Storming

Eleven

HITCH WAS ALMOST back to camp when a huge cloud unexpectedly shadowed the moon. He stopped his amble down the dirt road and looked up, hands in his pockets. Tall fields of corn framed either side of the road. Somewhere far off, a cow lowed. He stared up at the cloud.

He was ten kinds of fool. Luck and charm had gotten him through most of his scrapes, so he’d more or less figured on them getting him past Griff’s anger. Maybe nine years of silence was too much to overcome. He huffed wearily.

Beside him, Taos sat down, tongue lolling.

It was a crying shame people weren’t more like planes. You loved a plane while you were with her, and all was right with the world. Then you left her to do what you needed to do to stay alive and sane, and she never held it against you. Fill her with gasoline and point her in the right direction—that was all she needed from you. But people… God help him if people weren’t more complicated than any number of gears and pistons.

Especially the people that mattered. If he got right down to it, it sure seemed like he’d done a good job cracking up every relationship that had ever mattered. What did people expect? His foot had itched for as long as he could remember. He’d never lied about that, never pretended he was anything but what he was.

If Griff wanted it all to end, there wasn’t much Hitch could do about it. But he could hardly let it lie either. He’d only be here for the week. If things didn’t get put to rights now, they never would. He wasn’t about to come begging—especially since he had left, in the beginning anyhow, to keep his family clear of his own troubles. There had to be some other way to get it all sorted out.

“Durn your stubborn hide anyway, Griffith Hitchcock.”

He stared up at the gray-black underside of the cloud. It drifted on past the moon and released the light once more. Maybe it meant rain. From the looks of things, the valley sure needed it.

Taos gave a yip, as if reminding him they were getting nowhere fast.

He looked down. “Well, why not. Sometimes nowhere’s the best place to be.”

A smaller shadow zipped across the ground.

He looked back up.

A big bird, its wingspan easily a couple of yards wide, circled twice just above the low cloud. Then with a shriek, it soared up into the haze.

Another shriek echoed down: and this time it sounded suspiciously human.

Something—or some_one_—fell from the cloud and hit with a thump in the cornfield next to the road.

What in the sam hill—? Hitch blinked.

Taos gave a bark, and they both started running. Hitch clambered over the fence and elbowed through the heat-stunted corn. The body had fallen only a couple dozen yards away. He kept his face pointed in the general direction, pretty sure of being able to find it.

He cast a glance skyward. That cloud was wafting on by, faster than it had any business doing in a breeze this faint. And where had it come from anyway? Thunderclouds like that built up throughout the day. They didn’t sprout out of nowhere, particularly in a place with so little humidity as western Nebraska.

He reached the spot roundabout where the body had fallen and peered into the night, listening. No moans. No sounds of life at all.

And then a head in an old-fashioned bowler hat appeared above the corn. The man turned, and his face flashed white in the moonlight. Beneath a broad forehead and an aquiline nose, a beard outlined his jaw. Nobody could be standing after a fall like that—thirty feet at least—but nobody else was crunching about in the field.

“Hey.” Hitch swam toward him through the corn. “You all right?”

The man stared at him. He looked to be in his early thirties. His eyes were hooded and wary, lips pushed out in a thoughtful scowl. As the big cloud sailed on by, the flicker of the moon revealed that, even in the heat, he wore a brown coat down to his knees and a red scarf.

He shifted and gave Hitch a glimpse of the smashed corn at his feet—and the lifeless body of a burly man.

Hitch stopped short.

The bird—a strange-looking brown eagle—swooped low over their heads.

Hitch ducked instinctively.

But the stranger didn’t budge from staring back at him. The bird, fully two feet from beak to claws, circled around. It landed on the stranger’s hat, pushing the brim lower over his forehead.

It couldn’t be a coincidence that somebody as obviously out of place as this gent was standing right over the top of the eighth body to fall from the sky. This was Zlo. Had to be. And even though Zlo obviously couldn’t have pushed this man to his death, he was tied up in it somehow.

Hitch’s heart rate started double-timing. Before he could think about it too hard, he lunged forward and caught the man’s arm, whirling him around.

The idea was to get his arm up behind his back before Zlo had a chance to draw any weapons. But Zlo was at least five inches shorter than Hitch, and he moved like a greased pig. He spun with Hitch’s momentum and kept right on spinning until his arm slipped free.

The bird squawked and flapped away.

Zlo pulled the flare gun from his belt and held it between them. “I have no fight with you.” His accent wasn’t as thick as Jael’s.

Hitch stayed back, stance wide, hands in front of him. “Fine by me, brother.” He pointed at the body. “All I want to know is where that guy came from.”

Zlo grinned. “He is good sign. My people are finished with taking control.”

“Control of what?”

“Schturming.”

“What’s Schturming?” Hitch ran back through his brain for the biggest airplane he could think of. “A Handley-Page bomber? A hot-air balloon? What?”

“It is place where we pretend not to envy your world. But I think maybe it will be your world that will envy us.”

“What does that mean?”

“It does not concern Groundsmen. Not yet.” Zlo turned up the corner of his mouth. He seemed to be enjoying the fact Hitch had no idea what he was talking about.

“I’ll say it concerns me,” Hitch said. “You people keep falling on top of me!”

Zlo looked around, a smidge of theater in his expression. “I like your town. Very rich.” He grinned fully, and his front teeth sparkled, as if they were capped with silver or gold. “When I return, I will not be falling this time. I can promise you that.”

“Yeah, and do you promise you’re not going to go shoving girls out in front of you?”

The grin disappeared. Zlo took a step toward Hitch. “This girl? Jael Elenava—you know where she is?”

Hadn’t taken Zlo any time at all to grab that bait. Hitch stifled a growl. Probably should have let that one alone.

He moved to the side. “All I know is they found a body out by the lake this morning.”

Another step forward. “She was not killed. I saw her footprints.”

Well, it had been worth a shot. “Disappointed?” he asked.

Zlo shrugged. “I do not care if she dies or lives. If you want her, you can have her.” He tapped the center of his chest. “All I want from her is this.”

Her pendant? Hitch frowned and shook his head. “Maybe I can help you find it. My brother’s a deputy sheriff. Lives down the road here. He’ll help you retrieve what’s yours and get you on back home.”

“Deputy sheriff?” Zlo snorted. “I think not. But if you find yakor for me, I will promise you no more bodies will fall. I cannot leave you without it. I tell you that is no threat, it is just fact. I will even pay for it, yes? If you want nikto girl, she is yours too. And if you do not want her, I get rid of her for you. Is this deal?”

Hitch dropped his placating hands to his sides. “Look, you’re going to stay away from that girl.”

Zlo’s features stilled. “Fine. _Idi i bud’ proklyat._”

That didn’t sound too much like “farewell and good luck.”

Zlo stepped forward, the flare gun still in front of him.

Hitch’s choices had just rapidly narrowed themselves to one of three: get shot, turn and run like a scared rabbit, or take this guy from the front and probably still get shot.

He feinted to the right, then dove straight at Zlo. His shoulder caught the man’s gut and bowled him off his feet. Zlo lost all his air in a hard exhalation.

Hitch caught the wrist of Zlo’s gun hand and bashed it against the ground. The soil here was too soft to do much damage, and Zlo’s grip didn’t so much as loosen. Hitch hit it again with no luck, then looked back in time to take a fist in his ribs. His own breath whuffed out, but he managed to plant a knee on Zlo’s throat.

He curled his fingers into Zlo’s fist and pried the gun loose. “Now you’re going to see the deputy, whether you want to or not.”

Against Hitch’s knee, Zlo’s throat bobbed. “Maksim!”

The eagle hit Hitch from behind. Its talons skimmed the meat of his shoulder and knocked him off balance.

He lost the gun as he rolled, and it disappeared in the cornstalks. He turned around, jumping into a crouch.

Zlo was already up, fists clenched at his sides. The whites of his eyes shone in the dark.

Well, now Hitch had gone and made the man mad. Probably not a good sign, since to all appearances, he was already on his sixth kill.

Hitch rose, panting.

On the road, a motorcar puttered past. A woman’s familiar laugh sounded over the rumble of the engine. Lilla.

And Rick with any luck. Never thought he’d be saying that.

“Rick!” Hitch kept his eyes on Zlo. “Lilla! Rick! Get yourselves over here before I end up dead!”

Behind him, the hard slap of the eagle’s wings beat the air.

Zlo cast a glance at the road, then back at Hitch, hesitating.

The engine slowed. Stopped.

Lilla’s voice floated across the cornfield: “I heard something, I know it!”

Hitch hollered again. “Rick!”

“It’s Hitch,” Rick said. “What’s he want now?”

“Go see,” Lilla urged.

That was enough for Zlo. He glared at Hitch, then whistled for the bird and turned to scramble back through the corn.

Hitch gave a thought to following. But in a cornfield at night, Zlo could hide five feet away and nobody’d ever see him.

The beam of a flashlight cut across the field. Rick and Lilla tromped through the corn.

“Oh, it is you!” Lilla said.

“Yeah, it’s me.”

“What is it this time?” Rick said. “We’re on our way into town. There’s supposed to be a speakeasy down on East Ninth. Anything to relieve the tedium.”

“Well, how about this.” Hitch pointed at the corpse. “That relieve the tedium?”

Lilla screamed.

*

Practically the whole crowd from the airfield came out to see for themselves.

When Jael eased forward to see the corpse, still lying in the circle of smashed corn, her face went whiter than ever.

Hitch looked at her. “Know him?” He pitched his voice low, so only she could hear him.

She tucked her chin in barely a nod.

“Whoa now,” one of the flyers said. “Looks like somebody jumped without his parachute.”

That was a whole lot closer to the truth than these folks knew. The gent in question was a big man, tall and lean with a muscled torso. He was bearded, had dark hair down to his shoulders, and wore loose pants and scuffed knee boots. A black leather apron covered everything down to mid-shin. On one hand, he wore a black leather mitten extending to his elbow. Both the apron and the mitt were smeared with oil and ash. Gelling blood coated his nostrils and ears, and he most certainly had about twice as many bones now as he’d had before his fall.

Hitch had offered the crowd a quick explanation about finding Zlo standing over the body. He left off the falling-out-of-the-sky part.

He watched Jael. “Who is he?”

She shook her head.

“Not a friend of yours, is he?”

She stared at Hitch for another of those long, studying moments, probably gauging whether she should tell him.

Then she shook her head. “He is Engine Master. Never is liking me. But is not bad man.” She hung her head and huffed softly. “This is not how it is done.”

“What do you mean?”

“This”—she flung an arm out at the field—“this is what we do with dead. Drop them to final sleep. But over water, not over Groundsworld. And not before death comes.”

Okay. He glanced overhead. Not exactly what he had been expecting. If enough people died up there that they had rituals for taking care of the bodies, then it was starting to seem like more and more of a long-term place to visit.

Back at Rick’s car, the voices grew louder.

Hitch looked over his shoulder. The talon cuts in his shoulder pulled and stung, and he winced.

Livingstone had arrived. He strode through the weak beams of the car headlights and held up both hands in a placating gesture. “Not to worry, ladies and gentleman, not to worry. Before leaving camp, I stopped at the farmer’s house and was lucky enough to discover he is the proud owner of a telephone. I contacted the proper authorities. They should be here at any moment.”

Hitch’s heart sank.

Proper authorities meant Campbell. Maybe he’d send a deputy. Maybe he’d even send Griff since the farm was close by. Assuming Griff also had a telephone.

Problem was—murder was a big deal in a sleepy town like this, especially with all the brouhaha of the airshow in town right now. If Campbell had any notion at all that Hitch might be part of that airshow? He’d be personally headed in this direction, sure as shooting.

If he did come, there was no way Hitch could get out of talking to him, since he just happened to be the chief and only witness.

Jael turned back to him. “Authorities? These are custody men—like your brother? You have talked to him?”

“Yeah, about that. It didn’t go so well.” He made himself stop poking at the cuts and drop his hand back to his side. “He didn’t want to see me.”

“He is your brother.”

“That’s mostly the problem.” Hitch had never had any difficulty winning over strangers—only the people he cared about.

She frowned.

“In the meantime,” Livingstone continued, “I suggest we do not sully the scene of the crime any further.”

Even as he said it, headlights swiped across the field and tires crunched against the shoulder of the road.

“Ah,” Livingstone said. “Admirably timed.”

Hitch nudged Jael behind him and eased around to see the road.

Even before the big green sedan’s engine stopped rumbling, Hitch started getting a bad feeling in the pit of his stomach.

The sedan’s door opened, and Sheriff Bill Campbell slid his bulk out of the driver’s seat.

Frustration rolled over inside of Hitch and rose back up, carrying with it more than a fair share of anger. Nothing left to do but face it. Now that Campbell was here, Hitch sure wasn’t about to skulk around in corners, waiting to be hunted down.

He glanced back at Jael. “You stay back here. I’ll keep you out of it if I can.”

Her gaze flicked between Campbell and him, maybe not quite understanding what was happening. But she ducked her chin in a tight nod.

Hitch squared his shoulders and walked into the wind to meet Campbell.

They met at the roadside, a few paces off from the noisy crowd that had gathered around the body.

Campbell didn’t look surprised to see him. “Well, now,” he rumbled, his voice deeply graveled. “If it isn’t the famous Hitch Hitchcock. Heard folks saying you might be back.”

So it didn’t matter after all that the dead body had fallen right on his head. Hitch wasn’t sure if there was any comfort in that or not.

“Here you are,” Campbell said, “one day back, and already you’re my chief witness to a bizarre death. How’s that happen, I wonder?” He rooted in his shirt pocket and came out with a match. He flicked the flame free with his thumb and cupped it in his hand to protect it from the growing breeze. As he held it to the cigarette in his mouth, he looked past Hitch to the crowd in the cornfield.

The death would have to be a bizarre one. Campbell might not have bothered coming out himself if it hadn’t been.

“Same way it happens to anybody,” Hitch said.

Campbell was a hulking man, as tall as Hitch and maybe fifty pounds heavier. His face had gotten craggier in the last few years, but the same faint, knowing smile lurked around his lips, never quite pulling them tight.

“I was just walking by,” Hitch said, “coming back from seeing Griff.”

Campbell took a puff on the cigarette, then let the breeze blow out the match. “Sure you were, son. I know you wouldn’t get yourself mixed up in something like this. Tell me about it, why don’t you?”

Campbell, of all people, wasn’t likely to believe the truth. But it was the truth. If this murder was going to get solved, that truth would have to be told by somebody.

“I think he fell.”

“From where? A tree? In the middle of the cornfield?”

“I know you’ve heard about Scottie Shepherd saying he saw a body fall out of the sky.”

“Scottie Shepherd’s an old man. He don’t see good and he likes attention.”

“But do you believe him?” The answer could either make things easier for Hitch, or a whole lot harder.

“I believe something_’s going on.” Campbell studied him. “And I believe _you know more’n what you just told me. You think Scottie’s right? Something’s up there, in the clouds, killing folks?”

“That just sounds crazy, doesn’t it?”

Campbell regarded him for a moment, then leaned in. “I heard about the stunt you pulled this morning, stealing that plane right out from under Livingstone’s nose. That’s crazy. Only you—that’s what I said when I heard about it. Only you.”

Hitch tried not to tense up. “That’s got nothing to do with anything. I’m not lying about this. If it’s a murder, then I take it as serious as anybody.”

“Of course you do. You’re not the type to take the law lightly. You’re just the type to go hightailing when a job don’t go right and you lose a man’s money.”

And there it was. Campbell liked to dance around the truth, but it never took him long to stick in the first jab.

Hitch looked him right back in the eye. “I’m not the type to take the heat for smuggling stolen goods when the man who hired me didn’t tell me what they were.”

“What they were was none of your business. Still isn’t. You should have trusted your sheriff a little more, son.”

“What I’ve learned over the years is that the folks telling you to trust them are usually the last people who deserve it.”

Campbell shrugged. “Glad to hear you learned something along the way. Learn your lessons and pay your dues, I always say. That shipment you lost cost me a cool five hundred dollars. When I heard you were home, naturally I figured you’d finally decided to do the right thing and pay me back.”

“I don’t owe you anything—even if I had that kind of money.”

“The way I see it, either you owe me five hundred dollars, or I should be investigating those stolen goods you got caught with nine years ago.”

If Campbell wanted to put Hitch away for a crime he was guilty of himself—a nine-year-old crime, at that—he’d do it.

Even still, paying Campbell off wasn’t going to be more than a short-term solution, at best. If that’s all it would have taken, Hitch wouldn’t have had to scram out of the state.

Back when he’d taken Campbell up on his job offer—hauling goods over the state line—he had still bought into the whole idea that Campbell was an upstanding public servant. It was only after the cops in Cheyenne figured out the goods were stolen, and Campbell tried to pin the whole thing on Hitch, that he figured it all out.

Campbell had promised he’d clean up the whole mess if Hitch paid for the lost goods. Hitch hadn’t had that kind of money, even back then. When he’d tried to tell the mayor what Campbell was pulling under his nose, Campbell had threatened Hitch’s family—Celia, Griff, and his pop.

So Hitch had gotten into that plane and scrammed.

And now he was back, like an idiot. He’d never dreamed Campbell would still be in office.

“All right.” He forced the words. Going to jail wasn’t any better an option right now than it had been before. And this time he wasn’t going to run. “I’ll pay off. After I win the show.”

First prize was only $500, which left a big fat nothing over to pay off the crew. But if he won the show, he won the bet. Once he was managing Livingstone’s circus, the money would start rolling in. Earl and Lilla would understand the stakes here.

Rick wouldn’t. But Rick didn’t understand much.

“You always were a cocky son of a gun.” Campbell dropped the smile and watched Hitch. “I’ll tell you what. I like you, I’ve always liked you. So I’ll make this easy for both of us. I don’t need your winnings.”

“What do you mean?”

“I got a little job. Nothing tough.” He smiled. “Nothing stolen. Just moving a little booze across the state line. It’s a special gift for the governor in Cheyenne.”

“So you can add bootlegging to the charges?”

This crazy new Prohibition thing was a roaring mess all through the country. Why not here too? Campbell had always had an eye for a good on-the-side opportunity.

“Not if you do it right,” Campbell said. “In fact, you do it right, and I’ll not only cancel the debt and drop all charges, I’ll even give you something extra. Say a hundred dollars.”

A hundred dollars would come in handy like a new engine would come in handy. But that’s exactly what Hitch had thought the first time he’d talked himself into working for Campbell.

“You’ll get your money,” he said. “After I win the show.”

Campbell pursed his lips. “It’s a limited-time offer. You think about it. You got until the end of tomorrow to make up your mind.”

Hitch’s mind was already made up, but he left it at that. If Campbell wasn’t going to arrest him on the spot, the best thing he could do was keep his mouth buttoned up. He managed a tight nod.

Campbell took one step toward the cornfield, then stopped and looked over his shoulder. “Suppose you been out Carpenters’ way? Seen the kiddies?”

“Not planning to.” Hitch flexed his hands to keep from fisting them. “Nan made it pretty clear I’m not wanted.”

“Did she now?” The almost-smile flickered across Campbell’s face. “I’ll be seeing you. Tomorrow, I hope.” He lumbered over to the cornfield’s fence and stopped to shake Livingstone’s hand.

Livingstone immediately started talking and gesturing toward the corpse with his walking stick. That was one handy thing about having Livingstone around. He was always more than happy to take all the attention onto himself.

Hitch breathed out. That could have gone better. Could have gone worse too. But getting himself mixed up in this murder wasn’t good. Campbell could use it in any number of ways to twist Hitch’s arm up behind his back. He wasn’t likely to find any legitimate suspects now that he’d just dismissed out of hand the fact Hitch had seen this guy fall out of the sky.

He looked up at the stars. The big cloud no longer obstructed their glittering.

Speaking of people who thought they had seen things in the sky… He looked back down to find Jael lurking in the shadows at the edge of the crowd. She deserved to know what Zlo had said about her.

He strode over to her and beckoned her to follow. “C’mere.”

Once he had her off a ways, where she didn’t have to see the dead guy and the others couldn’t hear her, he ducked his head down to her level. “The guy I fought with, that was Zlo, wasn’t it?”

Her mouth was tight. “How you describe him is sounding like Zlo.”

“You were right about him being dangerous. He tried to shoot me.”

Her eyes got big. “Shoot you? Gospodi pomiluy. That is very, very bad. Only the Brigada Nabludenia have shooters. Zlo is Forager, not… Enforcer.”

This morning, she’d said the Foragers spoke English. That explained Zlo’s handle on the language.

“Well, it wasn’t a regular gun. It was that same flare gun he was using on you the other night. He’s after that pendant of yours, you know that, right?”

Her hand darted up to touch the bulge of the pendant beneath her blouse. She looked toward the east, and the breeze floated tendrils of hair around her face. “Then they are coming.”

“I don’t suppose you could just give him the pendant? Save yourself the trouble? He said he wouldn’t hurt you if you gave it to him.”

“No. I cannot be doing that. The danger is too much.”

“Why? What’s it for?”

She shook her head. “It is control for all of Schturming, because of dawsedometer.”

“Because of what?”

“It is not mattering.”

“Please don’t tell me it’s not Groundsmen’s business.”

She shrugged. “Taking it back to home is what I must be doing before Zlo can go there before I am.”

“Home to the sky. Right.” He scrubbed his hand through his hair. “Well, I don’t see how he’s going to manage that, so I think you’re safe on that score for now.

Across the field, Campbell straightened up from his preliminary investigation of the corpse. Several more cars arrived in the road, and deputies got out. Campbell gestured them all forward. He caught Hitch’s gaze just once, and that almost-smile pulled at his mouth.

Hitch breathed out, slowly. The way things were going, keeping Zlo out of the sky might be the only thing they were safe on.