by Clive Barker
“I want you to meet me, tomorrow, at the old town site. About five o’clock.”
“You must still be insane. What makes you think I’d do anything of the sort?”
“You’ll do it. You’ll do it or else I will tell everyone what you did.”
There was a long moment of silence.
“And if I do come, what happens then? Just what’s your plan?”
It’s not my plan, she started to say, but knew that would only bring more questions. Instead, she simply said, “You’ll have to be there to find out; to keep your secrets secret. Oh, and Henry…? I want you to bring the others with you.”
“Bring the others? I can’t do that! You have no idea what…”
“Just bring them,” she interrupted, and hung up before he could reply. It felt good to turn the tables on him. She sat back, satisfied. Now there was nothing to do but wait for events to play themselves out.
She looked out upon a town she didn’t recognize. It was a hollow place, built on lies and deception. The real town lay miles from here, fallow and abandoned. And waiting.
6.
Digger had just cracked his second beer and was walking across his brother’s back lawn, deep in thought but idly enjoying the feel of the grass between his toes, when the sprinkler heads suddenly popped up and started spitting in the late afternoon heat. Digger was caught in their midst and swore at the unexpected surprise, even though, he had to admit a moment later, it actually felt pretty good. He looked back toward the house, expecting to see a grinning Frank, hand poised over the sprinkler control, but instead he saw his brother, sister-in-law Mindy, and wife Christie, engaged in conversation around the barbecue grill. The kids had gone next door to a friend’s house to hurl themselves into a swimming pool until the food was ready.
Digger walked over to join the gathering around the grill, paralleling the arc of a miniature rainbow over the lawn. But like the skies themselves had proven to be so many times in the last few years, the rainbow was all flash and no substance—as Digger reached the end of the rainbow, it simply faded away, taking its pot of gold with it.
“You ever heard of water conservation, Frank?”
“What?” He looked up from his task of idly poking the meat on the grill. “Oh, the sprinklers…”
“If you’re using them at all—which you probably shouldn’t be—it should be early in the morning or late at night, so that—”
“I know. Get off your high horse, would you? Our power went out last week, when they were working on the lines. Screwed up the sprinkler timer.”
“Those things have battery back-ups, you know.”
“I can barely keep fresh batteries in my smoke alarms. You think I’m going to be right on top of my sprinkler system?” He flipped a steak, as if to underscore his point.
“Here they go again,” said Christie. “I knew we couldn’t have peace for long.” There was a jovial tone in her voice, but she exchanged a knowing look with Digger as she said it. He shrugged his shoulders and took another swig of his beer.
“Let’s get the rest of the food,” said Mindy, nodding to Christie. “Hope you guys are hungry,” she called as they walked inside, “I’ve got corn on the cob and baked potatoes, besides all that meat.”
Digger figured it was no coincidence that Mindy had chosen this moment to pipe up about the food—both she and Christie tired quickly of the two brothers’ jibes, good-natured though they usually were. Digger didn’t always care for his brother’s wife—she was a little too manipulative for his tastes—but she’d clearly been good for Frank. Since they’d married, he’d quit carousing and settled down, gotten involved with Lion’s Club, won a couple commendations, and wound up receiving the appointment to Chief of Police a little over a year ago. It was too bad that their father hadn’t lived to see it, but Frank had turned out to be a real success story; deserving of congratulations.
“Cheers, Frank. Congrats.”
His brother’s eyes narrowed. “For what?”
“For this,” Digger replied, gesturing expansively. “For everything. Just drink a toast with me.”
After another moment’s hesitation, their bottles clinked and Digger tilted his head back. The beer tasted good, but it was already losing its chill.
“You hear anything from Sharon?”
Frank snorted. “Not since my birthday. That’s about all she can muster these days—a couple cards a year on holidays, and a couple phone calls on birthdays. No, when she left, she left for good, that’s for sure.”
“You shouldn’t take it personally. Brad got an offer he couldn’t refuse from his company. What were they supposed to do, just ignore that?”
“She was looking for a way out of here before that. You know she was.”
“Maybe. But that’s her right. It’s hard to live with a legacy—you, of all people, should know that. How many times a day does somebody bring up Dad to you? Christ, sometimes I think he should get his own saint named after him. There’s a lot of past here for us to want to get away from. I can’t say I’m surprised that Sharon left. Can’t say that I blame her, either.”
Frank’s lips were pursed tight enough to become a single white line across his face. He looked like he wanted to spit. “Why are you always so hard on Dad? Sharon’s the same way, always talking like he’s this huge burden hanging over us. Most people I know would’ve loved to have had a dad like him. If it’s so hard for you to live with his memory, why don’t you just leave?”
“There you go again, taking it personally. This is my home, and I’m not leaving it. But that doesn’t mean I have to be in love with it every single day.”
In response, Frank looked away and drained the last of his beer. He turned and threw the empty bottle at a trashcan sitting behind the garage. The bottle sailed in clearly, a perfect toss. It shattered inside, the sound jagged against the quiet suburban afternoon.
Digger reached down and fished a fresh beer from the sweating ice chest. Frank accepted the bottle with a nod, which was usually as close as he came to an apology. But then he surprised Digger by saying, “Sorry. Guess I’m a little tense right now. Lot of stuff going on.” He paused. “Guess you heard about the goddamned gang fight we had?”
“I heard, but I couldn’t believe it. Since when have we had gangs around here?”
“Since now, I guess. The kids we brought in wouldn’t say much, but I think they just got together in the last few months. Probably looked cool to them from the movies. And, of course, they have to be rival gangs. So much for our peaceful small town.”
“I heard a second kid might die.”
“It looks like he’ll pull through. But besides that gang thing, we’ve had two bar stabbings in the last week and more fights and domestic disputes than we normally get in a whole summer. It’s like this whole damned town’s on edge.”
Digger started to make a crack about job security, but thought better of it.
“And then there’s the ‘old town mystery, ’” added Frank.
“Any idea yet who that poor guy in the cellar was?”
“No, it’ll take weeks to get the forensic results back. And the police files from back then, including the missing persons reports, are in boxes in storage. I sent Grunwald over there to take a look, and he called me up, practically begged me to not make him go through them. They’re a mess.”
“What’d you tell him?”
“What could I tell him? We’ve got what looks and smells like a forty-year-old homicide on our hands and we’ve got to start by figuring out who the deceased is. I told him to roll up his sleeves and dig in.”
“Speaking of which, are you sure you really need me back out at the lake tomorrow? I’ve got a sewer job needs to get done, and I’d rather do that myself. I could send Robinson down to the lake to dig for you while I get started on—”
“No, sorry. I want you at the lake. In case we find anything else, I don’t want word all over town that same night.”
Digger felt a su
dden breeze, cooling the sweat trickling down his neck and back. It felt wonderful. He knew there was likely no escaping another day at the lake, but didn’t want to give up just yet. “You really think you’re going to find anything else? Your guys have sifted through every inch of mud in that cellar. And you admitted that the Potter’s field story seemed to check out after all, in regards to the other bodies.”
“No, I don’t think we’re going to find anything else. I said ‘just in case,’ didn’t I? But we can’t quit yet—I have to be as sure as I can be that we’re not missing something. Or someone.”
Digger felt his hair lifted from his forehead. The breeze had become a wind. He looked up and saw the eastern sky rapidly darkening. He turned back to his brother.
“All right, fine. Lord knows what kind of trouble Robinson’ll get into if I let him do the sewer line on his own, but I guess that’s how it’s gotta be.”
“Thanks. I need somebody I can trust, and you’re it.”
Digger nodded. “So, that’s it, then—nothing else new on the old town case…?”
“Not really. We figured out that the cellar used to be under the old Water Department building. I talked to Eckersley, the guy who was running it back then, but he says he doesn’t have any idea who the dead guy could be. Why am I not surprised at his answer?”
Thunder suddenly rumbled through, punctuating Frank’s remark. As shadows of clouds fell across their faces, he seemed to notice the changing sky for the first time.
“Man, look at those clouds. If I didn’t know better, I’d say it was actually going to rain…”
7.
The sky was the Prince of Lies, the boy who cried wolf, and a shameless tease, all rolled into one. If there were any hopes left to wring out of the locals, the current crop of clouds would surely do so. Tufts like off-white cotton candy fled to the east, chased by roiling billows of dark gray and black. To the casual observer, it would seem that a storm must be in the offing. But to valley veterans, it wasn’t worth getting one’s hopes up.
Agnes was only vaguely aware of the drought that had spent the last seven years slowly squeezing the life out of the surrounding area. She dimly recalled hearing snatches of conversation about the subject during her stay in the convalescent home, and she understood that the condition must be severe, or else she wouldn’t be standing where she was—in the middle of a town that had laid at the bottom of a lake for nearly forty years. But that was the extent of it. To her, the drought was merely a piece of the puzzle, part of a bigger picture she couldn’t, and didn’t need to, comprehend.
Once the drought was in place, the town could be uncovered. Once the town was uncovered, she could wake from her long sleep. Once she’d awakened, she could bring all the players in this sordid drama back to the scene of their crimes. Once they were all there…well, she didn’t know what happened next. It wasn’t up to her. She merely had her part to play. Besides, she would find out soon enough.
She could see a vehicle driving toward her across the dry lake-bed, kicking up a trail of dust in its wake. She’d almost started to wonder if they were going to show, but somehow she knew they would. Orthlieb had too much to lose, and he was too eager to reassert control.
It was a late Sunday afternoon, early evening really, and Agnes had been out at the old town for nearly two hours now, making the long, halting walk out after taking a taxi to the former shoreline. She’d taken her time to explore, knees and hips complaining as she hunched beneath the police “crime scene” tape strung haphazardly between hastily-erected stakes, dried mud clinging to her shoes as she wandered about. There were several large mounds of dirt from a series of holes that had been dug. The holes lay patiently, like graves waiting to be filled.
For Agnes, each step brought with it another memory—here, the spot where she’d fallen from her bike as a child, garnering gravel burns that wouldn’t fade for years; over there, a lane where she’d strolled with her first boyfriend; a little further on, the bench where she’d collapsed in relief upon hearing that her brother was coming home from the war, safe and sound. There were other, far less pleasant memories as well, but she forced those aside.
When she saw the police tape, she knew they’d found Andrew, but she had to go look, anyway. The old water company cellar was just a mute hole in the ground now, scoured down to its foundation by searchers, the yawning space broken only by a few rusted pipes.
Those pipes…
The events of nearly forty years ago were as clear in her mind as if they’d happened yesterday. She’d turned away then, hoping the past could not yank free its chains from their moorings and come clanking, shambling after her. At least not yet.
Thunder rumbled again, rolling across the cracked lakebed; thunder, and something more, something deeper, a deep-throated growl that seemed to emanate from the earth itself. Agnes felt a first, tentative drop of rain. More followed, caressing soil that had lain untouched for too long.
She watched the vehicle, a Mercedes of some sort, draw close and come to a stop before her. She watched as the door opened, waiting for familiar faces, but only Orthlieb emerged. He gazed back at her with a combination of anger and curiosity.
“Where are the others?” she demanded.
“I tried to tell you, but you wouldn’t let me—Gavin moved away a long time ago; Carl refused to come.” said Orthlieb, holding up a hand to stop her protests. “And Ken is dead.”
Agnes knew she shouldn’t be surprised—after all, they were all so old now—and yet she was. She felt her mouth hanging open, but no words came to fill the void.
“I don’t know why I agreed to this, Agnes, but here I am. So what now? Do you harangue me for my sins? Lead a prayer for forgiveness? Try to blackmail me? What?”
“Doesn’t it bother you?” she asked, ignoring his questions. “Doesn’t it keep you awake at night? My God, you killed a man. Chained him up and left him there to drown. You killed...” She found herself fighting tears, even now, after all this time.
“What bothers you the most, Agnes? What I did? Or that it was your own brother who threatened to betray us? Or that you stood by and did nothing when he died? Or that you let it all happen because you stupidly fell in love with a married man who turned his back on you once you were no longer useful?”
“Shut up! God, you’re even more of a heartless bastard now.”
Orthlieb chuckled. “I could care less what you think of me. The only thing I care about is making sure that you don’t start causing trouble after all these years.” He was wearing a voluminous short-sleeved shirt, hanging un-tucked over his slacks. He reached beneath the shirt now, and his hand seemed to settle on something tucked in his waistband.
8.
Lightning forked above Frank Depp’s house, and the sky’s resistance suddenly faded, hesitant sprinkles turning to fat drops. The backyard group started grabbing items and moving inside before it got too wet.
Digger and Frank scurried back out to grab the last of the food but then just stood there, faces upturned to the sky. Digger started laughing, and Frank joined in; Digger danced around in a little circle, and Frank whooped. Finally, when they’d had their fill, they ducked back inside.
“Do you believe it?” asked Frank. “Do you believe it?”
“Un-fucking-believable,” grinned Digger.
“Look at you two, acting like a couple of ten-year-olds,” laughed Mindy.
“I’m going to get the kids from next door,” said Christie. “They probably think it’s fun to play in a swimming pool during a lightning storm.”
“Do you think it’s finally broken?” asked Digger.
“Don’t even say that,” said Frank. “You’ll jinx us.”
“Okay, then. Think it’s gonna last long?”
“Judging by the sky, I’d say so.” Through the window, a cape of gray and black hues surged overhead.
“Weird—there wasn’t anything in the forecast about rain.”
“Weather forecasters didn’t kn
ow a damned thing back when it actually used to rain,” said Frank. “Why should they know anything now?”
“You’ve got a point there. Man, just look at it.” The rain was pelting down harder now, appearing to rebound well back up into the air after striking the wooden deck outside Frank’s back door.
“Shit, I just realized—if this keeps up…” Digger’s voice trailed off.
“What?”
“I need to get out to the lake, get my ’hoe out of there. I left it where I was working last, right down by the waterline. It was pretty mucky there already. With this coming down, it’s gonna turn into a friggin’ bog.”
“You and Christie walked over here, didn’t you? Do you need a ride?”
“Yeah, if you could run me back to my house to get my car, that’d be great.”
“Oh, the hell with that. I’ll just take you out to the lake. We can take the Jeep. That way we can drive all the way out with no worries.”
* * *
By the time they reached the lake’s edge, it was raining hard enough that the wipers were having a hard time keeping up.
“Look at this. Man, I hope it rains for a week.”
“Let me get my ’hoe out first, then it can rain for a week.”
“You should be OK. We’re almost there and we’re not sinking in at all. I don’t—what the hell?”
Frank was leaning forward in his seat, eyes narrowed, straining to see through the downpour. Digger followed his gaze, and saw a vehicle parked ahead.
“Kids, you figure?” began Digger, but then he saw the make of the vehicle. Then he saw the figures pressed between sheets of rain.
Digger struggled to form another question, but before he could bring it to his lips, Frank had opened the door and stepped out. “Should’ve brought an umbrella,” Digger said to himself as he followed.
“What the hell are you doing out here?” Frank’s voice rose above the wind and wetness. “This is a crime scene. Can’t you see—” he stopped, mid-sentence and mid-stride, when he was close enough to see who he was addressing. “Christ, Henry, what are you doing out here? And who are you?” he asked, looking at a diminutive, gray-haired woman.
