Daniel Gomez shifted his dark eyes and smiled. “Do you believe in God, Dr. Slater?”
“I am a man of science, not one given to putting much stock in superstitious nonsense.”
“Well, Doctor, I have a hunch you’ll be a believer before all this is over, one way or the other.”
Slater frowned and looked away from the piercing black eyes of the priest.
“The Devil is a son of a bitch,” Gomez said. “I’ve been as close to him as I am to any of you, and let me assure you, it is not a pleasant experience. Look at my hair; I’m almost totally gray. Five years ago I did not have a gray hair on my head. I’m thirty years old, going on a hundred. You think Satan doesn’t exist, Dr. Slater? He’s real, bet on that.”
“He might be real in your mind, Gomez”—Slater clung to his fantasies—“but not in mine.”
“Then I feel sorry for you, Dr. Slater. You’ll probably be among the first to go.”
“Go where?”
Gomez smiled sadly and stood up. “Let’s go see this Glen Holland.”
“Are you going to answer my question?” Slater asked. “Go where?”
Gomez glanced at him, but said only, “I will pray for you, Doctor.”
Masked and gowned and gloved, the men and women stood around the bed on which Glen Holland lay, strapped down. His eyes were wild, and contained an inhuman light. He fought his straps and mumbled in a language no one could understand.
Gomez bowed his head and prayed silently.
Outside the trailer, the wind picked up, lashing the metal structure with sand. The wind sang in a low, moaning voice.
It was unnerving to several of those present.
Gomez sprinkled Holy Water onto the face of Glen Holland.
Holland began to scream as the blessed water burned into his flesh, and a foul stench filled the trailer as yellow smoke rose from the seared holes. Then small bloody rivers of sand began to ooze, like pus, from the holes.
Slater vomited behind his mask, and rushed from the room.
Holland screamed even more wildly. He spat great bloody globs of sand onto himself and the bed. The globs that landed on his chest began to eat their way back into his flesh.
Dr. Fletcher turned away from the hideous sight, and when Mike slipped his hand into hers, she took it gratefully.
Gomez said, “Let’s get this show on the road, people. There is nothing more I can do. He’s got to be destroyed, and it’s got to be done quickly.”
“I’m still opposed to this . . . this barbaric practice!” Dr. Thomas protested.
“Shut up!” Gomez’s voice was sharp. “If I get sick in body, I’ll come to you. If you get sick in spirit, you go to a priest or a minister or a rabbi. This is out of your field of expertise. Let’s go, folks. Move it!”
* * *
Riding out into the vastness of the desert with Leo and Stanford, in Mike’s city unit, Gomez said, “How come nobody asked me how I knew about Mantine and Nicole?” He was smiling very faintly.
“My wife was Catholic,” Stanford said. “I’m a convert. I’ve made friends with several priests on the island. And with several Protestant ministers who believe as we do. There are more than the average laymen might think. The priests told me something about some of the things they studied.”
“Mantine has been around for a long time.” Gomez was looking out the window. Ahead of them, a pickup truck, driven by a cop, was pulling the trailer that contained Glen Holland. Behind Mike’s unit was a station wagon, filled with doctors. “He’s been causing trouble for a lot of people over the years. And he’s been responsible, directly so, for the deaths of several priests and lay people. He’s ruined marriages, ruined lives. Just for the dark fun of it.” The priest was silent for a moment. “I want to catch him in human form. Just once.”
“You might very well die when you do,” Stanford reminded him.
“Death does not frighten me. I’ve faced it too many times. I just want my death to be worthwhile,” Gomez retorted.
They bounced along in silence for several miles.
Then Leo turned in his seat to face Stanford. “What about those other kids Janis told you about? The bunch that’s hanging around Paul?”
“It bothers me,” the inspector admitted.
“Why?” Gomez questioned. “That doesn’t bother me at all. Ten years ago, it would have. I wouldn’t have said that. But ten years ago, I didn’t understand the Devil or the people who worship him.”
The Galiuro Mountains loomed up in front of them, still some miles distant.
“God will forgive almost anything.” Gomez’s words were softly spoken. “But He is very clear about worshipping false gods. Very clear about his opinion of Satan. Some people are born bad. Branded with the mark of Cain. Born to serve the Dark One. It isn’t some supernatural spell they’ve fallen under. The Devil didn’t force them to follow him; Satan is not making them do anything. They’re doing it because they have the Devil in them, and have had since the moment of conception. You can call it the bad-seed theory, if you wish to.”
“Doesn’t that fly in the face of exorcism, Father Gomez?” Leo asked.
Gomez smiled. “A name like Corigliano and you don’t know about exorcism?”
Leo laughed. “I’m a backslider, Father.”
“Hell, Leo!” The priest laughed. “You’re not a backslider—you’ve fallen plumb off the horse!”
Leo grinned as the others had a good laugh at his expense. It was worth it; they had all been wound up tight.
Gomez looked first at Stanford, then at Leo. “I shall expect you both at church first thing in the morning. To hear your confession. And I want Father Gunter to bless us all. That is not a request, gentlemen.”
“Yes, Father,” the cop and ex-cop mumbled.
“As to your question, Leo—no. Being possessed is quite another matter. All that means is that during a moment of weakness, a moment the subject might not even have been aware of, the Devil took over. Most of the time, the human spirit can shake off Satan’s influence without outside help. A few quiet moments spent reading God’s word, meditating, sharing what you have with someone less fortunate... or just sitting in church. That’s usually all it takes. Only in extreme cases does it ever come to an exorcism. For me, there is no help for the ones born bad. They are beyond redemption. Many exorcists are split on that subject, however. Another priest might give you a totally different viewpoint. My theory is that one does not attempt to pet a rabid animal. There is no cure. You just kill it.”
“You are a violent fellow, aren’t you, Father?” Stanford said.
“You don’t think Satan is violent, Inspector? You don’t think Satan worship is violent? Do you believe that it doesn’t encourage violent and inhumane and perverted acts and actions? I think you are far too intelligent to even think that, much less believe it. And aren’t you here to kill, Inspector? Isn’t that a violent act?”
Stanford sat, a stunned look on his face. “I never told you that, Father. You could not have known.”
“Let’s just say I know what Mantine forced you to do, Inspector, and leave it at that.”
* * *
Rex Grummen rubbed his crotch and grinned at Janis from Paul’s bedroom door. In his room, Paul laughed and Lisa giggled.
Rex licked his lips in a very suggestive manner.
Janis shot Rex the rigid digit, and stepped back into her bedroom, slamming the door. She looked at the lock. Wasn’t much of one. But she’d never felt the need to lock her door before.
She locked it.
“Creep!” she muttered. “They’re all creeps.”
She had come home only to find Paul and Lisa naked on the bed.
She had screamed at Lisa and the girl—young woman really—had only lifted her head from Paul’s belly and laughed at her.
Whore!
This was a mistake, Janis silently admitted. I should have gone directly to the Matthews’ house like Mother told me to do.
Now t
here’s no way I can get out of here.
I’m stuck! Trapped.
She walked to her phone and picked it up, intending to call one of her friends.
But as soon as she put the phone to her ear, she knew someone was on an extension, listening in.
Verbal filth rolled into her ear.
Sickening. Disgusting.
She knew the voice. It belonged to one of Paul’s new friends. Lane Holcomb. Twice, the police had picked him up for rape. But the girls, at the last minute, had refused to testify against him.
Everybody knew why: Lane had threatened to kill them if they did.
And everybody knew he would.
She dropped the phone back onto the cradle. Looked at her clock. She sighed, knowing her mother wouldn’t be back for several hours.
Stupid! Why hadn’t she done what her mother had told her to do?
Janis caught movement out of the corner of her eye. A piece of paper being shoved under the door. She walked over and picked it up.
It was a pornographic drawing. Depraved and sewer-dirty.
She looked at it, then, red-faced and getting mad, wadded the piece of filth up into a tight ball and slung it across the room. It hit the rim of her wastebasket, rolled around, and dropped in.
“Two points,” she said automatically. “Maybe three from this distance.”
What those people had been doing in the picture was impossible.
She guessed.
Laughter came from the other side of the locked door.
Then the boys began calling out things they’d like to do to Janis.
“No way, creepos,” she muttered.
She went to her closet and got a coat hanger. Straightening it out, she went back to the locked door, and, kneeling down, put one side of her face to the carpet. Through the crack, she could see several pairs of bare feet.
She had a hunch they were all naked.
The smaller feet, with painted toenails, belonged to Lisa.
Unless one of the boys had turned funny.
The biggest set of feet, she guessed, belonged to Lane Holcomb. They were dirty.
“Hey, baby!” Lane hollered. “I got something nice and hard for you. I’m holding it in my hand. Why don’t you open the door and you can kiss it.”
Kiss this, you jerk! Janis thought, lining up the end of the coat hanger with one of Lane’s big feet.
She jammed it. Hard.
Lane screamed and squalled, and she could see him jumping around in the hall. Peeking out under the crack, she could see drops of blood on the beige carpet. She grinned, knowing she’d gotten in the first good lick of this battle.
“You lousy bitch!” Lane yelled. “I’ll get you for this! You’ll be sorry you ever done this to me, you . . .”
Janis tuned out on all the things he was going to do to her.
And he finally wound down.
“Why don’t you go stick your foot in Lisa’s mouth, Lane?” Janis yelled. Actually, she had another part of Lisa’s anatomy in mind, but she didn’t want to say that.
She heard Lisa tell Lane to go with her because she’d put something on his foot.
Janis jumped onto her bed and grabbed the phone. No one on any extension. Quickly, she punched out Jean’s number, got her on the second ring.
“Jean! Paul and his creeps have me cornered in my room. Get the gang and come over here real quick. Get Bing and Roy—and hurry up!”
“On my way!”
Since “the gang” lived only a few blocks apart, she knew they would be over in about five minutes.
Providing they could get permission to go out.
She sat on the edge of her bed and waited.
* * *
“What is this place?” Stanford asked, looking around him at the desolate spot.
“Where we burn dope,” Mike told him. “Been enough grass burned in this spot to get the entire state high for a week. Nearest resident is miles away. Right over there”—he pointed—“is our shooting range.” He glanced at Father Gomez. “You ready?”
“I am. But I’m not so sure about the doctors. Or the three of you for that matter.”
“What do you mean?” Leo asked.
“This is not going to be pleasant. You’ll see. Come on.”
“Come in, come in, come in!” a deep, hollow-sounding voice urged. It floated across the hotness. “We’re about to have a barbecue. And I’m going to be the guest of honor.”
“What the hell . . . ?” Belline muttered.
“Brace yourselves,” Gomez warned them.
The only person who was not visibly shocked by Glen Holland’s condition was Father Gomez.
Holland was lucid. He lay placidly in bed, not fighting his leather restraints.
And his voice was deep and firm, yet it had that strange hollow sound.
Gomez started praying.
“Oh, stop that mumbo jumbo, you stupid spic!” Glen said. “You’re wasting your time.”
Gomez stopped praying. Lifted his eyes to meet the savage dead eyes of Holland.
“You’re all fools!” the voice rumbled.
It was not Glen Holland’s voice.
“Who . . . ?” Slater opened his mouth.
He closed it after a hard glance from Gomez.
“Why are we fools, Glen?” Gomez asked.
“I’m not Glen!” the voice rumbled out of the mouth of Holland.
“Yes, I know that. But who are you?”
A hissing sound emanated from the mouth, followed by laughter. Evil, taunting laughter. Well-hollow. The odor that rolled in waves from the mouth was putrid. It fouled the nostrils of all present.
Father Gomez looked at Slater. “Dr. Slater, meet the devil.”
Slater’s face, under the mask, was pale. His eyes had a haunted and confused look.
Laughter once more rose from the bullet-mangled head of Holland.
“You have anything else you’d like to say?” Gomez asked.
“Yeah. Stick your Bible up your ass!”
Gomez picked up a can of gasoline.
“Going home, going home!” Holland sang. “In the heat of the day I’m going home.”
Gomez doused the soulless being with gasoline, and profanity flooded from its mouth.
Mary Beth turned and walked out of the small trailer. In the hot, breezeless air of that arid place, she removed her mask and gloves and walked over to the dubious shade an old ramshackle building provided.
The voice continued to taunt her, follow her, throwing profane suggestions at her. She wasn’t sure whether she was truly hearing the words or if they were in her mind.
Peter Loneman left the trailer, and took off his gloves and mask and gown. Then he took cans of gasoline from the back of the pickup truck. He glanced over at Mary Beth.
“Goes against everything you were ever taught, doesn’t it?” he called.
She looked at him. Nodded her head, not trusting herself to speak. Not just yet. She walked over to him.
Peter looked up at her as he was twisting off a gas cap.
“For God’s sake, don’t light a cigarette.”
“I don’t smoke.”
“Good. You know, what’s really bad about this whole . . . mess, is that little kid.”
“What little kid?”
“Paul Kelly.”
“What about Paul Kelly, Deputy?”
They could hear the low sounds of Father Gomez praying.
“Oh, shut up, you asshole!” The voice ripped through the air.
Gomez continued to pray.
“I thought the inspector leveled with all you people?”
“I thought he did, too.”
“Come in here and sit in my face, baby!”
“Our Father, who art in Heaven . . .”
“Will you knock off that fucking shit!”
“... hallowed be Thy name.”
“You haven’t seen the last of me, bitch! I’ll come back and kill you. Slow. I’ll make your dying last and last and
last.”
“... Thy kingdom come, Thy . . .”
The voice began to curse. And it gradually became the voice of the real Glen Holland.
“Paul Kelly?” Mary Beth asked.
“He’s a devil-child, Doctor. The inspector trailed him all the way from the islands,” Mike explained.
“A ... devil-child?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Oh, my God!”
“That pious puke won’t help you, baby!” The voice cut through the hot air. “But I’ve got something that’ll really make your day.”
The voice was so loud Mary Beth wondered how those remaining in the trailer could tolerate it.
Loneman looked at her. “What’s the matter? Other than the obvious, that is.”
“Paul’s father,” she whispered. Peter had to strain to hear her. “I don’t think he was checked for those strange red bites. Oh, God!”
“Too late, baby!” The words were blasted out over the hot landscape.
The others were leaving the trailer.
“Douse it, boys,” Mike called.
Gasoline was poured in, under, and on the trailer.
Then they all backed up and waited until the gasoline fumes had dissipated.
“You shitheads think this is the end,” Holland yelled. “But this is only the beginning. You’ll see. You’ll all see.”
“Light it,” Gomez said grimly.
The trailer went up with a whooshing sound that rocked them all back on their heels. The metal turned red-hot, the wood became an inferno, the plastic melted and dripped.
Gomez bowed his head and prayed softly.
Mary Beth suddenly screamed and pointed at the blazing trailer.
Eyes stared in disbelief, horror.
Glen Holland lurched out of the flames, his arms held out in front of him, cooked strips of flesh dangling from them. Wild laughter ripped from his now-lipless mouth.
All could hear the sickening sounds of raw flesh bubbling and sizzling as it cooked.
A ball of flame, he staggered toward the knot of lawmen and doctors.
Laughing hideously.
EIGHT
“Yeah, Frank”—Janis heard Roy Weaver’s voice—“you sure are gonna let us in. ’Cause if you don’t, I’m gonna stomp your head off. Now what’s it gonna be?”
“You get away from this house!” Paul shouted, his deep voice carrying to Janis. “Or I’ll call the police!”
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