Cat's Cradle (27 page)

The four officers clicked on their flashlights and searched the dark pockets where their high beam car lights did not reach. There was not a cat to be seen. But the odor of cat excrement was sharp in the hot night air.

“It’s a hell of a lot warmer tonight than it was last night,” Ken observed. “Temperature’s not much different than this afternoon.”

“Yeah,” Woody said. “You’re right. Weird things going on in this county.”

“How about the front door?” Ken asked.

“Locked,” Woody said. “I tried it.”

“Under the circumstances,” Susan said, “I don’t think Mrs. Quitman would object to us kicking it in.”

“Let’s do it,” Lewis said. He added, “
After
we check the house for cats.”

While the cops checked the house from the outside, inside the house, locked behind her bedroom door, Sylvia huddled on the floor, a few inches from the thick stain of blood on the carpet. Her husband’s blood. She knew that; accepted it with silent tears and shock.

Something scratched on the door.

She muffled a cry of fear.

The scratching came again, and it did not sound like cats.

Sylvia listen more intently. There it was again. Whatever it was was scratching on the door.

A low bubbling moan drifted to her. That was followed by a choking cry.

It was Larry. She just knew it was. “Larry?” she whispered. “Larry? Is that you?”

More moaning drifted to her. That was followed by more scratching. And grunting.

She pressed her cheek against the door and listened. She could hear ragged breathing. She put her hand at the bottom of the door. She could feel breath coming from under the crack between door and carpet. Hot breath.

“Larry?”

Grunting and moaning whispered from the other side of the door. Downstairs, she heard the sounds of glass and wood breaking, footsteps hard on the floor.

“Mrs. Quitman!” a a woman’s voice called. “Stay where you are. The cats are gone. We’re coming up there to get you.”

“Cats are gone!” Sylvia whispered, her voice ragged. She was on the verge on shock and hysteria. “Cats! What cats?”

That dry scratching once more rasped at the door. Sylvia unlocked the door. The scratching became more urgent. Gruntings became louder. Sylvia slowly opened the door.

A hand fell through the space. Sylvia screamed in horror. The hand had been stripped of all flesh. White bony fingers dug into the shag of the carpet. Through eyes that were approaching madness, Sylvia opened the door wide. She looked at the whiteness of skull bone; a face stripped of all flesh. The eyes were gone, the lips gone. Blood leaked out from under what remained of the scalplock.

From the lipless mouth, the woman heard moaning, grunting sounds. She crawled out of the bedroom and squatted by the man. She did not look up at the approach of the cops. Larry’s feet shone red/white in the dimness of the hall. Bloody white bones stuck out from under his jeans. What had once been her husband died on the carpet in the hall, his bony fingers digging into the carpet as his bones clacked and rattled in death.

Sylvia began shrieking. And rocking back and forth in the hall. She banged her head against the wall as her eyes grew wild with madness. Drool slobbered from her mouth as her mind snapped.

Then she could remember nothing. And never would.

5

Mille and Kenny had heard the sounds of shouting outside, all around the huge terminal complex, but neither knew what was going on. They both had shouted at the guard who was supposed to be just outside the door. They had received no reply. They both had listened at the door. Neither could detect any sign of life outside.

“I think he’s split,” Kenny said. “Boy! It’s hot. What’s happening around here?”

“I don’t know,” Mille said. “It’s miserable. Get the lock, Kenny.”

Using a stiff piece of wire, Kenny went to work. It did not take him long to open the cheap lock. “Piece of junk,” he said.

“Here goes nothing,” Mille whispered.

They opened the door a crack and looked out. Hot winds hit them in the face. The huge open sided building seemed void of life. They slipped out and closed the door. The door locked automatically behind them. They made their way cautiously and carefully through the huge, empty old building. They would occasionally catch the silver streaks of flashlights darting and bobbing in the outside night. They paused, squatting down near the open front of the building, trying to get their bearings.

“Where is Hoyt?” the shout came out of the night.

“Those things got him. He just opened the door to the trailer and was covered with those maggot-looking things. They brought him down and stripped him bare in half a minute. I never saw anything like it in my life.”

“I’m gettin’ outta here!”

“Goddamnit!” the harsh voice of Lou Lamotta came ripping through the turmoil and confusion. “Get yourselves together, people. You’re trained agents. Get those drums of gas over there and flood the ground around the trailer with it. That’ll kill those vermin. Do it!” he roared.

A woman screamed, shaking the night. “Get them off me!” The scream changed to one of agony. “They’re eating me alive!” she wailed.

“Somebody shoot that lady and put her out of her misery!” Lou yelled. “Move.”

A single shot blasted the hot air. The woman’s screaming ceased.

Kenny and Mille squatted in the darkness of the cavernous old building, neither of them understanding what was going on around them.

“Maggots?” Kenny whispered. “Did she say maggots?”

“I think so. Listen!” Mille hissed.

The echo of the gunshot had died away. The faint sounds of munching took its place.

“Whatever it is out there is eating that woman,” Mille said.

“Oh, wonderful!”

“That mummy-man is gone!” a voice shouted.

“So is the deputy,” another voice was added to the confusion.

“Gone!” Lou screamed in anger. “What do you mean? Gone where?”

“How do I know?” the man yelled. “What am I, Lamotta, a fortune-teller?”

“Hey, Carson!” Lamotta shouted. “You watch your mouth. Don’t get too cute with me.”

“Too bad, man. I’m gettin’ away from this place. Right now.”

“You pull out now, and I’ll contract your hide,” Lou warned him.

The man offered no reply to that.

Gasoline swooshed into fire, adding an unreal note to the happenings.

“Contract?” Mille whispered.

“Kill him,” Kenny said flatly. “I warned you about these guys.”

“Kenny, what are we going to do. I’m scared.” She sought his hand in the red-tinted night. “And why is it so
hot
?”

“I don’t know. But I’m scared, too. We’ll make it, Mille.” He looked around him, spotting some old crates and boxes piled against a wall. “Over there,” he said, pointing. “Outside, we might get shot. We’ll hide over there until we can make a break for it.”

The reporter and the investigator ran, hunched over, to the pile of crates and boxes and slipped behind them. They inched their way into a large packing crate. Where they sat, they could see the reflection of the fires in the compound, the images leaping and dancing on the wall that faced them.

“Looks like witches dancing,” Kenny whispered.

“God don’t say that! It looks like we traded one cell for another.”

“That’s one way of looking at it,” Kenny returned the whisper. “We’ve got to be quiet, Mille. Real quiet.”

“I’ll tell you something, Kenny.”

“What?”

“I’m scared. Real scared.” This from a woman who had covered stories in countries ruled by harsh dictators; who had faced interrogation from secret police; and was known as one of the most fearless of the new, young breed of international reporters.

“We’ll make it, Mille,” he assured her. I hope, he thought.

* * *

The Old One had widened the crack in the concrete floor. Now his powerful clawed hands were jerking off chunks of concrete from the lip of the hole, widening it still further. Betty Reynolds and her kids sat on the stinking, blood-soaked floor and watched the Old One pull its horrible bulk free of the womb of the earth. It crouched on the floor, staring at those staring at it.

“Can I help you?” Betty asked.

“Now that you mention it,” the Old One said, in her voice. “Yes. Yes, you can.”

She leaned closer to it. “Tell me how.”

The Old One laughed, a high, girlish giggle. “I’d rather show you.”

“All right.”

The Old One reached out and put both clawed hands on Betty’s neck. It jerked, tearing the woman’s head off. Blood squirted as if from a garden hose, spraying the walls. The Old One peeled the flesh from the head like the skin from a grape. Cracking her skull, the Old One began eating the still warm brains. It pausing, looking at Betty’s children.

“Excuse me. I’m very hungry.” Bits of gray matter clung to its lips.

The kids shrugged. The oldest boy said, “Have it all, man.”

“Thank you.”

* * *

At the bubbling hole not far from the chainlink fence around the old terminal, a faint cracking sound ripped from the pool as the earth around it parted. The Old One leaped from the hole to stand in the darkness and snarl and shake itself, flinging blood from the foulness that it was. Its long arms touched the ground where it stood. It looked at the flames jumping from the gasoline-soaked earth around and including the trailer. It smiled as it heard the sounds of frightened screaming and yelling voices. The Old One sensed if it stayed close, there would soon be more than enough food. It smiled again as it looked at the fence surrounding the bubbling pool. It shuffled to the fence, reached up, and tore it apart, flinging the fence into the brush. The Old One moved closer to the fence around the terminal. Choosing a spot behind some brush, it squatted down and waited. And listened to something only it could hear.

There were signals in the air. But they were conflicting and confusing.

The Old One snarled softly. The signals were missives between its Master and the Master’s foe. All was not well. The Dark One was hurling oaths and curses and challenges at its lifelong enemy.

The heavens spoke with laughter, seeming to taunt the Old One’s Master.

No, all was not well.

* * *

“I do thank you for waiting,” the Old One said to Mickey Reynolds.

Mickey grunted.

The Old One laughed. The cat beside Mickey seemed to laugh along with the foul hideousness.

The Old One paused, sensed something in the air that only it could sense. Messages. Angry messages. The Master was raging his dark fury.

No matter. At this time, the messages did not concern the Old One. The Old One reached out, its big, clawed hand covering the top of Mickey’s skull. It squeezed. Mickey’s head popped as the skull shattered. Pulling the dead, once human close, the Old One sucked out the brains, smacking its lips. It then began tearing the flesh from the carcass, stuffing the bloody strips into its wide mouth.

The cat watched and waited.

* * *

The Old One listened for a moment, not fully understanding the silent signals bouncing back and forth between heaven and earth. It shook its great ugly head and looked at that which had once been Eddie Brown.

“You have no idea why you are here, do you?” it asked, in Eddie’s voice.

Eddie grunted.

“Fool!” the Old One said, then smashed a fist against the animal head of Eddie, cracking the skull with the single powerful blow. Eddie slumped to the wet floor, dead. The ugly Old One began to dine, slowly, savoring each bite. It had plenty of time—hours. But this one miserable creature would not begin to be enough to appease the Old One’s ageless hunger. But it would do for the moment.

The cat waited. And watched.

* * *

The six Old Ones were free of the damnable tomb-like womb in which God had sealed them. There had been others before them to break free, but that had been centuries before. All six had heard or were listening to the signals that raged about them. None was sure of what lay before them. They were certain of only one thing: they must obey.

* * *

The cat sat and watched Anya. The girl appeared to be in a trance. But Pet knew she was receiving instructions from the Master.

It was almost time.

* * *

In the house next to where Anya and Pet were hiding, the windows were down and locked, the doors closed and locked. As the sounds of the loudspeaker faded, the man looked at his wife. “I wonder what in the world is going on?”

“I don’t know.” She looked out the window. “But the number of cats outside has increased. And I don’t like it.”

“I thought you liked cats?”

“One at a time,” she corrected. “I don’t like several hundred of them hanging around. It’s . . . well, eerie.”

“Several
hundred
?”

“Look out the window.”

He rose from the couch and looked. “For pity’s sake!” He clicked on the outside lights for a better look.

The yard was full of cats.

One of the cats closest to the window snarled and leaped at the window, its claws digging in, shredding the screen. It clawed and howled, almost a humanlike scream of fury, unable to get at the man.

The man stepped back, startled at the violence of the attack. “I don’t like this. I don’t know what is happening, but it’s unnatural. Try the police again.”

“I just did. The phone is still dead.”

Both of them stood silent in the large den for a moment, listening as the roof of the big, two-story home seemed to come alive under the feet of hundreds of cats.

“I don’t want to alarm you,” the man said. “But I think we’d better reinforce these windows.”

The couple began working hurriedly, moving cabinets and furniture around, barricading the windows. That done, and done well, the man went to a closet and took out an old double-barreled, side hammer shotgun. Then he forgot where he’d put the shells. He remembered and loaded the old coach gun.

She looked at the sawed off shotgun, doubt in her eyes.

“What’s the matter?” he asked.

“Is that the gun you got from my brother?”

“Yes.”

She arched an eyebrow dubiously.

He said, “You don’t think? ... No, he
wouldn’t
!”

“Yeah, he would, too.”

“Yeah,” he agreed. “He would. Help me find my other shotgun.”

“Good luck. I think it’s in the attic.”

“At least these shells will work in it.”

“If they go off.”

“Why shouldn’t they?” he asked, sticking out his chin.

“Because you bought them at a rummage sale back in 1965.”

* * *

“Turn the air conditioning up,” Dan told a deputy.

“It’s wide open, Sheriff,” the deputy said, after checking the thermostat. “It’s got to be a hundred and twenty degrees outside.”

“All planned,” Denier said softly.

Everyone in the room looked at the priest. “Planned?” Taylor asked.

“People will have to open their windows after a while,” the priest replied. “Soon every air conditioner in this area will be operating at full capacity. Breakers and fuses will go; the air conditioners will break down; the load will be too much on old wiring. The people will be forced to open windows in hopes of catching a breeze for relief. But there will be no breeze to catch. With the windows open, the cats can enter.”

“That is the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard,” a local minister said.

Dan ignored the man. He said to Denier, “You’re just full of good cheer aren’t you, Father?”

“Satan is playing,” Denier said. “He knows what you’re planning. This heat is his way of telling you he knows.”

“Hogwash! the very vocal and opinionated minister said. ”Sheriff, you can’t be taking anything this man says seriously.“ He looked at Denier.

Denier smiled. He was used to this type of reaction, from that type of minister.

Dan looked at the Methodist minister. “Jerry, what do you think?”

Jerry Hallock said, “You saw the thing, didn’t you, Dan?”

“I certainly did. And you saw the Polaroids we took out there.”

“Well,” the Methodist said, “I fully believe Satan is very much alive and well. This . . .” He waved his hand toward the outside. “This is a little hard to accept. But I’ll go along with it until somebody—” He looked at Louis Foster, the doubting minister. “-can come up with a better explanation.”

Louis snorted his contempt.

“Matt?” Dan asked the Presbyterian minister.

The other ministers in the town had flatly refused to even listen to Dan and Father Denier. One, upon sighting the priest, had slammed the door closed.

That had irritated the hell out of Dan. The priest had shrugged it off.

“I’m with Jerry,” Matt Askins said. He looked around him. “But is this it? Out of all the ministers in this town, is this the sum total of all who believe in Satan? My God, if that is so, what have the others been preaching?”

“You’re both losing your grip on reality,” Louis said.

He was ignored.

“You call the power boys?” Taylor asked Dan. The trooper was getting a gutful of Louis Foster.