Rockinghorse (30 page)

The Georgia State Troopers, to a man, all stood in awe as the sun came up. Kipling came to the mind of one of them. The Bible came to the mind of another. One of them said a silent prayer. Another crossed himself. Yet another thought it would be a hell of a day to go fishin'.

It was the most glorious sunrise any of them could ever remember witnessing.

Suddenly, none of them were tired. The grainy feeling left their eyes.

They all heard the sounds of an approaching vehicle.

“That's a Sheriff's Department car,” Al said. “Maybe now we'll get some answers.”

“B. C. Williams,” Carl said. “Good solid man.”

The chief deputy sheriff of Edmund County stopped his car and stepped out. “I hope to God you boys can tell me what the hell is goin' on around this place,” he said.

“We were hopin' you could tell us,” Al said.

“Your radios conk out?” B. C. asked.

“Yes. And we can't back our cars up or turn them around,” Carl said.

B. C. leaned up against his car and filled one side of his mouth with chewing tobacco. He chewed for a moment, rubbed the back of his neck, and said, “This is weird enough to make a hen quit layin', you know that?”

“That is one way of putting it,” Al replied.

B. C. was known statewide for his homespun sayings. “Any of y'all seen the sheriff?”

The troopers shook their heads.

“I can't turn my car around, either, boys,” B. C. said.

“When did you try?” Al asked.

“ 'Bout five miles down the road. I tell you what, boys. I 'bout had me an accident in my shorts when I tried to back up and turn around.”

The highway cops knew that feeling very well.

“How come there ain't nobody stirrin' around in this town?” B. C. asked.

Carl briefed the chief deputy.

B. C. nodded his head. “You ever get the feeling you'd just like to go back home, pull the covers up over your head, and pretend something bad just didn't happen?”

They all knew that feeling, too.

“How come you were heading this way so late at night, B. C.?” Al asked.

“Tuesdays,”B. C. replied.

The highway cops glanced at each other. B. C. picked up on the looks and smiled. “Y'all put it together, too, huh?”

“Yes,” Carl said. “We were heading up toward the Bowers' Plantation house, B. C. Care to come with us?”

“Seein' as how my car won't go but in one direction,” the deputy drawled. “I don't see I got much choice in the matter. Lead on.”

* * *

Jackie was awakened by a voice whispering in her head. “Evil cannot create, Jackie. It can only repeat. When the evil has fully sated its gluttonous appetite, when it has caused you all enough pain, the evil becomes bored, and can be driven away. Evil cannot be killed, Jackie. But it can be temporarily beaten.”

The voice faded.

Jackie cut her eyes, looking for Johnny. He nodded his head.

Jackie looked at her wristwatch. Seven o'clock. She waved for her brother to follow her.

In the hall, she whispered, “You heard that voice?”

“Yeah. But what does it mean?”

“I'm not sure.”

“I'm hungry.”

“Me, too. Come on.”

But before the kids could walk down the hall to the kitchen, the sounds of several cars pulling into the drive stopped them. They turned and went into the center room of the mansion, looking out the window.

David stood looking out a window. He turned and smiled at the brother and sister. “Help has arrived, kids.”

“Jesus Christ!” Carl said, his eyes taking in the charred lump of the old man; the broken windows of the mansion; the bodies that littered the lawn. He flipped on his speaker.

“Kyle! You in there, Kyle?”

Kyle came to the door, looked out, then stepped onto the porch.

“Christ!” Hunt said to Scott. “He's got a spear in his hand.”

“Come on in, Captain,” Kyle called. “But get ready for the shock of your life.”

* * *

“Sheriff Pugh is dead?” B. C. asked. “You killed him?” He looked at Lucas.

“And I killed Lancer last night,” Kyle said. “His body is out back. Or at least it was.”

Captain Denning walked to the rear of the house and looked out. Lancer's body was lying where Kyle had tossed it. He looked at Kyle. “Have you seen O'Brian or Watson?”

“No, sir.”

“I've got three out, too,” Al said. Quickly he explained what he and Carl had put together.

“666,” David said. “The Mark of the Beast.”

“You used a chain saw on some men last night?” Al asked Lucas.

“Look in the front room,” Lucas said. “The one with the boarded-up doors.”

All the highway cops looked. A couple wished they had not.

“Board it back up,” Carl ordered his men.

“Gladly,” Davis said.

That done, Captain Denning asked Kyle, “All right, Kyle. Where do we stand?”

The rocking horse laughed and whinnied on the landing above them.

“What in the hell was that?” Captain Johnson asked, looking around him.

“Get a firm grip on your emotions, Captain,” Lucas told the man. “ 'Cause you're about to hear the damnest story you've ever hard.”

“I knew I should have stayed in the Navy,” B. C. said.

* * *

The highway cops sat with their mouths hanging open as first Kyle, then Lucas, then Louisa, and finally David finished the story.

When David told of the professors' efforts to call forth the Dark Gods, B. C. swallowed his chewing tobacco and had to leave the room.

Captain Denning pulled his pistol from leather, checked the loads, and stood up. Then, realizing his gun was useless, he reholstered the weapon. “Give me that spear,” he told Kyle. Kyle handed it to him. “I want to see this damned rocking horse.”

“I wish you wouldn't, Captain,” Kyle said.

Denning ignored that and walked toward the curving stairs. Al took a spear from George and followed his friend.

“I feel like a flipping idiot!” Al said. “And I don't believe
any
of what I just heard.”

Carl said nothing as he climbed the steps. Halfway up, he realized the horse's eyes were moving, following him as he climbed. “Look at the eyes,” he told Al.

“It's a trick of some sort. I'm not denying these folks were attacked and defended themselves. But the rest of what we were just told is ridiculous.”

The men stood on the landing and looked at the hobbyhorse, looking at them. The horse rocked and whinnied and laughed at the men.

Al swore and kicked the horse on the rump with a boot. The horse spun around and bit the captain on the leg, drawing blood and tearing his trousers.

Al grabbed his bleeding leg and stared at the wooden horse, horror in his eyes.

Carl jabbed at the horse with his spear. The horse howled and charged the man, knocking him down the stairs. Carl grabbed a railing and held on. He watched as Al backed slowly off the landing, surrendering the initial round to the horse. He helped his friend to his feet and the two of them hurriedly went down the stairs.

The horse's taunting laughter followed them.

Trooper Hunt was standing in front of a door that led to the ground level of the mansion. He could smell the foulness that emanated from the floor below

“Go on,” a voice filled his head. “Open the door. What's the matter? Are you afraid?”

Hunt looked around him for the source of the voice. He could see nothing. He put his hand on the door knob, then hesitated.

“Help me, honey,” his wife's voice filled his head. “Help me. They're hurting me. Please, honey. Help me.”

He jerked open the door.

“No!” Jan screamed to his back.

Hunt felt himself being sucked into a raging vortex. His body spun wildly in the air. His clothing was shredded on his body until he was naked. Wild laughter filled his head. Then, unconscious, he fell heavily to the ground-level floor.

The door slammed behind him.

The newly arrived highway cops beat at the door and slammed their shoulders against the unyielding wood.

They stopped their frantic poundings as the house took a deep breath. They looked around them, utter disbelief in their eyes. The house emitted what sounded like a belching, chewing sound. The awful cadence of bones crunching came to the horrified men standing by the door.

“What in God's name is going on?” Captain Johnson screamed the question.

“I think,” Lucas said. He cleared his throat. “I think the house is . . .
eating
your man, Captain.”

The crunching continued. It stopped. The house sighed contentedly. The rocking horse laughed. The house belched. A window of the house cracked with a pop. Hunt's pistol, handcuffs, belt buckle, loose change, and badge were puked up from the ground level. They lay shining in the bright sun, slick with blood.

Jackie whispered to Johnny, “The house is playing with us.”

“I know,” the boy replied. “And it's getting stronger, too.”

“But those outside are getting weaker.”

“The house feels it's forever,” the boy said. “I think. . . I think the house feels it can always get other people to follow it. That sounds stupid. But I don't know any other way to put it.”

“What are you kids whispering about?” Lucas asked.

The house sighed.

Jackie found a notepad and a pencil and went to her dad's side. She wrote: The house must be destroyed. Don't say your reply aloud. Write it down on this paper.

The house began breathing heavily, as if frustrated.

How? Lucas wrote.

Those not on guard gathered around in silence, watching and reading.

A thumping sound came to those grouped on the second level. They looked up. The rocking horse was moving awkwardly down the steps, its eyes glaring with hate.

Stop that horse! Jackie wrote.

Several of the adults turned around.

“No!” Johnny cried. He grabbed Peter's hand and jerked the boys toward the steps.

The boys stood on the steps, facing the advancing rocking horse. The horse stopped, seemingly unsure of its next move. Behind the horse, a glow appeared, shining brightly. The horse spun around. It howled in anger.

But it stopped its advance.

“What is that glow?” Trooper Austin said, his eyes fixed on the sparkling glow that seemed to pulse with life.

“One of the Woods' Children,” Jackie said. “Probably Randolph.”

“Ain't y'all afraid of that thing?” B. C. asked.

“No,” Jackie said with a smile. Then it came to her; she knew why the horse had stopped. “I know how to win. We
can
win.”

The house took the longest breath any of them had ever heard it take.

“Stand firm, Johnny, Peter!” Jackie said. “Don't let the horse past you.
It can't hurt you!”

The house shook with locked-in fury. Chairs and sofas suddenly tumbled and toppled over. Chandeliers tore from their ceiling mounts and fell crashing to the floor.

The rocking horse snarled and turned around, facing the boys. It began awkwardly thumping down the steps.

Johnny pointed a finger at the advancing horse. “You . . .
stop!”

The horse stopped.

Jackie took Carla's hand and Carla took Betty's hand and Betty took Ruth's hand. They walked toward the bottom of the stairs.

The rocking horse suddenly became very nervous. Its tail twitched and its eyes flashed, rolling from side to side.

The house let out a long moan.

Louisa said, “The children can't be harmed by the evil of the house and horse.”

“Obviously,” Mark said. “But why?”

“The Woods' Children have already paid that price,” the woman said. “Normal children can be bad—according to adult standards—but normal children have not yet been corrupted by the world; so they don't know evil.”

“Evil can only take that which is in a person to use against others,” David said. “So if the children have no inherent evil, the source of any present evil is powerless against them.”

“The children can't be hurt,” B. C. said. “But that still leaves us.” He shifted his wad of chewing tobacco to the other side of his mouth and looked around for a place to spit. He walked to an open window and puckered up to spit. He spat everything onto the ground at the sight that greeted him.

The pale face of Burt Simmons was looking through the open window.

And the window was a good ten feet off the ground.

* * *

“Would you repeat that, Colonel?” Governor Rovere asked.

“I said, sir, we have twelve troopers missing and unaccounted for.”

“Couldn't be on special assignment, could they?” the governor asked.

Colonel Rodman gritted his teeth. Only a politician would ask the head of a state police force a question like that. “No, sir,” the colonel replied respectfully. “I would have that information available to me, sir.”

“Oh, yes. Right. Well . . . what do you intend doing about this, Colonel?”

Rodman stared at the wall of his office for a few seconds. He took a deep breath and said, “Sir, I am going to launch a full-scale investigation into this matter immediately.”

“That's a very good idea, Colonel,” the governor said. “Please keep me informed. Oh, and, ah, Colonel?”

“Yes, sir?”

“Let's keep the press out of this, shall we? There is probably some logical explanation. And you know how the press loves to make public officials look bad.”

“Yes, sir.” The colonel hung up. He glared at the phone. “I know how they like to make
you
look foolish, you ignorant, clod-hoppin', cotton-chopper!”

Colonel Rodman had used a state police helicopter to fly into Captain Denning's HQ, after first landing at Captain Johnson's HQ. He stalked out of the office after talking with the men who had been present when Denning took off to Palma. He got behind the wheel of a patrol car and jerked up the mike.

Two dozen patrol cars were lined up along the side of the road, lights flashing.

Colonel Rodman switched to a Tac frequency and said, “Turn off all those goddamned lights!” He glanced in his rearview. The lights went off. “Looked like a damned carnival,” he muttered. “Last car in the line switch on lights.”

The patrol car in the rear cut on its lights.

A trooper ran out of the HQ building and up to Rodman's car. “Sir. Edmund County Sheriff Bill Pugh is missing, and so is the chief deputy. Deputy Burt Simmons is missing, and so is the constable of Palma. All communications into Palma are out. The local wrecker operator doesn't answer on his radio. Governor Rovere was just on the phone. He says he's calling out the National Guard.”

“Will you go back in there and tell him not to do anything until I've had a chance to check this out?” Rodman yelled the words.

Rodman dropped the gear selector into D and pulled out, the line of troopers right behind him.

The young trooper watched the parade until it was out of sight. “All we need now,” he muttered, “is Goldie Hawn. Then we'd have the Sugarland Express in Georgia.”

* * *

B. C. let out a squall that startled everybody in the room. The chief deputy recoiled from the open window with a burst of energy that surprised even him.

Jackie ran to the window and looked at Burt, who was grinning evilly at her. “I forgive you,” the girl said. “Now go away.”

Tears began rolling down Burt's pale face. The tears seemed to melt the flesh, misting the image of the man. The house shook with rage as Burt Simmons became no more.

“Where the hell did he go?” Captain Johnson asked.

No one replied because no one really knew the answer.

“What did you mean, you forgave him?” Captain Denning asked. “Forgive him for what?”

“He raped me,” Jackie said. “Uncle Ira was trying to hit Daddy with an axe; he hit Burt instead and cut off his arm.”

“Jackie,” Carla called.

The girl turned around. The rocking horse was awkwardly climbing the steps, slowly making its way upward. It disappeared into the attic. The door slammed behind it.

“Now what does that mean?” Trooper Scott said.

“I think it means we've won,” Lucas said, looking up at the closed door.

“Not yet,” his daughter told him. She pointed to an open window. “Here they come.”

The men of the Brotherhood were running toward the mansion, racing across the estate grounds, spears and clubs and homemade bows in their hands.

The newly arrived troopers all reached for their pistols. To a man, they let their hands drop away from the butts of the sidearms as they realized the weapons were useless.

Kyle turned to the captains of the highway patrol. “You were both in Korea, right?”

“Both of us for two years,” Carl said.

“Ever handled a Molotov cocktail?”

The captains smiled. “Where are they?” they both replied.

The thin line formed a widely separated ring around the mansion. Kyle lit the first cocktail. “Now!” he shouted.

The gas bombs were lighted and hurled toward the shouting, cursing men. Both captains recognized the missing men from their command. The captains hurled the cocktails directly at their turncoat troopers.

The exploding gasoline turned the wavering line of Brotherhood members into a screaming inferno. The oil in the hair of the men exploded like a lightning-struck pine tree. The stench of burning, bubbling human flesh filled the mid-morning summer air. The line broke apart, sending what remained of the Brotherhood running for the woods.

“I recognized about half of those boys,” B. C. said. “We get out of this mess, I start fillin' out warrants.”

“Watson got away,” Denning said. “I'll get him.”

“I saw Gibson cut and run,” Johnson said. “I think we got the rest of them.”

“Then it's over,” George said.

“Not yet,” Jackie said. She looked at Kyle. “You have more of those firebombs?”

“All you want, honey,” the cop said. “The house has to burn, doesn't it?”

“Yes, sir. If it will let us, that is.”

All of them heard the house take a deep, angry breath.

The rocking horse whinnied. But this time there was no menace in the sound. It was a frightened whinny.

B. C. caught a flickering flash of light in the morning. He turned and looked down the road. “Looks like the whole damn Georgia Patrol is here,” he said.