Dead Man's Song (Pine Deep 2)

“You’ll think I’m crazy, but…I just saw a snow-white deer. A buck. You know, with all the horns? White as snow. ”

Val took a few steps toward the barn, but there was nothing to see and the trees were too thin to hide a full-grown deer. She looked back at Connie.

“Isn’t that just strange?” Connie asked with an enigmatic smile.

“Yeah,” Val agreed. “Strange. ”

(2)

It looked like a nest, with the bodies of the creatures tangled and clustered together with no thought of comfort. There were fourteen of them now, all pale and bloated, gorged and somnolent, huddled in the darkness of the basement, secure in the shadows. An onlooker would have thought they were all dead, a mass of murder victims whose bodies h

ad been carelessly disposed of out of sight in that forgotten, half-collapsed house, but every once in a while one of the bloated bodies would turn or shift, the movement inspired by some red dream.

Last night there had only been nine of them, but the number had grown, as it would continue to grow; just as it grew for each of the nests scattered throughout the town. Last week there had been two, but now Adrian and Darien lay sprawled there in the secret, silent darkness, wrapped in each other’s arms, clutched together against the sleeping back of Dave Golub.

The bodies all slept on throughout the burning day. Once, just before noon, a bold and foolish rat scuttled into the basement, following the scent of spoiled meat and fresh blood. It minced down through the spiderwebs and shadows, driven by the nearness of food, hungry beyond caution. In its daring and hunger it came close to Adrian’s outflung hand. The fingers looked fat and pale and full of meat, and the sleeper looked oblivious. The rat considered for a moment and almost fled out of natural fear, but the demands of its belly overrode the logic of its instinct. It darted in toward the little finger, its yellow teeth bared for the bite…but the white hand flashed so fast the rat was a broken-necked corpse before it was even aware that it was in threat. It twitched once, twice, and then lay eternally still in the killing grip of the boy. Adrian’s eyelids never twitched, never opened, but he pulled the corpse close to his chest the way he once would have held a stuffed bear. Beyond the speed of his hand he made no other move. As the hours of the day wore on, he lay there with the dead rat clutched in his hand and a smile of hungry joy on his innocent face.

(3)

“Crow…you’re scaring the crap out of me, here. Why the hell didn’t you tell me this stuff before?”

“Would you have come down here if I had?”

“Hell, no! And I want to turn around and go back right now. ”

“Why, do you think I lured you down here for some nefarious purpose?” Crow was smiling when he said it, then his smile faded. “Jesus Christ—you do think I lured you—”

“What am I supposed to think?” Newton shouted. “You talk me into coming down to the remotest place on planet-frickin’-Earth and then you tell me that Karl Ruger—who had never even been to Pine Deep before—used his last breath to give you a message from someone who’s been dead for thirty years…someone you also think is some kind of monster. What the hell am I supposed to think about that kind of thing?”

“Calm the hell down!” Crow yelled back, amping it up a notch. “And don’t get all paranoid on me. You wanted the whole story, right? Well, this is part of the story, and on that point—this isn’t just a story to me. I believe this stuff. All of it. I know that Griswold was a goddamn monster because I saw his goddamn monster face, all right? He killed my brother, he killed Val’s cousin, he killed Terry Wolfe’s sister, he killed a shitload of other people in this town, and he almost killed me. I know this and you don’t because you weren’t even there. As far as Ruger goes—I faced him down twice and he nearly killed me and my fiancée and our baby and I can’t just forget him or what he said!”

“Baby? What baby?”

That made Crow grind to a halt. He stopped, flushed and flustered and furious. He sputtered for a moment and then, just as loud, he yelled, “Val’s pregnant! You happy? She almost died and that means our baby would have died. You think I’d invent what Ruger said just to impress you?”

“Crow…shut up. ” Newton said it quietly and it had the same effect as if he’d have belted Crow across the mouth. “Just dial it down, okay?”

He stood there, hands up palms-outward, facing Crow, who had clamped his mouth shut but was still glaring.

“I didn’t know that about Val. ”

“Yeah, well, now you do. ”

“Congratulations. ”

“What?”

Newton held out his hand. “Congratulations. ”

Crow stared at him for a long minute and then took the hand and shook it, looking totally puzzled by the right-angle change of direction.

“Now,” Newton said with a level voice, “look me in the eye, Crow, and tell me that you aren’t completely off your rocker, ’cause I have to admit that this is all a bit hard to take and right now I’m more scared of you than I am of these woods, and that’s saying something. ”

“Why the hell are you scared of me?”

“Because you’re acting crazy and you have a gun. ”

That made Crow gape; then he turned and walked in as wide a circle as the brush would allow, flapping his arms and shaking his head. He stopped and turned and looked at Newton from a dozen feet away, and he was smiling a great big rueful smile. “Yeah, I guess it sounds pretty crazy at that. ”