Graham Masterton - Revenge of the Manitou

“I see.”

Harry cleared his throat again. “What I was wondering was, ma’am, if you could do me a favor if anything weird starts happening in your classroom.”

Mrs. Novato stopped counting, her finger poised in midair. She turned to Harry and said in an offended tone, “Something weircfl What on earth are you trying to suggest?”

Harry gave her a defensive smile. “I’m really not trying to suggest anything. But Mr.

Fenner has been kind of worried about some of the nightmares your kids have been having, as well as some of the peculiar events that have been happening in his home, and, well …”

Mrs. Novato took a patient, schoolmarmly breath. “Mr. Erskine,” she said, “I have already given Mr. Fenner far more leeway to investigate his suspicions than I should.

Several of the children’s parents complained to the principal about that business of setting their nightmares down on paper, and as a result I came very close to losing my position. Apart from that, it does seem from what I hear that Mr. Fenner is suffering from-well, overwork.”

Mr. Saperstein walked past, and Mrs. Novato said, “Good morning, Mr. Saperstein.”

“Okay,” said Harry, “1 can guess how you feel. But you can still do me that favor.”

“Mr. Erskine, let me assure you that nothing weird has ever happened in this class or is ever likely to. Now, please. I have enough on my hands conducting the correct number of children off to Lake Berryessa and back again, without troubling myself with weirdness.”

“Sure, I’ve got you,” said Harry. “But I’m staying with Mr. Fenner if you do want to call me.”

“I don’t want to call you.”

“But you might.”

Mrs. Novato closed her eyes and sought strength and fortitude under her lids. Then she said, “Very well, Mr. Erskine. Should I ever wish to call you, which will be never, I will know where not to do so.”

“That’s fine,” smiled Harry. “Now have a good trip, okay?”

Harry walked back to the pickup truck and climbed in, slamming the door behind him.

“Well?” said Neil.

“I just asked her to let us know if there was any trouble,” Harry told him. “Not that she’s likely to. She’s hidebound by educational bureaucracy, and apart from that she’s married.” “What’s that got to do with it?” “Nothing much,” admitted Harry. “It’s just that I find it hard to work my charms on married women of Mrs. Novato’s age.

They’re too old to be oversexed and too young to have husbands who can’t raise it.”

Neil started the motor. Before he released the brake, though, he took a last look at Toby through the dust-filmed windshield. His son was standing clutching his lunchbox, his blond hair as untidy as ever, in a blue windbreaker and denim shorts.

The other children were gathered around him, and he was obviously talking to them about something lengthy and serious. “I’ve got a feeling about today,” said Neil. “You think today is the day?” asked Harry. “I don’t know. But there’s a tenseness around.

Don’t you feel it? Like there’s a storm brewing.” Harry shrugged. “It’s hard to tell. But in any case, there isn’t much we can do until Singing Rock arrives. He said he’d be here by lunchtime.”

“It’s just those kids going off alone, with all those spirits inside them, all of those manitous. That really scares me. What do you think I felt like this morning, giving Toby his lunch and wondering if he wasn’t even my son at all, but some kind of ghost out of the past? I’m just standing there doing something really normal, like making sandwiches, and for all I know he might go off on that trip and never come back.”

Harry laid a hand on his shoulder. “Stop feeling so guilty, will you? It’s not your fault this has happened, even if it was your ancestor who led Misquamacus here. I mean-what control could you have possibly had over that? There’s nothing we can do until the medicine men show themselves. We can’t kill the children; we can’t even take them away from here. Apart from the fact that Misquamacus would prevent us, the police would probably arrest us for kidnapping, and we wouldn’t do anybody any good sitting in the Sonoma County pokey.”

Neil released the brake, and drove the pickup out of the Bodega school yard without saying another word. He didn’t even look back in his rearview mirror to see Toby and his classmates being ushered by Mrs. Novato onto the bus. Harry turned around in his seat, and saw how solemn and unsmiling the children were, and a sensation of sick tension began to rise in his stomach. He knew just what Neil meant about a storm brewing. It could have been the unusual humidity, or the soft but uncomfortable wind. But it could have been the beginning of the day of the dark stars, too.

They met John Singing Rock at the bus station. He was fifty years old, his face creased with the soft crisscross wrinkles of a South Dakota Indian, but his eyes were sharp and bright, and he walked across the concrete parking lot to greet them with the tensile step of a man twenty years younger. The last time Harry had seen him, his hair had been short and swept back with brilliantine, and he had worn a creaseless mohair suit. But modern trends had obviously blown with the winds across the plains of mid-America, because his hair was longer now and kept in place with Gillette Dry Look, and he wore a camel-colored sport coat and bright red slacks.

He set down his suitcase on the concrete and held out his arms. Harry embraced him, saying nothing, and for a moment they stood there close, while the other bus passengers looked at them with curiosity.

Harry stood back, still holding Singing Rock’s hand. “You look like you’ve been shopping at Gucci,” he grinned. “And what’s this with the hair?”

Singing Rock touched his graying sidepieces. “I had to give up that greasy kid’s stuff,” he said. “It kept leaving marks on my tepee.”

Harry laughed, and gripped Singing Rock’s arm affectionately. “It’s good to see you,”

he said. “If I ever went past South Dakota, I’d drop by more damned often.”

Singing Rock said, “Is this Mr. Fenner?”

Harry nodded and introduced them. Neil shook hands a little hesitantly, but Singing Rock reached out and placed his hand on top of Neil’s, and said warmly, “You’re wondering why I don’t have bones through my nose and feathers in my cap?”

Neil was embarrassed. “I guess I never met a medicine man before. I didn’t really know what to expect.”

Harry picked up Singing Rock’s suitcase and the three of them walked across to Nell’s pickup.

Singing Rock said, “I’d prefer to wear traditional costume. What’s the point of being a medicine man if you don’t look like one? But the costumes are pretty rare these days. They take years to complete, and when they’re finished they’re works of art.

These days, you can’t really walk around in a work of art. You might spill catsup on it.”

Harry helped Singing Rock into the pickup, and then they drove off toward Neil’s house. The sky was still oddly dark, and there was a feeling that rain clouds were building up.

Harry said, “Neil has a hunch that the day of the dark stars might be today. Or soon, anyway.”

“Any particular reason?” asked Singing Rock.

“I don’t know,” Neil told him. “It’s a feeling like someone’s trying to warn me.”

“Like when Dunbar warned you of Misquamacus?”

“Harry told you about that?”

“Harry told me about everything. The slightest detail could be vital.”

Neil brought the pickup to a stop at a road junction, waited for a carload of women to pass, and then turned left.

He said, “It’s not exactly the same feeling. When Dunbar first showed up, I could hear his voice, appealing for help. Toby heard it, too. Both of us saw him, or his ghost. A tall man with a light-colored beard and a long white duster coat. But today, the feeling’s just a feeling. I haven’t heard Dunbar’s voice since last night. This is much more general.”