Midnight Grinding (24 page)

Nervously, he raised his fist and knocked on the doorjamb.

At first he didn’t think anyone was going to answer. Then a form emerged from out of the gloom. “Can I help you?” asked a feminine voice with a soft southern drawl.

Ted stared at the woman on the other side of the door and, at first, the mesh of the screen caused an unnerving illusion. For an instant it was like looking at a freeze-frame of a grainy black-and-white film. A frame of a buxom blonde, minus the sunglasses and fifties clothing. The resemblance was uncanny, almost frightening.

“Fawn?” blurted Ted, even though he knew that the woman couldn’t possibly be the one he had come to see. She was too young; a little older than him, maybe twenty-six or seven. And her hair wasn’t platinum, but a more natural shade of strawberry blond. But the eyes were identical to Fawn’s, and that mouth! There certainly was no mistake that it had been derived from the same voluptuous gene pool.

The girl smiled. “No, but I’m her daughter, Lori,” she said. She stared at him for a moment, waiting. “Uh, can I do something for you?”

“My name’s Ted Culman,” he said, still stunned by how much she looked like Fawn. “I’m a big fan of your mother. I wonder if I could talk to her for a minute, if it wouldn’t be too much trouble?”

The smile faltered on Lori’s face and she looked a little sad. “I’m sorry, but that’s impossible.”

“Please,” said Ted, sensing that something was wrong. “Just a couple minutes and I—”

“You don’t understand,” said Lori Hale. She hesitated for a moment, her eyes full of pain. “My mother…she’s dead. She passed away about a year ago.”

Ted felt as if someone had sucker-punched him in the gut. “Oh no,” he muttered. “But…how?”

“Cancer,” she told him.

Ted took a step back, his face pale. For a moment he felt as if he might pass out.

He heard the girl unhook the screen door and open it. “Are you all right?” she asked, concerned.

“I…I don’t know,” he said truthfully. Even though Fawn Hale had died in practically every movie she had been featured in, Ted had a difficult time accepting the fact that she was actually dead in real life. “Could I sit down somewhere for a minute?”

“Sure,” said Lori. “Come on inside.”

Ted accepted her invitation and was soon sitting on a threadbare couch in a dusty parlor. The room was decorated with antique furniture, and the walls alternated between old family photographs and glossy 8x10 stills of Fawn in her prime, most of them showing off more her teeth and tonsils more than anything else.

When some of the color had returned to Ted’s face, the young woman seemed to relax a little. “Are you sure you’re okay?” she asked again.

“Yeah,” replied Ted. “I was just surprised, that’s all.”

“And disappointed, too,” said Lori. “I see it in your face. Just how far did you come to see my mother?”

“San Diego,” he said.

“California? No wonder you’re so upset.” She started toward an adjoining hallway. “I’ll go to the kitchen and fetch us something to drink. I just fixed a pitcher of iced tea. How does that sound?”

Ted’s throat felt parched. “Great,” he replied.

A minute later, Lori returned with a tall glass of iced tea in each hand. When she entered the room, Ted couldn’t help but admire the girl’s figure, clad only in a halter top and a pair of denim cutoffs. She possessed practically the same body that her mother had in her youth: perfectly formed breasts, graceful hips, and long, muscular legs.

Lori seemed to sense his attention, but didn’t seem to mind. She sat down next to Ted and slipped a cold glass in his hand. “There you go,” she said. She watched as he gulped several swallows of tea. “So you were a fan of Mama’s?”

“Yes,” said Ted. The tea was a little strong for his taste, but it seemed to calm him down. “I have about every film she ever made on video.”

“Really?” asked Lori, impressed. “Even
Demon Conquerors from Mars?”

Ted laughed. He knew the film she was talking about. It was a dreadful science-fiction flick made on a shoestring budget of two thousand dollars and featured some really horrendous special effects, such as a sinister robot constructed from an oil drum, and a magnified iguana attacking a shoddy model of a small town. If there was one shining point about the movie, it was the appearance of Fawn as an unsuspecting diner waitress who falls victim to the Martians and their oversized lizard.

“I do have that one,” he said.

“That was one of my favorites,” said Lori. She smiled. “You know, I do appreciate you coming. Mama would’ve appreciated it, too.”

“I’m just sorry I couldn’t have met her,” he said. Ted thought of the way he had exploited the actress in his own sleazy fantasies and suddenly felt ashamed.

“She would have enjoyed talking to you,” Lori told him. “She liked talking about her career.” A strange expression surfaced in the woman’s eyes. “Well, most of it, that is.”

Ted drank his tea, a question suddenly coming to mind. He wondered whether he should ask it or not, then figured it was safe to do so. “Exactly why did your mother retire, Lori? I’ve read about everything I could dig up on her, but I’ve never been able to find out the reason.”

Lori avoided his gaze at first. “There was a scandal.”

“Scandal?”

“Yes,” she went on. “It happened during her last picture,
Night of the Jungle Zombies
. They had finished up a day’s shooting on location near Los Padres National Park. It was after dark and Mama was walking through the forest back to her trailer. Before she got there, someone jumped out of the shadows and attacked her.” Lori paused for a moment.

“She was raped.”

Ted couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “Did she know who it was?”

“Yes, although she never told anyone,” said Lori. “It was a bit player in the picture. A guy by the name of Trevor Hall.”

“Trevor Hall,” repeated Ted. The name sounded familiar, but Ted had difficulty matching it with a face. There had been hundreds of bit players in the industry back then, some only lasting a picture or two.

Lori stared at Ted for a long moment, watchful. Then she continued. “After the attack, Mama found out that she was pregnant,” said Lori. “She decided to leave Hollywood and come home, to this house that once belonged to my grandparents. She had dreams of going back to California and taking up where she left off, but she never did. I was born and that was the end of it.”

“Oh, I see,” said Ted. He raised the tea glass to his lips, but it seemed strangely heavy in his hand. “You know, it wasn’t your fault,” he assured her. “It was that Hall jerk who screwed it up for her.”

Anger suddenly flared in Lori’s eyes. “My father was never as bad as folks made out,” she snapped. “He was just…misunderstood.”

Ted was surprised. He couldn’t understand the outburst, especially considering what the man had done to her mother. Ted couldn’t figure out why he was beginning to feel so exhausted, either. He guessed the long drive was catching up to him.

Almost as quickly as her anger had surfaced, it was gone. She smiled, eyeing him in that odd, attentive way of hers. “You haven’t told me about yourself, Ted,” she said. “What do you do for a living?”

Ted’s head began to swim. His eyelids felt heavier than lead, as if they could hardly stay open. “Uh, what did you say?” he asked.

“I asked what you do for a living,” she repeated. Her smile was fixed, unwavering.

Ted had to think for a moment before he could answer. “Nothing yet,” he said. His words seemed to flow as slowly as molasses. “I’m still in college.” He looked over at Lori. Two of her wavered before his eyes. “What do you do?” he asked softly.

“I make movies,” she said.

Before he knew it, Ted could no longer sit up. He slumped forward and rolled off the sofa, onto the parlor’s hardwood floor. He looked up at Lori, expecting to see a look of alarm on her pretty face. But it wasn’t there. Instead, there was a peculiar look of satisfaction.

“I make movies,” she repeated, as if making sure that he had heard. “Just like my mother.” Her smile broadened a little, curling wickedly. “And my father.”

Then her face turned into a blur and faded to black.

***

Ted was in the midst of a dream. One of the dreams that starred Fawn Hale.

He was on a big round bed that seemed to take up the entire room. He was naked, except for his glasses. Even then, his vision was a little hazy, like a camera fitted with a soft-focus filter.

The mattress sagged a little as someone joined him. It was Fawn Hale, also naked, her platinum hair gleaming in the harsh glare of a klieg light. She wore the sunglasses she had worn in
Curse of the Swamp Monster
, the ones with the white frames. The lenses were pitch black. Impenetrable.

Without a word, she crept across the bed toward him with the predatory grace of a cat. He moaned when she reached him and her flesh touched his. A tiny grin crossed her lips as she moved over his midsection and mounted his hips. Ted stared up at those wondrous breasts. They stared back at him, transfixing him, like the eyes of a Svengali.

Fawn purred deep down in her throat, then lowered herself. Ted groaned. They joined effortlessly.

The platinum-haired beauty seemed to ride him forever, her head thrown back, her huge breasts bouncing in time to the rhythm. Ted found himself to be powerless. He simply lay there and let the actress have her way with him.

Eventually Fawn could contain herself no longer. Her thighs tightened around his waist and her pace began to quicken. Ted felt himself begin to climax, too. The mounting pleasure in his groin seemed to clear his head a little and the sluggish, weighty feeling began to lift.

That was when he saw the black object at the far end of the bed. It was video camera on a tripod. Aimed straight at him and Fawn.

Ted remembered something Lori had told him.
I make movies.

Suddenly, he knew that he wasn’t dreaming.

And there was something else. Something that he had failed to recall before. Trevor Hall. He knew who he was now. Hall had not been a bit player, but a stuntman. A hulking stuntman big enough to play a convincing monster. And he had played them, too: werewolves, robots, swamp monsters. But that was not all that Ted remembered about Hall.

The stuntman had been a serial killer. In the early ’seventies he had been convicted of brutally raping and murdering several dozen women over the span of two decades. The evidence had been what had bought him a seat in the electric chair: an entire library of sixteen-millimeter reels Hall had filmed himself. Snuff films of those he had violated and slaughtered.

Ted stared up at the woman on top of him. He reached up slowly, his arms as heavy as concrete. He removed the white-framed shades. Lori’s eyes sparkled down at him. They looked as crazy as the photos Ted had seen of her father. Gleaming with a fiendish satisfaction that was a mixture of ecstasy and bloodlust.

He reached out for the platinum wig, but it was beyond his grasp. Lori leaned in closer, smiling. Her shoulder flexed as she brought her right hand from behind her back.

“Scream for me,” she whispered.

Ted felt the coldness of steel against his throat. He opened his mouth, perhaps to reason with her. But just staring into those lovely eyes and seeing the legacy of darkness that danced beyond them, Ted knew that any attempt would be futile.

As the edge of the knife stung his flesh, he braced himself and, regretfully, gave her what she wanted.

***

The images on the screen were color. Sharply defined, perfectly lit. The sound was minimal. The creaking of bed springs and the low murmurs of passion. There was no music. No soundtrack was necessary.

Lori Hale lay on the round bed, naked, her eyes glued to the television at the far side of the room. She watched as the image of a platinum-haired beauty straddled the hips of an overweight boy with brown hair and glasses.

She watched the scene unfold, slowly snaking her hand past the flat of her stomach to the cleft just beyond. Soon her fingers were at work, stroking.

The video—one of many—continued at a leisurely pace, finely orchestrated and leading toward a familiar finale. Lori watched as the woman reached beneath the edge of the circular mattress and withdrew a long-bladed butcher knife.

As the scene reached its climax, Lori found herself reaching her own. Her fingers worked furiously as she awaited the command she had given more times than she could remember.

Waves of ecstasy gripped Lori, washing through her, giving way to abandonment. Gritting her teeth, she clutched the bedcovers and felt the stiffness of dried blood in the fabric of the sheets.

Then she closed her eyes tightly and listened for the sound of the scream…

DEVIL’S CREEK

Several years ago, not far from where I grew up, folks were encountering some grisly discoveries in the forests and even off the hiking trails of one of the state parks. A few of the local dogs had been decapitated and their heads burnt as some sort of sacrificial offering. There was a lot of talk of devil worshippers and, for a little Southern town smack dab in the center of the Bible Belt, such talk can be mighty disturbing.

Even more disturbing was the fact that locals were believed to be responsible for the gruesome rituals. It could have been a friend or a neighbor…even one of their own kin. Eventually, the offerings stopped and the whole sorry business was forgotten. In a way, it was probably for the best. If some prominent member of the community had been linked to the practice of black magic and Satanism, the repercussions could have been devastating for such a God-fearing town.

The baying of Old Boone rang throughout the August darkness. It started deep down in the hound’s throat, escaping his gullet hoarsely and filling the backwoods hollows. A short silence followed, then another fit of triumphant howling was unleashed, heralding the end of that night’s lengthy pursuit.

Clinton Harpe grinned as he headed south though the black tangle of the Tennessee forest. The hound was closing in for the kill; he could tell by the frantic pitch of the dog’s voice. It wouldn’t be long before Old Boone treed the coon that had eluded them both for the better part of two hours. In his mind’s eye, Clinton could see the bluetick hound, lithe and lathered, stalking the shadowy woods like a pale ghost. The dog’s nose would be close to the ground and filled with the scent of its prey, its bright eyes peering into the darkness, eager for the first glimpse of furry movement shimmying its way up the trunk of a black oak or sourgum tree.

The hunter kept his ears keen. With the double-barreled shotgun tucked safely beneath his armpit, he scrambled down a slope of fragrant honeysuckle and hit the wet channel of Devil’s Creek running. Moonlight filtered through the heavy foliage of the surrounding trees, glistening on the surface of the brook, turning the rushing water into rippling currents of quicksilver.

Clinton wondered where he was at the moment, for that night’s coon hunt had taken him on a long and winding trek through the southern reaches of Bedloe County. It had been a while since he had traveled the heavy woods along Devil’s Creek. It was a land that possessed a dark past, a God-forsaken stretch of wilderness in the truest sense. Most folks preferred not to venture into its rambling labyrinth of blackberry bramble and dense woodland in broad daylight, let alone in the nocturnal hours following sundown.

If Clinton Harpe hadn’t been so caught up in the chase, he might have thought better than to plunge head-long into the dark forest, alone and without the company of others. But the fever of the hunt was within Clinton’s blood, the same as with Old Boone. He could no more halt his mad scramble through the darkness than the dog could put the brakes on his own instinctive nature.

Clinton thought of the history of Devil’s Creek as he moved onward. There had once been a small settlement of gypsy farmers a half mile further on, a tight-knit community of drab houses and barns built along the clearwater stream. As a group, they worked and associated solely with their own kind, living in what might be considered a commune of sorts. They were a swarthy race of people, dark of hair and eyes, as well as of character. Unlike their European counterparts, these gypsies were a brooding lot, as silent and somber as a granite tombstone. They did not sing or dance with the gaiety of those brilliantly-clothed vagabonds that most folks identified with the gypsy myth. When they came to the rural town of Coleman for their monthly supplies, they had walked the streets with an air of disdain and contempt, speaking only when necessary, then heading back to their farming community on the fertile banks of Devil’s Creek.

They were a religious people, although their devotion was completely opposite of what most folks’ spirituality consisted of. They belonged to an organization known as the Church of the Alternate Father. It didn’t take an educated man to figure out exactly who that alternate father was…Beelzebub, Lucifer, the Prince of Darkness. One only had to catch a glimpse of their place of worship to know that they were in league with the Devil. The steepled churchhouse was painted jet-black instead of pure dove white like most, and the high, peaked windows were darkly shuttered, bearing the blasphemous symbol of an inverted cross on each. It was said that on nights when the moon was round and high, the sound of chanting could be heard inside the shuttered building, soon followed by the aroma of burning flesh and the cries and moans of carnal acts being committed within. Every once in a while, a hunter’s dog would end up dead or a Coleman farmer would find a prized hog or cow slaughtered in its pen or pasture. In each case, only the head of the animal would be missing. The rest of the body was left, whole and intact.

Then, one night in 1938, the Church of the Alternate Father caught fire, along with most of the other buildings along Devil’s Creek. A good portion of the gypsy population died in the blaze, while the survivors scattered to the four winds afterward. Although it was never said out loud, most suspected that the fire had been set by folks whose tolerance of the blatant midnight rituals and wanton atrocities had finally reached its limit.

The legend did not sway Clinton in his quest for raccoon hide and meat, however. He continued on, splashing through the center of the creekbed, partly out of urgency, partly out of need to cool himself off. The summer night was sweltering and humid, despite the lateness of the hour. Clinton removed his hat, dipped it into the cold current, then dumped the contents over his head, nary a step of his long-legged stride faltering as he did so.

He was nearing the gathering of dilapidated, burnt-out buildings, when he became aware that Old Boone was no longer barking. Had he lost the coon? Whether he had or not, the dog would have still been howling to the high heavens. Clinton slowed his pace as he reached the edge of the forest, and it was a good thing that he did, too. He stopped stone still, hidden within the concealment of a heavy pine grove, and watched through the prickly boughs at what took place in the clearing beyond.

Dark figures gathered around the ramshackle hull of the long-abandoned church. It was difficult to make out their features, for the moonlight was all that illuminated them. They seemed to be dressed in hooded robes, similar to those worn by the Ku Klux Klan, though completely black in color. The shape and size of the mysterious forms varied. Some were men, while others appeared to be women and children. All were silent as they filed, one by one, through the open doorway of the fire-gutted structure.

A chill ran down the spine of Clinton Harpe, for he was sure that he was witnessing the ghosts of those who had worshipped there some twenty years ago. But such thoughts of haunting spirits vanished when he saw a group of men standing beneath a nearby tree. Old Boone was with them, jumping playfully, sniffing around as though he were among friends. “Good dog,” said a big fellow, crouching down. He hugged the hound close to him and scratched behind the bluetick’s floppy ears.

Clinton’s apprehension eased up at the sight of the man’s friendliness and he nearly stepped from the shadows to retrieve his misguided hound. But before he could, he watched in horror as the man grabbed the dog roughly by the ears, yanking the animal’s head back and bringing a yelp of startled surprise. Moonlight flashed on honed steel as the blade of a knife appeared, slashing horizontally across Old Boone’s throat, slicing deeply, drawing a fountain of dark crimson.

Shock gripped Clinton in its numbing grasp, followed by the heat of mounting anger. He was about to raise his twelve-gauge and confront the sadistic dog-killer, when he noticed that several of the robed men carried rifles and shotguns. He restrained his urge to step into view and watched the big man saw back and forth with the knife, slashing through the tender muscle of Old Boone’s neck, as well as the hardness of raw, white bone. Soon, the blade had completed its grisly work and the dog’s body fell away from its head. It dropped to its side on the summer grass, paws and tail twitching as the last of its lifeblood ebbed from the fatal wound.

Clinton felt a gorge of bile rising into his throat. He swallowed hard and fought off the nausea that threatened to overcome him. He watched as one of the men, tall and lanky beneath his hooded robe, turned and glanced his way. “Thought I heard something over yonder,” he said in little more than a whisper. His eyes glittered within the dark eyeholes, as he cocked the lever of a Winchester rifle and took a curious step toward the edge of the woods.

As quietly as possible, Clinton retreated into the darkness of the thicket. The last thing he saw before he turned tail and ran, was the big man heading for the old church house, holding the severed head of Old Boone by its ears.

***

The next morning, Clinton rode out to Devil’s Creek with Sheriff Boyce Griffin. They took the main highway out of Coleman, then headed down a turn-off that was little more than two rutted tracks of bare earth with weeds growing high in-between. It looked as though no one had traveled that lonely road in years, let alone the night before.

Clinton honestly believed that Boyce was making the trip simply to put his mind at ease. The sheriff was a good, level-headed man, an outsider who had moved into Bedloe County a few years ago and earned the respect of the local citizenry. He had been a deputy on the county force for a while, then was elected into the position of Sheriff when the previous constable, Taylor White, had died of a heart attack in 1952. Since then, he had proven himself to be a fair man and no one thereabouts had ever found cause to complain about the performance of his job.

They arrived at the charred ruins of the Devil’s Creek settlement around nine o’clock.

It was a beautiful day and the cleansing rays of the summer sun shone upon the burnt buildings and the surrounding land, easing the severity of the sinister events of the night before. Boyce parked his Ford patrol car next to the abandoned church. Then they got out and walked around a bit.

“Where’d you say this fella killed your dog?” asked the sheriff, prying specks of ham and eggs from between his teeth with a café toothpick.

“Over yonder, beneath that tree.” Clinton headed in that direction and Boyce followed.

When they reached the spot, there was nothing to be found. Hide nor hair of the bluetick’s body remained, not even a trace of blood on the grass. “This was where it happened,” swore Clinton. “This was where that bastard done in Old Boone.”

Boyce shrugged his beefy shoulders. “Well, no sign of the dog that I can see.” The sheriff eyed the lanky farmer with a trace of suspicion. “You sure you didn’t tie one on down at the Bloody Bucket last night and dream the whole thing up?”

Clinton was irritated by the insinuation. “I’ve had nary a drop since last weekend. I didn’t imagine what happened here last night, Boyce, and you know it.” Clinton knew for a fact that a strange rash of missing animals had hit Bedloe County recently: mostly lost dogs, but also a few stolen hogs and calves.

“I ain’t ready to believe all this bull I keep hearing about devil worshippers in Bedloe County,” Boyce told him flat out. “I know that it happened here once on Devil’s Creek, but that was pert near twenty years ago. And from what I’ve heard tell, all those gypsies either died in the blaze or left the county with their tails betwixt their legs.”

“Mind if we check out that church?” asked Clinton.

The lawman shrugged. “I ain’t got nothing better to do.”

They approached the black hull of the building that had once provided services for the Church of the Alternate Father. All four walls were intact, but the doors and windows had burned away, leaving narrow openings in the scorched building. They stepped inside the rickety structure and strolled amid the ash and debris. Most of the original pews stood upright, as well as the pulpit at the front of the building. The charred rafters of the great pitched roof stood starkly against the pale blue of the morning sky like the exposed bones of an enormous ribcage.

Once, on a morning very much like this, men hadpicked through the smoldering ruins of the church and removed the burnt bodies of those who had died while worshipping their profane master. Most were men who had been present the night before, men who had carried hatred in their hearts, as well as torches and gasoline cans in their hands. Clinton’s father, Wallace Harpe, had been among them, although he and a few others had only stood and watched, while the others ran through the little village, playing avenging angel and arsonist with the same self-righteous zeal.

“Don’t look like anybody’s been in this old church in a month of Sundays,” said Boyce, smiling faintly at his pun. “How many folks did you say you saw come in here?”

“Had to be at least two dozen,” said Clinton. He walked up the center aisle and halted before the podium. “Hey…come and take a look at this here.”