The Farm

Chapter Twelve

The cornstalks were streaked with brown from the early frosts, the tassels stiff and dry. Ray Tester worked his way between the rows, checking the ears. He'd grown Silver Queen, which produced sweet but short ears with small, white kernels. By this time of year, what hadn't been harvested or nibbled down by cutworms was left to freeze and harden. The crows, who hadn't been around since first planting, when they'd go down the rows like mechanical chickens and pluck seeds from the ground were now back for fall.

Some farmers laced loose kernels with battery acid and spread the tainted bait around the edges of their fields. Others would duck down in the rows with double-barrel shotguns, the shells loaded with small pellets to give the most scattering power. Ray figured both of those methods were useless. Crows were too stupid to learn a lesson, and if you killed one, then four-and-fucking-twenty would swoop down in its place. No, the best way to handle the black, thieving bastards was to head them off at the pass.

Which meant a scarecrow.

Not just any old scarecrow, either. Crows were dumb but they had eyes, and if you propped up something that looked like a sack of Salvation Army rags, then the crows would just sit on its head and shit on its shoulders, laughing in that cracked caw of theirs, a sound that taunted farmers everywhere. No, what you needed was something so close to flesh-and-blood that even humans did a dou ble take.

Ray was a champion scarecrow maker. He'd entered his best creation, named "Buck Owens" after the star on the old Hee-Haw television show, in a contest at the Pickett County Fair three years ago and had taken home the blue ribbon and fifty bucks. Buck had an ugly striped shirt and frayed overalls and a head that was sack cloth stuffed with old linen scraps. The judges had especially liked the straw boater that was perched atop its head, dented and torn and weathered. Ray had been proud of his handiwork, especially since he'd dropped out of school in the ninth grade and had never been mistaken for a genius. But while the scarecrow was on exhibit for the better part of that harvest week, the crows had ravaged his fields and taken up residence in the trees above the farm. His late wife, Merlie, had a little bird feeder built in the shape of a church that hung from a wire on the porch. The crows had streaked the church with green-and-yellow runs, proof that the winged rats had no respect for neither God nor man.

Since then, Ray had never entered another agricultural contest. He kept his scarecrow out in the field where it belonged, a good soldier on sentry duty who didn't complain and would give its life to defend its home ground. But even a soldier needed an overhaul every now and then, just to keep its spirits up. So Ray was bringing a moth-eaten scarf he'd found tangled in the briars at a county Dumpster site. The scarf had the extra advantage of being plaid, something that would spook even those nearsighted crows.

He could hear the crows in the forest at the edge of the pasture, cawing from throats that seemed way too long for their bodies. In case some of them had witnessed another farmer scattering their kind with buckshot, he'd tucked a gun in his scarecrow's arms. It was a rusty old air rifle scrounged from the flea market for a dollar. That helped with the soldier idea, too, even though that didn't square with the "Buck Owens" name. But a banjo wouldn't have done a damn thing against those miniature buzzards, unless the scarecrow started twanging it as off-key as did those Christian bluegrass bands.

The corn was about two feet over Ray's head. It had been a good year, rainy in the spring and sunny in the sunnier, and fall had been pretty slow and mellow. From between the rows, he couldn't see the scarecrow where it hung on a tall oak stake in the center of the field. But he could almost feel its gaze sweeping across the rows, alert for the slightest flicker of black feathers. Ray grinned, his feet crunching in the high weeds and dirt clods. The air smelled of that sweetness the grass and trees only gave off just before win ter, when the sugar was breaking down inside.

At the center of the field was a rusty fifty-five-gallon drum that caught rainwater. Ray didn't have an irrigation system, but the bar rel would provide some backup in case of a dry spell, especially when the seedlings were young and tender. That was also when the crows liked to swoop down, when the green shoots were easy to spot from above. The birds would tug the nubs out of the ground and eat the just-split kernels, sprouting roots and all. A few tools leaned against the barrel, and the scarecrow stood sentinel beside it

Ray eased back the cluster of stalks that separated him from the clearing. The first thing he noticed was the empty pole and cross- piece. He thought at first old Buck had slipped to the ground, blown by a strong wind, even though the scarecrow had been tied in place with baling wire. But there were no rags on the ground be neath the pole. The dirt was scuffed as if someone had been drag ging away a heavy load. Ray dropped the scarf and ran to the pole.

Not a scrap remained of the scarecrow. Ray squinted over the rows of corn to the edges of the field. Some kid was probably play ing a prank. One of those Halloween trick-or-treat deals. But who ever had stolen his award-winning scarecrow didn't know that some tricks weren't worth playing.

Ray looked in the weeds surrounding the barrel, figuring he'd at least find the air rifle or the battered straw boater. He studied the dragging marks for footprints. That's when he realized that some thing hadn't been dragged away, it had been dragged to. There were no footprints, just fine squiggles that looked as if someone had swept the dirt to erase tracks.

The marks led to the water drum. The stagnant water gave off the scent of rust and something ranker.

Ray looked in the water. At first all he saw was a reflection of the sky in the greasy surface, the frayed strips of cirrus clouds and a sun the color of a rotten egg yolk. But a shape hung suspended beneath the surface. Ray thought of one of those carnival sideshows he'd seen as a kid, back before polite society decided freaks couldn't earn an honest dollar with their talents. He'd seen the conjoined fetus of Siamese twins floating in a milky jar of formaldehyde, two tiny arms complete down to the fingernails, two legs curved like those of a frog. The two heads hung at different angles, one leaning forward with a single bleary eye open. Ray got in plenty more than his fifty cents' worth of looking before the crowd nudged him along.

This shape was almost like that, except indistinct. Somehow, the extremities didn't quite add up. Ray took the hoe from beside the barrel and dipped it into the tainted water. He hooked and lifted, straining from the weight. The odor hit him before his eyes could make sense of what they were seeing.

It was a goat, at least a week dead, its meat beginning to turn to pink soap. The animal had been gutted and a few ribs glinted in the afternoon light. The head hung by a narrow scrap of skin and the horns had been sawed down to blunt stumps. One leg was missing, and in the lower part of the goat's body cavity was a furry lump. Ray lifted the hoe higher to get a good look, and the head broke free and plopped into the barrel, splashing stinky water onto Ray. The head bobbed in the surface, the lips puffed into a grin.

Ray twisted the hoe handle so he could see what was inside the body cavity. He'd slaughtered plenty of livestock in his time, and he knew that guts were gray and pink and most major organs were ruby red. Nothing grew inside that was furry. He shook the corpse, expecting pieces of it to slough off and slide back into the water. It held together long enough for him to see what was lurking where the stomach, kidneys, and liver should have been.

It was another goat head, that of a billy, the horns long and slick. One of the horns had perforated the animal's skin, Ray let loose of the hoe and it slid into the barrel along with thirty pounds of scrambled goat parts. The stench was stronger now, and Ray wiped at the front of his soaked shirt. He forgot all about Buck Owens as he made his way into the sanity of the long, straight rows.

The Circuit Rider might have come riding through, but he wouldn't have any business with scarecrows. He'd never been known to slaughter livestock, either, at least not since he'd passed from the mortal coil. This business was different. As mysterious as the Circuit Rider was, at least he was a part of Solom, regular, reli able, not given to trickery.

"Better the devil you know," Ray figured. But some new devilry was afoot, and he didn't want to be caught out alone if that partic ular devil came calling.

Ray glanced back once as he entered the corn. A murder of crows had settled onto the crosspiece. One of them fluttered down and gripped the rim of the barrel, dipping its head to drink at the sickening soup.

Jett tuned out the monotone of Jerry Bennington, her earth sci ences teacher. That was no challenge, because Bennington was lec turing about gravity and even though gravity tied all the stars and planets into place, he managed to make it sound as simple and boring as a math problem. Like there was no magic or mystery in it at all. Public school teachers weren't allowed to address religion in the classroom, and explaining how heaven stayed in place might have made the subject a little more colorful.

The boy sitting in front of her, Harold Something-or-Other, must have raided his dad's medicine chest, because he reeked of Old Spice or Brut or one of those stinky-sweet colognes. She could endure it as long as Harold didn't bend forward to pick up a pencil or something and flash his sweaty crack over the belt loops of his low-riding blue jeans. She slipped Dad's letter from her backpack and read it for the fourth time since yesterday.

Dear Punkin,

I miss you so much mucher than all the chocolate donuts in the world. Right now I'm looking at the picture of us from the Outer Banks trip we took the summer you were seven. You look a lot like your mother in that one, more than you do now. I guess you were getting ready to be your own self.

How do you like the mountains? I'll bet they're not as strange as you thought they would be, but I wish you were down here right now so we could go to Discovery Place or a Panthers game, or anywhere that sold cotton candy and root beer. You'11 have to tell me all about your school and teachers. I would e-mail you but your mom told me her new husband (I don't like to say his name, I guess that's small of me but that's the way it is) put a password on the computer so you can't use it without his permission. Plus ink and paper give you something real to hold on to, and you can keep a letter nearby for when you want it.

Are you making new friends? I finally went out with that poodle woman but I don't think any sparks flew. If they did, I didn't get burned. I guess it's taking me longer to get over the breakup than it did your mom. But she's a great woman and a great mother. I tried my best but things happen, and I'll still always try my best for you no matter what. Listen to your old man going on like this. A good parent leaves the kids out of it, they say. I wish I could have left you out of my other problems, too.

It's not that long until Thanksgiving and I'm so much mucher looking forward to having you down for a few days. You know I'm not a cook but even turkey cold cuts will taste fine with you at the table. Work's going great, I'm designing some new wrought-iron furniture, wine racks and chande liers, fancy stuff. They pay me for all the designs they use and then I get a royalty on each piece cast from my design. I hope that will allow me more free time in the next few years so I can get up and see you whenever I want. Maybe I can even move near you, since there's nothing keeping me in Charlotte now except the manufacturing plant. All I would need is a small house and a workshop, and maybe we can work it out so you 're with me on weekends.

I was not going to mention the drugs, but it seems like part of the problem that caused the Big Problem. I'm sorry if I was a bad influence on you. I let that stuff take me over and steal part of my soul away, and things might have been dif ferent if I had given that bit to my family instead. The reason I bring it up is this: You 're going to be a big girl soon and have to make your own decisions about your life. I know bet ter than anybody that you can't change your heart just by changing your scenery. Because my heart still belongs to you even though we're two hundred miles apart.

So tell me all about Solom and send me some pictures when you write back. I've enclosed some stamps and a money order. The money is for you and you don't have to tell any grown-ups about it. I miss you all the world and love you all the stars in the sky and think of you all the fish in the sea. See you in November.

Giant hugs and supersize kisses,

Dad

Heavy shit, Dad.

"Miss Draper?"

Jett slid the letter into the papers on her desk. She wondered how many times Bennington had called her name before she'd no ticed. Harold turned in his seat with a faint farting noise and smirke d at her. She was used to the stares by now. Solom's first genuine artificial Goth girl, and the attention was half the fun. "Yes, Mr. Bennington?"

"We were discussing Sir Isaac Newton."

"The guy who invited the delicious fig cookies?"

That got a muffled laugh out of a couple of the kids. She had to admit, it was a pretty lame comeback, but she was off her game. Maybe when Tommy came through with the pot, she'd sharpen her wit a little and really wow the crowd.

Bennington wasn't amused, his Grinchish frown seeming to stretch longer in defiance of physics as his lips receded deeper into his mouth. "We were discussing Newton's Third Law of Motion."

"Oh yeah, that one. How does it go again?"

This drew a few more laughs. Bennington glanced above the chalkboard at the clock. Two minutes away from the bell. ''It seems not everyone benefited from today's lecture, so perhaps the entire class should read chapter four in your textbooks and write a two- page report on Isaac Newton's laws."

Bennington's frown lifted a little as the class let out a collective groan. "Good going, witch," Harold whispered.

After the bell sounded, Jett hurried from the room. She was to meet Tommy just before sixth period in the boiler room behind the gym. Tommy had skipped English class, so Jett assumed he'd gone off the school grounds to score. She didn't feel the least bit guilty for her part in his truancy. His attendance record was his problem. It wasn't like the goon was going to last past the legal dropout age of sixteen anyway.

The gym was set apart from the school, with a walkway that led to the bus parking lot. Phys ed classes weren't held during the last period so it was the perfect place for a little privacy. Jett passed a necking couple who were tucked behind a screened Dumpster. The boy wore dark boots and a stained baseball cap, the girl wore cheap jewelry and an outdated Friends hairstyle. From their downscale Kmart fashion wear, she pegged them for trailer trash. The girl would probably be pregnant by ninth grade and the boy would do the honorable thing and marry her, at least until he realized that di apers didn't change themselves and three people could never live as cheaply as one.

Not that you're any great shakes, Jett, but at least you're aware of your flaws. Like criticizing others.

She hefted her backpack higher on her shoulder and cut around the gym entrance, where cigarette butts and old ticket stubs littered the gravel. The dirt around the boiler room was stained black from spilled fuel oil. A large rusty tank was half-submerged in the ground, the cap locked to prevent sabotage or theft.

The door to the boiler room was ajar. The custodian must have been performing maintenance earlier in the morning. She'd expected the door to be locked and for the deal to go down in the shadows of the little brick outbuilding. The building had no win dows. Now they would have decent concealment, and if she and Tommy were caught, they could always pretend they were just an other couple sneaking off to swap a little saliva.

She took a look around before easing into the boiler room. It was dark and smelled of oil, musty pasteboard, and old pipes. Something rustled behind the giant steel-plated pipe-entangled contraption in the center of the room.

'Tommy?"

She reached into her hand purse for the money. She usually didn't carry a purse but had gone with a black, ruffled skirt today, with white knee hose, figuring cold weather would come soon enough so she might as well log some leg time while she could.

The noise came again, and the room grew darker. The door slammed shut behind her. A ventilation grille in the wall allowed some light, but it took her eyes a few seconds to adjust. Tommy must be playing some stupid stoner game. Or maybe he was dick-headed enough to try and get laid even under threat of death from AIDS.

"That's not funny, Tommy," she said trying the doorknob. Stuck tight.

"It's not funny," came a voice from behind the boiler. It wasn't Tommy's. It was deep and raspy and evoked a tingling familiarity.

Jett turned with her back to the door. The custodian? Maybe he hung out in here with his girlie mags in the afternoon, waiting for the last bus to leave so he could run a buffer over the hallway tiles. Except how had he closed the door when he was on the opposite side of the building?

A pipe reverberated as if someone had bumped into it. Though the boiler wasn't running, the room was stuffy. Jett tried me door again, wondering if her screams would carry to the couple by the Dumpster.

"It's not funny, it's serious," said the voice, and a blacker shadow moved in the darkness.

The brim of the hat lifted and the moon-white face gave a grin. Except it wasn't a grin, Jett saw, just an illusion caused by the man's missing upper lip. She decided it was a man though she had little evidence that it had once been human. A stench flooded the room, and Jett recognized the musky aroma of a male goat.

"You're not real," Jett said moving her backpack to her chest as if to add a protective layer between her and the nightmare.

"Judge not, that you be not judged" me man said. The head turned and dull silver flashed where the eyes might be. "I just wanted to tell you something while you were away from home, be cause home clouds your judgment."

"It's not my home," Jett said throat dry, sure she was having a nervous breakdown spiced with a bad acid flashback and a panic attack thrown in for good measure. Each breath felt like swallowing a handful of sand. She worked the knob with all her strength, chafing her palm.

"It will be your home soon enough." The man waited, as if re luctant to leave the safety of the shadows.

"What do you want?"

"To warn you about false prophets."

"I don't know any prophets." She wondered if acid flashbacks had a time limit, or if she was likely to keep on retro-tripping until her brain was a puddle of ooze.

"Yes, you do."

"Okay, whatever. I'll watch out for them, just let me go."

"Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep's cloth ing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves."

Jett nodded toward the dark figure.

"You will know them by their fruits," the voice said, as the shad ows merged into an unbroken darkness.

The knob turned in her hand. She staggered blinking into the sunlight.

Tommy Williamson sat on the oil barrel, legs crossed cigarette trailing smoke into the cloudless autumn sky. "What the hell were you doing in there?"

She didn't want to blow her cool in front of this ass clown. "Waiting for you."

Tommy inhaled blew out a long snake of smoke as if he were sighing, then flicked his butt onto the gravel. "Who were you talk ing to?"

"Nobody."

"You're as crazy as you look."

"No wonder the girls flock to you, with lines like that."

"Whatever." Tommy slid down from the barrel and reached into his NASCAR windbreaker. He pulled out a paper bag that had been twisted into the size of a hammer handle. "Here's your quar ter ounce. Fifty bucks."

Jett peeled off the bills with a trembling hand, hoping Tommy would think she was nervous instead of insane. She put the paper bag in her backpack without looking at its contents. "Thanks. I've got to get to class."

"Sure. Plenty more where that came from, just say the word." She left him lighting another cigarette, her heart throbbing,

wondering how she would make it through math with the man in

the black hat's voice buzzing through her skull.