Boone Read online

  “Who are you?” Leslie asked. “What are you doing here? You shouldn’t be up here, you know? This is my office, and patients aren’t allowed in here. Go on. Go back to your room.”

  There was just enough gloom in the office, despite the darkness. The man was the size of a football player. He was breathing shallowly, slowly, and Leslie could just make out the shape of his long hair. Despite his best efforts to remain calm, he felt another trickle of sweat drip down his spine and into the crack of his ass.

  They were here for a reason. And not all of them were stable. Some had to be tranquilized. Because they could, if not properly monitored, turn violent. Leslie sensed violence in the man standing in front of him now. It was brewing in the giant frame like slow-churning magma.

  “A-a-all right. I want you out of here. I mean it. I’ll . . . I’ll call security. Or . . . or one of the orderlies. You’re not supposed to be here! I won’t stand for it! You hear me! I won’t stand for it!”

  The sweat gathered now, more than just beads of moisture. It was springing up along his hairline, his jowls, and neck. His armpits were pouring wet. But his throat, his mouth . . . dear God, were so dry, he could barely speak, let alone swallow. His heart was galumphing in his chest. It wouldn’t be so bad if the damn numbskull would just speak, but he wouldn’t say a word. He was a mute.

  It must’ve been the power. That fucking Weasel had done it. The door had automatically unlocked when the power had gone out, and this oversized gorilla had gone wandering the halls, come up three flights of stairs, and right into his office.

  He was afraid, more afraid now than he’d ever been in his life. A shred of decency might save him, maybe even some groveling, but his impatience, his terror, and his cowardice were all churning together, the vision of Weasel looking at him while he’d groped Nancy’s thigh.

  Wanting to leave the hospital, to get home to his chicken dinner (he would definitely buy that hair-dryer now) and feeling himself about to cry, Leslie lost all control:

  “Goddamn you worthless S.O.B., get the hell out of here! I’ve told you once, now move it, goddamnit, I wanna go home!”

  Gov took a step back, and he wouldn’t have admitted it to anybody, not in a million years, but the whole thing got the best of him. He began to blubber like a baby. His crotch dampened with warm urine as his bladder let go.

  “I . . . I . . . ” he tried to say, but he wasn’t sure where he was going or what he was trying to say. “Please . . . ” he whimpered. “Please. I just wanna go home to my wife. I wanna go home. I just wanna go home. Please.”

  He had it now. He knew who this was. It was Boone. The man who’d killed his mother all those years ago, buried her in the Miramac, or so the story went, the reason he’d been here for as long as he had. This was the man the kids sang those songs about.

  But Leslie had not come from here. He’d moved to Shepherd’s Grove only a few years ago, and now he remembered one of the ditties: Boone, Boone, a troubled young man . . .

  “I SAID GET THE HELL OUT OF MY OFFICE!”

  He didn’t know why he shouted, why he suddenly snapped, but maybe when the end of your life was staring you in the face, you took a different turn, for better or worse. In Leslie’s case, he took the only turn he could think of.

  For a second he thought Boone winced, flinched even. But no, Gov thought. He’d cringed, as if the very sound of Leslie’s voice unnerved him.

  Boone reached out before Leslie could react. The man grabbed his arm holding the briefcase and spun him around like a ballerina. McGovern dropped the briefcase and felt Boone’s forearm wedge underneath his chin and into his neck. It was like being choked with a railroad tie.

  Leslie gasped for air, which was suddenly in very short supply. He held onto the man’s forearm, trying to pull it free, but it was useless.

  Boone applied more pressure. He had him in a sleeper. Les’ eyes bugged out of his head. He thought of Colette’s bosom, and how he’d wanted to suffocate under those gi-normous boobies, but not like this.

  His oxygen was cut off. He made gagging sounds and kicked and flailed. His bowels loosened, his arms wavering in front of him like two spring-loaded snakes in a mixed nut can.

  Then slowly, his arms fell to his sides. He was dead.

  Boone let go of him, and Les fell to the floor.

  ~

  The man had turned into one of those white noise television sets, blaring its painful siren. Boone felt another force working through him. There had been a second or two of peace when the man hit the ground, but it didn’t last long . . .

  Bedlam and screaming erupted throughout the entire asylum.

  It was everywhere.

  ~

  Weasel froze. The footsteps of the forest were drawing near.

  When they were kids, Weasel and his brother, Jed, had gone into the forest. Jed locked him in an abandoned shed they’d found. The boy thought it funny until he’d run far enough away and slipped into a ravine, breaking his ankle. He’d also fractured his wrist. His father had gone out looking for them and heard Jed crying for help. It got worse when Jed had to tell his father that not only was his ankle and wrist broken, but that he’d locked his little brother in some abandoned shed.

  The entire episode lasted more than four hours. Weasel had been crying his eyes out, trying to get the shed door open but unable to. There were no windows. When his father found him, he was a sobbing, wet-faced mess, and Jed had been grounded for two months.

  Weasel remembered that moment vividly. He remembered brushing spiders off his arms, hearing things outside the shed that would forever haunt his sleep. He would develop an irrational fear of the dark: the footsteps of the forest, he’d called it, when he was alone and terrified, and he could hear the sounds of the forest.

  Weasel heard the footsteps of the forest again.

  But he couldn’t stay out here all night. People would be looking for him.

  His eyes started to adjust to the darkness. Thunder sounded again, starting at one end of the sky and moving toward the other.

  He stood up and hurried along the back of the hospital, stopping at the first door he came to. It was the kitchen. Weasel opened the door and stepped inside. He could hear the residents down the hall, the orderlies, nurses, and doctors trying to calm everybody down.

  But he was out of the rain, out of the dark, and he breathed easier. His shoes squelched along the floor as he hurried through the kitchen. He moved through the dining area and into the hallway.

  He was imagining the worst. First the dark, then Nancy. She’d been feeling sorry for him. That’s why she’d been flirting with him, to make him feel better. She’d never liked him at all. She was probably up in Les’ office sitting on his lap.

  Jealousy and hatred rose for McGovern and pity for himself. He was nothing more than an ugly troll and scared of the dark.

  He ignored the commotion from the common room. The same thing came from the activities room.

  He hurried down the hall to the janitor closet and almost collided into Doctor Spillbourghs.

  “Weasel,” Spillbourghs said, taking a step back. He adjusted his glasses, a thin, small man with a hair like Art Garfunkel. Sweat was visible on his brow and cheeks. Weasel could smell him. “What the hell’s going on? Are we totally without power? Have you seen Les?”

  “I need a flashlight, Lou. The generator isn’t working. I can’t see a blasted thing in the dark. I don’t know where McGovern is. I haven’t seen him. I thought he was on his way out.”

  “Well, his car’s still here. What the hell would he be leaving for anyway?”

  “I don’t know. I have to go talk to him, though. How is everybody doing?”

  Spillbourghs calmed and took a deep breath. “It’s a mess, but we’re okay. We had to sedate a few patients, and we found some candles, so we’ve got some light at least. We really should have more flashlights, though, Weez.”

  “I know. I’m sorry. I’m working on it. I need one myself, then I need
to work on the generator.”

  “The water probably killed it.”

  “That’s what I was thinking, but I gotta check.”

  “Tell Les we need his help if you see him. I think we can get some of these patients to bed, but we got our hands full. There’s also the juvenile wing to think about. ”

  “Sure. Sure. Just sit tight. I’ll do what I can.”

  The man nodded and continued down the hall to the activities room.

  Weasel went to the janitor closet, reached into his pocket for his keys, and unlocked the door. He felt around the shelf. He found the flashlight, a good one, bright yellow with a 6volt battery. He turned it on. The beam cut through the dark like a bright white pillar.

  Another vision of McGovern and Nancy came into his head. Weasel tried to dislodge it and thought about the footsteps of the forest again. A cold sweat broke across his flesh.

  “Probably boffin’ her right there on his desk,” he said to himself, “because that’s the kind of drippy, disgusting character he is. Goshdamn two-timing perverted Santa Clause.”

  He made his way down the hallway until he came to the stairs, climbing them to the third floor.

  The rain in Shepherd’s Grove falls mainly on the plain, he thought, and cursed because he really didn’t know the rest of the words. It falls on the plains and doesn’t let up, because there’s not a damn thing anyone can do about it except sit tight and hope for the best.

  Weasel waved the flashlight back and forth. It was quiet on the third floor. He went to McGovern’s office.

  He felt like he had to tell McGovern every little detail when he should be out fixing the generator. Who cared what the insensitive asshole knew and didn’t know? He’d probably just yell at him for not being outside.

  “Les?” he said. “Hey, Les, you up here?”

  The rain against the window was the only sound, a sound that, after being on the third floor, was startling.

  “Les?”

  He imagined them behind a sheet, Les with his hand over Nancy’s mouth, stifling her giggles. It was a horrible vision, a ghastly vision, and he began to hate Nancy even more. He could imagine Nancy telling Santa Claus what she wanted for Christmas.

  He came to the door, panned the flashlight inside, and saw Les’ body.

  “Gov?” he asked. “Jesus, Les, what happened? Are you all right?”

  He knew it before he stepped inside.

  Gov had grabbed his briefcase on his way out. One too many cheeseburgers had finally caught up with him. A heart attack, Weasel thought. It was no surprise. The storm. Nancy. His weight. Weasel had seen him down at B-Happy Burgers plenty of times, his car in the parking lot.

  Weasel stepped into the office. The entire left side of his face was swollen and purple. He knelt and tried to turn him over. The man was already cold. Les’ eyes were open.

  Through the rain and thunder, Weasel heard the sound of breathing.

  He pulled back and stood up. He turned, shining the flashlight, and saw Boone standing by the window. The man put his hand up and turned his face away from the light. Weasel lowered the flashlight.

  It wasn’t a heart attack. He looked down at Les, then up at Boone. He didn’t understand it, and maybe he didn’t have to, but for whatever reason Boone had murdered Gov.

  There was no violence coming from the man now, not that Weasel could feel.

  “Boone?” Weasel said, in the gentlest voice he could muster. “You all right? You get lost along the way or something? You want me to take you back to your room?”

  Weasel always felt he’d make a better orderly than a janitor, but he didn’t have the training. He had a genuine empathy for the patients whenever they were around, and they were receptive to him.

  Boone didn’t reply, though. He moved closer to the window, as if trying to get to the rain. Weasel remembered a time when they’d found a bullsnake in the activities room, and several nurses, even some of the patients had screamed. Boone had been there. He’d cornered it, then corralled it. Everyone thought Boone was going to kill it. He remembered it all, how the man had motioned for him to open the door leading out back. Weasel had done so, walking with Boone until they’d come to the creek, where Boone knelt and let the snake go.

  He wasn’t thinking about why Boone had killed his mother or why he’d killed McGovern. He was simply acknowledging the situation. There was a body at his feet, and his only concern was keeping the light out of Boone’s eyes.

  “We got a problem, Booner,” Weasel said. “It seems the director of our famous psychiatric ward is dead, and there’s no here one to replace him. That might be a good thing, considering the kind of man he was. You didn’t see anyone come in here, did you, Boone?”

  He was flat out lying. He knew that, but under the circumstances, he felt it was the right thing to do. He felt it was the smart thing to do.

  Boone turned away from the window and did something strange. He put his hands over his ears and shook his head.

  “Something bothering you?” Weasel asked. “We’re gonna have to tell someone about this, or I’m gonna get an axe in the head. Understand?”

  Boone understood.

  ~

  He heard a barrage of words, none of which made sense through the white noise. But he did hear something strange. What he heard Weasel say was: “You’ll find an axe in the shed. Understand?”

  “You stay here, Boone,” the man said. “I’m gonna get some help.”

  But again, Boone heard something different. He heard, “The Lord cares, Boone, and He’s gonna make His presence felt.”

  Chapter 4

  All he’d ever seen was Weasel out on the riding lawn mower. He’d seen him raking leaves, painting the trim around the windows, trimming the bushes, even sweeping the hallways, but he’d never seen Weasel using an axe.

  There was something else . . . he could’ve sworn he’d heard Isabelle, saw her silver eyes and platinum hair, her voice, saying, “ . . . with whatever you can. You just have to silence it.”

  When Weasel left him alone, Boone slipped into the hallway, taking the stairs down to the first floor. He could still hear the voices of the patients, doctors, and nurses.

  The din was coming from all sides, and it was growing. With each crack of thunder, more screams sounded. With each flash of lightning, he heard more sobs.

  His skin began to prick along his arms, his muscles and shoulders tightening. Something was moving under his skin, working its way into the base of his spine.

  Because of the power outage and the storm, the entire staff was preoccupied. Boone walked down the hallway without a single person noticing. He passed the activities room. He went through a door on his right that led into the cafeteria and kitchen. He stepped through the wet tracks Weasel had left just minutes ago.

  There was another door leading outside and into the rain.

  Boone opened it and stepped outside.

  ~

  He turned and looked up at the façade behind him, the rain pouring down. The screams were still coming from inside. Every window was dark except for a few along the ground floor, where there was a dim, candle-lit glow. Boone looked at the windows along the back wall of the asylum. Giant spiders were pressed against the glass, their bodies like big round smudges.

  His eyes adjusted even more. They weren’t spiders, but hands pressed to the windows, a pale, chalky moon face centered between the two. Their mouths were open. They were trying to communicate, to speak to him.

  They were screaming, Boone realized, but they made no sound.

  He turned away, then looked to the sky. The rain beat upon his face. He was already soaked. It was loud against the roof of the asylum. It was loud on the ground, splashing in the pools of shallow water.

  His breath plumed out in front of him, then disappeared.

  The shed was ten yards away, a small wooden structure like a tiny house in the middle of the lawn.

  Boone moved toward it in his bare feet, not minding the rain, the c
old water, the torrential downpour, just glad to be out of the asylum, unaccompanied, for the first time in years.

  When he made it to the shed, he noticed a metal clasp, a padlock on the wooden door. He pushed it inward, and it moved easily, giving several inches.

  Boone stepped back and kicked in the door. The clasp broke free, the padlock falling to the ground along with a few rusty nails.

  The smell of fresh cut grass and petrol from the lawn mower hit him instantly. A shovel, rake, and hoe hung on the wall to his right, along with a weed eater. Shelves held Mason jars, tin coffee cans, and bug spray.

  It looked out of place when he saw it, but it was there, just like Weasel said it would be, a double-headed axe. It was a dangerous, brutal-looking thing hanging on the wall with the rest of the gardening tools. A chainsaw was on a shelf to the left, but it was Isabelle, the Silence Maker, he’d come for. Her silver hair was in the gleam of metal, the marble blue of her eyes.

  Boone stepped inside and lifted it off the wall. It had been used plenty. The wear and chips along the blade were visible, along with faded red paint. The handle was worn with wear, like the silhouette of a woman’s shadow in the gloom.

  He ran his fingers along one edge, not like a razor, but it didn’t have to be.

  It was merely a tool to silence them . . . and that was good enough for Boone.

  ~

  “What do you mean, he’s dead?” Nancy asked.

  The common room was quieter, the uneasiness coming more from the staff now than the patients. Weasel realized he should be outside fiddling with the generator, trying to get the lights back on, but another part knew it would be crazy to leave anyone alone while Boone wandered the halls.

  Before making it to the common room, Nancy had calmed down the kids on the juvenile wing, helped put them to bed with Colette, then come downstairs to help with the others on the first floor. Weasel checked the phone lines at the nurses’ station. There was no dial tone. He asked if he could borrow Nancy’s cell.