Revenge of the Manitou tm-2 Page 12

  “Neil,” said Harry, “we’re coming out because we faced Misquamacus before. If we hadn’t, we would have put you down as a crank, just like everyone else has. But the last time we faced him we came about as close to the happy hunting grounds as I ever want to get, and I don’t want that to happen again. This time, I want to face him forewarned and forearmed, and I want to make sure that he doesn’t have a chance to conjure up any of those demons that jump out at you and bite your head off.”

  “Are you joking?”

  “Do I sound as if I’m joking?”

  Neil stepped aside to let a fishmonger pass with a barrow of fresh blue-green lobsters.

  “No,” he said. “You don’t sound as though you’re joking at all.”

  “Okay,” replied Harry. “Now, this is what Singing Rock wants you to do. He wants you to keep a close watch on your son, and he wants you to make sure that he doesn’t go off on his own this weekend. Do whatever you have to do-take him bowling, or swimming, or whatever it is you people do out at Bodega Bay. Just don’t let him out of your sight. And one more thing. Make sure that he doesn’t get together with any of his classmates from school. If you can go, get bun out of school right now-so much the better. Singing Rock says that before the twenty-two wonderworkers can emerge, they have to go through some kind of performance with lizards or something, and they have to do it all together.”

  “Lizards?” frowned Neil.

  “Don’t ask me,” said Harry. “I know as much about Indian magic as I do about dancing the Highland fling. Apparently, the medicine men do something repulsive with lizards.”

  “Okay,” said Neil. “I’ll do what I can.”

  “There’s something else,” Harry put in. “If you think that Misquamacus is really starting to get a grip on your son-if your son starts talking like Misquamacus and looking as though his face is changing-then call me right away. If it gets really bad, then get the hell out of there.”

  “But what about Toby? If it does get bad, what’s going to happen to him?”

  “It’s pretty hard to say. He might have a chance of survival. But if you and your wife stay around too long, you’re going to find yourselves in much worse danger than he.”

  “What kind of danger? What are you talking about? What do I have to look for?”

  “You don’t have to look for anything,” said Harry dryly. “Whatever it is, it’s going to come looking for you.”

  He met Doughty on the jetty. The old man was sitting on the front bumper of Nell’s pickup, smoking his pipe. Neil said hi.

  Doughty stood up. He questioned, “Did you hear the news?”

  Neil shook his head. “What news?”

  “Billy Ritchie died this morning. I thought you might have heard.”

  Neil felt cold with shock. “He died? How did it happen? He looked fit enough to me, apart from his legs.”

  “His house was burned out,” said Doughty. “His neighbor said it was a freak stroke of lightning, sent the whole place up like a bonfire.”

  “Lightning? We haven’t had an electric storm for weeks.”

  “I know. But that’s what the neighbor said. The whole place was sent up like a bonfire. Poor old Billy, not having the use of his legs, was trapped in his living room.

  Burned to death, black cat and all.”

  Neil swallowed, and his throat was as dry as a nylon rug. The day seemed suddenly hot and oppressive, and the clank and clatter of boats’ rigging was like the tolling of toneless, funereal handbells.

  Neil admitted, “I saw him only yesterday. I was talking to him, as close as we’re standing now.”

  Doughty looked away, and puffed a couple of times at his pipe.

  Neil said, “Did you find out anything else about it? Or was that all?”

  Doughty turned around, and eyed him up and down. “All? What more do you want?

  You know what they’ve always said in Napa County. Where there’s a Fenner, there’s a bad wind blowing.”

  “What land of a saying is that?”

  Doughty shrugged. “I’m not sure I know. But I guess it’s one of those sayings that’s based on experience.”

  Neil stared at the blue-gray Pacific for a while, at the wavelets which lapped at the fishing boats and pleasure cruisers tied up at the jetty. Then he said, “Billy Ritchie talked about the old days, about the tunes when Bloody Fenner was still alive, and about the Indian massacres. He told me all about Ossadagowah, and some of the other Indian demons.”

  Doughty took the stem of his pipe out of his mouth and spat a distance of ten feet into the water. “So what are you saying?” he asked. “You think he talked too much, and some of them Indian demons set ablaze to his house?”

  Neil looked at him sharply. “It’s nothing to joke about, Doughty. Those demons are dangerous, just as much today as they were in the old days.”

  “Neil,” growled Doughty, in his old sea-dog voice, “you’re letting yourself get out of hand.”

  “You think so? What if I tell you I saw a ghost with my own eyes right out there on the bay? What if I tell you that one of the most powerful Red Indian medicine men who ever lived came alive in my house last night?”

  Doughty thought about it, and then reached out and held Nell’s arm. “I know what you must be feeling, Neil. I know you’ve been working hard. Maybe you’re feeling even worse now, because of poor Billy going up in smoke. But you’re not going to make anything better if you keep on letting these ghoulies and ghosties scare you so much.”

  Neil frowned. “Have you been talking to Susan?”

  Doughty kept his eyes steady for a moment, then looked away.

  “When did she come down here?” asked Neil.

  Doughty shrugged. “Yesterday afternoon, while you was up in Calistoga.”

  “And what did she say? That I was crazy?”

  “Not at all,” insisted Doughty. “She said she was worried about you, that’s all, and she asked if you’d been working too hard on them boats. I told her no, you seemed fine to me. But she was still worried about some of the things you’d been saying, and some of the things you’d been thinking. She said you were acting like a man with something on his mind. She’s been thinking of getting you down to a shrink, I can tell you.”

  Neil rubbed his face with the flat of his hand. “Do you think she’s right?” he asked Doughty. “Do you think I need analysis, too? Do you think I’m a head case?”

  Doughty didn’t answer.

  Neil said, “Well? Am I sane or insane? Am I dreaming or am I awake? Why don’t you tell me the way you feel?”

  Doughty said uncomfortably, “It’s not for me to say, Neil.”

  “But what the hell do you thinks’ going on here? Toby starts seeing ghosts in long white duster coats, the kids in his class start having nightmares about Indian massacres, and now Billy Ritchie gets himself killed in a freak fire, the day after he told me about redskin demons. None of this is normal, Doughty, but it’s happening for real, and it’s no use this town pretending it doesn’t exist.”

  “Neil-” began Doughty. Then he changed his mind and shook his head.

  “What were you going to say?

  “Oh, dammit, Neil, you’ve got to realize you’re fighting yourself an uphill battle.

  Everybody’s thinking you’ve lost your marbles. Don’t you think you’d be better off forgetting the whole business?”

  Neil turned away in exasperation. But then, in a low, intent voice, he told Doughty,

  “Listen-if I was like you, if I tried to pretend that nothing was happening, then this town would suffer the worst tragedy it’s ever known. It’s coming, Doughty, I warn you. It’s coming soon. I didn’t want to believe it myself, and even now I wish I'd never gotten myself mixed up in it. But it’s happening because of Bloody Fenner, my ancestor, and I don’t have any choice. If I don’t fight back, then you and me and Susan and Toby and thousands of people are going to die, and that’s all I know.”

  “Neil-”

&n
bsp; “That’s it, Doughty. No more advice. No more nothing. From now on, anybody who doesn’t believe me is against me, and that’s the way it has to be.”

  He left Doughty sitting on the pickup’s bumper, and went down to the White Dove to collect his metal polish and cleaning rags.

  In the middle of the night, with bluish moonlight irradiating the room, he woke up suddenly and lay silent, listening to Susan breathing beside him and Toby softly snoring in the cot across by the door. He must have stayed like that, unmoving and watchful, for almost ten minutes, for the brilliant edge of the moon slowly appeared in the corner of the window, and the light grew brighter and brighter.

  A voice whispered, “Neil.”

  He raised his head. There was nobody there. The moon glistened on the rails of the wide brass bed, and on the handles of the painted pine bureau, but even in the shadows behind the closet and in the alcove by the door, there were no apparitions, no ghosts in long white coats or clad in shiny wood.

  The voice repeated, “Neil.”

  He looked all around the room, straining his eyes, his heart beating quickly and irregularly. It was as still and silent as when he had first awakened.

  “Where are you?” he whispered.

  There was a pause, and then the voice said, “Beside you.”

  He jerked his head around. Next to him, Susan was fast asleep, her blond hair spread on the pillow, her lips slightly parted.

  “Where?” he asked. “I don’t see you.”

  Susan’s lips moved almost imperceptibly, and a man’s voice spoke out of her throat.

  “Here. Beside you. I can’t show myself because of Quamis.”

  “Is Quamis here?”

  “You bet. He’s inside your son. He’s like a moth inside of a chrysalis, and it won’t be long before he bursts out of there and spreads his wings.”

  Neil breathed, “Who are you? What’s your name?” “You’ve seen me before. The name’s Dunbar. I was out of Sacramento in ‘31. I thought you was Alien at first, you looked so similar. The spitting image of Alien.”

  “It was you in the beard and the long white duster?” “That’s right. In those days, there was me and nineteen others, and our wives, and all of our children. The Wappos took us by surprise up by Las Posadas, and killed us all. Alien was the scout on that trip, and went for help.”

  Neil stared at Susan. She seemed to be more than asleep. Her breathing was slow and shallow, as if she was in a coma. The voice continued, “Alien went for help, but he didn’t get back in time. He said he was going to go for the Mexican camp down in the valley, make his way back up the creek. But he never came back. They cut us all down, the Wappos, women and children too, and I saw my dear little Margie with an arrow clean through her face.”

  “Why are you here?” asked Neil. “What do you want from me?”

  The voice sighed. “I’m here because I’m here. It’s not for any reason. It’s dark out here on the outside, Neil, and time doesn’t mean what it does to you. All times are the same time. Ifs ‘31 still, Neil, and the Wappos are still cutting us down, and always will. We’re still waiting for Alien to help us. We’re still dying, Neil.”

  The voice began to falter, and grow faint Neil said, “Dunbar-don’t go. Dunbar!”

  “I’m here, Neil.”

  “Dunbar, what do you know of Quamis?”

  There was a longer pause. Then Susan breathed, “Quamis is everywhere. Always has been and always will be. The Indians told us he never died and never would.

  Maybe that was part story, but then maybe it was part truth, too. You could hear about Quamis from the woods of Massachusetts clear across to Denver, Colorado, and even beyond that. They said he lived in the wind that blew through the Georgia pines, and in the grass of the plains east of the Platte River. A great wonder-worker, they used to say, and still do.”

  Dumbar’s last words were so faint in Susan’s mouth that Neil could hardly hear them.

  He had to bend his ear close to her lips so that he might distinguish any syllables at all amid the hoarse breathing that came from her somnolent larynx, and he was sure that there was more, but it was inaudible. He thought he heard the word assistance, but he couldn’t be sure. It may have been nothing more than a sibilant whisper.

  He sat up. The moon was now fully visible, and the light in the bedroom was almost unnaturally bright. He felt strangely calmed by Dunbar’s visitation, as if he had been reassured that he wasn’t alone in his fight against Misquamacus. Perhaps it was Dunbar who had destroyed the blazing wooden image last night. After all, he remembered seeing the faintest hint of a white coat, and a hand bolstering a gun.

  He reached down the bed and adjusted the patchwork quilt so that it covered Susan’s bare feet. Then he glanced across at Toby to make sure that he was still asleep. Toby was less restless since they had moved him into their own bedroom, but he still mumbled as he slept, and had bouts of fierce tossing and turning.

  Neil stiffened. Toby was sitting up in bed and was staring at him. His small face was white, white as the

  silvered light from the moon, and his eyes were intense and glittering. He wasn’t smiling. He wasn’t frowning. His expression was calm and controlled, and because of that, it was even more frightening. Eight-year-old boys grin, or cry, or show some feeling, thought Neil. Why is Toby just staring at me like that?

  “Toby,” he said in a hesitant whisper. Toby continued to stare. “Toby, are you okay?”

  Toby’s eyes sparkled with malevolence. His features seemed to shift and change in the moonlight, one layer of features superimposing another, until he looked liked someone else altogether. Someone older, someone infinitely older, and someone infinitely more evil. “Toby,” insisted Neil.

  Toby rose slowly from the bed, and seemed to glide toward him. He stood only a few feet away, and then he spoke in the voice of Misquamacus, in that hollow distant voice that sounded as if it was inside Neil’s own head, and yet which echoed with countless miles and eons of ancient time.

  “You have spoken to the white magician Erskine,” said Misquamacus.

  Neil edged one foot out of bed, and then swung his leg to the floor. His muscles were tensed, and he was ready to make a dive for Toby and bring him down. He didn’t have any idea what Misquamacus might try to do, or even how powerful he was, but he wanted to be ready for a fight.

  Misquamacus said, “It is good that you have spoken. He will come, along with my treacherous blood brother, Singing Rock, and I shall show them that my manitou is indestructible, and that my vengeance spans fifty thousand moons.”

  Neil said steadily, “You must let Toby go. I want you to get out of my son.”

  Toby smiled, a slow, laconic smile. “You are powerless to prevent me from lodging here. I shall remain until I am ready. I am here at the direction of my white spirit guide, your ancestor, and because I am here by consent, no magic in the world can move me.”

  “I’m going to take Toby away from here,” said Neil. “I’m going to take him to Europe.

  Anywhere. Just so long as he’s out of your reach.”

  Toby shook his head, still smiling. “You cannot take the boy. If you attempt to interfere in the day of the dark stars, you will surely die more painfully than any other white man.”

  Neil climbed out of bed, and stood over his son, feeling cold and frightened, but deeply determined. If Harry Erskine and John Singing Rock had destroyed Misquamacus once, then somehow they must be able to do it again. He said, “I’m warning you, get out of my son. If you don’t leave him now, I promise you I’ll tear you to pieces.”

  Toby half-turned his head toward the bed where Susan lay sleeping. He regarded her for a while, and then he raised one arm and pointed to her. Very softly, he incanted, “Spirit of snake, spirit of storm, spirit of cloud, obey me.”

  Abruptly, with a deafening crash, the bedroom windows imploded, spraying stars of glass all over the room. A shrieking wind blew into the room, a wind as bitterly cold as dry ice, and Nei
l was knocked sideways, so that he stumbled against his bedside table and jarred his shoulder on the edge of his wardrobe.

  Toby remained still, unmoved by the gale, and pointed again at the bed. In front of Neil’s horrified eyes, the bed sheet rose and twisted like a rope, and entwined itself around Susan’s body. Over the storm, he heard her scream, and then shriek “Neil!

  Neil!” and he could see her struggling against the bedclothes. But the dreadful wind seemed to have drained away all of his energy, and the distance from the wall to the bed had become miles instead of feet.

  Raising his arm to protect Ms eyes, Neil saw Toby’s face fixed in a grotesque, wolfish grin, with his lips drawn back across his teeth. There was an ear-shattering flash of lightning, followed by a rumbling vibration which lifted the whole floor, and sent Neil staggering off balance again.

  Susan screamed louder, a scream of pain and total fear. In the flickering, sizzling lightning, Neil saw her arched back on the bed, her eyes wide, her hands struggling and tearing at the sheets. Then the abrasive wind was tearing at her flowery cotton nightgown, ripping it in tatters which whirled around the bedroom.

  “Susan!” yelled Neil, and tried to claw across to the bed. But the howling gale pressed him back, and sparkling shards of glass blew up from the floor and cut at his hands and his face.

  The sheets had taken on a bulky shape that pressed on Susan’s body, and twisted between her bare thighs in a thick, animate rope. She was hysterical now, screaming an endless scream which pierced the storm and the wind at an almost intolerable pitch. But the sheets bound her to the bed, forcing her shoulders back against the mattress, and her legs wide apart.

  Neil howled to Toby, “Toby! That’s your mother! That’s your mother!”

  But the boy simply turned and smiled at him, and lifted his arm again toward the bed.

  “Toby!” roared Neil.

  The bedclothes forced themselves onto Susan in a hideous, jerking motion, like the hindquarters of a rutting dog. Neil felt himself blacking out for a moment; then he opened his eyes again, and it was still happening, it was still real. His Susan, his wife, was being raped in front of his eyes by her own sheets.