Daemon: Night of the Daemon

by Harry Shannon

  When the cops got there, Lehane had raised Bert up to a sitting position to keep his breathing passages open. The Remington, still smoking, was at his feet.

  Astonishingly enough, the maniac biker was still alive. His chest was moving in shallow jerks and tiny bubbles of bloody air emerged from his nostrils. One of the cops, a redhead with freckles, went to tend to him. The other squatted by Lehane and Bert to take a statement. The redhead knelt beside the biker and started talking, but the biker spat in his face.

  The ambulance from Elko arrived half an hour behind the cops. By then Bert had passed away and the biker had offered up his death rattle. The redheaded cop who'd tended to the biker stood back several feet, staring at the bloody floor. He was young enough to still be shocked by a crime scene.

  Eventually, after being tape recorded and photographed and repeatedly interviewed, Lehane broke down and called Charlie Spinks. Charlie contacted the governor. Jeff Lehane was released and allowed to drive himself home.

  SEVEN

  The scornful casino attendants waved them off, so they drove their battered blue Dodge to the far end of the lot with the engine belching smoke and the decrepit stereo cranked to the max. Dixie Lawson insisted on playing some bluegrass tapes she'd shoplifted. Goober steered slowly, carefully, peering ahead into the shadows like the old geezer he'd become. He parked the car near a long stretch of trash cans and yanked repeatedly on the emergency brake like he was trying to jerk his dong.

  "Careful, damn it!"

  Goober blinked owlishly. He dialed the music down lower, turned his head away from her and stared out the window. "You promised you wouldn't start in on me tonight."

  "Oh, for Chrissakes, Goober," Dixie cawed, "don't be so damned sensitive. I wasn't picking on your sorry ass, I was just saying you should try and take it easy on my vehicle."

  "You don't have to take that tone with me."

  "You don't listen to any other tone."

  They exchanged frosty glances and listened to maybe 40 bars of Allison Krause doing "Darling Cory." Dixie, her dirty, fat fingers wrapped around the plastic bucket full of quarters, was the first to weaken. "Aw, sweetie, don't be mad at me. I'm feeling lucky, and we don't need a jinx."

  "Say you're sorry, then."

  She rubbed his bony leg. "I'm sorry, really I am."

  Goober brushed his few remaining grey hairs back into place on his patchy scalp. "I'm feeling lucky, too," he offered. His smile was a few inches short of genuine, but at least he tried.

  "All right, then. Are you ready to make some money?"

  He turned off the engine and Ms. Krause was cut off in the middle of a hot lick. He opened the driver's side door. "I'll come around and escort you like a lady."

  Dixie giggled girlishly. But Goober paused, half-way out of the Dodge, and made a sound somewhere between disgust and surprise. "What the fuck is that?"

  "Is what?"

  "That smell?"

  Dixie was still two feet from the pine tree air freshener dangling from the rear-view mirror. She also had a Camel dangling from the corner of her mouth. "I don't smell anything. Maybe it's a skunk."

  "No, smells like something crawled up a cows asshole and died."

  "Goober, don't be so crude."

  "Man, must be some very nasty road kill or something."

  Dixie gathered her coins and her frayed purse and grunted her way out of the Dodge. Wheezing from the effort, she leaned on the roof and sniffed. Her nose and upper lip collided. "Oh, that stinks."

  "I told you so."

  "Must be a dead dog over in them trash cans or something."

  "Or something."

  "Well, let's go. Time's wasting." Dixie lumbered around to the back of the car, coins jangling noisily in the deserted parking lot. The sky was velvet black, clear and crisp with stars splattered on the firmament. Somewhere to the east a mournful train whistle blew and wheels chattered down the tracks.

  "Goober?" The stench was overpowering, now that Dixie was out of the car, and it made her stomach lurch. "Honey, let's go."

  Goober didn't move. When he spoke, his voice was filled with a resolve unusual for a man of suspect character. "I saw this movie once," he said. "The cops caught a serial killer and put him away, all because some guy smelled something and went looking to see what it was."

  "What the hell are you talking about?"

  "I'm gonna take the flashlight from the trunk and go see what stinks, that's what I'm talking about. There might be a reward."

  "And leave me out here all alone? Why, you silly old man. What the hell would you do if you ran into somebody, tell me that?"

  "I'll take me a tire iron."

  Dixie snorted. "And drop the sucker on your own foot? Goober, you're a lover, not a fighter, and you know it. Now, stop playing games and let's get us into that casino and make some money."

  Goober slid toward the back of the vehicle, his fingertips scraping along the top of the roof. His eyes stayed fixed on the immense pile of garbage and the scattered, battered aluminum cans. "Looks to me like some kind of animal got into the trash, tore it up."

  "So?"

  He opened the truck so abruptly Dixie was forced to step back. She clutched the bucket to her chest and clucked as Goober searched through the trunk for his flashlight and tire iron. When he had them gripped, one in each hand, he answered her. "So I figure whatever it is maybe found a human body and got into the guts to feed."

  "Eeewww…"

  "I know, sugar. But I saw me some war back in Korea, and that's the only other time I've smelled anything like that."

  He began to move away toward the odor. Now Dixie felt the first stirring of real panic. "You can't just leave a helpless lady all by herself, Goober. What kind of a gentleman would do that?"

  "Get back in the car and lock it, you're so scared."

  "Damn you, old man!"

  But he was already down in the first row of broken plastic bags, the flashlight held high in his left hand and the tire iron gripped tightly in his right. He had left the car's headlights on, so his shadow stretched out thin and spread like fresh, dark blood across the dump.

  Dixie could hear his boots as they crunched through the trash. She shivered and forced herself to move back to the passenger door. She didn't much like the idea of being trapped in the car, but standing outside was out of the question. At least this way she'd be able to drive away if something happened. Just to get some help, that is. She slid inside and slammed and locked the door. She glanced over at the ignition.

  "Oh, no!" Dixie rolled the window down. "Honey, you forgot to leave me the fucking car keys!"

  She thought he might have shouted something back, but couldn't be sure. The train whistle sounded again, a lot closer now. That disturbing stink flooded into the car like poison gas. Dixie rolled the window back up.

  Since he'd taken the keys, the only thing she could listen to was the rapid pounding of her heart.

  Dixie Lawson was born and raised in the Ozarks, and generally proud of it. She didn't mind that her folks were poor enough to think possum was a delicacy, that the town had to hold up a mirror at one end to look bigger, or that her clothes were always hand-me-downs. She liked the mountain life, the raw heartbreak of the front porch music. People tended to beat hell out of their kids back then, but nobody thought it was a crime. In fact, her grandmother Bessie used belts and sticks of wood to make her point, even scary stories…

  Dixie spoke before she could stop herself. "Oh, damn. Why am I thinking about her at a time like this…?"

  Because Grandma Bessie, she wasn't right in the head. In fact, she was more than a bit 'touched.' She had a way of telling bedtime stories guaranteed to keep a child in bed, under the covers, afraid to peek at the window.

  One of her favorites was 'Old Pumpkin Head.'

  It seems a boy name of Jake loved a girl named Belle so much that he damned near died of it, but she wouldn't pay him any mind. So he made a bargain with an old witch who lived at the top of the moun
tain, in a pumpkin patch. Belle would fall in love with him, but he'd owe the witch a big favor, whatever she asked was hers.

  The night came and that wicked pumpkin woman ordered Jake to get a little bit of her hair and a rag from her clothing, and this he did. The full worm moon rose in the frigid autumn sky. The witch then killed some small things and mixed their guts with the hair and cloth. She threw the mess into a big fire and took off her clothes. The boy Jake had to look away, she was so damned ugly, or so Grandma would say as she told the tale to Dixie.

  That witch, she chanted and danced and danced and chanted. Jake felt his eyes grow heavy and he fell asleep just as the fire went out. When he woke up, the sun was shining on the pumpkin patch and the witch was gone. He went back down to his shack, and Belle was there waiting for him. She'd come to tell him she loved him—and wanted to marry him. Their wedding was the following weekend. Most of a year went by, and Jake all but forgot about his bargain. But one night they got to rutting and when it was over they both felt certain they'd made a baby this time, for sure. They went to sleep.

  Around midnight, there came a scratching at the window.

  Jake jerked awake and sat up in the bed, instantly dripping with sweat. The old witch was waiting outside, a twisted smile on her ugly face. He went out into the moonlight and she ordered him to follow. According to Grandma, she led him to her pumpkin patch at the top of the hill and reminded him of their bargain…

  "What do you want, then?" he asked with alarm. "Money? Moonshine? Some of my animals to eat?"

  "Oh, no," the witch replied with a smile. She laughed like the crackling of dry leaves. "You know as well as I do that I want this first born child."

  "No," Jake cried. "Anything but that!"

  "Then I want the life of your bride."

  Horrified, Jake stepped back. "I'll kill you first, you old hag. You can't touch my family, no way."

  "I'll have what is mine," the witch said. She was no longer smiling.

  Jake pulled a knife and rushed to kill her, but she wasn't there. He turned in confusion and saw her a few feet away. He rushed her again, hell bent on cutting her belly open, but she vanished again. Frustrated he dropped to his knees to beg her…But the witch was already fading away, back into the pumpkin patch.

  Jake held his breath all the way through the delivery of his child, Grandma would whisper. He stood in the other room, pacing and praying and listening to his wife in labor. Finally he heard the midwife calling with excitement that the baby was coming. Relieved, Jake ran to the door. He heard some horrified shrieks and gasps of utter disgust. He flew into the room in a panic, and there was his little baby lying on the floor, where the midwife had dropped it.

  …A little boy with the head of a squashed pumpkin.

  Dixie trembled at the memory of her Grandma's feathery voice telling her those old ghost stories. The old bitch would then end the tale with an admonition not to make a sound, or "the pumpkin boy" would sneak into the house and eat them all up.

  Something moved, out there in the piles of trash.

  Clear as a bell, Dixie heard a can fall over and sacks full of greasy innards spill out. She opened the window just a crack and hollered. "Goober? You come back here!"

  No answer.

  Well shitfire, Dixie thought, miserably. Should I just stay here or go check on the old peckerwood?

  Another noise, closer now.

  Dixie swallowed and sat up. Through the partially opened window again: "Goober, that's enough damn it! Come back here and let's go inside!"

  She turned around and there, pressed against the windshield, was pumpkin boy, with his lips smashed like grapes and his nose flattened, misshapen skull crushed and broken. He showed his yellowing teeth in a macabre smile and laughed at her.

  Dixie jumped. "You bastard!"

  It was Goober, making faces through the glass. He pulled away from the windshield and giggled. "I do believe you need to go back to the room and change your underwear, old girl."

  "That's not funny, you almost gave me a heart attack."

  "Let's go gamble some." He came around front and opened the door for her. "I couldn't find anything to account for that stink. I reckon you're right, probably just some animal."

  Dixie heard a rattling sound she couldn't place and realized it was the coins in her plastic bucket. She was shaking that badly.

  "Goober," she said, "I do believe I need a drink first."

  EIGHT

  Lehane was a boy again, riding Snip through a blue sea of undulating alfalfa. He emerged into a dry stream bed. The big palomino stumbled on some loose rocks and then stopped. The horse raised his head and snorted, nostrils sensing something. The boy stroked the animal's tangled mane and swatted at a few dark flies. He listened intently and heard a welcome sound in the distance, the sibilant hissing of a waterfall that lay off behind the thick grove of cherry trees. They'd found water.

  The happy boy used his knees to move the huge animal toward the stream. That was all the encouragement the horse needed. Snip broke into a clumsy trot. Lehane almost lost his balance and slipped down into a clump of cactus. Another shrill sound pierced the summer sunlight, something annoying and repetitive…

  The emergency line was ringing.

  Lehane woke up immediately and moaned. He felt sore all over. He glanced at the clock and was surprised to see it was late morning. He had slept for several hours. He yawned and grabbed the cell phone. "Yeah?"

  "Good morning, sunshine."

  "Thanks for springing me last night, Charlie."

  "We leave you alone for a couple of days and look what happens."

  "Ain't that the truth?"

  "That dude wasn't from around there, right?"

  "Never saw him before in my life."

  "Tweaker, maybe? Crystal meth can do weird shit to people."

  "Something like that. Well, no sweat. We took care of the local law once and for all. You'll just have to file a report at some point."

  "Charlie, I was sleeping."

  "I figured. And I almost didn't call."

  "Why did you?"

  Charlie Spinks sighed into the phone, an explosion of sorrowful air. "It has to do with Heather, man."

  "Huh?"

  "Her remains, I mean."

  Lehane sat up and the sheet, damp from dreaming, reluctantly fell away from his naked body. "Charlie, what the hell are you talking about?"

  Spinks cleared his throat. "There's no easy way to say this…"

  "Say what, damn it?"

  "Jeff, somebody messed with her body."

  Lehane felt a cold fist clench in his belly. "What do you mean, messed with her body? Her family had it shipped home."

  "It turns out the coroner in Vegas had to make a report before she could be shipped back to Los Angeles. I don't have all the details yet, but it appears some asshole broke into the morgue and…abused her."

  Lehane was already on his feet and half dressed. "Abused how, Charlie? Sexually?"

  "Maybe, Jeff," Charlie said, miserably. "But it gets even weirder."

  Lehane got a speeding ticket on the way to Vegas and still made into the funky Meadows Park section of Vegas in record time, arriving late in the afternoon. Once there, it took him three frustrating turns around the block to find the building that housed the spare morgue. He left his car unlocked, ran across the lot and got sick of waiting for the elevator. He jogged up the metal staircase to the third floor and burst into the nearly empty hallway.

  Charlie Spinks was chain-smoking by the fire exit. When he looked up, he checked his watch and his eyes widened slightly at how quickly Lehane had arrived.

  "Charlie."

  "Irish." Spinks got to his feet. "Take a walk with me for a minute, okay?"

  Lehane hesitated. "Why?"

  "Trust me on this." Spinks dropped his smoke into a huge pile of smoldering butts. He got to his feet and started down the hallway. "We've known each other for a long time, pal."

  "Long enough."

&
nbsp; "Do you trust me?"

  "As much as I trust any man." Charlie stopped and grabbed Lehane by the shoulder. "Reconsider going in there," he said, sorrowfully. "I want you to stop and think about this."

  "I've thought about it for hours, now."

  "How do you want to remember her, Jeff?"

  Lehane let his eyes roam the pale green hallway. It smelled of antiseptic. He scowled. "Don't patronize me, Charlie. The last time I saw her she had a bullet in her head and most of her face was gone."

  "This is worse."

  "Worse?"

  "I shit you not."

  "I still want to see her."

  "Okay." Spinks released him. "I told the assistant coroner we would be taking another look."

  They walked back toward two wide, swinging doors at the end of the hallway. "You've already been in there?"

  "Whiz got word from his pal who works for the Coroner and called me. He and I came down this morning."

  "Is Whiz still here?"

  "Whiz went back to the office. He decided he didn't want to see her. That boy has always been smarter than you." Spinks held the left door open. Lehane walked through. The room was divided into four sections separated by curtains on rollers, and each held a stainless steel gurney. Only one had a corpse on it, covered by a slightly stained white sheet. The standard yellow crime-scene tape surrounded the figure and her small toes protruded.

  "Ah, shit, Charlie."

  "I know."

  Lehane moved closer. He ducked under the yellow POLICE LINE DO NOT CROSS tape. His heart began to thud and blood hissed curses in his ears. He paused beside the gurney and closed his eyes for a moment, then leaned over her. He was vaguely aware that Charlie looked away.

  Lehane reached for the white sheet. His had trembled slightly as he pulled it up and down to her waist. He swallowed and his knees buckled slightly.