Where Darkness Dwells (30 page)

The reverend's gaze leveled at Cartwright. "You… you bastard! He's your son? You willingly led your son into Hell's embrace?" A vein throbbed at his temple, his limbs trembled. He squeezed his hands together even tighter, his voice rising, "Dear heavenly Father, I beg of You Your forgiveness, for my own sins and the sins of these vile men!"

Cartwright took two strides and kicked the reverend in the temple, sending him groaning to the ground.

"Damn it, look what you made me do." Cartwright sounded tired, but resolute. "You don't understand, that's all. Jasper's going to be in the family business."

With blood leaking from his ear, Blankenship closed his eyes again and continued praying, his lips moving without a sound.

"Ethan, time's ticking. We better get what we came for," the axe-wielder said. He seemed less frightened of Cartwright than the bounty hunting brothers. More on his level.

"Old Lewiston Willy mentioned a hidden room somewhere."

"You trust that nigger?" Parkins asked, keeping his eyes from taking in the mess on the floor.

Cooper still hovered above the melee like cigar smoke, swirling through the room in languid circles, unable to shut his eyes of sight, unable to shut his ears of sound.

Uncomfortably, Parkins squatted next to Blankenship, moving as if his riding gear had chaffed his delicate skin. "Where they at, nigger lover? Where's this hidden room? Let us know and we'll be peaceable. Just tell us where my property's at." His voice was southern-sweet. Cooper could picture him sipping lemonade while sitting on a porch swing, not a care in the world.

"You have no right!" Horace Blankenship cried, his eyes still held skyward. Cooper didn't know if he was admonishing his attackers' brutality or his savior's lack of empathy. "Cartwright, you and your heathens are going to hell, God as my witness, you will burn for eternity in Satan's fire!"

The room was quiet for several seconds, all except for an occasional splatter of spit tobacco juice and quiet whimpers from the boy in the corner.

Cooper, still circling, a fly caught in the tow of an autumn breeze, shifted about the room. He saw Parkins's bald spot, Cartwright's tight-lipped grin, the machete, the fire axe, the guns, Eunice's blood swirling on the floor as he moved, everyone ready for an escalation of violence if given cause. Cartwright placed a hand on Parkins's shoulder. The southerner backed away to stand with the others. Cartwright leaned over to whisper something into the reverend's ear.

The old man shook his head emphatically. "No. No, I can't do that."

Cartwright looked at his men, shook his head. He waved for the axe-wielder. "Scully, get what we need from him. Make it quick. Trail's going cold."

Blankenship didn't flinch, nor did he look to confront his interrogator. His lips trembled in prayer, spittle gathering on his lip.

The axe swayed low to the ground as he sized up the reverend, choosing a choice spot for his strike. The swaying increased, building momentum. Choosing Blankenship's left foot, he stomped on his ankle, holding the limb steady.

The air stilled with anticipation. Cooper's swirling stopped. He couldn't catch his breath; it built in his chest as a molten pain. Before the axe could sever the reverend's foot, a slight sound broke the loaded silence: a glass jar's hollow ping as it toppled over.

Cartwright's eyes gleamed with excitement. "Hold on, Scully. I think we've found our quarry!"

A forced quiet filled the room. The throb of blood rushed through temples. Adrenaline quivered muscles. Then they heard it. They all heard it. A scurrying sound, like animals of the night cowering through shadows and afterthoughts. Even Blankenship stopped his babbled prayer and looked at the wall with the hidden panel. He started crying afresh.

Leo Borland raised his weapon, finger twitching to pull the trigger. "They're in the wall!"

"Hold on." Cartwright grinned wide enough that the parting of his sun-weathered lips revealed straight, white teeth. "Scully, why don't you have the honors."

The axe-wielder sprang forward, the others clearing a path. He threw the axe back in a half swing and sent it crashing against the hidden panel. The wooden plank disintegrated. He went to his knees, shoved aside the debris.

"It's a damn tunnel," Parkins said, astonished. "You get after 'em before you lose them darkies again."

"They're your niggers, so that means you're coming with, Parkins," Cartwright said.

They passed a lit lantern to Leo Borland, and he and his long-barrel shotgun leapt for the hole in the wall. He almost immediately pulled out. "That was a piss jar they got back here. Aw, the fuckin' thing tipped over, now I got nigger piss all over my britches."

The riders laughed. "Leo, get your ass back in there," Cartwright said. The triplet spat, scrunched up his face, then disappeared. Without another word from Cartwright, another Borland brother fell to his knees to take up the pursuit.

"What about this piece of shit?" Scully asked, grabbing Blankenship's sleeve.

"Chop him like kindling," Cartwright said, then turned to his son. "Jasper? Son, you coming?"

Scully's axe left the toe-head boy transfixed but wary, as if the iron head was a living and temperamental thing. Cooper wanted to call out to him, or to at least shield him from this horror, but was helpless to do anything but hover.

"Jasper, you come along. You don't want to see this."

The boy scurried down into the darkness. Cartwright nodded to Scully, then grabbed Joss Parkins by the collar, not at all as would be expected of a hired man with his boss. Parkins tried to pry free, but was too weak in comparison. He gave up, stooped over, climbed into the opening, his disgust at crawling through a piss puddle expressed as a whiny, petulant sigh.

Cartwright entered, his hulking form blotting out the lamp light as their group advanced. The room filled with murk and shadow, the stench of piss and fear.

Blankenship closed his eyes, his lips moving through the desperate throes of a final prayer. If God ever heard him, Cooper would never know.

Scully crossed himself, then spit into his palms and rubbed them together. He took up his weapon and brought the honed edge down at the reverend's shoulder, his thrust held in check by his desire for accuracy. The axe still easily split flesh and bone.

Blankenship's eyes shot open.

Scully stomped a boot against his chest, pulled the axe free, striking again quickly, this time more assuredly, severing the man's arm. The limb thumped to the ground. Arterial blood sprayed from the reverend like a gushing garden hose.

Scully moved faster than the reverend could react. Horace Blankenship's words were done. He would never utter another prayer, wouldn't have the chance to start pleading for his life. Scully launched his weapon straightaway at the reverend's neck, full force, a wickedly wild swing more apt to clear a century's old oak. The axe cleaved cleanly; the reverend's head cartwheeled, hit a wall, came to rest near his wife's body.

Scully waited for Blankenship's body to slump to the floor--a long five seconds--before jumping into the hidden tunnel, his maniacal laughter echoing, chasing him into the chasm.

Alone with the reek of death wafting to the basement rafters, something tugged at Cooper's chest, at the root of his soul. A physical wrenching of his body from his ethereal drift. Scully's laughter simmered from the tunnel's opening. Cooper whirled toward the sound like a dropped leaf being sucked by the wind, unable to stop his descent as he flew into the pitch-black tunnel. Once therein, he learned everything.

3.

Ignorance was his first key to success as a lawman. Turning a blind eye fortified his position, allowed him to command the respect of those more ignorant than himself (which was most of the town as far as he could tell), allowed him to rise from the glum squalor of his upbringing, allowed him to have gainful employment when so many good men had no chance for the same.

Yet he couldn't go on lying. Not any more. He was done doing Thompson's bidding, and through extension, whatever dark force commanded Coal Hollow's doctor.

Sheriff Bergman was done with Coal Hollow when he spoke Thompson's words--his outright lies--to Jane Fowler. No, her son wasn't in Peoria, wasn't signed up for the army, or hadn't, for crying out loud, joined a traveling circus. Bergman wasn't even sure if Jimmy Fowler was still alive. If he was, the sheriff had a pretty good idea where he was being holed up, and if he was there, then he might as well be dead.

So, folks respected Doc Thompson, so what. So what if the doctor got Bergman elected a decade ago by his simple endorsement. So God damn what. He was no God. Coal Hollow was godless. Ignorance couldn't keep a person from that unpleasant knowledge. In a town struggling to survive, godlessness and ignorance went hand in hand. He was done with both.

He gassed his Plymouth around a bend just north of town. He was planning on heading north as fast as he could, putting as much ground as possible between himself and Coal Hollow. He had no intended destination, only a desire to get away. He humored himself by thinking he was heading to his cousin Tilley's house in Fargo. But that was just a direction to follow. He couldn't think so far ahead as to know where this would end.

How far does their influence reach?

Chicago, Milwaukee, Fargo? Could they send their shambling, rotting agents a thousand miles to slit his throat?

Dawn warmed the horizon. People were rising to milk and feed their animals. No one would know that he'd quit this town. No one would've seen his hastily written letter explaining a family emergency in St. Louis that needed his attention.

The Plymouth followed the road's bend to the long straightaway knifing northward.

Movement near the road's edge drew his bleary vision.

Deer.
He slammed the brakes, the car's semi-balds sliding through loose gravel.

No. Not a deer,
he realized, losing control of the car. "No!"

The old man stood stark still in the middle of the road. The last thing Bergman noticed before the impact was the wide grin on Jasper Cartwright's face.

The car crushed into his hip. The impact sent him airborne, flying backward away from the road, limbs trailing his torso as if he were being yanked by a rope tied about his waistline. He landed in a wall of thorny bushes, snapping branches, rattling leaves free to blanket the ground.

"Shit." Bergman punched the steering wheel hard enough that a bone broke near his wrist. The car's engine died, flooded. Pain grated the nerves in his broken hand like a coarse file working a suppurating wound.

"Shit-shit-SHIT!"

The sheriff shifted the dead car into park, opened the door and made his way to the wall of bushes, cradling his hand against his chest.

Jasper was hidden fairly well. It was only his liquid-wheezing breath that revealed his position.

He was in obvious pain, but as Bergman stooped to his side, the old man began to laugh. The jerking movement must have thrown his body through an incredible agony, but he couldn't help himself.

The poor man must be in shock.

He lifted Jasper's head after he started gagging on his own spit. "Jasper, what were you doing? Wait, don't move. We gotta get you help. What were you doing in the middle of the road so damn early in the morning?" Bergman rattled on, afraid to acknowledge to himself that his opportunity for escaping Coal Hollow had just come and gone.

Jasper blinked rapidly. Gathering his strength, he said, "They were coming for me. I heard 'em."

"Who? Who was coming for you, Jasper?" He didn't know if he should trust the old man's words. He could be delusional, raving as his mind tried to flee the painful ruins of his body.

"Collec-collectors. I heard them. From my room at the Calder place."

Bergman knew about the Collectors. They were some kind of miners' mythology that would've faded away but for the perpetuation of Greta Hildaberg's stories.

"It's okay, Jasper. No one's coming for you. No one but Dr. Thompson, that is."

Jasper's breath came in fitful spasms, a panting that punctured his words. "I'm… I'm dying. It's my… m-my time."

Bergman said the softest words to come to mind, "I'm sorry I didn't see you." What he wanted to say was a lot harsher. Words that would, in the end, forcibly reveal the real reason the old man had been in the road. He held back out of respect for the old man.