Scarecrow (18 page)

“But you lied to me about the road. And it’s miles to the nearest neighbor. I thought Dewey would be here by now.”

Seth paused, a line creasing his brow. “So did I.”

Something in his tone alerted me. I peered urgently into his face. “You’re worried, too, aren’t you? You don’t think it’s normal either, for him to be so late in coming. What is it? What are you thinking?”

He was silent for so long that I began to feel panicky. He looked at me with an expression I couldn’t read.

“You know you can’t make it. Even if you try, you’ll never get away on foot.”

“Why are you saying that!” My voice stretched as tight as my nerves. “Don’t you think Dewey’s coming? Is it something about Micah?
What
?”

“I’m saying I don’t know,” Seth responded calmly, pulling up a dead weed, peeling it away layer by layer with his long slender fingers. “I’m saying that after what happened with the scarecrow yesterday, I’m not sure about things.”

I stared at him, his meaning sinking slowly into my brain. “You said last night that you didn’t know if you could stop it now. Are you trying to tell me that Dewey’s not being here is somehow related to Franny’s scarecrow? That the scarecrow caused it all? That just because it wasn’t burned with the others—”

“I’m telling you what I told you before. Betrayal
can’t
exist in our world.”

He flicked his breadcrust into the dead grass and rose to his feet. His face was unmoved as he gestured to me to get up.

“You asked me last night about Micah,” he said. “All right. It’s time you knew the truth.”

I searched his eyes, his expression, for some clue as to what I was about to discover. How could I really trust Seth, who until now had been so adamant about guarding the privacy of his family? But as he moved off behind the shack, I found myself reluctantly following, my curiosity winning out.

We cut across the field, plunging into a rocky expanse of forest. Almost at once the hills changed to sheer bluffs rising up on either side of us, slashing a jagged path through the trees. Still, Seth kept on doggedly, never looking back to see if I was behind him, and as I was finally forced to stop for breath, I saw that the sky had gone dangerously dark. The ugly cliffs above us seemed alive as a growl of thunder shuddered through them. I felt the first icy drops of rain and ran on.

“Seth? Where are you?”

And then I saw him up ahead, waiting for me by the cave.

It was practically hidden by a screen of trees and a low overhang of rock, but there in the side of the bluff I could see its black, gaping entrance. Seth clambered over a pile of fallen boulders and reached out a hand to help me. I froze where I stood.

Something terrible was inside.

“Come on,” Seth ordered. “In here.”

I felt myself being pulled along, away from the air and the light. A wet, stale smell rose around us, and as I hung back, I could hear Seth’s footsteps crunching over gravel and dead ferns, echoing on cold, solid stone.

“Back this way,” he called to me, and other Seths called, all their voices alike, reverberating through the hollow hills. I couldn’t move. He came back and grabbed my arm, and I panicked as the darkness grew more complete around us, the strange, foul smell intensifying.

I knew it was close now.

Horribly, horribly close.

Seth dropped to his knees, forcing me down beside him.

“This,” he said, “this is what Micah can do.”

And I saw the rocks then—where Seth was kneeling—the neatly piled mounds of them, all in a row, the graves going off into the total blackness.

“No,” I murmured, “please, no—”

But Seth was already digging, flinging rocks off the first narrow pile, his fingers probing, deeper, deeper, and the look on his face so furious, so sad, so full of pain…

“Stop it
!” I cried, but he didn’t listen, didn’t care—only drew back for the briefest instant, staring at me—

And pulled someone’s hand from the grave.

I screamed, the terror of it all stabbing into me, flinging me down, so that I grappled with him and tried to push him away, to make him stop, but he shoved me aside, and there was an arm on the end of the hand—
an arm!
—and a shoulder stuck with matted hair, and then I was running, running, through the cave and away from the horror, away from the line of graves—
it could have been me! me!
—and the path was an endlessly twisted haze of gray, and my unshed tears were hurting, hurting, and suddenly his arms were around me, stopping me as I tried to thrash my way free, and my head snapped back and forth, him shaking me, shaking me—

“Nobody knows about that cave, and you can’t say
anything,
you understand? Not to Franny, not to Girlie. And especially not to Rachel. Only I know. Only me. And now you.”

“I don’t believe it!” I wrenched free of him, running, running, and by some miracle there was the shack just ahead—through the blinding torrent, the ground like quicksand beneath my feet.

“Pam! Wait!”

He called out through the rain, and I stumbled, fell, crawled, my clothes dragging me down, hard to move, to breathe—
oh, Brad, Brad, save me, I want to be with you, I’m so afraid, so afraid!
—and I fell into the cabin, into the corner, huddled against the wall, as Seth’s body filled the doorway, shutting out the light.

“I don’t believe it!” I screamed at him. “I don’t believe Micah could have done that—”

“Do you see now why I didn’t want you here?”

I was shaking so violently my teeth chattered, I could barely speak. “How
could
he have? Oh, my God—”

Seth slammed the door against the pelting rain, darkness closing the space between us.

“How
could
he?” I said again.
Oh, Brad, what am I going to do
—and Seth’s hands were suddenly on my shoulders, pulling me toward him. “I don’t want to stay here anymore, I’m so
scared
—”

“You should never have come…never…” And Seth towering over me, blocking out the storm, the wind, the rain. “Never…”

And Brad had never smelled this way—not like the land I was smelling now as Seth leaned closer—the strength, the roots, the dirt and sweat and endless toil—the very earth, the life I was smelling as he lowered me beneath him, his body pressing mine to the floor—

“No!”
I screamed, even as Brad flashed through my mind, the joys, the memories, the aching, endless loss—“No!
No!”
—and Brad’s face fading into that overpowering scent of rain and sky and autumn as Seth pinned me relentlessly, my arms in grips of cold steel, the rip of cloth as my blouse came apart, my breasts spilling out into his hands, his mouth, my skirt falling away, heaped about my bare feet, bare legs, deeply, deeply into the shadows, the wooden floor hard at my back and Seth above me, consuming me, and “Stop!” I screamed, crying, begging him even as the tears ran down my face at last, “Stop it! Let me go!”

And it was over, as quickly as it had happened, and I was outside in the rain, trying to run up the jagged incline of the hill.

“Pam!” I heard his voice, ghostlike, angry—“Pam! Come back!”

But I raced on through the darkness, great sobs wracking my body like convulsions. I didn’t know where I was going and I didn’t care—I just knew that I had to escape at the cost of everything else, and I plunged ahead in an insane oblivion, crying and fighting my way through the night.

Without warning my feet slid out over nothingness, and I dropped and rolled, landing with a thud at the bottom of a ravine. Moaning, I tried to stand up—put out my hands—saw the copperhead snake coiled to strike.

The shot came out of nowhere. It cut off my shriek of terror and flung the snake back, lifeless, into the brush as strong arms lifted me, struggling, into the air. I writhed and twisted against him but it was useless. He carried me back to the shed, my body limp now, my voice silent. He lowered me into a corner, his eyes burning down on me as he shut and bolted the door.

“I told you you couldn’t do it,” he said. “I told you you couldn’t get away.”

I
AWOKE TO THE
gentle whisper of rain. The shed flickered in half-light now, and with a cold, sick shock I sat up. I was on a pile of blankets. Seth was in the far corner watching me; beyond the lantern, his eyes glittered calmly from the shadows. Somehow I felt that he’d been watching a long while and as I drew the covers around my nakedness, deep slow sobs began to wash through my body.

I could think of only one thing, and it tore my heart.

“Rachel,” I whispered.

There was a long moment of silence. Seth leaned his head back against the wall and shut his eyes.

“It’s not like that,” he murmured. “Rachel and me…it’s not what you think.”

I couldn’t look at him anymore. I huddled myself into a tight ball and pressed my wet cheek to the floor.

I heard him uncoil from the darkness; I felt him pause above me and lift away the blanket.

“You couldn’t know,” he said. “You could never know how it is.”

His body slid down against me, stretching me full-length into the dim light.

The world shone brilliant the next morning. It was as if the last two days of rain had washed it clean and pure.

I stepped from the shack just as Seth was finishing up with the fence. He didn’t look at me, and he didn’t speak. I waited while he replaced his tools, then I followed in silence as we started back. I was in no hurry to get there now—shame and disbelief made me numb, and I wondered how I’d ever be able to face Rachel again. Feeling sick at the very thought, I nursed my bruised body along the endless trails and tried to prepare myself for our homecoming.

Rachel flew to meet us, flurrying around us in relief, shooing us in to have something to eat, insisting what good sense we’d had not to have tried to make it home in the downpour. I felt sickened just being there, but Rachel bustled about so cheerfully that I had no choice but to force myself back into the routine. After a late breakfast Seth went out to work, and as I helped Rachel clean up the kitchen I asked if there had been any word from Dewey.

“No,” she gave me a sympathetic look, “but I just have a feeling he’ll show up today.” She looked at me for a moment, her eyes darkening. “Poor Pamela, I know you’re mighty anxious to be home.”

Avoiding her gaze, I nodded. “I’ve been enough trouble to you already. It’s really time that I left.”

“Why, I’ve told you and told you, you’ve never been a second of bother since you’ve been here.” Rachel hugged me. “And don’t you ever think it. Now here—here’s some clean clothes. Go up and have a rest—you look plumb worn out. Just leave these dirty things outside your door so I can wash them later on.”

I was exhausted. Taking the bundle of clothes I dragged myself upstairs. I paused outside Franny’s door, raised my hand, but stood there without knocking. I wondered if she was all right, if she was still upset with me. I wondered where Micah was, and just how much he would remember once he was himself again. Could I even be safe here now—if he
did
recall his failed attempt to kill me, would he try again? I shook my head sadly. Still, even having seen that awful evidence in the cave, I couldn’t believe it of him…

I went into my room and shut the door firmly behind me, collapsing on the bed. Rachel…so trusting, so unsuspecting. Pressing my hands against my forehead, I rubbed wearily, trying not to cry. It was a nightmare, this whole thing—a cruel, hideous nightmare—for how many other travelers would ever get caught in a hell like this.

Feeling suddenly dizzy, I closed my eyes against the swaying room. Something tugged at the corners of my mind, gnawing relentlessly as I tried to find sleep.
How many others…
My eyelids struggled open, my mind trying to focus.
Visitors seldom come here…only when they’re lost…have trouble on the road…
Bolting upright I stared, unseeing, at the opposite wall.
Who was in that grave? And why had there been a whole row of those neat, rock-covered mounds, all hidden there, in the shadows of the cave?

Like a flood it all began to come back—Micah’s face, frightened and desperate just the other night in the parlor—
“Do you think you’re the first one? Do you?”
And Seth, saving my life in the barn that night,
“He always picks the time and place and lets you know…” Always, always…

I moaned, burying my face in the pillow.
How many?
Seth’s family in the cemetery and who else in those makeshift graves in the cave? And why had they come here—to this place where no one ever came? And how long had it all been going on? How many years had Seth been covering up the grisly evidence, the family lying and hiding Micah in the cellar so no one would ever know? My flesh crawled as I heard Seth’s words again—
“You’ve heard of people disappearing into thin air?…Well…this is it.”

Rocking gently on the bed, I tried to think calmly. What would I do if Micah tried to kill me again? Seth said he always let his victims know—but what if this one time was different? What if there was no warning, no Seth to intercede? My eyes widened.
How had Seth known about my meeting with Micah?
Micah would never have told him, and I was relatively certain that Seth hadn’t overheard Micah and me in the parlor.
Then how had Seth known?
Was he so attuned to Micah after all these years that he could read the signs of approaching madness, predict the time and place it was likely to happen? A cold hand of fear wrapped itself around my heart. What if Seth hadn’t found me after my car accident—what if Micah had found me instead?

Shaken with the staggering possibilities that confronted me, I eased myself back onto the bed and shut my eyes again. The sun, slanting in through the window, brushed lukewarm across my cheeks, caressing them, like someone else had caressed them not so long ago…

Gasping, I sat up with a start. The muffled sound came again—just a faint rustling on the other side of my door. The room was chilled, hazy with lengthening shadows, dusk beginning to sift beyond the window.

At first I thought it was Rachel, come to take my clothes away.

But as the knob began to turn, as the door swung slowly inward, I knew that the silhouette framed there was much too small to be Rachel.