“The crazy guy,” Eric murmured almost to himself. “The one with the axe.”
Miss Bloomfield’s head bobbed and she bit her lip. Then she took another breath, straightened herself in her chair, and folded her hands on the desk. “It was a horrible thing,” she said. “But I’m an optimist, and always have been. The town will come back to life. All things have their cycles.”
All things have their cycles.
The thought sent an icy shiver down Eric’s spine. Then, seemingly out of nowhere, a question came from his lips. “Whatever happened to the axe? Do you know?”
Kent and Tad glanced at each other uneasily.
“Now, why would you want to know that?” Miss Bloomfield replied, but before Eric could formulate a reply, she leaned forward as if to confide some kind of secret. “But it’s the strangest thing! The axe simply disappeared.” She spread her hands wide, as if still barely able to believe it. “Right out of the sheriff’s office. One day it was there, the next day it wasn’t.” She shook her head, her expression turning sorrowful. “Sheriff Ruston lost his job over it, of course. It was quite the scandal. And, I guess that was the beginning of the end, really. The thought of that terrible axe still being out there somewhere…” Edna Bloomfield’s voice trailed off, and she shuddered as if a draft had just chilled her.
“But you stayed,” Tad said.
“I wouldn’t know where else to go,” the ancient librarian replied. “I suppose when I die, they’ll close this old place, at least until Phantom Lake picks up again.”
“What about Cherie—” Kent Newell began, then faltered and looked to Eric for her last name.
“Stevens,” Eric said.
“Did you know Cherie Stevens?” Miss Bloomberg asked, brightening.
All three nodded.
“The last I heard of Cherie, she and her husband had moved to Minocqua. Now, what was the name of that nice young man she married? Not that terrible Mosler boy, thank heaven. I always thought he was trouble. If you ask me, I’ve always thought he must have had something to do with…”
As Edna Bloomberg prattled on, Eric wandered away, knowing deep inside himself that whatever Adam Mosler had done over the years, he’d had nothing to do with what happened that night.
Kent Newell and Tad Sparks thanked the librarian and slipped out, joining Eric on the front porch. Edna Bloomberg’s voice could still be heard until the heavy library doors swung closed behind them.
Eric’s arms felt like lead as they got back in the car. Suddenly, he wished he’d never suggested this trip; it would have been better at least to remember the town as the beautiful place it had once been before that awful Fourth of July when everything changed. And yet even as he wished he hadn’t come, he knew the trip wasn’t over yet.
He still had to at least try to find out what had happened all those years ago when he and Kent and Tad were plagued by nightmares that turned out not to be illusions at all, but twisted refractions of things that had actually happened.
But how had they happened?
What had caused them?
“What now?” Tad asked. “And where are we going to stay? I don’t think there’s even a motel here anymore.”
“Let’s at least go out to The Pines and take a look around,” Kent suggested. “I bet it’s still the same. Then we can get a room down in Eagle River or someplace.”
Eric took a deep breath and started the car. Going out to The Pines—no, going out to Pinecrest—was what this trip was all about anyway. Though they hadn’t talked about it—not directly anyway—all of them had known that was why they had come all the way up here: to try to make sense of something that he—that all of them—only vaguely remembered. But if he didn’t remember those things—if he didn’t close that particular chapter—it would haunt him for the rest of his life.
Perhaps it was different for his friends, he thought. Tad was headed for graduate school at Northwestern next year, and Kent was taking a research job in Salt Lake City. But he hadn’t quite decided on the next step of his future yet, and he knew why.
There were things he had to put to rest before he could go on.
Steeling himself against the heaviness that threatened to paralyze his arms, he steered the car out of town.
THE ENTRANCE SIGN to The Pines was overgrown with weeds and green with moss, its carved letters barely legible. As Eric drove slowly down the long lane, they could see that a few of the houses—a very few—had been kept up, but the rest looked as if they’d been abandoned for years.
Kent and Tad said nothing as they passed the summer homes that had been so inviting only five years ago but now crouched in the forest, empty and sad. The farther they drove, the deeper the melancholy that hung over the area imbued the car, and when they finally came to the gates at the head of the long Pinecrest driveway, Eric almost changed his mind about turning in. Yet going back to Pinecrest wasn’t something he—or any of them—could avoid. Whatever lay at the end of the drive, he had to come to grips with it.
Had to know.
Had to remember everything that had happened, or dismiss what memories he had as nothing more than the dreams they seemed to be.
“What are you waiting for?” Kent asked, and nudged Eric’s arm.
Eric turned into the driveway and drove to the house.
It stood as solid and as foreboding as the first time he’d seen it, but even with the first look, he knew there had been no one living in the house for years. The lawn was choked with weeds, and long-dead branches still lay where they had fallen years earlier. The wind had piled leaves against the front door; the fountain was choked with a vile-looking muck.
Despite the warmth of the summer day, the house and grounds felt dark and cold.
Eric parked the car and the three of them got out, their eyes going instantly to the old carriage house.
“Remember the nightmares we used to have up here?” Tad said in a voice so quiet that his words were almost lost.
Kent nodded and began walking toward the carriage house, and without a word, Tad followed.
Eric hesitated a moment, his gaze shifting toward the edge of the woods where a handmade cross still tilted over Tippy’s tiny grave, then he, too, started toward the old brick building.
THE OUTSIDE DOOR still scraped along the concrete when Kent opened it.
Deep in Eric’s mind, a memory stirred.
A memory of voices.
But not voices, really. Something that sounded like voices, but without any distinct words. Now, as the door opened wide, Eric listened.
And heard only silence.
Slowly, reluctantly, he stepped into the shadows of the carriage house and turned right.
Toward the storeroom.
A moment later they were there. Eric could feel Tad and Kent right behind him, feel the same tension emanating from their bodies that was making his own feel as if it was almost vibrating.
He reached out to touch the doorknob, his mind already filling with memories of what lay on the wooden panel’s other side. Just before his fingers closed on the knob, he hesitated, his fingers tingling in anticipation.
Anticipation of what?
Energy!
Yes, that was it. There had been a strange energy in the doorknob five years ago. An energy that had run through his whole body and amplified the voices that seemed to whisper to him out of nowhere.
He forced his hand to close on the knob.
Nothing.
No voices. No energy running through his hand as he gripped the doorknob.
Nothing at all.
“It all feels so different,” Tad whispered.
“We’re not kids anymore,” Kent said. “Maybe we imagined it all.”
Eric opened the door and turned on the light.
Everything was exactly the same. The same jumble of furniture, the same piles of cartons stacked against the walls.
Even the photo album still sat on top of the little desk in the corner.
And t
he sheet of plywood was still against the far wall, just as it had been the first time they came into this room.
And now Eric remembered what lay behind that sheet of plywood.
A door.
A sealed door they never should have opened.
“I don’t believe it,” Kent breathed, slowly scanning the contents of the room. “It’s all exactly the same. Exactly.” He walked over to the photo album and turned a couple of pages. “We were probably the last people ever to be in here.”
“Remember how weird it was?” Tad asked. “It always seemed like we lost track of time when we were in here. Hours and hours.”
“We were kids,” Kent said, waving Tad’s word’s dismissively away. “Come on—let’s move that plywood and take a look in the other room.”
Neither Eric nor Tad moved.
“Maybe we shouldn’t,” Tad said.
Ignoring Tad’s words, Kent grasped the sheet of plywood and pulled it, sliding it along the wall.
And all three of them froze at what they saw.
Instead of the open doorway to the tiny chamber that they were certain lay behind the plywood, all they saw was the faint outline of a small doorway that had been filled in with brick.
Brick that looked like it had been there for decades, not mere years.
Kent gazed uncertainly at Eric and Tad. “Didn’t we unbrick this?”
Eric said nothing, his own mind still grappling with the same question.
“Maybe the whole thing was a weird dream,” Tad said. “Could that be?” He walked forward and put his hand on the bricks. “This looks like old mortar—I mean, really old.”
“We should open it up again,” Kent declared. “I’ll bet that’s where the axe is—right back inside there with all the other stuff.” He stepped toward the door.
Suddenly, Edna Bloomfield’s words echoed in Eric’s mind: All things have their cycles.
“No,” he said, reaching out and putting a restraining hand on Kent’s shoulder. “Let’s leave it alone.”
Kent turned, his brow furrowed. “Leave it alone?” he repeated. “Why?”
“Let’s just leave it,” Eric said. “Let’s just leave it all and go.”
“I’m not exactly sure what happened when we were inside there,” Tad said when Kent still seemed unconvinced. “I don’t remember a whole lot about all of this. But I remember the nightmares. I remember the nightmares, and I never want to have them again. I think Eric’s right.”
Still Kent hesitated, putting his hand on the bricks and running his fingers down the poorly mortared joints.
And as he watched, Eric had a déjà vu flash.
A flash of Kent, his expression as mesmerized as it looked now. But in the flash, Kent wasn’t running his fingers over mortared bricks.
He was running them over the surface of a cracked Formica tabletop.
More images flashed through his mind: scalpels, and blood streaming from a gaping wound. A rusty hacksaw. A severed arm.
And a lamp shade.
A lamp shade made of—
As if to shut the images out of his mind, Eric grabbed the edge of the plywood and shoved it back across the doorway, knocking Kent’s hand away.
Kent jerked back. “Hey!”
“Let’s go,” Eric said, his voice suddenly hard. “Let’s go right now.”
He held the door for Kent and Tad, and when they were in the open doorway, Eric took one last look around the storeroom.
Then he flicked off the light and closed the door firmly behind him.
But as he started back toward the car that would take him forever away from Phantom Lake, he turned and looked back at the carriage house one last time.
And wondered how long it would be before the next cycle began.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
In the Dark of the Night is JOHN SAUL’s thirty-third novel. His first novel, Suffer the Children, published in 1977, was an immediate million-copy bestseller. His other bestselling suspense novels include Perfect Nightmare, Black Creek Crossing, Midnight Voices, The Manhattan Hunt Club, Nightshade, The Right Hand of Evil, The Presence, Black Lightning, The Homing, and Guardian. He is also the author of the New York Times bestselling serial thriller The Blackstone Chronicles, initially published in six installments but now available in one complete volume. Saul divides his time between Seattle, Washington, and Hawaii. Join John Saul’s fan club at www.johnsaul.com.
BY JOHN SAUL
Suffer the Children
Punish the Sinners
Cry for the Strangers
Comes the Blind Fury
When the Wind Blows
The God Project
Nathaniel
Brainchild
Hellfire
The Unwanted
The Unloved
Creature
Second Child
Sleepwalk
Darkness
Shadows
Guardian
The Homing
Black Lightning
THE BLACKSTONE CHRONICLES
PART 1: An Eye for an Eye: The Doll
PART 2: Twist of Fate: The Locket
PART 3: Ashes to Ashes: The Dragon’s Flame
PART 4: In the Shadow of Evil: The Handkerchief
PART 5: Day of Reckoning: The Stereoscope
PART 6: Asylum
The Presence
The Right Hand of Evil
Nightshade
The Manhattan Hunt Club
Midnight Voices
Black Creek Crossing
Perfect Nightmare
In the Dark of the Night is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2006 by John Saul
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by Ballantine Books, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.
BALLANTINE and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA
Saul, John.
In the dark of the night : a novel / John Saul.
p. cm.
1. Teenage boys—Fiction. 2. Spirit possession—Fiction. 3. Serial murderers—Fiction.
I. Title.
PS3569.A787I5 2006
813'.54—dc22 2006045283
www.ballantinebooks.com
eISBN: 978-0-345-49367-5
v3.0
John Saul, In the Dark of the Night
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