In her trailer, Santha continued Billy’s education. An hour later, he was as weak as water, and she was pressed as close to him as a second skin. Through the dim haze of sleep, Billy could hear Buck Edger’s hammer, striking metal again and again out on the darkened midway. He lay awake, listening, until Santha stirred and kissed him deeply and sweetly.
“I wish things could stay like this,” Billy said after a moment.
Santha sat up. A match flared as she lit a cigarette; in its glow she looked beautiful and childlike. “What are you going to do after the fair’s over?”
“I’m going down to Mobile with Dr. Mirakle, driving his equipment truck for him. Then… I guess I’ll go back to Hawthorne. It’s been a good summer. I don’t think I’ll ever forget it. Or you.”
She ran her fingers through his hair and then said, “Hey! I know what would be real nice! A hot shower! We can just about both fit into the stall, and we can get real soapy and slippery and…ooh, I’m tinglin’ just thinkin’ about it! Okay?”
“Sure,” he said, thrilled.
“One hot shower, comin’ up!” Santha rose up from the bed and, still naked, went to the tiny bathroom. She reached in and flipped on the light. “I’ll call you when I’m ready,” she said, and giggled like a schoolgirl. Then she went inside and shut the door.
Billy was sitting up. His heartbeat had quickened, and there was a sick sensation in the pit of his stomach. He wasn’t sure, wasn’t sure at all, but just for an instant—as Santha had been silhouetted in the bathroom light—he though he’d seen a pale gray haze around her. An alarm went off in the back of his head, and he climbed out of the bed to approach the bathroom.
Santha, her body rosy, reached in through the green-plastic shower curtain and turned on the hot water. It sprayed downward into the tub, but instead of the sound of water against porcelain there was a different sound—a wet, thickened noise. Santha drew aside the curtain and looked into the tub.
The water was hitting a large burlap bag, drawn closed at the top. She reached for it even as Billy said, “Santha?” from just outside the door.
She pulled at the bag. It came open. It was very heavy, and wouldn’t slide.
“Santha?”
And then a triangular head with blazing eyes shot out of the burlap bag, the nightmarish thing stretching high through the hot-water fog. Santha threw her arms up instinctively, but the cobra struck her on the cheek and she slammed backward against the wall, striking her head on the tiles. Her scream gurgled away as she pitched forward, her legs dangling over the tub, the scalding water beating down on her exposed back.
Billy burst through the door, barely able to see because of the rising fog. The cobra came flashing out of it toward him. He jerked his head back, and the fangs missed him by bare inches. It was uncoiling out of the tub. Billy saw that Santha was being burned, and he reached forward to grasp her ankles. The cobra hissed, its hood spreading wide, and struck at him again. He backed away. The cobra reared up over four feet, watching him with its terrible baleful gaze as steam filled the bathroom.
Billy was still naked, but he didn’t think about his clothes. He ran to the door, threw aside the bolt, and tried to push it open…but it wouldn’t budge. He slammed his shoulder against it, and heard the rattle of a lock in the clasp. But Santha had taken off the lock when they’d come in! He realized, then, what must’ve happened: the snakeman had gotten in here and put that cobra in the bathroom hours ago, to kill them both, and then while they were sleeping he’d put one of his own locks through the clasp. He hammered against the door, and shouted for help.
Steam was rolling out into the room. He fumbled with the lamp, knocked it to the floor, bent and found the switch. The low, harsh light spread out in irregular rays, and Billy saw the cobra winding out through the bathroom door in what looked like foot after foot. It reared up again, its gaze fixed on him, and now Billy could hear Santha’s low, terrified moaning. The cobra hissed and slithered forward, trying to defend its newfound territory.
Billy backed up against the dresser. He opened the drawer, threw aside lipsticks and makeup until his hand closed on the chrome-plated pistol. When he turned, the cobra was only a few feet away from him, its head weaving back and forth. Billy picked up a pillow from the bed, and suddenly the cobra darted forward; its head hit the pillow with the force of a man’s fist. He aimed the pistol and squeezed the trigger, but nothing happened. The safety was on! The snake was motionless, its tongue flickering out as it watched him. Billy would have to drop the pillow and push back the safety with his free hand. The cobra was still within striking range, and Billy had backed up as far as he could.
Someone hammered at the door. The cobra’s head whipped to one side, toward the vibrations, and Billy threw the pillow at it with a guttural shout. He flicked off the safety, and the pistol was ready as the cobra’s head started to wiggle free from beneath the pillow. Billy fired at it—one, two, three, four, five. The air stank of powder, and now the cobra was twisting madly, its head almost severed from the thick body. It started to rise, but the mangled head was out of control and the body snapped and writhed, the tail clenching around one leg of the dresser. Billy stood over the thing, and stretched his arm down. He had a glimpse of one single terrible eye, burning to his soul, and then the head exploded with the force of the sixth bullet. The body continued to jerk.
The door burst open, and two men who came in recoiled from the sight of the writhing snake. Billy was already in the steamy bathroom, pulling Santha out of the hot water, her back was a mass of blisters, and she was sobbing hysterically. He saw the snakebite, and saw the gray aura darkening. “Call an ambulance!” he shrieked to the men. “Hurry! The snake bit her!”
They wrapped her up in a sheet, and Billy straggled into his pants. A knot of people had gathered outside the trailer, trying to find out what had happened. When the ambulance came, Billy told the attendants that Santha had been bitten by a cobra, and if they didn’t hurry she was going to die. He watched them roar away, and he heard someone say that the police were on their way.
He realized he still held the pistol. He went back into the trailer, avoiding the blood and mess, and found another box of bullets in the dresser drawer. He loaded the pistol, and then walked out through the gawking carnival people toward the midway. He could hear approaching sirens, but their noise neither increased his pace nor slowed him. As he passed the Octopus, he imagined he heard a high shriek of laughter. Buck Edgers, hammer still in his hand, looked up from his work through dark-circled, disturbed eyes. Billy paid him no attention. His heart was pounding, a fever of revenge burning in his brain as he reached the Killer Snakes sideshow and flicked the safety off his pistol. He pushed at the entranceway and was not surprised when the door—the reptile’s mouth—noiselessly opened.
“Come out of there, you bastard!” Billy shouted.
Darkness lay thickly within. Nothing moved, but Billy thought he could hear the soft slidings of the man’s pets. “I said come out, or I’ll drag you out!” He aimed the gun into the darkness. “I’ve got a gun, you bastard!”
He steeled himself and stepped into the darkness, his hand almost melded to the pistol. “I’ve got a gun!” he warned, tensing for an expected attack. Nothing moved, and now he could see the vague shapes of the cages, set in orderly rows. A few feet away and above, a light bulb caught a speck of reflected light; Billy reached up, found the switch and turned it on. The bulb flickered, slightly swinging back and forth to throw huge and distorted shadows.
A short, balding man in a brown suit was lying on his back, on a mattress at the rear of the place. His hands were clamped around the grayish green boa constrictor that had strangled him to death. His glasses were off, and his face was bluish white. There was a note safety-pinned to the man’s checked shirt. Billy approached the body, and ripped the note away. It said MURDER MURDER MURDER MURDER MURDER. And then, at the bottom: SUICIDE. Billy stared at it, wondering what madness had prompted this man to wrap the
boa around his own throat and lie down to die. He returned the note to the body, where the police could find it, and then a wave of anguish crashed over him. He’d seen a gray aura enveloping Santha, not a black one: what did it mean? Tears searing his eyes, he left the sideshow and looked out to where he could see red and blue police lights spinning amid the trailers.
A cool breeze had kicked up, breaking his flesh into goose-bumps. Bits of paper wheeled along the midway, spinning in miniature tornadoes. Billy’s cold gaze fell upon the Octopus. Buck Edgers was working like a machine.
“Billy? My God, what’s going on!” Dr. Mirakle, in an old undershirt and his pajama bottoms, had staggered out of the truck parked behind the Ghost Show, next to the Volkswagen van. His eyes were swollen with heavy sleep, and he exuded the aroma of bourbon. He looked down at the pistol and stopped. “Billy?”
“It’s all right. They took Santha to the hospital. The cobra bit her, it was there in the bathtub when she…” His voice cracked.
Mirakle eased forward and took the pistol from his hand. “You look like death warmed over, boy. Come on, I’ll pour you a drink and you can tell me—”
“No. Not yet.” Oblivious to the commotion, Edgers was driving his hammer up and down on a bolt that had probably never been loose in the first place. It dawned on Billy that the Octopus was wearing Edgers down, commanding all of his time and attention, using him as its puppet. There were revenants caught within the Octopus, crying out in their confusion and terror. Perhaps now, Billy thought, it possesses some part of the snake-man as well. He could hear the faint screaming, and he knew the Octopus wanted him too. It wanted to consume him, to draw his spirit and power into its black, greedy gears and pistons.
Are you strong? Are you strong in your heart, where strength counts?
Billy’s hand had gone into his pocket. Now he brought the hand out and looked at the nugget of coal in his palm. He didn’t remember putting it in these pants; he’d thought it was still with his belongings, in his suitcase under the cot at the rear of the Ghost Show tent. It reminded him of the strength he possessed, the risks he must take if he was to continue his Mystery Walk. If he backed down, if he failed to trust his own inner will, then whatever inhabited the Octopus would win, and in some terrible way it might even grow stronger still. He clenched the coal in his fist and returned it to his pocket.
“Billy?” Dr. Mirakle said. “Where are you going?”
“You can come with me, if you like. But don’t try to stop me. I have to do this right now. Right now.”
“Do…what? My God, have you lost your mind?” But he was following along, holding the pistol out to his side as if it were a dead fish.
Before Billy reached the Octopus, Edgers stopped hammering. He straightened up from his work, and turned to face the boy. Across his features was a hideous grin that stretched his mouth wide in eager anticipation. The Octopus had him, Billy knew. It was not Buck Edgers grinning.
When Dr. Mirakle saw that grin, he was shocked motionless for a moment. He said in a nervous voice, “Billy, I don’t…think you should…”
“Step right up, pard!” Edgers boomed, shuffling forward. “Thought you’d never come!”
“I’m here. Start it up.”
“Come on, then! Yessir! Oh, you’re a special guest, you don’t even need a fuckin’ ticket! Been savin’ a ride just for you.” He moved to the shrouded gondola and tugged at the tarpaulin until it tore away. There were holes in the rusted metal, and faint streaks of bright orange paint. He pulled the warped metal-mesh canopy open, exposing the rust-riddled interior. “Perfect fit, I’d say.”
“I wouldn’t get in that rust-bucket if I were you,” Dr. Mirakle said, tugging at Billy’s arm. “No, I forbid it! I told your mother I’d take care of you, and I forbid you to do it! Now listen, come on back to the tent and we’ll—”
“Shut your mouth, you old cocksucker,” Edgers said softly, his eyes blazing into Billy’s. “The boy’s grown up now. He’s a man. He’s got a mind, and he knows what he wants to do. Show’s about to start!” He gestured toward the open gondola.
Billy pulled free of Dr. Mirakle. He had to do this now, while there was still a rage burning in him. He moved forward, but suddenly Edgers’s wife stepped out of the shadows, her round-cheeked face pasty with dread. She said, “No, please…don’t do it, boy. You don’t understand it. You don’t see—”
“SHUT UP YOU GODDAMNED BITCH!” the man howled, brandishing the hammer at her. She flinched but did not step back.
“That machine,” she said, staring at Billy, “is Satan’s handiwork. Buck bought it out of a junkyard in Georgia, and from the first day he couldn’t do anything but work on it, trying to put it back together. It slashed his face, and broke both his legs, and—”
“SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP!” He hobbled toward her, raising the hammer, and she screamed, “Please Buck, don’t!” and dodged a vicious blow that might’ve broken her shoulder. She slipped and fell to her hands and knees; her husband stood over her, panting like an animal. She looked up at him, an awful pleading expression in her eyes, and said, “I love you, Buck…”
Billy saw the man’s face change; he blinked uncertainly, and his terrible grimace slipped a few notches. For an instant, he resembled nothing more than a tormented man who’d been down on his luck for most of his life; then the savage grin came back, and his eyes flared. He put his booted foot against his wife’s side and pushed her down into the sawdust. He said, “Now you stay right there, like a good little girl.”
“Come on!” Billy said. “I’m waiting for you!”
“Oh, yes. Of course. The master speaks, the servant obeys. Of course, of course!” He giggled and watched as Billy climbed into the gondola. The seat was a hard mass of cracked vinyl and Billy could see the ground through a few quarter-sized holes in the metal. He stretched his legs out into the gondola’s nose, his back straight against the seat. There was a seatbelt, and Billy drew it tightly across his lap. Edgers rushed forward and clanged the mesh canopy down, drawing a small metal bar through a safety clasp. He grinned in through the mesh. “All comfy-cozy? Good. Then we’re ready to begin, aren’t we?”
Edgers scuttled to the generator that powered the Octopus and switched it on; it hummed, sending electricity through cables as thick as a man’s wrist. The ride’s lights flickered, flickered again, and then blazed brightly. The remaining bulbs that spelled out OCTOPUS buzzed like angry hornets. Edgers stood over a small control board and turned on the ride’s engine; it hooted and moaned, gears and wheels spinning. “I’ve got you!” he shouted. His face was ruddy and demonic as he let off the brake’s foot pedal and slowly pushed forward the lever that engaged the drive-train.
“Billy!” Dr. Mirakle shouted, stepping back as the Octopus began to move.
The gondolas slowly gained momentum. Billy’s head was forced back by centrifugal motion. Edgers bore down on the lever; Billy’s cheeks rippled with the rising g-forces. The gondolas began rising—five feet, ten feet, fifteen feet.
And then a garble of screams, moans, and sobbings—agonized sounds, some high-pitched and others so low Billy felt them in his bones rather then heard them—began to rise up around him, faintly at first, then with increasing intensity. He could hear a cacophony of voices, cries for help, sudden shrieks that seemed to pierce him. This gondola was the evil heart of the Octopus, Billy knew, and within it were the disembodied revenants of its victims—God only knew how many.
The gondola pitched upward suddenly, then fell with a frightening speed. It stopped with a squeal of cables and pistons, then jerked upward again. The Octopus was spinning faster, the world beyond the gondola a dizzying blur. Billy, his face twisted into a rictus, tried to force his concentration on the voices, tried to focus his energy on drawing the revenants to him.
No fear, he thought. No fear. I can help you. I can…
A roar filled his head: No you can’t! You can’t reach them I won’t let you reach them!
The gon
dola was rising and falling, faster and faster, Billy’s head brushing the mesh canopy with its upward sweep. He shut his eyes, his hands gripping the cracked vinyl armrests. There was a coldness in the air, gradually creeping up his body; he let it overtake him, and suddenly his brain was crackling with the last thoughts and images of perhaps a dozen people the Octopus had destroyed.
“No fear,” Billy breathed. “Just touch me…no fear…”
And suddenly electricity seemed to sear through him, and there was something else in the gondola with him, something laughing and shrieking.
The voice came in a triumphant cackle: “You’re mine now, boy!”
Billy shouted, “NO!” The voice rippled and faded, and he knew he’d touched the pulse of wickedness in this machine. “I know you! I know what you are now!”
Do you, boy? Then come join me.
Billy heard something grind and rip. He opened his eyes, and saw with horror that the long bolts securing the mesh canopy in place were slowly unscrewing. Smaller screws that held the safety bar were being ripped out. The canopy assemblage tore away and flew into the air. Wind screamed into Billy’s face, forcing his chin backward. Another bolt clattered loose down around Billy’s knees. The quarter-sized holes tore open still wider, like rotten cloth. The gondola was coming to pieces around him, and when it pitched him out to his death the entire machine would break loose, off-balance, and go spinning down the midway trailing live electric cables.
“STOP IT!” Billy yelled to Buck. He caught a quick glimpse of the man, bent over the control board like a hunchback, his hand pressed down on the lever. Above him more bolts unscrewed, in the central mechanism that held the gondolas to the Octopus, and a cable tore loose to spit orange sparks.
He could feel presences all around him, trying to cling to him. He forced himself to concentrate on their anguished voices again, and now he saw a faint mist taking form and shape, a figure with many heads and arms and legs, the faces indistinct, the whole thing reaching for him, clinging to him like a frightened animal. “Oh God,” he whispered, “help me do it, please help me…”