They Roam Those Hills

By W. D. McComb

When a stranger named Iris knocks on Dr. Evan Salter’s door with tales of a long-lost cemetery on his property holding “secrets that can help the living,” he believes she may be mentally ill.

Then Iris says something even more outrageous - that wolves still roam there, too.

As much as Salter would like to forget her bizarre words, he can’t. Instead, he and his young son are drawn to go see for themselves. Is the land itself calling them?

Or is it something else?

• Language: English
• Publisher: W. D. McComb
• Release date: Feb 17, 2021
• ISBN: 9781734090451

W. D. McComb

W. D. “Dwight” McComb graduated with a degree in chemical engineering from Mississippi State University before deciding that a career in medicine was his true calling. He received his Doctor of Medicine degree from the University of Mississippi, then earned board certifications in Internal Medicine and Pediatrics as well as a specialist certification in wound care. He has been practicing medicine for fifteen years in northeast Mississippi, where he lives with his wife and three children. When he’s not treating patients or writing, he can often be found on the sideline with the local high school football team, roaming the woods of the Buttahatchie River bottom, or tossing batting practice to his kids. The Truth That Lies Between is his first novel.

Book preview

THEY ROAM THOSE HILLS

a short story

W. D. McComb

This is a work of fiction. All names, characters, places, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used factitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is purely coincidental.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise without written permission from the publisher. It is illegal to copy this book, post it to a website, or distribute it by any other means without permission.

THEY ROAM THOSE HILLS

Copyright © 2020 by W. D. McComb

wdmccomb.com

All rights reserved. Published by TreaShore Press.

Cover design by David Provolo

First edition.

ISBN 978-1-7340904-5-1 (ebook)

ISBN 978-1-7340904-6-8 (paperback)

To all the keepers

Chapter 1

IT’S A WHOLE FAMILY. Dr. Evan Salter took a deep breath and peered up the hill. He lifted his cap, wiped a glisten of sweat from his brow with the back of his other hand, and mused about how the month of May used to be cooler.

The boy followed his father’s gaze, squinting into the sun just beginning to peek between the trees at the top of the rise. All of them? What do you think happened?

Salter laughed and gave the boy’s matching cap a twist by its bill. I don’t think they all died at the same time. He paused while Tommy straightened his cap with an understanding nod. But they lived and worked on this land and were buried here when their time came.

The boy was on the move before his father finished speaking. Trudging through the leaves, fighting to lift his eight-year-old feet clear of their depth with each step, pushing low-hanging limbs away from his eyes as he climbed. Salter marveled at his son’s energy and enthusiasm about their little expedition. He had talked of little else from the moment the strange old lady walked out their front door two nights before.

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A rapping of knuckles on wood had sounded the arrival of a visitor, who didn’t ring the perfectly good doorbell, and a tall, wispy woman whom Salter had never seen asked to come in. She insisted she had critical information to share. Tommy had stared, wide-eyed, while she ambled with the assist of a cane to the living room couch, refused the glass of water his mother offered, then spoke in hushed, airy tones to Salter about how the 212 acres he had bought the year before held a very important secret.

There’s an old cemetery up there.

Salter frowned. His farm had more than one rise in elevation above the valley floor. She would have to be more specific. Up there, where?

Nashoba Hill.

Salter glanced at his wife out of habit, before he thought about it. He hadn’t spent as much time on the place as he intended, but she knew even less about it than he did. He turned back to the old lady, who was watching him intently with dark eyes set deep in their sockets. He thought she might have been attractive, once upon