Where Darkness Dwells (39 page)

He could never have a fresh start. Not after tonight. Not after he so easily grabbed that bottle when no one was looking, grabbed it guiltily, but with lust also. He no longer had Mabel, not the Mabel he'd fallen in love with. With his own selfish actions he'd turned her into a monster. His boy, George, he was gone, too. As for Elizabeth, she would never see him as anything other than a vile, sticky thing clinging to the bottom of her shoe. Someday she would scrape him off, toss him away, and move on. Maybe today was that day.

Louise's unborn child kicked the hardest yet, making the girl catch her breath. Tears fell down her cheeks as she gritted against the stabbing pain.

He felt bad for her with no husband to calm her anxieties, no one to hold her hand through these baby pains. Jane Fowler was no where to be seen, either.

"Baby coming?"

"No, just doesn't like," she said, cut off by another kick. "Baby… doesn't like potato salad." She somehow smiled when she looked at him.

He closed his eyes and saw his beloved Mabel as young as Louise. So lovely, so humble and pure. The image blurred and distorted to the horrid thing she'd become. Undead, mindless, soulless. He heard the scraping of her nails against the door, wanting to get out, to ravage and tear him apart.

When he opened his eyes, Louise had drifted to the kitchen table, within reaching distance of a dirty carving knife.

"You know that Jimmy a' yours?"

Her hand stalled inches from the blade.

"He's dead."

"No. You don't know that."

"A' course I do. I brained him dead myownself."

Louise reached for the blade.

"And here you are, shaming a miracle."

He took two steps, grabbed her wrist with one hand, taking hold of the carving knife with the other. She screamed, but no one was near enough to hear.

3.

It was a rough go trying to find Greta Hildaberg's treehouse in the dark. Cooper had only been there once and was still unfamiliar with the wooded surroundings. Jane hadn't visited since she was a girl, on the eve of her marriage to Dwight Fowler. As they searched for signs they were in the right area, Jane told Cooper that she had gone (with a fair amount of skepticism, she emphasized) to ask Greta how her marriage would play out. Greta had told her during that long ago visit that her marriage would be loving and fruitful. If Jane would've only thought to ask if it would also be long-lived, she could've saved herself years of heartache. When you're fifteen, you never think you or a loved one is anywhere close to death. Death doesn't come near you. It is but a rumored condition afflicting others.

An amber glow warmed a wide tree canopy in the distance. They covered the remaining quarter mile quickly, kicking through a waist-high field that transitioned to a rough undergrowth of brush. The tree was the tallest around, with gnarled branches, roots grown grasping through the soil's surface below, a mantle of leaves blotting out the moon above. They mounted the spiral steps. Cooper found the nighttime effort considerably more amenable than his earlier attempt while accompanying the children in the bright sunshine. By the time Jane tapped on the door, he'd nearly forgotten his fear of heights and that they were now thirty or more feet in the air.

Greta answered the knock almost before it was finished.

"Good, good. Come on in. Cider's at the table. Have some if you will."

Jane looked at Cooper, but neither said anything. They entered, each taking a seat at the low table. Two cider filled wooden mugs were at the table. When Cooper touched the wood, steam poured over its rim. Neither drank.

"Time's almost gone. You know that, don't you?" Greta said directly to Jane. "You wouldn't be here otherwise."

There was no need to explain the reason for their late night visit. "I just need to know. I can't leave a stone unturned."

"I suppose, since I haven't seen you since you were a girl, I must be the last stone for you to consider." Greta turned away, peering through the wooden slates of the small kitchen window. She appeared to be gathering herself, while at the same time, checking the neighboring vale. "Your boy, he's in trouble."

Jane was going to say something, but held her tongue.

"There are dark forces at play--"

Jane cut in, "Greta, please. If you know anything, you have to tell me. He's my son. What if Arlen were in danger? You'd want to know, wouldn't you?"

Greta joined them at the table. Her eyes glistened with emotion. "Why of course I'd want to know. But we're all in trouble, not just your boy. There are reasons I live like this, in this damnable tree like some mad monkey. But I'm not crazy. No, no, I'm trapped here. Trapped by fate. I wanted to leave Coal Hollow and be done with it when Arlen was born. But I couldn't do that, even with my son's best interests at heart. I had to stay--we both did. Because we all play a part in this. If I had left, evil would have continued unabated."

"What evil, Greta?"

"First off, Janie-girl, you know what I'm telling you. You can't live in Coal Hollow a lifetime and not know. It's the Underground. The evil is underground. But it strays. Sometimes it strays to the surface; sometimes the evil of above drifts below, too. But when it does surfaces, it will at times take along innocence when it returns to its lair."

"They took my boy?"

"In Jimmy's case, he stumbled upon it. It was an accident; but sometimes accidents have unforgiving consequences."

Seeing pain etched in Jane's face, Cooper chimed in, "I know we've come unannounced, Greta, but if you know anything about Jimmy's whereabouts and how we can bring him home, you need to tell us, straightaway. In plain and simple langue. Drop the hyperbole; no more talk of 'evil and dark forces.' That doesn't help the situation."

Greta didn't look at him, didn't even acknowledge him. Instead, she gazed at Jane with mounting intensity.

At long last, Jane broke under her glare. "I know. Well, I've heard stories. The Underground is a place where men venture who soon become beasts. That's what my grandma once said." Her voice was soft, but thick in her throat. "Less human than animal."

"Depraved, yes. Indeed." Greta nodded, knowing she'd finally gotten through.

"Why didn't you tell me?" Jane looked miserable, as if she'd just gone through a physical trauma that began without certainty of her survival. Her face was gaunt, and she appeared a decade older than her thirty-two years.

"Oh, dear, I would've if it would've done any good. I had a right mind to follow those kids home after their recent visit and try to get through to you as well. I could've told you the day before Jimmy went missing. Or when you came asking about your marriage prospects all those years ago. I could have been done with it by whispering to your newborn ear. At no other time would you have listened. Not with open ears and understanding. Not until now."

A crash from outside halted their conversation, a slight pounding against the clapboards. Cooper thought a bird might have made an unwise flight path directly into the wall of Greta's home, perhaps a crow or barn owl, but an accompanying sound did away with that notion: the lively rush of rapidly expanding flame.

"We need to go now." Greta's voice trembled. "If it's not too late already."

Flames burned just outside the kitchen window. Greta stepped back. Heat pulsed from the window as the fire fed on the treehouse. Cooper went to the far side of the little home and looked out the small window by the kitchen table. A single row of torches marched through the tall brush toward the treehouse.

"What is it? Who's doing this?" Jane shouted, grabbing Greta's arm as the three of them rushed for the door.

Greta didn't answer right away, but Cooper knew.

Sometimes evil strays to the surface to steal away innocence.

Greta shrugged away from Jane's grip. "You can't leave this woman's side, Mr. Cooper," she said, then turned back to Jane. "You need to stay with Mr. Cooper. You will find your answers if you don't stray from his side. You'll be safe; that's as clear as day in my visions. You hurry down those steps, make your way North through my field. There's good covering ground in that direction, which will give you time. I need to take care of this, end it now. They want to scare me off. But I won't let them hurt you two. Now go. Off with you." Greta patted Jane's hand, squeezed Cooper's shoulder, then ushered them out the door.

"Greta, you're coming with us. The fire. It's spreading."

"Don't you worry. They won't let anything happen to me. They just want to scare me is all," Greta repeated. Her tired expression belied her words.

"Who are they?"

"The undead."

Greta closed the door on them, terminating the conversation. Fire spread across a third of the home, licking along the ancient tree branches, wilting the moisture from its leaves before they also caught fire. Smoke twirled along a gust of wind, enveloping Cooper and Jane as they nearly tumbled down the spiral steps.

"She's not going to make it out," Jane said.

Cooper didn't respond. The row of torches was closing on the house. They didn't even have a second to dawdle. He took Jane's hand and pulled hard as they made a break for the nearest gap in the surrounding brush. Together, they bound through the undergrowth as it tore at their clothes and skin.

They ran. Blood pulsed through their ears, but it seemed the sounds of the destruction they left behind only intensified--the flames overtaking the treehouse, timbers crumpling, upending, crashing to the forest floor. And voices, none-too-distant, closing in on the ruins, reveling in the destruction, basking in the warm glow of their hapless victim.

After a tense ten minutes, Cooper eased their pace. They caught their breath, tasting smoke on their tongues, smelling it in their hair. "They killed her. There's no way she got out in time. Why didn't she come with us. Why, Ted?"

"They--whoever 'they' is--didn't kill Greta. She
let
them kill her."

Behind them, the fire glowed over the treetops. Cooper saw how recklessly they'd trampled the grass during their escape. They might as well have painted a line of arrows in the bent blades to indicate their direction.

"Did they see us?" Jane asked the question before Cooper could.

"I don't know, but I'm guessing they were coming if we were there or not."

"Who are they? What did Greta mean, undead? The dead can't do that. The dead can't start fires and destroy, because, damn it, their dead!" Their slow progress screeched to a halt. "Ted, what aren't you telling me?"

"Greta knew what she was talking about. About Jimmy and the Underground. She knew we could escape safely if we headed north through her field."

"How can you be so sure?"

"Well, first of all, just over the next ridge is a meek runnel of a creek, and at the top of the next hill past the creek sits my house. She knew what she was talking about. We just need to figure out how that helps us find Jimmy."

They stepped across the meek runnel of a creek, the grass lining the shore lush and green, becoming sparse not more than twenty feet beyond. Cooper realized they were still holding hands long after it was practical for them to do so. It was a comfortable thing, a warm reassurance during such an disturbing night.

"You must be a wealthier man than you let on earlier tonight."

"What do you mean?"

"Your houselights are on."

The house was indeed alight, the two facing windows on the ground floor bright and wide-eyed, the upper floors awash in an umber of flame. It appeared as if the grand celebration of the day had assembled at Cooper's house instead of Jane's. But the house was empty. Essentially.

"Let me explain." He guided her by hand up the porch steps. He opened the front door, but when they stepped inside, the lights warming the house all went out. The entryway was dark and cold. No hint of a lantern's lingering warmth.

"That's odd," Jane said, looking around.

"Not from what I've seen." He closed the door behind them.

"You must have some draft," she said, chuckling nervously.

"No, I have guests. Or more precisely, I'm a guest in this house."

"Are you going to buy furnishings, or just sleep on the floor?" she said, pointing at his nest of blankets. He felt exposed having her see his bedding, as if she would instantly know the dreams he experienced while sleeping there.