Dark Hollow (17 page)

Sliding into a raincoat and shoes, I then returned outside. The rain had slowed to a light drizzle, the storm’s intensity vanishing with Hylinus. Dale stepped out of his house, breathing hard and rubbing his shoulder where the rifle had kicked against it.

“You okay?” I asked.

“I’m too old for this shit.” He gasped, trying to catch his breath. “And Claudine. She was…”

He couldn’t finish. All that came out of his mouth was a high-pitched gobbling sound. Dale’s face was wet, and not just from the rain.

I put my hand on his shoulder, and he winced. A tear slid from the corner of his eye.

“I know,” I told him. “Tara was doing it, too. Best not to think about this right now.”

“How can I not? They were
enjoying
it, Adam!”

“No,” I said. “They were under its spell. That’s all. They didn’t know what they were doing. Tara would never willingly do something like that. Neither would Claudine.”

Even as I said it I realized that I wasn’t just trying to convince him. I was also trying to convince myself, because the alternative was unthinkable.

“The things it said,” Dale whispered. “How did it know?”

I shook my head. Tara’s voice mocked me.

I want to have his babies, Adam. The ones you give me are no good. You’re tainted. Weak. That’s why our babies died.

I clenched my teeth. “I’m going to kill that fucking thing.”

“How did this happen?” Dale asked. “Did you fall asleep?”

I hung my head in shame. “Yeah. I didn’t mean to.”

“I was in my den,” he said, “doing some more research on the computer. I didn’t even know Claudine had left the house until I heard you shouting for Tara.”

Shadowy figures rustled toward us in the darkness. Dale and I both jumped, but it was only Merle, Cliff, and Cory returning from their search.

“Find anything?” I asked.

“Nothing,” Merle reported. “The tracks lead to the alley and then stop. There’s a car parked over near the playground, so we didn’t go any farther.”

“Whose car?” Dale asked.

Merle shrugged. “I don’t know. Probably just some kids making out or something. The interior light was on, but the windows were fogged up.”

Dale turned to me. “Think they heard anything, or saw it?”

“Maybe,” I said. “Did any of you guys call nine-one-one?”

Cliff stepped underneath my gutters and lit a cigarette. “I didn’t. Was too busy throwing my jeans on.”

“Me neither,” Merle said. “I heard the gunshot and came running.”

“I was asleep,” Cory mumbled. “Didn’t know what the fuck was going on.”

I took a drag off of Cliff’s cigarette. “Could any of the other neighbors have called?”

“Stacy Ferguson works nights at the strip club,” Dale said. “And since she’s not home, I doubt Seth is home either. Probably out getting into trouble. Mrs. Jefferson’s ninety. Doubt she heard anything. And the Legerskis…”

He trailed off. Obviously Paul and Shannon hadn’t called the police.

“So what do we do now?” Merle asked.

Cliff sneezed. “How about we get out of this fucking rain?”

I started toward my door and Dale glanced at his house.

“I’m not leaving Claudine alone,” he said. “Not now. And we can’t go to sleep, either. You hear me, Adam? No sleep.”

“I’m sorry,” I apologized. “I didn’t mean to.”

He smiled. It looked fake. “It’s okay. I’m not blaming you. But we can’t let it happen again.”

“Believe me,” I said, “last thing I can do now is sleep.”

“Should we move Claudine and Tara into the same house?” Merle suggested. “That way we can all stick together. Keep an eye on things.”

“No,” I said. “Let them rest. They’ve been through enough tonight. I don’t think we should wake them if we don’t have to.”

Dale nodded. “I agree.”

“I’ll go with Dale, then,” Merle offered. “Cliff and Cory can stay with you and Tara.”

“Me,” Cliff said. “Cory still needs to sleep it off.” Cory nodded drunkenly. “Word.”

“You okay on my couch?” I asked Cliff. “I want to stay upstairs with Tara. But I’ll make us some coffee, and you’re welcome to watch movies or something.”

“Illiterate fucker can read one of your books,” Merle said, and we all laughed a little. It felt wrong, however, and the laughter dried up, followed by an awkward silence.

“Are we still going to LeHorn’s tomorrow morning?” I asked.

They all nodded, even Cliff.

We bade one another good night and went inside. While the coffee brewed I grabbed a towel for Cliff to dry off with and stowed the baseball bat back under the bed. Tara hadn’t moved. She snored softly, and the sheets rose and fell in time with her breathing. Big Steve lay pressed up against her. His eyes shone in the darkness. I patted him on the head and he licked my hand. Then I went downstairs.

Cliff had helped himself to a cup of coffee. He stood at the living room window and peered out the blinds, watching the rain.

I lit one of his cigarettes, inhaled, and coughed. The nicotine rushed through me, and I felt better.

“I appreciate this, man.”

He stepped back from the window and sat on the couch. “No sweat, brother. Sorry about scoffing earlier. Anybody tries to get at Tara, they’ll have to go through me.”

“So you believe now?”

Cliff propped his feet up on my coffee table. “I believe that there’s some weird shit going on, and I believe something scared the piss out of you guys tonight. I still don’t know if it’s a goat man. I need proof. More than those tracks.”

“You come with us tomorrow,” I said, “and we’ll find the proof.”

Neither Big Steve nor myself slept for the rest of the night. We lay there in the darkness and watched over Tara. Cliff stayed downstairs on the couch, drinking coffee and watching television. Snatches of old movies and infomercials drifted up the stairs. He came upstairs to piss once, and Big Steve timidly wagged his tail as Cliff passed by the closed bedroom door, but that was it for activity.

I rolled over to pet the dog. He looked at me with those big brown eyes and sighed. His normally soft fur was coarse, and as my hand passed over his flank I felt ribs instead of fat. I realized that while I’d been focused on Tara and myself, the weirdness and stress were affecting him as well.

“You’re a good dog,” I whispered. “You know that?”

He thumped his tail against the mattress, indicating that he did.

I scratched behind his ears the way he liked, and Big Steve leaned into it, tilting his head against my hand. When I was done he straightened and shook his head, jowls and ears flapping. Tara and I called it his helicopter impression.

Despite the commotion, Tara didn’t stir.

Her words kept running through my head. I tried to block them out, tried to forget the hurt they’d caused, but it was no use. I knew that she’d been under some kind of spell from the satyr’s pipe. That was why she’d done the things in the yard. I gritted my teeth, remembering the look on her face as she’d knelt in front of Hylinus and begun giving him a blow job. She’d never had that look on her face when she did the same to me. I was sure of it. But as painful as the images were, the words were worse. That taunting laughter as she’d spoken them, telling me it was my fault we’d miscarried, saying I was weak and the satyr—her lover—was strong. That hurt in ways the sex itself never would. It cut deep, and I knew the scars might never completely heal.

Just like the scars left behind by the miscarriages themselves.

I reached for her in the darkness, but pulled my hand away at the last moment. I wanted to hold her while she slept, but I was afraid to touch her. Afraid of
her
. Until then I’d no idea she could hurt me this way.

Around four in the morning the rain stopped. Eventually dawn arrived, but things seemed no brighter.

The dog snuggled up between us. I wrapped my arms around him and soundlessly cried into his flank. Gummy fluid leaked from the corners of his eyes.

Big Steve cried, too.

ELEVEN

The birds greeted the dawn outside our bedroom window. A garbage truck rolled down the street, its sputtering engine and the clang of the sanitary workers throwing trash cans around both loud enough to wake the dead. Daylight filtered through the blinds, bathing our pillows and the bedspread. Despite all of this Tara slept on. Big Steve remained sprawled out between us, all four feet planted firmly in my back, his claws poking my skin. He opened one eye and glared at me when I moved.

I got up, stretched, and rubbed my tired eyes. They felt like they’d been sandpapered. Big Steve stretched and jumped off the bed, following me. The mattress springs creaked, but Tara didn’t stir. I turned off her alarm clock so that it wouldn’t buzz when it was time for her to go to work.

Big Steve and I went downstairs. Cliff lay on the couch, aimlessly flipping through the television channels. He waved a greeting and I yawned.

“I’ve been thinking,” he said. “One thing’s for sure: You can get a good book out of all that’s happened so far.”

I thought about that. All fiction writers are semi-autobiographical when it comes to their work, and all fiction contains an ounce of truth. If a writer tells you that’s not so, they are lying. Characters share the same traits as those around us—and often ourselves. Situations mirror things we’ve gone through in real life. The names may have been changed, but it’s there. Sometimes this is a conscious decision. Other times we aren’t even aware we were doing that until the work is finished. But it is always there, the truth. This is called writing what you know.

I considered everything that had happened: the odd weather, Shelly and the satyr, the disappearances, what had happened in the yard last night. Or even before that: the miscarriages, and the sadness that had fallen over our home. Cliff was right: It would have all made a hell of a book.

But there was no way I could write it. Therein lay madness. In truth I wondered if I’d ever write again at all.

“I made more coffee,” Cliff said. “Figured we’ll need it.”

“You’re a gentleman and a scholar.”

Cliff grunted, his eyes not leaving the television. “A scholar’s somebody who’s smart. And a gentleman is a guy who can count all the hairs on a girl’s pussy without getting a hard-on. I’m neither.”

I started to laugh, but then I remembered the sound the satyr’s penis had made as it fell out of my wife’s mouth. Grimacing, I walked into the kitchen and poured myself a cup of coffee.

Big Steve went to the door, sniffed around, and then looked back at me.

“Hang on,” I told him, sipping coffee. It tasted good, and the effect onmy exhausted body andmindwas even better.

“Good coffee,” I called.

Cliff muttered his thanks.

I set the mug down, put Big Steve’s leash around his neck, and took him outside to pee. The satyr’s tracks were still in the yard. Big Steve smelled them, growled, and then began to bark.

“Hush,” I commanded.

Ignoring me, he growled louder.

“I know. It was here. Just like at Shelly’s house. But quiet down. You’ll wake up Mommy.”

Snorting, Big Steve lifted his back leg and pissed all over the tracks, covering them with his scent. Then he followed the hoofprints through the yard, his nose to the ground. Every few feet he’d stop and pee some more.

“Well,” I said, “at least you’re getting braver about it.”

We stopped when we reached the alley. The media circus was back, as were the cop cars. They were gathered around a car in the Fire Hall’s parking lot, a red Mazda with its interior light still on. The driver’s side door hung open, and there was blood splattered on the inside of the windshield—enough that I could see it even from my vantage point. A crow shrieked above us. I hurried Big Steve back to the house and went inside.

In the living room Cliff had settled on an old episode of
The Herculoids
, and he looked up from the television as we walked in.

“Dude.” He yawned. “I’m fucking tired, man.”

I didn’t reply.

“What’s wrong?” Cliff asked.

“What kind of car did you guys see in the parking lot last night?”

“You mean when we were searching? A red Mazda, I think.”

I poured dog food into Big Steve’s dish. “Turn on the news.”

Cliff flipped to the local news channel while Big Steve devoured his food in five huge gulps. After pouring myself a mug of coffee, I carried the coffeepot into the living room, refreshed Cliff’s mug, and turned back toward the kitchen to get mine.

Cliff said, “Shit.”

Pausing, I turned. The screen showed the parking lot out back, and the same red Mazda with an open driver’s door and a cracked, bloody windshield. Cliff thumbed the volume on the remote, and the announcer’s voice filled the room.

“Not too loud,” I cautioned. “You’ll wake up Tara.”

He ignored me, his attention fixed on the news report. A pretty blond reporter stood in the alley, right at the edge of our backyards, smiling for the camera even as she reported something ghastly.

“…apparently the victim of a homicide. Police say Michael Gitleson, of York, was killed sometime between one and three this morning. Missing is Gitleson’s companion, twenty-three-year-old Leslie Vandercamp, of Shrewsbury. The two were on a date.”

Cliff bolted upright. I almost dropped the coffeepot.

“Dude.” Cliff stared at me, his mouth agape. “Did she just say Leslie? Our Leslie, from the gas station?”

I nodded, unable to speak.

The newscaster continued. “Sources close to the case say they had just come from a movie at Regal Cinemas. Gitleson and Vandercamp were parked here in the lot behind the volunteer Fire Hall, next to a neighborhood playground. This is the same area where Shannon Legerski and Antonietta Wallace have disappeared in previous days. Yesterday York City detective Hector Ramirez named Shannon Legerski’s husband, Paul, as a suspect in both women’s disappearances. There’s no word on whether this morning’s horrific discovery is related or not, but some of the neighbors we’ve talked to are assuming it’s connected.”

They played a pretaped interview with old Mrs. Jefferson from down the street. It must have been filmed earlier. Then the blond reporter came back on-screen.

“Gitleson’s body was discovered this morning by an elderly couple walking their dog. Vandercamp’s whereabouts are still unknown, and police spokespersons have refused further comment. They also refused to confirm reports that the victim’s head was missing.”

“Holy mother of fuck.” Cliff slipped on his boots. “You said this thing—whatever it was—ran toward the alley last night.”

“Which would have put Leslie and her date directly in its path,” I said. “Hylinus couldn’t take Tara and Claudine, so he took Leslie instead.”

“Who?” Cliff looked confused.

“The satyr,” I explained. “Tara and Claudine called him Hylinus.”

I sank onto the recliner, still holding the pot. Hot coffee sloshed inside it. Big Steve trotted out from the kitchen and lay down at my feet. He looked troubled.

A smiling anchorman sitting in the studio replaced the pretty blond reporter. “Jennifer, is there any word on whether or not these cases are related to the additional disappearance of a fourth young woman, Shelly Carpenter?”

I stopped breathing.

The blond reporter, Jennifer, came back on-screen. “No word at this time, Ron. Apparently police weren’t informed that Carpenter was missing until early this morning. We have no further details at this time.”

While she was talking the camera panned over the bloody Mazda. Cliff and I stared at the screen, and I tried to catch a glimpse of Ramirez amongst the assembled throng of crime-scene investigators. I didn’t see him.

“They know about Shelly,” I said. “That means the cops will come here next.”

Cliff sipped his coffee. “Why’s that?”

“Because I stopped by her house yesterday to check on her. I talked to Shelly’s neighbor, and she knew who I was. Ramirez is sure to have talked to her already. Hell, she’s probably the one who reported Shelly missing. They’ll know I was there, and they’ll want to know why.”

“You were worried about her,” Cliff pointed out. “That ain’t no crime.”

I nodded. “Yeah, but not reporting what I knew might be.”

Cliff lit a cigarette. “Shit, man. It ain’t like you could tell them what you saw in the woods. You said so yourself.”

I stood up. Cliff and Big Steve both followed me into the kitchen. I put the coffeepot back on its burner and took a sip from my mug. It had already grown cold.

“What the fuck are we gonna do, Cliff?”

As if in answer there was a knock at the back door.

Cliff and I stared at each other, our eyes wide.

“Answer it,” he whispered, nodding toward the door.

“You answer it,” I said. “It might be Ramirez.”

He shook his head. “It’s your house, man.”

The knocking continued, loud and insistent, the kind that indicated the visitor was very anxious to have the door opened.

Swallowing hard, I turned the knob.

Merle stood in the open doorway, looking excited. His thin hair was askew, and his eyes were bloodshot from fatigue.

“You guys hear the news?” he asked.

“We’re watching it now. Have you or Dale been out back yet?”

“No. Dale thinks we should hit the LeHorn place before we go to the cops. Or before they come to us.”

“You heard about Shelly too, I take it?”

“Yeah. They know, so Dale figures it’s just a matter of time before Ramirez shows up. He said to tell you to get ready. Him and Claudine will be over in a bit.”

“How is she?” I asked. I was surprised to hear that she was coming over, let alone awake.

Merle’s face darkened. “She doesn’t remember any of it. Woke up complaining about a bad taste in her mouth, and an even worse headache. That’s about it.”

“So why are they coming over?”

“Dale thinks the women should stay home today. Claudine is too sick to go to work, anyway. If Tara refuses, Dale said we should tell her that we’re worried about their safety, now that there are four women missing and at least one murder. He said we can leave somebody here with them while the rest of us go to the house.”

It made sense to me. “Cliff and I will be ready.”

“Okay.” He turned away. “I’m gonna go get dressed. Need some coffee.”

Cliff left for his apartment as well to grab a shower and change clothes.

“Wake up Cory too, on your way back?”

“Will do.” He waved over his shoulder and departed.

After he was gone I went upstairs. Tara was still sleeping. I crawled into bed beside her and wrapped my arm around her waist. I breathed in her scent. My lips nuzzled her ear. Slowly she stirred.

“Morning, sleepyhead,” I said. “How do you feel?”

She opened her eyes, glared at the alarm clock, and then shut her eyes again.

“Like shit.” Tara groaned. “Headache. Nausea. Feel like I’m hungover. And I’m going to be late.”

“No work today,” I said, keeping my voice steady. “Leslie’s vanished, just like Shannon.”

She stiffened. “Oh, no…Leslie from the gas station?”

“Yeah. And there’s more.”

Tara rolled over and stared at me, blinking the sleep from her eyes. Her forehead wrinkled in concern. “What?”

“Leslie’s date is dead. Somebody murdered him. Right out back. They were parked next to the playground.”

“Oh, my God…”

“Dale and I want you and Claudine to stay home today, just to be safe. Okay?”

She groaned again. “Believe me, the way I feel, I’m not going to argue. Feel like shit. Going to call in sick, anyway.”

“I’ll get you some aspirin,” I offered. “Coffee, too.”

“Mmm.” Tara smiled. “I love you.”

“I love you too,” I said. And I did.

Then the image of her sucking the satyr’s cock came rushing back again.

You’re tainted,
she’d said.
Weak. That’s why our babies died.

I got up and left the room before Tara could see the expression on my face. I suppressed the urge to scream, to rant, to hit her, curse her, and curse Hylinus, Nelson LeHorn, God, and anyone else involved in this fiasco. I wanted to break something, felt like smashing my fist against the wall. But that wouldn’t help.

What would help us were answers. Answers from the LeHorn place, with any luck.

In the kitchen I poured Tara a cup of coffee, with an ice cube to cool it down, just the way she liked it. I tried to push the memories from my mind, but all I could see was my wife’s lips wrapped around that…
thing
. I closed my eyes and saw my dead baby’s eyes, still staring back at me from the toilet.

It’s your fault, Daddy. Your fault I died. You were supposed to keep me safe, but you didn’t. You couldn’t protect me, and you can’t protect Mommy either.

I collapsed to my knees and wept silently, conscious enough not to let Tara hear me. Big Steve walked over and pressed his cold nose against my cheek. I hugged him tight, afraid to let go. He was my anchor. My sanity. All I had left.

“Seems like all we’ve done the last twenty-four hours is cry,” I told him. “I’m sorry, buddy.”

He nuzzled me again, letting me know it was okay.

I hung on tight.

A half hour later we gathered together in my living room. Claudine and Tara looked like hell: dark circles under their eyes, hair mussed, skin pale. They sat together on the couch, clutching steaming mugs of coffee and squinting against the sunlight. Both were convinced they’d picked up the same bug, the suggestion made easy by the fact that there was indeed a flu bug going around town. They put up no argument when we suggested they stay together for the day, especially after we filled them in on Leslie’s and Shelly’s disappearances. Cliff, Merle, Dale, Cory, and I didn’t look much better. Hungover, Cory moved at a snail’s pace. The rest of us were tired and irritable from stress and lack of sleep.

While the girls talked, we stepped into the kitchen to go over the plan. Someone had to stay behind to safeguard Tara and Claudine, and we decided it should be Cory. He protested, but we explained how important his role was, how we were entrusting him with the safety of the women we loved, and how he’d better not fuck it up. Cory got very solemn after that, and promised us he’d do his best. In truth, I wasn’t too worried. Hylinus didn’t seem to be active during the day, and this way Cory wouldn’t annoy the rest of us once we were inside LeHorn’s house.