Town in a Pumpkin Bash (2 page)

Had something changed? Had something gone wrong?

Did he need to alter his plan—again? He had hoped the end of his financial troubles
was within reach. Now he had his doubts.

To find the key, search that which binds.

The key…

That’s what he needed. But had it already been discovered?

That thought alone had drawn him out from his room at a hotel up on Route 1, where
he’d been encamped for the night, longing for a nightcap and an early bedtime, since
he had an appointment in the morning, in this very field.

He’d wondered about that.
Why this field? This place?
It could be coincidental—but, no, he’d decided after he thought it through. There
had to be a reason he’d been asked to come here.

And why the late hour for the meeting? Why not meet at some cozy pub with a warm fireplace,
instead of this cold patch of land?

He had a nagging feeling that he’d missed something, been lax in his research, but
he pushed it down. He’d come too far to back out now.

He’d left the university earlier that day, letting a grad student take his late class
so he could make the seven-hour trip from western Massachusetts, first heading east
toward Boston, then northward along the coast, past Portsmouth and Portland, Freeport
and Waterville, and eastward again to Bangor. He’d stopped only a few times to gas
up and grab
something to eat at a fast-food joint. But he was quickly back on the road.

Once east of Bangor, he’d checked into the hotel and watched the clock until the appointed
hour, then let the GPS guide him as close as possible to his destination, though no
address had been provided. Just a road marker and a cross street. He’d never been
on this backcountry lane, and it had taken him a while to find the dirt track he sought,
but finally he’d spotted the small vertical white sign, and the turnoff just beyond.
After that he’d crept along at five or ten miles an hour, thinking all the time he
was probably on private land, or had gotten himself turned around somewhere, or worse,
had fallen victim to some sort of cruel prank. But his desperate need to know egged
him on.

He eventually parked where he’d been instructed—or as close as he could determine—locked
the car, dropped the keys into his pocket, and traveled the rest of the way on foot,
over a low ridge and through a stand of trees and dense shrubbery, approaching the
pumpkin patch from the rear.

That’s when he’d stumbled into the graveyard.

He turned the flashlight back toward the tall, thin headstones, playing the beam of
light across their shadowed surfaces.
What’s a graveyard doing out here in the middle of nowhere?
he wondered, confused. The message he’d received hadn’t mentioned anything about
it. He knew there was a cemetery just out of town along the main road, Route 192,
known to the locals as the Coastal Loop. What was that place called? Something with
rock or stone in the name? Stone Hill Cemetery? Yes, that sounded about right.

That’s where they’d buried Sapphire Vine.

Just the thought of her made him queasy. He hadn’t attended her funeral. Instead,
he’d smartly skipped out of town a few days before, which had seemed like the best
decision at the time, given all that had happened back then. It must be…what? A little
more than two years ago now? He took a moment to dig into his memories to confirm
the
time frame and decided that, yes, she had died two summers past. It seemed like forever—and
just yesterday.

He could still remember the last time he’d seen her, though he quickly shook away
the unpleasant memory. Sapphire’s death had caused a massive disruption in his life,
both good and bad. She’d been blackmailing him, so her murder had eliminated that
financial burden for him, as well as the humiliation of her never-ending demands.
But his career also had taken a hit. Though he’d managed to keep most of the details
of the events of those days from his employer and coworkers, the rumors had been damaging
enough. Since then, he’d worked hard to rededicate himself to his craft, reestablish
his reputation, and put some major distance between then and now. But admittedly it
had been a struggle, and over the past year, he had experienced a number of setbacks.
Someone had started spreading rumors about him again, though he couldn’t determine
who or why. But word had gotten around. His career had stalled. His creativity had
faltered. His books weren’t selling. His classes were poorly attended. His future
looked bleak.

He knew he needed to find a way to break through the barriers that were holding him
back.

So here he was, just outside Cape Willington, Maine, standing in a dark pumpkin patch
a few minutes before eleven o’clock on a Friday night, exhausted after the long drive
from western Massachusetts and the tense wait in his hotel room, feeling wired and
on edge, and wishing he were anywhere else but here.

And now he had just trespassed on someone’s private burial plot, a particularly distasteful
development.

The tall stones were abnormally thin, which caused him to suspect their true nature.
On an impulse, he took a few tentative steps forward, shining his light across their
granite gray surfaces. But he knew almost at once they were not made of any sort of
rock or stone. Instead, the surfaces looked as if they’d been painted on, and they
had writing
on them. Not engravings, but bold lettering applied in an almost comical hand. He
focused in on the epitaphs:

H
ERE
L
IES
O
LD
M
AN
W
INTER, THE
C
OOLEST
C
AT
E
VER
, one headstone read.

M
ARY
, M
ARY
, Q
UITE
C
ONTRARY
, A
RGUED IN THE
C
EMETERY
, said another.

And on a third: RIP, R
EGINALD
I. P
ERIWINKLE, A
M
AN OF
I
NITIAL
W
ORTH
.

And another: C. A. G
HOST, A
S
PIRITED
F
ELLOW
.

His brow furrowed. They were complete nonsense.
Joke lines,
he thought.

He reached out and pushed at one of the headstones. It teetered back loosely.

They weren’t real.

It must be some sort of Halloween gag,
he realized.
Decorations of some sort.

He heard the sound again, more distinct this time—a low whistle from the trees off
to his left.

Nervously he shifted the beam of the flashlight around, surveying the landscape. “Who’s
there?” he called into the darkness. “Is that you? I’m here, just like you asked.”

Again, no response. He swallowed hard. Was this some sort of game?

“I’m coming over there,” he called out, as if in warning, and started off toward the
trees. “Give me a signal or something so I know where you are.”

He moved at a cautious pace, stepping carefully over the uneven landscape, keeping
a watchful eye for any sort of movement or signal. When none came, he veered toward
a particularly large oak, which stood out among all the other gray trunks.

He had just stepped into a low area when the heel of his boot struck hard earth. He
shined the light down toward his feet and saw that he stood on some sort of dirt road,
which ran along the edge of the trees. He shined the light along the road to his left.
It curved around the tree line a little
farther on, where he saw a pile of pumpkins and more evidence of Halloween decorations—probably
for some sort of activity, he thought, like a hayride.

Something moved in the shadows to his left.

He swung around, crouching warily as he turned, the light moving with him.

A figure had emerged from among the trees.

It was luminescent in the moonlight, a thin, gangly thing of awkwardly moving appendages,
coming toward him at a steady pace. As it got closer, he could see the thin ribs and
even the finger bones of one hand, curled around an old pitchfork. The face was especially
troubling—a skull with a wide grin and black eyes.

It was a skeleton.

Or, rather, someone wearing a skeleton costume.

It’s some sort of a prank,
he realized as his hopes crashed and his stomach heaved in on itself in despair.
I’ve been lured out here for nothing
.
I’ll probably get robbed—or worse.

He heard several things at once—a shift of fabric, the deep echo of a heavy truck
passing along a distant road, the faint sound of a dog barking somewhere, the closer
rustle as a breath of wind kicked up a few fallen leaves that rattled past his feet.

A click, as if someone had flicked off the safety on a pistol.

There was a spark of light, a crack of sound, a slap at his chest as if a big bug
had flown into him. He shuddered, his fingers tingled, his neck bulged strangely.
Everything in his brain turned hot and red as he felt his knees buckle and his body
collapse.

And then the ground came rushing up to meet him at a speed he’d never thought possible.