granite. There was only his pasty white face, and there was nothing to be done about that, not even cover it with his pasty white hands… All he could do was press himself flatter and flatter against the stone and pray to Jesus Christ Almighty that he was just too damn drunk and none of this was happening…
The corpse shot to its feet like a spear thrust up out of the surf. Gary’s eyes darted eastward, out to sea, toward the spot it seemed to be staring at.
Three round things appeared in the trough between two waves and started toward the shore. Swells rolled over them, but each time they reappeared, closer to the beach. After a time they were clearly recognizable as heads, rising slowly from the water, faces pale beneath dark hanging hair. Shiny black shoulders broke the surface; white collars gleamed. Pressing purposefully through the foam, barely staggering as waves crashed into them, the figures halted suddenly where the water was only knee-deep.
The corpse strode out to meet them, splashing through the shallows like an over wound toy soldier. As it came up beside them, they pivoted mechanically around; the four marched back out into the Atlantic, finally sinking from sight.
Frigid sweat poured down Gary’s face.
He was leaping from stone to stone down toward the beach before he even realized it. Bounding onto the sand, he pelted across the beach to the boardwalk, not stopping till he reached his parents’ house.
Chapter 5: Wrong Again
Duck Island was a mile-long patch of sand and tall weeds in the middle of the Squankum River, a half-mile to the east of the Rt.35 Bridge. The Central Penn rail line ran across its western end, jumping the Squankum’s narrower southern fork over a modest timber trestle; a longer span with a drawbridge spanned the river to the north. The island’s shore was mostly salt marsh and mudflat, the habitat of the fowl that had given the island its name. There was only one real beach, on the northern side; Duncan Grady had gone there. And even now, two hours after Gary saw what he couldn’t possibly have seen, Duncan was
The suspicion had dawned on Duncan, however, that Gary might’ve been right about this particular outing. As a matter of fact, it had dawned on him about fifteen minutes after he began staring at the moon. There was just so much of the moon to see, and sure enough, its glow blotted out just about everything else in the sky.
But Duncan hadn’t let that stop him. He was going to wait till moonset, and then do some real stargazing. He would tell Gary all about it at the viewing. Gary probably thought he’d wait a ridiculously long time on the island and then pack it in without seeing much of anything. Well, Dunk Grady was sure going to show him.
He’d spent most of his time lying wrapped in a blanket, nursing his resentments and dreaming of scores resoundingly settled, particularly against his bitch ex-wife. Even these diversions had paled after a while, but he kept plugging away at them, despite the chill that eventually penetrated his blanket. He wished he didn’t have to stay out here; but there was principle involved.
Presently he got up on his knees and looked through the scope once more. The moon had moved; he shifted the scope. Aside from the position of the lunar disc, nothing much had changed. When was the damn thing going to set?
He lowered the scope, turning it so he could look across the river. He was somewhat annoyed he had been forced to take such a course of action; here he was, in possession of a piece of optics you could see the rings of Saturn with, and he was about to kill time with it eyeballing the far shore of the Squankum. He knew what Gary would think. But there was no reason Gary had to find out.
Beyond the marsh grass on the north bank of the river was a dark line of trees, a few house lights shining through. A tubular water tower, looking almost like a rocketship, loomed above the trees, red lights blinking on its crown.
Duncan slowly swiveled the scope to the left. The railroad trestle slipped into view. Looking past the raised slant-drawbridge, he found the bridgekeeper’s booth. Its dirty windows glowed yellow; he could see the keeper leaning against a wall, drinking from a thermos cup.
A blue light flashed on the wall beside the man. The keeper set the cup on a table, went over to a large black lever, and pulled it. Duncan heard huge gears grinding, and shifted the scope back to the drawbridge. The span was going down.
Duncan guessed the last train from Atlantic City must be coming through. He knew from experience that that run was usually crowded, full of poor schnooks heading back to North Jersey and New York with blown wallets and busted bankbooks, swearing they’d never do it again…
The bridge sank lower and lower. It almost reached the level of the trestle.
Then the gears went silent. The bridge stopped dead.
A whistle blew somewhere to the south. So much for that theory. Had the gears locked, maybe? He turned the scope back toward the keeper’s booth, expecting to see the man wrestling with the lever.
Instead, he saw the keeper hanging in the air, struggling wildly, trying to pry open the hand locked on his flesh.
Perfectly, inorganically rigid, the man holding him might’ve been a statue. Even with the keeper thrashing at the end of his arm, he was utterly still. It was as if the keeper’s throat had been impaled on an iron rod.
An accomplice stood near the lever, watching, but shortly he rushed over to them with a bizarre clockwork gait, and almost as though he were afraid he wouldn’t be able to get in on the keeper’s death agonies, grabbed one of the man’s hands and started biting. Things flew, and the hand went red. Duncan’s jaw sagged, and he felt a sudden, savage, ache in his knuckles.
The victim’s fingers were coming off a joint at a time.
Rubbing his hands, Duncan murmured something in a low stunned voice. He himself had no idea what it was.
The keeper’s struggles ceased. The finger-biter stepped back. His partner let the corpse drop.
Both men stood motionless, staring at each other. Then the finger-biter wiped his mouth with a spasmodic sweep of his wrist.
The train wailed again, closer now. Duncan shifted the scope back to the bridge. It was almost level, but the difference in slope between it and the trestle was more than enough to derail the train.
Duncan’s mind raced. He doubted he could reach the booth and throw the switch in time-but he couldn’t sit back and do nothing. He’d just have to run along the path and back to the tracks and puff his way out to the booth and fight his way past those two psychos, one of whom was capable of holding a grown man off the floor at arm’s length and strangling him one-handed…
On second thought, maybe it wasn’t such a good idea.
But what then? He turned the scope back to the booth. A third man had joined the other two. He seemed to be in some kind of uniform. State trooper’s, maybe.
The train wailed once more, closer yet.
A minute passed. The three men left the booth. Duncan followed them with the scope. They didn’t turn north or south along the tracks, as he thought they must, but headed straight across, moving with quick jerky strides like people in an old silent flick. Duncan had always found the speeded-up action in those films hilarious, but in real life the effect was horribly disturbing.
They neared the edge of the trestle. He guessed they had a boat tied up below and that they would climb down to it. Instead, they walked over the side like automatons, dropping straight down into the river.
The train wailed yet again. It was close enough now for him to hear the sound of its engine, the rumble-and- click of its wheels. He pulled his face back from the scope, looking toward the bridge, knowing he’d get a better, wider view of the crash unaided. There was more than enough moonlight. Since there was nothing he could do, he would just sit back and watch the spectacle.
The train barreled into view off to the left, brightly-lit passenger cars looking about two-thirds full. There was going to be one hell of a body count.
