Hangman, page 7
Something terrible was going on in this village, but she couldn’t worry about that now. Firstly, she had to concentrate on not dying right now, and put everything else to one side.
She put her hands under the man’s armpits and heaved, pulling him to one side. His head lolled to one side and the wound in his neck gaped. She tucked away that little nugget, and the feeling of holding a dead man in such an intimate embrace, for some book in the future, then lowered him gently out of the way.
With the man out of the way she could get to the weakened board. She pushed with her hands and it gave a little, but not enough. Pushing out with her legs would be better than merely kicking, if she had something to put her back against. It’d be just like doing squats, but with her back against the shelf behind her. But then the rack of shelves would just be pushed back ... unless she could somehow ...
“William, help me shift this rack over, would you?”
They heaved as hard as they could, trying to drag the shelving unit along the concrete floor. The tendons stood proud in Sam's bare wrists as she strained, but it was far too heavy.
“Tip it. Tip all the boxes off. Then we can move it,” she said.
They tipped everything off—it proved easier to tip it than drag it. She was worried about the noise. Now she really didn’t have much time. The couple must have heard the crashing lighters and cans and bottles that slid from the shelves.
But then, they could be coming at any moment, anyway. There was no sense in sweating it.
Sweat on getting out, she told herself instead.
Together, Sam and William dragged the shelf between the other shelf and the door. The door opened outward, but it would slow down the couple if they tried to get in.
“I’m going to try to push the board out with my legs. Okay?”
“Hurry,” said the boy.
William. Got to start thinking of him as William.
She nodded and set her back against the row of shelves. It would cut into her back when she pushed, but she couldn’t do much about that now.
She curled herself up, feet against the back panel, back against the end of the shelf. And pushed. Pushed as hard as she could, slowly, slowly exerting more pressure as she went. She heard a crack, and the first board broke.
“Yes!” she said.
Immediately, cold air rushed in. She saw muted daylight.
She smiled, despite herself and their situation, pleased with a small victory. They’d be free, and safe, once they got out. They could find help. Find somewhere warm.
She put her feet against the next board, and that cracked too, then broke away. The third board put up more of a fight, but the fourth didn't matter, because by then they could squeeze through.
*
20.
Dale Smithson and his good wife Marjory tucked into ribs and eggs for a late breakfast. The kitchen was spotless, modern. The only sign there had been any cooking going was the food on the table and a pan for the eggs in the sink.
“Time to go get them?”
“No,” said Marjory. “We can’t afford to get on the wrong side of him.”
Dale Smithson sucked at his teeth, a bit of gristle stuck somewhere he couldn’t quite get.
“You’re right. Wait for him. Right.”
They didn’t have long to wait. Dale shovelled in the last of his eggs, and then he was there, at the kitchen door. The sweeper, the servant, the gatekeeper.
He held his teddy bear in the nook of one elbow, like a baby. The filthy man and his filthy toy, in the doorway, blocking the way out. Dale Smithson outweighed the bearded old man by maybe a hundred pounds, but still he shivered at the sight of the man named Terrence, but more so the small, matted bear.
“You got them?” said Terrence.
“Locked in the back. In the storage shed. They were out cold before. Might not be now, but we thought—”
“You did right. Good man. Fuck her?”
Dale gulped. “No, sir.”
“Sir!” The sweeper slapped his thigh. “Oh, that’s a good one, all right. You’re a card, Mr. Smithson, you really are.”
Dale smiled, carefully, not sure if the sweeper was joking, or serious, or about to put him down.
“Come on,” said Terrence. “Let’s go get me some fodder.”
*
21.
Sam put her head through the hole, splinters pricking her shoulders, but she couldn’t worry about that now. It was cold, and the sudden drop in temperature hurt more than the splinters. She’d thought it was freezing in the shed, but it was nothing compared to this. It was winter with teeth, and she only wore a T-shirt. At least the boy was wearing a coat and a jumper, though without a hat and gloves, he’d soon be frozen.
She saw nothing to worry about as she poked her head through the hole. No insane shopkeepers, no hoards of crazed cannibals.
There was a six-foot fence behind the shed, but there was enough room between the fence and the back of the shed for a slender young woman and a small boy to crawl into, and she could lift the boy up to the top of the fence. There would be a drop down to the other side, but they could make it.
She pushed through the hole, then held out her hand for the boy and pulled him out into the gap.
Not the boy, she chided herself. William.
He smiled at her. She found herself smiling back, thinking it was nuts to be smiling right now, but that didn't stop her.
She was so used to being alone that she forgot she needed other people sometimes. Not just an endless procession of one-night stands, either, but friends, and people she could rely on. Now she had to rely on a little kid. She was responsible for him, but he’d help her, too.
He’d already proven that.
William didn’t complain, and she marveled at his resilience.
He was one tough kid. She was lucky. From her limited experience with children, she’d expected him to be a problem, but he never complained.
Scrap that, she thought. He wasn’t just a tough kid. He was amazing.
“If I push you up, you think you can drop over the other side?”
William nodded. “Of course I can. It’ll be just like falling out of a tree.”
Then he cocked his head. Frowned.
“Someone’s coming,” he said. “Hurry, please ... someone—” he managed, before two massive hands took hold of the fence panel and tore it away as easily as someone opening a door.
*
Sam cried out when she saw the man’s face. Handsome, in a blunt way, but terrifying, too, because where his left eye should have been was a shiny steel ball. There was something in the man’s hair, looked like food, but she had a horrible thought that maybe it was not ... maybe it was ... God, her mind told her in that kind of slow-motion thinking she did ... she dreaded to think what the people in this town thought of as food.
“Come on,” said the giant, and began to walk away. He glanced over his shoulder at William, seeming to fix the boy in the glare of that steel orb.
“We should go with him,” said the boy.
“Who are you?” asked Sam.
“Safety,” the giant said simply, and walked off into the fog.
Follow, or take their chances alone. Sam didn’t fancy their chances. And the big man had probably saved them.
She took an instant to decide, but not too long, because in the freezing fog the man would soon be gone.
“Hold up,” she said, and took William’s hand and led him through the fog.
*
“No, seriously, who are you?” said Sam at the broad back of the man leading the way. She noted that his coat was covered with blood.
Whose, she dared not ask.
Things were different, today, though. Things had already changed, hadn't they? It wasn't like she was in a park, saw blood on a kid, asked if he was okay. This wasn't real life. Handsome black giants covered in blood? All in a day's work, she thought. Nearly laughed but bit her lip instead and was glad to find she could still feel pain.
“I can’t explain much, because you’re already thinking, ‘Am I better or worse off walking with this huge dangerous guy through the fog’—right? But if you go it alone, know this: you can’t get out of the village, and half at least, probably more, of the villagers have gone over to him.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” she said.
“They’ve taken sacrament, miss. They’ve eaten human flesh and gone over to the dark man. The Hangman. Don’t ask me who the Hangman is, because I’ve never seen him in all my years.”
“But,” said Sam. “Who are you?”
Warren laughed. “My name is Warren Johns, and I’m a walker.” He turned and looked at William with a softer, kind expression. “You know what that is, young man?”
William shook his head, in awe of the giant.
“I’ll tell you before the day’s out, because you’re here, and I think…no, I know I need you both.”
“Warren,” said Sam, her head spinning. “You better explain what the hell’s going on. Someone killed this poor boy’s mother, and we’re both frightened to death. All I want is to get some serious police up here all over these weird fuckers, and to get the hell away.”
“Your name?”
“Sam,” she said. “Green.”
“Sam, I’ll be as straight with you as you want, but first let’s get to safety, okay? The Gone will be coming for all of us—all those who’ve not taken the sacrament. All those who deny him, deny the darkness. It’s going to be bloody, and I need to be ready. So, too, do you, Sam, and you ... what’s your name?”
“William Bridges.”
Warren didn’t have the heart to tell the boy what he’d found back at the hotel. That his mother had still lived, and that he’d had to put her down. And the boy didn’t need to know, not now, not ever.
“Hallowed ground’s what we need. I can feel the pull of it. Can you, William?”
“Leave the kid alone,” said Sam.
“I feel it,” said William.
“Okay, if I wasn’t freaked before, I am now. What the fuck is going on? Hallowed ground? Are you some kind of exorcist?”
Warren nodded, looking her in the eye. “Some kind…” He nodded again.
She didn't get anything else out of him. Then, runner or not, she was concentrating too hard on keeping up with Warren Johns’s long stride. The man walked faster than most people jogged. William, for his part, skipped along beside them. He didn't complain.
They went down a narrow alley, almost blind in the fog, and nearly got into a tumble as they came to a wrought iron gate covered with ivy.
Through the gate, Sam became aware of something rising out of the ground in the fog.
Her heart pounded suddenly, her body wanting to flee, but it was just a gravestone ... and another, and another. For an instant she imagined all those graves to be empty, the dead rising, but it was just her imagination.
Wasn’t it?
Their footsteps, dull on the paved path, led them to the church.
*
Warren stood with his massive hands against the doors. He bowed his head in penitence, then turned and looked at William. “You feel it?”
William nodded. “Wrong,” he said.
Warren nodded back. “You ready?”
“Ready for what?” said the young woman.
Warren just shook his head. He could feel it. Wrong, like the little boy said. Things were about to get worse, and he feared there would be no sanctuary during the long day, and the night would only get tougher.
The Hangman had taken their sanctuary from them.
*
It can’t be. Can’t be.
Warren Johns led the way, pushing against the heavy doors. They groaned inward.
There won’t be any flies, thought Sam. It’s too cold, even in this. Even in the carnage.
Somehow the interior of the old church managed to feel colder than it had outside. Sam rubbed at her arms, hard, her breath coming in short gasps from the cold and ...
She closed her eyes for a second. Turned away from the death.
Every surface in the church was covered with thick ice, so that it looked almost as though the whole place was frozen solid.
The floor was slick with it, the flagstones underneath visible, the ice translucent. It glowed with the dim light coming through the stained-glass windows. The largest relief pictured Saint Christopher, leading a traveler across a river, with two angels either side, guiding him, maybe. Or observing.
At least it doesn’t smell. Too damn cold for putrefaction.
Putrefaction was a word she’d looked up once, for her first book. It was a good word. She’d liked it, then. Now ... not so much.
She tried to cover William’s eyes against the obscene tableau, but William shrugged her off.
“Who ... who could do this?”
Warren Johns shook his head. “I don’t know. I think ... I think it’s worse than I imagined. It may have gone too far.”
Too far? That was the understatement of the year. Of the century. Sam didn’t know what the hell was going on, but if this was too far ...
Had Warren been expecting this?
“Help me?” he said.
“Help you what?” said Sam. Warren walked down the aisle, and the corpses hung still, like a congregation at some sick wedding, waiting for the happy couple.
Sam followed, the bride, late to her big day.
“No,” she said, as she saw what he intended to do. “No, I can’t help.”
“I understand.” Warren nodded and reached for the first body. “But,” he added, his voice quiet so William couldn’t hear, “this place is no longer safe.”
“Oh,” she said, “you’re kidding.”
Bodies hung from meat hooks in rows above the pews. Bodies lined up in the pews, positioned on those little cushions that people knelt on to pray. Hassocks, Sam’s mind dredged up.
“The church has been desecrated—”
Each corpse had been mutilated. Some had been partially eaten.
On the altar rested a pile of grinning heads. Some were unmarked, their grins almost happy. Some were misshapen. Like they'd been crushed. Then torn loose.
“Never would have guessed,” she said, falling back on her cold and detached writer self.
The first body fell with a thump as Warren freed it from a meat hook through the chest. Sam couldn't tell the sex of the corpse. It was just a nondescript body, just a lump of frozen flesh, a little shorter than the others, maybe, but yes, just frozen meat.
Wrong to think of it like that, she knew. But easier.
“It looks like the whole village has been killed,” said William.
“No. I don’t think so. I think this is more ... offerings. A freezer ... saving—”
“Stop there,” she said to Warren, because he really didn’t need to say more. She’d seen the half-eaten man. She knew ...
William certainly didn’t need to know.
No, she thought. No. It was her who didn’t want to know. William didn’t seem frightened at all.
“Someone’s coming,” said William, and Sam jumped at the sudden sound of the heavy wooden door grating against the stone and ice behind her.
*
22.
“The sacrament, Grant,” said John. “An inversion. Like the holy sacrament, but with nothing holy about it. The people of the village are calling down a bad man. The Hangman, he’s called. I don’t know what he is. Truth be told, I don’t want to know. I'm kind of hoping I won't still be around to meet him.”
Grant Bridges wanted nothing more than to get in his car and drive away, but he couldn’t. Not until he found his wife and son. He might be a bastard, he wasn’t about to run out on them. No matter how scared he was.
“What’s happening to this village, John? What’s going on? My wife and son are missing. I just want to go home. I just want to go home.”
John finished rolling a cigarette. It turned out damp, in the fog, but Grant was a seasoned smoker. After John handed it to him, Grant got it going and sighed in contentment. John smiled, turning his head to one side so Grant couldn’t see him.
“A man came to the village a while back. A street sweeper, but he’s not. He’s something else. He corrupted the village, turned them against each other. There’s something evil about the man—no, that’s wrong,” said John, stroking his beard thoughtfully with the hand not holding the shotgun. “He’s evil through and through, but he’s just the harbinger. It started with a few people at first, a few converts, if you will. Like some kind of weird cult thing, but not exactly. It had nothing to do with faith. He offered people what they thought they wanted, and when they took it, it was too late to turn back. Plenty of people denied him. But this thing’s coming to a head. Soon, I think.”
John hefted his shotgun. Grunted. He had a fair limp on him.
“Old hips,” he said, seeing Grant’s concerned look.
“You were going to tell me about the sacrament?”
“A bastardization of the holy sacrament. The body and blood of Christ? Well, they started eating people.”
“What the fuck?”
“Yep,” said John, and he seemed far too chipper to be imparting such knowledge.
“I just want to go home, John. Get my wife and kid. They must be at the hotel.”
John thought going to the hotel was a bad idea. Maybe a very bad idea. But he didn’t say so.
“First, I want to check something. Okay? Humor an old man. If what I find is good, we’ll go to the hotel, okay? It won’t take long.”
Grant shook his head. “No. I’ve got to get out. I’ve got to get to the hotel. They could be hiding … hurt—”
