F. Wilson - Secret Circles

No mow, no pay. And the longer the grass, the tougher the job, and the longer to get it done. A vicious cycle.

As the three of them pedaled across the bridge over the lake, Jack glanced at a boxy, two-story, stucco building known around town as “the Lodge.” It belonged to the globe-spanning Ancient Septimus Fraternal Order. A very secretive bunch, tight-lipped about its activities and purposes and membership, and highly selective about who it accepted.

It had lodges all over the world. Why they‟d put one here in Johnson, New Jersey, no one knew.

Well, Weezy knew—or thought she did. She said the Lodge was here before the town, that members of the Order had settled here in prehistoric times. But that was part of her Secret History of the World, and the Septimus Order played a big role in it.

Membership was by invitation only, and this Lodge was rumored to include some of the state‟s most influential and powerful people.

Weezy glared at the building as they passed. “You want to find our pyramid, look in there.”

Jack was ahead of Eddie but could hear an eye roll in his tone as he muttered, “Here we go.”

“It‟s true,” she said.

Against his better judgment, Jack said, “Things do get lost, Weez. It happens all the time.”

“Things that are clues to the Secret History don‟t get lost, they get hidden away. The Order‟s job is to keep the Secret History secret. If we searched that place, we‟d find it.”

“Fat chance,” Eddie said. “What are you gonna do, get invited in for milk and cookies?”

“I‟ll think of something. And you‟ll come with me, right, Jack?”

Jack glanced at the Lodge‟s barred windows and figured it was safe to agree—no way they‟d ever see the inside of that place.

“If you‟re there, I‟m there.”

They passed the empty and supposedly haunted Klenke house that had been for sale ever since Jack could remember, and then the home of the town‟s supposed witch, Mrs. Clevenger. Jack had heard stories about the weird smells and noises in the Klenke place, but he‟d never been in there himself, so he couldn‟t say if they were true or not. He had, however, come into contact with Mrs. Clevenger on a number of occasions since the summer, and though she was strange and never gave a straight answer, she wasn‟t a witch. Who believed in witches and hauntings anyway?

They approached the place where Quakerton Road ended and the Pine Barrens began. Jack recognized Gus Sooy‟s pickup parked by the lightning tree. A lot of folks said Gus‟s moonshine—known as applejack—was the best in the Pinelands. Jack also recognized the guy buying from him.

So did Eddie. “There‟s Weird Walt,” he said from behind Jack. “Stocking up.”

“Hey,” Weezy called as she brought up the rear on her banana-seat Schwinn. “Don‟t call him that.”

She and Walt had a strange bond, and she always took his side.

“It‟s gotta be eighty degrees out and he‟s wearing leather gloves and you‟re telling me he‟s not weird?”

Jack glanced over to where Walt was watching Gus Sooy fill a quart bottle with water-clear liquor from one of his big brown jugs. Hard to argue against him being weird. Folks said Walter Erskine hadn‟t been right since he‟d returned from Vietnam. He said weird things and wore gloves day in and day out.

“He‟s a good guy,” Jack said as they turned onto a firebreak trail and followed it into the Pines.

Weezy moved up beside him. “How would you know?”

“He comes into the store every now and then and we talk. He—”

A helicopter, heading southeast, did its wup-wup-wup thing overhead and Weezy stopped for a moment to stare with an anxious expression.

Jack understood her reaction. A few weeks ago, late one August night, government men—at least Jack assumed they were from the government—had used black helicopters to fly backhoes into the Pines and dig up the mound where he and Weezy had found the pyramid and the corpse.

Who had told them about the mound? Who had sent them to tear it apart? These were questions he doubted he‟d ever answer.

“It‟s not black,” he said. “And it‟s not headed our way. Probably some high rollers headed for AC.”

Gambling had been legal in Atlantic City for half a dozen years now and was enormously popular.

Weezy said nothing as she pulled ahead to lead the way. She always rode point when they were in the woods. Made sense. She knew this corner of the Pine Barrens backward, forward, up and down. She never got lost.

As they rode, the forty-foot scrub pines thickened on either side, stretching their gnarled, green-needled branches overhead as they lined the path like sentinels guarding their woodland domain. Jack checked the overcast sky through the needled canopy. This was the kind of day when people got lost in the Pines and were never seen again. But no worry about that with Weezy along.

Weezy led them along the dipping, deeply puddled trail onto Old Man Foster‟s land. Foster was something of a mystery. Nobody had ever seen him or seemed to know who he was, but he kept his land heavily posted with signs warning against fishing, hunting, trapping, and trespassing.

Jack ignored them. He figured obeying the first three out of the four was good enough.

At least he wasn‟t trapping like a certain someone was doing around a spong they‟d be passing along the way.

When they reached the spong they saw Mrs. Clevenger standing with an armload of sticks. She wore her usual long black dress and a black scarf around her neck—which made as much sense in this weather as Walt‟s gloves. Her three-legged dog sat to the side, watching their approach.

The big, floppy-eared mutt had the thick body of a Rottweiler but with lots of other breeds mixed in. Its right front leg was missing as if it had never been—not even a scar.

Weezy stopped and waved. “Hi, Mrs. Clevenger. Need any help?”

“No, dear. I‟m doing fine.”

Some Piney had been setting leg-hold traps around the spong—the local term for a wet low spot—trying to catch coons and possums and such when they came for a drink. Mrs. Clevenger had been coming out regularly and springing the traps with sticks. Jack wondered what the trapper would do if he ever caught the old lady at it. What ever it was, he‟d have to get past her nameless dog, and that wouldn‟t be easy.

Eventually they reached a burned-out area deep in the Pines. They knew the place well. Maybe too well. Here was where they‟d dug up the little pyramid and the corpse.

After they‟d leaned their bikes against some trees, Jack stood in the shade and pulled out their aerial photo of the area. Judging by the position of the midmorning sun, they‟d been following the fire trail eastward. The mound lay to the right of the trail, which meant south. The strange-looking thing he‟d spotted on the photo was to the right of the mound, which meant farther south.

He pointed to the burned-out area. “This way.”

As they walked a weaving course around the blackened tree trunks, Jack saw green branchlets poking through the charred bark. Hard to kill these pines. Fires were common in the Barrens during the summer and fall, mostly the fault of campers and lightning. With all the recent rain, he doubted they‟d see any fires at all this season.

“Think anything‟s left in there?” Jack said, pointing to the ruins of the mound as they passed.

Weezy shook her head. “Look at it. It‟s not even a mound anymore.”

She had a point. The government men had left little more than a twisty-turny trench, now filled with stagnant water.

The pines thickened past the burned-out area, slowing their progress.

“This better be worth it,” Eddie said.