He began to walk faster. The pace behind him didn’t increase, but clearly it was progressing toward him quicker than he was moving, and he became painfully aware of just how many switchbacks there were in the road and just how close the turn up top was to the road turning back just beneath. What was the reach? Fifteen feet? Twenty feet? Could it survive jumping down between the switchbacks as it had so easily survived jumping from the cliffs to the beach, an even greater height?
Greg MacDonald started running.
He ran as fast and as hard as he could, but the thing kept coming on, coming faster although still at a deliberate pace. If it had any sense at all it would begin jumping to insure capture—or would it? Would it really care if it had to go into town or not to get him? He was running towards a harbor and town that was essentially a cul de sac. It had no need to hurry, for there was no place he could run.
He turned a corner and spotted not far below a lone man on horseback. For a moment he feared that they were coming at him to block him in, but then he realized that it was Red.
The chief constable stopped suddenly and his horse began to act up. He shook his head and tapped on his ear. as if wondering if he’d abruptly gone deaf. The horse grew more and more skittish, and he tried to calm and control the animal, and so he was still there when MacDonald rounded the switchback turn and practically ran into him.
“Red!” he shouted, breathing hard and feeling a little dizzy. “Red—get me down from here and fast! Whatever killed Sir Robert’s coming right down this road!”
Although the man was shouting, his voice was so muffled it was difficult to hear him, while the sudden sounds of the hollow footsteps of some great beast hit them both. The chief constable stared at him, then looked up at the Institute. Although the road lights seemed out up above and were progressively winking out below that as he watched, he could clearly see the Institute and something of the road in the moonlight. Clearly there was nothing there—nothing large, anyway.
“What the bloody hell is going on here?” he shouted at MacDonald.
“No time for explanations now! Let me get up on the horse with you and get us both back down. That thing’ll be here in another minute and a half!”
In the distance, through the eerie muffling of natural sound, the breathing of some great beast could be heard along with the footsteps. Red reached down and almost pulled the younger man up, then turned the horse and started back down as fast as he dared.
“But there’s nothing back there!” the old cop protested. “I can see there ain’t!”
“The damned thing’s invisible!” MacDonald told him. “That’s why it didn’t care about the beach in the daylight!”
Red didn’t much believe in invisible things, but he was too nervous to argue right now. “Where’ll we head? Surfs too rough to do us much good in the water, and I’ll let it get me before I’ll lure that fucker into town!”
MacDonald’s mind raced, trying to think. The decision had to be made in a matter of seconds. He peered forward and saw the steeple of the little chaple, removed from the town by about a hundred yards. Not much, but it was something.
“The church!” the younger man yelled. “It’s not much of a chance, but they’re devil worshippers, Red!”
They were there only a minute later, and both men jumped off as quickly as they could, then as Red pushed open the door to the church MacDonald looked back up the mountainside. Red was right—he saw exactly what he expected to see, except for the completely extinguished battery lights outlining the road. Still, he could hear the footsteps, very close now, and almost feel the hot breath on his face. He turned and followed Red into the church.
The lights didn’t work, but they managed to find a few things to pile up against the only door, including some of the back pews. The pews were all bolted to the floor but these had come loose years ago and nobody had ever gotten around to fixing them.
Red groped for MacDonald in the dark. “So now what do we do?”
“I wish I knew, Red. This may be it. You haven’t got a gun, have you?”
” ‘Course not. What the bloody good would it do against that anyway? Listen to it!”
It was clearly right outside now, and had stopped. They could hear its massive body rustle and the snort from its nostrils. They held their breaths and waited for what came next.
The creature or whatever it was seemed equally confused as to that question, almost as if, after confidently tracking its quarry without hurry or worry, it had suddenly and inexplicably lost the scent.
Suddenly the entire chapel shook and the windows rattled as it pounded on the walls, again and again, with tremendous force. The shock waves sent everything loose tumbling, and, after a while, the altar in the rear collapsed with a crash. They could hear the bell in the steeple above start to clang, but it was so muffled by whatever it was that surrounded the thing that it could barely be made out from within the church and certainly would not be heard by anyone in town, although that may have been all to the good. The pounding ceased for a moment, and they heard Red’s horse give a terrible, unnatural cry outside and then all was silent once more.
After a minute or so, the pounding resumed.
“Sweet Jesus, forgive me my sins and save our poor souls,” Red whispered quietly to himself as he crouched down in the center of the building.
MacDonald, crouching beside him, eyes now accustoming themselves to the greater darkness, huddled and looked around and hoped that nothing was above them that would come tumbling down and do the monster’s dirty work for it. The pounding went on and on, like a rhythmic earthquake, and both men wondered just how long it would be before the little building gave in to the brute force being applied to it.
Poor Angelique! MacDonald thought, resigned to fate. Who is left to save you from them now?
7
CHANGE OF GAME
Kris Symonds had not expected to spend the night on Allenby, but had every expectation when she’d started out that she’d deliver her goods and then take the chopper back to Port of Spain. The people at the Institute had been quite nice to her, though, and she’d finally recovered from the terrible motion sickness flying through that storm or whatever it was had given her. She was even giving serious thought to flying back if they said it was fixed in the morning, and had managed to keep down a light snack and some tea they had offered. She did not, however, have a change of clothes or even a purse. It just hadn’t been the kind of job where she’d needed them, and with a heavy briefcase locked on her wrist you took as little extra as you could.
Much of the Lodge was quiet now, although there was always somebody up and about in a place like this, and she sat in the lounge as instructed and waited while they made up a room for her and found her the basics. She badly needed a shower, she decided, and sleep wouldn’t be such a bad idea.
She was thumbing through some old magazine when a young, rather pretty black girl entered. “Miz Symonds?”
“Yes, that’s me.”
“Come with me, please.”
She rose and followed the young woman, noting the thick French accent. Haitian, she guessed, or from French Guiana or whatever they were calling the place these days. They did not go up or down stairs, but went along the rear corridor of the building to an oak door. “Go on in,” the girl told her. “De security boys, dey hav’ ta ask you some questions. Den we’ll get you to your room.”
She didn’t like the sound of this. “Security?”
“Jus’ go in. Dey explain everyt’ing.”
She knew this was a top security installation, but she really wasn’t prepared for this. Oh, well, she decided, there was nothing to it but to get it over with so she could get some sleep. She opened the door and stepped into a small sitting room, with a few comfortable chairs, a couch, and some reading lamps. There didn’t appear to be any other entrance to the room but the door through which she’d entered, and there didn’t seem to be anyone in the room. She stopped, turned, and said, “Hey! Wait a minute!” but the door closed and she could hear a lock being turned. She tried it anyway, to no avail, and started to get nervous. What kind of place was this, anyway?
She went over and sat on the couch, growing more nervous with every passing moment. She hadn’t like that MacDon-ald’s intimation that the storm hadn’t been natural, and she remembered the details on Martinez.
This had seemed a glamorous, exciting job when she’d applied for it. International courier. Expense-paid trips to lots of different places all over the world, really good pay and bonuses, plenty of vacation time. Although she knew that she sometimes carried valuable things, even lots of cash, she had never really worried much while doing the job and certainly hadn’t worried after delivery was made.
She heard a noise from a far corner, and was suddenly aware of another presence in the room. “Who are you?” she asked, masking her fear with bravado. “I mean, what the hell is all this, anyway?”
The figure stepped from the shadows into the light, but it didn’t help at all. He was all black—not his skin or clothing, because you really couldn’t tell much about that—but strangely, unnaturally so, like a cut-out figure of a man on TV, a man-shaped blackness that moved.
“Please pardon my appearance,” said the Dark Man, “but it is necessary for now for a number of reasons to adopt what you might call a high-tech disguise.” The voice was deep and resonant and radiated a strange power. “I wish first to simply ask you some questions. Your answers will determine what happens next.”
“W—Who—what are you?”
“That is no concern of yours,” he replied, walking over and taking one of the chairs facing her. It did no good to be this close. It was like looking at a deep hole that moved and rippled. It was more terrifying than facing a man with a gun. “I wish to know who sent the parcel you delivered tonight.”
“I—I don’t know. I only know when I have to meet the person sending it or I need to get paperwork signed. This was a straight drop, using the coded ‘cuffs. I’m not even usually down here! Before this I ain’t never been further south than Puerto Rico, honest!”
“Who gave you the package and your instructions?”
“Mrs. Corvas, the head of the Service in Port of Spain. I just got an order from Mr. Sanchez, who runs the shop in Miami, where I was at the time, to fly down to Port of Spain and make a delivery.”
“You received triple pay for this delivery. Why?”
“How’d you know that? Yeah, well, they told me the usual guy who did this run was killed. I made ’em run the bonus money up when I heard that.”
“And what were your instructions? Exactly.”
“I was to take the chopper, for which clearance had already been made, and meet this Mr. MacDonald at the pad. He would take the case and I would go back and that’s it. Honest!”
“And they told you the specific details about Martinez?”
“Huh?”
“Ms. Symonds, you must be honest with me because it is your only choice. I have great power, and my power increases moment by moment. Right now my unaided power is limited to individuals, one at a time, but it is considerable at that level, and it will continue to increase. I could order you to tell me all and you would do so, but I prefer a different approach because it serves more then one purpose and because it pleases me to do so.”
“What—what are you going to do? Rape me? Butcher me like you did Martinez?”
“Not here, not on this island. It is unnecessary. You need a demonstration of my power, and I will give it. Did you realize, for example, that even while we have been having this little chat you have systematically removed every bit of your clothing and now sit there, legs apart, feeling yourself up?”
She started, and looked down at herself, and found it was true. Her clothing was in a heap on the floor. She wanted to stop her self-arousal and pick up the clothes, but found she could not.
“You see? Your mind, as well as your body, belong to me. They are my playthings, to do with as I will. Only your soul, for what that is worth, is yours, for it can be surrendered only voluntarily. So, relax. Don’t fight it because you can not. I have no cause to harm that which I own. Now, down on your knees before me on the floor. There! See?”
Her terror was now absolute, but she couldn’t even faint. She couldn’t do a thing he didn’t tell her to do.
“Now, I wish to know the consignor of the briefase. I wish to know the true employer of Mr. MacDonald.”
“I don’t know,” she answered truthfully, for she could answer no other way to him now. “I know only that it is a pretty big crowd, at least from money and power. Timmons Courier is mostly owned by them, I think. It’s a front for their use. You don’t ask questions and you get big bucks.”
“It is partly owned by Magellan,” the Dark Man told her, “but not entirely, nor is it controlled by Magellan. I wish to know of your past in this company. I want to know where, and to whom, you have delivered things since you joined it two years ago.”