The Widow's Son (19 page)

The dirt road forked after a mile. Rather than take a direct route to the altar, I slowed to a near crawl, shut off the headlights, and turned onto a branch leading to a small rise several hundred yards to the west of Tower Hill. It soon became impassable for the Chevrolet. I got out and began walking quickly down a narrow path roughly parallel to where I thought the sacrificial stone would be at the base of the hill.

Thorn trees joined in a spiky arch above my head; sharp nettles cut into my legs as I stumbled and slid down the steep slope. Most of the trees were dead, their gray trunks testament to some disease or destructive beetle. Logs and branches felled by wind or rot lay everywhere on the ground. Even some of the living trees had diseased limbs. It was not a place for living things except, perhaps, for night scavengers.

Forty yards later, panting and sweating, I came to a flat ledge overlooking a precarious cliff, the top of which extended outward ten feet. There was no time to head back up to search for another route.

I stuffed the six-inch barrel of the Magnum in the small of my back and crawled over the side of the breast of rough granite. Almost immediately I found myself in an awkward position, with my legs dangling over empty space. My shoulders and arms carried all my weight as I began to haul myself down by clinging to outcroppings of rock and the more secure roots, scrabbling for a hold wherever I could find it.

Another fifteen feet of this and it was all too clear gravity was winning. To fall meant broken limbs, if not death. I spotted a moss-covered ledge a few feet below and to the left of my position. With willpower born of desperation, I gathered what little strength remained in my arms and hurled myself onto it. It was only about twenty inches wide, but the stone face went inboard a few inches and I was able to land on it with both feet. For a few desperate seconds I tottered on the slippery shelf, until I gained a semblance of control. Nauseated from the exertion, and with chin, chest, and thighs leaning tenuously against the wall, I caught my breath and rested my shaking arms. When I dared to look down, all I could see were the dark outlines of unforgiving boulders and spear-pointed saplings far below.

What a stupid way to die, I thought. With all my mountain-climbing experience, it was beginning to look like I would perish while trying to descend a hill on a warm night in Missouri. Not exactly Mallory-esque.

While struggling to find a hold, I'd been able to rein in fear and even use its testosterone-induced chemicals to power my muscles beyond their normal limits. But now that I was marooned on this mossy rim of rock, unable to move up or down, my energy drained to the point where I couldn't have acted even if a ladder miraculously appeared.

It was a cramp that saved me. I felt it building in my left calf, its pain fierce, as if the muscle in my lower leg were tying itself in a knot. I rose up and down on my toes to try to make it stop, but it only spread the torture to the other limb. My entire body began to spasm uncontrollably, disturbing the swallows nesting in the nooks of the cliff.

Many birds disappeared over the top, but a few, intent on protecting their hatchlings, swarmed around me, diving at my head, squawking their complaints, and beating their wings. To prevent several of the more insistent ones from pecking my eyes, I swiped my arm at them. But the windmill action only disturbed them more and they continued their relentless attack. A beak struck my neck. Another pecked my cheek. Then another. More birds returned to take part in what had become a frenzied defense of their rooks. Blood streamed down my forehead and cheeks and into my mouth. I continued to swing frantically at the feathered beasts even as I found myself falling.

My hands clutched for the rock I had just stood upon. The jolt nearly jerked my arms out of their sockets. I clung with bleeding hands, but began to slide even as my fingernails clawed for whatever resistance could be gained. With my face getting sandpapered by the rough rock, I scratched with anything to slow my descent—hands, toes, elbows, knees—but the momentum couldn't be stopped. A tenth of a second later I was hurtling down the slope barely in contact with the surface. Any sense of self-preservation deserted me as I prepared for the agony of compound fractures or impalement.

Then, miraculously, I felt a slight outward inclination of the surface. Slight, but certain. Thirty feet later one of my feet struck the base of a tree that sent me spinning sideways onto a boulder. I tumbled over it, spinning, arms and legs flailing, but slowing, always slowing until coming to a stop in a pile of acorns and deer droppings.

I didn't move for a few seconds in order to take physical inventory. Both knees were sore, my hands were numb, and I was bleeding from head to toe from the scouring I'd got from the rock surface, but nothing seemed broken. I got to my feet a little uncertainly but not trembling. I took a step. The left knee buckled but held. I'd played rugby with worse.

Hobbling through a grove of pin oaks while ducking to avoid the lower branches I came to a clearing. The thick clouds that obscured the moon made it difficult to survey more than fifty yards, but I could see the shadowy outline of Tower Hill above. The road meandered fifty feet to my right. I had to be near. Dropping on my belly, I crawled over rough terrain until coming to the trail Josie and I had walked down when we first came upon the altar stone; it felt like an eternity ago. A light flickered in the near distance, but trees and foliage blocked my view. I crept farther on my hands and knees, pausing behind a slender tree upon hearing faint voices. My head was still ringing from all the blows it had suffered that day, but there was no mistaking the sound of Lamar's growling truculence and Porter Grint's whine.

I lurched forward a few more yards until coming to a large round boulder. Getting to my feet, I peered through the leafy branches of the tree in front of it.

The thick oval stone lay twenty-five yards ahead. The squat wooden chair from the house had been placed in its center between a pair of tall wax candles, their flames flickering in the breeze. Beyond the ominous scene was Jacob, his set-up work completed, leaning against a pickup on the side of the road.

I could still hear voices, but saw no one around the altar. I had the horrible thought that they might be cleaning up after having fulfilled their loathsome oath. Whether or not that was the case, I wasn't about to let them get away with their crime.

I was pondering how when I noticed movement near the road. Seth and Porter Grint, bedecked in his temple robe, hauled what looked like a squirming white bag from the pickup. As they came closer I realized it must be Natalie, alive and literally kicking. Bless her feisty Irish heart.

Dennis Dietz and Lamar Stagg, also wearing robes, walked a few paces behind, making a grim procession toward the altar of sacrifice.

Only three rounds remained in the cylinder of Tate's revolver. I had qualified “expert” with handguns every year in the Marine Corps, but that was years ago and always on a firing range during daylight hours. While twenty-five yards was a relatively easy range, even for a head shot in poor light, the tremendous noise and muzzle flash would have the secondary targets instantly dropping for cover. I'd likely kill the first person wielding the knife at Natalie's throat—probably Dietz—but the odds were nil that I'd have a second chance before Grint and the others regrouped to get me.

But what choice did I have? Even if Josie had succeeded in contacting Buford Higgins or the police, reinforcements wouldn't arrive in time.

The two men forced Natalie out of her bag and onto the chair and bound her body to it with wide strips of white cloth. In the weak candlelight her face appeared ghostly pale, but far from defeated. Either out of a warped sense of propriety or some twisted protocol requiring that the sacrifice be lucid, she didn't appear to have been drugged.

Having performed his task, Seth stepped from the stone. Lamar and Dietz, each with some difficulty because of their disabilities, joined Grint atop the altar. Standing behind Natalie, Dietz tied a white scarf around her eyes and mouth while his uncle and cousin stood beside the respective candles. Then he nodded to indicate all was ready.

Lamar's sudden paroxysm of coughing shattered the night stillness. He bent over in real distress and I began to hope his helpless hacking would postpone the ceremony. But all too soon the geezer straightened up and his spasms ended in a brief series of hiccups. Clearing his throat, he proceeded to pronounce in a raspy rattle:

“Repent ye! Repent, woman; and by your sacrifice wash away the perfidious sin of your ancestor, Thomas Ford. Accept your salvation with fear and trembling before the Lord and be rewarded with everlasting life.”

Dietz followed with his practiced lines. “Fear not, Natalie Delaney Phelan, for the Kingdom of God is close at hand. Prepare ye the way of the Lord.”

Then it was Grint's turn. He unfolded a piece of notebook paper, held it in the light of a candle, and struggled to read what had been written for him: “ ‘Know ye the dead shall receive reward after paying pen…penit…penitence for their transmissions.' ”

“Transgressions,”
Dennis Dietz corrected. Then he withdrew from within his robe the bone-handled knife I'd seen at the farmhouse.

I stepped from the boulder for a clearer sight line and assumed a firing position: knees slightly bent, one foot behind the other, upper body squared to the target. Mindful of the Magnum's strong recoil, I gripped the handle of the revolver firmly in both hands keeping thumbs and fingers below the cylinder gap to avoid the escaping compressed gas. I leaned forward, held my arms straight out, and used my dominant eye to line the barrel at a spot one inch above Dennis Dietz's right ear. I pulled back the hammer and placed the tip of my right index finger on the trigger.

Dietz bent over. He clutched the back of Natalie's chignon with his titanium hand and drew back her head.

I adjusted my aim and squeezed the trigger.

Click.

Misfire. Rare for a revolver.

I stroked the trigger again.

Click.

With my thumb I felt the firing pin that was attached to the hammer. It felt jagged instead of smooth.

Broken. Useless.

The knife in Dietz's good hand hovered next to Natalie's throat. There was a rustling of the leaves as the wind picked up, extinguishing one of the candles.

Then everything froze.

At first I thought the sound came from the throat of a very large cat—rare sightings of cougars had been reported in northwest Missouri for years. But what followed was something far different. How to describe it?

Think of the mournful yowl of a starving child, the tortured screech of a hare caught in a trap, a thousand other harrowing images increased in vehemence with each passing minute until reaching a spectral intensity so loud and long as to be beyond an earthly source. When it finally ended, it did so in a protracted wail full of such agony and despair as to make Charles Manson weep.

With the last note the clouds parted. The liberated full moon shone its beams upon the gauzy image of a shimmering figure dressed in a loose-flowing, fantastic garment. Crowned with a tangled mass of silvery hair, the gray skin tightly drawn over facial bones like a mummy, it looked ages old, as if it had been buried and dug up again.

“Elohim! Jehovah! Adam!” Seth screamed from the foot of the altar while pointing to the summit of Tower Hill. “Sweet heavens, what can it be?”

Damned if I knew. But Denny Dietz had a pretty good idea.

His titanium hand released its grip on Natalie Phelan's head.

The moon retreated behind the clouds and the figure dissolved in darkness.

Dropping the blade onto the rock, Dietz declared, “Enough! As God tested Abraham with Isaac, so he has tested us and shown his mercy for the lamb. Our oath is fulfilled.”

“That was no archangel,” Lamar snarled between choking gasps, “only that witch of a girl.” His face was a cadaverous yellow in the glow of the candle.

Looking back on it, I can't say whether Denny Dietz truly believed what we saw was a guardian spirit. I do know, however, how I was affected by the otherworldly sounds and sight of that moon-christened being on the hill. To this day, I'm not entirely convinced it was Claire.

“The atonement is honored,” Dietz insisted. “God has spoken through his holy messenger.”

While these words were being said, Grint recovered the knife.

“Blasphemy!” the old man sputtered. He turned to Seth and Jacob. “Quickly, get after her. Don't fail this time.”

While the two began their sprint up the hill, Lamar turned to Grint and very deliberately commanded, “You…will finish…God's work.”

Grint hesitated. “The girl, Uncle…”

“Yes, yes, son. She is yours once they catch her. Get on with your duty.”

By then I'd begun my dash to the altar, but it was Dietz who tackled his knife-wielding cousin. They fell in a heap at Natalie's feet, scratching and tearing at each other in deadly earnest. Lamar hollered at them to stop, but Grint's arm jerked outward then back, driving the blade deep into his cousin's armpit.

Dietz groaned as blood spurted from his chest, painting both of their robes muddy red. Despite his death agonies, the former Marine's bionic hand made a frantic grab for Grint's wrist and held it, allowing the human one to wrench the bone handle away. With superhuman effort, he fended off his cousin's desperate jabs to plunge the point deep into Grint's neck. A ghastly wail was followed by a convulsive twist, then both fell silent.

At least that's how I pictured it happening. I'd heard the grunts and agonized cries, but didn't see much of the action because I was occupied at the time with Uncle Lamar. For an octogenarian with a bad hip and diseased lungs he was a gnarly dude who could counterpunch with hands still hard as whalebone. And he fought dirty—after I'd finally cold-cocked him with the butt of the revolver, I had to pull his dentures out of my forearm.

Blood covered every inch of the altar—the scene made even more garish in the flickering light of the remaining candle—and as I watched volumes of it oozing off the flat stone I couldn't help but think that the vow of Alonzo Stagg had been fulfilled after all.

Lamar, unconscious, had begun to hemorrhage from the lungs. There was no sound, no coughing as rivulets of blood seeped through his lips onto his chin and chest. He was clearly dying and no longer a threat. I turned my attention to Natalie.

“You're safe,” I said, removing the cloth that had covered her eyes and mouth. She didn't hear me, for she had passed out.

Leaving her secured in the chair, I moved to where Grint's corpse lay atop his cousin and shoved him to the side. Denny's face, pale as bleached wood, was no longer handsome. The eye patch had come off during the brief fight and the cavity was filled with blood. His jaw hung unnaturally slack so that his mouth was wide open. He might have swallowed his tongue. I didn't bother searching for a pulse. I had started to turn away when suddenly his lips quivered and the lone eye shot open to study me with a long, empty stare. It was a simple muscle retraction that had nothing to do with life, but it startled the hell out of me.

I wanted to say something like “You did the decent thing, Marine.” But it seemed awfully trite and there was no time for sentiment or even ministering to Natalie, not with the two armed Danites chasing after Claire.

Withdrawing the sacrificial knife from Grint's neck, I bolted up Tower Hill, leaving Denny's dead eye gazing at eternity.

A hundred strides later the hoot of an owl stopped me.

“Claire?” I called softly. “Where are you?”

No answer. Again I ran, my eyes sweeping the dark, crashing headlong through thornbushes, adding more blood to that already covering me.

Suddenly, I felt as much as heard the swoosh of wings over my head. The owl had settled on the middle branch of a ragged pine. I slowed to a walk. At the base of the tree was a faint spot of light. Moving closer, I saw the prostrate body of Claire Phelan, still dressed in her school uniform. Around her head and shoulders was the white T-shirt that had been used to gag her.

Anxiously, I knelt beside her and whispered her name. She didn't respond.

I touched her forehead and brushed back her silvery hair. Her chest rose and fell in soft breaths. The skin on her neck felt warm and there was an even pulse. She seemed to be in a deep sleep. There were no signs of injury. Gently I picked her up and carried her down to the dirt road, where I placed her in the backseat of Tate's Chevrolet. Then I returned for Natalie.

She was awake now and strangely calm. Cutting her bindings with the knife, I told her Claire was safe, but that Seth and Jacob were still out there armed with rifles. I offered to carry her, but she said she could walk. Moments later she was in the backseat of the Chevrolet cradling her daughter in her arms. I started the engine and drove away from the scene of slaughter without turning on the lights.

We were a half mile or so from reaching the parking lot entrance of Adam-ondi-Ahman when a shot rang out and the back window exploded. Anguished cries engulfed the Chevy as the shattered glass spattered over Natalie and Claire. I pounded the steering wheel while uttering a string of obscenities and floored the accelerator. The car leapt forward and I thought for a moment we were out of range, but a second burst soon destroyed a front tire.

The tortured sound of flayed rubber slapping against the side panels accompanied the car's violent swerve to the left while I struggled with every sinew to maintain control. But there was no stopping two tons of skidding steel going sixty miles per hour on a loose gravel road. The car smashed through a rail fence, hurtled over an embankment and rolled twice before landing on the driver's side in a splintering crash of metal and glass.

Radiator steam poured from the hood. The pungent odor of gasoline filled the interior. Blood trickled from an ear as I fought to clear my head. A heavy groan from behind brought me to my senses. I slid from behind the steeling wheel and shifted my body to peer into the back.

Natalie, her right forearm dangling unnaturally, lay crumpled against her daughter.

“Can either of you hear me?” I asked softly. “We must get out. Now.”

Natalie's body stiffened. She moaned, “How…Claire?”

A few heartbeats later we heard a stoic voice whisper: “I'm okay. I…I think.”

“Good girl,” I said, while stretching up to reach the rear door handle. “You'll have to help me get your mother out.”

The latch clicked, but the door didn't budge.

The growing pool of gasoline at my feet provided all the motivation I needed to try again. Bursting with adrenaline, I braced my feet against the floorboards and shot upward, ramming my shoulder against the door panel directly under the lock.

I heard something crack. Instead of my collarbone being broken—given the pain resulting from my effort, that was my first thought—the noise was of metal or plastic jolted loose within the door. A slight tremor reverberated throughout the framework of the car. Then, as I reached again for the door handle, a sudden shift of balance made the effort unnecessary.

The effect of my weight slamming into the door had tipped the Chevy so that it landed right-side-up. The resulting impact opened the door and, after climbing out, I gently reached under Natalie's shoulders. Ignoring her desperate groans and with Claire helping from behind, we eased her from the car. I held her upright as she struggled to stand by herself. The bottom half of her dress was soaked with gasoline.

I looked into her tense white face. Her eyes were fathomless at first, but soon the blankness left and she held my gaze.

“Buck up, woman,” I hissed. “Your arm is broken, not your legs. We've got to move.”

Natalie, her mouth clamped shut, took a tentative step, then another, and we scrambled into a field of sunflowers before she collapsed in agony.

Although it seemed like an eternity, less than a couple of minutes had elapsed since the crash and, while free of the fire danger, we hadn't made it to the cover of trees. To confirm our perilous situation, a new round of bullets zipped through the yellow petals near my head.

“Run, Claire,” I urged as we ducked among the sunflowers.

“Not this time.”

“You must,” I said.

Another round buzzed over our heads like mad hornets. It only made her more adamant.

“I'm not leaving her this time.”

I nodded in resignation. There would be no more miracles. The girl lay protectively by her mother while I crouched in front of them, knife in hand, and waited for the avenging angels.

Some say hope is only a gentler name for fear, but I'll take it anytime over despair. When times are at their rawest, I've always been willing to grasp at any shadow, especially now when I heard sirens wailing in the distance.

I saw the rotating sapphire and red lights of the highway patrol cars a few minutes later. They were a quarter of a mile away, speeding in the direction of the altar. I dashed for the road just as the first cruiser barreled over the rise. I leapt into the road desperately waving my hands. Three more cruisers sped past without slowing, but the fourth slid to a stop in front of me.

Squinting over the glare of the headlights, I saw Trooper Buzard behind the wheel.

And Josie Majansik riding shotgun.