The Devil's Touch

The girl pressed her lips to the palm of the priest's hand and wept.

NINE

Mille bathed her sister and washed and fixed her hair. She found her a T-shirt of Sam's and Jeanne used that for a nightgown. While Mille was tending to Jeanne, Sam and Nydia boarded up the window that had been smashed and cleaned up the room. Then closed the door and locked it. Jeanne stretched out on the sofa in the den and was asleep in a minute.

The adults gathered in the kitchen for coffee. Sam used his handy-talkie and called in to Monty, asking about Little Sam.

'He's been asleep for hours, Sam,' Viv told him. 'He's such a sweet child. Don't worry about him. He is perfectly safe here.'

'We left several changes for him. You've probably found them by now. I don't know whether to risk traveling back to your place tonight. Not this late. I'll see what the others want to do. If we don't call back in, we're staying over here for the night.'

'Sam?' Monty took the walkie-talkie. 'Don't risk traveling tonight. The students at Nelson College— some of them at least—have gone wild. Roaring up and down the streets, screaming and yelling all sorts of filth. And there are—hell, things roaming the darkness. I don't know what in the hell they are. Some of those creatures like the one you shot in the orchard, I guess. But they are accompanied by humans. I've heard the sounds of screaming from time to time. Terrified, agonized screaming. Can you tell me what is going on?'

'Maybe it's the coven members rounding up those who will not swear allegiance to Satan. I don't know, Monty. It could be almost anything. I think it's going to be grim around town in the morning.'

Monty exhaled a long sigh. 'All right, Sam. We'll see you all in a few hours.'

Sam clicked off and looked at his watch. He was startled to see it was past midnight. The exorcism had taken several hours. He turned and faced the group in the kitchen.

'From this moment on,' he warned them, 'no one travels alone or without being armed. With the exception of you, Father Le Moyne. Armed, that is. Unless you feel it's time for you to start carrying a gun.'

The priest smiled and held up his cross. 'I am armed, Sam.'

Sam did not return the smile. He said, 'It's past midnight, people. And this marks the week of the Black Sabbat.' He looked to Nydia for support. She nodded her head. 'All restraints have been removed. Be prepared for anything from coven members. And the undead will be walking the night.'

Father Le Moyne thought of his brother and sister-in-law.

Joe shuddered.

In the firmament, the Giver of Life and Light sat with a brooding warrior by His side. 'So now it begins,' the warrior grumbled.

'The priest speaks with much conviction, does he not?'

'Stop trying to change the subject. You are allowed to intervene; why am I not permitted?'

'Patience, Michael, patience. Does the father know of his son's dilemma?'

'Of course. And the mother. The father assisted the boy in some way not too many hours ago. But he did not leave as before,' he quickly added, not feeling up to a lecture on the comings and goings of the Elder Sam Balon. 'But both mother and father are strangely at peace. If they know fear, they are disguising it well.'

'Umm,' His voice rumbled. He knew only too well Sam Balon's ability to slip out of the firmament, even though the minister knew full well it was against the rules. 'Well, I want you to keep an eye on the father—no! That would be like assigning the fox to guard the henhouse. I'll assign that to someone else.'

The warrior chuckled. 'The odds are strong against the little band of believers succeeding.'

'I am aware of that.'

'Still You vacillate in Your decision.'

Michael was fixed with a look that on other occasions had caused volcanoes to erupt, floods to occur, sandstorms to whip across the deserts, and hordes of barbarians to fall to their knees, trembling in fear.

Michael ignored it.

The Giver of All Life muttered something that sounded suspiciously like, 'One of My better efforts, too.'

The warrior merely smiled.

'We will give them a few days,' His mighty voice rumbled. 'Then I will decide. And I forbid you to leave the firmament.' Then He thought: Not that My forbidding means one twit to you.

'Bah!' the warrior snorted. He picked up his heavy sword and walked off muttering.

'Really, Michael! There is absolutely no need for armament here.'

The ageless warrior glanced over his shoulder at the Ruler of all that is Right and Just. 'It don't hurt,' he called.

Pete LaMeade walked the dark grounds of the cemetery. He carried a shovel in his hand. It was time. He grinned in the night, his footsteps firm on the grass, his destination fixed in his mind.

He reached the gravesite of his wife—dead for more than a year—and began digging at the damp earth. He hummed as he worked.

Marie Fowler encountered Max Oberlin in an alley behind the drug store on main street. They looked at each other for a moment and then grinned. Marie held out her hand and Max took it.