Sam: A Novel Of Suspense (37 page)

Right? 

“Dane?
Where are you?” 

 Oh
God, he realized, Matti’s awake!

He
took the stairs two at a time, this time knocking over a box of knick knacks,
and rushed into the bedroom. Matti was sitting up, rubbing her eyes, feeling
the empty spot in the bed next to her. She was all right, her complexion back
to normal.

“What
are you doing?” she asked. “It’s almost four in the damn morning. I told you
we’ll finish packing tomorrow. The truck isn’t coming till noon. Stop freaking
out about it.”

“Yeah,
baby,” he said, kissing her head and rubbing her hair, feeling how much she was
a necessary part of his life. “It’s just...um…you were talking in your sleep.”

“Oh
please, not that again. What’d I say this time?”

“Um…well…nothing.
I’ll tell you in the morning.”

“Good.
I’m exhausted.” Matti rolled over and curled up in a fetal position, finding
one of the small bears that kept residence around her pillow and pulling it
toward her. “Come cuddle me,” she said.

“Hey,
baby?” Dane put his arm around her and drew her into him, spooning.

Matti
grunted.

“We
never did get the history of this house before we moved in, did we?”

Another
grunt.

“I
love this house, you know. I always felt comfortable here for some reason. I
mean, nothing ever went wrong here. Everything always worked, I always felt
safe, I never really felt…alone here. You ever feel that?”

“Mmmm.”

A
minute passed, Dane lightly rubbing his hand down is wife’s warm back,
rethinking his attitude toward the unknown. As her breathing shifted to the
even rhythm of sleep, he asked quietly, as much for himself as for Matti or
anyone else listening, “You ever think there are people in this world who are
just happy to be around other people? Content to watch silently as things go on
around them? Just staying out of the way. You think they get sad when people
leave them?”

Matti
managed a final comment before she began to snore. “I dunno, Dane. I’m tired.
Does it matter?”

He
let her drift into her dreams before answering: “Kinda. I think I just met
one.”

Downstairs,
the kitchen phone began to buzz as the line came back to life.

Looking
at the clock, he thought, two hours until I have to get up.

The Flesh of Fallen Angels

(A Gibson Blount Novella)

By

R. Thomas Riley and Roy C. Booth

    
The town of Jacob's Bluff was covered in a black putrid haze.  Yet, it was more
than that.  It was more like the dismal cloud inhabited the town as Gibson and
Sarah topped the overlooking hill. Finger thin shafts, mingled with log-sized
tendrils, criss

crossed
the town as if it were a familiar lover.

    
Gibson held his tongue, waiting for his wife to scream out because of the
abnormal presence engulfing their town, but she sat placidly beside him,
humming a church hymn, quite oblivious to the black cloud and the oncoming
storm still far off in the distance. Thoughts of cancer, blight and rot rushed
into Gibson’s mind, nearly overwhelming his senses at the sight.

    
Reflexively, Gibson tightened his grip on the reins, leaning in as he did so. 
The horses snorted against the pressure, coming to a halt.  Something was at
the apex of the black, swirling cloud.  Just a hint, huge, its features
obscured.  Fading in and out, a tenebrous shape, twice the size of the entire
town, hovered inchoate and nascent.  The black, inky, oil-like haze emanated
from there, like an airborne disease.

     
Gibson looked on in horror, now envisioning the entire town engulfed in flames,
obliterated to ash right before his eyes.  Dark winged figures were traveling
down from the vague shape obscured in the black miasma.  Mere hints, but enough
for Gibson to realize he was thankful they were shrouded in the swirling mist. 
To see more directly would mean madness, he sensed.

    
“Darling?”

    
His wife’s perplexed intonation and gentle hand on his shoulder invaded his
consciousness, startling him -- the entire illusion dissipated.  Not all at
once, like a feverish hallucination might, but gradually, like watching time
unravel and flow backwards.  Now the anomalous, swirling mist was all that
remained. Lingering, hovering.

    
“Don’t you see that?” he said with a ragged breath, hoping she indeed did not
see anything.

    
She leaned forward, peering down at the town. “See what, silly goat?”

    
“Nothing, love,” he replied after a few beats, forcing a smile.  “Just feeling
a bit queer is all, I reckon. I must be more tuckered out than I thought.”

    
“Well, I’m sure you’ll feel much better once we get into town, dear.”

    
“I reckon so, my love, I reckon so.”

    
He knew that to be a lie.

    
Gibson was not an overtly religious man, but what he’d just witnessed couldn’t
be described in any other terms, no matter how much he tried to apply simple
logic and reason to the situation.  What he had seen was pure, malicious evil,
silently lying in wait for his town. 

     
He shuddered again, stifling a cough to mask his enhancing sense of dread, his
mind racing, trying to make sense of it all, still trying to logically sort out
some kind of solution to what he had seen and experienced that day.

    
At wit's end he concluded there was only one logical person in town who might
be able to help him with an explanation for what he was witnessing. 

    
His friend, Nathan, the priest of Jacob’s Bluff.

NOW

    
“Hey there, handsome, want some company?”

    
Blount glanced up slowly, fully taking in the speaker posing before him.  Black
scuffed boots below a pair of dingy white crinoline, horsehair trousers, up to
a preposterously tight red silken corset, her breasts straining above the
restrictive leather and lace device every time she took breath, ready to pop
out at any moment. 

    
“Well, now.”

    
Finally, his eyes came to rest on her face, painted up white, red lips standing
out so starkly against the pale canvas it pained his eyes.  The makeup gave her
the appearance of a fresh corpse, although beneath the trowel-slathered makeup
he could still tell there was a rather pretty girl hidden somewhere.

    
“Hurm.”  Blount poured himself another and slammed it.

     
She moved in, sliding up to him, now close enough that he could feel her
sweet-scented breath on his cheek.

    
“What’s your name, girl?” he asked between a few more shots.

    
“Name’s whatever you want it to be, dumplin’,” she cooed, playfully pawing at
his jacket.  “I saw you sitting over here drinkin’ with a purpose all by your
lonesome.  I haven’t seen you in here before.”

    
“No, no, I reckon not.” Blount shifted in closer to her, now making eye
contact. Something didn't seem quite right, not in a dangerous or threatening
sense, but it made Blount mighty curious all the same.

    
“Good, I’m always partial to new company.”

    
“I see.” He checked to see who else was watching. No one. “What’s your name?” 
he repeated.

    
“Name’s Petty,” she revealed, giving off a slight giggle.

  
  “Ah,” was his only reply. He leaned back, putting some distance between them.
Names held power and now that he had hers, it was time to sit back for a bit
and try to analyze what he had just gleaned, now allowing himself to relax and
look around some more.

    
“You’re a strange one, mister.”

     
He gave an affirmative grunt. “So I’ve been told, so I have been told,” Blount
chuckled, though there wasn’t any humor in it at all. 

     
“May I?” she asked, motioning to his side.

     
“Yes, I would enjoy your company.  Sit.”

     
Petty grabbed a chair and dragged it noisily over next to Blount, plopping
herself down as if they were long time friends.  “Mind if I have a drink?”

    
“Suit yourself,” grunted Blount, motioning to the bottle.

    
He watched as she grabbed the almost-empty bottle, tipping it back in one fluid
motion.  Blount gauged her age to be around twenty, no more than twenty-five,
but it was hard to be sure with the illusory hue the heavy makeup added.

    
Blount saw Bartender Bill motion to him: did he want another bottle? Blount
declined.

    
“People venture you’re an outlaw,” she blurted, wiping her mouth. 

    
“And who might those people be, Petty?” smiled Blount, slouching forward. 
“I’ve yet to be in this town two hours and already I’m a no-good account fierce
outlaw?”

     
“I see the guns you’ve got strapped to you,” Petty said, shrugging, a droplet
of whiskey stubbornly clinging to her lower chin.  “When a man has one gun,
usually means he sees the occasional trouble.  When he has two, he expects
trouble,” she finished matter-of-factly.

    
“You’re quite keen,” Blount allowed. 

    
“Why, thank you,” responded Petty, flashing Blount a knowing smile.

    
“I think I shall indeed indulge on that offer of company, miss.”

    
After securing a room from Bartender Bill, Blount took Petty straight to his
bed.  No matter how hard he tried, he kept seeing Sarah’s face as he savagely
thrusted.

THEN

    
Gibson slowly pulled to a halt in front of the general store, waving absently
to the flock of smiling children that erupted from the doors, each laughing and
clutching hard onto a stick of rock candy.  He clicked softly to the startled
horses.

     
“You run along, Sarah,” he suggested.  “I’ve got some business over yonder to
discuss with Father Nathan before we head off over to Carson's for a bite of
lunch.”

    
Sarah gave her head a slight tilt, and then replied, “Well, all right.
Remember, Carson should have fresh cucumbers in by now. And I know how much you
adore a good cucumber and bacon sandwich.”

    
“Only if the olio is fresh. I’ll be along shortly, don't you fret none.”

     
He blew a kiss to his wife as she turned to glance back at him.  Her face was
troubled, but as soon as Gibson blew the invisible kiss, her face lit up.  She
made as if to grab the kiss, pretending to pocket it for later for safekeeping,
quiet laughter drifting up.

     
He clicked to the horse and the wagon lurched away.

    
Gibson glanced up as he neared the middle of town.  The hovering dark shape
he’d glimpsed from afar was directly above Jacob's Bluff, blotting out the sun,
casting a graveyard-like shadow across the town.  However, no one else in town
seemed to notice the dread phenomena.  For a brief moment, he did question his
precious sanity; but he knew he wasn’t crazy . . . yet.

     
He watched as two small girls jump-roped nearby, oblivious to their bare feet
splashing in a puddle of thick dark blood.  Splotches clung to their bare
legs.  One of the girls carelessly pushed a hand through her long blond
tresses, staining the locks a dusty red.  As he rolled past, the girl casually
glanced his way.  Half of her face was gone.  A ragged hole leered at him,
filled with maggots and bits of stringy flesh.  He gasped, closing his eyes in
horror.  When he reopened them, the girl was normal again, still looking at
him, smiling.  She giggled and called to the horses.

    
Then he saw it.

    
Movement caught his eye from the rooftop to his left.  He saw the first one. 
It was hunched, clothed in fire, bat-like leathery wings wrapped around its
hairy apish muscular frame. A disturbing amber glow obscured most of the
creature’s features, but its eyes were what struck fear in Gibson’s heart:
large, l vacuous wells of sheer malevolence.  The massive lupine head swiveled
his direction.

    
The creature looked right at him and grinned.