Dark Corner Part 39

"Spoken like a true brother afraid of commitment." Pearl laughed again. She took his hands in her small fingers. "Blessings to you, David Hunter."

He kissed her on the cheek, then walked down the porch steps. The chief's car idled at the mouth of the driveway. They would follow him to police headquarters.

"What were you two gabbing about?" Nia said.

"Oh, nothing, really." David s.h.i.+fted into drive. "I was thanking her for helping us"

"That's all, huh?" Nia said.

"That's all." He rolled down the driveway.

"So why are you grinning like that?"

He winked. "Wouldn't you love to know?"

As they turned off the gravel path and onto the road, a c.o.c.ker spaniel with a mud-spattered coat dashed across the street and burrowed into the thick bushes that flanked the road.

David's smile slipped away.

"Are you thinking the same thing as I am?" Nia said. Worry clouded her eyes.

"Yeah," he said. "We're being watched."

Back at the police station, his head ready to blow up from everything Pearl had told them, Jackson threw the town's machinery into high gear.

Upon arriving at the office, he'd hoped, in vain, to see Dudu's cruiser in the parking lot, and his deputy inside, lanky legs propped on his desk as he flipped through one of his silly tabloids. But the deputy was not there. Jackson made a mental note to return to the Mason place later to retrieve Dudu's patrol car. He sure wasn't looking forward to that trip.

He settled behind his desk and began to work the phone. As he made calls, David, Nia, and Jahlil sat around a table and brainstormed the design of an informational flyer that they could distribute throughout the town.

Jackson spoke to the mayor, Cleotis Davis; Reverend Brown, pastor of New Life Baptist, the biggest church in town; the Chester County sheriff, Johnny Chaser; and then Dr. Green. He was amazed at how easily he got in touch with everyone. For once, things seemed to be going their way.

"All right, folks," he said to the others. "Everyone'll be here in an hour. Looks like the show's on the road"

"It better be, it's already past noon," Nia said. "I checked the paper. The sun sets around eight-fifteen. We have a lot to do in only eight hours, and time is flying."

"Hey, everyone, check this out," Jahlil said. He watched the small TV that stood on the deputy's desk.

Jackson, David, and Nia came behind Jahlil. It was the local weather program. A severe thunderstorm was gradually rumbling toward the area.

It would reach them by nightfall.

Part Three.

FRIGHT NIGHT.

When the webs of the spider join, they can trap a lion.

-Ethiopian proverb.

The hunter knows his prey.

-Nilotic proverb.

No matter how long the night, the day is sure to come.

-Zairean proverb.

Chapter 16.

*he emergency town meeting was scheduled to begin at four J o'clock, but people did not begin filing into New Life Baptist Church until twenty minutes after four.

Even in the middle of something like this, folks are on Colored People Time, David thought, and could not repress a rueful smile. He and Nia sat together in a pew near the back of the sanctuary. He remembered when he had visited the church only a week ago. What a difference a few days could make. He had entered a strange new world.

The past few hours had been busy. They'd had a meeting at the police station with the town's leaders, and they had convinced them that they faced a citywide health crisis that demanded immediate action; they accomplished this without stating the word, "vampire" David shared Chief Jackson's sentiment that without proof, no one would believe their farfetched story of supernatural beasts roaming Mason's Corner. They offered the leaders the more palatable theory of a fastspreading, rabieslike virus that afflicted canines and humans. Dr. Green, Franklin's physician, supported the idea, which helped his comrades fall into line. Together, they outlined a simple but effective plan that they would roll out to the residents in the town meeting.

To notify everyone of the afternoon's discussion, David, Nia, Jahlil, and his friend, Poke, had traveled throughout town distributing hundreds of flyers that Nia had designed and printed at Kinko's. Due to the Labor Day holiday, most people were home, fortunately, and received the information. The flyers announced the meeting time, location, and topic, which was, "Health Emergency in Mason's Corner: What You Must Do Now." The flyer stressed the critical importance of attending the meeting, but for those who were unable to attend, Jackson had arranged a hot line-a voice message on his cell phone-in which he outlined the basics of the threat and what residents must do to ensure their safety. Again, they avoided mention of the word, "vampire."

David hoped that they were not doing the townspeople a disservice by concealing the true nature of the crisis. He was eager to hear what people would say at the meeting when the floor opened for discussion. Undoubtedly, others had witnessed things that defied explanation. Diallo and his clan had been busy lately.

Their last task had been stockpiling tools and weapons. They had a war ahead of them and could not wade into battle unarmed. They had delved into their collective resources and prepared the best they could. David only hoped it would be enough.

He checked his watch: 4:25. It was about four hours until nightfall, and they still had a great deal to accomplish.

A steady stream of people flowed into the church. David recognized many faces. Several folks greeted him as they filed past.

Reverend Brown had volunteered his church as the meeting location. The sanctuary could seat about three hundred, and could accommodate more if the pews grew full and people had to stand.

David and the others had placed a second flyer on the seats. This particular flyer outlined the fundamentals of what was going on, and the action plan. s.n.a.t.c.hes of conversation floated his way. People were reading the doc.u.ment and speculating.

An hour ago, he had called the hospital to check on Franklin. Ruby said he was asleep and had not awakened since they had visited him that morning. David cautioned her to be careful, but he knew she would never leave her husband-even if he attacked her in an inhuman frenzy.

He s.h.i.+vered.

"Why hasn't Mama come yet?" Nia looked around. "I asked her to be here at four. She's never late."

"I'm sure she's on her way," David said.

"I hope so. I'm going to call her if she isn't here in five minutes."

At the front of the church, Chief Jackson, the mayor, the county sheriff, Dr. Green, and Reverend Brown sat in a row of tall chairs in the chancel. Jackson read his watch, glanced at the other leaders, and they nodded.

Jackson approached the pulpit. He cleared his throat, raised the microphone closer to his lips.

"All right, folks. Thanks for coming to this meeting on short notice and on your holiday. I 'spect more folks will be coming in, but we got to get started. We're facing something I ain't never seen in this town, and I've been here in Dark Corner all my life, like a lot of you.

"Let me run down the basics for you ..

Junior Hodges sat in a middle pew, fidgeting. He wore his overalls and boots, and he felt out of place coming to church dressed as he was, though no one else was dressed in their Sunday best, either. Mama had taught him that whenever you entered the house of the Lord, you had to wear the best clothes you could afford. Junior owned a navy blue suit that he'd worn for years, but the woman, Nia, who pressed the flyer in his hand while he was cutting gra.s.s told him that this wasn't a wors.h.i.+p service, it was a town meeting, and he could come dressed as he was. He took her suggestion, but he felt uncomfortable, anyway. Especially with Reverend Brown sitting up there.

Junior read the flyer he'd picked up from the seat. It talked about a "health emergency," a virus, and how dogs and people seemed to be the ones that caught it. You could get infected if a sick dog bit you, or if a person who had the illness bit you, too. The ones who were sick were in so much pain that they might hurt you, the paper said. If you knew someone who seemed to be acting sick lately, who was sleeping all the time and not leaving the house, you were supposed to write their name on a list that would be pa.s.sed around. Those people would then get "proper medical care," whatever that meant.

Junior knew at least five people who were sick. Vicky Queen was one of them. Earlier, he'd visited her house to offer to trim her hedges, something he did every now and then, and her mama answered the door. Her mama said Vicky was sick and in the bed. Junior cut the hedges anyway, for free. It made him feel better.

What worried Junior most of all was that he had the feeling that this health emergency had something to do with the work he and Andre had done at the Mason place. Nothing had been right in the town since they'd dug open that cave. Maybe they'd let out the virus. The scary man in black seemed like the sort of fella who was up to no good.

The pews were filling up. He didn't see Andre, or his father. The last time Junior had seen Pa, his father was sleeping off a hangover at home, and Andre ... well, he didn't know where he was. Probably somewhere getting high.

Junior returned his attention to Chief Jackson. The chief was running down the stuff on the flyer.

". . . trying to keep this in layman's terms, see," the chief said. "We've got Doc Green here if you want him to lay it out for you with big medical words. Like I said, we think it's a virus, like rabies. Get it when you get bit. Dogs are running around doing the biting, but people might bite you too, if they've been bit and got infected. They're sick and ain't themselves . .

A teenage girl who sat near Junior was frowning.

"It sounds kinda like vampires, doesn't it?" she said.

"Sure does," Junior said, and thought again of the man in black. He felt a chill. "Just like vampires."

Emma Mae Taylor allowed her sister, Lillie, to drag her to the town meeting. Earlier, she'd banged on Emma's door like she'd lost her mind, then shoved a green flyer in her face.

"If you got any sense, you'll go to this," Lillie had said. "You need to come outta that house from up under that man and learn about the evil that's running through this town"

"I got me some gardening to do," Emma said. She'd gotten one of those flyers about the medical whatever happening in town. Some meddling fool had slid it under her door, and Emma had skimmed it, then thrown it away. Emergency? Please, it was all a matter of perspective. She didn't let things get under her skin like most people did. She was cool.

"Emma, you come outta there or I'ma drag you out," Lillie said. Her eyes narrowed. "I'm sick and tired of you not caring what's going on here. You need to learn for your own good and for that man you so crazy 'bout."

"All right, all right, I'll go! d.a.m.n, you a pain in the a.s.s. Let me fix my hair." Emma spun away from the door, not bothering to invite Lillie inside. Lillie was a cleaning freak and would start criticizing Emma about cleaning her house, and Emma didn't feel like hearing it.

After she fixed her hair, she checked on Blood. He'd been under the weather all day. She was sure it was because some mutt had bitten him last night when he was leaving the bar. She'd taken him to the emergency room, to get a rabies shot; afterward, the doctor had wanted Blood to stay there, but Blood hated hospitals and begged Emma to take him home. She couldn't say no to him, so she brought him home against the doctor's protests. Since then, Blood had been running a slight fever and sleeping like a log.

Medical emergency, she thought, with a pang of anxiety. She didn't like leaving him alone in the house.

"We gonna stay at this meeting one hour, and that's it," Emma said to Lillie, coming outside. "I got to get back, I got things to do ""

"Where's Blood?" Lillie said. "He needs to come, too"

"Aww, he's got a hangover and he's sleeping it off"

"Hmph, I ain't surprised," Lillie said. Emma let her snide remark pa.s.s. Blood's condition was none of her sister's business. Lillie ran her mouth too d.a.m.n much.

Now she sat beside Lillie in the church (where she hadn't been since Mama had died, eight years ago), as Chief Jackson explained what was happening. A virus, pa.s.sed by a bite from a dog, or a person. Now that was some upsetting s.h.i.+t. Emma couldn't stop thinking about Blood.

"... we gonna set up a special area in the hospital, to keep all the folks that's been bit," the chief said. "Kinda like a quarantine. We need to put 'em there so we can keep an eye on them, make sure they're getting the care they need, make sure the infection don't spread, too. So if anybody's in your house who's been bit, we want you to fill out the sheet that we're pa.s.sing 'round. And if your neighbor or friend's been bit, we wanna know that, too. Doc Green's crew is gonna come pick them up and take them to the hospital . . ."

A paper attached to a clipboard was thrust in front of Emma. At least a half-dozen names were scribbled on the list. They were all people that she knew. d.a.m.n.

But Blood didn't want to stay in a hospital, and she wasn't going to make him. h.e.l.l, how did she know what was really going on? They might be planning to operate on them folks that got taken into quarantine, or they might pump some kinda drugs into them. It could be the government running biological weapons experiments or some s.h.i.+t. She didn't trust these people. She'd keep Blood at home and take care of him herself.

Pressing her lips together, she pa.s.sed the clipboard to Lillie.

Nia had not seen her mother enter the church. It was not like Mama to be late, and Mama would never miss something as important as this meeting, if for no other reason than it would give her some fresh gossip to spread to her friends.

"I'm going to go outside and call Mama," she whispered to David. "She still isn't here"

"Are you sure?" he said. "There's a couple hundred people in here, she could've slipped in when you weren't looking"

"I'm positive. I'll be right back."

At the pulpit, Dr. Green had come to stand beside Chief Jackson and was delivering his jargon-filled theory of the "virus" He sounded so convincing and knowledgeable that Nia would have believed him herself if she had not seen the vampires with her own eyes.

In the lobby, Nia used her cell phone to call her house. The phone rang five times, then the answering machine picked up. Nia ended the call, and tried again. Still no answer.

She looked through the lobby's gla.s.s doors and at the parking lot, which was full of cars. She did not see her mother's green Chrysler.

Maybe Mama was on her way. But the church was only three minutes away from the house. Mama could've left home and arrived there in the time that Nia had been standing in the lobby. There was never any traffic to speak of in Mason's Corner-unless it was a funeral procession.

Her gut spasmed.

As she debated her next move, David pushed through the wooden sanctuary doors.

"Is everything okay?" he said.

"Mama's not answering the phone. I'm worried."

"You want to swing by the house to check?"

"Yes, but you can't leave, David. Jackson needs you here. Remember our plan."

"Yeah" David bit his lip.

"It's daylight," she said. "I'll be okay. I'll have my cell, and you're wearing yours, too. I'll call you if anything happens"

'Be careful." He handed her the keys to the Pathfinder.

"I'll hurry back, promise."

She kissed him quickly, then rushed outside.