“I can’t.”
“Yes, you can. You have no choice, Adam. You owe it to your friends. To your wife. It’s time to finish this once and for all.”
“Okay!” Adam shouted. “You win! You’re right. Just leave me the fuck alone!”
Maria ducked down behind the minivan again, gasping. She started to speak, but Levi held his hand up, listening. They waited, but heard nothing.
“Shit,” Maria breathed. “If that didn’t wake anybody up, then nothing will.”
“It didn’t,” Levi said.
“Then this town could sleep through a nuclear bomb attack. Or the Second Coming.”
“Perhaps. Or maybe the Lord is with us.”
Adam started to speak, but they both silenced him. After making sure his outburst hadn’t attracted any late-night attention, they crept out from behind the minivan and snuck across the yard, single-file. The grass was wet with dew and showed traces of their passage. Maria kept glancing at the houses around them, looking for lights, but the homes remained dark and silent.
“Don’t any of these people have dogs?” she whispered.
Levi shrugged.
“I did,” Adam said. “Big Steve. He was my best friend.”
“Where is he now?”
“Hylinus killed him, too.”
They crossed over the second yard and then into the third, darting quickly behind the former woodshed. The corrugated steel structure hid them from the view of the other houses. Now all they had to worry about was someone driving down the alley unexpectedly, or the fire siren going off.
Adam moved to the center of the building’s wall and stood with his back against it. Then, staring at the ground, he counted off twelve paces, putting his feet together, heel to toe. He stopped and crouched down.
“It should be right here. Which one of you brought the shovel?”
Maria and Levi glanced at each other. Levi closed his eyes and shook his head in frustration.
“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Maria whispered. “You didn’t prepare for this?”
“Well, I didn’t know he’d buried it, now, did I?” Levi protested. “We’ll just have to use our hands.”
Kneeling next to Adam, Levi began digging at the earth with his hands. After a moment, Adam joined him. Together, they tore up clumps of sod and tossed aside rocks, then pawed through the softer dirt below. Earthworms wriggled in annoyance, disturbed by the intrusion. They’d only dug about eight inches when their fingers grazed the surface of the cigar box.
“See? I knew I didn’t bury it too deep.”
“I’ll be thankful when I get what we need,” Levi said.
Adam started to dig again, but Levi gently pushed him back.
“Allow me.”
“I can help.”
“I know you can. But trust me, it’s for the better. With all the pain this book has caused you, do you really want to touch it again?”
Adam shook his head, then stood up and wiped his dirty hands on his hospital smock. Levi clawed at the dirt feverishly, throwing it to the side until he could slip his fingers around the edge of the box. Then he hauled it upward and brushed the soil from the lid. He ripped the duct tape away and then opened the box. Inside, just as Adam had told them, was a slim, brown leather book wrapped in a plastic freezer bag. Levi unzipped the bag and held up the book. Maria leaned forward, reading the tiny gold lettering on the front cover:The Long Lost Friend A Collection
of
Mysterious & Invaluable
Arts & Remedies
For
Man As Well As Animals
With Many Proofs Of their virtue and efficacy in healing diseases and defeating spirits, the greater part of which was never published until they appeared in print for the first time in the U.S. in the year of our Lord 1820. By John George Hohman
I N R I
“Wow,” she whispered. “That looks really old.”
Levi flipped it open and glanced at the bottom of the title page.
“It’s a 1916 edition. Not the complete translation, but not as bad as some of the later editions. Certainly better than the abridged versions available on the Internet.”
“Is it worth anything?”
“Quite a bit, actually. An antiquarian book collector would pay several hundred for this. A powwow practitioner would pay even more.”
Holding the book by the front and back covers, he turned it upside down and fanned the pages. Six folded sheets of paper fell out. Levi closed the book and picked them up. He glanced through them quickly, then settled on the final sheet. His eyes glinted in the darkness as he scanned it. Then he smiled.
Maria tried to read over his shoulder, but the words were in another language. She tried to figure out what it was, but couldn’t. The words weren’t typeset. They’d been written by hand. There were also several hand-drawn diagrams and figures. When Maria focused on the drawings, her vision blurred. She chalked the occurrence up to her lack of sleep, and rubbed her eyes. When she opened them again, Levi was folding the sheets of paper again. He tucked them carefully in his shirt pocket.
“The book is valuable,” he repeated. “These pages from Nelson LeHorn’s Daemonolateria are priceless.”
“Can we go now?” Maria asked, shivering in the damp air. “Do we have everything we came for?”
“Oh, yes. This is exactly what we needed. We’ve got one more stop to make, but it will be quick.” Levi stuck his hand out to Adam. “Thank you, Mr. Senft.”
Maria groaned upon hearing of yet another stop.
Adam stared at Levi’s hand for a moment, his expression timid. Then he shook it.
“So this really will help you?”
“You’ve helped me a great deal,” Levi said. “I’ve got one more thing I’d like you to do for me, but we’ll talk about that later. For now, this is enough.”
“What is it?”
Levi walked out into the alley and headed for the car. “Something small. Just some closure. But not now. Like Maria, I’m exhausted. We all are. Let’s talk about it in the morning, after we’ve all had some sleep.”
“But it is morning,” Adam said. “It’s just not light out yet.”
Levi glanced up at the sky. The moon was shrouded in clouds again. The stars seemed dim and cold, and the darkness between them was vast and impenetrable. He turned back to them. His expression was grave, his eyes bloodshot.
“Then let’s just hope that when the dawn arrives in a few hours, it’s not for the last time.”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Levi had Maria drive him back across the river to his home in Marietta. She’d protested. It didn’t make sense, driving all the way to Lancaster County at this time of night, especially when they were currently at the far southern end of York County. But Levi said there were items he needed for the confrontation. Reluctantly, she conceded. When they finally arrived, Levi grabbed his wicker basket and got out of the car. He asked her to wait while he went inside. She’d wondered aloud why they couldn’t just sleep at his place and then go to the Ghost Walk. He didn’t explain his reasons, but Levi was adamant that she and Adam couldn’t come inside. He offered to let her wait outside on the porch, but insisted that they not cross the threshold. Fuming, Maria told him to hurry up.
They waited in the car. Maria seethed, fighting to stay awake. Adam snored softly in the backseat, still dressed in his sweat-soaked hospital clothes, now covered with dirt and grass clippings. She was amazed. In the space of a few hours, he’d escaped from a mental hospital, seen a black magic spell almost backfire, tasted freedom, been confronted with his past, and had a near nervous breakdown in his former hometown. Despite this, he’d fallen asleep soon after they’d retrieved the book, and had slept undisturbed ever since. Like a baby—innocent and carefree.