Cage of Night (14 page)

CHAPTER NINE

The country road was a roller coaster of steep upslopes and equally steep downslopes. There was just enough snow and ice on them to make them dangerous.

I followed Garrett's Firebird deep into the country, the farmhouses getting fewer and fewer the longer we drove, timber becoming more and more dominant.

The moon was behind clouds and the snowy land had a dirty, gritty feeling.

I had no idea where he was going and I wondered if Garrett did. Maybe they were just driving around. Maybe they were having an argument and needed to talk it out and weren't paying any attention to where they were at all.

Then Garrett did a peculiar thing.

About half a mile from the Swenson farm, he cut his lights. He didn't pull over to the side of the road. He didn't even slow down.

He just cut his lights and headed straight for the Swenson place, turning into the gravel drive as soon as he reached it.

He stopped right at the head of the drive.

And sat there.

A quarter mile behind them, I pulled off to the side of the road.

I grabbed my binoculars and got out.

Icy snow crunched beneath my feet. The below-zero temperature bit at my nose and cheeks. The night seemed vast and somehow alien, as if I'd been set down on a world that was not quite earth. Only the lonely bay of a timber wolf reassured me that I was still earthbound.

I focused the binoculars and had a look.

They sat in the front seat of Garrett's Firebird, talking.

Garrett smoked a cigarette.

They didn't seem to be arguing—no angry faces, no sudden sharp gestures—but the conversation didn't seem relaxed, either.

Then I saw that Garrett had spread a piece of paper on the dashboard.

He pointed to it, spoke.

Cindy seemed to be listening intently.

He pointed to the paper again, several times.

Then they were up and out of the car.

Mae Swenson was an aged and wealthy widow who kept her farm running with a succession of managers and hired hands. She was no easier to work for than her husband had been, and he'd been known to fire a dozen people in a single month. The Swensons had inherited several large farms from Mae's father. They sold them off back at the peak of land values in the late seventies, when corporations were paying ever-sillier prices for rich black Midwestern soil.

Now Mae had just this one farm.

But according to local legend, Mae had something else, too.

Her own father having lost most of his money in a bank failure, Mae had an almost psychotic fear of banks.

It was said, therefore, that she kept her valuables, including large amounts of money, right in the house with her.

She didn't have any security alarm to protect her, it was further said, nor any kind of security surveillance team driving by.

But she did have Poker.

Poker was a German shepherd that delighted in landing on and tearing to pieces any living thing you put in front of him.

It was said that a little girl came with her folks to visit Mae one sunny Sunday afternoon.

The little girl brought her kitten with her.

Once they were outside the car, the kitten jumped out of the little girl's hand.

Poker took it from there.

Not even Mae herself, who shouted and beat at the German shepherd with a broom handle, could quell Poker's appetite until the kitten was nothing but a bloody carcass.

Poker, it was further claimed, preferred human meat to all else.

A drifter had heard tell of Mae's goodies tucked away inside her house. He decided that he was man enough to overpower a widow woman and take her treasure.

The drifter jimmied one of the downstairs windows and climbed inside.

Poker found him pretty quickly. He'd broken a leg the day before and Mae had kept him inside for a time. Usually he stayed on the front porch.

My dad happened to be downtown that same night, when the ambulance brought the drifter in.

My dad swears that Poker ripped the man's windpipe right out of his throat, leaving only a bloody cavity.

No charges were pressed.

Everybody knew that Poker was a killer and that uninvited guests visited Mae at their peril.

So here were Cindy and Garrett walking up to Mae's house late at night.

I trotted down the road after them. I wanted to get a better look at what Garrett held in his left hand.

My first impression was that it was a pistol. But there was something odd about it—pistol-like but not a pistol. It was the difference between a .38 and a starter's gun for a race. They resemble each other until you look closely.

They went right up to the porch of the large two-story white house with gables and a few spires added to show some creativity.

You could see they were waiting for Poker.

They looked left, right, straight ahead.

Now that they were within his domain, they moved more slowly, carefully.

I could hear them wondering, Where is Poker?

And that's when Poker appeared.

He came straight for them, flying off the porch, his knife-like teeth dripping saliva, his eyes glowing.

I have to say that Garrett was a lot cooler than I would have been in his situation.

He stood his ground.

When Poker was airborne, and about to knock him to the ground, Garrett took two careful steps to the left, raised the weapon in his hand and fired.

If there was a sound, I didn't hear it.

I just saw Garrett's hand jump from the recoil. Otherwise I wouldn't have known he'd fired at all.

Poker's trajectory took the dog a foot past Garrett.

Poker ended up slamming into a snowbank.

The enraged way he pulled his snout from the snowbank, the furious way he turned his long, lean body around to face Garrett, I assumed that Garrett was in deep trouble.

Then Poker collapsed.

No other way to say it.

One moment he was standing there growling, ready to pitch himself at the hated Garrett, and then he was flat on the ground, his head lolling to the left.

Unmoving.

I wondered if he was dead.

Cindy had covered her face, didn't want to see.

Garrett approached the animal, knelt down next to him. He felt for vital signs.

He looked up and said something to Cindy. The way she took her hands from her face, I could tell that Garrett had reassured her that the dog wasn't dead.

Garrett stood up. Walked over to Cindy. Took her in his arms. Kissed her.

I brought my binoculars down.

I still couldn't watch her kissing anybody else.

Then they were moving again, this time toward the house, walking on tiptoe as they ascended the three steps leading to the porch.

Only on the porch did Garrett show any hesitation. He glanced around, as if looking for something important.

Then he walked over to the door, took a bulky ring of keys from his pocket, and started searching for the proper one.

Cops have as many keys and tools as burglars. That's why a number of cops go bad. Simply can't resist the temptation. Who would suspect a cop of being a B&E man?

Garrett found what he wanted on the tenth or eleventh try.

The front door opened.

The interior of the house, as seen from the front door, was much darker than the night outside.

Then he nodded for Cindy to follow him.

She seemed just a bit reluctant but then walked past him, into the interior.

No lights ever showed.

No sounds were ever heard.

For the next half hour, the house sat as dark and quiet as it had been previously.

There was just the prairie and the snow and the silence, not even any wind now.

The few times I put my glasses on Poker, he was as unmoving as ever.

They came out of the house quickly.

Garrett carried a bulging paper sack.

Cindy's face was what held me.

Something was smeared all over it.

All I could think of was the war paint Indians used to wear for battles.

Why would she have something smeared all over her face?

I took a closer look at Garrett and saw that his face, too, was smeared with something dark and streaky.

What was it?

When they reached Poker, Garrett laughed.

His foot lashed out and caught Poker in the belly.

The dog didn't move.

Garrett laughed again.

They started walking to the car.

Cindy looked scared.

She said something to Garrett.

He walked over to her, lowered the bag so she could see inside.

And then he laughed again.

Cindy smiled but she still looked scared.

When they reached the car, Cindy got inside right away. Garrett walked to the road and looked up and down.

He didn't want anybody to see him pulling out.

Apparently satisfied that nobody was around, he walked back to the car, opened the trunk, and set the grocery sack inside.

Then he walked to the driver's door, and got in.

He kissed her immediately, and before long I had to look away again.

This time it was worse.

Garrett had slid over on the passenger side of the front seat so Cindy could mount him.

There on the lonely prairie, the car rocked, springs laboring, and Cindy's tiny screams of passion rang in my ears.

At least it was over with quickly.

Garrett backed out with no lights, pointed the car west—away from my car—and took off fast.

Still no lights.

I stood there for a long time listening to the silence. I just kept thinking about those smears and streaks on their faces.

There was only one way I could know for sure if my worst suspicions were right. I'd have to go inside Mae Swenson's house myself.

CHAPTER TEN

Just inside the front door, I paused. In the Army I'd been around a number of serious accidents, and as a result there was a harsh, iron smell I'd come to know. Blood.

That smell filled this house.

I took a deep breath and walked deeper inside.

There were a lot of antiques in the living room and parlor—pewter mugs and Victorian gas-style lamps and a Charleston Battery Bench among them. There was also a 36" TV screen and a very modern couch. Apparently the widow Swenson wasn't long on consistency.

I saw all this in the faint silver moonlight that touched the frosty window panes. The darkening clouds had passed.

I walked over to a staircase and put my hand on the banister and looked upward to the darkness on the second floor.

My hand felt sticky.

I took it from the banister and held it up to the moonlight. I felt the texture, held my hand to my nose. The smell.
That
smell.

I started walking up the steps. I wanted to run back and call the police but I was afraid of getting Cindy in trouble.

I always think of
Psycho
whenever I'm ascending a staircase like this. You know, the scene where private investigator Martin Balsam is going up the stairs to look for Norman's mother. And suddenly there she is, butcher knife and all.

But Norman's mother wasn't here tonight.

I climbed all the way to the second floor without anybody running out of any of the bedrooms.

The second floor was so deep in gloom, I could see only a few feet ahead of me.

The smell was awful up here.

Blood was now mixed with feces. That's another helpful thing I learned in the Army, how at the last your bowels frequently betray you.

The first door I came to, I pushed inward, and then held my breath, afraid of what I was about to see.

Moonlight revealed a kind of informal den. There was a wall of bookcases and a small fireplace and a 21" portable TV on wheels. There was also a desk and a daybed. Neither was an antique but both looked pretty old.

But the most interesting part of the room was the wall safe. It stood open, a virgin violated.

I walked across two shaggy throwrugs and stood in front of the safe.

I peered inside.

I couldn't see anything. Too dark.

I walked over to the desk and started going through the drawers. I'd remembered to pull my gloves on before entering the house. No fingerprints.

In the bottom left drawer, I found a two-battery flashlight. The batteries were dying. The light cast was yellow and muzzy but it was better than nothing.

I went back to the open safe and shone the light inside.

All I found were stocks and bonds, ITT and IBM and other blue chips. There was no money of any kind.

I could make a pretty good guess of where it had all gone.

I walked back down the hall. The flashlight beam was now flickering on and off.

The next door stood ajar.

The stench was overpowering.

I used the toe of my boot to open the door further.

She was completely naked. She lay atop white, blood-soaked sheets. Her hands and breasts had been hacked away. And her eyes cut out.

Her white hair made the scene not only terrible but pathetic. Nobody should treat an old person like that. The blood was even spattered over her white hair. Like decoration.

I walked very close to the bed and then slipped in a pool of blood. I was thrown forward so that my face ended up only inches from her empty gaze of blood. I heard myself scream and quickly pulled myself erect.

Blood splotched and gooped and glopped the wall behind her brass double-bed. My sputtering flashlight also revealed pieces of human meat that had adhered to the wallpaper.

I found the bathroom, two doors down, just in time.

After I was finished, tears stung my eyes, vomit burned my throat.

I went back into Mae Swenson's room and took a final look.

She couldn't have done this, I thought.

Or so I hoped. Not Cindy.

Maybe all she did was watch.

I tried not to think of some of the things David Myles had said on his cassettes—things about Cindy.

I turned around, to get out of the room fast, and as I did, I stepped on something.

I didn't want to shine my sputtering flashlight to the floor but some grim impulse made me.

One of Mae's hands.

The simple gold wedding ring looked sad sitting on the hand that had been ripped away from its arm.

Downstairs, the front door slammed shut.

I immediately pictured police.

I'd be up here, trapped, and they'd never believe my explanation.

I ran out of the room and down the stairs.

The living room and parlor seemed much darker than before.

I shone the flickering light around both rooms.

No cops.

The wind had blown the door shut.

I felt drained, then, totally exhausted.

But I had to move and move quickly now.

I forced myself out of the death house, and into the night.