Dunston Falls (11 page)

Somewhere, far in the distance, a coyote howled.

From the bedroom in his private quarters in the hospital, McCoy opened his eyes when the light of the moon shown so brightly through the window it struck him across the face and woke him up.

McCoy got out of bed, slipped on his robe, and went to the window. The gigantic moon hung low in the sky, brightly illuminating the sky in a mixture of dark blue against twinkling stars. Clouds appeared white and silver to the eye. McCoy could see the outline of pine trees in the distance. He looked at his watch. It was nearly two in the morning. He knew he should return to bed, that he had a great deal to do in the morning, but he was so captivated by the moon he couldn’t tear himself away from the window.

Finally, out of desperation, McCoy forced himself to return to bed. He slipped under the covers and lay perfectly still to wait for sleep to overtake him. Instead, he was more wide-awake than ever.

Far away, traveling on the night winds, he heard a coyote howl.

Regan was unable to sleep. Although he was certainly tired enough, the vision of Doris White and Deb Robertson weighed heavily on his mind. The priest dressed in a robe, crossed the hallway from his small apartment to the private chapel reserved for baptismal and other ceremonies. He knelt at the small altar and prayed for strength, guidance and wisdom.

As he prayed, Regan suddenly noticed the bright moonlight filtering in through the stained glass, chapel window. The sight of the brilliantly colored glass image of our Lord, Jesus Christ was hypnotic. He stood and went to the window, opened it and gasped. The sight was spellbinding as the moon passed before a group of clouds and brought a smile to his lips. God was awake and looking down upon the Earth, blessing it with his beauty.

Somewhere, off in the distance, a coyote howled.

Linda Boyce celebrated her thirtieth birthday a few weeks earlier by spending one hundred and ten dollars on a new winter comforter. It was a pale white with a star pattern and thick with down, guaranteed to keep you warm on the coldest nights.

By candle light, she brushed her hair in front of the bedroom dresser mirror. She may have been thirty, but she didn’t look it, so everybody said. She took exceptional care of her skin, used creams and moisturizers and avoided the sun during the summer months. During winter, with the dry heat, she took extra precautions, using lotion and cold cream twice a day. At five foot four, she weighed the one eighteen of her high school graduation.

She put the brush down and inspected her shoulder length, black hair. She was proud of the fact she lacked a single strand of gray. Her green eyes were flawless, the skin around them unlined or blemished. Only her breasts betrayed her age, that she was no longer a girl of twenty-one. While still firm, they had gentle sag and a hint of stretch marks that were imperceptible to a stranger, but stood out like a beacon to her. Still, by anyone’s standards she was a knockout.

It was no wonder she could command twenty-five dollars a trick. Even more if she operated in a big town like Augusta or Portland. She had thought about it, moving to a city, but always put it off. For on thing, the bigger the city the greater the risks. For another, the chances of facing arrest for solicitation out here in the sticks were slim to none. Besides, she was saving her money and when she had enough, there would be other career considerations. For now, she was content with her modest status in life.

Linda left the bedroom of her tiny mobile home and went to the kitchen for a beer. She had not run the generator in two hours, but the bottle was still cold. Even the ice trays were still semi frozen.

She lit a cigarette and checked the battery run clock on the wall over the refrigerator. She had time to finish the beer and maybe have another cigarette.

She carried the beer to the bedroom where she removed all of her clothes and slipped on a sheer, black nightgown. Goose bumps rose up on her arms. She brushed her teeth and used a mouthwash because men hated the smell of cigarettes on a woman’s breath. Then she  flipped down the comforter and crawled into bed to warm herself and to wait and maybe have a nap.

At two Am, she heard Harvey Peterson arrive in his truck. She heard the engine shut off and the truck door open. She heard him walk to her front door, open it and enter her trailer.

“Linda?” Harvey called to her.

“The bedroom,” she replied. “And it’s about time.”

Harvey entered the bedroom and smiled at her when he saw her tucked in like that. Kittenish was the word that came to mind.

“I waited up for you,” Linda said.

Harvey tossed his jacket and immediately removed his shirt. He was a good-looking man, tall and well built, a cheerleaders dream.

“How much to stay the night?” Harvey said. “I’m too tired for the drive home.”

He sounded Canadian, but it was difficult to tell. She hadn’t been home to her small town north of Sherbrook, Canada for so long she had lost the ear for the dialect.

“I wouldn’t throw you out, Harv,” Linda said. “Not on a cold night like this. Twenty five and we’ll call it even.”

Harvey grinned at her as he dropped his pants. He was already excited.

“Only hurry up. I’m freezing.”

Harvey slid into bed next to Linda and reached for her. She winced at his touch.

“Your hands are like ice,” Linda complained.

“You’ll just have to warm me up then,” Harvey said.

Linda crawled on top of him and Harvey closed his eyes. Neither of them paid any attention to the tiny bedroom window in the corner of the room, or the bright moonlight, which filtered in. Had either of them taken the time to notice, they would have been shocked to see the ski masked figure of a man, watching them through the window.

He wore a dark jacket with matching pants and boots. The gloves on his hands were also black, as was the ski mask. Only his eyes were visible and in the moonlight, they appeared a peculiar shade of yellow. As he watched Harvey and Linda make love, he could hear her soft moans and cries of pleasure, his disgusting, animalistic grunts. Anger rose up in his stomach. His hands balled into tight fists and shook violently as his anger became uncontrolled rage.

Turning away from the window, he ran into the woods and vanished into the dark cover of night.

Staring out the window, Peck had forgotten about the lit cigarette until it burned his fingers. He dropped it to the floor and stepped on it with his boot. Stupid, he told himself.

The coyote continued to howl.

Turning away from the window, he tossed several logs into the woodstove and stirred things up until the fire was roaring again. He stripped to his underwear and tossed a blanket on the cot. Before extinguishing the candles, he removed Doctor McCoy’s pills from his desk and set them aside where they would be handy.

He looked at his watch as he settled in on the cot. It was just after two AM. As if saying goodnight, the coyote howled several times in succession. Peck closed his eyes with the coyote’s haunting cry echoing in his ears.

FIVE

Peck was up at seven, made a fire, and then ran the generator long enough for the water to heat. In the hallway bathroom, he shaved and washed his face and used a splash of Aqua Velva to take the sting off. Back in his office, he dressed in a twice worn uniform and met Reese for breakfast by eight.

The diner was crowded, but not full. Peck and Reese shared a table by the window. As he sipped coffee, Peck noted that there was actually street and pedestrian traffic on Main Street. If people were able to venture out on foot and in vehicles, he took that as a sign things were beginning to returning to normal.

Reese spooned oatmeal into his mouth. “God awful stuff,” he commented. “I’ll radio my men to stock up on supplies before they leave. A week of this oatmeal and I’ll not only go nuts, I’ll permanently lose my appetite.”

“You can use my short wave to call your men,” Peck said.

Reese ate another spoon of oatmeal and washed it down with coffee. “My men could be here as early as five this afternoon if I can get through to them. In the meantime, I suggest we begin interviews. We might get lucky and find somebody who’s a bit too nervous or maybe noticed a stranger or drifter.”

“This is a small town, lieutenant. Even by Maine standards, it’s a small town.”

“Meaning?”

“A stranger, a drifter is going to stick out like a sixth finger.”

“You think he’s keeping to himself or gone underground?”

“Or is hiding right out in the open for all to see.”

Reese took a sip of coffee and looked at Peck. “That is possible, but unlikely. I feel our best bet is to target the unknown.”

“That unknown has forty seven square miles to hide in,” Peck said. “It would take six months to find him given our limited resources, if our man proves to be a stranger.”

“I’ll go out on a limb and guess that you’re leading up to something.”

Peck sipped coffee, set aside his cup and lit a cigarette. “The governor has the authority to activate the National Guard in a crisis. We have two murders wedged between the ice storm of the century. I’d say that qualifies.”

Reese nodded his agreement. “I’m sure the governor has the guard already mobilized and committed elsewhere, but I’ll put through your request to his office when I speak to my men. Until we get an answer, I suggest we make the most with what we have available.”

Linda Boyce enjoyed watching men eat. They were not like women in that regard. They wolfed their food down, ate with gusto and embellished each bite as if it were their last. They weren’t afraid to burp, either. Women were like birds, picking away at their meal as if afraid to be seen enjoying their food. She knew she was guilty of just such behavior, taught to her by her mother at a young age. When alone, she ate like a starving wolf cub, but in the company of a man, it was a habit she just couldn’t seem to shake.

“Men don’t want to see a woman eat like a pig,” her mother would say at the dinner table when she was a young girl.

What mother never knew, or chose to ignore was that men did not care how a woman ate just so long as she delivered in the bedroom. Linda found that out when she was sixteen and the men came home from the war, desperate for female companionship and more than willing to part with some of their war treasure in exchange for some of her feminine treasure. It proved to be a profitable exchange.

Harvey was up with the sun and insisted he was starving. He said he had a full day’s work ahead of him at the paper company and she took the hint. She made a fire in the small woodstove, then ran the generator long enough to scramble eggs and fry some bacon. She made coffee, which was all she took in the morning, along with a cigarette.

Harvey spooned eggs into his mouth and washed it down with coffee. “I’m off at midnight. I’d like to stop by again.”

Linda took a sip of coffee as she looked at him. “How can you afford that, sugar? I know what the paper mill pays.”

Harvey grinned at her. “I got a nice Christmas bonus and I can’t think of a better way to spend it.”

“Okay, but listen. I have to charge you for overnight. That’s forty dollars and brings some groceries, the way you eat.”

“Some steaks, how’s that?” Harvey said. “A nice bottle of liquor.”

“In that case, bring a bottle of scotch. Chevis.”

Harvey nodded and stood up. “I will, but right now I gotta go.”

Reese got through to Augusta on Peck’s short wave radio without much of a problem. He spoke to several of his men, put through a food list and relayed Peck’s request for the National Guard. After signing off, Reese told Peck that maybe things were not back to normal yet, but there was progress.

Peck sipped coffee from his desk and watched Reese. Ed Kranston walked into the office just as Reese signed off and returned the headset to its stand.

“Good morning,” Kranston said, chewing his customary gum. “Any news from the radio?”

“The good news is I reached the emergency center in Augusta,” Reese said. “My men will be here as soon as possible and with additional food supplies. I’m also told phone lines will be up and running within a week. Two weeks for power to return statewide.”

Kranston reached for the coffeepot on the woodstove and poured a cup. He turned and looked at Reese. “What’s the bad news?”

“A nor’easter is on the way,” Reese said. “A foot of new snow is expected the day after tomorrow.”

“For crying out loud,” Kranston said. “We need to catch a break here.”

Peck lit a cigarette and looked at Kranston. “I’ve invited the lieutenant and his men to use the old logging camp outside of town as a headquarters.”

Kranston looked at Reese. “It’s comfortable. I’ve been out there with the code enforcement officer when they redesigned some of the zoning laws. At least that’s something.”

Reese looked at Peck with a grin in his eye. “Yeah, what?”`

“It’s…well, I don’t know,” Kranston stammered.

Peck looked at Kranston, who appeared somewhat ill at ease.

“I’ll be in my office,” Kranston said. “I have some……. you know.”

Kranston reached the door, paused and looked at Peck. “Good luck today, Dave.”

“With?”

“Whatever it is you and the lieutenant are doing.”

Kranston left the office and Peck looked at Reese. “What are we doing?”

By five thirty in the afternoon, Peck and Reese were back in Peck’s office. Reese occupied Bender’s desk, while Peck sat behind his own. A fire in the woodstove crackled in the background. A half dozen candles and the kerosene lantern burned for the necessary light they needed to read and write reports.

Sipping coffee, Reese looked up from his notes at Peck. “Would you care to sweeten this, sheriff?”

Peck opened the desk drawer for the scotch bottle. It was nearly half-empty. Peck dumped an ounce into his coffee mug, and then crossed the room to pour another ounce into Reese’s cup.

“How many people we talk to this afternoon?” Reese said, sampling his sweetened coffee.