Ghouls (43 page)

“it’s those fuckin’
bedo
tribes, goddamn animals, they’re always ripping our people off and cutting them up. come on, we’ve gotta get him back to the
caz
.”

timid, the figures move in. are they afraid of you, or just unsettled by all the blood? they lead you forward, into the light, one is an E-2, the other a tech sergeant, both are air force security police.

“hey, this grunt’s bleeding buckets, serious.”

“holy shit, it’s sanders.”

this voice you recognize, van
holtz
, the fourth man.

“you
know
this bullet-stopper?” the E-deuce says.

“he’s a friend, a good friend,” van
holtz
answers, “he won DSC and a bunch of other shit in Vietnam,
i
owe him
bigtime
.”

“the guy’s obviously into some deep shit.”

“I don sizost care, we’re gonna have to stand for him.”

“I ain’t covering for this grunt, he could be a dope mule for all
i
know, or running guns.”

van
holtz
is adamant, “you’ll cover, asshole, you’ll back up every word
i
say to the brass, unless you want to walk a pipeline in
alaska
for the next six years, understand?”

“yeah,
i
guess
i
fucking do.”

they help you into the Jeep, the E-deuce pulls a mad
u-turn
and barrels away down the rutted road, toward the caserne, van
holtz
breaks out his field kit.

“van,” you say.

“be quiet, don’t talk, play dumb when we get back, tell them you can’t remember anything,
i’ll
take care of the rest.”

“van,” you say. “it’s all true, it’s all true.”

he tells you to shut up as he prepares a gauze, the Jeep’s rocking lulls you. you’re safe, and that seems odd. you’re home free and alive, but in the back of your mind you can still see the narrow, doglike face of the ghala…

««—»»

Sanders’s eyes snapped open.

He lay stunned in bed, sheets twisted about his waist like writhing snakes. Darkness threatened to smother him, to squash him into the mattress. He sensed people, or things, in the room, killers, madmen, VC throat-runners hidden and grinning, their black blades poised. But then reality reformed, the edges slipped back into place, and he remembered the dream.

Those SP’s had saved his life, Van Holtz and the E-2; he probably would’ve bled to death without them. Van Holtz had bailed him out with a well-devised lie, and the E·2 had corroborated. Sanders had never seen Van Holtz again, had never had the chance to even thank him.

< font size="3">He reached up and touched his face, very slowly, as if he weren’t sure it was there at all. The
runneled
network of scars reminded him of what the thing had done. He’d tried to blot it out, for years, but somehow the darkness of the motel room fostered a dozen suggestions of the ghala. Closing his eyes didn’t help; he could still see the stark, corded body; the jammed mouth full of protracting teeth; that hideous three-fingered hand reaching out to tear away more of his face.

The
moment noosed him, hauled him back further. He remembered the two Marines who’d gone in with him.
Kinnet
and O’Brien—they’d been finished in seconds, jerked apart like clay dolls. At least they hadn’t suffered much.

Could’ve been me,
Sanders thought.
Maybe that would have been better.

It was very late, yet he felt no urge to sleep now. The dream had jolted him awake, as quickly as the touch of an electric prod. He slipped out of bed and moved through the room’s murk, toward the dim shape of the desk.

A breath froze in his throat when he turned on the lamp. Opened newspapers covered the desktop; he focused on the two articles, each circled in red, as though they were obituaries.

From the
Metrosection
of yesterday’s
Washington Post:

BODY FOUND IN WOODS

TYLERSVILLE, MD—Prince George’s County Police officials today announced the discovery of the skeleton of an unidentified woman in a wooded area of privately owned land within Tylersville city limits. Security guard Glen
Rodz
, 26, told reporters that he found the skeleton near an
out-of·service
access lane at approximately 1 A.M.
Rodz
contacted authorities at once, after which the skeleton was transported to South County General Hospital for examination. Deputy medical examiner Ronald T. Greene stated that the skeleton was of a female in her early twenties. “She hadn’t been there long,” Greene said to reporters. “The condition of ligaments and bone marrow made that quite plain. Topical soil analysis of the area around the discovery site indicates that she probably died right where she was, more than likely an animal attack.” Positive identification has not yet been ascertained, though an undisclosed local source of high reliability speculates that the skeleton may be that of one Donna Fitzwater, 22, who was reported missing earlier this week. Both Greene and P.G. County homicide lieutenant D. Choate refused to comment on that possibility.

And a more recent article on page 1 of the
Bowie Blade
read:

BOWIE GIRLS MISSING,

VIOLENCE SUSPECTED

This morning a county police officer on routine patrol discovered an abandoned automobile in the woods just off of Governor Bridge Road, the tentative Bowie-Tylersville boundary line. At about the same time, Stuart
Lazernik
, of the Whitehall area in Bowie, reported that his daughter, Lisa, had not returned home last night with the family car, after an outing with a school friend.
Lazernik
later identified the vehicle found abandoned as the same vehicle he’d loaned his daughter. Further investigation verified that the friend who had accompanied Miss
Lazernik
, Catherine
Bathory
, also of Bowie, never returned home last night either. Both girls are 18 and seniors at Bowie High; neither has been seen or heard from since last evening at approximately 8 P.M. “Each family has been prepared for the likelihood of a tragedy,” County Lt Dennis Choate told
Blade
reporters this afternoon. “We have no choice but to suspect foul play. It’s the county’s presumption that at least one of the girls is dead or in need of prompt emergency medical treatment The preliminary examination of the crime scene revealed much evidence of sexually motivated violence.” Choate declined to relate details of this evidence, though P.G. County Sgt. Timothy McGinnis, the officer who originally discovered the abandoned auto, told reporters in Hyattsville that he noticed “large stains on the hood and fenders, plus torn articles of clothing to the front and right of the vehicle. There were some other things, too. Things I’m not authorized to say.” A full investigation is in progress. Anyone with information regarding either of the two missing girls is asked to phone Prince George’s County Police at 336-8800.

Sanders stared. The articles confirmed everything; they were proof. What he feared the most was already taking place.
How many?
he thought.
He must be crazy. Or maybe he’s dead himself by now.
It didn’t matter.

He switched off the light and let himself be enshrouded again by the dark. He stared pensively at nothing.

The station wagon would be reported stolen soon, if it hadn’t been already. There was nothing more to do, that much he could see. Now he was just wasting time, and increasing the risk of being caught with a hot car. He should have gone by now. Or perhaps—

He wondered if he had lost his nerve and had just not admitted it yet. He felt lashed to opposing forces, being pulled both ways. “Partly my fault,” he whispered aloud, to the wall. He thought again of the newspaper articles. “All my fault.”

But blaming himself lacked any purpose at all. His compulsion was simply this: He would not go home until he had seen the full truth. He had to know.

He had to know what the colonel had done.

Oppression seeped
mistlike
up into his mind, and mulled his movements like a dropped net; he felt his head grow heavy with guilt. The darkness turned to a mass of clots, the walls seemed to swell inward, to crush him. He went back to bed and soon lapsed into a mute, suffocating sleep, his mind’s visions dragged repeatedly in and out of a chasm of nightmares.

««—»»

At about the same time, Kurt Morris slipped into a similar chasm.

Again he dreamed he was sitting in the den beneath a canopy of amber lamplight. Night filled the windows like darkly stained ice, as a sprawl of wisteria ticked against the glass. He thought he heard a faint sliding sound behind him. Was someone running a hand along the wall of the next room? Opened in his lap was a book he’d never heard of.
You Are What You Eat,
by Albert Fish, the binding read.

Almost immediately, this time, he knew he was dreaming. He heard:

THUNK
THUNK
, THUNK

He pretended to ignore it. He tried to read but saw that the book contained only black and white photographs of great age. The picture on the first page showed a thin, old man leading a little girl into a cottage.

THUNK, THUNK, THUNK

Only a dream,
Kurt thought in the dream, though he felt little assurance in the thought. On the second page was a picture of a vat of stew. In the third picture the same old man was serving the stew to a group of children seated around a table, but the little girl from the first picture wasn’t there.

THUNK, THUNK, THUNK

“God
damn!
” Kurt shouted. “Go away! I’m not gonna go through this shit again!” He stood and slammed the book shut, half noticing that in the last photograph the old man was strapped to a wooden electric chair, and on his face was a malignant grin.

Kurt was furious. He wished he could wake up and not have to answer the door. Impulsively, he started to call out for Melissa, but decided not to bother when he recalled the last time he’d done that.

He stepped broadly into the foyer. The pounding continued, like a roofer driving nails.

THUNK, THUNK, THUNK

Kurt flung the door open wide.

Fog swirled in the doorway, misting over the figure of a man who stood tilted at an angle, as though one leg were too short The visitor’s outline seemed to vibrate as it stood.

Kurt stepped back, stunned by a rushing stench. This was too real for a dream, details too concise. He detected a jagged twitter—
breathing?
—and
a sharp, steady drip.

The figure remained still, its features hidden in the mist. It stood bowed slightly forward, neck crooked and shoulders hunched, as if hung from a meat hook. Something metallic flashed on its chest.

“Well?” Kurt said. “I know you’re not the paper boy, so let’s get this over with. Goddamned dreams.”

The figure shifted once, but did not come forward. Fog began to spill in through the doorway, minutely darkening the foyer. Kurt could feel the temperature drop.

“Come on, fucker,” he said. “You’re pissing me off. Who are you?”

From the fog came a wet chuckling sound.