Page 55 of Stay Buried

“Trying to trick us,” Luther spat. “To tire us out so we’ll be weak when they attack.”

“Attack?” Uncle Thomas said.

“Always knew something wasn’t right about the man,” Michael said.

Bert nodded. “My Jimmy, he swears he saw him high up in a tree once, too high a place for a man to climb, up there at the top, swaying in the moonlight.”

“And wasn’t it just after he sharpened Mrs. Prigget’s knives that she and her daughters took ill in July?” Michael said.

Uncle Thomas interjected, “The Prigget household had a simple, though severe, case of summer diarrhea, and all four recovered with rest and—”

The men ignored him.

“And Old Man Dunn’s crops failed right after the knackerman shod his horses, isn’t that right?” Lester Styles spoke up from the crowd. He was a burly, bearded man who worked as a logger in the winters. He’d lost his wife and baby daughter to the flu, and my uncle and I had spent hours in his home, trying to save them. “My wife, she used to bake him pies. Felt sorry for him.” He spat in the snow.

The dog paced nervously, watching each of us, wondering whatwe might do next.

“The devil is a trickster—he wears many faces,” Luther said, looking up at the hills surrounding town, the acres of forest.

Was it my imagination, or was Benjamin watching me warily? Reverend Davies, too.

How easy would it be, I wondered, for them to declare me a devil too? Certainly, if word got out about Pearl and me, they’d say I had the devil in me and had managed to possess poor, innocent Pearl as well.

I imagined myself running through the trees, being hunted by men I’d known my whole life, the grown boys I’d once played with in those same woods, battling invisible enemies with stick guns and swords.

“Luther, may I remind you—” Uncle Thomas began, but he was cut off by Reverend Davies.

“And Jesus asked, ‘What is your name?’ and the man replied, ‘I am legion, for we are many.’?”

A shiver seemed to go through the small crowd of men. Murmuring. Someone said a prayer.

“God save us,” Michael Knapp said. “The devil has come to Boone’s Ferry.”

TWENTY-FIVEASHLEY

October 17, 2016

Eighty-four Main Street was a handsome two-story New England–style house with the clapboards freshly painted white, black shutters, and tidy gardens.

“Holyshit,” Malcolm breathed as they stood on the sidewalk facing the house. “This is it, Ash! The house from my visions! The one I saw again and again when I was down in Peru, the place I still dream about.”

Ashley took in a breath. She considered telling her brother that there were millions of white houses that looked like this one, probably thousands in Vermont alone, but instead all she said was, “Wow.”

“I know you don’t believe me, but I swear this is it.” He chewed his lip, and she watched his eyes seem to open wider and wider. “This is a sign, Ash! Oh man, things are falling into place. This is where we’re supposed to open the bed-and-breakfast! You can run the kitchen, do all the food. We can have a big garden out back—something that would make Gram proud, and we’ll serve veggies we raise and grow right here.” He was talking fast, the words all running together.

“Mal, I’m not really interested in running a kitchen. I’m still thinking about going back to school. And who’s going to be the clientele, exactly?”

He frowned. “But you were there, in my visions. Maybe—”

“There’s also the fact that there’s a woman living in the house and we can’t legally kick her out.”

“Maybe she’d love the idea of the bed-and-breakfast. Maybe she’d want to help!”

Ash ran her hand over her face. “Let’s just go meet her, okay? Check out the house. And absolutely no mention of the bed-and-breakfast. That might really freak her out, you know?”

Malcolm gave a reluctant nod, and they started down the brick path that led to the front door.

Ashley glanced off to the left, toward the center of town, just in time to see a figure step off the sidewalk, disappear behind a row of tall hedges.