The Shadow in the Dark (Part Three)

 

I was struggling to stay awake as a combination of fatigue and aching pains urged me to take a nap in the cab of the truck as we drove on through the night. The radio station was playing a mix of easy-listening folk and country music of the kind beloved by long haul truck drivers. Henry had more or less stopped talking now as he concentrated on the narrow road, which came as something of a relief. He was hard to figure out. Had he been trying to scare me with all those questions, or was he in some way actually concerned that I was wandering around on my own?

 

I glanced at the clock on the dashboard and saw that it was now half past nine in the evening. I had no real hope of reaching Springfield this evening. I would just have to call Martin from a pay phone in the service station and explain the situation. Hopefully he’d be worried sick for me. I smiled to myself, imagining him jumping into his car and making his way over here, all heroic and frantic with concern. A white knight coming to save me. Why do we modern women still cling to such absurd romantic ideals? Why do we sometimes get turned on by the thought of a man coming to our rescue? 

 

Did I want to be rescued? Really? Me, the big bad Federal agent? Well, maybe, just a little bit. I imagined Martin wrapping his arms about my shoulders and telling me everything was going to be okay, as I rested my head against his chest. His arms felt so strong around me. How is it that men are so very strong?

 

“How long have we been driving?” I asked. I was aware only that the journey seemed to be going on for ever, with little to see beyond the repeat scenery of dark wooded spaces punctuated by bramble covered hedges. 

 

“Be there soon, Miss Ellis,” he said.

 

“You said that…” I yawned as fatigue nipped at my heels, “half an hour ago?”

 

“No more than ten minutes ago, Miss Ellis.”

 

“No, half an hour ago, I’m positive.”

 

“You’ve had a shock to the system. Why don’t you nap for a few minutes?”

 

“Just where are we now?”

 

“Near Dunwich, Miss. Service station will be coming up soon.”

 

“Weren’t we near Dunwich half an hour ago?” I tried to sit up and focus, but all I could see out of the side window was the familiar dark woodlands I had seen throughout this journey. 

 

“This ain’t no straight road, Miss Ellis. Not round these parts. No straight roads round here. Just the ancient serpent trails.”

 

“The what?”

 

“A manner of speech. This is old woodland, Miss. It was old even before the time the Indians hunted here. They knew.”

 

I bridled a bit at the word, Indians. “Native Americans,” I said, correcting his turn of phrase. 

 

“Same thing.”

 

“No it’s not.” I gazed out of the window again. Don’t go down there, Ashlee, I thought to myself. Don’t get into an argument with him. It’s really not worth it.  

 

“This was sacred ground ten thousand years ago,” said Henry after a while. “You speak to the right people and they know. Some stories are passed down from generation to generation, the old fashioned way. This was once Iog-Sotôt’s land.”

 

Oh boy. 

 

“You one of them woke girls, Miss Ellis?”

 

Oh God, he was talking again. I shouldn’t have said anything. I shouldn’t have started him off.

 

“What do you mean by woke?”

 

“You know what I mean by woke.”

 

“Yes, I probably do.” Please God, just let us find this service station before I have to scream.

 

And then, much to my blessed relief, we took yet another turn in the road and suddenly it was there, thirty to forty yards ahead – a service station with neon lights flickering in the rain. Orchard Pines, read the illuminated sign. It wasn’t a large affair. I could see there was a single pump gas station with a wooden framed office and parking garage set back from the road, besides which there was a small diner built with an outhouse around the side. The lights above the pump and the café were burning brightly through the driving rain as Henry slowed his truck and pulled into the station court. 

 

A two seat Ford Ranger was parked out in front of the café and another, older Ford was lodged by the gas station office. No other vehicles were evident tonight. 

 

The woods on either side of the surrounding area had once been planted apple orchards but were now largely run wild and overwhelmed in places by invasive species, such as elm and ivy. I felt sure that during daylight hours the scenery might be picturesque, yet at night and in this rain storm, the woods seemed something out of a gothic nightmare.

 

“Orchard Pines, Miss Ellis,” said Henry as he switched off the engine. “You’ll find help here.”

 

I felt really stiff as I limped out of the raised cab and dropped down onto the tarmac. A few stretching exercises helped, as Henry climbed down on the other side, locked up the cab and trailed his hand along the side of some of the packing crates loaded onto his flatbed. I yawned and regarded the three foot by three foot boxes with a long tarpaulin stretched across the top as I took shelter beside the overhanging forecourt roof. 

 

“Got far to go tonight?” I asked.

 

“Far enough. Near enough.” Henry lit up a cigarette and breathed some smoke into his lungs. I couldn’t believe he had actually lit a cigarette while standing twenty feet away from a gas pump!

 

“Those things will take ten years off your life, you know.” I meant it more as friendly banter, but Henry seemed to take offence. 

 

“A man’s got to have his pleasures.” He regarded me again, and I was suddenly aware that the button of my tailored jacket had come loose. My bra was clearly outlined against my damp white blouse. His eyes declined to look away, and so I turned my hip away from him and fumbled the button closed again.

 

“Far be it from me to take away your pleasures,” I said.

 

“Glad to hear it.” He smoked some more and then ground the cigarette butt under the heel of his boot. “Come along. I’ll introduce you to Rosemary.” 

 

*****************

 

“Well, now, aren’t you a sight. Just look at you, you poor thing – half drowned and in danger of catching a cold if we don’t get you out of those sopping wet things right away.” Rosemary was in her mid-forties, though with her makeup and bright red lipstick, she looked younger. She wore an old fashioned waitress/diner uniform of the kind you might have seen in milkshake parlours in the mid-fifties. Her dark hair was upswept in the modern style, which is to say an old-fashioned style, harking back to a mythical bygone age when women were gossiping housewives and men smoked pipes, drank dry Martinis, and provided for their families. Rosemary was smiling at me and I had a feeling she was the kind of woman who smiled a lot. The kind who always seems unsettlingly happy.

 

“Her car broke down,” said Henry as he settled himself down on a vinyl covered bar stool at the diner counter. “Coffee. Black, four sugars, Rosemary. The usual.”

 

“It didn’t break down,” I tried to explain. “I swerved off the road when a naked woman ran out from some bushes. My car went down a slope and nearly hit the river.”

 

“She saw a deer,” said Henry with a snort. “She needs to sit down and get out of those wet things she’s wearing.”

 

“Of course she does,” said Mrs Rosemary Adler with a tut and a wag of her finger at Henry. “You just leave her in my capable hands, Henry Bryant. She doesn’t need any of your moody sass, tonight.”

 

“It ain’t sass,” said Henry. “She shouldn’t be out here on her own. Not around Dunwich. Not now.”

 

“Well, bless me if that isn’t the most obvious thing you could possibly say, Henry Bryant. Of course she shouldn’t. I mean, just look at the poor thing. Just a slip of a girl. All alone with no man to look after her. Tch. How old are you, honey?” She brushed back some of my wet hair. 

 

“I’m an FBI agent,” I said, feeling it was important to be taken seriously. “Based out of Amherst.”

 

“She ain’t got a badge,” said Henry as he picked up the stiff card menu. “Just says she’s a Fed.”

 

“No badge?” she gave me a warm and sympathetic smile, and I got the feeling it was probably the kind of smile she would offer a precocious teenager if the teenager claimed to be old enough to buy cigarettes and order a beer.

 

“I AM an FBI agent,” I said again. “Can I use your phone? It’s important.”

 

“Payphone’s on the wall over there,” said Rosemary. “Be my guest, Honey.” I got up and walked towards it, picking up my handbag and finding some loose change in one of the bag’s zipped pockets. I needed to call Martin and explain what had happened, but as soon as I picked up the receiver it suddenly dawned on me that I didn’t have his number anymore. The number was in the address book of my iPhone, just like all the numbers I might need to dial, and Martin was new enough in my life that I couldn’t recall what his number looked like.

 

I stood there for a moment, cursing my luck, before I returned the phone to its cradle.

 

“That was a quick call, honey,” said Rosemary as she poured coffee for Henry. “Boyfriend not answering? Tch. You shouldn’t leave him alone on a Friday night. There are other girls, you know. Men are like dogs, always sniffing around. You need to keep them interested.”

 

“I need to speak to your local Sheriff,” I said. “It’s about the girl I saw.”

“Deer,” said Henry, without bothering to look round. “There weren’t no girl running about in this weather, naked or otherwise. Not in this weather. Not on this night.”

 

“I know what I saw.” I turned back to the waitress. “It’s important.”

 

“First things first,” said Rosemary. “You need a nice hot shower and some clean dry clothes. And then we’ll see about calling Sheriff Root and he’ll drive over to listen to your story, whatever it might be.”

 

I sighed. I did need to get out of these wet clothes before the sneezing took hold. “Fine. You’re right. Shower, clean clothes, and then a call to your Sheriff’s department.”

 

“And some hot soup,” added Rosemary. “Goodness knows you could use some hot soup in you, with hot buttered rolls on the side. I bet you’re one of those young girls who hardly eats? Are you vegan?”

 

“I am as it happens, but…”

 

“Thought as much. Not enough protein in your diet, for starters. Your mother should never have permitted that silly vegan nonsense when you were a teenager. How tall are you, honey? Five one?”

 

“Five three,” I said, pointedly.

 

“I think someone’s just told a teensy little fib…”

 

“I AM five feet, three inches tall.”

 

“When you’re standing on tippy-toes, perhaps?”

 

What the hell? “I think I know how tall I am!”

 

“Oh, honey, I’m just having fun with you. Don’t take offence. You modern girls. I think you’re just a little bit too sensitive about your height, hmm?”  

 

“I’m not sensitive. I’m just pointing out that I’m…”

 

“It doesn’t matter.” She rubbed my shoulder. “You can be as tall as you want to be. Of course you can. Now, clean clothes. My daughter’s over at Miskatonic university these days, reading Gender Studies – I have no idea what that even is – she’s such a modern girl - but I think I still have a few of her things in storage. I’ll pull the boxes down and find something for you.”

 

“That’s kind of you,” I said through gritted teeth.

 

Ten minutes later I was stripping off my tailored jacket, dark pants, white blouse, strappy heels, and undoing the clasp of my bra in an adjoining shower room when Rosemary came in with a pile of pink fluffy towels and a carrier bag that she placed at the foot of the bench. She began to take my discarded clothes as I draped them over a rail. 

 

“Some hot water and soap will do you the world of good,” she said as she placed a wash room bag on the sink. “Now there’s some of my daughter’s makeup in there. Good brands. You can freshen up and make yourself pretty when you’re dressed. And here’s a brush for your hair.”

 

“Thank you,” I said, as I wriggled out of my underwear. 

 

The hot water did feel really good. I stood there for several minutes just relishing the sensation of the hot needles massaging my skin. After a few more minutes I leaned against the tiled wall with my left hand and just held my head under the shower point with my tired eyes closed. What a day it had been. And what a close call. Eventually I lifted my head away from the water, reached for the shampoo and body wash, and began to scrub myself clean.  

 

The towels seemed to be scented with the same soft perfume as the body wash and shampoo. It was a bubble-gum candy like smell, very different from the more exotic scents I might choose when buying something for myself. 

 

I reached for the carrier bag, opened it and drew out the clothes that Rosemary had sourced for me. 

 

What the hell…

 

The bag contained a light powder blue Frozen t-shirt, with three quarter length sleeves, with a picture of Elsa on the front, and a short pink denim skirt with a purposefully frayed hem. There was some light grey woollen pantyhose and a pair of pink ballet style flat shoes with a cross strap. When she said these were her daughter’s clothes, just how old was her daughter when she’d stopped wearing them? Fourteen at best, I would have thought. This was the best she could find me?

 

My own formal trouser suit and expensive Italian blouse had been taken away, along with the strappy heels that gave me the semblance of being six feet six. All I had were these teenage clothes. I checked the labels and was irritated to discover they would actually fit me. 

 

And then I took a deep breath. I had to look twice. No, I was imagining things.

 

I had to be imagining things.

 

At the bottom of the carrier bag was some underwear.

 

Was it perhaps the utilitarian cotton underwear that a fourteen year old girl might wear? 

 

No it wasn’t.

 

I leaned against the shower wall for a while, trying to make sense of this. It was a coincidence, nothing more. How could it be anything more?

 

I closed my eyes tightly and tried to control my breathing.

 

Because the underwear in the carrier bag, unless I was very much mistaken, looked identical to the expensive silk French underwear I had bought from the department store specifically for this weekend to tease Martin with – the lingerie that was packed away in my suitcase, locked in the trunk of my car that I couldn’t open.