Dwellers of the Night: The Complete Collection (62 page)

- Felix Adler (A.D. 1884-1963)

I

Morning has come. Rachel had dressed warmly, drinking several cups of dry coffee, unable to sleep for the terror that gripped her in the dead of the night. She talked to no one and climbed the spiral staircase to the roof. She pushed open the door and exited onto the rooftop. Water had collected in the cracks of the cobblestones, rain having fallen upon the city in the early morning, and the sun feels faintly warm against her rose-blotched cheeks. She stands at the edge of the roof, leaning against the railing, staring down towards the Ohio River. She hears footsteps behind her, and she turns to see Sarah joining her. Sarah nods a quaint
Hello
and stands beside her.

“You’re waiting for them to return?” Sarah asks.

Rachel nods. “Yeah.”

“You must be worried. Him being out there.”

“No, they’ve done it before. They’ve never lost anyone.”

More silence.

Rachel looks over at her. “I’m pregnant.”

Her words come as a shock, and Sarah is off-kilter for a moment. “How do you know?”

“I went to the store… got one of those over-the-counter tests…”

“They’re not always accurate, Rachel.”

“I’m telling Adrian when he gets back. He should know.”

Sarah turns her eyes back to the distant river. “How do you feel about it?”

“About what?”

“About being pregnant.”

She shakes her head. “I don’t know.”

“You don’t know how I feel?”

“I know how I
should
feel. I look at you, and I see this woman who has tried all her life to get pregnant, but who could never manage it. And then I look at myself, and I have a child growing in my womb, and I know I should feel excited, ecstatic, that I should be leaping off the walls in joy. I’ve always wanted to be a mother, Sarah, just like you. But now… Now I don’t know how I feel. I don’t want to give birth to a child who will have to grow up in this world, knowing the horrors that we face everyday.”

“But your child won’t know anything else.” She looks back over at the frightened mother-to-be.

“She or he will understand this to be normal. In the Stone Age, children were born into a world filled Anthony Barnhart

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with saber-toothed tigers, giant flightless birds with beaks the size of basketballs, in a world of herds of wooly mammoths that would trample a person underfoot. But the children grew up, they knew their dangers, they enjoyed life. Your child will be born into this world, and she’ll be a beautiful angel. She’ll be everything you imagined.”

Rachel isn’t listening. She’s staring out at the river, face fallen.

“Rachel?” Sarah asks. “Rachel? What’s wrong?”

“They’re at the river. I can only count five of them. Six left yesterday morning.”

Sarah looks out towards the river.

She can see the boat, small and miniscule, figures boarding.

“Oh my God,” Sarah murmurs under her breath. “Oh my God…”

She throws open the front door of the church and scrambles down the stone walkway, nearly slipping over the slick steps. She reaches the gated fence, throws the latch, and pushes it open. Her legs carry her out into the street, and she runs to the crest of the hill that runs down to OH-50 below. She stands, heart pounding in her chest, and in a moment sees the 4x4 rounding the bend, climbing the hill. It moves agonizingly slowly, and her mind screams for it to move faster. She steps off to the side as it passes, and she stares through the tinted windows, and she can make out three faces. She follows the vehicle for a short while, then climbs the steps and enters the garage. A moment later the 4x4 appears, pulling inside, having taken another road up the hill and to the church parking lot. The stench of exhaust intensifies her nausea, and she waits, dreading what she might discover. The vehicle is turned off, and the doors open. Figures crawl out. Harker is driving. The man is in the passenger seat. There comes Kyle. Anthony.
Oh God oh God oh God
. Another figure exits the vehicle. Her eyes flush with life, and she loses all semblance of control, leaping forward. Adrian embraces her, and she kisses him all over. He grips her tightly, running his hand through her hair. Tears crawl down her cheeks. “I thought I lost you… I thought I lost you…” Her cries echo in the cavernous chamber.

The man is exhausted, kicking off his shoes in a back room, sitting upon a cot. The door opens and Mark enters. The man looks up, nods
Hello
, goes back to pulling off his last boot. Mark moves into the room, sits down on the cot opposite the man. “Harker told me what happened. That Malkovich was lost.”

The man curses under his breath. “Harker’s a damned fool.”

Mark’s eyebrows raise in curiosity. “And you say this why?”

“He thinks we’re safe in this church. This ‘castle.’ We’re not.”

“We haven’t had any break-ins. We have ultraviolet lights combing the grounds at night.”

“They’ll find a way in.”

“They’re not like us. They’re not capable of thinking, of strategy, of—’’

The man snaps his gaze up at the boy. “And you know this how?”

“They’re just animals,” Mark says.

“Just animals. Did you ever watch the DISCOVERY CHANNEL?”

“Not too much.”

“They had this special once. On hyenas. And in the show, the hyenas chased several antelope into a thicket, and in this thicket, more hyenas were waiting. They had set a trap. Adrian told me that last November, the dark-walkers did the
same exact thing
. And did Harker tell you how they got Malkovich? No? They entered the church and made everyone panic. Kyle and I were in the hunting canopy, so we didn’t see any of it. But Anthony told me what happened. They came inside. We Anthony Barnhart

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started shooting. Killed several of them. But four or five crept along one of the back walls, actually
crawled
, moving slowly, quietly. We didn’t even see them. Malkovich’s rifle had stopped working, so he retreated back to the far corner—right into their hands. They grabbed him and dragged him out of the church, into the woods.” The man lies down upon the cot, head on a pillow, arms folded over his chest. He closes his eyes. “Don’t tell me that the dark-walkers can’t think, can’t strategize. I’ve seen it. Spring is coming. They’re emerging from their hiding places. They’re stronger now; winter didn’t weaken them, it just weeded out the weak and made the strong even stronger.” His eyes open, and he leans his head to the side, glares straight at Adrian. “When spring finally gets here, it’ll be warm, and they’ll swarm this church, and they’ll find a way in. And it will be a slaughter.”

There was a small funeral service for Malkovich, followed by dinner, and nearly everyone crept back to their rooms, the dreariness of the day weighing heavy upon the human soul. Rachel kissed Adrian goodnight, told him she wanted to do some thinking alone. She made her way into the sanctuary and sat down in the darkness. Her eyes slowly adjusted, and she stared at the cross, the smiling and crucified Savior. The dark-walkers could be heard outside the church walls, distant but growing closer. A chill runs up her spine.

“Did you tell him?” Sarah asks, emerging from the shadows.

“Not yet,” Rachel says.

Sarah sits down beside her. “You should probably take another test.”

“I don’t need another test.”

“Sometimes home pregnancy tests give a false positive.”

“I know I’m pregnant. I knew it before I took the damned test. I just… needed to be sure.”

“So when are you going to tell him?”

“It didn’t seem right to tell him today. Not with Malkovich being gone.”

“He’ll still be gone tomorrow.”

“This was Malkovich’s day. Not mine.”

“So you’re going to tell him tomorrow?”

Rachel draws a deep breath. “I don’t know.”

II

Sarah had left Rachel alone, giving her time to bathe in her own thoughts. The night drew thicker, and the air became heavier. Resounding footsteps echoed behind her. She didn’t look back as Carla sat down behind her. Rachel acknowledged her presence, and Carla had said, “Usually no one is here this late at night. This is where I come to pray and read my scriptures. I can’t sleep when I can hear them so close, but prayer and the Bible gives me comfort.” Rachel hadn’t said anything, and Carla had offered to pray with her; Rachel had just shaken her head,
No
. Carla began peeling through her Bible, a tattered leather-bound scribbled with notes and seeming incantations, desperate pleas to a distant God. Rachel just sat in the pew and stared forward in the darkness, stomach churning like a vat of oil.

“Rachel?” Carla now asks. “Can I share something with you?”

She looks over, can barely see her profile in the blackness. “Yes.”

“I have been reading from the Prophet Isaiah, and I have come across some very interesting texts.” Her small reading lamp illuminates the page, and she begins reciting from the Holy Writ.

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“Behold, the LORD maketh the earth empty, and maketh it waste, and turneth it upside down, and scattereth abroad the inhabitants thereof. And it shall be, as with the people, so with the priest; as with the servant, so with his master; as with the maid, so with her mistress; as with the buyer, so with the seller; as with the lender, so with the borrower; as with the taker of usury, so with the giver of usury to him. The land shall be utterly emptied, and utterly spoiled: for the LORD hath spoken this word. The earth mourneth and fadeth away, the world languisheth and fadeth away, the haughty people of the earth to languish. The earth also is defiled under the inhabitants thereof; because they have transgressed the laws, changed the ordinance, broken the everlasting covenant. Therefore hath the curse devoured the earth, and they that dwell therein are desolate: therefore the inhabitants of the earth are burned, and few men left. The new wine mourneth, the vine languisheth, all the merryhearted do sigh. The mirth of tabrets ceaseth, the noise of them that rejoice endeth, the joy of the harp ceaseth. They shall not drink wine with a song; strong drink shall be bitter to them that drink it.”

Carla’s face glows with excitement. “Don’t you see, Rachel? The prophet Isaiah prophesied about
this
. About what we’re enduring right now! The earth has been made empty of its former inhabitants, it has been laid waste. Cities and towns are abandoned. I can see cruise ships floating aimlessly through the ocean. Those who have been spared have been spared not by any merit of their own, but they have been chosen by God. God has thrust this upon us because we have broken His laws, we have changed His ordinances, we have broken the covenant He made with the forefathers.”

She shakes her head in amazement. “Why must we speculate and conjecture about why this has happened when the answers are all right here?” She slams her fist against the Bible, eyes ablaze. She takes a deep breath. “I’m sorry, Rachel. I must truly be frightening you.”

“It’s all right,” Rachel says, slightly disturbed.

“You must think I’m crazy.”

“I’m envious. Envious that you seem to have the answers.”

“The answers are all right here,” she says, squeezing the Bible once more. “In 2 Peter, we are told that there will come a day when the earth will be wiped clean as if by fire. I believe that is a metaphor regarding what took place last August. In the Gospel of Luke, we are told that when the Day of the Lord comes, two people will be in bed, and one will be taken while the other remains. Is this not what happened? The Christ also taught that when the End Days would come, the world be filled with sex, self-indulgence, greed, envy, idolatry, theft, murder, and adultery, and that people would be so wrapped up in their own little worlds that they would laugh and drink and be merry. But just as Noah’s Flood came when no one expected it, when everything was going beautifully, so the End of Days would come when nobody expected it. And who could have expected this?”

Rachel is finding her quite wearying. “No one.”

“Precisely!” Carla exclaims. She takes a moment to calm down. “Rachel?”

She rolls her eyes, something Carla cannot see in the darkness. “Yes?”

“There’s something I discovered a few nights ago. Something that… I haven’t shared with anyone. May I share it with you?” Rachel nods. Carla turns back to the Bible, begins flipping through the pages. “It will take me a moment to find it… Ah, here it is.” She clears her throat and begins to read, her voice echoing in the musky sanctuary:

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“Thy dead men shall live;

their bodies shall rise.

Awake and sing for joy,

ye who dwell in the dust:

for thy dew is as the dew of herbs,

and the earth shall give birth

to

the

dead.”

III

“When you lost your baby,” Rachel asks after a moment of impermeable silence, “How did you deal with it?”

The question surprises her, and she folds her Bible shut.

“I’m sorry,” Rachel says, seeing the mask of pain dripping over Carla’s face.

“No,” Carla says. “You have no reason to be sorry.”

“I didn’t mean to bring it up. I know… I know it hurts.”

“It is good to remember these things,” Carla says, “lest we may forget.”

∑Ω∑

The rain had fallen heavily that night, and she had fallen into a fitful sleep. She awoke around two in the morning, finding that her husband had not yet returned. She crawled out of bed and found the telephone, dialed his number. It went straight to voicemail. She left a quick message, then set the phone down upon the hook. He had never been out this late before, and immediately her mind jumped to an affair. She cursed herself for thinking like that. A moment later she heard the doorbell ring downstairs, followed by several quick knocks. She wondered if he had forgot his keys as she threw on her robe and descended the steps. She reached the front door, could see rain tapping on the glass windows on either side. She unlocked and opened it, ready to launch into a diatribe against her husband for coming home so late. But it is not her husband who greeted her, but two police officers, rain falling like waterfalls from the brims of their hats.