The Devil's Laughter

by William W. Johnstone

  Cliff tried the back door. The doorknob turned under his hand and he cracked the door. The smell of death struck him hard. He pushed open the door with the toe of his boot and stepped inside, rifle at the ready. He found the bodies of a man and woman in the den. They had been hacked to pieces. Blood splattered the walls. SATAN LIVES was spray-painted on one wall. ALL PRAISE THE DARK ONE was written in blood on another wall.

  Cliff spun around at footsteps behind him. Susan and several more of her group. He lowered the rifle.

  “Kids,” Susan said, looking at the gore. “Frankie Marley and Jason Matisse and Chris Brooks and that bunch. Karen Broussard, too, probably.”

  “Wait a minute,” Cliff said. “I thought Karen Broussard was opposed to devil worship? I thought she talked the Stern boy out of the coven?”

  “That’s what she wanted everyone to believe,” Susan said. “But she’s always been a big leader in the young peoples’ branch of it.” She looked at him and shrugged her shoulders. “All the kids knew that.”

  Cliff stared at her for a moment. He sighed and shook his head. If kids would just talk to law officers, he thought for the umpteenth time in his life. If they would just break that stupid unwritten code of theirs. He started to lecture the girl and then said to himself, Oh, to hell with it!

  A car pulling up outside put them all on the floor. Cliff crawled to the front and looked out a window. It was the young black man Jimmy Hughes, and he was being escorted by a knot of kids, all carrying guns.

  “Yeah, nigger,” the words carried clearly to those in the house. “We gonna see how much pain you can stand. You coons are so proud of your cocks, we’ll see how you like yours stuck up on a wall.”

  Jimmy took them all by surprise when he suddenly bolted and ran behind a row of hedge.

  “Don’t kill him!” a young man shouted. “We want him alive for torture.”

  Cliff jerked his rifle to his shoulder and began hosing down the front yard with lead. Susan and several of the others in the house did the same. In ten seconds, the front yard was almost entirely void of human life. Except for Jimmy.

  “It’s okay, Jimmy,” Cliff called. “It’s me, Cliff Sweeney. Come on in the house. We’ll cover you.”

  The man ran from hedgerow to house and stepped inside. The air was acrid with gunsmoke. He sank to his knees. He was exhausted and his face mirrored it. He looked at the hacked-up man and woman on the floor. “Mr. and Mrs. Carmichael,” he said dully. “Those punks out there,” – he jerked his head toward the front yard – “were bragging about how they killed them.”

  “Susan,” Cliff said, “find some blankets and cover the dead, will you? Thanks.” To Jimmy he said, “You seen any of the others?”

  “Mrs. Lucas got clear with the two troopers. I saw them make the field behind the house. I stopped to help Vivian when she tripped. Then they were all over me. The men took turns raping Vivian – right there on the cold ground – and then said they were taking her back to the Romaire complex. They were going to cut me and leave me to bleed to death. But they got careless. I kicked one in the nuts and split. Those kids out there found me about an hour ago. I don’t know what happened to Gerard or any of the others.”

  Cliff nodded his head. “Some of you young people gather up all the guns and ammunition from the dead in the yard. Jimmy, let’s drag the bodies around to the back and hide their cars until we can come up with a plan.”

  “What are we going to do, Mr. Sweeney?” Jimmy asked, getting to his feet and tested his legs.

  “Cliff. Call me Cliff.” He shook his head. “I don’t know. You can bet all the roads are blocked and blocked solidly. The whole thing is insane. This just can’t be happening. But it is. It boggles the mind. I don’t know what to do.”

  “Mr. Sweeney?” a girl asked. “What was that thick stinking stuff that filled the house last night?”

  “The devil,” the FBI man said softly.

  * * *

  Lynette Jackson was all smiles. She felt wonderful. Better than she’d felt in, oh, seventy-five or a hundred years. Her master had not forsaken them. The Dark One had returned and she could plainly taste victory on her tongue. The young girl, Vivian something-or-other, had been passed around among the men and several of the women, and had pleasured them all in various ways. Then Dick Marley had cut her throat and tossed her bruised and naked body into a dusty corner of the complex.

  Not even the fact that the coven had lost almost two hundred men and women and still had not dislodged that accursed Link Donovan and his allies from his fortlike house could wipe the smile from her face.

  The Dark One had promised them extra time to win the good fight. He would help as much as he could, but he had warned her that he must be careful not to arouse the ire of that ever-present Big Eye in the sky. And He was watching what was going on. But it had not yet reached the point where He would interfere . . . at least not directly.

  Her followers had assured Lynette that Gerard Lucas and his allies had been wiped out to the last person. Lynette rather doubted that, but she praised her followers for a good fight. Had to keep morale up, you know.

  She had been promised another full twenty-four hours, and she felt the fight could be won in that time. Probably half that time if all went well. It was simple: Link Donovan had to die. He was the stumbling block to victory. Sally Wilson had told her that Donovan wore the mark. She had personally seen it. So that meant that Link Donovan had to die. Without him, the others would crumble.

  The problem was how to kill the son of a bitch. The man had more luck than a leprechaun.

  * * *

  Link slept for a few hours. He awakened refreshed, and showered and shaved. The day had turned clear and very cold for this time of year. Bodies lay stiff in death all over Link’s property. Tom and Paul and Mark Palombo had pulled the dead away from the fence, so if the fence had to once more be charged, they would not short it out.

  “They’re not entering the property, Link,” Paul told him over coffee. “But we’re surrounded. To try any sort of bust-out would be suicide.”

  “Maybe,” Link said. “I think they’re there to keep our friends out rather than to contain us. That means that Gerard’s bunch was not wiped out.”

  Link turned and looked toward the north, toward where the old Romaire complex stood. “The coven leaders are up there.”

  “Where?” Mark asked.

  “The Romaire factory.”

  “How do you know that?” the young priest asked.

  The old priest stood with a half smile on his face.

  Link shook his head. “I don’t know. I just do, that’s all.”

  “And you’ll go up there?” Matt asked.

  “Yes. But not yet. It isn’t time.”

  “How do you know that?” Mark asked.

  “I just do. And I’ll have to deal with Lynette Jackson on her terms. At night. And before you ask how I know that, I don’t know how. I just do.”

  He turned and went back into the house. He had to get ready. He had a lot of work to do.

  “Where are you going?” Anne asked him.

  “To find the others. I’ll go out the back way and grab the first vehicle I find on the outside.”

  “How do you know you’ll find one? Is God talking to you again?” Anne was a tad on the irritable side.

  Link smiled. “Not exactly talking, Anne. But somebody or some being is sure putting thoughts into my head.”

  She came to him and put her arms around him. “Sorry, Link. I didn’t mean to sound bitchy.”

  He kissed the top of her head and held her close. “Don’t worry about it. It’ll soon be over. That I can promise you.”

  “Can you promise me it’ll end for the best?”

  “Yes. But perhaps not the way you’re thinking, and perhaps the peace won’t last for the rest of our lives.”

  She stepped back and looked up at him. “Are you coming back?”

  “I don’t know, Anne. I certainly hope so. But I
can’t promise that.”

  There were tears in her eyes. “Do you often play the big hero type, Link?”

  “I can truthfully say, Anne, that I have never done anything like this in my entire life!”

  Chapter 11

  Link played with his dogs for a few minutes in the front yard, petting them and talking to them. He gave them each a dog biscuit and watched them scamper away to the various spots in the yard that they claimed for their own.

  The group watched him from the porch.

  “He’s saying good-bye to them,” Linda Chavez said.

  “You’re very astute, child,” Father Lattier said.

  “I don’t know about that,” the teenager said. “But I know this: That’s a very brave man out there. He’s physically tough and he’s mentally hard and maybe a little on the mean side if you push him. But he’s got a lot of compassion in him for God’s lesser creatures. Maybe lesser isn’t the right word. After the past four or five days, I don’t think it is.”

  Link reentered the house and began gearing up. The others watched him in silence. Since it was lighter than his MAC-10 (3.8 pounds as compared to 6.4 pounds unloaded) and he could comfortably carry a lot more clips for it, Link took an Uzi 9mm automatic pistol for this run. It did not have the stopping power of the big old lumbering .45 slug, but it would spit out a lot more lead and get the job done. The job. This run.

  This run, he thought. Might be my last run. The irony of it all brought a slight smile to his lips. He turned his head so the others would not see it. He had left the Company to come back home and live a quiet life. Some quiet life.

  He filled the rucksack with instruments of war, added three more boxes of ammunition, adjusted the shoulder straps, and slipped it on. With a sigh, he laid aside his old faithful .45 and picked up a Beretta 9mm pistol, model 92F. Fifteen in the clip and one in the slot gave him nearly three times the firepower of the .45. And he was just as good a shot with it as he was with the .45. Maybe even better, he reluctantly admitted.

  Sudden and fast shooting spun them all around and racing toward the porch.

  “Cars comin’ in!” Matthew shouted from the garage apartment. “Tom’s clearin’ the gates, so they must be friendly.”

  Cliff Sweeney, Jimmy Hughes, and Susan and her bunch.

  “All right!” Matt shouted. “All right!”

  Brought up to date by both sides, Cliff looked at Matt. Once he had finished playing with his dogs, Link had dressed in faded black and gray camouflage and tucked his trouser legs into the top of his boots. He did not want those watching the house through binoculars to know he was planning on pulling out.

  “I’d feel better knowing you were here, Cliff,” Link said, seeing the surprise in the Bureau man’s eyes as he picked his thoughts out of the air.

  “How – ?” Cliff blurted out.

  “Don’t ask!” Father Mark Palombo said quickly. “Just accept.” The young priest crossed himself and muttered a quiet prayer.

  “By yourself, Link?” Cliff asked softly.

  “That’s the way it has to be,” Link told him.

  “I don’t understand,” Jimmy said.

  “Nor do I,” Link said with a smile. “I just know what I have to do. Now then, I’ve rigged up more surprises out in the woods. Tom has the remote. You people gear up and get set for a siege. They’re going to come at you hard this night. I believe Satan has set a deadline. Dawn tomorrow. I know the Dark One doesn’t want God to interfere directly. Get my animals in and see that they remain safe. I’ve made out my will. It’s in the safe. The door is closed but not combination locked. I’ve spoken separately with Toby and John and Mark. So I’m well blessed. I guess there isn’t anything left to say. I won’t say good-bye. I plan on returning. But that’s something that’s pretty much out of my control. I believe it’s now in the hands of God.” He turned and walked out of the house, using the back door.

  * * *

  Gerard hooked up with Troopers Miller and Holt and hugged his wife for a long time. “You guys seen any of the others?” Gerard asked.

  “No,” Dennis told him. “We’ve just been trying to stay alive. The place is jumping with crazy young people and crazier adult coven members. They’ve gone on a killing spree.”

  “We investigated a dozen homes out in the country, baby,” his wife told him. “The families had all been butchered horribly, senselessly.”

  “The boil has busted,” Gerard said. “Now it’s up to us to put some salve on it and start healing.” He lifted his rifle. “And I have just the right prescription.”

  Link pressed the razor-sharp blade of the big hunting knife against the man’s neck. The man stiffened in the truck seat. “You want to live?” Link asked him.

  “Yeah. I sure do.”

  “Renounce your master and praise God. Beg for God’s forgiveness. Pray, sinner. Long and hard.”

  “Fuck you, Donovan! All praise the Dark One! Bow down to Satan and kiss the—”

  Link cut his throat and jerked him out of the cab of the truck before he could get the seat all icky. He dragged him to a ditch and dumped him, after taking the man’s 9mm sidearm and four full clips. He had seen an old Thompson SMG lying on the seat, a bag of clips beside it.

  The truck was new, a three-quarter ton job with four-wheel drive and two gas tanks, both full. Link inspected the Thompson. It was the real article. Old but in excellent shape. He put the weapon on full auto and jacked a round into the chamber.

  It was about to get quite lively in the parish.

  “I wish I could remember what it was I was supposed to do today,” Captain Terry of the state police said to a lieutenant. “And I know it was important. I talked to Sergeant Davidson about it last night. Damnit!”

  “Maybe he left a note on his desk.”

  “I hadn’t thought of that.” Terry found the note. “Ah, here it is. Yeah. Troopers Miller and Holt. I was to meet with them this morning. Have you seen them?”

  “Not since you sent them down to New Orleans.”

  “I did not send them to New Orleans. Damnit!”

  The others in the room wisely decided not to push the issue. “Bump LaGrange P.D. and see if they’ve seen Miller and Holt,” the captain ordered.

  “They haven’t seen them in several days,” dispatch said, after speaking with the dispatcher at LaGrange’s police department. “Captain, I haven’t heard any traffic out of LaGrange in several days.”

  “Nothing?”

  “No, sir. Nothing except for a few garbled words that sounded like they were coming from a low-band walkie-talkie on a skip.”

  “Odd,” Captain Terry muttered. “Miller and Holt are a couple of clowns, for sure, but they’re good troopers.” Then he stopped as he lost his train of thought. He looked at a lieutenant. “What the hell were we just talking about?”

  The lieutenant blinked. “Ah ... damned if I can remember, Captain.”

  “Now, this is getting ridiculous!” Captain Terry said. “If it wasn’t impossible, I’d think that someone is playing mind-games with us.”

  “Captain!” dispatch called. “A bad pile-up on 1-20 between Arcadia and Ruston. Witnesses say about fifteen eighteen-wheelers and at least twice that many cars are all jammed up. Multiple injuries and deaths. The entire westbound side of 1-20 is blocked for hundreds of yards.”

  “Almost as if it was planned,” the captain muttered.

  “Say what, sir?” a sergeant asked, slipping into his jacket.

  “Nothing,” the captain said. “Let’s roll.”

  * * *

  Link stayed on the parish’s gravel back roads as he made his way around the parish, by avoiding hard-top whenever possible. He stopped at a rural home when he saw a man splitting wood in his backyard. Link got out and yelled at the man. The man kept right on splitting wood.

  Link walked up to him but stayed well away from the axe. “Is your phone working, mister?”

  The man stopped splitting wood and looked at him. “Phone?”<
br />
  “Yeah. Phone. Like in telephone. Is your phone working?”

  “It isn’t qualified to do very much.”

  Link stared at him. “Ah ... have you seen Humpty Dumpty lately?”

  “Not in a day or two. Say, if you see him, tell him I said hello, okay?”

  “Yeah. I’ll sure do that.” He looked at the huge pile of split wood. “How long have you been splitting wood?”

  “Splitting wood? I don’t split wood. Why would I split wood? I’m on butane.”

  “See you around, mister.” Link carefully backed away from the man.

  “Not if I see you first,” the man said with a very foolish grin.

  “See you later, alligator!” a woman called from the back porch, flapping her apron at Link and grinning.

  “After supper, motherfucker!” the man yelled.

  Link got back in the truck and left. He drove for several miles, stopping when he saw a man driving a tractor around and around in circles in the middle of a field. Link watched for several minutes. The man continued to drive in circles. He must have been driving for hours, having worn huge ruts in the earth.

  Link drove on. About two miles down the road, he stopped behind a car parked off on the side. The windshield and side windows were spider-webbed with bullet holes. He got out and carefully walked up to it. He had a hunch what he’d find and he wasn’t disappointed.

  The man and woman were dead. Stiff. Both of them had been shot dozens of times. The back seat was filled with grocery bags full of food, paper towels, toilet paper, and so forth. Link had seen the man and woman many times in town but did not know their names. He left them as he found them and drove on.

  Link thought he heard a noise and stopped, listening. He cut his engine. There it was. Rock music was coming from . . . He strained his ears. There! That clump of woods. He got out, taking the keys and locking the doors. He took rope from the bed of the truck and walked toward the woods. The music grew louder and wilder. He could see shapes jerking about in what passes for dancing nowadays. The music was coming from a boom box placed on a stump. Three boys and three girls. They looked to be seventeen or eighteen, and they were leaping around and jumping up and down and in general behaving much like caged monkeys in some sort of foreplay before mating. A pile of guns lay on the ground beside the stump.