The Strain, the Fall, the Night Eternal (41 page)

The rest staggered out into the new night, excited into action by the presence of their Master. They stopped, staring at him in black-eyed awe.

Children.

Palmer—standing right before them, between them and the Master—was completely ignored. The force of the Master’s presence held them in abeyance. They gathered before him like primitives before a temple.

Mr. Fitzwilliam remained on his knees, as though struck down.

The Master spoke in a way that Palmer believed exclusive to his own ears.

You brought me all this way. Aren’t you going to look?

Palmer had beheld the Master once before, in a darkened cellar on another continent. Not clearly, and yet—clearly enough. The image had never left him.

No way to avoid him now. Palmer closed his eyes to steel himself, then opened them and forced himself to turn. Like risking blindness by staring into the sun.

His eyes traveled up from the Master’s chest to …

… his face.

The horror. And the glory.

The impious. And the magnificent.

The savage. And the holy.

Unnatural terror stretched Palmer’s face into a mask of fear, eventually turning the corners of it into a triumphant, teeth-clenching smile.

The hideous transcendent.

Behold the Master.

Kelton Street, Woodside, Queens

K
ELLY WALKED FAST
across the living room with clean clothes and batteries in her hands, past Matt and Zack, who were watching the television news.

“We’re going,” said Kelly, dumping the load into a canvas bag on a chair.

Matt turned to her with a smile but Kelly wanted none of it. “Come on, babe,” he said.

“Haven’t you been listening to me?”

“Yes. Patiently.” He stood up from his chair. “Look, Kel, your ex-husband is doing his thing again. Lobbing a grenade into our happy home life here. Can’t you see that? If this was something really serious, the government would tell us.”

“Oh. Yes, of course. Elected officials never lie.” She stomped off to the front closet, pulling out the rest of the luggage. Kelly kept a go bag also, as recommended by the New York City Office of Emergency Management, in the event of an emergency evacuation. It was a sturdy canvas bag packed with bottled water and granola bars, a Grundig hand-crank AM/FM/shortwave radio, a Faraday flashlight, a first-aid kit, $100 in cash, and copies of all their important documents in a waterproof container.

“This is a self-fulfilling prophesy with you,” continued Matt, following her. “Don’t you see? He knows you. He knows exactly which button to push. This is why you two were no good for each other.”

Kelly dug to the back of the closet, tossing out two old tennis rackets in her way, hitting Matt on the feet for talking like that in front of Zack. “It’s not like that. I believe him.”

“He’s a wanted man, Kel. He’s having some sort of breakdown, a collapse. All these so-called geniuses are basically fragile. Like those sunflowers you’re always trying to grow out along the back fence—heads too big, collapsing underneath their own weight.” Kelly sent a winter boot out, flying near his shins, but this one he dodged. “This is all about you, you know. He’s pathological. Can’t let go. This whole thing is about keeping you close.”

She stopped, turning on all fours, staring at him through the bottom of the coats. “Are you really that clueless?”

“Men don’t like to lose. They won’t give in.”

She backed out hauling her big American Tourister. “Is that why you won’t leave now?”

“I won’t leave because I have to go to work. If I thought I could use your daffy husband’s end-of-the-world excuse to get out of this floor-to-computer inventory, I would, believe me. But in the real world, when you don’t show up at your job, you lose it.”

She turned, burning at his obstinacy. “Eph said to go. He’s never acted that way before, never talked like that. This is real.”

“It’s eclipse hysteria, they were talking about it on TV. People freaking out. If I was going to flee New York because of all the crazies, I’d have been out of here years ago.” Matt reached for her shoulders. She shook him off at first, then let him hold her for a moment. “I’ll check in with the electronics department now and then, the TVs there, to see if anything’s happening. But the world keeps turning, all right? For those of us with real jobs. I mean—you’re just going to leave your classroom?”

Her students’ needs pulled on her, but everybody and everything else came second to Zack. “Maybe they’ll cancel school for a few days. Come to think of it, I had a lot of unexplained absences today—”

“These are kids, Kel. Flu.”

“I think it’s actually the eclipse,” said Zack, from across the room. “Fred Falin told me in school. Everyone who looked at the moon without glasses? It cooked their brains.”

Kelly said, “What is this fascination with you and zombies?”

“They’re out there,” he said. “Gotta be prepared. I’ll bet you don’t even know the two most important things you need in order to survive a zombie invasion.”

Kelly ignored him. Matt said, “I give up.”

“A machete and a helicopter.”

“Machete, huh?” Matt shook his head. “I think I’d rather have a shotgun.”

“Wrong,” said Zack. “You don’t have to reload a machete.”

Matt conceded the point, turning to Kelly. “This Fred Falin kid really knows his stuff.”

“Guys—I’ve HAD it!” Being ganged up on by them wasn’t something she was used to. Any other time, she might have been happy seeing Zack and Matt pulling together. “Zack—you’re talking nonsense. This is a virus, and it’s real. We need to get out of here.”

Matt stood there while Kelly carried the empty suitcase to the other bags. “Kel, relax. Okay?” He pulled his car keys out of his pocket, twirling them around his finger. “Take a bath, catch your breath. Be rational about this—please. Taking into account the source of your ‘inside’ info.” He went to the front door. “I’ll check in with you later.”

He went out. Kelly stood staring at the closed door.

Zack came over to her with his head cocked slightly to one side, the way he used to when he’d ask what death meant or why some men held hands. “What did Dad say to you about this?”

“He just … he wants the best for us.”

Kelly rubbed her forehead in a way that hid her eyes. Should she alarm Zack too? Could she pack up Zack and leave here solely on Eph’s word, without Matt? Should she? And—if she believed Eph, didn’t she have a moral obligation to warn others in turn?

The Heinsons’ dog started barking next door. Not her usual angry yipping, but a high-pitched noise, sounding almost scared. It was enough to bring Kelly into the back sunroom, where she found that the motion light over the backyard deck had come on.

She stood there with arms crossed, watching the yard for movement. Everything looked still. But the dog kept going, until Mrs. Heinson went out and brought it—still barking—inside.

“Mom?”

Kelly jumped, scared by her son’s touch, totally losing her cool.

“You okay?” Zack said.

“I hate this,” she said, walking him back into the living room. “Just hate it.”

She would pack, for her and for Zack and for Matt.

And she would watch.

And she would wait.

Bronxville

T
HIRTY MINUTES NORTH
of Manhattan, Roger Luss sat poking at his iPhone inside the oak-paneled bar room of the Siwanoy Country Club, awaiting his first martini. He had instructed the Town Car driver to let him off at the club rather than take him straight home. He needed a little re-entry time. If Joan was sick, as the nanny’s voice mail message seemed to indicate, then the kids probably had it by now, and he could be walking into a real mess. More than enough reason to extend his business trip by one or two more hours.

The dining room overlooking the golf course was completely empty at the dinner hour. The server came with his three-olive martini on a tray covered in white linen. Not Roger’s usual waiter. He was Mexican, like the fellows who parked cars out in front. His shirt was shrugged up out of his waistband in the back, and he wore no belt. His nails were dirty. Roger would have a talk with the club manager first thing in the morning. “There she is,” said Roger, the olives sunk at the bottom of the V-shaped cocktail glass, like beady little eyeballs preserved in a pickling vinegar. “Where is everyone tonight?” he asked in his usual booming voice. “What is it, a holiday? The market closed today? President died?”

Shrug.

“Where are all the regular staff?”

He shook his head. Roger realized now that the man looked scared.

Then Roger recognized him. The barman’s uniform had thrown Roger off. “Groundskeeper, right? Usually out trimming the greens.”

The groundskeeper in the barman’s uniform nodded nervously and shambled off to the front lobby.

Damn peculiar. Roger lifted his martini glass and looked around, but there was nobody to toast or nod to, no town politicking to be done. And so, with no eyes on him, Roger Luss slurped the cocktail, downing half of it in two great swallows. It hit his stomach and he let go a low purr in greeting. He speared one of the olives, tapping it dry on the
edge of the glass before popping it into his mouth, swishing it around for a thoughtful moment, then squishing it between his back molars.

On the muted television built into the wood above the bar mirror, he saw clips from a news conference. The mayor flanked by other grim-faced city officials. Then—file footage of the Regis Air Flight 753 plane on the tarmac at JFK.

The silence of the club made him look around again.
Where in the hell was everyone?

Something was going on here. Something was happening and Roger Luss was missing out.

He took another quick sip of the martini—and then one more—then set down the glass and stood. He walked to the front, checking the pub room off to the side—also empty. The kitchen door was just to the side of the pub bar, padded and black with a porthole window in the upper center. Roger peeked inside and saw the barman/groundskeeper all alone, smoking a cigarette and grilling himself a steak.

Roger went out the front doors, where he had left his luggage. No valets were there to call him a taxi, so he reached for his phone, searched online, found the listing that was closest, and called for a car.

While waiting under the high lights of the pillared carport entrance, the taste of the martini going sour in his mouth, Roger Luss heard a scream. A single, piercing cry into the night, from not so far away. On the Bronxville side of things, as opposed to Mount Vernon. Perhaps coming from somewhere on the golf course itself.

Roger waited without moving. Without breathing. Listening for more.

What spooked him more than the scream was the silence that followed.

The taxi pulled up, the driver a middle-aged Middle Eastern man wearing a pen behind his ear, who smilingly dumped Roger’s luggage into the trunk and drove off.

On the long private road out from the club, Roger looked out onto the course and thought he saw someone out there, walking across the fairway in the moonlight.

Home was a three-minute drive away. There were no other cars on the road, the houses mostly dark as they passed. As they turned onto Midland, Roger saw a pedestrian coming up the sidewalk—an odd sight at night, especially without a dog to walk. It was Hal Chatfield, an
older neighbor of his, one of the two club members who had sponsored Roger into Siwanoy when Roger and Joan first bought into Bronxville. Hal was walking funny, hands straight down at his sides, dressed in an open, flapping bathrobe and a T-shirt and boxer shorts.

Hal turned and stared at the taxi as it passed. Roger waved. When he turned back to see if Hal had recognized him, he saw that Hal was running, stiff-legged, after him. A sixty-year-old man with his bathrobe trailing like a cape, chasing a taxi down the middle of the street in Bronxville.

Roger turned to see if the driver saw this also, but the man was scribbling on a clipboard as he drove.

“Hey,” said Roger. “Any idea what’s going on around here?”

“Yes,” said the driver, with a smile and a curt nod. He had no idea what Roger was saying.

Two more turns brought them to Roger’s house. The driver popped the trunk and jumped out with Roger. The street was quiet, Roger’s house as dark as the rest.

“You know what? Wait here. Wait?” Roger pointed at the cobblestone curb. “Can you wait?”

“You pay.”

Roger nodded. He wasn’t even sure why he wanted him there. It had something to do with feeling very alone. “I have cash in the house. You wait. Okay?”

Roger left his luggage in the mudroom by the side entrance and moved into the kitchen, calling out, “Hello?” He reached for the light switch but nothing happened when he flipped it. He could see the microwave clock glowing green, so the power was still on. He felt his way forward along the counter, feeling for the third drawer and rooting around inside for the flashlight. He smelled something rotting, more pungent than leftovers moldering in the trash, heightening his anxiety and quickening his hand. He gripped the shaft of the flashlight and switched it on.

He swept the long kitchen with the beam, finding the island counter, the table beyond, the range and double oven. “Hello?” he called again, the fear in his voice shaming him, prompting him to move faster. He saw a dark spatter on the glass-front cabinets and trained his beam on what looked like the aftermath of a ketchup and mayonnaise fight. The mess brought a surge of anger. He saw the overturned
chairs then, and dirty footprints (
footprints?
) on the center island granite.

Where was the housekeeper, Mrs. Guild? Where was Joan? Roger went closer to the spatter, bringing the light right up to the cabinet glass. The white stuff, he didn’t know—but the red was not ketchup. He couldn’t be certain … but he thought it might be blood.

He saw something moving in the reflection of the glass and whipped around with the flashlight. The back stairs behind him were empty. He realized he had just moved the cabinet door himself. He didn’t like his imagination taking over, and so ran upstairs, checking each room with the flashlight. “Keene? Audrey?” Inside Joan’s office, he found handwritten notes pertaining to the Regis Air flight. A timeline of sorts, though her penmanship failed over the last couple of incomprehensible sentences. The last word, scrawled in the bottom-right corner of the legal pad, read, “hummmmmm.”