Casket For Sale

Chapter Nine

CATCHING CHARLIE WASN'T difficult. I grabbed him by the back of the collar just as he reached the front counter and yanked him to the ground.

"It wasn't my fault!" he insisted. "I tried to keep him from hurting you!"

"No, you tried to keep him from sullying your merchandise with my blood. Tell me, were you lying about the phone?"

"No, I swear!"

"Were you lying about the computer?"

"Yes, I swear!"

"How did you going to contact Troll?"

"A walkie-talkie. It's behind the front counter. But I wasn't really going to contact him."

I dragged Charlie with me behind the counter. The two most notable things underneath the counter were a huge stack of porno magazines and a walkie-talkie. I grabbed the walkie-talkie but refrained from commenting on the magazines.

Charlie coughed. "Don't kill me. I wasn't going to rat on you, I swear. I hate helping these people, but they forced me to do it and they don't pay me much!"

The walkie-talkie had a hell of a lot more knobs and buttons on it than any walkie-talkie I'd ever used as a kid. "How does this work?" I asked.

"Press the big black button on the side."

I pressed the button. "Hello?" I said into the receiver.

A moment of silence, and then: "Troll?"

"No, this is Troll's captor. You may remember me from the exploding camper incident. To whom might I be speaking?"

"It's Goblin."

"Hi, Goblin. Look, I want to cut a deal. You let my wife and kids go, and I'll let your friend here go."

"How do I know you've really got him?"

I gestured at Charlie with the walkie-talkie. Charlie leaned into it and spoke. "It's me. Troll is unconscious on my floor."

I heard a soft curse on the other end.

"I've already lost two of my closest friends," I said, hoping that if he thought Roger and Samantha were dead they wouldn't look for them, "and you've lost one. Now, we can keep whittling down each other's numbers, or we can cut our losses and call it quits right now."

"What do you mean, you lost two?"

"Exactly what I said. Call off the hunt and let us work out some kind of truce, or I'll slit Troll's throat with his own knife."

"Well, you see… who am I talking to, anyway?"

"Andrew."

"Well, Andrew, you see, we've got a bit of a problem here, because Ogre tends to have a lack of respect for my title, and he always got along really well with the boy your wife killed, so it seems unlikely he'd listen to me even if I did ask him to give up the chase."

"I'm not screwing around here," I said. "I'll kill him."

"I wasn't accusing you of screwing around. But, Andrew, another problem we've got is that Troll was never one of the more popular associates in our little group. I don't want to disrespect the poor guy when he's this close to death, but he actually made the rest of us kind of uncomfortable. Did you see that knife thing he does?"

"Yeah. What's up with that?"

"No idea." Goblin sighed on the other end. "You do what you've got to do, Andrew. I can't honestly say I want you to cut his throat, but I'm afraid it's not possible for us to work out a deal. I would like to leave you with one last thought, though: Now we know exactly where you are."

The door opened.

I spun around to see who it was, and caught a flash of Troll running out of the store.

Damn!

Before I'd even finished thinking the word "Damn," I heard another vehicle approach.

"Is there a back way out of here?" I asked Charlie.

He nodded.

I didn't think the old man would make a very good hostage. Most likely, they'd happily blow a hole right through his chest if I were standing behind him.

Keeping the walkie-talkie and the hunting knife with me, I rushed into the back room. It was filled with approximately eighty-seven tons of raw clutter and no computer. I spent a few seconds looking for a weapon but had no luck, so I threw open the door and ran outside, shutting the door behind me.

I'd made it about a hundred yards into the forest before I heard the door open again. I looked back and saw both Troll and Witch emerge. They immediately followed me, although Troll didn't seem to be quite as energetic as Witch.

I ran as fast as I could. If I could get far enough ahead so that they couldn't see me, I'd loop around to the front of the store and steal one of their trucks.

Please don't trip, I told myself, since this seemed like the most appropriate moment for me to trip.

I didn't turn back but I could hear Witch's footsteps behind me. It sounded like she was gaining.

Then the footsteps stopped.

A gunshot fired, and several leaves flew into the air from the branch it struck. I'd thought I was hauling ass, but I picked up my pace nevertheless.

Another gunshot. This one seemed further off the mark, yet somehow I didn't feel like dancing a merry jig. My mind turned to other important matters, like the fact that I could fall into a spiked pit at any moment.

I glanced down, and promptly smacked into a branch.

Hard.

Though the branch didn't poke out anything, it was a violent enough blow that I found myself momentarily dazed. I stopped running and leaned my arm against the tree to keep my balance.

Just ahead I saw a tree much larger than the ones surrounding it. I'd hide behind it and pray they didn't find me. I stumbled to the tree and cried out as a noose closed around my feet.

I was yanked upside-down, which caused me to drop the knife and walkie-talkie. I dangled there, about four feet off the ground, swaying back and forth.

Okay, this was pretty bad.

But it was important not to be cynical. After all, it was entirely possible that Troll and Witch might walk past without noticing the shirtless guy swinging upside-down from a tree. Or perhaps the blood rushing to my head might increase my powers of thought, allowing me to come up with an unbelievably creative solution to this whole problem involving tree sap, magnetic fields, and my own perspiration. Or I might look so pathetic hanging here that Troll and Witch would take pity on me and let me go.

If you really took the time to think about it carefully, getting caught in this trap was probably the best thing to happen to me all afternoon.

Definitely.

I heard Witch approach and moments later she stepped into view, smiling-as quite naturally she would since she wasn't the one hanging from a tree. Troll joined her, looking way too peppy for a guy who was still bleeding from being stabbed in the shoulder.

"Well, well, well," said Troll. "I'm glad to see my hard work setting up all of these traps paid off."

"Did you make all of them?" I asked.

"Yep."

"What's up with the spiked pit? Why take the time to set up that whole spring and board thing? If you'd put some spikes on the bottom it would've worked just as well."

"I have a lot of down time."

"Makes sense," I said, getting dizzy.

Witch took her walkie-talkie off her belt. "Goblin, you there?"

Goblin's voice crackled over the speaker. "Sure am."

"Troll and I have one of them. Do we kill him or bring him back?"

"Is it Andrew?"

Witch looked at me questioningly. I gave her an upside-down nod.

"Yeah," she said.

"Then definitely bring him back."

"You've got it. Witch out." She clipped the walkie-talkie to her belt and turned to Troll. "I'll keep you covered. Get him down."

"Don't worry," Troll told me. "Pretty soon your body will be hurting a hell of a lot worse than your pride. Which is saying a lot."

He walked around the tree and out of sight. A moment later, I let out an embarrassing yelp and dropped to the ground, just barely managing to cushion my fall with my hands.

It was a close race, but yes, my body was indeed hurting worse than my pride. Of course, he probably wasn't referring to the fall, but rather fun stuff to come after the fall.

I pushed myself up. Maybe I could try the old throw-a-handful-of-dirt-into-the-bad-guy's-eyes-and-kick-them-in-the-stomach-while-they-are-blinded trick.

Or maybe I could admit defeat.

"Look at me," said Witch.

I did.

"See this gun? We were told to take you back alive, but neither of us will be written up if that fails to happen. So if you try another stunt like you did back at the camper, or anything else, anything, I'll shoot you in the leg. If you try again, I'll empty the rest of this gun into your head. Do you understand me?"

I nodded.

"Say it."

"I understand."

"Good."

"Hey, looky here!" said Troll, wandering over and picking up his knife. "I've really missed this." He fondled it, flicked the tip against his leg, and walked toward me. "Maybe I'll slice him up before we take him back. Just a little."

"Fine with me, if you do it quick," said Witch, keeping the gun pointed at my head.

I didn't try to gather a handful of dirt. That would simply get me shot. As much as I hated to admit it, the only way I'd stay alive and possibly see my family again was to concede defeat.

For now.