“Yeah,” Steve said.
Gordon nodded. Despite the calm assurances of his friends, he had a hard time believing everything was going to turn out okay.
Chapter Eleven
Early morning. Six-fifteen A.M.
Scott Bradfield and David Bruce made their way through the thick woods to the spot where they’d buried the bum last night. Scott had picked David up at a quarter till six and they’d made the twenty minute ride in silence, each lost in their own thoughts. Scott was pretty sure that when they arrived at the clearing they were going to find it in the state they’d left it in and they came prepared: both boys were carrying shovels and a burlap bag with a change of clothes for school. The burlap bag also contained two coils of rope in case they struck pay dirt and had to tie the dead bum up.
But if the spell didn’t work? “We’ll bury him deeper when we get there,” Scott had said during the few words they exchanged in conversation. “It shouldn’t take long.”
As they rounded the corner of the bend that took them to the clearing, David was a few feet ahead of him. Scott almost bumped into him as David stopped suddenly and said, “Holy shit!”
Scott reached the clearing and felt his stomach plunge into his bowels.
The grave was dug up. Torn pieces of plastic from the garbage bags they’d wrapped the bum in lay discarded in the shallow grave.
The bum was nowhere in sight.
Scott and David ran to the edge of the hole. They looked around, their faces panic-stricken. “What the fuck?” David began.
“It’s an animal,” Scott said, already trying to rationalize it. “It’s gotta be an animal that got him.”
“Then where the hell is he?” David asked. When Scott looked at him he saw a mirror image of how he felt: he was scared shitless.
“We’ll find him. Come on.” Gripping his shovel, Scott headed north, into the woods. Surely an animal wouldn’t have dragged him that far.
“Hold on, look at this,” David called out behind him. Scott stopped, turned back to the clearing. David was standing at the other side of the grave, inspecting the side of the hole. “It looks like he went this way.” David pointed in a direction to Scott’s left.
“What do you mean he went that way?” Scott said. He headed back to the clearing, trying to see what David was pointing at.
“Look at the ground,” David said, motioning toward impressions in the muddy soil. “See how the grass and those weeds are flattened down? He crawled over this way and — ”
“He crawled?” Was he hearing this right? Did David believe that Count Gaines’ spell worked?
“What else do you think?” David asked. He looked at Scott, his features serious, nervous. “Even a possum or a fox couldn’t pull a full grown human corpse out of a hole this shallow. And we don’t have bears in these parts, nor mountain lions. And I’ve done enough tracking while hunting deer with my dad to know when something is dragging itself through the forest.”
For the first time Scott felt a shiver run through him at the very implication.
“Come on.” David headed into the woods, his stance unwavering, determined. Brandishing his shovel like a weapon, he headed into the woods slowly, following the tracks only he could see. Scott cautiously followed behind him, searching the woods all around them for any tell-tale signs that somebody else had been through here: a bent branch, footprints, flattened down weeds or grass. He had no idea what he was looking for. With a heavy feeling of dread, Scott followed David, clutching the shovel tightly in his grip.
When they were fifty yards away from the clearing Scott started to get worried. Surely even if Count Gaines’ spell had worked, the bum couldn’t have gotten that far. Or could he?
As they headed deeper into the woods, David occasionally stopped and searched the area with the gaze of a hawk. Scott stood still each time, keeping his breathing shallow, ears tuned for every sound. He felt an internal timetable ticking away as the minutes passed. They were not going to make the morning weight room workout, which meant Coach Clark, the head football coach, would ride their ass but that was nothing new. Coach Clark was always riding their asses. First period started at eight A.M. sharp, and ditching it was out of the question this late in the game. It was Finals week.
“This way,” David said. He took off in another direction, heading south this time. Scott followed, still tense and wired.
The woods in this part of Lancaster County were thick. Scott had no idea it was so remote here. It was weird to think that modern civilization was only two miles away, yet in here, in the thick of the forest, it felt like being in another world. He wondered why this section of what had to be state game lands was so desolate, why it hadn’t been built up. His dad’s company, Evergreen LLC, was responsible for most of the rural development in Lancaster County these days. In fact, his dad sat on the Spring Valley County Commissioner’s board for development. Whenever a large corporation like Target or Wal-Mart wanted to build a store in the area, representatives from those companies had to pitch the idea to the city. Scott’s father had tremendous influence on the Commissioner’s board for development, and sometimes Scott overheard his father while he was in his office during phone meetings. He couldn’t recall this section of Spring Valley being in discussion and had never ventured to ask. Surely it was owned by the County or the state, right? Scott didn’t think it could be privately owned, but then–
“There’s a farm up ahead,” David said, his voice a low whisper. David had stopped and was looking intently ahead at something through a thick band of trees.
Scott stopped. “Where?”
David pointed. “About a hundred yards away. Looks like a field. Come on.”
As they threaded their way through the thick woods, Scott could make out where the forest ended and the beginning of what appeared to be a farmer’s field. His heart quickened. What if he made it out to the field and some farmer found him?
Later, when they got back to the house and talked about what happened between themselves, and later with Gordon and Steve, Scott would learn that they’d walked almost a half a mile through the forest. But now, as they reached the edge of the forest and Scott saw a figure just breaking through the stand of trees and head into the field, all thoughts of how far they’d come flew from his mind. Scott recognized the lurching figure the moment his eyes rested on him. “That’s him!”
Scott and David ran the last dozen yards through the trees toward the bum, who was lurching toward the field on wobbly legs. As they fell upon him, Scott raised the shovel over his shoulder and brought it down on the man’s back. The blade hit the small of his back and brought him to his knees. “Motherfucker!” Scott tackled him, his knees grinding against the man’s lower back. He was instinctively reaching for his neck to throttle him when David pulled him back.
“No! We gotta restrain him. Help me tie him up!” David was reaching into the burlap bag he’d lugged along and pulled out a coil of rope. He tossed one end to Scott, who caught it one-handed. Then David was on the ground helping Scott tie the dead man up.
It wasn’t until they had the man’s arms bound to his sides and his legs tied together that Scott realized the implications of his blind rage could have gotten him killed. He’d attacked a zombie! What if he’d been bitten?
As David brought the dead man up into a sitting position, Scott warily took stock of the situation. A wave of naseau swept through him and he fought it down. For the first time he was intimately aware of the odor emanating off the man. It was the stink of death.