The Caretaker of Lorne Field

Chapter 5

Jack Durkin wiped his brow, squinting towards Lorne Woods. Lester should’ve been at the field an hour ago. Durkin had already finished one pass of his weeding and was a third of the way into his second pass. How long does it frickin’ take to pick up a pair of work boots and gloves and ride your bike three miles? Can’t the boy be counted on for nothin’?

As he peered towards the woods and searched for any sign of his son, Durkin felt a sharp pain slice through his groin-almost as if someone had stuck a hand inside him and grabbed his guts and squeezed. The pain immobilized him. Sweat poured from his face, and he knew it was far more from nervousness than the heat and humidity-and he had a damn good reason for being nervous. In a corner of the field he had let an Aukowie grow to almost a foot in height. It was a violation of the Caretaker’s contract to purposely let that happen, but he couldn’t help it-he needed one that big so he could prove that these things weren’t weeds.

The pain cutting through his groin subsided and his stomach muscles unclenched to the point where he could breathe normally again. He looked over his shoulder and stared at the foot-high Aukowie and knew it was staring right back. At that size he could make out its face clearly. Others might confuse it for leaves and branches and thorns, but to him there was no mistaking its narrow slanted eyes and evilly grinning mouth. Those so-called thorns were sharp enough to cut a man’s hand off, and they’d get a lot sharper before the thing was done growing.

Durkin looked away from the foot-high Aukowie and went back to his weeding, moving slowly as he bent over and pulled out small two-inch baby Aukowies. After he had pulled out a couple a dozen of them, he sneaked a peek at the larger Aukowie. He knew it was studying him. He knew it hated him for what he was doing to its brethren. Not that hate much mattered to Aukowies. Fully matured they were killing machines that would lay waste to every human, animal, bird, fish and growth of vegetation on the planet. When they were done there would be nothing but dust and rubble left behind. With their evil grinning faces he couldn’t help thinking of them as devil spawn, hatched from hell to bring about their apocalyptic ending. But of course, he knew that was nonsense. For him to believe there was truly a hell he’d also have to believe there was a heaven, and even more difficult to accept, that there was a God. How could any God put the fate of the world on one man’s shoulders? How in the world could he believe in a God that would curse a family with that kind of burden? No, as much as they looked the part, he knew the Aukowies weren’t born in hell. Most likely they came from another planet, maybe an asteroid that crashed hundreds of years ago, or maybe they were simply the result of the evolutionary process run amok. But heaven and hell had nothing to do with these Aukowies. They were something random, and there was no divine intervention protecting man from them. That fate fell on the Durkins and their solid but all too human shoulders. And the load seemed to be getting heavier every day.

He forced himself to keep weeding, but every so often he had to look over at the foot-high Aukowie. He knew every minute it was growing just that much larger and knowing that made him feel funny inside. Made his legs sort of rubbery too. But there was nothing he could do about it. He needed to videotape that foot-high Aukowie in action, and in order for him to do that, he needed Lester’s help. Still, every time he looked at it he had to fight back the urge to dig it up while he knew he still could.

He got careless with his weeding, too distracted by the ever-growing foot-high Aukowie to concentrate properly on what he was doing, and ended up slashed right above his glove. He wrapped a handkerchief around the wound and cursed Lester bitterly. Cursed him first for not being there on time, cursed him for his laziness, and finally for not being stillborn like his sisters before him-because if he were, then Bert would be the eldest son and would be in line to be the next Caretaker. If Bert were going to be Caretaker, he wouldn’t have to worry about the human race coming to an end after Lester’s twenty-first birthday.

Durkin finished tying the handkerchief around his wound. A thin red line expanded slowly across it. He couldn’t afford to let any blood drip near the Aukowies-human blood drove them wild. He took his glove off and shoved it in one pocket and stuck his hand deep in the other pocket, then continued his weeding one-handed.

About the time he was halfway done weeding the field he spotted Lester trudging out of Lorne Woods. The boy moved in a slow, disinterested gait, every few feet kicking at the ground. Jack Durkin could see he didn’t have his work boots or his gloves with him.

“What are you doing?” he yelled.

Lester looked up, shrugged.

“How come you don’t have your boots or gloves with you? Don’t tell me you dropped them off at home?”

“I dunno. I guess I forgot about them.”

“You’re telling me you didn’t go to the Army Surplus store this morning?”

Lester shrugged again.

“For Chrissakes, I ask you to do one thing-” Durkin’s eyes grew wide as he watched Lester reach down towards an Aukowie seedling growing on the edge of the field. “Damn it, Lester, get your hand away from that!” he ordered.

Lester slowly pulled his hand back, a hurt look showing on his mouth. “I just wanted to see what the big deal is about these weeds,” he said.

“You want to lose a finger? That’s what’s going to happen if you try touching one of them without a glove.”

“I’m not going to lose a finger,” Lester insisted, his face a mask of hurt.

“You sure as hell will if you put your hand down there without knowing what you’re doing. Just stay right where you are. I’ll come get you.”

Durkin heaved the canvas sack over his shoulder and started towards his son. When he got within a few feet of the boy he slung the sack to him. The weight of the sack almost knocked Lester over. “You carry that,” Durkin told him. “We’ll dump this first and then get started with what we need to do.”

“This is heavy,” Lester complained.

“You’ll get used to it. Put it over your shoulder. It will be too hard carrying it two-handed like that.”

Lester struggled to get the sack over his shoulder, his knees buckling. “We’re taking it over to that stone pit over there,” Durkin said, pointing out with a thick knobby finger where his son had to bring the sack. As he led the way, he looked back once and couldn’t help grimacing watching Lester’s thin bird-like legs shake as he struggled to carry the sack of dead Aukowies. He regretted thinking the things he did earlier. The boy may not be much but at least he was out there trying. As thin and slight as he was, he was going to have a hard road ahead of him as Caretaker. The Durkins historically were of a stockier build. Lester, unfortunately, had to take after Lydia’s side of the family and end up as thin as a stick. The boy was already over six feet tall and didn’t weigh more than a hundred and thirty pounds. When they reached the stone pit, he helped Lester dump the sack out.

“It smells bad,” Lester said, wrinkling his nose.

Jack Durkin nodded. “Yep. Those dead Aukowies been baking in the sun for a few hours now, getting nice and ripe. Wait till you catch a whiff of them when I set that pile on fire later. The smell alone will prove that these ain’t no weeds.”

“They look like weeds,” Lester said stubbornly, his eyes squinting and peering off at the field.

“You’ll think differently soon. Now grab that empty sack and follow me.”

Jack Durkin led the way back to the shed near the entrance of the field. “Your great great grandpa built this almost a hundred years ago,” he proudly told his son. “Solid pine. Probably be around another hundred years.”

Lester shrugged, didn’t seem too impressed. “How come one of the weeds is bigger than the others?” he asked.

“’Cause I needed to let one get that size.” Durkin stopped to wipe some sweat from his brow. He frowned deeply at the foot-tall Aukowie. “Son, you’re going to have to be extra careful around that one. When they get that big they can whip out at you like a rattlesnake, and trust me, they’re far more deadly than any snake.”

“Sure they are,” Lester muttered under his breath.

Durkin heard the crack, but showed nothing except weariness, and maybe a bit of tenderness, in his heavily-lined leathered face. “It’s true,” he said. “You’ll be seeing soon enough, son. When they get to two feet, they get much bolder. Then they’re like a rabid pit bull, flying all over the place trying to get at you. But at one foot they’re still dangerous enough. Hell, even at two-inches they can hurt you pretty bad.” He breathed in deeply and sighed. “Just keep your distance from that sucker when we go over to it.”

“Why are we going over to it?”

“So you can record it when I dig it out. You’ll see what an Aukowie really is then.”

Durkin opened the door to the shed and took out a spade for Lester to hold onto. He was going to need that spade later when it came time to subdue the foot-high Aukowie. He next retrieved Charlie Harper’s video camcorder that he had left in the shed for safekeeping. He struggled for a moment to hit the power button with his thick index finger, then handed the camcorder to his son. “You remember from last night how to use this, right?” he asked.

Lester rolled his eyes. “Yeah, I remember.”

Durkin ignored the insolence and said, “Since you didn’t wear work boots we need to stay off the field where they’re growing more than an inch, otherwise they’d slice your feet to ribbons. Follow me and don’t put your hands anywhere near one of them, okay?”

“Okay,” Lester muttered. He hesitated and asked, “How come you’ve been keeping your hand in your pocket?”

“I got careless earlier.” Durkin took his hand out and showed Lester the blood-stained handkerchief tied a few inches above his wrist. “You can never let an Aukowie taste human blood. Not even a drop. Don’t matter how big they are, they’ll go nuts if they do.” He studied his own arm and nodded slowly. “Looks like I don’t need to worry about bleeding on them anymore. Be careful, okay, son? You might think this is all one big joke right now, but it ain’t.”

Durkin untied the handkerchief from his arm and folded it back in his pocket. Blood had scabbed over his wound. He took his glove from his pocket, put it back on, then led the way along the edge of the field. When he got to where he had stopped his weeding, he told Lester to stand still.

“I was hoping today to start teaching you how to kill these things, but I can’t do it without you wearing gloves. These critters are tricky. You got to grab them just the right way and pull up at just the right angle. After a while you’ll get the hang of it. For now, though, watch me. Also, take a deep breath and listen carefully.”

Durkin waited until his son did as he was told, then he reached down and pulled a two-inch Aukowie from the ground. He turned his head sideways to look at his son.

“You hear that?” he asked.

“Hear what?”

“The scream it made when I killed it.”

“Nope. I didn’t hear nuthin’.”

Durkin’s eyes and mouth weakened with disappointment. “You will eventually, son. Sometimes it takes practice. My pa told me it took him over a year before he started hearing it. Me, I started hearing it from the very first Aukowie I killed.”

“I dunno. I didn’t hear nuthin’.”

“It will just take some time.” Durkin straightened up and grimaced painfully as he worked a few kinks from his back. “We’re going to go over to that large one over there,” he said. “They’re longer than they look, so be careful.” He paused, smiling wistfully. “Can you see the face on it?” he asked.

“Nope.”

Durkin pointed out its eyes and mouth and horns. “You can’t see all that?”

“All I see are a bunch of leaves and vines.” Lester narrowed his eyes. “Maybe some thorns, too, but that’s all I see.”

“Sometimes it just takes a while, that’s all,” Durkin said with a heavy sigh. “You keep looking and you’ll see it.”

“Dad,” Lester said, “do you really believe all this?”

“What?”

“That these aren’t just weeds?”

“What have I been saying?”

Lester scratched his jaw, then scratched behind his ear. “I dunno. That’s all part of the act, right?”

“Son, you’ll be finding out soon this is no act.” Jack Durkin emptied out a lungful of air and sighed heavily. “Hand me that spade. And get ready with the camera.”

Lydia called Paul Minter’s office at nine o’clock and was told by his receptionist that he was in court and wouldn’t be back until after one. From that point on she sat at the kitchen table chain-smoking through half a dozen packs of cigarettes, all the while keeping one eye on the clock over the oven. At one o’clock she thought about calling again but held back. When the phone eventually rang it jolted her.

“Dorothy told me you called?” Paul Minter said.

“It’s one thirty-five. She told me you’d be back by one.”

“Things took longer than expected. What’s up?”

Lydia told him about her husband planning to make a videotape of the weeds. How he was planning to show it to the town.

Minter took the news quietly and finally asked, “Why does he want to do that?”

“Because he wants to prove to everyone that these things ain’t weeds.”

“You’re kidding.”

“I wish I was.”

Another long silence from Minter’s end, then, “I don’t think this would be the best thing for us.”

“I didn’t think so either.”

“Who is your husband planning to show his videotape to?”

“Probably the local news station.”

Minter digested that and said, “No, that definitely would not be good for us.” Lydia could hear him coughing at his end, then spit something into a trashcan. When he came back, he asked, “Your husband doesn’t actually believe what’s in the book you showed me?”

“I think that damn fool believes every word of it.”

“This really isn’t good at all,” he said softly. He cleared his throat some more. “It’s one thing to have this quaint little fairy tale that everybody knows is only a fairy tale, it’s quite another to rub everybody’s nose in that fact…” He hesitated for a long moment. When he continued his voice was more controlled. “Did you tell your husband about our plans?”

“Of course not. You told me you’d talk to him after your plans were worked out.”

“That’s right, I did. How about if I meet with him later today. Do you think you can bring him over to the office this afternoon?”

“He’ll be at that field until eight tonight.”

“Can you get him to leave early?”

“Not a snowball’s chance.”

“How about if I stop by your house tonight?”

“Fine with me.”

“What time does your family have dinner?”

“When my husband comes home. Eight o’clock usually. We should be done by nine.”

“Expect me there at nine. I’ll have a talk with your husband then, and I’m sure he’ll be as excited about our plans as we are.”

“We’ll see,” Lydia said, without much enthusiasm.

“And, Mrs. Durkin, it’s not just us. I’ve had preliminary talks with several members of the town council. There’s a lot of excitement brewing over these plans. I’ll be meeting with potential business partners tomorrow. But it would be best if you can keep him from showing videotapes he may have made to anyone, especially to the media, at least until I have a chance to talk with him.”

“He won’t be showing anyone videotapes,” Lydia promised. “At least not today.”

Paul Minter told her that was good news. He put his receptionist on the line to get driving directions to her cabin. After Lydia got off the phone, she chain-smoked through half a pack of cigarettes, then put on a fresh pot of coffee. While she waited for the coffee to brew, she heard some noises from outside. It sounded like a sick dog howling off in the distance. She looked out the kitchen window and saw her husband and Lester maybe a hundred yards away. Her husband had his arm around Lester’s waist and seemed to be half dragging and half carrying him. Her son was shirtless and looked white as a sheet. It also looked like he was dragging something with his right hand. As they got closer she could see him more clearly. His face was screwed up as if he were dying and a redness around his eyes stood out in stark contrast to the unnatural paleness of the rest of his skin, almost as if paint had been used. She could also see he was-n’t dragging anything in his right hand-that instead his shirt had been wrapped around it. She remembered him leaving the house in a green tee shirt. What was around his hand looked like it had been dyed red. She could hear him whimpering.

Lydia stood frozen as her son and husband moved closer, trying to make some sense out of the scene. Then she sprang to life and rushed out the kitchen door to meet them.

“It wasn’t my fault,” Jack Durkin told her.

Lydia brought Lester’s head to her shoulder. His eyes were squeezed tight. What looked like paint was blood that had been smeared across his face. As she whispered to him, his mouth opened wide and he whimpered like a wounded dog. Thick strands of saliva dripped from his mouth onto her blouse. She rubbed her hand across his face wiping off tears, then started kissing his cheek, his eyes, his forehead, all the while telling him that everything was going to be okay.

Her husband repeated that it wasn’t his fault. “It happened so fast,” he said flatly, his expression vacant. “I didn’t know what was happening until it was over.”

She looked away from her son to her husband, her small eyes enflamed. “What did you do to my son?” she demanded, her voice shaking.

“Nothin’.” Durkin shook his head. “I didn’t do nothin’. It wasn’t my fault.”

Lester let loose a low cry. She gently took his hand and unwrapped the shirt that had been tied around it. Underneath was a bloody mess. She saw that his thumb was missing.

“It wasn’t my fault,” her husband insisted. “He was supposed to film me while I dug up one of the Aukowies. I heard something, looked over and saw he dropped the camera. Before I could stop him he reached down for it.”

“You monster,” she said to him, her voice still shaking and barely a whisper.

Durkin flinched. “There was nothing I could do,” he said.

She flew at him, beating him over and over again in the chest, her hands clenched into tiny fists that were no bigger than small Cortland apples. Durkin stood helplessly and took it.

“There was nothin’ I could do to stop it.”

“Where’s his thumb?” she cried. Tears streamed down her raisin-like face. “What did you do with it!”

“It’s gone.”

“What do you mean it’s gone?”

“The Aukowies got it,” he said.

“You bastard!”

“There was nothin’ I could do. They took his thumb. Next thing it was gone. Nothin’ left but a pink mist.”

She flashed him a look mixed with hate and disgust and utter contempt, then led Lester away from him.

“You better take him to the hospital,” he said, acting as if Lydia were still listening to him. “I can’t. I have to go back. I have to finish weeding.” There was a desperate pleading in his eyes. He waited for her to look back at him. She didn’t. He wiped the back of his hand across his brow, then under his nose. “Lydia, there was nothin’ I could do.”

“Go to hell.” She guided Lester into the passenger seat of their car and secured the seatbelt around him. She stopped for a moment to kiss him on the cheek and forehead, then got behind the wheel. She floored the gas, revving the engine to a high pitch. Durkin stood staring helplessly. He didn’t bother to move when she backed the car out at full throttle, coming within a hair’s breadth of clipping him.

“There was nothing I could do,” he repeated to no one. He stood and watched the car race down the dirt road and saw it barely miss spinning into a tree before Lydia regained control of the wheel. When it was out of sight, he turned and headed back to Lorne Field.

The nearest hospital was two towns over in Eastham. When Lydia arrived there with Lester, the doctor handling the emergency room gave her a funny look when he saw Lester’s hand. He wanted to get Lester into surgery, but before that he had questions for her. The first one was where was the thumb. All she could do was tell him she didn’t know.

He was checking Lester’s vital signs while a nurse attached an IV and another wrapped gauze around Lester’s hand. She recognized the nurse attaching the IV as Abby Huffman’s girl. She had never seen the doctor or other nurse before, knew they weren’t from her town. The doctor asked how the injury happened.

“I don’t know. My husband says it was an accident. That’s all he told me.”

“He was with your son at the time?”

“Yes.”

“Anyone else with them?”

“Nope, just Lester and my husband.”

“What happened to the thumb?”

“All he said was it was lost. Anyway, I don’t have it and I don’t know where it is.”

“That’s too bad,” the doctor said. “It looks like a clean cut. The thumb probably could’ve been reattached.”

“H-how do you think it was cut off?”

“A knife.”

Lester was sedated when he was brought in. He started moaning. Abby Huffman’s girl told the doctor that the IV was in. He told Lydia that they were taking Lester to surgery. That not only did they need to operate on his hand, but his blood pressure was dangerously low and he needed a transfusion as quickly as possible. He looked away from her and told her that she would be escorted to a waiting area.

“I want to be with my son.”

He turned only partly to face her. He was a lean man in his early thirties with a face like a razor. The look he gave her had about as much warmth as a sheet of ice.

“We have certain rules we need to follow for cases like this,” he said.

“Cases like what?”

He ignored her, nodding instead to two orderlies standing nearby. They took hold of the gurney Lester was on and started wheeling it away. The doctor followed them. When Lydia tried to follow, the nurse that she didn’t know stepped in her way.

“I’m sorry,” the nurse said, “but I need to bring you to one of our waiting rooms.”

The nurse was a good forty pounds heavier than Lydia and had a thick neck for a woman. Her forearms were also thicker than Lydia’s thighs. Lydia felt very tired at that moment. Weak also. She nodded and followed the nurse to a small room that had only a table and two chairs in it. The nurse asked Lydia whether she could get her a magazine. Lydia shook her head, sat down and started to cry. She didn’t want to cry in front of this other woman but couldn’t help herself. She heard the door close as the nurse left.

While she waited, a woman from the hospital came to ask her questions. She was about Lydia’s age but looked much younger. She wore a turtleneck sweater and a long wool skirt, which seemed to Lydia like an odd choice for the summer. Most of her questions were about their family life. It was a blur to Lydia. She was only half-aware of her answers. A short time after the woman left, two local police officers came in to talk to her. They didn’t have many questions, mostly the same ones the doctor had, and a few about her husband. It was also like a blur with them. It seemed as if they were only there for seconds before they were gone. She knew it was longer, but that’s what it seemed like.

When Sheriff Wolcott walked into the room she was surprised to see that it was already a quarter to five. He looked ill at ease as he sat across from her, his skin color not quite right.

“Mrs. Durkin,” he said.

“Daniel.”

“I understand there was an accident?”

“Yes.” She looked again at her watch and slowly made sense of the fact that she’d been sitting there over two hours. “My boy should be done with surgery by now,” she said, her face crumbling as she expected the worst.

“I understand the surgery went well. A doctor will be in here soon to talk to you about it, but I understand it went well and Lester’s recuperating right now.”

“Thank God.” She started crying then, her sobs wracking her nearly skeletal frame. “Oh thank God for that.”

Through the sobbing she could see Wolcott studying her, his eyes queasy and his lips turned up into a forced look of sympathy. He looked like he wanted to bolt. She sniffed a few times, got control of her crying and wiped a hand across her eyes.

“Why ain’t I allowed to be with my son right now?”

“You will be,” he said. He looked down at his hands, didn’t seem to know what to do with them, and ended up folding them in front of him with his fingers interlaced. “I understand Lester’s still in post-op, but you’ll be able to see him soon. I have some questions for you.”

“Well, why don’t you get around to asking them!”

He smiled weakly at her then, reminding her of the way he was when he was five and she used to babysit him. The smile faded quickly. “I need to know about the accident, Mrs. Durkin.”

“There’s nothing I can tell you,” she said. “You’re going to have to ask Lester or my damned fool husband about it.”

“I plan to,” he said. His manner shifted momentarily to something more formal, more police-like. When he met Lydia’s stare, the hardness about his face faded. “I was hoping you might have some idea what happened.”

“Nope. I wasn’t there.”

“The doctor I spoke to thinks Lester’s thumb was cut off with a knife.”

Lydia didn’t say anything. Wolcott tried to meet her eyes, but instead lowered his gaze back to his folded hands. “Do you think Jack might’ve done something like that?” he asked.

“All I know is he told me it was an accident.”

“But you know him as well as anyone. Could he do something like that?”

She laughed. “Know him as well as anyone? Ha! I don’t have a clue what goes on in that block of cement he calls a head. But no, he wouldn’t intentionally hurt Lester. He never once laid a hand on me or the boys. It’s not in him to do something like that. He makes a lot of noise but that’s all it is.”

“He does seem to have quite a temper.”

“Not really. His bark’s worse than his bite.”

“What about his mental state?”

Lydia laughed again. “He’s no crazier now than he’s ever been.”

“I don’t know,” Wolcott said. “I was talking to him just last night and he acted pretty crazy to me. You know that a bunch of boys snuck down to Lorne Field and threw tomatoes at him? He wanted me to track them down so he could have them hung publicly in the town square.”

She shrugged. “That’s what’s written in his contract.”

“I don’t care what’s in his contract, that’s insane!”

“Don’t yell at me, Daniel.”

He nodded, contrite. “I’m sorry, Mrs. Durkin. But you have to admit someone wanting to have teenagers executed for throwing tomatoes at him is pretty insane.” He waited for her to say something. When she didn’t, he wet his lips and edged closer to her. He asked, “I was wondering if that contract has anything in it about cutting off someone’s thumb. You know, as a punishment?”

Lydia shook her head. “I’ve read it. There’s nothing like that in it. And my fool husband only does what’s spelled out in his contract.”

“I’d like to read it also.”

“You come over to the house when he’s not home and I’ll get it for you. You just can’t let him know I did it.”

He licked his lips again and asked, “So you don’t think Jack’s acting any crazier these days than usual?”

“Nope. No more than usual.”

“Then what do you think happened?”

“I have no idea. Probably it’s just an accident like Jack said. He was probably showing Lester how to pull out one of those weeds, and maybe what he was using slipped. Maybe he uses a knife. I don’t know. You’ll have to ask him.”

“I will when I talk to Jack later. Did he bring Lester back to your house after the incident?”

She nodded.

“Why didn’t he come with you to the hospital?”

A dark film fell over her eyes. “He had his weeding to do.”

“So he went back to Lorne Field afterwards?”

“That’s right. After he brought Lester home he headed back there.” She paused as she considered this, and as she did, her features weakened, becoming more like bone china than stone. “That would’ve been a violation of his contract. He’s not supposed to leave that field until his weeding’s done. It must’ve been difficult for him to do that.” A tear leaked from her eye. She wiped it away with a hand. “When do you plan on talking to him?”

“As soon as possible.”

“Daniel, can you wait until he leaves that field?”

“I don’t know if I can do that-”

“It would be hard on him to have someone come by that field like that. Please, Daniel, wait until he finishes his weeding.”

He started to tell her that that wouldn’t be possible, that there was possible evidence at the field which he needed to examine, but instead he looked away from her and stared out the window. “I’ll try, but I can’t promise anything.” A red-tailed hawk flew into view, and he watched as it circled lazily in the sky and then darted out of sight. He imagined that it spotted a rabbit or squirrel. He turned back to her. “What bothers me the most about all this is wondering what happened to Lester’s thumb. If it was cut off in an accident, then where is it?”

Lydia shrugged and said she didn’t know.

“This just doesn’t make sense. If it was simply an accident, why didn’t Jack bring Lester’s thumb with him so it could be reattached…?”

“He said it was lost,” Lydia said.

“What?”

“Jack said the thumb was lost,” she repeated weakly.

“That doesn’t make any sense.”

“That’s what he said.”

Wolcott frowned, his lips straightening out into a hard line. He pushed himself out of his chair and told her he’d have Lester’s doctor talk to her. He stopped at the door, took a deep breath, and informed her that Child Services was investigating the accident. “Until their investigation’s complete Lester’s going to have to be placed in a foster home. Bert, too. I’m sorry, Mrs. Durkin, but those are the rules.”

“That’s not right.”

“There’s nothing I can do about it,” he said.

“It’s still not right.”

“Mrs. Durkin, what we have right now is a seventeen-year-old boy alone with his father having his thumb cut off and no reasonable explanation as to how it happened.”

Lydia’s took a tissue from her pocketbook. Her hand shook as she dabbed her eyes with it. “That woman who talked to me, the one wearing a turtleneck sweater in ninety degree weather, she’s not with the hospital, is she?”

“Do you remember her name?”

Lydia found the woman’s card. “Suzanne Phillips,” she said. The card had a lot of acronyms and abbreviations on it and she had no idea what any of them stood for.

“Ms. Phillips is with Child Services,” Wolcott said.

“How can you have a woman like that-someone without the sense to wear proper clothes during the summer-be allowed to make decisions like that about my family?”

“I don’t know, Mrs. Durkin.”

“It’s not right.”

Wolcott looked away from her and didn’t answer.

“When’s Bert and Lester going to be allowed to come home?”

Wolcott sighed and squeezed his eyes with his thumb and index finger. “I’ll talk to Jack and Lester and see what they both have to say. If I can clear this up quickly enough, maybe tomorrow.”

Lydia sniffed and gave Wolcott a hard look. “Well, make sure that you do that.”

He hesitated for a moment with his hand on the door-knob, then walked back to her so he could give her a hand and escort her to the doctor who had performed Lester’s surgery.

Time floated by Jack Durkin. One moment he’d be aware of weeding in one part of the field, next he’d be realizing that he was pulling out Aukowies fifty feet away from that spot. Somehow, even with his mind turning on and off like that, he survived it without any further injuries. He guessed he had gotten to the point where he could weed Aukowies in his sleep, which was a good thing since he was for the most part sleepwalking that afternoon. He was surprised when he was done with his last pass of the field and saw it was only six-thirty. Even with everything that had happened he had finished early.

Even with all the distractions…

Even with having to half-carry Lester the three miles back to their home…

He heaved the canvas sack over his shoulder and carried it to the stone pit. After dumping the Aukowie remains with all the others, he tossed a match onto the pile and watched it burst into flames. Once again they shot close to twenty feet upward, a bluish-reddish flame lighting the sky. It was an unnatural color for a fire, something that burning weeds shouldn’t cause. It hit him then that he had planned to videotape the flames. Up until that moment he had forgotten about Charlie Harper’s video camcorder. After Lester lost his thumb he put the camcorder in the shed for safekeeping. He turned to retrieve it, but stopped after a couple of steps knowing the flames would be out by the time he got it. He turned back to the fire and watched it burn. It didn’t matter. Lester had videotaped enough of that foot-high Aukowie in action before he dropped the camcorder…

The scene played back again in his mind, just as it had all afternoon. He had warned Lester what to expect, but the boy still thought it was all one big joke. When the foot-high Aukowie quit playing possum and whipped out at him, he was ready for it but his boy wasn’t. He sidestepped the attack, then tried to pin the thing back with the spade. Lester, who was standing a good ten feet away to his left, nearly dropped the camcorder then. Durkin glanced over his shoulder and saw the boy fumbling with it, his skin paling to a sick white. He yelled at him to just be careful and keep videotaping. He knew a one-foot high Aukowie didn’t have anywhere near the strength of a fully matured one, but they could still surprise you. If he had been able to leverage his full body weight and strength properly he would’ve been able to pin that Aukowie to the ground, but he was reaching too much and didn’t have his full weight behind him and the Aukowie was able to whip the spade out of his hands. It flew past Lester and almost hit him. Lester stumbled then. He dropped the camcorder also.

Durkin realized too late that Lester had reached down for the camcorder. It didn’t click fast enough in his mind that it had fallen among two-inch high Aukowies. Before he could say anything he saw his son’s thumb disappear. It was as if it had been chewed up by a buzz saw. He remembered the pink spray that came from it. He remembered Lester staring down at his hand, confused, trying to make sense out of what had happened. And then the screaming. Jesus, there was a lot of screaming. Even now in the dead stillness of the early evening he could hear traces of it.

He slapped Lester hard across the face then, trying to bring him out of his shock. Lester stopped screaming. He still whimpered and cried, but he stopped his screaming. Durkin needed to tie something around his son’s hand. His own shirt was too dirty and damp with perspiration. He was afraid it would infect his son’s wound, so he had Lester take his shirt off and he wrapped it tightly around Lester’s damaged hand. After the shirt was tied as tightly as he could make it, Durkin picked up the camcorder and led Lester off the field. He had to keep telling his son to keep his hand held up. He didn’t have to look down to know the rustling sounds were being made by baby Aukowies that had gotten a taste of human blood. Durkin left the camcorder in the shed and then brought Lester back home.

The flames died down. All that was left was a foul stench and a mound of smoldering ashes. He thought about Lester and wondered how his boy was doing. He wouldn’t die from losing his thumb like that, not unless he bled to death or picked up a nasty infection. And Durkin couldn’t help wishing that one of those two things would happen. He also couldn’t help regretting not tying his own shirt around Lester’s hand. While he felt ashamed for those thoughts, he no longer had any doubts about Lester. The boy was not cut out to be Caretaker. It was as simple as that. He couldn’t risk the fate of the world in Lester’s hands. Bert was going to have to be Caretaker. Durkin found himself alternately wishing Lester was okay and hoping his son would die.

He used a shovel that he had brought from the shed to bury the Aukowie ashes and mix in lime. When he was done he stored the shovel and canvas sack back in the shed and took the camcorder. He stood for a moment looking upwards at the barren sky overhead. Even in the early evening with the Aukowies weeded out, birds still avoided the area. All his years coming here he never once saw a bird fly over Lorne Field. Never saw any squirrels or chipmunks in the woods nearby either. He wondered whether it was like this in the winter when the Aukowies were deep underground and hibernating. He wondered if birds dared fly past the field then. He decided one day he’d have to come out and see for himself.

He started down the dirt path leading to the Caretaker’s cabin. Thoughts about Lester bombarded him. He could see clearly the look on Lester’s face as his son realized what had happened to his thumb, then how helpless Lester was when he had to be mostly carried those last two miles home. He tried to shake those images from his mind and instead focus on what he had to do. Bert needed to become the next Caretaker. Which meant that he was going to have to continue being Caretaker for another eight years. As hard as that sounded, he was going to have to accept that. It also meant he was going to have to take the necessary steps to make Bert his eldest son. Unless Lester died from losing too much blood. Or picked up a deadly infection…

All of Durkin’s strength bled out of him as those thoughts crept into his mind. He grabbed onto a tree for support, his legs wobbly beneath him. He decided then that he would have to ignore the contract and transfer the Caretaker position to his second son. What was wrong with that? After losing his thumb, Lester was probably no longer even capable of doing the job. It was just common sense. Durkin felt better, less shaky, at least for the moment. Then all his recent transgressions came crashing down on him. First letting an Aukowie grow to one foot in height, then leaving the field before finishing his weeding for the day, and now this. Up until two days ago he had lived his life exactly to the letter of the contract, never wavering, never making any exceptions. As far as he knew, all Durkins before him had done the same. And now this.

The first Durkin to turn his back on the contract…

He was so damn cold. His tongue had turned fuzzy, like he had swallowed a wool sock.

The same one that his pa and grandpa and every Durkin before them held sacred. And now one intentional violation after the next…

His head reeled with that thought. The ground started to slip sideways on him. Then the sky went black and the earth rushed up to meet him, smacking him in the face. He didn’t even feel it. He couldn’t feel anything except being so damn cold. He tried to lift his head up through the blackness but couldn’t.

Dear God, he thought, I’m going to die right now and nobody’s going to be left to save the world. I do believe in you. Please, I want so much to believe in you.

He didn’t die, though. He realized he had only fainted. After a minute or so the blackness started to fade. Slowly, he rolled onto his back. He lifted his hand in front of his eyes and could see its outline through a dim haze. He dropped his hand to his forehead, resting it there. His skin felt so damn clammy and wet. He shivered, realizing his shirt was drenched in cold sweat. After several more minutes he was able to push himself to a sitting position. He had dropped the camcorder when he fell and was now reaching out with his arms trying to locate it. He felt it, then gathered it up and pushed himself to his feet. He made a decision then. He was-n’t going to violate the contract again. No more exceptions.

He steadied himself, waiting until he had some strength in his legs, then set off down the path again. He was surprised when he turned the next bend to see Sheriff Wolcott leaning against a tree.

“Jack,” Wolcott said, nodding.

“What are you doing here?” Durkin asked, his voice coming out as a low croak. “You’re not supposed to be out at Lorne Field. It’s against the contract.”

“I don’t believe I’m at Lorne Field.” Wolcott slapped his neck and studied the palm of his hand before wiping it against his pants leg. “I’ve been standing here waiting for you and getting bit up by mosquitoes. Damn things are the size of hummingbirds here. I don’t know how the hell you stand it.”

“What do you want?”

“Jesus, Jack, you know what I want. Your son had his thumb cut off. You need to tell me about it.” Wolcott’s eyes narrowed. “Jack, is something wrong? You look sick.”

“Never mind how I’m feeling. You ain’t my doctor.”

Wolcott chuckled softly. “No, I’m not. But you don’t look well at all. What happened out there today, Jack?”

“Didn’t you talk to Lester yet?”

“Not yet. He’s doped up on painkillers and his doctor asked me to wait ’til tomorrow.”

Durkin felt lightheaded and almost lost his balance. He could see that Wolcott noticed it.

“So Lester’s okay?” he asked.

“As okay as a seventeen-year-old boy can be after having his thumb chopped off.”

“It wasn’t chopped off.”

Wolcott raised an eyebrow and waited for Durkin to explain further.

“Lydia knows what happened. She didn’t tell you?”

“All she said was that there had been an accident.”

“That’s all she told you?”

“Jack, what happened?”

Durkin met Wolcott’s eyes and told him that an Aukowie had gotten Lester’s thumb.

“Come on, Jack-”

“I’m tellin’ you what happened.”

“You’re kidding, right?”

“That’s what happened.”

“Damn it, Jack, I’m trying to give you every benefit of the doubt here.” Grimacing suddenly, the sheriff slapped hard at his forearm, then his right ear. He looked back at Durkin and shook his head at him as if he were talking to a five-year-old child. “I need you to explain it to me, Jack.”

“Don’t you patronize me. Not after what I do for you and your family everyday.”

“Yeah, I know, you save the world for us. Thanks, Jack, we appreciate it. But you have to tell me exactly how Lester lost his thumb. And telling me that an Aukowie got it isn’t good enough.”

“It ain’t, huh? I wish I could take you down to that field so you could see for yourself.”

“Is that a threat, Jack?”

“Nope, just something I wish I could do.”

Wolcott straightened up, flinched and slapped the back of his neck. He searched the palm of his hand to see if he’d been quick enough. “Well, why don’t we do that, Jack?” he offered.

“I can’t. That would be violating my contract.”

“You violated it earlier today, didn’t you, Jack? When you brought Lester in from the field?”

Durkin’s face reddened. “Yes, I did,” he admitted.

“Of course you did,” Wolcott said. “You had to. What else were you going to do? Leave your son out there to bleed to death?”

Durkin stared stone-faced at Wolcott. Wolcott waited for a response but didn’t get any. He slapped at another mosquito, then sighed as he glanced at his watch.

“Look, Jack, it’s getting late. I have a family to get home to. Why don’t we take a walk back to the field and you can explain to me what happened.”

Durkin didn’t say anything, just continued to stare hard at the sheriff. Wolcott smiled pleasantly. “Come on, Jack,” he said, “you violated your contract once today, what’s one more time?”

“I ain’t doing it. Not never again.”

Wolcott started to sigh, then hopped to one side, ducking his head and brushing furiously at his ear. “Goddamn these mosquitoes!’ he swore. He glared angrily at Durkin, his temper slipping away. “I want to hear right now what happened to Lester’s thumb,” he demanded, all signs of folksy pleasantness gone from his manner.

“Not much to tell. Lester dropped this camcorder. When he reached down to pick it up one of the Aukowies chewed his thumb off. It all happened too fast for me to do anything about it.”

“You’re telling me a weed bit off his thumb?”

“They ain’t weeds.”

Wolcott put a hand to his eyes and rubbed them with his thumb and index finger. He did for a while. When he took his hand away his eyes were rimmed with red. “Jack,” he said, “you realize how nuts this sounds?”

“That’s what happened. Ask Lester if you don’t believe me.”

“Jack, Jack, Jack,” Wolcott repeated softly. “You’re making this so damn hard on yourself. You want me to arrest you right now?”

“What for?”

“What for? How about maiming your son?”

“I didn’t touch Lester. Ask him yourself.”

“Sure. You didn’t touch him. A weed bit off his thumb.” Wolcott rubbed his eyes again, then pushed his hand through his hair. His hair was damp enough with sweat that it spiked up. “What was Lester doing with the camcorder?” he asked.

“He was helping me videotape those Aukowies in action.”

“Yeah? You didn’t by any chance videotape that weed biting off your son’s thumb?”

“I don’t know. Maybe. He was videotaping me trying to dig up one of the Aukowies when the damn thing whipped the spade out of my hands. That was when Lester stumbled and dropped the camcorder. Maybe it landed so it was pointing in the right direction to videotape what happened to Lester.”

“So now you’re telling me that a weed grabbed a spade out of your hands?”

“No, I said an Aukowie, not a weed.”

“My mistake. An Aukowie. And let me guess, it threw the spade at your son.”

“Yep.”

Wolcott showed a tired smile. “And it hit Lester in the thumb, right? Chopped it right off?”

Durkin shook his head, scowling. “Nope, that’s not what I said. The spade missed Lester. He had his thumb chewed off when he put it too close to an Aukowie. I kept warning him all afternoon not to do that.”

Wolcott looked at Durkin and tried to make up his mind whether or not to keep humoring him. “Why don’t you show me what you videotaped,” he said finally.

Durkin pulled the view screen out from the camcorder and tried to play back the video. His scowl deepened as he stared at it. “I can’t remember how to use this damn thing,” he muttered.

“Give it to me.”

Durkin handed Wolcott the camcorder. The sheriff tried to turn it on and frowned at it also. “I think it’s broken,” he said.

“Lester did drop it,” Durkin said. He remembered with some shame dropping it also when he fainted. He remembered the ground around where he fell had been hard and that there were rocks there too, but he didn’t mention any of that.

Wolcott examined the camcorder more carefully. “There’s no tape inside.”

“What?”

“There’s no tape inside. See for yourself.”

Wolcott pointed a finger at the empty slot where a tape should’ve been. Durkin squinted at it, shaking his head.

“That don’t make any sense,” he said. “There should be a tape there.”

“Jack,” Wolcott said, his expression turning grim, “why don’t you quit wasting both our time and tell me what really happened at Lorne Field today.”

“I’m telling you, there should be a tape in there. I don’t understand why there ain’t. There was one in it last night.”

“It’s empty now. Why is that?”

“I don’t know.”

“I’ll tell you why. Because you took it out and got rid of it. I wouldn’t be surprised if you buried it.”

“Why would I do that?”

Wolcott looked at Durkin with a mix of exasperation and pity. He swallowed back what he wanted to say, which was that he did it because he was nuts. Instead he kept his voice as calm as he could and said, “Because somehow you’ve convinced yourself you could make a videotape proving that those weeds are monsters. But when the videotape showed they’re nothing but weeds, you had to try something else. Is that why you cut off Lester’s thumb? So you could claim they bit it off and prove they’re monsters that way? Come on, Jack, just admit this and let’s make this easy for everyone. Especially your family.”

“One of the Aukowies chewed off Lester’s thumb,” Durkin argued stubbornly.

“That’s the story you’re going to stick with?”

“It’s the truth.”

“I should arrest you right now,” Wolcott said. “But if I did I’d have to drag you over a mile in handcuffs. No, with this I’m going to make sure to dot my i’s and cross my t’s. I’ll wait until I talk to Lester. Besides, I know where to find you. You’ll be back at Lorne Field tomorrow saving the world, won’t you, Jack?”

“Make fun of me all you want.”

“I’m simply asking you a question, Jack, that’s all.”

Durkin’s eyes darkened. “Talk to Lester,” he said. “He’ll tell you what happened.”

“I’m sure he will. I’ll be seeing you, Jack.”

Sheriff Wolcott handed the camcorder back to Durkin and nodded as he headed down an intersecting path leading to Hillside Drive where he had parked his car. Durkin stared dumbly at the camcorder in his large thick hands, wondering what had happened to the tape that had been inside it.