Bloodstained Oz (5 page)

Emmett Blanton let out a whoop of celebration that damn near stopped
Hank’s heart. Emmett wasn’t the smartest bird in the nest, and had a way of
proving it almost every day. Normally he did something to annoy the guards and
get himself knocked around a little—but not too much. Emmett was
practically the same thing as a pet dog around the place; enthusiastically
friendly and just dumb enough to bring a smile to the day.

The problem was, whatever the thin man did, he did loudly. Emmett had
a voice like a coyote stuck in a bear trap. His laugh was a loud braying and
if he was angry he sounded more like a panicked swine.

Today Emmett’s voice was the sound of a choking hyena. Hank looked in
the man’s direction and saw him dancing—dancing!—in the blistering
heat. Emmett’s hair fell damply down to his collar as he moved in an excited
jig; his right hand held up in a fist that he pumped up and down several times.

J.D. Cotton took care of the fancy footwork. The guard stepped up and
slammed the butt of his shotgun into Emmett’s stomach. The man dropped to the
dirt, gasping, his mouth working with nary a sound to be heard. Cotton didn’t
seem to take any pleasure in the action. He just did what he saw as his job.

“What are you going on about, Blanton?” Cotton was in a foul mood.
From what Hank had overheard, the bastard had lost part of his roof in the storms
the night before. Unlike Emmett, Hank managed not to smile or dance at the
thought.

Emmett groaned and stood up, holding out his right hand for all to see.
Cotton looked closely at is prize and let out a low whistle. A green gemstone
the size of a walnut rested in his palm, glinting brightly in the sunlight.

Hank let out his own low whistle of appreciation. He'd never in his
life seen an emerald anywhere near the size of the thing in Emmett’s palm.

Cotton reached out like a striking snake and tried to pluck the stone
from Emmett’s hand. He failed. Emmett was not bright, but he was fast. He
clutched the emerald to his chest and turned away from the guard, looking over
his shoulder and frowning like some petulant kid.

“I found it! You can’t have it! It’s mine!” Emmett shook his head and
backed away, his eyes wide and focused only on Cotton. That was his mistake.
The other guards fell on him like a pack of wolves, but showed a lot less
mercy.

Hank stood and watched the men beat Emmett into submission, knowing all
too well that if he tried to help the feeble minded man he’d get twice the same
as punishment.

Cobb was smiling now, a tight little slash of sadistic pleasure. He
didn’t let it show too often, but his penchant for violence was always there.
Hank figured it was half the reason he was a guard, it gave his nastier
tendencies a place to express themselves.

“Now, look what you did, Emmett. Time for you to go explain why you’re
acting like a baby to the warden.”

Emmett shook his head, his face already swelling and one eye blackened
shut, on the verge of tears. Cobb and two more guards hauled him away, while
the rest of the prisoners and their keepers watched.

While all eyes were on Emmett and the guards, Hank glanced down at the
treasure he himself had found, and then hastily shoved it into his pocket. The
fine links of the chain were silver and the centerpiece, a medallion of the
same precious metal, was studded with at least five small emeralds that were as
clear and beautiful as a glass of ice water.

Hank started digging again, his skin suddenly cold. He didn’t know how
the necklace had gotten there and he didn’t much care. He just knew he’d have
to find a way to keep it safely hidden away until his sentence was up. A piece
like that could make a man’s destiny go in all new directions.

The work went on and Hank kept digging, losing himself in the labor.
If he focused on the task at hand, he could resist looking at the fortune he
had sitting in his pocket.

Sweat cut lines through the dust that adhered to his skin, but in time
the guards called everyone in from the field and loaded them back onto the
trucks. Nearly everyone was quiet after what had happened to Emmett earlier
and especially after Pritcher got his head blown off. Best to keep quiet and
not draw attention to yourself.

Or maybe it’s more than that.
Maybe some of these guys are so quiet because they found things in the field,
too.

The thought wouldn’t leave Hank alone as he looked at the other
prisoners in the truck. They weren't just tired, they were still. Quiet and
careful. The more he thought about it, he could easily believe they were
hiding something. Even the guards seemed to notice, a few of them sitting
straighter than usual, gripping their weapons tighter than they normally did at
the end of a work day.

Guilford was as warm and welcoming as an outhouse after a flood.
Home sweet home
. Hank ate his meal in
silence and watched the prisoners around him do the same thing. There was only
one source of distraction in the camp during the meal of bread, water and what
was supposed to be beef stew: Emmett kept up a litany of screams and howls from
the Hole. Most times the noises he made were almost funny, but this time the
poor bastard sounded so miserable that it frayed at the nerves.

The entire prison was jittery and anxious. It had been a weird couple
of days. A violent couple of days.

The Hole was a miserable little cell in the ground, smaller than a root
cellar and befouled by human waste that had nowhere else to go. No one ever
wanted to stay in the place, which was exactly why the warden used it as a
method of punishment. When the meals were done and the guards watched Hank and
the rest of the prisoners head for their cells, Emmett started begging for someone,
anyone to help him get free. No one dared.

Emmett’s howling kept on until after the sun had set, and Hank did his
best to adjust to the sounds. He closed his eyes and settled in on the cot
provided for him and he even wrapped the thin pillow around his head in an
effort to block out the noises.

Eventually he managed to drift toward sleep.

He hadn’t even begun to snore when he was jarred awake, his eyes
growing wide. In the time he'd been at Guilford he had learned to accept most
of the noises that came to him in the dark. Even Emmett’s howls were only part
of the horrific tapestry of Guilford. But now something had changed. Hank
could sense it, but it took him a moment of listening to understand what he was
hearing.

Emmett didn’t sound miserable anymore. He sounded terrified. His
howling had become a scream, a full scale, blood-curdling shriek. Even when
the guards got nasty with him, he didn’t sound that frantic.

The guards
, Hank thought.
Teaching him a lesson
.

He would have loved to help, if only to stop the screaming, but there
wasn’t a damn thing he could do about it. Not from in here.

Hank turned over on his cot, feeling the sweat of the day pull at his
clothes, and let out a small grunt of disgust that helped him hide from the
helplessness he felt. He clenched his teeth together and let his hand move
down to his pocket, where he fingered the fine chain through the fabric,
imagining a day when he would be free from Guilford and have enough money to
live comfortably in a place that didn’t make him want to curl up and die.

A moment later, as sleep was about to catch him again, the screams from
outside stopped and left behind a silence that was somehow even worse.

Gayle crawled into her bed and closed her eyes, a smile playing at her
lips. She felt too excited to sleep. Her parents had talked about the dolls
she’d found for what seemed like forever and then finally decided that she
could keep five of them.

“It’s like an answer to a prayer, Silas. We can probably get enough to
pay ourselves up to date with the bank if we’re shrewd about it.” Her mother
had spoken in whispers, as if afraid that speaking any louder would frighten
away their sudden fortune.

Her father had nodded his head and lit his pipe, something he only did
when he felt like celebrating. Christmas and Thanksgiving were pipe days. The
rest of the time he went without. They'd spoken about the antique stores until
the sun was down, carefully assessing each of the figures and settling them on
the sofa as if they were guests come to visit. Most of them were only
visiting, but five would be hers.

Which ones?
She wondered with all the solemn joy she
could manage, as she closed her eyes and drifted into a restful slumber. There
were so many to choose from, and each seemed more beautiful than the last. It
was not long before she was dreaming of porcelain figures.

In her dream she was gathering the porcelain dolls in a rusty old
wheelbarrow, carefully setting each figure into its spot before reaching for
the next. That nasty scarecrow was walking beside her, one gloved hand holding
on to the stake that had been driven through its chest and the other reaching
for her dolls.

“They’ll do you no good,” the straw man said earnestly, as wheat straw
and blood seeped from the corners of his burlap mouth. “They’ll bring you
nothing but blood and pain. They’re his toys, you know, his to do with as he
will.”

She opened her mouth to tell him that she did not, as a rule, speak to
scarecrows and that he should be careful, because her father was nearby. But
all that came from her mouth was a scraping noise.

Gayle opened her eyes and looked at the ceiling of her bedroom. Light
from the moon outside was her only illumination, and the familiar walls had
taken on unusual angles as the shadows hid the corners and swallowed the meager
furniture.

A sound had awakened her from her unsettling dream, but she had no idea
what it might have been. Gayle strained to hear any sound at all beyond the
wind outside and the floorboards of the old house settling as the air cooled
down to tolerable levels.

Out in the hallway beyond her door, something scraped softly at the
wood. Gayle squeezed her eyes shut, wondering if a rat had managed to get
stuck in the house. It happened from time to time and the nasty little
creatures almost always seemed to find her room. Just last winter her father
had sent her into the hallway while he took care of one of the vermin with a
pitchfork. Before she could enter the room afterward, her mother had gone in
with a bucket and a rag. For over a month she had stared at the clean spot on
her floor as if it might suddenly attack.

But she was older now, and she had to face her fears. That was what
her father said was the difference between a good farmer and everyone else. So
Gail slid off of her bed and onto the floor. As quietly as she could she put
her feet into her slippers and moved toward the door.

Something heavy fell to the ground in another part of the house, the
impact loud enough to shake the floor beneath her slippered feet. Gayle stared
at the door and tried to make herself move, but her legs didn’t want any part
of the notion. The soft, scrabbling noises near her door stopped and were
replaced by several light taps as something moved down the hallway.

Gayle listened, wishing she could muffle the sound of her own heart in
her ears, and when she heard nothing else out of the ordinary she carefully
opened her door.

There was no sign of life in the hallway and nothing moved near the
banister but her own faint shadow. Gayle started down the stairs as carefully
as she could, her feet testing each floorboard to see if it would creak. Light
spilled across the ancient throw rug at the foot of the stairs, coming from the
living room where she knew her folks liked to sit and read quietly before they
retired. If the lights were on, they were likely still awake.

She almost called out to them, but hesitated instead. They'd be
awfully upset if they found her awake and creeping around the house. As
careful as she had been in the hallway, her trek down the stairs took longer
and made less noise. Somewhere up ahead she could hear the scraping sounds
again and wondered if she was right about the rats. Perhaps they were eating
her dolls even now, tearing away the fabric and chewing on the finely crafted
porcelain faces.

The idea finally got her to move faster, and Gayle moved across the
foyer and looked into the room where her parents liked to read. Her pulse
raced at the notion that anyone would hurt the beautiful figurines and she
looked quickly at the couch as if to reassure herself.

She would have preferred the rats. They would at least have made
sense.

Instead she saw her father on the ground, his face mashed against the
wooden floor, his eyes closed and a thin line of reddish drool trickling from
between his clenched teeth. Her mother lay on the couch, her legs spread
farther apart than was proper for a lady, and her hands over her head, one
wrist crossed over the other. Gayle’s eyes sought the source of the scratching
noises. The soft clinks and tinkles of fine porcelain and glass touching hard
surfaces assailed her, and she looked down to the foot of the couch where she
fully expected to see a black brute of a rat feasting on the delicate dolls
she’d somehow managed to bring in from the field intact.