The Pines (26 page)

Bare arms on heated sand, the boy continued to launch the stones. They w ere runners, racing downhill, and he was in the lead, feeling the wind cool his face, feeling courage and grace surge within his body. He was winning the race, and she stood at the bottom, cheering him. And now the rolling shapes became soldiers, like his father in the pictures or the ones Pammy had told him about, racing down a dune to the rescue. His mother was among those camped at the bottom, captive, straining her eyes toward the bright figure at the head of the column.

The pebbles changed again. Now they became other people. Bad people. The ones who pointed at him and laughed. But now they ran before him, ducking through the wild pines, screaming like babies. Like loonies. He’d show them. He was the brave one now, the fierce strong brave one, and try as they might they would not escape as they struggled and slid. Bad people, all of them…like the one with the clear bottle of foul stuff.

He shut his eyes and fragments of half-forgotten dreams drifted under the lids: a dusty road…himself floating…the windowless shack in the swamp.

Dooley whimpered, then howled. Matty looked up to see the dog backing away from him, body low against the ground. “Dooley?”

The animal continued to retreat, but its tail wagged briefly.

“Dooley!”

The dog hesitantly returned. Matty reached out to rough the dusty whorls of fur, and the dog’s tail beat his legs. Soon, they rolled together, happy and relaxed again. The boy’s breathing steadied, and in another moment the soldiers might have resumed their charging rescue. But the boy’s quick eyes caught movement overhead. A hawk circled in the air, searching, wheeling lower. It swept in ever-tighter circles.

It dove, disappeared into the trees. The boy’s eyes followed the motion, and he stared into the breeze-swept, kaleidoscopic pines. Patterns altered. Matty’s hand ceased to stroke the dog’s back and slid forward, coming to a stop on Dooley’s neck. Through his light fingers, he could feel the pulse. The hot, infuriating pulse. His body stiffened.

Dooley sprang away, vanishing into the brush.

The voice spoke, clearer this time, more compelling.

Chabwok.

And for five minutes, his face gone dark and fierce, it was as though the boy lived a raging, biting life on the forest floor.

“No! Go away!” He stood, angry and confused, hurtling stone after stone into the woods. “You were gonna hurt Pammy! You were gonna hurt her! Ain’t your friend no more. Go ’way!” With a dull thump, the final pebble bounced off a pine trunk and fell noiselessly into the sand.

“Look, Frank, calm down, will you? I’m telling you, it’s not gonna be a problem. We’re…Frank…Frank…We can handle this ourselves, boss.” Barry opened the phone booth, letting some of the heat out of the glass box. “Would you…would you listen…would you listen to what I’m telling you for just a minute, Frank? What? Yeah. Don’t worry. I’m gonna talk to her about it. Yeah. It’s that Doris. She’s the one might cause trouble. Huh? Yeah, I will.”

“Hey, Bar.” Looking over the map, Steve sat with the car door open. “Hurry it up, will you?”

“Listen, Frank, I got to go. Yeah, I don’t want ‘Buford’ over here to know I been talking to you. I told him I was calling home. Like I said, we got all the poison placed and everything. It’s only cause a the stateys and the reporters that we can’t move the cars yet, but soon as the dogs are all dead, everything’ll quiet down again.”

Steve refolded the map as Barry approached. “You ready?”

“Yeah, let’s go in,” Barry muttered, shading his eyes against the sun to peer at the diner.

“So how’s your father-in-law?” Steve hoisted himself out of the car and slammed the door.

“Huh?”

Steve shook his head, dismissing it. “Got any ideas what this is all about?”

“Doris just called and said Athena needed to see us here at one o’clock. Sounded kind of weird.”

“It’s one thirty now.” A dark puddle spread beneath the clattering air conditioner. They crossed the parking lot, Barry a little in the lead.

“Damn.” He sauntered in the door. “Would you look at this reception committee?”

Blind from the sudden change in light, Steve stood in the doorway and relished the coolness. He strained his eyes in the direction of the corner booth. Even from across the room, the group’s quiet conveyed a tautness, and only Athena failed to look up as Barry approached. Steve stared a moment, shocked: her face was the color of lead.

“You’re late,” said Doris, and Steve noticed the worried way she kept sneaking looks at Athena.

Barry stood in front of the table, glaring down. “You got guts, boy. What the fuck you doing h ere? You didn’t tell me he was gonna be here, Doris.”

Very red, Jack fidgeted and shot Larry a glance, while Steve appropriated chairs from a nearby table.

“Yessir, you really got balls.” Barry sat. “You’re lucky to be still breathing.”

“Look, Barry,” began Jack carefully.

Barry leaned across the table, pushing his face too close to Jack’s. “Don’t give me that ‘look, Barry’ crap.”

“Hey,” Doris interrupted, “what goes on? I thought you guys were supposed to be such good buddies.”

“Not no more,” Barry growled. “Some buddy.” His tone became aggrieved.

Steve relaxed as the violence almost imperceptibly melted from his partner’s stance.

“A guy don’t want buddies that are hanging around the house while he’s out working.”

“You got it wrong, Barry. Cathy and me ain’t…”

“Oh Christ,” interrupted Doris. “You two would have to start this now.” She kept checking Athena, but the other woman kept her eyes fixed on the table, her face unreadable. Larry, however, had gone dead white.

“And you supposed to be her cousin,” Barry went on with a nasty smile. “Let me tell you something, cuz. I ever catch you two at it, I’m gonna blow your head off.”

“You’re crazy. I never…” Jack stopped. His jaw tightened, and he gave Larry a look that clearly said “you owe me big-time, pal.”

Steve’s gaze never wandered from Athena. Something was going on here. Something bad. There were blotches under her eyes. Her blouse was newly washed, very clean, very wrinkled. She’d been the source of the tension when they’d entered—he felt sure of that. Dread coiled deep in his gut.

Finally, there came a lull in the noise from Barry.

Still gazing down at the table, Athena drew a deep breath. “I asked you two to stop here because, well, really, Doris asked you, but we both thought so, because I wanted to ask you—I mean, tell you—what I’ve just been telling the others.” She paused, gathering strength. Barry stared at her, and the ambulance crew squirmed. “The night my husband, I mean, my brother-in-law died, the night before last when Lonny was killed…I saw something in the woods. It came after me. Something like a man.”

“What?”

“But I thought”—Steve paused, searching her expression—“I thought it was the dogs.” She raised her head for the first time, and with a sinking feeling, he recognized the look in her eyes; he’d seen it often enough in mirrors. But what could she have to feel guilty about? “Are you telling us a man killed Lonny?”

“Like a man.”

“What are you saying?” Barry glared at her.

Everyone shifted uneasily. Doris picked up a hamburger. “There’s a hair in this. Oh Christ, I think it’s from Sims’s mustache.”

Larry nudged Jack. “Quick, man, get the throw-up pan.”

“What exactly did you see, ’Thena?” Steve kept his voice calm.

“You can’t expect her to describe it,” Doris interrupted, bristling. “Not after everything that’s happened, not when—”

Athena put up a hand. “It was dark…and the storm…” Her voice fell, and she turned her face toward the window. “Barry? I saw its teeth. They were human teeth. And it stood up.”

“So what are you saying? It was the Jersey Devil or what?”

Steve asked, “Did anyone else see this…this thing?”

Athena looked away from the window. “My sister-in-law was there.”

“And did she see it?” he repeated gently.

Doris leaned forward.

She shook her head. The Formica tabletop was scratched and yellowed, and she stared at the worm tracks of cigarette burns.

Steve’s voice coaxed. “What did she see?”

“Dogs,” she whispered, gazing into her coffee mug as though peering down a well.

With a laugh both exasperated and triumphant, Barry sat back. Before he could speak, Doris added, “I took some scrapings from the bodies of both victims.”

“What both?” Barry looked ready to snarl.

“Athena’s brother-in-law and the construction worker found in the car.”

“Oh for—”

“I took scrapings,” she continued, “and left them with a friend of mine at the lab. Unfortunately, the hospital administrator got wind of it. Took sort of a dim view.” She sighed. “So we don’t exactly have a lab report, but—”

“You support this?” Steve interrupted, watching her face. “You’re supporting this story? This claim that there was a man or what ever involved? Do you know something about this?”

“It’s like I was saying, I don’t exactly have a report. But one of the bodies, the hard hat, I’m pretty sure what the scrapings were. Semen.”

“Jesus,” Larry breathed.

“You may have noticed this last little fact wasn’t in the official account,” Doris finished. “No mention of it at all.” Exhaling a cloud of smoke, she put a supportive arm around Athena’s shoulders.

Barry stared hard at Athena. At the next table, a woman asked loudly for the check.

“Even so.” Steve nodded slowly, his voice grim. “It could still have been dogs.”

“Oh shit.” Larry looked sick.

Unnoticed until now, photographs had been lying facedown on the table. Doris flipped them over.

“Jesus H. Christ!”

The color enlargements revealed each wound in pornographic detail.

“Where the hell’d you get these?” demanded Barry. “Oh. Of course. You and your frigging friends.”

“Doris?” A slight tremor marred Steve’s attempt at a tone of mere professional interest. “Have you got anything else to go on?”

Some of the anger drained from her face, but her hands remained clenched. “Well, for one thing,” Doris began, “there are no animal hairs on this body. And there should be, especially considering the method of attack—the ferocity, the violence. Look at the claw marks.” She pointed to a photo, nodded to Steve. “We both saw those. Even on the side of the car.” She stubbed out her cigarette. “There should be fur all over, inside the wounds, even.”

“And the other? Lonny?” asked Steve. “Was there any fur on him?”

“Well,” Doris hesitated. “He may have been killed first and later eviscerated by dogs.”

“Shit,” Barry grumbled. “So what you’re saying is there were dog signs all over Lonny. Am I right?” Again he laughed. “This is fucking ridiculous.”

Steve watched Athena. Her fingertips stroked her forehead, one hand shielding her eyes from Barry, screening her face from his words. She seemed so drained, so weary, yet still so strong. He felt as though he were seeing deep inside of her now, as though this quality, this endurance, this purity were something she normally kept hidden from the world.

Hesitantly, Larry turned to the older cop. “But what about the guy in the car?” he ventured. “I mean, like Doris says, if the dogs did it, why isn’t there…?”

“The rain.” Barry spoke slowly. “The rain washed the dog fur off him. That’s all, twit.” He looked at his watch. “Is that it?”

“The stateys may have something,” added Doris.

“Yeah, so? What do you want me to do about it?”

“Couldn’t you maybe talk to somebody?”

He mumbled an obscenity.

“When I was in the trailer…”

Everyone turned toward the flat voice.

“I think I heard…what ever it was…fighting with the dogs. It…the man…may be bitten. We could check hospitals.”

Barry made a scornful noise.

“Maybe what you heard was your brother-in-law,” Steve suggested, “being attacked by the dog pack.” His hand inched across the table toward hers, then stopped, fingers curling.

Barry blew smoke. He leaned forward, parodying Steve’s position and tone of voice. “Listen, Athena, I understand how bad you feel about poor old Lonny, but you really do know it was dogs tore them men up, don’t you?”

Athena clenched the handle of her mug so hard her knuckles stood out like a row of pearls.

Steve cleared his throat. “Barry, I thought you were the one saying these animals weren’t dangerous.”

“I never said they wasn’t dangerous,” Barry railed at him, obviously feeling betrayed. “I just said—”

“It wasn’t an animal! I told you, it stood on two legs like a man! Why doesn’t anybody believe me?”

“And I’m telling you we don’t need to stir up no trouble like that!” Barry answered, breathing hard.

“About what time would you say this all happened?” asked Steve. “’Thena?” When she didn’t answer him, he looked around and realized that all over the restaurant, people were staring at them. “’Thena?” he repeated. “What do you want us to do?”

She looked at him and didn’t say anything.

“What?” He furrowed his brow.

“I don’t know.” She shook her head. “I want you to help me, I guess. I had a chance to shoot it and couldn’t do it. I waited too long. I don’t know why.”

“Could it have been your brother-in-law who chased you?” asked Steve.

“Listen, Doris.” Jack started to get up. “Larry and me, we got to get going.”

“Yeah, right,” said Larry. “We, uh, got things to do.”

“Could a couple of scrawny mutts tear a man’s arm off?” demanded Doris.

“You saying a man did that?” Barry slammed the photos down in the center of the table. “You said it yourself—look at the claw marks.” He sat back, satisfied he’d made his point. In a softer, patronizing tone, he added, “Now, it would be different if you had one shred of evidence.”

“That’s exactly what we do have.” Doris shoved the pictures back at him. “Shred of evidence.”

“I’m not crazy. Don’t everybody look at me like that!”

“Honey, nobody said that.”

“Let’s get out of here.”

“Wait a minute, Barry,” Steve said. “If it is wild dogs, and if they have started attacking people…”