The Chosen

By Craig Conrad

Paul Rice returns to Lanark, Wisconsin to help his friend, Police Chief Thayer, with another murder that has all the earmards of a ritual killer he thought was dead. When he arrives in town, he finds that Durie House, which he burned to the ground a year age, is very much visible at night with lights burning in all its windows, lights that only

• Language: English
• Publisher: Conrad Press
• Release date: Oct 7, 2022
• ISBN: 9781955243780

Craig Conrad

Author resides in Milwaukee. Wisconsin, has been hooked on mysteries and supernatural thrillers since reading his first H.P. Lovecraft novel. He has written twenty novels, fourteen of them are Paul Rice novels, his reluctant paranormal investigator, with cameo appearances in two others that feature two of his war buddies along with two Dutch Verlander stories, and a collection of short stories.

Book preview

1

THE MILKY EYE OF the moon followed the dark-blue Chrysler sedan along its journey from Milwaukee’s Mitchell Airport to the gates of Lanark’s Graceland Cemetery. Ever-present lake fog began to drift inland in thin, gauzy wisps as the car rolled to a stop.

The driver turned to the man sitting next to him. I told you it would be locked up by the time we got here.

So you did, the man said. Open it.

The driver started to protest, but the man seated in the back cut him off. I’ll do it. He got out of the car and worked on the padlock with a pick taken from a small leather case that je removed from his coat pocket. A minute later, he swung the cemetery gates open and got back in the car.

The crypts are over the bridge in the old section, the driver told the man next to him.

I know, he said. When was He interred?

About a week ago, the driver said.

I supposed the Philo will be snooping around soon.

They’re here already, the one in the back said.

The man nodded and looked out the window.

The Chrysler ambled along the winding road, its headlights picking up patches of fog moving in.

The car crossed the old bridge that spanned railroad tracks far below and stopped in the crypt area. The driver took a flashlight from the glove compartment as the three of them piled out of the car. They made a strange trio, each one a head shorter than the other. The driver was the tallest; a man with fishlike features. The second man was shorter and pear-shaped, and the third man, from the back of the car, was shorter still a possessed a full head of gray hair and a short, gray beard. They followed the flashlight beam along the row of crypts.

Moonlight spilled through the gauzy winter night highlighting the leafless trees and skeletal branches.

There it is. The tall man said. It’s probably locked as well.

No problem, the gray man said. Just hold the light so I can see what I’m doing.

He worked swiftly in the circle of light and quickly pushed the heavy crypt door open. The three entered, moving with the probing light as it swept across numerous spider webs and dusty sarcophagi until they found the one they were looking for.

The pear-shaped man came forward the reverently touched the stone lid just under the brass nameplate. It read: Phillip Deering. He held his hands there, standing silently as if in prayer.

Moments later, he turned to the tall man holding the flashlight.

Who murdered him?

Paul Rice, the tall man told him.

Who does he love? he asked.

2

SEVERAL MONTHS LATER, IN a home on Milwaukee’s southwest side, Paul Rice watched the fog build into thick, heavy rolls and gather ominously outside his living room window. He stepped away from the window and looked back at the closed bedroom door where Linda Eastman was finally sleeping. She had another bad night, and he had held her until she was able to sleep again. Who could blame her after what she had been through?

Paul checked his watch. It was three-twenty in the morning. He took a pack of cigarettes from his robe pocket and lit one. He wasn’t sleeping too well either, not after what happened. The war-dream seemed to be gone and also the pain and nausea of their place was something less tangible, less definite in its nature. It haunted the mind. Not being able to sleep at night was just part of it; another was the feeling of being malevolently watched at odd times during the day and night by some invisible lurker. He was sure Linda felt it, too, and Thayer, though they never spoke of it.

A year had almost passed since Durie House was destroyed, completely burned, even its stones were gone, only the hole of its foundation was left. And after, Thayer laid the bones of the Lanark murders to rest, to the satisfaction if everyone concerned, without disclosing the insanity of what really took place.

Everything was neatly labeled and put on the shelf for reasonable people to look at without doubt or fear and say, Yes, that’s the way it was. Even Marion Koss, who at first was under suspicion for murder, was now a free woman. Durie House had claimed enough victims. He broke into a slight ironic smile. But of course none of that will ever come out now.

Paul shook his head and crushed out his cigarette, then quickly lit another. Leave it alone, he thought. Put it all behind you and try to live again. It was over. All he had to do was bury it, and help Linda do the same.

The telephone startled him, its ring jarring him the way a late-night noise frightens a sleeper awake from a supposedly safe slumber. He looked at it for a few seconds, unable to move, then quickly picked it up so it wouldn't wake Linda. He recognized Police Chief Thayer's voice immediately.

Paul... Thayer hesitated.

Paul, it's starting again. There's been another murder...

3

THE LATE-MORNING SKY HELD a threat of rain that was building in the west and moving in Paul’s direction. He saw distant flashes of lightning and heard thunder roll shortly after. Paul got into his Buick and pulled out of his driveway, heading for Lanark. Forty-five minutes into the drive, Paul watched a flight of geese, strung out across the cloudy sky in a V-formation, heading for a nearby farmer’s field. He thought about the last time he made this trip. Linda was with him then, taking him home to meet her parents, her brother, and sister. By the end of the week, they were all gone. Linda was the only one left.

Rain started to foul his windshield. It fell lightly at first, just turning the trees black along the way, then heavier, bouncing off the road ahead of him in long, silver spears, finally drenching the countryside with a torrential downpour, making visibility risky.

Paul almost had to pull over and wait for the rain to let up, but managed to make it to Lanark and turned into the police station lot. Parking, he slid his tall frame out from behind the wheel and ducked in the building, heading for Chief Clive Thayer’s office.

How come every time you come up here it starts raining? Thayer greeted him with mock complaint.

Just call me ‘Shalako,’ Paul said, trying to shake some of the rain off his light jacket.

The man who brings the rain. I see you read Louis L’Amour, too.

Oh, yes, big fan.

Thayer got up from behind his deck and warmly shook hands with Paul. I appreciate you coming up here. It’s good to see you.

And you. Paul studied his friend. Thayer was a big man in his early sixties, four inches over six feet, and had a head of thick white hair. You look good.

God, do you need glasses. I haven’t been the same since we walked into Durie House.

Welcome to the club, Paul said.

They looked at each other for a long moment; the glance passed was friendly and knowing. They were battle-scarred veterans, surviving a very bad experience which had forged them together into a deep friendship. Both men shared a terrible, forbidden knowledge that they dare not reveal to the uninitiated – lest they be called mad.

Yeah, I know what you mean, Thayer said after a pause. Coffee? Paul looked good, Thayer thought, all things considered. His hair and mustache were still dark; they hadn’t suddenly turned white. But there was a difference around the eyes. It was a more guarded look.

Coffee sounds good. Paul said, removing his jacket and draping it over a plastic chair. I could use some.

Thayer poured them each a mug of coffee from a coffeemaker sitting on a table behind his deck. He handed a mug to Paul.

Thanks, Paul took a sip and made a sour face. Thayer’s coffee was always strong, bordering on lethal. I forgot how bad this stuff tastes.

At least it’s hot.

Paul had to give him that. So what have you got? He sat down on one of that uncomfortable plastic chairs flanking Thayer’s desk. You were rather vague over that phone.

Thayer threw a leg over the corner of his desk. Paul had become his unofficial confidant in these matters. Besides, there wasn’t anyone else he could talk to – unless it was a priest. A street person, he said. Here in Lanark?

Yeah, we have a few. This guy lived in a cardboard box a little bigger than a broom closet. His name’s Willie Meyer. Same MO as last year: cut throat - almost in two – disemboweled, and his penis was cut off. The killer took the body parts away.

Over the phone, you said it was different. How? Paul asked.

He straightened from the desk. The shirt and pants of his khaki uniform met in a slight bulge around his middle.

The location, Thayer said. It’s not the same.

Paul gave the coffee another try, but it didn’t improve. Where did you find him?

In a downtown alley – behind the Red Dragon, a Chinese restaurant. One of the cooks found him when he went out for a smoke and called it in. But it’s a hair off course. It doesn’t match any of the previous places that were used.

You think someone found the grimoire and is trying to open the thing up again?

Yeah, don’t you?

Sounds like it, Paul had to admit. The house is gone, but that doesn’t mean that the damn opening isn’t still there.

Thayer shook his head. I’m not afraid of anything I can see, but every time I think about what happened, it scares the bejesus out of me. And now some crackpot is trying to start the whole thing over again.

Paul nursed his coffee. Did anything ever turned up in Dwayne Eastman?

No. Nor on Mrs. Eastman, or the two missing cops I sent over there that night, Thayer shot him a look. I would have told you if anything surfaced.

I know, Clive, Paul said, staring off into space for a moment. It’s just that I feel uneasy about the ones we couldn’t find.

I feel uneasy whenever I think of that poor kid locked in that room alone. It’s still hard to believe that something got to him up there.

Paul turned to look at him. But something did.

You think Dwayne’s father saw that something?

I think that whatever John Eastman saw in his son’s room frightened him to death.

Thayer gave Paul a long glance. You know, you never did tell me what you saw up there that night you started the fire.

Paul smiled grimly. You don’t really want to know. He finished his coffee. Maybe someday, when we’re both roaring drunk, I’ll tell you.

The way things have been going lately, that won’t be long.

Paul got up and walked over to the wall behind Thayer’s desk where a map of Lanark hung with pins of last year’s murder sites still stuck in the corkboard. Where is this Chinese restaurant exactly?

Thayer joined him at the map. Here, this green pin. The red ones are the previous sites. The location just didn’t match up with anything we had before.

Paul studied the map, and then glanced at Thayer. It might be a new pattern that someone is using to prove this hell-existence-theory of the Duries’,

Not the same as before?

Maybe someone came up with a new pattern that works just as good.

Like what?

Paul shrugged. Hard to say now. Could be anything.

Goddammit, Thayer swore under his breath, running a hand through his hair. You know what that will mean.

I know, Paul said, not liking the thought any better than Thayer. Willie Meyer’s murder had set something in motion that was going to be hard to stop. It means more killing until we can figure it out and catch this guy.

4

LET’S GO, THE SHORT man said.

The two men in the car had waited a full ten minutes after Paul left before they got out of their vehicle and headed up the walk to his house and rang the bell.

Linda Eastman opened the door and found them standing before her. Both wore black, and one was a full head taller than the other. The taller, younger one had a fishlike face; the smaller one was the older with light brown hair turning gray that framed a vulpine face. His body had an odd shape to it.

Hello, the taller one said. My name’s Kenneth Sollis and you’re Linda Eastman, are you not?

Yes, Linda said, a little apprehensive, wondering what these two wanted. I’m she. Why?

Sollis smiled. I sort know you indirectly through Jennifer Hanson. Well, to make a long story short, your uncle, whom I’ve known for many years, is here on a visit and wanted to meet you. Since he was not familiar with the area, I took the liberty of helping him find you. Sollis turned to the smaller man. This is your mother’s brother, Emerson Sundstrum.

All the time Sollis was talking, Linda couldn’t help notice the other man watching her with deep, strange eyes that drew you in to God’s know where. You could easily lose yourself in them, and Linda was certain she never wanted to do that.

Linda gave him a hesitant smile, avoiding his eyes and offered her hand. Oh, I didn’t know Mom had a brother.

He took her hand in both of his and held it. His touch was not pleasant. Your mother and I really haven’t been that close for years. I’m terribly sorry to hear about the family tragedy, he said, then paused. May we come in, my dear?

Why, yes. Yes, of course, Linda invited, stepping away from the door. Come in.

Lassiter and Luke, Paul’s cats, who had escorted Linda to the door when the bell rang, were now backing away with their ears pinned back to the sides of their heads, hissing loudly as the two men entered.

Linda closed the door. What’s the matter with you guys? she asked the cats.

They gave one final, loud protest, then turned and disappeared into the house.

Linda shook her head, looking at the two men. Cats, she said.

I’m afraid, said Emerson Sundstrum, that cats do not like me very much.

5

DAMN VULTURES, HE SAID to himself.

Fred Owens sat his seventy-nine-year-old- body down in a chair, moving his long, bony legs under the kitchen table, taking his cup of morning coffee with him, and went through the mail that he had not gone through yesterday.

You get on in years and the bastards are sending you brochures from funeral parlors or nursing homes, or large print books from book clubs. Goddamn embalmers can hardly wait till you kick the bucket.

Fred picked up everything he considered junk mail and threw it in the trash bag. It was bad enough growing old and waiting to die so he could be with his wife, Martha, without having to be reminded of it every day.

Finishing his coffee, he got up, poured another cup, and glanced at the Kit Kat clock at the kitchen wall. Ten o’clock. He’d drink this coffee and then go out and feed the birds. Fred returned to the table with his fresh cup, sitting down and planning what he would do today. He laughed to himself. Probably the same thing he did yesterday and the day before that. What has an old fart has to do anyway? He’d feed his bird friends, and the rabbit, and a squirrel or two, then go down to Booker’s Tavern and see the boys. His daughter, Nancy, would probably drop by in the afternoon with some food she cooked for him.

That means he’d have to vacuum before she got here; otherwise, she’d be on his back about all the birdseed on the floor. But, let her holler. What else did he have to do? The birds and animals kept him company.

Looking out the kitchen window, Fred saw it was a bright sunny day, now that the rain had moved on and late enough for lots of people to be up and about. He didn’t feed his friends in the predawn darkness anymore. Not since Philip Deering had tried to kill him last year. He didn’t do anything in the dark at all, except turn on the lights. He must have aged about ten years during that period, until the cops finally killed Deering. That bastard broke right into the house that night. Would have got him, too, if he hadn’t locked himself in the bathroom. Then luckily, the cops showed up, but that murdering son of a bitch got away, stabbing Chief Thayer In the process. They got him though. Tracked him down in the cemetery, right into the Durie crypt.

Everyone in Lanark breathed a sigh of relief after that. No one more than him. He didn’t fancy himself as a target, or relish the idea of someone trying to kill him every night. His nerves had been rubbed raw and he hadn’t slept worth a shit.

Now the papers say there’s been another killing just like the ones last year. So what did that mean? Fred wondered. Would he have to stay up night and keep all his lights on again? Was he on this killer’s list? A target again?

6

PAUL FOUND THE RED Dragon at the end of Lanark’s downtown area, between AAA Chiropractic and NAPA store, directly across from a Wendy’s on Richard Street, which intersected the city’s main thorough fare.

Swinging into the restaurant’s lot, Paul parked and got out; giving the AAA place a glace, figuring the owner came up with that name so he would be listed first in the telephone directory under chiropractors. Yeah, good old AAA didn’t miss a trick.

Paul walked around to the back of the Red Dragon. He wanted to see himself where the body was found. Steam poured out of the kitchen vents laced with the aroma of Chinese cuisine, making Paul’s stomach growl, reminding him that he hadn’t eaten much of a breakfast.

The yellow crime-scene tape was gone, but Paul found where Willie Meyer had laid down for the last time. He really didn’t expect to find anything. No missing clue that the police had overlooked. Thayer and his technical boys had been over this area with painstaking care. He just wanted to see it first hand and get the feel of it, instead of looking at crime photos. Not that he was a psychic, not by a long stretch of the imagination. The only psychic energy he was able to pick on was fear. He was good at that one.

Judging from the pictures Thayer had shown him, the body was found near the garbage cans and a large dumpster, both easily visible from the restaurant’s kitchen door.

Paul knelt down and touched the spot with a hand. What happened to you, Willie? Paul said. But Willie wasn’t talking, not anymore anyway, and the only feeling Paul was picking up on was revulsion, his own, that his horror was starting all over again. He could visualize Willie spread-eagled and mutilated here, his manhood violated, his humanity defiled, his life forfeited. And for what?

Rising disgustedly to his feet, Paul looked east, toward Blackmoor Road, toward Durie House, a house that had quickly changed all of his previously held beliefs about reality. His life’s convictions had suddenly been blown away by last year’s ill, unforeseen wind of change.

Paul turned his eyes back to the spot where Willie Meyer had been murdered. He paused for a moment, then walked back to his car. Getting in, he pulled away and started to drive though the streets of Lanark.

His intention was to get on the expressway and return to Milwaukee; however, although he hadn’t meant to, he found himself parking and wandering through the manicured lawns of Graceland Cemetery. Something drew him there with magnetic force and here he was, haunting a cemetery.

Paul’s wanderings took him close to the crypts, Durie crypt, bringing to mind the night he had trailed a vicious killer through these grounds, following him into the black maw of that crypt. Bad thoughts made him break out in an icy sweat. Bad dreams kept him awake at night. He smiled to himself. Like Thayer told him: They were both in great shape, for the shape they were in.

Nearby, the name on a plain stone marker caught his eye and brought him up short: Jennifer Bernstein. Paul didn’t know Jennifer was buried here. He thought her husband had taken her body back to New Orleans after the murder, but evidently, he decided not to. Maybe her mother had something to do with that.

But why didn’t he remember her burial? Things were so screwed up at that time, he never had a chance to come to her funeral to say goodbye. He felt bad about that.

He felt bad about their breakup, too, but looking back at it realistically, and not without emotion, it would not have worked out. Jennifer had been too status oriented, something that he could care less about.

The morning rain had broken up and left the sky clear for the afternoon sun that was making a comeback, but dark clouds, heavy with rain, were slowly moving in again. Paul decided he’d better leave before the downpour started and headed back to his car.

Halfway there, he thought he recognized a woman kneeling at a grave. She got to her feet when he stopped and looked at him.

Hello, Marion, Paul greeted her, Marion Koss was a tall blonde with short hair and blue eyes who always reminded him of Jane Wyman, and who, for some reason, was totally oblivious to her good looks. In fact, she seemed to be rather self-conscious about herself.

Hello, Paul, she said in a small voice. She avoided his eyes and was somewhat apprehensive about meeting him here.

Paul thought she looked rather drawn and tired. How are you? Getting along, Okay?

Yes, she nodded and said, I’m fine.

You have someone here? Paul asked, indicating the gravesite.

My husband is buried here.

She seemed reluctant to talk and he didn’t want to press her or add to her uneasiness. There was a sadness about her that she wore like another layer of skin.

Well, it’s nice to see you, Paul said lamely, after an awkward silence. Take care of yourself. He almost patted her arm, but she appeared to be so nervous, he thought better of it.

Thank you for what you did, she said, catching him before he turned away.

You’re welcome, Paul said. It wasn’t your fault,

Marion nodded absently, looking off into the distance of the cemetery, momentarily losing herself there, then turned and said, Wally Schaefer is buried here, too.

It wasn’t your fault, Marion, Paul said again.

Yes, it was, she said, lowering her head and walking away.

7

IN A CONDO ON Milwaukee’s south side, Juan Guerrero’s head still hurt.

He had drank too much two nights ago at Peter’s, thanks to those two guys he had met up with who kept buying him drinks, but that really wasn’t the main reason his head ached, he kept hearing voices telling him to do a bad thing. He wished they’d stop and go away. Juan put his hands over his ears, trying to block them out, but they were inside his head. How did they get in there? Was he going crazy? A breakdown? What?

Juan crossed himself. Dear Mother of God, he thought, I don’t want to hurt this man.

The man was always decent to Juan at work, always gave you a smile and a friendly greeting. Not like those other stuck-up pricky supervisors down there. They’d pass you up without a word, like you were a bastard at their family reunion. They’d only talk to you to have you do something, take the mail here, take the mail there, never a kind word. Or no word at all, unless they told you what you were doing wrong. Juan prided himself on being a good mail handler, on doing his job right. This man was the only one who praised him, who told him he was doing well.

He did not want to hurt this man.

There are devils, little one, his mother often told him, that will lead you astray. Always be good. Follow the Church.

Juan often thought of his mother and his Chamorro roots and going to that little white church every Sunday. It was a small church, but so was his village, nestled near the waters of Telafofo Falls. And the church had served him well over the years. It had gotten him through the Vietnam War, wounded but alive, and provided him with a good job afterward.

Did not his mother tell him all things came from God?

And did not the Church take care of his father as well. His father fought in the Great War against the hated Japanese from the time Guam fell that sad December of 1941 until the Americans liberated the island three years later. All those, during the Japanese occupation, the Church kept him safe while he fought with a band of guerillas, and was only slightly wounded at the end, near the village of Yigo. The Church had always been there for them.

But Juan’s beloved church had changed. English was said at mass instead of Latin, and it was not the same. It did not have the power and mystery of Latin and made the mass seem inadequate and ineffectual. Women were no longer required to cover their heads while in church; in fact, women hardly dressed for church, always wearing her good dress and making sure he had on his best clothes. Not you could come to mass in shorts and sandals. No, it was not the same and that was sad, but God still provided, and when the opportunity came, Juan took it.

He left his island home and accepted the good job. Winsconsin was a new land, where there were four seasons, two more than the rain and dry seasons he knew as a boy.

Juan walked into the bathroom of his condo and splashed cold water over his dark face and neck. Toweling himself dry, he stood in the doorway and looked back toward the kitchen. It was still sort of a mess, because he was painting, but the last few days he didn’t feel like doing anything.

Opening the medicine cabinet, he unscrewed the aspirin bottle, shaking out four tablets, and popped them in his mouth, washing them down with a glass of water. His head felt like it was going to explode with all the traffic that was going on up there.

Too many thoughts, too many voices that were not his own, but rather from what seemed an alien source, instructing him to do an evil thing.

He had been all right until he met those two at the bar. Afterward, he did not feel the same; it was as if he was carrying extra baggage around with him, some presence that got into his head. Thinking about it now, it was as if the two at the bar were waiting for him, singling him out for purpose of their own.

Rubbing his forehead with both hands, he tried to ease the pain, than decided to head for the bedroom. Maybe if he laid down for a while and said some prayers, it would all go away, but then, he tried saying prayers before, and he could never finish. It was as if something was blocking him.

There are devils, little one. Had his mother not told him that, and he believed her words. Just as he believed some were with him now.

Juan made the sign of the cross and laid down on his bed, covering his eyes with an arm. He wished the voices would leave him alone.

He did not want to hurt this man.

8

ACROSS TOWN, SARA ANN Stewart was stuck again. Dammit to hell, she swore. This house just wasn’t built for anyone in a wheelchair, which had been her lot for the last five years, starting with a walker and ending with the chair. Now she was wedged in the bathroom doorway. God, she didn’t want to call Paul again. He was just here three days ago when her lap-cover got caught in the wheel of her chair and she couldn’t move. Then again, she really couldn’t call anyone. She was nowhere near one of her phones. Damn, now what? Sara gave a deep, frustrating sigh. Nothing to do but keep at it, which she did, and after several minutes of maneuvering, she got the wheels to cooperate and rolled out the doorway into the living room.

Sara was born in 1881 on the twenty-third of December, at seven in the morning in Milwaukee. The family she chose as parents (as she liked to put it) was not well off by any means, not in a monetary sense, but rich in intelligence, good looks, and dumb luck. The foundation of the family was rooted in solid spiritual values. It wasn’t large as families go, but two brothers and three sisters were large enough for her.

True, there wasn’t always enough to eat, but no one ever went away from the table with at least something in their belly. Charles and Emily Rice were devoted parents, and no one in that house ever went unloved, from a stray mouse walking across the floor to neighbor kids looking for a place to roost. All were welcome.

In growing up, there was just the right stuff; a splash of this or a pinch of that bring everyone through the unpredictable mix of childhood unscathed. All of them managed to get a collage education without stepping on any bodies or leaving any skeletons in closets. They all made it through, strong and firm, and straight.

Sara bore Carl Stewart (a very wise Scot; he picked her, didn’t he?) three children, all girls. Their life together had been great. There was money, although she had to admit sometimes sorrow. Looking back, there wasn’t a damn thing that she regretted. Maybe losing Carl so fast, and all her girls, not to mention all her siblings. Aside from that, there was nothing, unless it was her height.

Sara had always been proud of her athletic body and five- eight frame, but now she was shrinking. The doctors called it osteoporosis, but no matter what its name, Sara knew she was down five-five and still going, being sucked into a black hole of life that she would just as soon not enter, but the very worst thing was the speed.

Time flew, especially on her end of the scale. All the old people (she would be ninety-eight this December) were at mach five and going…going…going… She wished she knew just where the hell they were all going. If everyone had only one life (and Sara believed they passed this way many times) why was it running at such a fast clip? What was the rush? Just to end it, so they could come back again? One way or the other, it didn’t make much sense, but neither did anything else around here, like outliving your children. All her girls were gone now.

Or being able to see dead people after you turned ninety-tree.

Now what the hell did that mean? Was your time getting close and these people were sort of a welcome wagon for you? Or were the old just vulnerable to those rogue spirits that inhabited the outer fringes of the planes? Or were they spiritual predators, haunting these outer limits, feeding off whatever spiritual energy they could find, alive or dead?

She had been raised a Catholic, not strict, but strict enough, and there were the usual stories passed down by the Church to scare people into believing, told especially at Lent. Like the young girl who snuck out to go dancing during Lent, and met a handsome young man who asked her to dance. And they did, but when she looked down at his feet, he had cloven hoofs.

Stories like that used to frighten her so that she had to sleep with the covers over her head. Not that she needed stories to believe in the existence of evil. She knew that evil had many faces, many guises, just as she knew what had recently entered her house. Sara was pretty sure that Paul knew, too.

9

LATER THAT AFTERNOON, WHEN Paul returned home, he found Linda in the bedroom, taking her clothes out of drawers and closets and piling them on the bed, or packing them in suitcase.

What are you doing? Paul asked, watching her move stiffly around the room.

Leaving, she said, not bothering to stop her packing or look at him.

You’re leaving?

That’s what I said.

Linda, for God sake, stop, Pail said, completely bewildered by her actions. Why are you doing this?

It’s for the best, she said woodenly. Besides, every time there’s murder in Lanark, you have to go running over there.

This isn’t an ordinary murder.

All the better for not going.

There was something wrong with the way she was talking, Paul noticed. It was like she was reading off a cue card or doing it by rote.

You saw what it was like, Linda. You want this to spread? Your whole family…for God sakes…

She stopped packing for a moment. I don’t know what I want. I guess I just wish to forget everything that happened in Lanark.

Linda turned away from the bed and looked at him, but to Paul it seemed as if she didn’t really see him. Her green eyes weren’t focused on him.

When I look at you, it all comes back, she said. My parents, Dwayne Chrissie.

You’re blaming me for what happened? Paul couldn’t believe what she was telling him. This was so unlike her.

She turned back to her packing. I’m not blaming you. You just make me remember this I’d rather forget.

So what does that mean? You’re dumping me?

I wouldn’t use that word. I loved you, Paul, but I’ll get over it just like you will."

No, I won’t Paul thought, but said, What do you plan to do?

Forget everything. Find someone else.

Paul tried to take her in his arms. Is it that easy to forget all that we’ve meant to each other?

Please, don’t. Linda pushed him away. Yes, it’s easy. It has to be.

Was it his imagination that she was acting like she was programmed or was it just his ego making vain excuses, telling him something was wrong with her; otherwise she couldn’t be doing this. Or was it what he wanted to think and see?

Just like that, Paul said. Snap your fingers and I disappear.

Please don’t make this anymore difficult than it is. Let’s just have a clean break. Don’t start coming around or showing up unexpectedly at my place.

Paul took her arm. For God sakes, don’t I mean anything to you?

Stop grabbing at me, Paul, she said, pulling away from him. That isn’t going to change anything. I’ve made up my mind.

Rather sudden isn’t it? You were okay with everything when I left this morning.

No it’s not sudden, Linda explained. I’ve been thinking about it for a quite while.

Paul couldn’t believe his ears. Just like that. He was dismissed. Pushed out of her life, and done with all the emotion of a novice actress reading off a script someone else had prepared for her.

What’s wrong with you? Paul said, wondering what had happened to her while he was gone.

Nothing’s wrong, Linda said, glancing at him but not meeting his eyes. Does something have to wrong with me because I don’t choose to be with you?

So what will you do? Paul heard himself asking her again, his heart getting in the way of his tongue.

Well, I found out I have an uncle I didn’t know I had. My mother’s brother, Emerson Sundstrum. I’ll spend some time with him.

And after that?

Probably go on a trip somewhere, and try to forget.

And me? Paul said, biting off the rest of the words he wanted to say. He wanted to argue her out of it. Tell her how wrong she was, but didn’t. If she could be this cold, this detached after all they had been through, then the hell with it. He wasn’t going to beg her.

Luke Lassiter showed up and jumped on the bed, watching Linda snap the last suitcase shut. She was usually very affectionate with the cats, but this time, she didn’t even touch them.

Like I said, let’s make it a clean break, Paul, she said, putting a suitcase on the floor.

He didn’t answer her, but helped carry her luggage outside and load it in her car. She got behind the wheel without saying a word. No hug, no kiss goodbye. She just closed her car door and backed out of the driveway.

Paul stood there under a brooding sky of light rain, his insides torn and bleeding. He watched Linda Eastman drive out of his life. Linda of the model looks, the beautiful green eyes, and the auburn hair, was gone.

She cut him out of her life as skillfully as a surgeon with a cold, uncaring hand.

10

THEY CALLED HIM PIMPLES.

He sat behind his desk in English class and looked around the room, giving each one of his classmates an equal dose of his hatred as he waited desperately for the 3:10 bell to sound and end school day.

Tommy Russel wished they were all dead. Every last one of them from Lanark High School. Tommy wasn’t a bad-looking boy, even though he was going through an awkward stage of being a teenager, but he had the misfortune of having bad acne all over his face, back and shoulders. At night, he would lay on the living room couch while his mother would administer hot towels, soaked in boric acid, on his blemishes. It helped some, but not enough, causing a lot of scabbing.

Doctors told him the acne would eventually go away, he would outgrow it. Tommy thought by the time that happened he would be one big scar. Without the acne, he figured he could of at least have had a girlfriend, but with it, it was impossible. His mother said he was handsome, but mothers always say that to their sons.

Only he knew he wasn’t handsome, not with a face full of pimples oozing whiteheads, The girls treated him like a leper, avoiding any contact with him, afraid of contamination. The boys weren’t much better. They all made fun of him, behind his back and to his face. He hated them. He hated them all.

Tommy only had two friends at school. Freddy Rogers who wore glasses with lenses as thick as coke-bottle bottoms, and who was naturally called four-eyes; and Dean Post, who got tagged with fatso or butterball because of his weight. Dean was not the sharpest student academically, and anyone showing the same aptitude was referred to as Dumb as Post.

They were thought of as being very weird by the rest of the students, especially the senior class to which they belonged. So they banded together. Three ugly ducklings that shared a haunted youth, having to endure the taunts and cruelty of their peers.

The three of them kept together at school as much as possible, meeting after classes in their secret clubhouse to plot and dream what they’d like to do to their classmates. They called themselves The Devil’s Disciples, a name taken from a comic book story Tommy had read and liked.

Not that Tommy hadn’t tried to fit in. During his sophomore year, Tommy thought it would be cool to dress all in khaki; only he was ridiculated for his effort, especially from Richie Sommers, who took a special delight in tormenting him every chance he got. He would jeer, Hey Russel, when he fuck did you get out of the army?

Another time, walking from home from school, a car came by with Richie in the passenger seat. He rolled down the car window and gave Tommy the finger as they passed. And again, in the boy’s restroom at school, Tommy made another attempt at being friendly by asking Richie, who had just entered, about an assignment in English class.

Don’t talk to me, Pimples, Richie sneered, if I want to talk to you, I’ll do the talking’, but don’t you ever talk to me. You belong with those other creeps you pal around with – that fat turd Post and that four-eyed fucker Rogers. So I don’t need a creep like you to talk to.

Tommy just smiled nervously, the humiliation unbearable, every word burned in his memory. He started to shake with rage, and wished he knew of some way he could strike Richie Sommers dead in his tracks.

If being treated as piece of shit at school wasn’t bad enough, his mother had to marry a drunk. John Justin was an ex- priest who was drummed out of energy because he had difficulty discerning the kneeling position from the prone position with female parishioners.

Losing his collar, Justin became a twenty- four-hour plasterer; he plastered walls during the day and got plastered out of his mind at night. And the night was his playtime.

He would run around the house in his underwear looking for Tommy’s mother, who would hide from him until he got tired and passed out. Trouble was he hardly ever did, and he kept everyone awake until he found her or she revealed herself in exasperation.

His mother called him Baby Sandy, but Baby had a mean and destructive nature. If he wasn’t busting up the house looking for his mother or trying to crawl in bed with Tommy’s twenty-year-old sister (who eventually left to live with Tommy’s real father), he was verbally abusive to Tommy.

Right after Tommy graduated from grade school, he took the entrance exam for Marquette High School in Milwaukee, and failed. Since then, Baby Sandy referred to him as the dummy or stupid. Tommy had put up with that for the last three years along with cracks about his acne; If you’d stop jerking yourself off, you wouldn’t have pimples.

During those same three years, Tommy had prayer constantly to God to heal of his acne and deliver him from the torments of his classmates and the drunk his mother had married.

But God didn’t seem to be listening. So Tommy reasoned if God wouldn’t help him, maybe Satan would.

The 3:10 bell finally rang.

11

IT WAS A THURSDAY.

At least it looked like a Thursday to Paul when he heard the whoop of the siren and saw revolving red lights in his rearview mirror, as the police car nosed in behind his car. Paul pulled off to the side and waited for the officer to approach while he watched the sun drop low in the western sky. It was Thayer.

I thought that was you, Thayer said, leaning down to the window. You all right? Hell, you’re all over the road.

Was I? Paul rubbed a hand over his face. I guess I was woolgathering. I needed to take a ride. I had to do something.

About what, this murder? Everything’s been quiet so far.

No, not about that, Paul said, meeting Thayer’s eyes. Linda walked out on me several days ago.

Jesus H. Christ, Thayer said, straightening from the car and glancing into the distance for a moment, then turned back to Paul. Follow me to the station. We’ll talk.

Thayer led him to the police parking lot, into the station, and back to his office. He flicked on the office lights and hung up his cap and jacket, settling down a bottle of Johnnie Walker and some paper cups.

Close the door and sit down, Thayer told him.

Paul swung the office door shut