Rockinghorse (15 page)

And the tapping had a voice.

“Here,” the voice said. “Now. Back. Let me in.”

Lucas woke up, drenched in sweat, even though the night was pleasantly cool, with a light breeze. Lucas sat up in bed. Had he been dreaming the tapping, the voice? Surely he had. Then he heard it once more. He listened. Slipping from the bed, Lucas dressed quietly and quickly and opened his nightstand drawer, taking out his pistol. He eased down the dark hall.

The tapping grew louder as he got closer to the kitchen. The voice came to him, but it was muffled, and he could not make out the words. They seemed to be coming from far away. He jacked a round into the chamber of the .45 as the tapping and the muffled voice became more intense, somehow demanding, suddenly insistent. Lucas paused, shifting the pistol and wiping his sweaty right palm. He once more gripped the butt of the .45 in his right hand.

He stepped into the dark kitchen. It was the door. The tapping and the muffled voice were coming from outside, on the veranda, behind the kitchen door leading to the outside. The smell of fresh earth came to Lucas, assailing his nostrils.
Earth?
And something else . . . some medicine-like smell. Through the curtains, Lucas could make out a form. It looked like a man.

“Back,” the voice said, much more clearly now. “Here. Wrong.”

Wrong?
Lucas thought. What is here? Back? What does that mean?

“Who is it?” Lucas whispered hoarsely.

“Back. Here. Wrong.”

Then the tapping picked up in rhythmic intensity.

“What do you want?” Lucas called softly.

“You.”

The tapping stopped. The form stood patiently behind the door.

The smell of fresh earth was much stronger.

Lucas cocked the pistol. Putting his left hand on the door knob, he slowly turned it.

He jerked open the door.

He fought back a scream of protest.

Ira stood on the veranda. He was dressed in a cheap dark blue suit, white shirt, and dark tie. He was naked from the waist down, his feet bare. He was covered with dirt and bits of grass, and a yellowish fluid dripped from his nose and mouth. Ira opened his mouth and grinned at Lucas through bloodless lips. He opened his eyelids.

His eyes were gone.

Ira held out his arms and opened his hands, the fingers wriggling. A foul odor sprang from the dead man's mouth.

Lucas screamed and raised the pistol, emptying the. 45 in Ira's chest.

“It was a dream, Lucas,” Tracy said, holding his head against her breast. “It was a dream. Nothing more.”

“It was no dream, Trace,” he said. “Look on the veranda floor.”

Tracy looked and felt sick to her stomach. Bare muddy footprints were visible on the painted wood of the veranda floor. A yellowish stain led off the veranda, the steps staggering ones, disappearing in the yard.

“What . . . what is that stuff?” she asked, pointing to the stains.

“Fluid from his body, I suppose,” Lucas replied, a weary tone to his voice. “Now do you believe me?”

She could not deny that something had certainly been on the veranda. But what? “Yes,” she said quietly. “I believe you. I don't want to, but I do. Lucas, give it up. Let's go home.”

“No.” He shook his head. “I won't be driven out of here. But I want you and the kids out of here. If you won't go back, then we'll send the kids to stay with friends. How about that?”

“We can't go,” Jackie spoke from the door leading into the kitchen.

Lucas and Tracy looked at her. Johnny stood by her side. Both of them wore very serious expressions. They were scared, badly scared by the events of this night, but they stood firm.

Johnny said, “Kendra said that if we go they will win, and the only change will be for the worse.”

“They?” Tracy asked.

“The bad guys,” Johnny said, and Lucas fought back a hysterical laugh at his terminology. “Anna told me that the only way she and her friends could ever leave this place, the woods, was if those belonging to the Brotherhood were defeated.”

“What
are you talking about?” Tracy blurted, looking from brother to sister.

“Why didn't either of you tell me all this when I was questioning you earlier?” Lucas asked. “What else are you holding back?”

“We didn't tell you because we didn't remember it,” Jackie said. “And I don't know what we're holding back. Randolph said it would be like this. That we would recall only what is important and necessary at the time.”

“I don't believe any of this,” Tracy said. “I just don't.”

She was ignored.

“We can't go, Dad,” Johnny said. “I think what we're doing is more important than our personal safety.”

“That is very adult thinking, Johnny,” the father said.

“I think maybe some of the Woods' Children said that, and I'm just repeating it.”

Lucas looked at his wife. He could tell she was on the ragged edge of tears. He felt like crying himself. Maybe he would. Then he shook his head. He looked at the loaded .45 pistol on the table in front of him, and suddenly felt ten years older. At least. Lifting his eyes to his children, he asked, “What do either of you know about something called the Brotherhood?”

“Nothing,” they both said.

Jackie said, “At least not at this moment. Maybe they told us something about it, but it just isn't time for us to tell you.”

Lucas felt totally helpless. Tracy put her face in her hands and began weeping softly. “Goddamn it,” she said through her tears. “Are we going to start taking orders from our kids, Lucas? I swear to God, if this continues I'll be in the nut ward someplace.”

Jackie came to her mother's side and put her arms around her. Mother and daughter hugged each other. Jackie said, “We can't go, Mom. We just can't. We know you don't understand, 'cause
we
don't really understand. But please trust us—OK?”

“I trust you, baby,” Tracy said. She lifted her eyes to her son. “Both of you. But you're right. I don't understand any of this.”

I don't either, Lucas thought. And God help me and my family, but I'm staying. I refuse to be driven out. Then he had to force back a sarcastic laugh as an old song from out of the '60s came into his mind. Who sang that? Yeah—Jumpin' Gene Simmons.
“Haunted House!”

* * *

“Sorry about your brother, Lucas,” Kyle said, shaking hands with Lucas on the front porch. “I'm really sorry it had to go down this way.”

“Thank you, Kyle. I know you mean that. But, in a way, I'm glad it's over.” He cut his eyes and looked at the woman standing just to Kyle's left and slightly behind him, as if for protection. “And this is? . . .”

“This is my wife, Louisa.”

Lovely, Lucas thought. Just perfectly lovely. As he nodded and smiled and took her hand, Lucas thought that if ever there was a model for a gypsy, it was Mrs. Cartier. A very petite lady, no taller than Jackie, maybe even a half-inch shorter. Dark eyes, dark hair, and a beautiful olive complexion.

“Now I can see why Kyle's been hiding you from us, Louisa,” Lucas said. “You are a very beautiful woman.”

Louisa blushed gracefully and Kyle said, “Now you've done it, ol' buddy. You've spoiled her for sure.”

She cocked an eye at her husband, and then socked him on the shoulder with a very respectable blow from a balled right fist. It actually staggered the big ex-SEAL.

“You are looking at an abused husband, Lucas,” Kyle said, as he rubbed his shoulder. He grinned at his wife.

Tracy and the kids stepped out on the veranda and were introduced. Louisa said, “Before we go into the house, please let us sit out here on the porch for a moment. If that would be all right,” she quickly added.

“Certainly,” Tracy said. Like her husband, she thought the small woman very beautiful. “Jackie, you and Johnny bring out the iced tea and the glasses. We'll get something a bit harder later on.”

Lucas looked at her and waggled his eyebrows. “Oh?”

That got
him
a sock on the arm.

“Oww!
Right on the tattoo. Don't you have any respect for art?”

Only Louisa did not laugh. She smiled a bit, faintly, but the humor did not touch her dark eyes. She said. “May I see that tattoo on your arm, Mr. Bowers?”

“Lucas, please. Surely.” He rolled up his short sleeve.

She inspected the tattoo and nodded her head. “Thank you very much,” she said formally.

“Have you ever seen one like that, honey?” Kyle asked her.

“Yes. It is very rich in detail, is it not? I have an old book on witchcraft and demonology at home. The likeness is in the book. The rocking horse is supposed to have the powers to turn one's worst fears into reality.” Her eyes touched both Lucas and Tracy, and she knew they had experienced that, but had no memory of it. Yet, she thought. “You have a gold pin, too, don't you, Lucas?” Her eyes said she knew perfectly well he did.

Lucas knew then the woman's powers went far beyond psychic abilities. It would be practically impossible to lie to her. Not that he had any intention of doing that. “Yes. I'll get it.” He was back in a moment and handed her the gold pin.

She inspected the pin closely, as Lucas had done when he first found it, then she closed her fingers tightly around the gold rocking horse. When she opened her eyes, they had changed expression—had darkened. But they were still unreadable.

“You may as well keep the pin,” she said, returning the rocking horse to him. “For you will never be able to rid yourself of it, no matter how hard you try.”

As Lucas gazed into her dark eyes, he felt as if he were being swallowed into their depths. He shook his head to clear it and said, “Oh, I can always throw it away.”

“It would only return,” she told him. Her eyes were once more normal size and coloration. And still unreadable.

“I can't believe that,” Lucas said. “No offense intended. I just think that would be impossible.”

Her smile seemed to gently and silently mock his words. “You shot to bits and pieces a wooden rocking horse here the other day, did you not?”

Lucas had been around psychics many times before; some legal offices even kept a psychic on retainer—although few would ever admit it—and their powers never ceased to amaze him. “Yes, I did. I tossed what remained of it on the garbage heap and set it afire this morning.”

“It did not burn, and what you placed in the garbage is no longer there,” she bluntly stated.

Lucas smiled, conscious of Tracy and Kyle sitting very still, their attention riveted unwaveringly on the man and woman. “I'll make a wager on that, Louisa,” Lucas challenged.

“You'll lose,” she told him.

“Bet?”

“All right. But what shall we bet?”

Lucas thought for a few seconds, then smiled. “If the remains of that rocking horse are not on that smoking garbage heap, Kyle and I will do the dishes this evening.”

Kyle grunted. “Where do you keep the dishwashing liquid, Tracy? Me and big mouth are about to do the Ivory Soap test.”

The rocking horse was gone. And in the bright light of the Georgia afternoon, all could see that the fire had not touched the rocking horse that had been tossed.

The flames had burned all around the garbage pile; they still smoked. But not where the broken horse had been. Its outline gave mute testimony to that.

Lucas stood in silence, staring at the trash heap. Then, succumbing to what he hated to hear grown men do, he said, “Somebody stole it.”

“Oh, Lucas!” Tracy said. “You sound like some silly little boy.”

“No one stole the rocking horse, Lucas,” Louisa corrected. “But it will be back.”

“I don't want the damn thing to come back!” he said irritably.

“You didn't want Ira to return either, did you?” Louisa countered. “But he did, didn't he?”

“Something did,” Lucas admitted, not really wanting to relive that awful memory.

“Yes. Something did.”

“Ira
returned?” Kyle blurted, a confused look on his face. He had been at his fishing camp, out of touch.

Briefly, Lucas brought the Georgia Highway Patrolman up to date.

“Did you report . . . ah, the sighting?” Kyle stumbled over the word. Then he blurted, “Jesus Christ! ”

“Not.”

Louisa looked at her husband. “He might be able to help,” she said softly, causing all eyes to swing toward her. “But I should imagine it will be mostly up to us.”

“Us?” Kyle said.

“Yes. We are now a part of it,” Louisa explained.

“Wonderful. I can hardly wait.”

“Oh, it will not be a long wait,” his wife assured him.

The small gathering had cooked ribeyes on the grill in the back yard, had baked potatoes, devoured a fresh green salad, and the adults had all had just a little bit too much to drink. Even Louisa had seemed to unwind a little, smiling more and visibly relaxing. The petite woman had a surprisingly sharp sense of humor, and despite her lack of formal education—she had left high school at sixteen, the taunting of the other children and of more than a few so-called adults as well driving her out—was extremely intelligent and very well read.

Kyle had told Tracy and Lucas that his wife's I.Q. was very high—over 160—and that she had taught herself to speak Spanish and French. But it worried him that she had so few friends.

Jackie and Johnny were both tired and had gone to bed right after dinner. With much vocal supervising, Kyle and Lucas had washed the dishes. The four of them now sat on the veranda, having coffee and talking.

“Well, honey,” Kyle said. “You've been wanting me for years to bring you to the Bowers' place. Now that you're here and have looked around some, what do you think?”

Louisa was silent for a short time, staring out into the darkness in front of the house. No other lights could be seen, and the night lay like soft dark velvet over the land. “It's too soon for me to say,” she finally spoke. “I feel . . . many things hovering around me. Tomorrow I would like to explore all the rooms of the house.”

“Very mysterious lady,” Kyle grinned his remark.

Her eyes touched him in the darkness, wiping the grin from his lips faster than an eraser on a blackboard.

“It's evil,” Tracy said, surprising Lucas by stepping so far out of character.

Louisa glanced at her, her dark eyes seeming to bore into the other woman's brain. “I see. And when did you choose that word to describe this house?”

“About a minute ago. To say I've been forced into some radical thinking changes over the past month would be putting it mildly.”

“No doubt,” Louisa said. “And you're right, of course. The house is evil. It holds many dark secrets and is a friend to none of us. Tomorrow, with your permission, I should like to begin seeking out those secrets, exposing them to light.”

All of them suddenly felt something clammy touch their skin, the sensation lasting only a moment before vanishing into the night.

“Sure. But I can't say I'm looking forward to it,” Tracy replied. She rubbed her bare arms. For a moment she had had the feeling that a roach was crawling on her flesh.

“Nor I. But it's the only way.”

“When do we start telling ghost stories?” Kyle said with a nervous laugh.

“We're living one,” his wife replied.

No one laughed.

Lucas glanced at Kyle. “Kyle, have you ever heard of something called the Brotherhood?”

The man was thoughtful for a moment. “Now that you mention it, yeah, I think I have. Now where have I heard that?” Once again, he was silent, deep in thought. “Yeah,” he said very softly. “Now I remember. My dad—no! My granddad. Now what did he say? Oh, yeah. You see, my granddad was sheriff of this county for a long time. He told me once that . . . let me get this straight in my mind. He told me that compared to the Brotherhood, the KKK was a bunch of angels. I asked him what he meant, and he said he hoped to God I never had to find out for myself.”