The Walker in Shadows (19 page)

"Mark, you don't think…" Kathy began. She did not finish her sentence, but her gesture, toward the fallen earth, expressed the horrified surmise they all shared.

"No, no," Mark said reassuringly. "They would have dug the dirt out if the tunnel had collapsed while it was still in use. I think it gave way later, long after there was any reason for its existence."

"No ghosts here, then," Pat said. "You didn't find anything, did you, Mark?"

"No."

"Then let's go."

Their retreat was not dignified. If there were no ghosts in the buried tunnel, there was the memory of old cruelty and injustice. Pat recalled a friend of hers, an Army wife who had spent several years in Germany, describing a visit she had made to the former concentration camp at Dachau, now a memorial to the tortured victims. "I stalled at the gate," her friend had admitted. "I couldn't go in. I was sick at my stomach, unable to breathe." There was nothing supernatural or psychic about such impressions; they were simply a physical expression of the impact of tragedy on a sensitive mind.

All the same, she breathed more easily when they were upstairs, with the cellar door closed. Darkness was complete outside, and the rain hissed drearily against the windowpanes. After searching, Pat found a bottle of wine in the kitchen cabinet. No one volunteered to go downstairs again.

Josef drank most of the wine. He had had two drinks before dinner, and when they returned to the parlor, after eating, he went straight to the liquor cabinet. When he asked Pat to join him she shook her head, not trusting herself to speak. She could not see that he was visibly affected by what he had drunk. But she didn't like it. Her feelings must have shown on her face; Josef returned her unconsciously critical glance with a look of sullen defiance, and poured a sizable jolt of Scotch into his glass.

Mark settled down on the floor with the photograph album.

"I promised Jay we'd return this tomorrow," he said. "Mom, you better come with me."

"I have to work tomorrow," Pat protested.

"How can you think of work at a time like this? I'll call in for you, tell them you're sick."

"I can't do that!"

"Well, you can't sit up half the night and expect to work."

It had been expressed, the thought she had dreaded. Pat let her breath out in a long sigh.

"Mark, are you really going to go over there tonight?"

"We agreed," Mark said. "Nothing's going to happen, Mom. I promise."

Pat turned away with a helpless gesture, and met Josef's gaze. She knew what he was thinking as clearly as if he had spoken aloud. Mark was so sure. He had been un-nervingly accurate so far, in all his guesses and hypotheses. What source of information was he tapping? A possible answer occurred to her, and the very idea turned her cold with apprehension.

It was still raining at twelve thirty, when the men left the house. Without star- or moonlight, the night was as black as pitch. From Mark's bedroom window the house next door was a darker shadow in the darkness, eerily distorted by the water streaming down the windowpane.

Her forehead pressed against the glass, Pat strained her eyes.

"Your father is going to get soaked, squatting in that tree like a pigeon," she muttered.

The inane comment scarcely deserved a reply. Kathy made none. She knelt beside Pat, her face also pressed against the glass, and Pat felt the tension that held the girl rigid. She herself was ready to shriek with nerves. It must be the weather, she thought. There's no reason to be nervous. Nothing much happened last night; if Mark is right, tonight should be without incident.

The weather was certainly responsible for Jud's state of nerves, and no doubt the dog's misery was affecting her. Jud hated rain. No fool he, he knew that thunder and lightning often accompanied that atmospheric disturbance, and he was deathly afraid of thunder. He had been on Pat's heels all evening. Mark was a lot of fun, but when danger threatened, Pat was more dependable. He had accompanied them up the stairs and was now lying on the floor by the bed, his head under it. His agitated panting scratched Pat's nerves like a fingernail on a blackboard.

Something is coming.

The words flashed across her mind with the impact of a hot brand pressed against flesh. So keen was the mental anguish that Pat fell backward, landing with an ignominious thump, her legs doubled up under her. The dog was no longer panting, but whimpering-a craven, abject sound, as if Jud were so terrified he could not even express his feelings in a long howl of woe. Turning, with some difficulty, Pat saw the bed shudder as Jud forced himself under it, well-padded rump and all.

Even then she did not understand. She assumed the danger would come from the house next door, the house where her son and Kathy's father waited. She tried to get back to the window so she could see, and found her limbs so stiff she could barely move.

Then the smell reached her nostrils. The same foul, indescribable stench she had smelled twice before. And it came from behind her.

Squatting, awkward and ungainly, Pat managed to turn.

It filled the doorway. A thin, spinning column of luminescence, taller by several feet than she herself, the color of… But there was no word for that shade. It was part of the infernal aura the thing gave off, a deadly miasma compounded of parts the normal senses could not absorb. It was not heat or cold, not light or color or smell. But because the human sensory organs were limited, they had to translate it into terms they could transmit. So… her nostrils flared and her stomach heaved at the odor; her eyes winced away from the cold, pale burning; the hairs on her arms rose, as a current of… something… filled the room like smoke, acrid, choking.

The feeble remnants of reason left in her flailed helplessly, seeking escape. But she knew she could not allow herself the luxury of fainting; bad as it was to face the thing, it would be much worse to lie powerless before it. It was not after her. She knew that as surely as she knew her name, her age, the color of her hair… It wanted Kathy.

She was fond of this girl; perhaps more than fond. But the strength that came into her body did not come from love or from any hypothetical maternal instinct. It came from without. Not in a great, overwhelming flood; it was more like-the incongruous simile occurred to her-more like liquid from a leaky faucet, slow and trickling. But it was strong enough to raise her, first to her knees, then, swaying, to her feet. With something like horror she felt her knees bend and saw her foot slide forward.

As she moved, one unsteady, reeling step after another, the thing in the doorway changed, in response to her advance. It thickened and shrank in height, as if condensing; and if its former amorphous contours had been hard to contemplate, this was worse, for there was in it a dreadful suggestion of human form. In the crown of the burning column two spots formed, like the low blue flames of a dying fire.

Through the pounding of her pulse, Pat heard a distant sound and recognized it: the door downstairs crashing back against the wall, as it did when Mark was in a hurry. The cold flame in the doorway flared and was gone, as suddenly as if air had first sparked and then overwhelmed its burning.

She was still on her feet when Mark burst into the room. He hit the light switch as he passed it, without pausing. Pat's eyes closed against the brilliance. She felt her son's arm around her, and pushed feebly at him.

"I'm all right," she said. Her voice gurgled idiotically. "I'm… How is Kathy?"

"She's just been sick," said Mark. "Hey, Kath, hang in there, will you? At least wait till I can get you into the bathroom."

The voice came from behind her. Pat opened her eyes.

Not Mark's arms-Josef's. She recognized the blue-and-brown plaid of his shirt. That was all she could see; her face was mashed against his chest and his arms were squeezing the breath out of her.

"I'm all right," she repeated. "I'm-"

"All right?" Josef held her out at arm's length. His voice was quizzical, his expression calm; only the fact that he was paler than the white background of his shirt betrayed his feelings. "Sit down," he said.

"No, I don't want…" Pat glanced around the room. It was unbelievably normal. There ought to be some traces of that incredible presence-the marks of scorching or destruction. From the bathroom she heard gulping sounds, and Mark's voice, forced to calm: "Atta girl, you're okay now. Cool it, love; gotta get back and see how Mom is doing."

Pat pulled away from the hands that held her.

"Where is Jud?" she demanded.

"Under the bed," Mark answered. "Some watchdog!"

He stood in the door, his arm around Kathy. She looked very small and pathetic; her hair hung in dripping strands, darkened by the water she had splashed on her face. She pulled away from Mark and ran to Pat.

"I told him how wonderful you were," she whispered, her head against Pat's shoulder. "I was petrified. And you were so brave. I don't know how you did it."

"Neither do I," Pat said honestly. "It wasn't me. Something… came into me."

She patted Kathy's shaking shoulders.

"You mean that?" Mark demanded. "Tell me what happened, Mom. Exactly. It's very important."

Pat was tempted to swear at her best-beloved son. She didn't blame Kathy for being sick. Her own stomach felt unsteady. She wanted to lie down and have a cold cloth on her head, and someone holding her hand, telling her how wonderful she was… and a sleeping pill, a very large, very strong sleeping pill that would knock her out for about a year. And maybe when she woke up it would turn out that the whole thing was a nightmare, some neurosis from early childhood…

"Leave your mother alone," Josef said. "She's had enough."

Pat turned on him, pushing Kathy out of her way.

"Don't talk to him that way!"

"I'll talk to him any way I like. He is a… Get your things, Kathy. We're spending the rest of the night at a motel. Tomorrow I'll put that damned house on the market."

"You're not serious," Pat said.

"I have never been more serious." He took her hand, his fingers curling around her wrist like manacles. "You're coming too. Pack a bag."

"Wait a minute." Mark advanced on them, his pallor gone, his cheeks flaming with anger. "Who the hell do you think you are? That's my mother you're talking to."

"You seem to have lost sight of that fact." Josef glared at him.

Mark put his arm around Pat's waist. For a moment she was literally pulled between the two of them, for Josef did not release his hold on her wrist.

"Cut it out," she said. "You are both acting like-"

"Let go of her," Mark said.

"You let go. She's an adult, with a life of her own to live. She can't spend the rest of it coddling some lazy-"

Mark's clenched fist interrupted the tirade. The old man staggered back, his hand covering his face.

For a few seconds they all froze. Mark's arms fell to his sides.

"Cripes," he said, his voice squeaking like that of a twelve-year-old. "Oh, God. I didn't mean-"

Josef lowered his hand. The austere lines of his mouth were blurred with blood.

"Kathy," he said.

"Oh, Daddy, please-"

"Get your things."

Kathy gave Mark an anguished glance. He was still staring in horror at his victim, and did not respond. She lowered her head and ran out of the room. Josef followed.

Mother and son contemplated one another. After a moment of internal struggle Pat held out her arms.

"You goofed, bud," she said.

"I know." Mark gathered her up, buried his head against her shoulder. "Oh, God, Mom-do I know."

After an encounter with a visitant from beyond the grave one does not worry about mundane matters, such as a job. Pat fell into bed as if she had been hit over the head with a rock, and did not stir until late the following morning.

Memory flooded back, in all its dreadful detail. Pat couldn't decide which depressed her more, the fear that her house was haunted by a particularly malevolent spirit, or the recollection of Mark's attack on Josef Fried-richs.

Normally when she overslept she was awakened by Albert, demanding his breakfast; but today the cat was nowhere to be seen. Pat got out of bed. She glanced at the clock and then at the telephone, and shook her head disgustedly. No use calling the office. If Mark hadn't already phoned to say she was sick, she was in trouble; and she was in no mood to invent symptoms or listen to reprimands.

She stood in the shower for a long time and dressed slowly, trying not to think about anything. The house was quiet. Perhaps, wonder of wonders, Mark had gone to class. After what had happened he would hardly have the gall to seek Kathy's company.

Sighing, Pat trudged down the stairs, feeling as if the descent took her back into a world of complex troubles. She had no idea what, if anything, she could do to solve even the smallest of them.

The sink was piled with dirty dishes. Pat sighed again, louder, and with more feeling. That was all she needed to start her day. She turned on the burner under the teakettle as she passed the stove and started to take the dishes out of the sink. As she did so her eyes went to the window, and what she saw made her drop a glass.

Not what she saw-what she did not see. The fence was gone.

Pat ran to the back door. The fence was still there, but it was in fragments. Mark had piled some of the wood into a rough heap. He was squatting on top of it like a gargoyle on a cathedral, his back to his mother, his attitude one of profound meditation.

He turned his head as Pat came squelching across the lawn. It was still wet with the rain of the previous night. Her sneakers were soaked before she had taken three steps.

"Hi," he said.

"What the hell-" Words failed his mother.