Estate. Cute. Odds are, she's one of them.'
In the two years that Sam and Nydia had lived next to the old orchard, he had never seen Norman Giddon or any of his company trucks or cars even so much as drive past. The land had once been productive; now it lay barren.
Sam wondered why.
Then the wind once more shifted direction, bringing with it a smell that touched and raised the short hairs on the back of Sam's neck.
The Beasts were close. The smell was stronger than ever. Sam looked up to the Heavens. 'I know you're not with me on this one, Dad. I'm on my own, right?'
The skies remained mute.
'It's all up to me this time, huh, Dad?'
The silence prevailed. The wind from the north had ceased. Sam could not hear one audible sound. Not a car, truck, nothing at all.
He turned slowly in a circle. He could see nothing to alarm him. But he knew the Beasts were very close; he could sense them as well as smell their odious presence.
It was an aura of evil.
The Dark One is here, Sam thought. Satan is very near. The Beasts have been here—these Beasts—for a long time. So that means Logandale has been chosen by the Prince of Darkness for his own.
Sam's smile was a mixture of sadness and understanding as he contemplated his future, and Nydia and Little Sam's future. He would have to pay the local priest a visit. Father Le Moyne appeared to be a sensible, levelheaded person. He had no doubts but that when he laid it on the line for the priest his story would be believed. Chief Monty Draper would be quite another story.
Sam could almost hear the laughter of the chief.
Til be back,' he spoke to the almost tangible evil that clung to the trees and rocks of the orchard. 'Bet on it.'
The wind sighed in reply.
It was a hot stinking wind.
FOUR
Chief Monty Draper looked again at the body of the young woman and once more felt like tossing up his breakfast. Marie Fowler had stiffened in death and was becoming a bit on the smelly side. He fought back his sickness.
Monty looked at Sheriff Jenkins, looking at him.
Clark County was a large county, but it was one of the smallest in population. Half of the county was set within the borders of the Adirondack Park, about forty miles from the Canadian border. It was, for all intents and purposes, a peaceful county. The county liked to boast of its good fishing and skiing. One rather well-known ski lodge operated within the county. And there hadn't been a murder in Clark County in two years. Not since those doped up skiers had been found in a naked jumble of sex by the boyfriend of one of the young ladies caught up in the orgy and hauled out a pistol and started blasting away.
Sheriff Jenkins often expressed the opinion that anyone who would kill someone else over pussy was an idiot. Too much stuff prancing around just waiting for a stiff pecker.
Sheriff Jenkins turned his gaze from Monty to a deputy. 'You got your pictures, Ed?'
'Yes, sir.'
'Then somebody cut the poor girl down and cover her up, for God's sake.' His voice sounded too loud, too false, too protesting. Shakespeare came to Monty's mind. Pat Jenkins looked back at Monty. 'This happen over at Lecoy or Woodburn or Aumsville, Chief, those guys would be running all over the place in a panic, stomping all over the physical evidence and making damn fools of themselves. But I guess you saw worse than this in the big city, right?'
'Yes,' Monty said. 'I did. Sheriff, the only physical evidence I found was a basket and a scattering of freshly picked wild flowers.'
'Yeah, I know,' the sheriff replied glumly. Why did Monty think it was an act? And why? 'And if you didn't find nothing, Monty, not much point in my boys covering the same ground.'
Not very professional of you, sheriff, Monty thought. What the hell is wrong around here? Monty could not shake the feeling. Something is
'What do you make of it, Monty?' Sheriff Jenkins asked.
Monty was careful in his reply. He thought of the priest's description of the cuttings and markings on the man Le Moyne had found. Same markings on the dead girl. He decided he would not tell the sheriff of that. Not just yet. Of course, Monty thought, he could be way off base about this whole thing.
'I think we got a problem,' he said.
The sheriffs smile contained a hidden meaning. Monty picked up on it but did not know what it meant. 'You care to elaborate, Monty? That we got a problem is obvious.'
Don't tell him! That leaped suddenly into Monty's brain. 'The girl was tortured; cut many times with a sharp instrument.' He would not be the one to bring up strange markings. If the sheriff didn't mention it, then that would prove to Monty that something odd indeed was going on. 'The girl's genital area was mangled.' Monty chose his words very cautiously. 'She was raped; no doubt about that.'
'By one big-hung sucker,' a sheriffs deputy said with a nasty grin.
'Yeah,' the sheriff said, a grin slipping onto his lips. It faded as quickly as it came. 'Go on, Monty.'
The sheriff thought rape amusing. Yeah, Monty thought. About as amusing as a crutch. And the deputy, Vernon Parish, was behaving even more oddly than ever.
