There was a deafening boom! and a heavy slug whickered through the icy branches by Job’s ear. He threw himself flat, gaping in amazement at the cabin, the corn shed, the frozen garden patch, the woman with the muzzle-loader in her hands.
“Charity!” he yelled. “It’s me!”
Half an hour later, in the cabin, Fly Beebody was still shaking his head darkly.
“I’ll make my couch in the snow if need be,” he said. “But I’ll not set foot i’ that bewitched forest ‘ere tomorrow’s dawn.”
“You can lie here, i’ the shed,” Job said grudgingly. “If you must.” Charity offered the involuntary guest a quilt, which he accepted with ill grace. He departed, grumbling, and Job barred the door.
Husband and wife slept poorly that night. Shortly before dawn, they were awakened by a frantic pounding on the door. Job leaped up, opened it, gun in hand. Fly Beebody stood there, disheveled, coatless. He stuttered, then pointed.
Tall in the misty light of pre-dawn, the mighty cottonwood tree which the two men had with such labor felled the previous day stood once more in its accustomed place, untouched by the axe.
CHAPTER ONE
1
Roger Tyson flipped the windshield wipers into high gear as the spatter of rain became a downpour, then a deluge. He slowed to fifty, his headlight beams soaked up and absorbed by the solid curtains of whirling water sheeting across the blacktop. Lightning winked and thunder banged like artillery.
“Perfect,” Tyson congratulated the elements. “What a way to end up: the middle of the night, in the middle of nowhere, with no gas, no money, no credit card.” His stomach rumbled. “Not even a ham sandwich. Something tells me I’m not fitted to survive in the harsh modern world.”
A broken seat spring prodded him painfully; water trickled down from under the dash and dripped on his knee. The engine gasped three times, backfired, and died.
“Oh, no,” he groaned, steering to the side of the road and off onto the shoulder. He turned up his coat collar, climbed out in the driving rain, lifted the hood. The engine looked like an engine. He closed the hood, stood with his hands in his pockets, staring off down the dark road.
“Probably won’t be a car along for a week,” he reflected dismally. “Only a damned fool would be out in this weather—and not even a damned fool would stop, even if he came along here, and—” His ruminations were interrupted by a glint of light in the distance; the faint sound of an approaching engine cut through the drum of the rain.
“Hey!” Roger brightened. “Someone’s coming!” He trotted out into the center of the road, watching the light grow as it rushed toward him. He waved his arms.
“Hey, stop!” he yelled as the oncoming vehicle showed no indication of slowing. “Stop!” He leaped aside at the last instant as a low-slung motorcycle leaped out of the gloom, a slim, girlish figure crouched behind the windshield. He caught just a glimpse of her shocked expression as she swerved to miss him. The speeding bike went into a skid, slid sideways forty feet, and plunged off the road. There was a prolonged crashing and snapping of wood and metal, a final resounding crunch, and silence.
“Good Lord!” Roger skittered across the road, picked his way down the steep bank, following the trail of snapped-off saplings. At the bottom, the crumpled machine lay on its side, one chrome-plated wire wheel turning lazily, the headlight still shining upward through the wet leaves. The girl lay a few feet away, on her back, eyes shut.
Roger squatted at her side, reached for her pulse. Her eyes opened: pale green eyes, gazing into his.
“You must help me,” she whispered with obvious effort.
“Sure,” Roger gulped. “Anything at all! I—I’m sorry . . . ”
“The message,” the girl whispered. “It’s of the utmost importance. It must be delivered . . . ”
“Look, I’ll have to go back up by my car and try to flag somebody down.”
“Don’t bother,” the girl whispered. “My neck is broken. I have only a few seconds to live . . . ”
“Nonsense,” Roger choked. “You’ll be right as rain in a few days—”
“Don’t interrupt,” the girl said sharply. “The message: Beware the Rhox!”
“What rocks?” Roger looked around wildly. “I don’t see any rocks!”
“For your sake—I hope you never do,” the victim gasped. “The message must be delivered at once! You must go . . . ” Her voice faltered. “Too late,” she breathed. “No time . . . to explain . . . take . . . button . . . right ear . . . ”
“I’m wasting time!” Roger started to rise. “I’ll go for a doctor!” He checked as the girl’s lips moved.
“Take . . . the button . . . put it in . . . your ear . . . ” The words were almost inaudible, but the green eyes held on Roger’s, pleading.
“Seems like a funny time to worry about a hearing aid,” Roger gulped, “but . . . ” He lifted a lock of wet black hair aside, gingerly grasped the small gold button tucked into the girl’s delicately molded ear. As he withdrew it, the light of awareness faded from the girl’s glazing eyes. Roger grabbed for her wrist, felt a final feeble thump-thump of the pulse—then nothing.
“Hey!” Roger stared uncomprehending at the white, perfect-featured face. “You can’t be . . . I mean, I didn’t . . . you mustn’t . . . ” He gulped hard, blinking back sudden tears.
“She’s dead,” he breathed. “And all because of me! If I hadn’t jumped out in front of her like that, she’d still be alive!” Badly shaken, he tucked the gold button in his pocket, climbed back up the slope, slipping and sliding. Back in his car, he used tissues to mop off his face and hands.
“What a mess,” he groaned. “I ought to be put in jail! I’m a murderer! Not that my being in jail would help any. Not that anything I could do would help any!” He took the button out and examined it under the dash light. There were thin filaments trailing from it, probably leads to a battery in the owner’s pocket.
He rolled the bean-sized button between his fingers. “She seemed to think this was important; used her dying breath to tell me about it. Wanted me to stick it in my ear . . . ” He held the tiny object to his ear. Did he hear a faint, wavering hum, or was it his imagination? He pushed it farther in. There was a faint tickling sensation, tiny rustling and popping sounds. He tried to withdraw the button, felt a sharp pain—
“Drive to Pottsville, one hundred and two miles, north-northeast,” the dead girl’s voice said in his ear. “Start now. Time is precious!”
2
There was the sound of an approaching motor. Roger scrambled quickly from the car, peering into the rain, which had settled down now to a steady drizzle. For the second time, a single headlight was approaching along the road.
“Now, this time don’t jump out yelling,” he cautioned himself. “When they stop, just tell them that you’ve been driven mad by hardship, and are hearing voices. And don’t forget to mention the hallucination about the girl on the motorcycle; that may be an important lead for the psychiatrist.” He stood by the side of the car, staring anxiously at the oncoming light, waving his hand in a carefully conservative flagging motion. The vehicle failed to slow; instead, it swung wide, shot past him at full bore—and as it did, he saw the shape behind the handlebars: a headless torso, obese, bulbous, brick-red, pear-shaped, ornamented with two clusters of tentacles, like lengths of flexible metal hose. Through the single goggle, an eye as big as a pizza and similarly pigmented swiveled to impale him with a glance of utter alienness. With a strangled yell, Roger leaped back, tripped, went down hard on the mud-slick pavement. In horror, he saw the motorcycle veer wildly, stand on its nose, hurling its monstrous rider clear, then skid on its side another hundred feet before coming to a stop in the center of the highway.
Roger tottered to his feet and cantered forward, approached the inert form lying motionless on the pavement. From a distance of ten feet, he could see that it would never ride again: the upper portion was smashed into a pulp the consistency of mashed potatoes.
“Help,” Roger said weakly, aware of a loud singing sensation in his ears. In his left ear, to be specific.
“Time is of the essence,” the girl’s slightly accented voice said. “Get going!”
Roger tugged again at the button, was rewarded with another pang.
“I should go to the police,” he said. “But what can I say? That I was responsible for the death of a girl and a giant rutabaga?”