Al Sarrantonio - Totentanz

Smashwords Edition published at Smashwords byCrossroad Press

Copyright 2011 Al Sarrantonio

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If it be summer, he is easy to see, for hecomes dressed in mourning, his breath smelling of retribution,asking only for a kiss....

Anonymous

There was ice in the summer night, but it wasnot in the trees or on the ground. It was not in the July air, hotand close around them, as sticky as dried vanilla ice cream. Theirskin sweated because of the night, yet there was nothing but snowin their bones. Ice, long shivers of it, ran through them likeclear cold blood.

"The box opened," ReggieCarson said in a fierce whisper, leaning forward, spreading hishands over his two friends like an Old Testament prophet, "and thething sat straight up, its waxy face running flesh, its eyeballspopping out, and in its half-eaten hand it held... the claw!"

Reggie tossed something at them, a mass oftwigs or pipe cleaners in the shape of a talon.

They jumped, and another wash of cool frightbroke over them and then rolled back.

Heat lightning flashed suddenly overhead,illuminating the scene like a postcard: three boys on a hill in achurchyard. Around them, like bumps on a blanket, sat a thousandgraves in neatly planted rows or older, jumbled clusters. Justbehind the three boys, on the summit of their grave hill, stood amystery vault, a squat, locked death box, its darkly mottled,stained-glass windows like eyes, its big rectangular door like anowl's hooting mouth. Another lightning flash, revealing those threeboys: Jack and Pup, sitting down, knees drawn up, a scattering ofcandy wrappers and sandwich leavings around them, a knocked-overcan of Coke and a half-full bottle of orange soda between them,their faces looking up expectantly at Reggie, who stood above them,dark face momentarily still.

"Tell us about the tomb again," Jack said.Long and lean, he stretched his legs out, pulling the creases outof his jeans. He sometimes said he wanted to be a Marine, like hisfather. Pup, with brighter, smaller eyes, was not quite fat butmight someday be so: he reached for the fallen Coke can and cursedto find it nearly empty, its contents puddled on the ground.

"Yeah, tell us about that Jeff Scott guy, andwhy they never put him in the crypt," Pup added.

"This one's real," Reggie said, and for amoment disappointment crossed his friends' faces, as if his hintingthat the other story had not been real was a kind of betrayal: asif to reinforce this, lightning shone once again. "Well, anyway, Iknow this one's for real because it's in the town history books.They call this the Tomb of the Unknown Man, not because they don'tknow who he is, but because they don't know what happened to him.It was built for a guy named Jeff Scott. I never found out what,but the town did something to him, and so in nineteen twenty, along time after he died, they built him this crypt, to say theywere sorry, I guess. Only, when they went to dig up his oldgrave"Reggie pointed downhill to a ragged group of tiltedheadstones around a huge oak tree, barely discernible in the nightexcept when the lightning illuminated it"they found that he wasn'tin it. There was just a pile of churned-up dirt in the hole."

They had studied that grave site a hundredtimes, the earth now patted down, the stone reading "Jeff Scott,1846-1865," had put their hands upon it, had tried to draw meaningand sustenance from it.

"What happened to him?" Pup asked. He knewthe good part was coming. He swatted at a mosquito, trapping it onhis palm and pinching it between his thumb and forefinger. Hewatched the blot of bright red that came from it and then wiped hishands on his pants.

Reggie's face grew serious. "Barney Batestold me he rose up by himself and left Montvale and that somedayhe's coming back." Slowly he looked around at the stone buildingbehind him, then back at the other boys. "I don't know what thatmeans, but Barney Bates says he's coming back not to sleep in thistomb, but for revenge."

A delicious chill crept over Jack and Pup,and they let it wrap around them for a few moments.

"Did you ever think there might be somethinglocked in there anyway?" Pup asked finally, pointing to the vault.The feeling was fading, and he wanted to revive it. "Did you everthink that maybe it's not empty? I think there's a bucket of batsin there, or something worse. Maybe something that would come outand kill everyone in Montvale."

Jack said to Pup, laughing, "It'd have atough time getting you. There's so much of you to get." A dark lookpassed over Pup's face.

"Sometimes," Reggie said dreamily, "I dothink there's something in there, waiting for me." Cautiously theylooked around at the windows, imagining something moving behind thestained glass.

"Jesus." Jack said, pointing to what lookedlike motionbut it was only the weak reflection of a cloud acrossthe winking half-moon.

"Sometimes I really think there's somethingin there." Reggie repeated. His voice was low and serious. Jack andPup looked at each other, and a smile passed between them becausethey knew what was coming. They knew Reggie was going into one ofhis real weird moods, one of his death moods, and nothing but agood thrill would come of it.

Reggie said. "I think there's something inthere calling to me. I'd walk up there, the doors would swing openand it would reach out, whatever it is." The other two boyssquirmed. Its touch would be warm, and then icy cold. Just a longblue vapory arm, trailing off into the darkness behind it. Thefingers of the hands would tighten around me and begin to pull meforward. I'd hear something inside, a scratching sound like nailsdown a blackboard, but I wouldn't be able to get away from the gripof the thing. It's reeling me into the darkness like I'm afish.

Reggie's face resembled a sleepwalker's, andhis voice became a whisper. "Inside, the scratching sound stops.And there's dead silence. It smells like damp wood in there. At thedoor the hand stops, and then it pulls me inside. I hear the doorclose slowly, and I struggle but I can't loosen the grip the thinghas on me. It's so wet and cold. I begin to shiver. I reach out tothe door, trying to stop it from closing. But it clangs shut, andI'm in darkness."