Where the Summer Ends Part 10

Mercer groped for a wall switch, located it, snapped it back and forth. No light came on.

"Mr Gradie?"

Again a bubbling sigh.

"Get a lamp! Quick!" he told Linda.

"Let him alone, for Christ's sake."

"d.a.m.n it, he's pa.s.sed out and thrown up! He'll strangle in his own vomit if we don't help him!"

"He had a big flashlight in the kitchen!" Linda whirled to get it, anxious to get away.

Mercer cautiously made his way into the bedroom-treading with care, for broken gla.s.s crunched under his foot. The outside shades were drawn, and the room was swallowed in inky blackness, but he was certain he could pick out Gradie's comatose form lying across the bed. Then Linda was back with the flashlight.

Gradie was sprawled on his back, skinny legs flung onto the floor, the rest crosswise on the unmade bed. The flashlight beam s.h.i.+mmered on the spreading splotches of blood that soaked the sheets and mattress. Someone had spent a lot of time with him, using a small knife-small-bladed, for if the wounds that all but flayed him had not been shallow, he could not be yet alive.

Mercer flung the flashlight beam about the bedroom. The cluttered furnis.h.i.+ngs were overturned, smashed. He recognized the charge pattern of a shotgun blast low against one wall, spattered with bits of fur and gore. The shotgun, broken open, lay on the floor; its barrel and stock were matted with b.l.o.o.d.y fur-Gradie had used it as a club when he'd had no chance to reload. The flashlight beam probed the blackness at the base of the corner wall, where the termite-riddled floorboards had been torn away. A trail of blood crawled into the darkness beneath.

Then Mercer crouched beside Gradie, s.h.i.+ning the light into the tortured face. The eyes opened at the light-one eye was past seeing, the other stared dully. "That you, Jon?"

"It's Jon, Mr Gradie. You take it easy-we're getting you to the hospital. Did you recognize who did this to you?"

Linda had already caught up the telephone from where it had fallen beneath an overturned nightstand. It seemed impossible that he had survived the blood loss, but Mercer had seen drunks run off after a gut-shot that would have killed a sober man from shock.

Gradie laughed horribly. "It was the little green men. Do you think I could have told anybody about the little green men?"

"Take it easy, Mr Gradie."

"Jon! The phone's dead!"

"Busted in the fall. Help me carry him to the truck." Mercer prodded clumsily with a wad of torn sheets, trying to remember first-aid for bleeding. Pressure points? Where? The old man was cut to tatters.

"They're little green devils," Gradie raved weakly. "And they ain't no animals-they're clever as you or me. They live under the kudzu. That's what the Nip was trying to tell me when he sold me the skull. Hiding down there beneath the d.a.m.n vines, living off the roots and whatever they can scavenge. They nurture the G.o.dd.a.m.n stuff, he said, help it spread around, care for it-just like a man looks after his garden. Winter comes, they burrow down underneath the soil and hibernate."

"Shouldn't we make a litter?"

"How? Just grab his feet."

"Let me lie! Don't you see, Jon? Kudzu was brought over here from j.a.pan, and these d.a.m.n little devils came with it. I started to put it all together when Morny found the skull- started piecing together all the little hints and suspicions. They like it here, Jon-they're taking over all the waste lots, got more food out in the wild, multiplying like rats over here, and n.o.body knows about them."

Gradie's hysterical voice was growing weaker. Mercer gave up trying to bandage the torn limbs. "Just take it easy, Mr Gradie. We're getting you to a doctor."

"Too late for a doctor. You scared them off, but they've done for me. Just like they done for old Morny. They're smart, Jon-that's what I didn't understand in time- smart as devils. They know that I was figuring on them, started spying on me, creeping in to see what I knew-then came to shut me up. They don't want n.o.body to know about them, Jon! Now they'll come after..."

Whatever else Gradie said was swallowed in the crimson froth that bubbled from his lips. The tortured body went rigid for an instant, then Mercer was cradling a dead weight in his arms. Clumsily, he felt for a pulse, realized the blood was no longer flowing in weak spurts.

"I think he's gone."

"Oh G.o.d, Jon. The police will think we did this!"

"Not if we report it first. Come on! We'll take the truck."

"And just leave him here?"

"He's dead. This is a murder. Best not to disturb things any more than we have."

"Oh, G.o.d! Jon, whoever did this may still be around."

Mercer pulled his derringer from his pocket, flicked back the safety. His chest and arms were covered with Gradie's blood, he noticed. This was not going to be pleasant when they got to the police station. Thank G.o.d the cops never patrolled this slum, or else the shotgun blasts would have brought a squad car by now.

Warily, he led the way out of the house and into the yard. Wind was whipping the leaves now, and a few spatters of rain were starting to hit the pavement. The erratic light peopled each grotesque shadow with lurking murderers, and against the rush of the wind, Mercer seemed to hear a thousand stealthy a.s.sa.s.sins.

A flash of electric blue highlighted the yard.

"Jon! Look at the truck!"

All four tires were flat. Slashed.

"Get in! We'll run on the rims!"

Another glare of heat lightning.

All about them, the kudzu erupted from a hundred hidden lairs. Mercer fired twice.

.220 Swift.

*I*

Within, there was musty darkness and the sweet-stale smell of damp earth.

Crouched at the opening, Dr Morris Kenlaw poked his head into the darkness and snuffled like a hound. His spadelike hands clawed industriously, flinging clods of dirt between his bent knees. Steadying himself with one hand, he wriggled closer to the hole in the ground and craned his neck inward.

He stuck out a muddy paw. "Give me back the light, Brandon." His usually overloud voice was m.u.f.fled.

Brandon handed him that big flashlight and tried to look over Kenlaw's chunky shoulder. The archeologist's blocky frame completely stoppered the opening as he hunched forward.

"Take hold of my legs!" came back his words, more m.u.f.fled still.

Shrugging, Brandon knelt down and pinioned Kenlaw's stocky legs. He had made a fair sand-lot fullback not too many years past, and his bulk was sufficient to anchor the overbalanced archeologist. Thus supported, Kenlaw crawled even farther into the tunnel. From the way his back jerked, Brandon sensed he was burrowing again, although no hunks of clay bounced forth.

Brandon pushed back his lank white hair with his forearm and looked up. His eyes were hidden behind mirror sungla.s.ses, but his pale eyebrows made quizzical lines toward Dell Warner. Dell had eased his rangy denim-clad frame onto a limestone k.n.o.b. Dan made a black-furred mound at his feet, tail thumping whenever his master looked down at him. The young farmer dug a crumpled pack of cigarettes out of his s.h.i.+rt pocket, watching in amused interest.

"Snake going to reach out, bite his nose off," Dell ventured, proffering the cigarettes to Brandon, selecting one himself when the other man declined.

The cool mountain breeze whisked his lighter flame, whipped the high weeds that patchworked the sloping pasture. Yellow gra.s.s and weed-cropped closely here, there a verdant blotch to mark a resorbed cow-pie. Not far above them dark pines climbed to the crest of the ridge; a good way below, the slope leveled to a neat field of growing corn. Between stretched the steep bank of wild pasture, terraced with meandering cow paths and scarred with grey juts of limestone. The early summer breeze had a cool, clean taste. It was not an afternoon to poke one's head into dank pits in the ground.

Kenlaw heaved convulsively, wriggling back out of the hole. He banged down the flashlight and swore; dirt hung on his black mustache. "G.o.dd.a.m.n hole's nothing but a G.o.dd.a.m.n groundhog burrow!" Behind his smudged gla.s.ses his bright black eyes were accusing.

Dell 's narrow shoulders lifted beneath his blue cotton work s.h.i.+rt. "Groundhog may've dug it out, now-but I remember clear it was right here my daddy told me granddad filled the hole in. Losing too much stock, stepping off into there."

Kenlaw snorted and wiped his gla.s.ses with a big handkerchief. "Probably just a hole leading into a limestone cave. This area's shot through with caves. Got a smoke? Mine fell out of my pocket."

"Well, my dad said Granddad told him it was a tunnel mouth of some sort, only all caved in. Like an old mine shaft that's been abandoned years and years."

Ill-humoredly snapping up his host's cigarette, Kenlaw scowled. "The sort of story you'd tell to a kid. These hills are shot through with yarns about the mines of the ancients, too. G.o.d knows how many wild goose chases I've been after these last couple days." Dell's eyes narrowed. "Now all I know is what I was told, and I was told this here was one of the mines of the ancients."

Puffing at his cigarette, Kenlaw wisely forbore to comment.

"Let's walk back to my cabin," Brandon suggested quickly "Dr Kenlaw, you'll want to wash up, and that'll give me time to set out some drinks."

"Thanks, but I can't spare the time just now," Dell grunted, sliding off the rock suddenly. The Plott hound scrambled to its feet. "Oh, and Ginger says she's hoping you'll be down for supper this evening."

"I'd like nothing better," Brandon a.s.sured him, his mind forming a pleasant image of the farmer's copper-haired sister.

"See you at supper then, Eric. So long, Dr Kenlaw. Hope you find what you're after."

The archeologist muttered a good-bye as Warner and his dog loped off down the side of the pasture.

Brandon recovered his heavy Winchester Model 70 in .220 Swift. He had been looking for woodchucks when he'd come upon Dell Warner and his visitor. From a flap pocket of his denim jacket he drew a lens cover for the bulky Leupold 3x9 telescopic sight.

"Did you say whether you cared for that drink?"

Kenlaw nodded. "Jesus, that would be good. Been a long week up here, poking into every groundhog hole some hillbilly thinks is special."

"That doesn't happen to be one there," Brandon told him, hefting the rifle. "I've scouted it several times for chucks-never anything come out."

"You just missed seeing it-or else it's an old burrow," Kenlaw judged.

"It's old," Brandon agreed, "or there'd be fresh-dug earth scattered around. But there's no sign of digging, just this hole in the hillside. Looks more like it was dug out from below."

*II*

The cabin that Eric Brandon rented stood atop a low bluff about half a mile up a dirt road from the Warner farmhouse. Dell had made a show of putting the century-old log structure into such state of repair that he might rent it out to an occasional venturesome tourist. The foot-thick poplar logs that made its rough-hewn walls were as solid as the day some antebellum Warner had levered them into place. The grey walls showed rusty streaks where Dell had replaced the mud c.h.i.n.ks with mortar, made from river sand hauled up from the Pigeon as it rushed past below the bluff. The ma.s.sive river rock fireplace displayed fresh mortar as well, and the roof was bright with new galvanized sheet metal. Inside was one large puncheon-floored room, with a low loft overhead making a second half-storey. There were no windows, but a back door opened onto a roofed porch overlooking the river below.

Dell had brought in a power line for lighting, stove and refrigerator. There was cold water from a line to the spring on the ridge above, and an outhouse farther down the slope. The cabin was solid, comfortable-but a bit too rustic for most tourists. Occasionally someone less interested in heated pools and color television found out about the place, and the chance rent helped supplement the farm's meager income. Brandon, however, had found the cabin available each of the half-dozen times over the past couple years when he had desired its use.

While the archeologist splashed icy water into the sink at the cabin's kitchen end, Brandon removed a pair of fired cartridges from the pocket of his denim jacket. He inspected the finger-sized casings carefully for evidence of flowing, then dropped them into a box of fired bra.s.s destined for reloading.

Toweling off, Kenlaw watched him sourly. "Ever worry about ricochets, shooting around all this rock like you do?"

"No danger," Brandon returned, cracking an ice tray briskly. "Bullet's moving too fast-disintegrates on impact. One of the nice things about the .220 Swift. Rum and c.o.ke okay?" He didn't care to lavish his special Planter's Punch on the older man.

Moving to the porch, Kenlaw took a big mouthful from the tall gla.s.s and dropped onto a ladderback chair. The Jamaican rum seemed to agree with him; his scowl eased into a contemplative frown.

"Guess I was a little short with Warner," he volunteered.

When Brandon did not contradict him, he went on. "Frustrating business, though, this trying to sort the thread of truth out of a snarl of superst.i.tion and hearsay. But I guess I'm not telling you anything new."

The woven white-oak splits of the chair bottom creaked as Kenlaw s.h.i.+fted his ponderous bulk. The Pigeon River, no more than a creek this far upstream, purled a cool, soothing rush below. Downstream the Canton papermills would transform its icy freshness into black and foaming poison.

Brandon considered his guest. The archeologist had a sleek roundness to his frame that reminded Brandon of young Charles Laughton in Island of Lost Souls. There was muscle beneath the pudginess, judging by the energy with which he moved. His black hair was unnaturally sleek, like a cheap toupee, and his bristly mustache looked glued on. His face was round and innocent; his eyes, behind round gla.s.ses, round and wet. Without the gla.s.ses, Brandon thought they seemed tight and shrewd; perhaps this was a squint.

Dr Morris Kenlaw had announced himself the day before with a peremptory rap at Brandon's cabin door. He had started at Brandon's voice behind him-the other man had been watching from the ridge above as Kenlaw's dusty Plymouth drove up. His round eyes had grown rounder at the thick-barrelled rifle in Brandon's hands.

Dr Kenlaw, it seemed, was head of the Department of Anthropology at some Southern college, and perhaps Brandon was familiar with his work. No? Well, they had told him in Waynesville that the young man staying at the Warner's cabin was studying folklore and Indian legends and such things. It seemed Mr Brandon might have had cause to read this or that article by Dr Kenlaw... No? Well, he'd have to send him a few reprints, then, that might be of interest.

The archeologist had appropriated Brandon's favorite seat and drunk a pint of his rum before he finally asked about the lost mines of the ancients. And Brandon, who had been given little chance before to interrupt his visitor's rambling discourse, abruptly found the other's flat stare fixed attentively on him.

Brandon dutifully named names, suggested suggestions; Kenlaw scribbled notes eagerly. Mission accomplished, the archeologist pumped his hand and hustled off like a hound on a scent. Brandon had not expected to see the man again. But Dell Warner's name was among those in Kenlaw's notes, and today Brandon had run into them-Kenlaw, having introduced himself as a friend of Brandon, had persuaded Dell to show him his family's version of the lost mines. And that trail, it would seem, had grown cold again.

The chunky reddish-grey squirrel-they called them boomers-that had been scrabbling through the pine needle sod below them, suddenly streaked for the bushy shelter of a Virginia pine. Paying no attention, Dan romped around the corner of the cabin and bounded onto the porch. Brandon scratched the Plott hound's blackhead and listened. After a moment he could hear the whine and rattle as a pickup lurched up the dirt road.

"That'll be Dell," he told Kenlaw. "Dan knew he was headed here and took the short-cut up the side of the ridge. Dog's one of the smartest I've seen."

Kenlaw considered the panting black hound. "He's a bear hound, isn't he?"

"A d.a.m.n good one," Brandon a.s.serted.

"A bear killed young Warner's father, if I heard right," Kenlaw suggested. "Up near where we were just now. How dangerous are the bears they have up here?"

"A black bear doesn't seem like much compared to a grizzly," Brandon said, "but they're quite capable of tearing a man apart- as several of these stupid tourists find out every summer. Generally they won't cause trouble, although now and then you get a mean one. Trouble is, the bears over in the Smokies have no fear of man, and the park rangers tend to capture the known troublemakers and release them in the more remote sections of the mountains. So every now and then one of these renegades wanders out of the park. Unafraid of man and unaccustomed to foraging in the wild, they can turn into really nasty stock killers. Probably what killed Bard Warner that night. He'd been losing stock and had the bad sense to wait out with a bottle and his old 8-mm. Mannlicher. Bolt on the Mannlicher is too d.a.m.n slow for close work. From what I was told, Bard's first shot didn't do it, and he never got off his second. Found what was left pulled under a rock ledge the next morning."

Dell's long legs stuck out from the battered door of his old Chevy pickup. He emerged from the cab balancing several huge tomatoes in his hands; a rolled newspaper was poked under one arm.

"These'll need to go into the refrigerator, Eric," he advised. "They're dead ripe. Get away, Dan!" The Plott hound was leaping about his legs.

Brandon thanked him and opened the refrigerator. Finger-combing his wind-blown sandy hair, Dell accepted his offer of a rum and c.o.ke. "Brought you the Asheville paper," he indicated. "And you got a letter."

"Probably my advisor wondering what progress I've made on my dissertation," Brandon guessed, setting the letter with no return address carefully aside. He glanced over the newspaper while his friend uncapped an RC and mixed his own drink. Inflation, Africa, the Near East, a new scandal in Was.h.i.+ngton, and, in New York, a wave of gangland slayings following the sniping death of some syndicate kingpin. In this century-old cabin in the ancient hills, all this seemed distant and unreal.

"Supper'll be a little late," Dell was saying. "Faye and Ginger took off to Waynesville to get their hair done." He added: "We'd like to have you stay for supper too, Dr Kenlaw."

The redhead's temper had cooled so that he remembered mountain etiquette. Since Kenlaw was still here, he was Brandon's guest, and a supper invitation to Brandon must include Brandon's company as well-or else Brandon would be in an awkward position. Had Kenlaw already left, there would have been no obligation. Brandon sensed that Dell had waited to see if the archeologist would leave, before finally driving up.

"Thanks, I'd be glad to," Kenlaw responded, showing some manners himself. Either he felt sheepish over his brusque behavior earlier, or else he realized he'd better use some tact if he wanted any further help in his research here.

Brandon refilled his and Kenlaw's gla.s.ses before returning to the porch. Dell was standing uncertainly, talking with the archeologist, so Brandon urged him to take the other porch chair. Taking hold with one hand of the yard-wide section of white-oak log that served as a low table, he slid it over the rough planks to a corner post and sat down. He sipped the drink he had been carrying in his free hand, and leaned back. It was cool and shady on the porch, enough so that he would have removed his mirror sungla.s.ses had he been alone. Brandon, a true albino, was self-conscious about his pink eyes.

As it was, Kenlaw was all but gawking at his host. The section of log that Brandon had negligently slewed across the uneven boards probably weighed a couple hundred pounds. Dell, who had seen the albino free his pickup from a ditch by the straightforward expedient of lifting the mired rear wheel, appeared not to notice.

"I was asking Dr Kenlaw what it was he was looking for in these mines," Dell said.