Strangers

by Mort Castle

  “I think so, too.”

  “And I’m sure the girls had a good time at camp.”

  “Sure,” Michael agreed, “ghost stories around the campfire, canoe races and nature hikes. They probably got to weave a lanyard or a potholder in the crafts shop. Say, we’re talking about real adventures!”

  Beth laughed, then became serious. “You know, living in the suburbs, Marcy and Kim get a fairly narrow view of life…”

  “Uh-huh, know what you mean…”

  “So,” Beth continued, “I hope they met all kinds of different people at camp…”

  He was unprepared, for once completely off-guard. He took a drink of coffee and Beth said, “Maybe they learned that not everyone is the same after all.”

  The laugh corkscrewed up from the center of his chest. He tried to swallow, to smother the laughter, and could not. He coughed and gagged. Coffee sprayed from his mouth and his nose. Tears stung his eyes.

  Beth was on her feet, slapping his back. “Oh, I’ll get you some water.”

  Sputtering and choking, he gulped the water. Not everyone is the same after all—another volcanic laugh threatened to erupt and he struggled for control. Oh, Beth, not everyone is the same—I am not—and summer camp is the ideal place to learn that—I know. I did!

  Feeling as though there was a fuzzy tennis ball wedged between his tonsils, Michael croaked, “Wrong pipe.”

  “Okay now?”

  “Sure, I’m fine.”

  But the laugh kept trying to seep out of him, emerging as a clearing of the throat or a mock cough, and he was glad to get out of the house a few minutes later.

  When he was in the car, driving to Superior Chemical Company’s office in Oakwood—when he was alone—he at last had his laugh, fullblown and wild and true.

  Michael remembered summer camp, Camp Bethel, and Jan Pretre, and Alvin Burdell, Alvin, the very first.

  Michael Louden remembered when he was 12 years old…

  The screen door rasped like a parrot—Ahrkee—and the young man stepped into Cabin Three, the door clack-rattling shut behind him. He was tall. His black hair was trimmed in a neat flat-top. A hooked wrinkle connected his heavy eyebrows above his straight nose.

  The young man’s deep-set, dark blue eyes went down the row of beds and the boys assigned to them on the left, then up the rows on the right. He had responsibility for eight boys in all. He was a volunteer counselor at Camp Bethel, a Baptist church sponsored program that gave kids low cost fun and regular religious training.

  Michael thought the young man’s eyes spent a second or two longer on him than on the others, but he could not be sure. He would be careful. He was always careful.

  “My name’s Jan Pretre, guys.” The counselor had a deep and friendly voice. “We’ll be spending a lot of time together the next couple of weeks.”

  “Hi, Jan!” squalled the fat boy who had the bed opposite Michael’s. Michael had sat next to him on the bus ride. The fat boy was named Alvin Burdell. There was a huge, red-brown birthmark over his left ear that showed through the fuzz of his crew cut, and he smelled like cheese.

  “Howya doin’?” Jan Pretre nodded at Alvin. He told the boys that once they were unpacked, he’d take them down to the lake for a dip.

  After their swim, they had free time, and, after that, lunch. The camp director, Pastor Bill, spent so much time saying grace that the unappetizing food turned into barely edible cold lumps.

  That afternoon, a kid from Number Six punched Michael on the arm, a good one, knuckle out, twisting into the bicep. He was looking for a fight, but Michael did not fight back; he ran away.

  He never fought.

  Lights out came at nine o’clock.

  At midnight, Alvin Burdell’s crying woke up Cabin Three. Alvin had wet his bed.

  Steve Dawes, at thirteen the biggest and oldest Cabin Three camper, hollered, “You fat-guts! Stinking up the place!”

  “I can’t help it!” Alvin wailed.

  Michael lay on his back, not joining in the chorus that derided Alvin.

  Carrying a flashlight, Jan Pretre came in. He told them all to get back to sleep, that he’d take care of everything. He told Alvin that what had happened was “no big deal.” Anyone could have an accident, nothing to be ashamed of. Jan comforted the boy and assured him, “We’ll take care of everything.”

  Alvin Burdell had his accident three nights in a row.

  Steve Dawes decided they’d all better take care of “Fat-Guts.” He had a plan. If anybody snitched, he’d get it, too, but good.

  Michael stayed out of it as much as possible, saying and doing only what he had to do to keep Steve Dawes and the others from turning on him.

  On a free afternoon, Michael lay on his bunk, flipping through a Picture Stories From the Bible comic book, the only kind of comic permitted at Camp Bethel. The only other boy in the cabin was Alvin Burdell. He didn’t want to go out, didn’t want to be the “we’re stuck with him” clown in a softball or volleyball game or to go down to the lake for a “free swim” where “seeing how long you can keep Fat-Guts’s head under” was becoming the camp’s newest sports craze.

  When Jan Pretre stepped in, he said, “Hello,” to Michael—it made Michael feel strange. He wanted Jan to say more to him—to really talk to him—and he didn’t understand why that was so.

  But Jan Pretre went over to Alvin, sat down next to him, and spent twenty minutes talking with him, an arm draped over the fat boy’s shoulders. Michael could only hear a phrase now and then: “It’s okay. Don’t you worry. We’re friends.” Then Jan left and Alvin was grinning, scratching the lumpy birthmark over his ear.

  It was not until Sunday that Michael had his talk with Jan Pretre.

  It had been easy for Michael to slip away from the church service in Big Hall. There were a lot of kids, so the counselors couldn’t watch everyone. Michael knew how not to be noticed.

  Now he was lying down, hands folded under his neck. On the ceiling, in the comer, a spider had nearly completed a web and was shuffling from strand to strand. If Michael watched patiently, he might see a fly fall into the trap, see the struggle and the slow, certain conclusion.

  Then Michael heard the screen door and the hush and scrape of sneakers. Alongside the bunk, Jan Pretre stood over him.

  Michael sat up and scooted back, his spine curved to the wall. “Hi! I was just sitting here and thinking, you know…”

  “ Thinking? Shouldn’t you be with the other good boys in Big Hall, singing praise to Him from Whom all blessings flow?”

  “Sure,” Michael nodded. “I guess so…”

  “Oh yes,” Jan Pretre said. “You’re a good boy, aren’t you? That’s what you want them to think.”

  Michael felt a fluttery palpitation of his heart. He looked at Jan Pretre, wondering just who he was seeing. Then Michael said, “So I guess I better go on over to Big Hall…”

  Jan’s heavy hand on his shoulder froze Michael, stopped his flow of words.

  “No, you stay here, Michael,” Jan said quietly. “And don’t lie to me. Don’t. You don’t have to, you know.”

  Then Jan sat down, turned his head, fixing his serious blue eyes on him. The corner of Jan’s mouth rose but he was not smiling. “You said you were thinking, Michael. What is it you think about?”

  Warily, Michael replied, “Oh, you know… Just stuff, I guess.”

  “Like who’s going to win the World Series? Maybe a cute girl you’d like to take to the junior high sock hop? Whether a Chevy is better than a Ford?”

  “Sure,” Michael said. “Things like that.”

  Jan chuckled. “That’s a fucking lie and I told you not to lie to me.”

  Michael did not even see it coming. Jan’s slap was an explosion of heat on his cheek and a roar in his ear. He nearly tumbled off the bed, but Jan gripped his upper arm savagely and hauled him back up. He saw Jan through a kaleidoscope of tears.

  “What you really think about is how hard it is to fool them day after d
ay, to pretend you’re like they are.”

  “Huh?” Michael put on the stupid, big-eyed, mouth hanging face he frequently used at school. “I don’t get you.”

  Jan sighed. “You can bullshit them, Michael, but not me. Should I hit you again?”

  Michael cowered and waited, but Jan did not slap him. The counselor shifted his gaze to look through the screened window toward Big Hall. “Amazing Grace,” poured from the building, spreading over the camp like sluggish syrup, youthful voices ponderous and discordant.

  “They’re making noise so God will watch over them, protect them from the terrors of this universe He created. They live their foolish, frightened lives, praying that God, or the President, or the FBI won’t let anything hurt them. They’re nothing but shit, Michael, animated shit on legs, and they don’t mean any more than shit.”

  Jan turned his head. His eyes caught Michael and held him. “You hate them, you hate their fucking guts and you want them dead, all those whimpering, pathetic, nothing people.”

  Jan dropped his voice to a whisper. “Michael, you and I, we are the same. Do you understand now?”

  Daring to hope, Michael wanted to laugh or even to cry. So long alone, surrounded always by people whom he resembled but with whom he had no more in common than he did an alien from outer space… And now Jan Pretre was telling him…

  Wasn’t he?”

  He had to be sure, and he had to be cautious. Michael said, “Are you saying we’re friends?”

  Jan said, “You don’t want friends, Michael. You don’t need friends. Allies, Michael, different than they are, standing outside and above their moronic notions of right and wrong. We are Strangers…”

  “Strangers,” Michael said. Saying the word brought him a feeling of both excitement and contentment. A Stranger—that was what he had always felt himself to be!

  “And we are not alone, Michael,” Jan said.

  Michael’s heart pounded, speaking in code within his blood.

  “There are others, more now than there ‘ever have been. Oh, we’ll hide while we must. We’ll pretend. But the wheel is turning. And then, our time, the Time of The Strangers. Our Time!”

  “Yes,” Michael said, and he realized he was not using the voice of the one he pretended to be; this was his true voice.

  He had a question. “How did you know, Jan?”

  Jan barked a quick laugh. “I have eyes,” he said. “I can see.”

  Then Jan stood up. “We’ll talk again, Michael. I’ll tell you more, teach you.” He grinned and tousled Michael’s hair. “For now, just you be a good boy, right?”

  When Jan left, Michael stretched out on his back. He studied the intricate spider web overhead. He did not see any flies but the flies would come. Flies were created to be killed by spiders. The weak and the stupid were always the prey of the strong and the smart… Our prey. We are Strangers…

  And now, twenty-three years later, and The Time of The Strangers was nearer, foreshadowed in newspaper headlines and despairing sociological studies.

  Michael Louden anticipated the promised Time with the voracious joy of a shark about to feed, felt it great within him as he parked the LTD in his numbered slot in Superior Chemical Company’s lot.

  He took the elevator to Vern Engelking’s office, the office of his ally, his boss, a Stranger.

  The green glowing readout of the digital clock radio clicked from 9:30 to 9:31. Lying on his bed in his clothes—he hadn’t bothered to undress last night before passing out—Brad Zeller was wide awake. He had been since seven, not moving, eyes open, wondering occasionally where the room’s darkness left off and the ceiling began. He knew the ache in his head would continue until he drank it away.

  Dusty’s habit was to wake Brad with a whine and a paw at seven o’clock. That had not happened today.

  There was a click-jump at 9:32. Brad Zeller said aloud, “I can’t just lie here all day, can I” No one answered him. It took another five minutes, but he groaned himself into motion and went to the bathroom.

  Then, in the kitchen, he drew the tan drapes of the sliding glass patio doors. The glaring sunlight in the back yard increased the intensity of his headache. He squinted, trying to believe the feeling that, any second, Dusty would come around the side of the house, press his nose to the window, wanting to come in.

  No, that was goddamned stupid. Dusty was gone; he felt that. The cop he’d spoken to when he’d telephoned last night was an okay guy, telling him that most dogs that were lost in Park Estates usually got found, but Brad considered that only official optimism.

  Brad decided he ought to eat something. Sure, a hearty breakfast to get the day going—going nowhere, as usual. He thought about a morning eye-opener, but rejected it. Okay, he drank, did some heavy juicing in fact, but that didn’t mean he was a booze-hound. Hell, he never touched anything until noon, and then, only beer until evening. Liquor helped him get by—and who didn’t need something in this screwed up day and age?

  Brad started a pot of coffee and put cornflakes in a bowl. He poured milk on the cereal, but, sitting at the table, he got a warning from his nose when he raised the spoon; the milk had soured. He dumped the mess down the garbage disposal, spilled the remainder of the milk carton after it, and washed it down with cold water.

  He opened the cabinet beneath the sink to throw away the carton. The plastic bag in the trash bucket was nearly full. He stuffed the carton in, squeezed it down, and yanked the white plastic liner from the container.

  Carrying the tied trash bag, he stepped onto the patio in his bare feet. The humid heat triggered a wave of nausea. He walked toward the back of his lot where he kept the garbage.

  From twenty feet away, he heard the high-pitched drone of the flies. There was a light wind at his back, so the odor did not come to him until he’d gone a bit farther.

  He’d never smelled anything quite like it, yet he knew what it was, somehow, knew what it had to be. The smell was of death, death and the aftermath of death as heat speeded the process of putrefaction.

  Brad shuffled into the stink. He was close enough now to see—and he had seen. The black and white fur, the precise shape of paw pads. The cover of the garbage can was slightly raised. Between the lid and the can, the dog’s rear leg projected stiffly.

  The flies were brazen, clinging to the top of the can when he lifted it; their green-blue bodies were as bright as Depression glass.

  If it weren’t for the smell, Brad would have thought the moment unreal.

  Dusty lay on mounds of garbage inside the container. The dog’s head was craned impossibly far back as though he’d been frozen while trying to howl the moon out of the sky. Dusty’s tongue protruded, black and swollen.

  Brad dropped the bag of kitchen trash. It split open. What a mess, Brad thought; now I’ll have to pick that all up.

  Then he thought: Dusty is dead and for more than a minute, that was all he could think.

  Then he turned and staggered to the house. He had a quick shot of Imperial, felt its promise and needed more and had another.

  He telephoned the Park Estates Police. “I found my dog, Dusty,” he said. “He’s dead.” He felt the sweat like ice on his forehead, the flash of tears that were also so cold. “He’s dead and someone…someone killed him.”

  — | — | —

  FIVE

  SOMETHING WAS going to happen…something wrong. Claire Wynkoop knew that, felt it now as she had all day. Unable to relax, she sat stiffly on the bentwood rocker on the screened-in back porch and tried to ignore the promise of the premonition that teased her mind.

  On her lap lay an open book, I See Tomorrow’s Forevers, a choice of reading matter that she considered ironically appropriate: an “as told to” autobiography of an alleged psychic. This particular self-proclaimed prophet received her impressions of the future by gazing into a glass doorknob.

  Thirty atrociously written pages had convinced Claire Wynkoop, the town of Belford’s librarian, that Tomorrow’s Forevers
was “Today’s Tripe,” definitely not a book for library purchase; the review copy would be returned. Claire considered most of the “studies” of the paranormal to be sheer nonsense, or worse, malicious frauds to generate new fears for the already fearful.

  Claire closed the book. Just above the nape of her neck was a pulsing ball of tension and, in the center of her skull, a feeling she could describe only as “an itch impossible to scratch.” There was, too, the vibrato of a single, high-pitched note ringing in her ears, the constant sound that had been amplified in the day-long stillness of the library.

  Symptoms of her hypertension or perhaps an adverse reaction to the new prescriptions meant to lower her blood pressure? She could not deceive herself. All the premonitions she’d experienced in her sixty years—Not that many but every one was one too many!—had been heralded by her feeling this way, the way she did now.

  She tipped back her head. Though Claire Wnykoop’s hair had made the transition to snowy white a decade earlier, she was a woman who wore her age well. Her neck was neither wattled nor excessively wrinkled, and the lines bracketing her mouth were friendly, indicating she’d spent more time smiling than scowling. She prided herself that weight was not a factor contributing to her high blood pressure; she was no heavier at sixty than she’d been at twenty, and while she granted that some of her pounds had “relocated themselves,” she carried herself with the erect dignity of one who’d gone to school at a time when posture was a vital part of the elementary curriculum.

  Claire’s eyes, however, were not what they had once been, so she peered at the western sky through the upper lenses of bifocals. The isolated puffs of white cloud, the fine, golden ball of sun against the tranquil blue, made for a peaceful scene, so lovely that it was hard to accept that something bad was on Fate’s calendar.

  It was. She knew that. What? When? She didn’t know yet. Nor did she have any guarantee of clear, comprehensible answers; often her visions were vague, as though she were seeing abstract-impressionist paintings in motion. It was only rarely that a premonition jumped into three-dimensional focus.