Helliard wondered how she’d lost the eye.
Maybe a knitting needle accident, or else she had de-visioned herself in a fit of sudden depression, cheap gin, and dollar store nail scissors.
“Give me a half a dozen burgers,” he answered her back. “Cook them light, mind you. I like them damn near raw.”
“They’ll be mooing, sweetie.”
“Got any beer?”
“Just root. This ain’t no tavern.”
“Give me two Cokes. None of that Pepsi, mind you. I’d just as soon drink piss.”
“You got it sweetie.”
He drummed the side of his fist against the dash while he waited. He didn’t like the way she called him sweetie, all high and nasal, like she had a nose full of snot.
“Here you go, sweetie.”
She leaned through the sliding window to hand him the burger bag.
Duane reached up to grab the bag from her. As he reached he tangled with Duane’s blanket, and it slid to the car seat.
That’s when she started screaming.
“Kill the bitch,” Duane crackled bluely.
She screamed like a garlic soaked dill pickle had just been jammed up the pucker of her asshole. Her screaming was way worse than the way she said sweetie. Helliard pulled Big Fuck and popped a bullet right through the money chute. He aimed for her eye patch, but the bullet caught her beneath the chin and opened the top of her skull on the way out. The wound looked like an oil well going gusher, the way the blood and stuff shot up.
He heard someone yelling inside the restaurant.
Oh my god!
An honest-to-huskies Mountie stepped out of the restaurant. He had his hand half on his pistol, like he wasn’t sure whether or not he was going to use it. He was a big boy, close to six three.
It was funny that way, how Mounties were usually so tall.
Helliard liked it that way.
Tall made for more of a target.
Helliard opened the car door, stepped out with Big Fuck in his hand and got down to work.
* 3 *
Police Chief Wilfred Potter awoke to the stink of rotten meat and spoiled groceries, seeping up from beneath the floorboards.
The stink was nothing new.
He raised himself from the couch. It was over three weeks since he’d slept in his own bed. He just couldn’t seem to settle into sleeping in it, since Emma had left.
“Damn it,” he swore. “Why the hell did you do it?”
Maybe he should talk to her again.
Hell.
He grabbed the couch by the leg and upended it in a fit of fury. The couch smashed the wall plaster and a painting of a pot full of daisies.
Damn it.
Emma had bought that damn daisy painting at a church rummage sale.
She loved the damn thing.
He leaned his head back like a baying wolf.
“WHEN ARE YOU COMING BACK?” Wilfred howled.
No answer. There never was. He grabbed his pack of Player’s. He bit the filter off a cigarette. He clicked the lighter, three times fast.
There was nothing but sparks.
Damn it.
He stuffed the lighter back into his pocket before rummaging through the overturned couch until he’d found a half empty book of matches. Then he lit the cigarette, squatting there perched on the edge of the overturned couch.
“Yeah I know, Emma,” he said aloud. “I ought to give these damn things up before they finally kill me.”
Fuck it.
He had this urge to light up the whole pack. To cram them down his throat, all smoking and hot, chewing them up, filter and all. That’d give him cancer quick, wouldn’t it?
Fuck it.
He chucked the matches next to the ashtray.
“I’m too tough to die and too stupid to quit,” he decided. “That’s my goddamn problem.”
The smoke curled like a snake about his head and chest. He guided it with his hands, catching the smoke and making washing motions with it. He had seen the M’ikmaq Indians do this with sweetgrass to wash away the darkness. The smoke moved away, as if it could taste the secret he hid in his heart.
He smoked the cigarette down to the butt and hacked up a wad of chewy phlegm – which he spat upon the rug. The floor rug was calico, so no one would likely notice the stain. He pinched the cigarette butt between his thumb and index and pinged it across the room, aiming for the big black fireman’s helmet, hung above the fireplace.
He was five when the fireman had given him that helmet. He remembered the stink of rubber and the smell of the burning house. He remembered the fire that took his father and mother in their sleep. His sister too. He’d been the only one out alive. He’d damn near died. If the fireman hadn’t dragged him out and pumped life back into his lungs with the gift of his own breath.
Wilfred drank a toast to the helmet, every winter on his birthday. He kept a bottle of ten year scotch on the mantle for that purpose. Some nights he dreamed of the fireman. Some nights the fireman wore the face of Wilfred’s father. Some nights he wore a burning skull.
Some nights the face that the fireman wore was Wilfred’s own.
BA-RING!
The telephone screamed like a damned banshee.
He grabbed it by the second ring, grateful for the distraction.
“H’lo,” he said.
“Ain’t got time to good morning you, Chief Wilfred,” Wendy Joe Joel said. “Clavis is at it again.”
It figures.
“He at the church again?” Wilfred asked.
“You know it,” Wendy Joe Joel replied. “I reckon he’s a diehard Baptist. Do you want to check it out, or do you want me to let Earl know?”
“Naw. The old pudge-ball has worked his shift. It’s my turn at the plow, I guess. I’ll drive by on the church and pull him down just as gently as I can. Is there anything else happening?”
“There’s a big fire out county way. The Night Owl at the crossroad. Old man Delrosa was killed. Shot dead along with his grandson Joe on the counter.”
“Old Richie Delrosa? Damn it.”
“Friend of yours?”
Wilfred heard the concern in her voice. That wouldn’t do. He had to keep this whole thing professional.
“Not particularly,” he said. “Do they got any sort of idea who might have done it?”
“Got an APB for a red Mercury the perps might be driving.”
“Perps?” Wilfred asked.
He was grinning loud enough that she ought to hear his teeth shining together – but she wasn’t rising for the bait, damn it.
He’d hoped for a little gentle kidding.
“What do you want me to do about this, Chief?”
“Not much to do. It’s too far away from Crossfall to worry about. I’ll keep my eyes peeled for the Mercury, but them assholes have most likely perped the hell out of here and are long gone by now. They’re most likely headed down to Yarmouth and the ferry to Maine. You got anything else?”
“Nope.”
“Good enough. I best get Clavis before he gives himself lockjaw on a rusty nail.”
A thought pestered him like a single nagging horsefly.
“Who called in the report on Clavis?” he asked
“Marvin Pusser. He was out on his route.”
“Is he delivering on weekends again? Goddamn it. We’ll be hearing from Lily on this, just as sure as shit draws little blue flies.
He hung up.
He took a long deep breath.
He walked to the basement door.
He opened the door and walked on down.
He stepped past the rotting meat. The popsicles, melted down to sticks. The pork chops. He reached the freezer and opened it up. He shivered at the blast of frozen air, staring down at the body lying in the freezer.
“Morning, Emma,” he said. “Did you sleep well?”
Emma, being dead, said nothing.
THERE IS SOMETHING GROWING IN
THE FIELDS OF CROSSFALL.
IF YOU LIKE WHAT YOU’VE READ – WELL, YOU HAVEN’T READ ANYTHING YET.
WANT TO READ MORE?
RESURRECTION: BOOK TWO OF THE TATTERDEMON TRILOGY
REQUIEM: BOOK THREE OF THE TATTERDEMON TRILOGY
OR – SAVE MONEY AND BUY THE TATTERDEMON OMNIBUS EDITION – ALL THREE BOOKS IN ONE!
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Steve Vernon is a storyteller. The man was born with a campfire burning at his feet. The word "boring" does not exist in this man's vocabulary - unless he's maybe talking about termites or ice augers.
That’s all that Steve Vernon will say about himself – on account of Steve Vernon abso-freaking HATES talking about himself in the third person.
But I’ll tell you what.
If you LIKED the book that you just read drop me a Tweet on Twitter – @StephenVernon - and yes, old farts like me ACTUALLY do know how to twitter – and let me know how you liked the book – and I’d be truly grateful.
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