TEN

NO WAY TO DIE IS ANY GOOD

For Muscadine John, the night was a friend. Maybe the night was his only friend, now that Old Mack Tucker and Salty Reese were dead.

At least he thought Mack Tucker was dead. Tucker had missed their meeting at the campground under the railroad trestle three miles south of Latrobe, and asking around about the man, Muscadine John had learned from a sallow-looking 'bo named Wintzell that Mack had fallen from a northbound freight only a week earlier, outside Charleston, West Virginia.

"Yeah," Wintzell had said as he rolled a cigarette between browned fingers, "I seen it happen. Frail old man, he was.

Couldn't've stood the road much longer, any ways." Light from the cooking fire touched his face. It looked like the leather pouch he carried his tobacco in. "He was up jumpin' and dancin' around, don't you see? Happy, like. Said he was headin' up toward where he was born and he was goin' to see some old friends, Anyways, he slipped.

Fell right out through the door, and us burnin' the tracks at fifty, fifty-five miles an hour. Sharp gravel bed, too. We jumped up and looked out, tried to see him, but by then we was on around a curve, and it was too dark, anyways."

For a long time Muscadine John said nothing; he stroked his long silver beard and sat staring into the fire, his legs crossed in front of him. Across the foliage surrounded campground the other 'boes played cards or talked quietly, catching up on stories or mapping out rail road routes. "You sure his name was Tucker?" Muscadine John asked finally.

"Tucker?". Wintzell narrowed his eyes in thought. He scratched the bridge of a nose that had once been badly broken and never properly set. "Now wait a minute. Wait just a minute. Tucker, you say? Well, I think this here fellow's name was Tuckey. Or maybe it was Tucker, now I'm thinking of it."

There was no use in trying to match a description because Mack Tucker had looked different every time his and Muscadine John's paths had crossed. Once the older man had sported thick white hair and a walrus mustache; the next time John had seen him, Mack had shaved his head bald and had grown a stringy goatee. So there was no way to know the real fate - death on the tracks? small-town jail? vagrants' work farm? - of Old Mack Tucker. All Muscadine John knew was that the man had failed to show at that particular connection point for the first time in seven years.

Which saddened him, because he knew that friends were few and hard to come by, and there would probably be no more real ones in his life.

He talked of the road with the other 'boes gathered around the fire; he was heading up into New England, he told them, and then probably over toward the Lakes.

You goin' northeast from here?" a lean, taut-jawed man named Dan asked.

"That's right. Up through Pennsylvania."

"Uh-huh." Dan chewed on a weed and seemed to be examining him; he seemed intrigued by the battered olive-green Army surplus knapsack John carried with him, and John made a mental note to sleep on the opposite side of the camp from this man. "You best watch yourself," Dan said quietly.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"No offense. Just thinkin' about something I heard once. You movin' up into the state kinda reminds me of it." He glanced around the ring of hollow-eyed men. "Any of you know Mike Hooker?

Tommy Jessup?"

"Heard of Jessup," one of them said. "Four fingers, they called him."

"'That's him," Dan said, nodding. "Crossed their paths right here, two, three years ago. They were takin' the route up to Maine.

Had big plans. Hooker was goin' into the lumberin' business with his brother-in-law. I sat right here and talked to them and wished them good luck, and then they were gone. And by God that's the last anybody ever heard of 'em."

"Law?" Muscadine John asked.

Dan shrugged. "Nobody knows. I mean, hell, it was funny.

Sooner or later you hear tales on the road of just about everybody you know. You listen and you pass 'em on. But in all that time nobody knows what's happened to Hooker and Jessup. They're just...gone."

"Same with Perkins Casey," said a younger man with longish brown hair as he rolled a cigarette, tucked it, and licked it. "Good old fellow, too. He was moving cross country through Pennsylvania last time I saw him, maybe eight mouths ago. I've asked around about him, but...well..." He shrugged and was silent.

Firelight played across the faces of the listening men. Someone coughed, and someone else tipped up a bottle that glinted orange.

"Yeah," Dan said. "I'll tell you men what I hear. And I hear it from more men than one or two, men who ain't scared of the law, either. Tough, smart men. there's a place up northeast of here swallows 'boes whole. That's what they say, and you can laugh if you like, but I know what I hear. Little town by the name of...I don't know, Brittany or somethin' like that. Swallows 'boes up. You go through there, you don't come out again."

"Ain't Brittany," another man said from where he sat on a stump. "It's a funny name. Bostany. Bostany's...Sin."

"Sin?" John raised furry eyebrows. "Seems like I've heard of that place somewhere before."

"Well, listen to what you hear," Dan told him. "If I were you, goin' up that way, I'd stay plenty. far from there. Got some bad-assed troopers hang their hats around those parts, too."

"Hey," one of the others said, "we got some hot cards over here getting cold. You men going to spin tall tales or you want in on a matchstick pot?'

All this Muscadine John remembered at the same time he remembered that the night was his friend. It protected and shielded him, and he preferred traveling when it was cooler, when the night birds were singing hobo lullabies. The midnight breezes nestled against him, and the weight of the knapsack - filled with an odd assortment of rags, shirts, socks, an extra pair of shoes, a red golfing cap he'd found on the side of the road, a couple of empty muscadine wine bottles - was familiar and reassuring rather than cumbersome.

He wore his road uniform: black, threadbare trousers, sneakers with dirty laces, a Coors Beer T-shirt, won in a beer-drinking contest in a California bar and one of his proudest possessions. His silver hair was still luxuriant on the sides of his head but had almost disappeared from the top; he took pains to keep his long beard looking good. He combed it and washed it whenever necessary, and it never failed to get comments most everywhere he traveled, which had been many times across the face of the United States and twice into Mexico.

Walking northeast along a narrow Somerset County road, Muscadine John stared into the face of darkness and wondered where he was. He'd seen only a few cars going south in the past three hours, and he'd seen no road signs at all. There was a map somewhere in that knapsack, but he didn't want to take the time to find it. The road unfolded at its own speed; he knew that from experience. Overhead, the sky was a canopy of stars, some bright, some distant, like memories. The moon lay over his right shoulder, as if protecting him, and he could see the faint outline of his moon-shadow walking ahead of him on the concrete. On all sides lay a thick black blanket of forest, and from it Muscadine John could hear a dozen different kinds of noises: shrill bird cries, crickets sawing, small nocturnal animals skulking through thicket. His own footfalls were all but silent, and as he walked he felt himself truly part of the night world, a passing shadow, perhaps, the rustle of the breeze through leafy branches, the chirruping of insects bedded down in high roadside weeds. In another hour or so he would find a spot off in the forest to sleep, and then, in the morning, maybe he could scout out some good neighbor who would part with fifty cents or directions to the nearest soup kitchen.

He had taken three more steps when he froze. His heart leaped, beating furiously, and his eyes widened involuntarily.

Perhaps twenty yards ahead, a figure stood at the side of the road, framed against the outreaching arms of the trees. Muscadine John stood motionless, eyes narrowing slightly to see better in the darkness. The figure did not move.

He took a tentative step forward. Then another.

Jesus God," he muttered after another moment. "Damned eyes are shot to hell." He rubbed them and looked again at the roadside sign. It had appeared briefly as a tall, gaunt human being, and the sight of it had sent a cold chill up John's back. Now he muttered under his breath at his stupidity and neared the sign. He dug in a pocket for a book of matches and lit one; it blew out, and he lit another to read the white lettering: COLVER - 2. ELMORA - 7.

BETHANY'S SIN - 9. Never been through Colver, he told himself; might be a friendly little town. Have to see. His eyes dropped to the last name. Bethany's Sin. Heard of that one somewhere, haven't I?

Yeah, somewhere. And then it came to him like the rush of blood to his face after a three-day drunk. Around the hobo campfire. What Dan had said. Place swallows 'boes up. Stay away from there. Bad place. He ran the back of his hand across his mouth, still staring at the name. The match went out. He flicked it to the side and continued walking, a little faster now, not knowing why but remembering what Dan had said and the way that man's eyes had looked dark and strange when he'd said it. Maybe it was time to bed down for the night, get an early start with the birds.

He'd walked perhaps another mile when he decided to make camp, and he pushed his way off into a maze of trees and sharp thornbeds in search of a hidden clearing. No use letting the troopers see his coffee fire. As he walked he thought of Mack Tucker. He hoped the man wasn't dead; he hoped they'd meet again somewhere, but if he was dead, John wished him well in that next and better world. But that would be a bad way to go: head cracked open on stones and the brains oozing out as a freight howled lamentations above the corpse. His mind sheered away from that thought. No way to die was any good.

Muscadine John glanced back. The road was gone, hidden by dense foliage. He smelled the sweet green smell of the woods, of the rough tree bark, of the charcoal black sky with glittering diamonds strewn across it. He continued deeper into the forest, thorns catching at his shirt and trousers.

And then he stopped; he cocked his head to one side, listening.

His eyes glittered.

He'd heard something strange.Something distant; The echo of a noise. But from what direction it had come he couldn't be certain.

The high, shrill cry of...sure, he knew that sound. An eagle.

Hunting.

And that was funny, Muscadine John thought, because there weren't a lot of eagles in this part of the country. And they didn't hunt in darkness.

He listened, his ears burning, but the sound did not repeat itself.

He moved on, only dimly aware that the palms of his hands were wet.

In a few more minutes he thought he heard it again, but he couldn't be sure if it was his imagination. Yet it sounded nearer, over to his right. He turned toward the left, pushing aside thicket. A thorn scraped across his forearm, drawing a thread of blood. "Shit!" he said.

Another eagle cry. Or was it? Damn it to hell, John thought; I can't tell. I hear it, but I can't tell where it's comin' from. He was facing into the moon now, and that white orb burned down on him as if he were struggling in the heat of a searchlight. He glanced up at it, realizing that tonight the man in the moon looked more like a woman. Too bad about Old Mack; too damned bad. Woods are plenty thick. Maybe I'd better get my ass back to the road. What do you say, old-timer? A cry catching in the night breezes, closer now, much closer; moving over his head and gone. His flesh crawled, and he abruptly stopped pushing through the brush. Yeah. Get back to the road, troopers or no. Go on, right now. He turned, lighting his shirt free of thorns, and struggled back the way he'd come; he thought he could feel the touch of the moon, soft and hot, on the back of his neck. He shrugged it off.

Damn these friggin' woods, he thought. I'll take my chances on the road. That fella Dan was probably crazy. Bethany's Sin. What kind of a name for a place was that? What the hell did that fella Dan know, anyway? He craned his neck, looking for the familiar ribbon of concrete. A clump of high foliage stood before him, dark and shapeless.

He stepped forward.

And realized too late.

It was not foliage, no. Not foliage, but -

In the next instant something roared a challenge that almost shattered his eardrums and .made him stagger backward, his heart beating in cold, absolute terror. The thing leaped forward, rising, rising on muscle-corded rear legs, its front legs pawing the sky; moonlight glittered off piston like hooves and from red, distended eyes on either side of a massive, triangular head.

Muscadine John's nerves screamed. A horse. A god-awful huge, solid-black horse.

And something more terrible astride it.

A human figure, one hand in the short-cropped mane. The eyes staring at him fixedly from a shadowy face: eyes of burning electric blue that uncapped the terror boiling within John's throat and drove out the scream that ripped at his vocal cords. He spun around, his flesh tingling. Another dark shape. Another. Another. And more, ringing him in. All of them with eyes like furnaces, burning now beyond blue to a hideous, terrible white-hot hatred. Gossamer robes billowed about the bodies, colored silver by the moonlight, and in that instant John knew he had stepped into a place where time stood still, and if he could somehow break free of that ring and run for the road, it might not be there, nor would Colver or Elmora. There were human-seeming forms astride those huge black horses, but they were not human. No, not human anymore. But things of nightmarish evil and hideous intent.

John's foot caught in a tree root; he staggered and fell, pulled down finally by the weight of the knapsack. Empty bottles clinked together. He held out his arms for mercy, crouched on his knees, sweat rising in beads on his face, and all of them reflecting the moon as they rolled down and glistened in his beard. His heart hammered.

Around him the riders were silent, but the horses rumbled like the thunder of storms worlds away. The eyes, unblinking, scorched his soul.

He searched for his voice, found it in a deep cavern within himself. "Who...are you?" he whispered. "Who are you?"

They said nothing. He could hear them breathing.

"Please," he said, his voice cracking now. "I'm just an old man.

I don't...want to hurt nobody." His outstretched arms were trembling.

"I don't want no trouble," he said.

And it was then that the figure behind Muscadine John leaned slightly forward; one arm dashed out, leaving a trail of bright and brittle blue, the color of raw, unchained power.

John felt the hot sear of pain, and a tremor rocked his body. He gritted his teeth, and tears trickled from his eyes. He heard water running. Peed myself, he thought; fuck in' peed myself. But no. It wasn't that. It was the blood running from the stump where his right hand had been. The full impact of the pain hadn't reached his brain yet.

Another figure raised its ax; moonlight burned on the killing edge. The blade fell with a hissing, metallic sound. Muscadine John's right arm fell off at the elbow. He found himself staring at the threads of flesh and the ghostly white, wet glimmer of bone. His hand clutched air a few feet away. And it was then, as the sick heat set fire to his veins and nerves and the marrow of his bones, as his mouth opened and his eyes bulged from their sockets, that his scream filled the night like the sound of a wounded and dying animal. An ax fell.

The stump of his right shoulder gushed thick, glimmering red blood. Red rain spattered the trees. Muscadine John's body trembled as if touched by an electric wire; he saw their eyes on him and he knew he must get to his feet, must get to his feet and run, run, run for the highway. Screaming in horror and pain, he staggered up and forward, off balance, then fell against the side of one of the horses and down into a clump of spined thorns. The things turned toward him, their axes rising. He ran for his life, tripping, screaming, staggering from tree to tree; but they were only footfalls behind him, slowed by the dense foliage but not slowed enough. Bleeding.

Bleeding too much. Oh God oh sweet Jesus God bleeding too much put hand in that socket hold the veins oh God bleeding too much JESUS HELP ME BLEEDING BLEEDING TOO MUCH...!

They guided their horses expertly around the trees and the thicker growth; their faces were split by moon light and shadow, and their fingers were clamped like vises around the hafts of their glowing axes.

He tripped again, almost fell, but caught himself. His legs were weakening; there was a buzzing in his brain and a numbness that had claimed more of him with each step. One side of the knapsack dragged because there was no arm to secure the strap. And then he turned his head, sweat burning on his face, to see them.

And it was then that the thing just behind him bent down and, with an almost effortless blow, cleaved the head from the fleeing, bloodied body of the man. It sailed out into the night, turning over and over, the silver beard catching moonlight, the eyes staring and seeing nothing. The body staggered on, jerking crazily, and in another second crumpled down in a gore-splattered mass of rags.

With eaglelike screeches of hatred and vengeance, the things urged their horses forward. Hooves pounded the body into a bone-crushed jelly. One of them found the head, and it shattered like a porcelain bowl that had held a wine-soaked sponge. For almost ten minutes the things screamed and their mounts danced the dance of the death-giver, and when they were finished, nothing was recognizable except a battered, split-seamed Army surplus knapsack.

With one final, chilling cry they turned their horses northward and slipped into the forest like wraiths. For a long time after they had gone, no animal in the forest dared move, and even the insects sensed the quick, consuming presence of ax-wielding Evil.

In the sky the moon hung as mute witness. Very slowly it began to sink toward the horizon as gray light crept over the rim of the world. A few trucks passed on the road, heading for distant cities to the north that might have been eons away from the forest surrounding Bethany's Sin.

And in the forest the flies gathered for a feast.