

  * * * *

  12.

  "Come out here! I'm getting killed out here!"

  She hears his clothes ripping, and something—his body?—being flung back and forth on the ground. He is screaming in pain, a screeching siren like she has heard only once before, when her father hit a deer with his truck, blood splattering over their windshield, the deer screaming until her father collected himself enough to grab his Remington from his gun rack and shoot it.

  "I'm getting killed out here!"

  This can't be happening! Not as they were just about to leave, not as her life was just about to begin for real. That's not how the story goes. The woman is rewarded for her bravery, for her sacrifice.

  She can't move. Her body does not obey her commands, just as it failed to respond in similar situations of crisis, her mind fleeing her body in complete disbelief—This can't be happening!—and she is lost in a space without time, floating, powerless, paralyzed, even as shame floods over her for her inaction.

  Did he yell, “Come out here” or “Don't come out here"? She feels a warm trickle of urine down her jeans, and, absurdly, worries about soaking her sleeping bag, recalling the miserable discomfort of trying to sleep in a wet bag. Yet she can't move.

  "I'm getting eaten alive out here!"

  "Play dead,” she yells, and her words yank her back into her body. She scrambles out of her bag, her feet hitting the freezing ground, cold shooting up her spine. She spins, looking for a weapon, and, seeing only an iron skillet, nearly laughs as an absurd image pops into her mind, a cartoon of a bear smacked over the head by a skillet, pound signs and exclamation points blazoned across the sky. Even in the cartoon, the bear doesn't fall. She spins again and grabs a tripod, yanking down the legs and locking them, as if unsheathing a sword.

  "It isn't working!” he screams. “Ahhhhhh..."

  "Fight back!” she yells, and then hears a pop, and a crunch that could only be bones, and a squelch, something hard followed by something soft. The bear gnashing, tearing, ripping flesh.

  She hears the wet thud of flesh hitting the ground.

  The screams stop.

  She hears the bear circling him, huffing angrily. Its long claws scrape and dig at the ground. It must be piling leaves and sticks on top of him, burying him, making a cache, saving him for later. Good. That means the bear thinks he is dead and maybe it will go away. But maybe that means he is dead. How could he not make a noise with the bear biting him? Is he unconscious?

  She sees the bear in her mind, as if there were no tent between them, its muzzle lathered with blood and foam. She feels a scream building in her chest, rushing up her throat like a geyser, a live thing struggling to get out, and images of death—his and hers, blood, mutilated bodies, darkness—swirling in her brain, and the scream pushing, pushing up. No! She mustn't make a sound. The scream has to come or else she'll explode. No! She clamps her hands over her mouth and doubles over as if to vomit, shaking her head violently, locking her jaws against the scream.

  Her temples throb, and the pressure in her nose feels like it will pop. Then the scream passes, leaving her throat raw. She pants for air, terrified now, trying not to listen, then listening so hard her ears hurt.

  Is this how I'm going to die?

  She knows the bear is listening, lifting its chin to taste the air. It knows she is there. It hears her breathe. It smells her.

  She hears alder branches snapping, and the bear crashing down the hill.

  She is shaking violently, gasping in big gulping breaths, tears leaking out of the corners of her eyes as if facing a bitter cold wind. Rain plinks against the side of the tent. She waits and listens.

  Is it really gone? Is it watching? Does it want to kill me too?

  She has to go out there. She has to unzip the tent. She must try to save him.

  She pinches the zipper flange until her fingers ache, taking care to unzip the tent as quietly at she can.

  I have to go out there.

  She can barely hear the zipper. The bear can't hear it, can it? No, it couldn't, it wasn't possible, not with the wind. It seems to take forever. She unzips it to the very bottom to make sure she doesn't trip.

  She pokes her head out of the tent. The sky is steel gray, the rain falling hard again, the sedge grass rippling in the wind. The smell of bear lingers in the air. She smells blood.

  It is too dark to see much. She clutches the flashlight in one hand and the tripod in the other—her weapon in case the bear charges her. Will the flashlight attract it? Where can she run? She knows there are no trees nearby that she can climb, but she looks for one anyway, a maverick tree that she missed, silhouetted against the gray sky.

  She sees no sign of her lover.

  She steps out of the tent, staying crouched, listening for the bear. She clicks on the flashlight and cautiously moves the beam around the camp—to the edges of the tent and down the bear path. She sees a mound of leaves and dirt, and a dark smear on the ground which could only be blood.

  She listens for the bear, for any sound from the mound of leaves. Nothing. Only the sound of rain.

  Slowly she straightens, slightly more confident, and steps toward the bear's cache. She flashes the light on either side of the mound looking for the bear's tracks, so she will know what direction the bear ran, and from which direction it might come charging back. The light reflects on a staggered line of bear prints, quickly filling with water. The tracks lead to the creek.

  She moves the light over the ground, which is torn up like a football field after a game in the rain, grass yanked out in clumps, slick patches of mud. Hanging from a thorny weed is something that looks like a large deflated balloon. As she steps closer, cupping her hand over the top of the flashlight to direct the beam, the balloon begins to look like a rubber Halloween mask folded in half. She gasps, realizing what it must be, nausea rushing up her esophagus. She vomits, and quickly wipes her mouth.

  Got to help him. Got to get him out of the rain. Got to find the satellite phone. Got to call for help. But she knows no pilot will fly in this weather. Not until it clears.


  She steps carefully toward the cache. Chunks of flesh and bits of clothing litter the ground. She circles to the other side where she sees some of a flannel shirt exposed. Slowly she moves the beam of light up the mound.

  A bloody arm sticks out from under a sprinkling of leaves, a hand twisted at an odd angle. She lifts a branch. A red pulpy mess of a skull leers at her, its upper jaw exposed, fleshless, a hole where there should be a nose. Lidless eyeballs stare out at her.

  She drops the flashlight and screams.

  She thinks she hears the thunder of a distant earthquake, then feels a tickle on the soles of her feet, the rippling of the earth's crust, followed by violent crashing noises. The ground jumps and shakes as if trying to topple her to her knees.

  * * * *

  13.

  The tape rolls on, audio only, the camcorder lens cap tightly screwed on.

  The tape rolls on, a tape that will confound the National Park Service employees, who will execute the bear as if it were a murderer. And the medical examiner, who will analyze the bear's stomach. And the documentary filmmaker. And whoever else is brave enough to listen.

  Six minutes that seem like six hours.

  Six minutes that paint in the mind a scene of dark horror. Whatever your mind can imagine.

  "Come out here, I'm being killed out here!"

  "Play dead!"

  "It isn't working!"

  "Fight back!"

  The tape records the wind and the rain, the zipper, the roar of the grizzly, and their screams.

  And then the tape runs out.

  (c)2007 by Ruth Francisco

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  THE PROBLEM OF THE SUMMER SNOWMAN by Edward D. Hoch

  EQMM has received an unusual number of Dr. Sam Hawthorne stories lately, and that's because his creator, Edward D. Hoch, is readying another Dr. Sam short-story collection. Hawthorne is your editor's favorite of all the many fine characters the Rochester author has conceived. Why not write and let us know which characters you like best.

  Our new daughter Samantha was only seven weeks old (Dr. Sam Hawthorne was telling his visitor) when Northmont was hit with one of the most baffling murders I'd ever been called upon to solve. And in a way it was never solved. If you'll let me pour you a small libation, I'd be happy to tell you about it.

  It was late August of 1944 and the war was going well on all fronts. Allied troops were on the outskirts of Paris, with the city expected to fall within days. Some of our local boys were even coming home on leave and I'd seen them around town. Annabel was back to work at the Ark, taking our daughter with her each day in a wicker basket. I couldn't imagine how she'd grow up after spending her early days in a veterinary hospital, but I knew with Annabel as her mother nothing dangerous would occur. We were already looking for someone to take care of her when she reached the toddler stage.

  It was Annabel who mentioned Scott Grossman to me one night over dinner. With most young men off in the military, he was one of our town's few eligible bachelors. “We should find a nice young woman for him,” she decided one evening after he'd brought his cat in for some minor ailment.

  "What's the matter with him? How did he avoid the draft?"

  "Some medical condition, I suppose. You don't ask questions like that, Sam. Any number of things might keep him out of the army, all the way from a punctured eardrum to homosexuality."

  "If it's the latter, he doesn't need a nice young woman,” I pointed out.

  "Sam!"

  Grossman was in his late thirties and lived alone with his cat, though he had a married brother and sister, both with families. He wasn't one of my patients, but in a town the size of Northmont we all pretty well knew each other. “What makes you so interested in him all of a sudden?” I asked her.

  "I don't know, he just seems like a nice guy. He told me he's planning a birthday party for his eight-year-old nephew on Saturday. Another nephew is home on leave from the navy."

  "He'll be going back,” I predicted. “The war's not over yet."

  "They say once Paris falls, the German army will fall apart."

  "I doubt that. They'll protect the fatherland at all costs."

  I thought no more about Grossman until Saturday, when the radio news reported that Paris had fallen and American troops were marching up the Champs-élysées. It was a great day, made even finer by a late-summer warmth that covered the area. I was relaxing on the porch while Annabel fed our daughter, and I thought nothing of it when Sheriff Lens pulled up in front in his patrol car.

  "Enjoying the weather?” I called out to him.

  "I was until a half-hour ago. Something's happened out at Scott Grossman's house, and I may need you if you're free."

  "What is it, a medical problem?"

  "Don't know. Some family members arrived for a birthday party and the house is locked up. They think they see someone on the floor through the kitchen curtains."

  I told Annabel I was going with the sheriff, which prompted her to reply, “Please, no more locked rooms!"

  We arrived at Grossman's small house on Dakota Street about ten minutes later to find a group of people standing out in front, all arrivals for the birthday party. Eight-year-old Todd was the star, restlessly waiting for the party to begin. His older brother Mitch, on leave from the navy but wearing civilian clothes, was trying to keep the birthday boy in tow. Young Todd's parents, Hugh and Vicky Grossman, looked increasingly concerned, and Grossman's sister Ethel was positively frantic. As I stepped from the sheriff's car she came running up to me, dragging along a small girl with blond curls who couldn't have been more than five years old.

  "Dr. Sam, this is Amy Feathers. She lives two doors away in that green house. Tell the doctor what you saw, Amy."

  The little girl looked up at me with wide blue eyes. “I saw a snowman,” she said, “just for a second. He went into Mr. Grossman's house."

  * * * *

  We broke the glass in the kitchen door and Mitch Grossman reached in to unlock the bolt. When we entered we found Scott's body on the kitchen floor, just inside the doorway to the living room. “Looks like a wound to the heart,” I said. “Too big for a bullet. Probably a knife."

  The children were kept outside in the care of Vicky Grossman while Sheriff Lens and I investigated. “Front and back doors both locked and bolted from the inside,” the sheriff told me. “One side window open for some fresh air, but the screen is securely latched from the inside. No one went out that way."

  "The neighbor girl says she saw a snowman go in."

  "Sure, in August!"

  "You may not like it, but she's our only witness."

  "She might as well have said Santa Claus killed him. Any chance he lived long enough to bolt the door after his assailant left?"

  I shook my head. “He was probably killed instantly. The autopsy should show a wound directly to the heart. Any sign of the weapon?"

  Sheriff Lens shook his head. “Killer must have taken it with him."

  I walked around the small living room, noting a few paperback western novels and an inexpensive chess set. A 12-inch world globe shared an end table with a crystal lamp that looked like an antique. I tried to think of what was missing, and then it came to me. “Where's the cat?” I asked.

  "What?"

  "Scott's cat. Annabel just treated it for an infection or something."

  We searched around without luck, and finally I went upstairs to the tiny bedroom under the rafters. “Here she is,” I called out as I opened the door and the cat came running to greet me. “I'm surprised he kept it up here.” I bent to pet her a bit and then closed the door. It wouldn't do to have her down by the body. While I was upstairs I checked a small storage area, but there was no place big enough to hide even a midget. There was no sofa or fold-out bed that might have concealed the killer, and the house had no basement.

  Sheriff Lens had noticed something on the living room carpet and was on his knees when I went back downstairs. “Look here, Doc. This big portion o
f the carpet is soaking wet. What do you make of that?"

  I hated to say it, but I had no choice. “It's where the snowman melted, Sheriff. And probably the weapon too, if it was an icicle."

  * * * *

  The family had gone home to celebrate Todd's birthday at his own house. “We can't let his uncle's death ruin his birthday,” Vicky Grossman said, seemingly unmoved by her brother-in-law's murder. I promised to come over later, if only to cheer them up on this bleak day, but first I wanted to speak with the parents of little Amy Feathers. Her mother, Jeanette, was at home, and she let me in at once, wondering just what had happened two doors away.

  "I'm afraid your neighbor has been killed,” I told her.

  She was a large woman, tending to overweight, and I hoped her daughter wouldn't grow up the same way. “Mr. Grossman? That's what Amy said, but I couldn't believe it."

  I glanced through the parlor at the little girl playing with one of her dolls. “Does she often make up stories, Mrs. Feathers?"

  "Amy? Not really. Sometimes when she's playing with her dolls she invents a little tale, like most girls her age, but she never lies to me."

  "She said she saw a snowman going into the Grossman house."

  "I know. I've tried to reason with her about that, telling her snowmen don't come out in the summer, but she insists that's what she saw."

  "Could we take her out in the yard for a moment so she can show me where she was standing?"

  "Certainly.” She called her daughter, who came running, ready for a new adventure. Outside, she pointed across the adjoining yard toward Scott Grossman's house. “I was right here when I saw the snowman."

  "There's a hedge in-between,” I said. “You couldn't have seen his feet."

  "No, but I saw the rest of him, especially his head."

  "Could you draw us a picture of what you saw?"

  "Sure,” she agreed, eager to oblige. We went back in the house and she quickly drew a figure in white passing behind the hedge, with a big round head that could only have belonged to a snowman.

  "Did he have eyes and a nose?” I asked.

  She thought about that. “I didn't see any."