As an outsider, Hellboy found it especially difficult trying to dig through the layers of open secrets. Maybe the sheriff was just trying to be polite while talking about freaks face to face with Hellboy. He might be more worried about the swamp folk than he let on, or perhaps he wasn't worried at all and was trying to mislead Hellboy so they wouldn't trip over each other while investigating. No matter how fast you wanted to cut through the crap, it took some dancing around before you could do it.
Mrs. Hoopkins told the two men to sit and poured two glasses of milk. She handed them plates with slices of a dark purple pie on them. 'Here, you boys have some briarberry.'
It took Hellboy aback. He'd never heard of briarberry pie and the sound of it made his throat tighten.
Mrs. Hoopkins sat and said, 'Them girls were havin' dreams, Jebediah.'
'You keep saying, that, to no disregard,' Hark said, his mouth full. 'But you still cain't tell me what kinda dreams they were.'
'That Sarah, she's tryin' to keep ahead of some kind of evil that's been chasin' her in her nightmares. Every night for more than two weeks she'd been wakin' up in a froze sweat, weepin' and callin'.'
'Callin' on who?'
'On that John Lament.'
'That boy? I always liked him when he show up.' Hark sipped some more milk and had a final forkful of pie. 'But he ain't been around in more than a year, has he?'
'Not that I know,' Mrs. Hoopkins said. 'But he's a drifter, comes and goes as he pleases, and now her dreamin's caught on with some of the other girls.'
'Becky Sue and Hortense,' Hellboy said.
'That's right. They dreamed their babies would be born…
'Ill children,' the sheriff put in.
'Pumpkin-headed or pinheaded.' She turned to Hellboy. 'Now and then, well… sometimes the poison in the ground comes up and gets in the blood, or venom in the blood gets into the ground.'
Mutants. Probably because of all the contaminated moonshine made out here over the last century, the outbreaks of yellow and scarlet fevers. And more recently due to the toxic waste dumped into the marshes by big corporations. Barrels of hazardous waste, perhaps even radioactive material, brought down in eighteen-wheeler caravans. Who the hell knew what might have been tossed out there to avoid federal regulations and health codes.
Mrs. Hoopkins said, 'You ain't eatin', son. Why ain't you eatin' my pie?'
'Sorry, had a big dinner at Bliss Nail's house.'
'Nobody in that house can cook the way I can.'
'No, ma'am.'
'Give it here,' the sheriff said, pulling the plate to him and digging in.
Another toddler stepped into the kitchen and went for Hell-boy's tail. Mrs. Hoopkins came flying out of her seat and shouted, 'Lolly Mae, ain't you got a boy needs some changin' and feedin'?'
'Yes, ma'am.'
'Well then, get him off that big fella's posterior and get
'Yes, ma'am.'
Lolly Mae picked up her son, did a little curtsey, and raced upstairs.
Flailing her arms, Mrs. Hoopkins said,'These girls got to get them some rest. Those who can got's to harvest peanuts on the morrow.'
Hellboy had seen a lot across the world, but he'd never seen anybody work a peanut farm before. He wished he had time to watch such a thing. 'I understand.'
The sheriff finished his other slice of pie, stood, and followed Hellboy to the door. 'You wanna wait until morning and I'll send some men with you.'
'I can't wait,' Hellboy said.
'Then you be safe, son.'
Mrs. Hoopkins pressed a hand atop his own. 'You think you can find them three girls out there in the slough 'fore any danger befalls them?'
'I'm going to try.'
'I got me a bad feeling in these old bones.'
Hellboy thought, Me too, but said nothing.
Tapping at the driver's window, Hellboy waited while Waldridge snorted awake from his nap. He told the houseman that he was going to go off and look for the bog village.
'You want I should go with ya?'
'No, that's okay. I was just hoping you could point me in the right direction.'
'You just gonna set off walkin'?'
'Yeah.' He knew that something would be along to shove and prod him on the way. Ever since he'd been let off in Enigma he'd felt he was being watched.
'Swamp that way,' Waldridge said, angling his index finger south-east down a dirt track. 'They say it's eight hundred square miles. Heard it on the radio once.'
Only about 450,000 acres. 'That's not so bad.'
'You don't know your way 'round these black waters.'
'Do you?'
Waldridge considered the question. 'No man does fully, but it's better to have someone with ya. In case'a… well, snakebite… and to keep an eye out for gators.'
A tough old feisty dude, all right. Hellboy said, 'Thanks anyway. I appreciate the offer, but there's things I'm better off doing alone.'
'I s'pect you're right about that. Hope to meet up with you again soon. If not, you'll always have my prayers.'
Hellboy knew what they were worth, but it was nice to hear anyway.
Chapter 4
People had been dying out here by the dozens since the beginning of the world, swallowed by the bayou without a ripple. Or found hanging in the cypresses after a week of being lost in the maze of green, tormented by swimming snakes, alligators, and half-pound spiders.
Tourists came for the gator farms, tent revivals, hootenannies, and jamborees. Hellboy still didn't know what he'd come for, but he was glad he had a reason now to do the only thing he knew how to do.
As he walked the empty road he sensed the scrub around him beginning to encroach, the night growing heavier and blacker, reaching for him. He stopped, stood still, and watched as the tree branches whirled and clawed past the moon. The ground shifted, alive, advancing and somehow taking him along with it. In the distance ahead he watched as… as
Before him now stood a small one-room shack.
'Now that was a pretty neat trick,' he said. Stepping over, he waited for someone to come out. No one did.
Hellboy thought, All of that and they're going to make me knock.
So he knocked.
The thin pineboard door of the dilapidated shanty slowly opened, answered by a hulk of a man who managed to tower even over Hellboy. The giant looked back over his shoulder and said, 'Mama, Satan hisself is at the door.'
