Mr. Shivers (25 page)

Connelly said, “You got to get up, Hammond. You got to get up and climb up.”

“My God, Connelly!” he shrieked. “I can see my insides! I can see them!”

“You’ve got to get up and climb up to us, Hammond! Just get up and we’ll help you!”

He heard shuddering breaths from below. Pike fired another round and someone squawked.

“Hammond?” called Connelly.

“I’m… I’m trying.”

Connelly rolled to look below. Hammond was extending one deathly white hand toward a tree root. His fingers clutched at it
but could not grab hold. “I’m trying,” he said softly. “Going to pull myself up. Pull me up. Far as I can go.”

“Come on, Hammond.”

The boy’s head lolled into his upper arm. He coughed. A bullet caromed off of a stone above him.

“Connelly?” he said.

“Yeah?”

“I’m dying.”

“I know.”

“I’m dying here, Connelly.”

“I know, Hammond.”

“This… this is an awful place to do it in.”

“Yeah.” He stared down at the boy. Rubbed the sweat from his head with his coat. “We’ll get him for you, Hammond,” he called
down.

“Get who?”

“Shivers. We’ll get him.”

“Oh,” he said weakly.

“It’s his fault. Bastard trails death behind him, and… and…” He left off. All words of justification and purpose sounded pathetic
against the silence of the boy dying below.

“Connelly?”

“Yeah?”

“I want to go home.”

Connelly did not answer.

“I want to go home, Connelly,” Hammond whimpered. His voice was terribly soft now. “I should have never come out here.” He
coughed again. “I want to go home,” he said, louder. Then he shrieked, “I want to go home! I want… I want…”

His voice faded. Connelly looked below. The boy was rubbing at his wound, his eyes glazed and almost dark. “Connelly?” he
whispered. “There’s… there’s…” Then the movement stopped and he lay still.

“Don’t,” said Pike.

“Don’t what?”

“Don’t go get the gun,” he said.

“What… what the hell do you mean?”

“I mean don’t go get it. It’s too dangerous. It’s not worth it.”

“I wasn’t going to, anyways.”

“They aren’t chasing us anymore. Whatever spine they had we took out of them, shot for shot.”

“Shut up,” said Connelly.

“What?”

“Just… just shut up. For once. I mean…” Connelly shook his head.

Pike turned his blank face back to the woods, waited a moment, then stood and started on the trail again. Connelly stayed
for a second and then followed.

Mr. Shivers

They staggered through the bends and gullies of the mountain, fighting the dry cold. Pike tried to follow the gray man by
bent leaves and broken twigs but eventually said he wasn’t sure what the hell he was looking at anymore and they limped along
in silence. They walked until the sky was white with morning light.

“I’m thirsty,” said Connelly.

“I am, too.”

They sat down on the side of a steep embankment and drained their canteens. Connelly tossed his over the edge and listened
to it clanking and rattling as it tumbled below. He could not see where it landed.

“You shouldn’t have done that,” said Pike.

“There isn’t going to be any water up here.”

“You don’t know that.”

“Yeah I do.”

Pike looked at his canteen and then hurled it over. They listened to it crash and stood up and dusted themselves off and started
walking again.

“We should have asked those goddamn bastards for more food,” said Connelly.

Pike laughed. It was a nasty, grating sound. Connelly was not sure if he had ever heard him laugh before.

“Did I ever tell you about my friend?” Pike asked, shivering. “My friend, Jonas?”

“No.”

“He was my friend. Back in Georgia. I was a preacher and he was one of my flock.” Pike was quiet for a long time. “He was
a beautiful boy. Most beautiful boy I ever saw. I-I was young then. At least… I think I was.”

Connelly took measure of the terrain and stepped over a wide ditch. Pike followed.

“He cut his throat,” said Pike. “I remember that. Cut it ear to ear, for no reason I can understand. You have to remember
those things. Keeps you going.”

“I remember my daughter’s eyes,” said Connelly. “She had the most beautiful brown eyes. Eyes like… like molasses.” He stopped.
“At least… I think they were brown.” He reached for his wallet but found it was gone. He could not recall when he had lost
it.

“What happened to her mother?”

“She’s waiting for me.”

“Oh. I remember now.”

“She’s waiting for me. I’m going to go home. I’m going to go back home once this is done and everything’s going to be the
way it was. Just the way it was.”

They heard something and stopped. It was whistling. They followed it and found Roosevelt sitting upon a stone, looking down
a cliff at the fog, kicking his legs like a boy on a church pew. He heard them coming and looked and beamed at them.

“Hello, boys,” he said. “Hello. Morning. I think it’s morning.”

Connelly and Pike glanced at each other.

“Where did you go, Mr. Roosevelt?” asked Pike.

“I went here, of course. Walked right here. Just a stroll.”

“Are you sure no one told you to go and sit there?”

“No. No one told me. I just thought, well, there’s got to be a nice seat up there, I bet. I’d like to sit up there. Sit and
look. So here I am.”

“I see,” said Pike. “What’s your name?”

“What?”

“Your name. What is it?”

Roosevelt faltered. “I… Something. It’s something,” he murmured. “I know I have one. I’ll remember it,” he said, and smiled
again. “Don’t you worry.”

Pike nodded. “Well, stay here for a moment longer, sir. Just stay there while we talk.” He motioned to Connelly to follow.
They walked a few yards away.

Pike said, “Roosevelt is not himself.”

“I know.”

“He led us to that town. When he first saw the pastor he said something. It was a code, or a message. Then the pastor looked
at us and knew he had to kill us. Did you see?”

“Yeah.”

“The shiver-man did something to him in that jail. I don’t know what, but I have an idea. I think he told Roosevelt to lead
us here. I think he tortured it into him. Like he wrote his orders in Rosie’s skin or on the inside of his skull.”

“I know. The pastor looked in his eyes and said, ‘There he is.’ He recognized the gray man had changed him. Somehow.”

“All right. Who’s going to do it, then?”

“I don’t want to kill him.”

“And I don’t mean to,” Pike said tonelessly. “At least, not yet. If the shiver-man told him one thing he might have told him
others. We may not have his devilry but there are ways we can ask Roosevelt all the right questions and get him to answer.”

Connelly looked at Pike. Then he looked at Roosevelt, just beyond. Rosie was holding a small stone and cooing at it and telling
it to wake up and give him water. Connelly watched him for a long time.

“I don’t want to do it,” he said.

“At least help me bind him.”

“Goddamn it, Pike.”

“Do you want this or not?”

Connelly took a breath. “All right, then.”

They walked back over to him. “Mr. Roosevelt!” called Pike. “Here. Let me help you.”

“Help me with what?” asked Rosie, curious.

“Help you with your hands,” he said, and he took off his belt and handed his gun to Connelly.

“All right,” Roosevelt said, and smiled and held them out.

“No, no. No, no. Behind. Behind you.”

“Behind me?” asked Roosevelt, now confused. Connelly walked around him.

“Yes. Behind you. It’s good for you, you see.”

“Oh,” he said. “Did you see where I left my rock?” he asked as Connelly tied his wrists.

“No, I’m afraid I didn’t,” said Pike. He tore off part of his sleeve and began tying Roosevelt’s ankles.

“That was my special rock. I was going to get water from it. Poke a hole in it and make it give me drink.”

“Were you?”

“Yes.” He whimpered. “That’s tight,” he said, wriggling his arms. “That hurts.”

“Yes, yes,” said Pike. “Now sit.”

“Listen,” said Roosevelt as he sat. “Listen. Listen to me.”

“We’re listening,” said Pike. He secured the binds at Rosie’s feet.

“Listen—take a man,” said Rosie. “Take any man. Lawyer-man. Preacher-man. A man of law and civilization, the highest in the
land. Take that man and put him before a desert and march him across that desert with naught but the clothes on his back and
a thimble of water a day—”

Pike nodded. “He’s been changed, all right.”

Rosie’s voice grew stronger. “—march him across that vast dry expanse with no contact and no food, no meat nor grain, and
by the time he reaches the other side he will have been whittled down to his darkest heart—”

“Do you want to stay or go?” Pike asked Connelly.

“—and his eyes will see no love nor comfort nor compassion in the arms of others—”

“I’ll go,” said Connelly.

“—but his hands will sing with the great red song that they have been waiting to sing their whole life.”

“Then go,” said Pike. “But give me the knife.”

“He will be as he was meant. The knife he has carried in his heart, the weapon that he is, it will find use—”

Connelly took the knife out and looked at it. Watched the edge gleam with the morning sun. Then he held the hilt out to Pike.
Pike took it, nodding like he was listening to Roosevelt’s words.

“—he will find the bright cold use among his brothers and among the beasts of this world and he will find joy in it. He will
find joy in it. He will find joy in it.”

Connelly began walking away. He heard Roosevelt say, “What’s going on?” in a quieter voice. “What’s going on?”

Connelly heard Pike say, “Hush now. We’re playing a little game,” and Connelly walked to the other side of the cliff and moved
behind a stone and sat.

He was still for a second but then shifted uncomfortably. He reached behind and into his pocket and took out what was digging
at him. It was a small crescent wrench. He could not remember where he got it. He tossed it away and looked up at the sky
and wondered if it was going to rain. Then the shouting began.

There were words to the exchange but he did not listen for them. A question, calmly asked. An answer, given in panic. The
question came again, whatever it was. A protest, again and again, no, no, not me, I don’t know, no. Then the mountain quiet
was pierced by hysterical cries and maddened wailing. He heard Pike ask something again, calm and low, but the screams did
not answer, just intensified. Then the voice choked and coughed and Pike said something once again.

Connelly listened for what felt like a long time, for hours or perhaps minutes. In that place time no longer functioned. Its
purpose was moot, perhaps forgotten. When he could bear no more he stood up. He walked back down the path and paused behind
a rocky outcropping, listening to what was happening on the other side. Then he steeled himself and looked out.

It was only the briefest glance, but it was enough. First he saw Pike crouched before something, something twitching and supine
against the rock. He did not immediately recognize it as Roosevelt, could not even recognize it as a person, but then he saw
a mouth and eyes in it, vague human features adrift among all the writhing redness. Pike sidled up before Roosevelt, back
and legs taut, knife clutched low like the ovipositor of some foul insect. He whispered something to him, a priest delivering
some depraved last rites, eyes small and muddy and empty and his fingers testing the hilt of the knife. Then the blade began
to move back in and a burbling sound came from deep within whatever was left of Roosevelt, a sound that steadily grew to a
scream.

Connelly withdrew and walked back up the path as the screams went on. He looked back. Thought. Then knelt beside a stone.
He took out the last gun and counted the rounds in it.

“Bastard,” he said softly to himself. “Bastards the world over. Ever since I met you. Bastard.”

There were five rounds left. He did not know if there was any other ammunition. He rolled the cylinder and snapped it shut
and stuffed it in the waist of his pants. Then he waited, listening. Trying to see if Pike had any more questions and hoping
it was done with and he would see no more of it.

When he judged it was time Connelly got up and returned to where Pike and Roosevelt sat. He saw the two men ahead, piled on
each other in the mist. Pike calmly digging at something in Roosevelt. Moving with the lapidary care of a master craftsman,
eager to see his work done right. He was not asking any questions. Connelly could tell all his questions had come and gone.

“Stop,” said Connelly. “Jesus Christ, stop.”

Pike looked at him, startled, and stood. His knees and hands and front were stained with gore. “Mr. Connelly,” he said. “What
are you doing here? I’m… I’m not yet finished.”

Connelly looked at Rosie. Looked at the lines in his scalp, his toes at sick angles on one shoeless foot. Below his chest
he was a mass of redness. Connelly could still see his little soft eyes among the wreckage of his face, lids fluttering, struggling
to stay conscious. He was curled around the rock beside him like he was trying to anchor himself to the earth and a few more
seconds, even if they were spent in agony.

Connelly took out his pistol. He lifted it and looked away as he put the little soft eyes under his sights.

“No!” said Pike. “No, no!”

He pulled the trigger. The report seemed to sound from far, far away. When he turned back there was a gaping wound in Roosevelt’s
breast, drooling blood. His back warped against the stone in his last throes, spasms racking him as the bullet drifted through
his body. Then his back went slack and he was still, his face mercifully away from them.

“Damn you!” shouted Pike. “What… what did you do that for? I wasn’t… I wasn’t done.”

Connelly swallowed and tried to slow his breath. “What did he say?”

“I wasn’t done. I wasn’t done at all. Not at all.”

“What did he say, damn it? Did you ask any questions at all?”

“I did,” Pike said, indignant. “I most certainly did.”

“Then what?”

Pike considered him. Then looked back at Rosie and studied his work. “He said the scarred man was looking for a cave. A cave
somewhere in the mountains.”

“Where?”

“In a fault,” he said. “A fault that ran between two peaks. One short, the other tall, rising up like one’s leaping on the
other.”

“What’s he doing in there?”

“He said he was looking for something,” Pike said. “Looking for… for rebirth. To make himself anew.” Then he crouched before
Roosevelt and reached out and touched the man’s cheek. He put one finger to his chin and tilted the dead man’s face toward
him. Looked into his eyes. Stroked his bloody temple with one knuckle. Then he patted Roosevelt on the shoulder as though
bidding goodbye to an old friend. “Well. He’s gone,” Pike said, standing. “He’ll be of no more trouble to us. Eh?”

He turned to Connelly and smiled. Connelly lifted the gun again and pointed it at Pike’s face and cocked it.

Pike’s brow furrowed as he saw the gun. He looked at Connelly, confused.

“I never liked you,” said Connelly, and fired.

A red eye opened on Pike’s cheek and his head snapped back and he fell in a heap. He stared up at the gray sky, forever perplexed
at the way the world was developing. Smoke drifted out of his nose and mouth and the eye above the bullet hole sank in and
filled with blood. One hand twitched as the wiring in his damaged brain fought to process information before giving up and
going dark.

Connelly looked at both of them, then checked the rounds in the gun. He put the gun back in the waist of his pants and then
stripped them both of their coats and put them on. Then he continued up the trail.

Mr. Shivers