land to the base of the Superstitions. The sky had been spectacularly, unnaturally blue, so blue that he had specifically noticed it, though that was not something that often captured his attention. He'd felt slightly dizzy, and he'd stopped to rest on a low mound of sand, taking off his T-shirt and using it to wipe the sweat from his face, knowing from touch that his nose and forehead were already burned. He'd glanced down at his feet. : And he'd seen The Face. Twice the size of a normal human face, it had looked like a sculpture protruding from the ground. The chin and cheeks, eyes and mouth, nose and forehead had all been formed from sand and had a strange, grainily smooth texture. For a brief second he'd wondered why he hadn't seen it before and what its creators had used to hold the sand together. Then he'd seen that the face was moving, muscles outlined in ridges beneath the cheeks stretching taut, lips spreading out into a silent scream, eyes rolling wildly.
He'd jumped up, nearly tripping over his feet in his at tempt to scramble away from the mound. Even as he moved frantically back, he kept his gaze on the face in the sand. Or The Face in the Sand, as it had immediately become. He would have screamed, wanted to scream, but was afraid of what The Face would do in reaction. The sweat pouring down his face was cold, and his heart was pumping crazily. It was not merely the fact that sand was sen dent that scared him so; it was the structure of The Face itself, the contours of its form. There was something about the cruel shape of the mouth, the way the eyes were positioned above the nose that seemed wrong, unnatural. Evil The effect was all the more terrifying because of the monochromatic nature of the sand. The eyes that were glaring at him, the mouth that was grimacing at him, everything was the same light tan white color, and the imposition of a three-dimensional form on a two-dimensional substance was monstrous.
Above the beating of his heart and the pounding of blood in his temples, he'd thought he heard a noise, a hiss issuing from those shifting sand lips. He held his breath, tried to hear the sound above the panicked rasp of his own breathing.
The words were faint, but audible: 'I will find you.' The eyes had met his, locked, and though he'd tried to look away, he couldn't. The Face had strained, grown, pushed outward, as though trying to break free of the confines of the earth, then had sunk back into ordinary sand.
There'd been a brief moment of respite, a few confusing seconds in which he'd put it all down to heat prostration and an overactive imagination. Then The Face had reformed in the sand at his feet, thrusting upward from the ground. A small cactus was sucked into the opening mouth. The horrible eyes had glared at him, then the mouth had grinned and whispered his name. 'Cutler.' Again: 'Cutler.'
And: 'I will find you.'
He'd run then, back down the trail on which he'd come, knowing that at any moment The Face in the Sand might reappear, might pop up before him, might whisper his name.
Might do something worse.
He had not known why The Face had promised to follow him, but it was instantly clear that he had to get away from the desert, away from Arizona, away from the sand. Whatever it was, whatever its purpose or motives, it would not be able to find him if he stayed in forests or cities, if he got away from the stuff of its substance.
He'd done a good job of keeping away from the desert before coming to Rio Verde to work at the Rocking D. But somehow, he had never traveled far. He had never gone to the East Coast or the South or the Pacific North west or another country. He'd always stayed in the South west, near Arizona.
And now he'd returned.
Why hadn't he stayed away forever?
Again he closed his eyes, willing The Face to go away, praying to God, promising He or She or It that he would be good, that he would never so much as swear ffhe could just get out of this restroom with his sanity and his life.
It was late and the gas station would be closing soon. Surely the attendant would come back here to see what had happened to him, to inform him that they were get ting ready to close.
But the Face in the Sand might get the attendant.
But then the police would come.
But what if the police couldn't stop The Face? What if nothing could stop it? What if it would not give up until it had him, no matter how many others it had to kill first? 'Curler.' . The voice was rough and whispered, barely audible above the grainy liquid sound of the wind.
He wanted to scream but could not. He opened his eyes, and in the mirror his mouth was open, although no sound was coming out. Over his shoulder, outside the small window, was The Face. The features changed, the wall of sand on the other side of the dirty glass shifting, rippling, now grimacing, now smiling, now screaming, the movement not smooth and fluid but still and jerky.
Hadn't it been more fluid before? ,
'I found you.'; .;
He plugged his ears, trying to keep out the voice, trying not to hear it, but though the sound of the wind was shut out, the voice echoed in his head. There were only the two phrases, repeated--'Cutler' and 'I found you' rebut for some reason that frightened him more than if a coherent series of threats had been leveled at him.
The glass in the window shattered, flying inward, and, reacting instinctively, Cutler hit the floor, curling instantly into a position under the sink that was half fetal, half duck-and-cover. Now he was screaming: short, high, feminine bursts.
He stopped screaming when the first grains of Sand tickled the back of his neck. I ............ There hadn't been a single car on the highway for the past fifteen minutes, and Buford wanted to close up early. He had never closed the stand before ten o'clock in the nine years it had been operating, and he didn't want to start now, but something was wrong here. He could feel it; he could sense it. He glanced over at the clock, but he could see the order window in his peripheral vision, and he looked immediately away. Licking his lips, he started singing.
Military songs. 'pick the lock with my enormous cock, said Barnacle Bill the Sailor. 'His voice sounded strange in the silence, and he stopped almost immediately. He reached over, flipped on the radio, turned the knob, but there was only static.
Something was definitely wrong. He didn't like the color of the sky or the sound of the breeze or the fact that his was the only business open this late in this part of town.
He scraped the grill with his spatula, oncentrating all of his attention on the square of dark metal and the brown hardened grease, trying not to think of that blackness beyond the order window. There were goose bumps on his arms, and he had to admit that he was spooked.
Hell, a few moments ago, he'd nearly jumped out of his shoes when the phone rang. It had only been Jacy, and for the few moments they talked he'd felt fine, but the second he hung up the receiver the chill had returned.
He'd thought he'd seen movement outside the window, but when he'd looked more closely there'd been nothing there.
He'd avoided looking out the window since then.
He'd pretended to himself that he hadn't heard the noises.
He finished scraping the grill and used the spatula to pick up the congealed grease and drop it in the empty coffee can on the floor. He had never before been this scared. Not in 'Nam, not nowhere.
But there was nothing to be frightened of, nothing out there.
Buford reached for his cup on the edge of the grill, picked it up and drank the dregs. He should close up, let Taco Bell or Dairy Queen get the extra business. How much could he make between now and ten anyway?
If he was lucky, a couple of kids would stop by for Cokes and fries after the movie got out, but that was the most he could hope for. And considering the fact that the theater was showing a 'serious' film this week, not an action flick or a comedy, and that this was a weeknight, not a weekend, the chance that any kids would come by at all was damn near zip. He could close up now and not notice the difference.
But he didn't want to close up, and he was forced to admit to himself that he was afraid to leave. His truck was parked in the rear, facing the desert, and the outside bulb in the back had burnt out some time ago.
The stand was surrounded by darkness.
He could call Jacy, invent some excuse, tell her to come over and meet him here. But she'd probably taken her bath and was in bed already.
Besides, he wasn't such a pussy that he had to have his wife save him from the monster, was he? found himself thinking of Manuel Torres and those animals lying in the arroyo with the blood sucl out of them. The arroyo stretched only a few dozen Fa behind the stand. He knew that a police had searched area thoroughly, but he also
