The Ridge (42 page)
Authors: Michael Koryta
Tags: #Fiction, #Suspense, #Thrillers, #Horror, #Occult & Supernatural, #Horror fiction, #Supernatural, #Lighthouses, #Lighthouses - Kentucky, #Kentucky
They listened, starting uphill, and Kimble turned from them at first, then looked back.
“Darmus?”
The reporter turned back to him, waiting.
“When you tell it,” Kimble said, “tell it right, okay? Tell it the way it happened, not the way people will want to hear it. Tell it the way it happened.”
Roy Darmus stared at him for a moment and then nodded. “I will, Kimble,” he said.
Kimble left them then and went back out onto the bridge. Crossed the length of it, not daring to look back at the fire, where
faces of his own kind gathered over more than a century waited and watched. He got to the place on the western side of the trestle where he had emptied the gasoline, and then he removed the pack of matches from his pocket, folded it backward, tore a match free, and struck it.
The glow was small but warm and bright, and he cupped one hand to shield it from the wind and then he passed it to the planks that had once been handled by fevered men who were fading fast. It sparked, hesitated, then absorbed the glow. Began to burn, and he blew on it gently, and that fanned the small flame out and grew it and then it caught the first of the gasoline and went up fast and hot. He stepped away, backpedaling, heading toward the safety of the eastern shore, where the living waited for him with hopes, however faint.
“It’s going,” Audrey Clark said, and Roy nodded, watching as Kimble backed slowly toward the darkness, the fire riding the lines of fuel toward the rocky cliffs on the opposite shore, the crackle of flames audible now, the smell of smoke in the air.
“It will work,” Shipley said. “It will work.”
Roy didn’t answer.
Kimble got to the center of the bridge, still moving backward slowly, and then he turned and faced them. Held up a hand and waved, and Audrey and Shipley matched the gesture.
Roy held up his own hand and whispered, “Good luck, Kimble. Good luck, and God bless.”
When Kimble knelt on the eastern side of the bridge and struck another match, Shipley said, “What’s he doing? He’s going to trap himself. He’s going to—”
Shipley started forward then, and Roy grabbed his arm and held. The deputy was young and strong, but Roy knew that this
hold mattered, and he did not let go, not even when Shipley had dragged them both to the ground and they lay in the snow and watched as the flames rose high at the eastern edge of the bridge and roared toward Kimble, who was backing up again, into the middle of the trestle, fire coming at him from both ends now, whipped by the wind and strengthening quickly.
“Why’s he doing that?” Audrey cried. “Why isn’t he trying to run?”
“Because,” Roy said, “this may work, but he’s not sure. He wants to be sure. He needs to be.”
Kimble retreated to the center of the bridge and watched his fire. Only when he was satisfied that it was going well enough did he chance a look back down to Vesey’s blaze, where the cold blue flames licked at the darkness, waiting for him.
You’ll get me,
he thought,
but you will not get anyone else. I’ll hand myself over before I hand you anyone else.
The ghost with the torch left the blue fire. He walked away from his blaze and stood looking up at Kimble, and there was abject disappointment to his posture, but no resignation. Then he turned and headed north along the river.
He’s leaving,
Kimble realized with amazement.
He is not done, but he is leaving. There will be another spot for him, and another fire. But not here.
Above the ghost, a shadow ran along the top of the ridge, tracking the blue torch.
It was the black cat. Following.
But not with him,
Kimble thought. No, the cat was not a friend. He was keeping watch on him, and somehow Kimble knew that it was very good that the cat had found him. The reasons were beyond him in that moment as the fire encroached,
but he understood that Silas Vesey was leaving and that it was good that the black cat trailed him.
It was important that something trailed him, and kept watch.
Kimble turned back to the cold fire then, back to what waited for him, and saw that the ghosts were all leaving. They were climbing the rocks.
For a moment, he feared for those he’d left behind, those who waited on the hilltop unaware of what was coming toward them. Then he saw that the first of the ghosts—was it Mortimer? Hamlin? one of the ancients—had detoured to the right immediately, was running for the trestle.
Coming for me,
Kimble thought, and then he saw the ghost enter the flames, saw a brilliant shower of red sparks, and then there was nothing.
I’ve released them.
The next ghost entered, another shower of red sparked high and vanished, and Kimble’s excitement grew. He remembered, finally, to call out to those he’d left behind.
“It’s done here!” he yelled. “I’ve put an end to it here!”
He couldn’t see the group he’d left on the hill, though, not now, with the flames so tall. The firelight was brilliant, the night a thing forgotten. He shouted to them again, as loud as he could, and he hoped it was loud enough. He hoped that they’d heard, and that they would understand the significance of that last word.
He wanted very badly for them to know.
The fire was near him at both ends now, and one of the trestle supports broke free. It shattered with a crack and then one of the massive timbers on the trestle’s eastern edge began easing away from the bridge, as if it hated to let go, and swung down in a ribbon of golden light and met the river with a splash.
The ghosts continued their entrance—
exit,
Kimble thought, deliriously happy,
exit—
and as he was pushed farther back into
the center and the trestle continued to give way around him, he saw Wyatt French coming, and he wanted to laugh, wanted to shout his thanks, but the lighthouse keeper was already gone into the warm sparks, and then there was only one left, at the top of the ridge and heading his way.
“Jacqueline,” Kimble said as she stepped toward him, “I’m here.”
He went forward to meet her.
There was a time when I felt eternally bound to
The Ridge
myself, and I’m deeply grateful to those who cast guiding lights along the path for me (no blue torches in this group): Christine, Tom Bernardo, Vanessa Kehren, David Hale Smith.
For Michael Pietsch, I haven’t the proper words of thanks. Michael, the importance of your insight, patience, faith, and unbreakable, irreplaceable enthusiasm cannot be overstated. Thanks for having confidence to spare on the days when I ran dry.
The rescue center portrayed in this book is based on a far more fascinating reality, the Exotic Feline Rescue Center founded by Joe Taft. Joe’s willingness to share his time, expertise, and perspective with me enabled this story to exist, and his mission is deserving of our attention and support.
Every writer jokes about someday killing off his editor in a book. I’ve now done it! Felt pretty good, I have to say. But in all seriousness, I’m forever indebted to Pete Wolverton, who read my first manuscript when there was no earthly incentive to do so, then took a chance, and taught me so much about the craft through our five books together. Always, always grateful, Pete.
Josh Ritter and Joe Pug, both wildly gifted artists, graciously allowed me to use their lyrics in the book.
To Marlowe, thanks for the insight into the complex feline mind, not to mention the help with choreography. To Riley… well, you punch the time clock every day, if nothing else.
And now the list of people I’d like to thank in detail but who would take out red pens and begin cutting pages if I tried: David Young, Heather Fain, Terry Adams, Sabrina Callahan, Nicole Dewey, Amanda Tobier, Tracy Williams, Robert Pepin, Louise Thurtell, Nick Sayers, Renee Senogles, Anne Clarke, Heather Rizzo, Luisa Frontino, Miriam Parker, and everyone else involved in making the books a reality.
Michael Koryta is the author of seven previous novels, including
Envy the Night,
which won the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for best mystery/thriller, and the Lincoln Perry series, which has earned nominations for the Edgar, Shamus, and Quill awards and won the Great Lakes Book Award. His work has been translated into twenty languages. A former private investigator and newspaper reporter, Koryta lives in Bloomington, Indiana, and St. Petersburg, Florida.
LSO BY
M
ICHAEL
K
ORYTA
The Cypress House
So Cold the River
The Silent Hour
Envy the Night
A Welcome Grave
Sorrow’s Anthem
Tonight I Said Goodbye
Copyright © 2011 by Michael Koryta
All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.
Little, Brown and Company
Hachette Book Group
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First eBook Edition: June 2011
Little, Brown and Company is a division of Hachette Book Group, Inc.
The Little, Brown name and logo are trademarks of Hachette Book Group, Inc.
The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
The publisher is not responsible for websites (or their content) that are not owned by the publisher.
The author is grateful to Josh Ritter for permission to quote from his song “The Lantern.”
ISBN: 978-0-316-17535-7
