Scary Creek (5 page)

“What are you doing?” I asked.

“Can’t be too careful,” he replied, clipping the
weapon to his belt. “Never know what we might run up against.”

On the way out the door, he stumbled, nearly impaling
himself on the knife. His dexterity with dangerous weapons left much to desire.

A Ford station wagon with simulated wood trim, sat at
the back door. Targets, gun oil, shotgun shells, outdoor magazines, Guns &
Ammo, and other literature and plastic toys cluttered the back seat and bay.

“You a vet?” I asked, harboring doubts.

“Three years in Nam,” he said. “What about you?”

“I took a few pictures in Ho Chi Minh, Cambodia, Laos
and a few other places.”

He shook his head intently.  “I miss it. Wish I were
there now. We never finished that job. We should have stayed until we
finished.”

I wanted to say ‘wars are unending’ but I held my
tongue. He slid behind the wheel carefully to avoid a second encounter with the
machete. I crammed my road-weary bones into the front seat and settled back. The
leather seats conveyed a message of affluence. A gismo panel near the steering
wheel indicated the car was loaded with every imaginable option.

“What do you do for a living, Mr. Case?”

“Call me Charlie,” I said. “I’m a photographer and
living off my prints and assets.”

“Can you make a living taking pictures?” He asked.

“Depends on the number and quality of shots you have
in circulation,” I replied. “I do a lot of work on speculation.”

“Doesn’t that get expensive, traveling around for long
periods of time?”

“I don’t do that kind of work,” I said. I knew what he
was after and it wasn’t my resume. “I’m also a D.C. landlord. I own a
townhouse, thanks to a benevolent relative, and I collect atrocious rents on
eight tiny apartments. In fact, if I’m not careful, I’m going to lose it all.
”

“Marriage
on the
rocks?” He asked restraining a grin.

“Nothing that a little domestic violence wouldn’t
resolve,” I replied, clenching my teeth.

He pulled on the street; drove passed my RV and reviewed
the DC tags.

“Is that your RV?”

I nodded proudly, the doting parent. It was the only
material possession, besides my cameras, that I’ve
ever
owned, loved
and believed could love me in return.

“All the luxuries of home with none of the headaches,”
I said. “I can take it with me when I go, leave it, love it, hate it, or sell
it. It’s the closest thing to a faithful companion I’ve ever known.”

There was something sad in that statement, though I’d
never thought much about it. It made Virgil squirm.

“Is the cat yours, too?” He asked.

“Cat?” I said. “What cat?”

“The big old grisly cat sitting in the van.”

“You saw a cat in my van?”

“Sitting in the front window,” Virgil replied.

I gave some thought to the remote possibility that
Myra’s cat may have entered the van, but I kept it sealed almost hermetically
to prevent that possibility from happening.

“What’s the matter, cat got your tongue?” He asked,
smiling.

“My wife’s cat,” I explained. “It took a shine to me
after she moved in.”

“Is it pretty expensive to care for?” He asked.

“The cat?” I asked.

Virgil stared without speaking.

“You mean the van!” I shouted, nodding like a ‘Goofy’ bobbling
head car toy. “We’re not just talking dollars here, Virgil. May I call you Virgil?”
He nodded. “We’re talking life-style. Besides, the guy who sold it to me said
I’d get eighty miles to the gallon and never have to change the oil.”

“You believe that?”

I didn’t believe it anymore than I could believe
Myra’s cat had gained entry to my van. Although I’d shared his fantasies of
mysterious deaths and ghosts in the Ryder house, I was disappointed that he
chose to cast dispersions on my fantasy.

“Why not?” I replied.

Virgil’s impatience was tottering on the cutting edge.

“He just wanted to sell you the damn thing; he didn’t
care what he said. I’ll bet it gets less than eight miles to the gallon and
burns more oil than a diesel locomotive.”

I lost faith in
my
fellow man
the day my autocratic father
told me I was a reject, a throwaway baby found in a dumpster and adopted at an
early age. To this day, I believe there is more truth to the claim than he
intended to convey.

“Coming from a guy who sells blue sky and green fields
for a living, that’s a heavy trip,” I said, “but what he said doesn’t matter,
eight miles or 80. I’m going nowhere and in no hurry to get there.”

“Are you staying in Vandalia?”

I’d only glimpsed the town’s surface and felt as if
I’d re-discovered Erskine Caldwell's 'God’s Little Acre,' minus the promiscuous
women. Vacant houses however were plentiful and property was selling cheap,
even though it meant a financial loss to someone. Besides, there were more
trees then people and that made me curious to know about the local industries.

“Where do the ‘grass roots’ folks make a living?” I
asked.

“The kids grow some of the county’s finest hemp,” he
said. “There are a few coal mines still scratching around in the hills, and
everyone owns a pickup truck and a chainsaw, which means they cut and haul
firewood.”

“Sounds seasonal,” I said.

“You cut it in the spring and summer and haul in the
fall and winter, that’s year-round work.”

“What’s the average income?”

“About six thousand dollars,” he said.

“A month?” I asked, concerned that I’d been too long
out of touch.

“More like a year.”

“Are there any other major employers besides Mother
Nature?”

“The schools and the state; we’ve got a few doctors
and lawyers; lots of lawyers, lots of litigation.”

“Why is that?” I asked, sensing his need to spill a
little judicial blood.

“We’ve got a lot of unemployment, which translates
into a lot of unpaid bills. People lose their homes, cars and furnishings. They
start stealing from each other and screwing each other’s wives and daughters. They
have too much time and energy on their hands and nothing constructive to do
with it. Eventually that leads to bigger crimes, like making illegal whiskey or
growing pot, robbing stores and gas stations to pay for it, and finally they end
up shooting someone.”

“Sounds like one of those irresolvable social dilemmas
that only war, Dr. Ruth or Oprah can resolve,” I said.

“That’s where the lawyers come in,” he said
sarcastically. “One hundred bucks an hour to cop a plea, and those bastards
have the balls to say they aren’t making enough to make it worth their while.”

“If it isn’t enough, they shouldn’t take the case,” I
said.

“The state has got it rigged so they can’t pick and
choose,” I said. “Hobson’s choice: if they want in on the action, they can’t
refuse. If they could, there’d be lots of hillbillies going to the electric
chair for drunken driving, disorderly conduct and a myriad number of old-fashioned
sex offenses.”

“You mean their crimes are so reprehensible?” I mused.

“There is no crime here,” he said. “Only unemployment,
hunger, privation, ignorance, greed and neglect, and those are crimes
perpetrated against people, not by them.”

He took a minute to settle down and then continued: “It
wouldn’t be so bad if lawyers won once in awhile, but around here you get 1-5
for jay-walking or murder, it’s all the same.”

A few blocks past the main intersection, we were out
of town and heading east. Houses were growing fewer and farther apart. Only an
occasional service station or ‘mini-market’ appeared on the highway.

“Where is Elanville?” I asked.

“Not far, about 10-15 miles out of town. It may seem
farther because of the road, it winds a little.”

Twenty minutes later, the car topped the crest of a
hill. Virgil pulled off the road and set the brake.

“I’ll show you a bird’s eye view of the house,” he
said.

We left the car, climbed a gnarled guardrail and
walked to the edge of the hill. The view overlooked a narrow stream and wooded
hillside. In the distance, there were a few cleared fields and a dilapidated
barn.

The sun on the back of my neck and shoulders felt
warm. The green leafy landscape before me was bright and cool. For the most
part, it was an unbroken landscape of lush green treetops, brush and blue
skies. A few hardwood trees were beginning to show the effects of
an early
autumn.

“It’s not so easy to find when the forest is dense and
green. People are inclined to pass right by, except for those it calls. They
seem to have no trouble finding it.”

I didn't know if he was talking to me or himself.

“Let your eyes follow the creek to the bend,” he said,
“Do you see the gray slate roof and the side of the house?”

I sighted along his finger as if I were gazing down
the barrel of a rifle.

“It looks harmless enough to me,” I said. “It’s hard
to believe all the bad press and gory stories from up here. I’m more anxious
than ever to see it now.”

We returned to the car and drove down the road, crossed
a bridge of rusting steel girders and turned left onto a dirt side road.

A row of dark, weather-beaten frame houses jutted
haphazardly from the side of the hill. An assortment of derelict cars, old
washing machines, mildewed furniture and water tanks lay alongside the road and
tall weeds.

A greasy auto engine dangled like a giant spider from
a tree limb rigged with a block and tackle. Red, rusting oil drums, wrecked
toys and scraggly mongrels lay on the dry, sun-dried earth. The locals were secluded
apparently inside their board and batten cabins.

“This place reminds me a little of the budget traveler’s
guide to Katmandu, Nepal.”

Virgil agreed with a sullen nod.

“You’ve been there?” I said surprised

“Where?” Virgil replied

“Kat-man-do,” I said, while shifting the car seat to a
reclining position.

Gray and unpainted, the aging shed-like houses were on
the brink of collapse.

“They don’t look habitable,” I decided.

“A lot of people would agree with you,” he replied.

Elanville was a socio-economic aberration comparable
to those that were supposed to exist only in Third World countries.

“Why haven’t these shacks been torn down?” I asked.

“They’re not as fancy as your metropolitan ghettos,” Virgil
said, “But they do provide some shelter.”

“With all the abandoned housing available, you’d think
they could find something better than this,” I said.

“You don’t understand, Mr. Case. These people live
here because it is home, the only
home
they’ve ever known.”

For several miles, the shacks squatted alongside the
road, or against the hill; identical in that they were all constructed of the
same drab, discarded materials. A few had received some care and maintenance.
Others were so neglected they had fallen into a state of total disrepair.

“What do you mean, the only home they’ve ever known?”
I asked.

“These people aren’t…average,” he said. “They’re poor,
uneducated and there has been some inbreeding. They’re not considered your ‘citizens
of the year’.”

A lone disheveled child squatted near a mud hole on
the side of the road. Her clothes were ragged and her eyes were dull as slate.
She held a thin, mangy pup in one arm. The features of her face were old and
misshapen, out of place on the small frail body. Her appearance frightened and
moved me to pity at the same time.

“That kid looks kind of strange,” I muttered.

The dog’s wasted body also seemed out of proportion.

Virgil’s own profile, I observed, appeared more
exaggerated than before, especially his lower jaw.

“Uh huh,” he said, without taking his eyes from the
road, “they’re typical.”

I leaned back into the seat and tried to relax, to
enjoy the scenery, which was beginning to distort my image of rural America.

“Typical?” I said. “Typical, of what? No wonder you
can’t sell that house. Sane people don’t want to settle down in a town
populated with neighbors from a short story by H.P. Lovecraft.”

 Virgil’s eyes were intent on the road, but his
thoughts were traveling down that lone and untrammeled highway in his mind.

“It must be something in the water,” he said
absently.

A brick wall studded with rounded river stones jutted
into view. Virgil slammed on the brakes and brought the car to a
n abrupt
stop.