The words were of bitter copper on Jay’s tongue. “Leave them. They wouldn’t listen.”
* * *
But he couldn’t leave them. He had backed his car out of the drive and into the street, then stopped.
Amy was with Jim. Eric and the general were with Stoner in the van. Shari and Nick rode with Jay.
“I can’t leave them,” Jay said. “I just can’t do it.”
They sat in their vehicles in the street and watched as Parnell lumbered out onto the porch and fell down the steps. Tim and Ellis followed him out. They lurched down the steps and moved toward the street, silently stalking their prey.
“Oh, Jay!” Piper called from the side of the house. “Wait for us.” She was holding Kelly’s hand. The child was smiling.
Deva and Piper called from the other side of the house.
“Don’t listen to them, Jay!” Eric yelled. “It’s a trick. You don’t see the walking dead attacking them, do you?”
“Dammit, Eric!” Jay screamed out his lowered window. “Let’s give them a chance!”
“Please, Jay!” Piper called. “I love you, Jay. I always loved you. I’ve never forgotten you.”
Mother and child came closer, and so did Deva and Jenny.
Eric was right. The shapes of Tim and Ellis and Parnell made no move to attack the women or kids.
In the span of fifteen seconds, a dozen or more unanswered questions entered Jay’s mind. Forgotten bits of information returned to him. Piper’s questioning of Jay as to exactly when he and Kelly would be going to Victory. He’d told himself it was a mother’s concern, nothing more.
“I came back to you, didn’t I, Jay?” Piper called. “That should prove I love you.”
“Yeah,” Jay muttered. “And it clears up a lot of things, too.”
And Kelly hadn’t even told her friends in the city where she was going. Now he remembered how evasive he’d heard her be on the phone.
“You’re all in this together,” he screamed at the women and the girls. “It was all planned. Goddamn you to hell!” he shouted.
“Get him!” Deva shrieked. “But don’t hurt him. Take him alive. It has to be!”
The street suddenly filled with people. They carried clubs and sticks and knives and rocks. They lurched in their stilted manner toward the vehicles.
“Go!” Jim shouted from the lead vehicle. He gave it the gas and plowed right into the mob.
As the cars and van impacted with the crowd, there was almost no resistance. The vehicles slammed into the mob and dust and plaster and plastic choked the hot night air as the doll people were smashed and crushed and ground to dust under the wheels.
It was a silent killing. There were no screams of pain and anguish from the human forms as they were ripped apart and slung from side to side. One woman held onto the outside door handle of Jay’s car. He dragged her down the street. Her feet fell off, then her legs. Her head cracked open, and finally the arm tore loose from the shoulder. But the hand held on.
And Nick’s mini-cam was recording it all.
The small caravan stopped on the outskirts of town, pulling over to the shoulder.
“Where are we heading, Jay?” Jim asked.
“To the old Clute place. We have to destroy it. I think Deva slipped up a couple of times – saying too much. The old house is the source.” He looked at Nick. “You got plenty of film.”
The cameraman nodded his head in the glare of headlights.
“Jay!” The voice sprang out of the darkness of a field. “Jay Clute.”
All turned, weapons lifting.
“It’s me, Jay. Johnny Stevens. Can I approach you, Jay?”
Johnny Stevens. Jay remembered him from high school. Pretty good ol’ boy. Good football player.
“Come on, Johnny,” Jay called. “Talk to me. What do you want?”
“To be safe, man. They’re after me. I never did join up with them. Let me join you, Jay. I want to get out of here, man.”
Jay wanted to believe him; wanted desperately to believe in somebody he once knew. “Come on, Johnny. Walk to us.”
A figure rose from out of the field, walking slowly toward the road.
“Movement in the field on the other side of the road,” Stoner whispered.
“Get ready,” Jay whispered back.
There was something in Johnny’s hand. Whatever it was, it was picking up and reflecting light from the moon.
“What’s that in your hand, Johnny?” Jay called.
“A knife, Jay. I had to protect myself, man.”
“Drop it. We’ll arm you.”
Johnny continued walking; climbed the fence and started up the ditch bank.
“Drop the knife, Johnny!” Jay called.
Johnny charged the small group, the machete raised high above his head. Jay pulled the trigger, the buckshot taking the man in the chest and knocking him backward.
Screaming, the people Stoner had spotted charged the road. Heavy sound pounded the night as shotguns roared.
“Let’s get out of here!” Jay yelled, jumping into the car.
The caravan sped into the unknown night.
The caravan encountered no more hostility as they drove toward the old Clute house in the country. Even at night, it loomed up large and ominous long before they reached it.
As they rattled over the cattle guard and into the yard, Jay could sense that the house was empty. The group got out and stood for a silent moment. A wind was blowing, quite hard, blowing from south to north.
Jay looked at the field that lay north of the house; the field from where the savage young people had emerged.
Jay chuckled grimly.
“You wanna share the joke with me?” Jim asked.
Jay knelt down and fingered tall clumps of grass. Dry and brittle. Standing up, he took off his shirt and roamed around until he found several hefty sticks. He passed them out as he wrapped his shirt around one end.
“I imagine those punks are hiding in that field, don’t you, Jim?” he asked.
The trooper grinned. “Yeah. Let’s just sort of amble over that way and see if we can’t get a nice fire going in that dry field.”
“We’ll have to surprise them to make it work. Nick, don’t start filming until the fires are set.”
“Gotcha.”
The men walked to the edge of the field and squatted down, securing the cloth more firmly on the heads of the stakes. “Now!” Jay called in a stage whisper.
The cloth was ignited. Blazing, the men set the field afire. The winds whipped the small flames into an inferno, the winds pushing the flames high, fast, and north.
Nick lifted his mini-cam to his shoulder in time to catch several young people, their faces ugly with hate, racing toward the flames.
“They’re running toward us!” Amy hissed. “Straight into the flames.”
Human eyes watched, and the camera’s eye recorded as one tall youth burst into flames, his long hair blazing in the night. They watched as other youths tossed knives and clubs aside and ran, trying to beat the flames.
They did not make it.
It was over in a few moments, the fires failing to jump the road.
The smell of burning human flesh was strong in the night.
“Reminds me of when we used flamethrowers to flush out the Nazi pillboxes,” General Douglas said, breaking the silence.
He turned to face the house, Eric by his side. “Now it’s evil,” Eric said. “It’s empty and it’s evil. Feel it?”
They all turned, allowing the invisible, evil vibrations to strike them full force.
General Douglas walked back to the van and got something out of a suitcase. He rejoined the group, holding a large Bible in his hand. He took off his web belt with the twin .45s and handed it to Stoner. “You might not hit anything, Stoner, but you’ll sure scare the hell out of them. Strap ’em on, boy.”
“What are you going to do, General?” Amy asked.
“I’m an old soldier, girl. I’v
e lived a damn good life. You young people deserve to live as long. You’re all good kids. I got an idea. I think if we can destroy that house, some of you just might get out of this mess.”
“Now, wait a minute,” Jay protested. “We’re all in this thing together, General.”
“Don’t argue with me, boy. I’m going to hurt that house. I’m going to see if I can’t make it so none of you will be trapped in there.” The old soldier’s eyes were burning with courage and conviction.
He walked away from the group to stand squarely in front of the huge old home, filled with evil. The wind changed directions and strength, hurling sticks and scraps of paper around the old man. Douglas defiantly stood his ground, the Bible held out, the front facing the house.
“God’s word!” he yelled into the night. “See it, fear it!”
The winds howled.
“As God is my witness and will be my judge after He guides me, I swear I’ll be a part of destroying you.”
Lightning scalded the darkened sky and thunder rumbled all around the area.
Jim had adjusted the web belt to fit Stoner’s waist, and the small man had strapped on the twin .45s.
“I feel like an idiot,” he muttered.
General Douglas lifted his voice in song, singing his favorite hymn: “Onward Christian Soldiers.” The words pelted the house.
And the house responded in rage. The ground began to tremble as evil gathered to fight those who dared defy it.
With a quiet prayer for strength, General Douglas ran toward the house as the others watched helplessly.
Stoner blurted out, “Give ’em hell, soldier!”
Douglas turned his head and smiled at the group. He ran up the steps, two at a time. The wind picked him up and tossed him off the porch. He landed heavily on the ground, picked himself up, and once more ran up the steps. This time, he made the door. With the winds howling around him, the general pressed the Bible against the door and held it there.
The screen door melted under God’s word. The wooden frame ignited briefly and broke apart.
Douglas pressed the Bible against the thick door. Smoke erupted from the door, a stinking, yellow fume. Rolling balls of fire gathered on the porch, hurling themselves at the old soldier. With one hand holding the Bible firmly against the door, Douglas slapped the fiery balls away, but not before his clothing ignited.
Stoner lunged to help him. Jay jerked the man back. “No,” he yelled against the wind. “Let him do it his way.”
With a deafening clap of noise, the door splintered, exploding in a mass of burning wood. With his clothing on fire, the general ran to a corner of the house and pressed the Bible against the outer wall. The wall exploded, long splinters driving deep into Douglas’s flesh. But still he would not stop. With his voice filled with pain, he looked back at the group. “It’s hurt, and I’m going to hurt it some more.”
He staggered down the porch, to the far corner, and pressed the Bible against the wall.
“Help me, God!” he cried.
The Bible flamed in his hands. The front of the house exploded, the force of the dispersion blowing away half of the front of the old mansion. General Douglas was hurled out into the yard, burning, bleeding, mangled, and dying.
But there was peace in his eyes as the group reached him.
“I hurt it,” he said past charred lips. “And I saw things. Not all of you will make it. But some will. God is waiting for us all. We’ve earned a place.” He closed his eyes and died, the smoldering Bible clutched against his chest.
The sky erupted in a violent rainstorm, dark sheets of smelly liquid pelting the house and the group. The stinking downpour smothered the flames that threatened the mansion.
Stoner pulled the 45s from leather. “Somebody show me how you work these things.”
Jim gave him a very quick lesson.
“I know some of the words to that song the general was singing,” Stoner said. “Let’s do it together.”
They lined up, the accountant, the cop, the shrink, the reporter, the cameraman, the young college girl, the companion of the priest. They marched toward the house, in a solid line, singing as loudly as they could, Stoner only slightly off key.
The stinking rain stopped. The stars popped out, pocking the velvet with God’s diamonds.
An ear-wrenching howl sprang from the shattered mansion. The force of the wailing caused the line of marchers to waver for a second. They caught their balance and marched on, nearing the steps.
As a group, they climbed the steps. The house belched out a stinking gravelike odor, the stench almost overpowering the men and women. They fought back sickness and climbed up to the porch.
A tattered and rotting figure of an old woman appeared before Stoner, who was the first to step through the ruined doorway. Stoner paused for a second, shook his head, and said, “Go on back, Grandmother. I know it isn’t you.”
The apparition vanished.
The others followed him into the unknown smoke-filled darkness.
“Quite a show, son.” Cary’s voice came out of the darkness.
“You can’t make up your mind what side you’re on, can you, Cary?” Jay asked. “But you have to be a cowardly turncoat old whore to play footsie with the devil.”
“You’ll suffer for that!”
“Maybe. But a Christian can die but one time.”
“Oh, how pukey! When did you turn Holy Roller?”
Jay didn’t dignify that with a reply.
Screaming that seemed torn from the pits of hell reverberated throughout the mansion. Hideous creatures seemed to form in every dark pocket of the house, to crouch hairy and scaly and hissing at the group.
“They aren’t real,” Jay said. “Ignore them.”
The creatures vanished.
“How did you know that?” Jim asked.
“I didn’t.”
The trooper smiled. “I don’t ever want to sit across from you at a poker table.”
Jay looked up to the dark landing of the second floor.
“Oh, yes, Jay!” Cary’s voice touched him. “Do come up and see your old auntie.”
“I believe I will,” Jay answered.
“Then come on!” she taunted.
Shari stepped to his side. “How much of this is going to be real?”
“I don’t know. Maybe all of it; maybe some of it.”
Nick pointed his mini-cam upward.
Jay and Shari began the climb up into the unknown.
“Take my hand,” Jay said. “And don’t be afraid.”
“Oddly, I’m not.”
“Goddamn you!” Cary screamed. “Show me some fear.”
“That’s the key, isn’t it, Jay?”
“Part of it, I’m thinking. Come on, let’s go back downstairs. There is nothing to fear in this house.”
“I know what you’re thinking!” Cary screamed. “Don’t do it, Jay. Don’t!”
Jay ignored the screaming and pleading voice. “Don’t do what?” Shari asked.
“Burn this godless place to the ground.”
* * *
Jim remembered seeing a piece of hose in the back of the house. He got it and siphoned out gasoline from the vehicles. Jay walked through the lower level of the house, saturating the place with gasoline, while Stoner made another torch and ignited it. Jay walked to the house and tossed the torch inside, through the ruined front. Most of the fumes had dissipated, but still it made quite a show when the torch hit the gas.
Above the roaring flames, they could all hear a scream. No one had to ask who it was.
“The bitch is finally dead,” Stoner said.
“I wouldn’t count on it.” Jay sobered the moment.
The roaring waves of heat and danger of collapsing timbers drove the group to their vehicles and away from the inferno. They had covered General Douglas’s body with rocks, to hopefully prevent animals from eating the corpse.
“Do we try a bust-out?” Jim asked.
“You know
better,” Jay said.
“Yeah,” the trooper said with a long sigh. “But I had to ask.”
“Look up the blacktop, north,” Stoner said, pointing his finger.
There were a dozen or more headlights on the road, parked cars. Waiting.
“Look over there.” Nick pointed.
Down a gravel road, near the outline of timber, more headlights could be seen.
“You got lots of film, Nick?” Jim said. “I think it’s going to be a long night.”
6
“We cut one head off of the Medusa,” Stoner said. “But the other snakes surrounding us are just as dangerous.”
They were standing just inside the city limits. Standing in the road, talking.
“I think as the night progresses,” Stoner continued, “we shall all be faced with many more daughters of Phorcys.”
“What are you talking about?” Amy whined.
They were all sooty and dirty, their faces as grimy as their hands, their clothing sweat stained.
As one, they looked back in the direction they’d come. The old Clute house was now just a dull glow in the night sky.
“Ahoy, mates!” a tiny voice called from the other side of the road.
The group stared. They could see nothing.
“Down here!” the voice called. “And a point or two starboard.”
Jay spotted him first and pointed him out. A tiny man dressed like a pirate, peg leg and patch. They walked over to him and knelt down. Nick’s camera was grinding.
“I’m come to ye wit’ a message from Colonel Richelieu,” the tiny man said. “From him, and from us all, mates. Thank ye for burnin’ that house o’ horrors out yonder. Now the other part o’ the message: Don’t ye interfere this night unless asked to. Ye’ll want to, but don’t ye daren’t. If we’re victorious this bloody evenin’, some one o’ us will be askin’ ye to do something’ that ye won’t favor; but do ’er ne’er the less. Ye must. Do ye all understand?”
“No,” Shari said, her voice gentle. “But we’ll do what you’ve said.”
“Thank ye, miss!” The little pirate doffed his three-corner hat, plopped it back on his head, and jerked out a cutlass. “Now I’m off for the fight. Top o’ of the evenin’ to ye, ladies and gents!”
He stumped off toward the town, singing an old English ditty.
Toy Cemetery Page 24
