“What did you just say?” asked Sara, in shock.
He can’t know this...that’s not possible.
“Oh, I’ve taken the precaution of investigating you, Sara Renardine. What I know is that you are on the run from the man who has beaten you senseless on any number of occasions. What I know is that Jackson Woodard is deputy sheriff of Cavanaugh County and that your pleas for help to his colleagues have gone unanswered.
“What I know is that you are being actively searched for, Sara. A simple phone call and...how do they say it? The jig is up."
This time he laughed out loud, all pretext of being quiet for the sleeping woman’s sake gone.
“You are the ideal candidate, Sara, because you reek of desperation. You know it. I know it. In fact, I can taste it from here...it's so sweet...like candy to me," he said, his voice trailing off before resuming.
“Now pay attention. Under the woman’s hands is a contract. Take it, read it if you must, then sign it. That is not a suggestion, Sara...that is a command.
"In summary, it states that you will go to the address listed on the last page of the document and present yourself to the department manager. She will assign you whatever work it is that you do.
"That is your first job.
"The second is of far greater importance. Each work day, during your lunch break, you will go to the restaurant mentioned on that last page. You will take your lunch in the immediate proximity of the restaurant’s bar. You will do so each and every day without fail.
"Sooner or later, there will be someone who will approach you. You will allow him. Further, as the situation develops, you will do whatever he asks of you, Sara. You will acquiesce to his every desire, without question.
"Do this and your financial security and continued freedom from the likes of Deputy Woodard are assured. Renege in the slightest of ways, and you and I shall come face to face.
"I promise you, you wouldn’t like that, Sara. Oh no...not one bit.
Her hand shaking, Sara reached for the paper under the woman’s hands. She tugged on one corner, but it would not slide away. With no choice, she gently took the woman’s wrist...
She’s freezing....
...and lifted it up so that she could slide the paper out.
The words were written jaggedly, in longhand, obviously hurried.
No...it was written by someone in a panic.
Sara looked down again at the woman, trying to see if she still breathed.
"Sign it, Sara. Right now."
She scanned the ragged lines seeing essentially what he had already described. Then, with a sensation of quicksand around her feet, Sara scribbled her name on the dotted line.
Better this, than going back to that son of a bitch. Anything would be better than that.
"That's the spirit, my girl." The voice seemed positively cheerful.
"Now tear off the page with the addresses. You are going to need that. Then, in the woman's purse, you will find a wallet with some cash.
"Open it and tell me how much you find there."
Sara did it, her trembling fingers fumbling for a moment.
"There's, uh...there's almost three hundred dollars."
"Oh, what luck, Sara," he said, and suddenly she could not help but think that although they had been holding a conversation, a very strange conversation, that the most unusual thing of all was that the silhouette behind the dressing screen never moved.
It was as though the voice was as disembodied as that of a ghost.
She held the wallet in her hands and realized that her entire body was trembling.
"Take the money. I will be sure to square up with my associate in short order."
Sara hesitated, her knees quite literally knocking together.
"Take it, I say. You will be in need of professional attire for the coming Monday. Consider it an advance payment for the work you will carry out for me."
Shadows fluttered in the corner of Sara's vision. She turned and there, upon the iron balustrade outside, large birds had gathered in silence, watching her through the glass.
The balcony was blotted out by shapes as dark as the night. They were lined up, shoulder to shoulder, and followed her every movement in horrible silence.
Crows. Maybe a hundred pairs of black eyes that tracked Sara as she turned to speak.
"I don't think I should. In fact, maybe this is all just a big mistake," Sara started to put the cash back into the poor woman's wallet.
“So disappointing, this sudden concern for a stranger, Sara. That’s not like you. Not when you have so much to gain and so much to lose.”
Then, just when she was sure that there really was no one behind the dressing screen, she heard a chair slide, squealing like a mouse trodden underfoot.
“I hadn’t planned on it, but it seems you need further convincing. And for that, I am sorry, Sara. Really, I am.”
The silhouette got jerkily to its feet. Like an enormous string puppet, the shadow shambled forward.
Sara backed away and without wanting to, she saw the crows shifting excitedly upon their perch, as if the spectacle they had come to see was about to begin.
A hand wrapped fingers around the edge of the dressing screen. A white hand with fingers far too long to be real.
There was a croaking sound as a crow coughed in joy, then another and another joined in to squawk as a second hand, just as deathly pale as the first, appeared.
Sara took another step back, then shrieked as the back of her leg came up against a chair.
“This will only hurt a little,” the whispering voice said, only so much closer then. “At least, I think so.”
What stepped around from the dressing screen was dressed in pinstriped pants that hung loosely upon its gangly frame. Suspenders held the pants in place, stretching up and over bony shoulders.
Another shambling step and the dim light of the banker’s light ran up the thing’s body as the crows outside screamed in raucous anticipation.
Sara screamed, too, her voice lost among that of the crows as the creature holding a battered derby hat in one hand swept toward her.
And where it’s face should have been, there was a hole. Dark...empty...there was nothing at all.
The sibilant voice of a serpent spoke in Sara’s ears as it said, “I am the Journeyman, Sara, and you will do as the Journeyman says.”
She screamed and screamed with the crows in the night as the thing took her into its arms.
Sara jumped up, sweat running down her face, the sounds of crows still screaming in her ears.
She lay upon her own bed, the threadbare sheets twisted around her as she realized that what she was hearing was not the sound of crows, but rather the sound of an ambulance siren just outside the hotel.
She got to her feet as she heard heavy steps practically running down the stairs just outside the door of her room.
Without taking time to brush her hair into any semblance of order, Sara poked her head outside her door to see Simon-something-or-other from the third floor stomping hurriedly by. She tried to slip back inside before it was too late, but he had already seen her.
“Holy cow...someone took out Mr. Jenkins,” he said, flashing his famous neon yellow grin. Sara tried to look away, but his stained teeth would not let her go.
She sighed. “What are you talking about Simon?”
“Whatta ya mean, whattum I talkin’ about?” The young, awkward man was so excited that even his acne seemed to shine like red neon.
“Someone murdalized him. Last night, I guess. Mrs. Baker only just found him a couple minutes ago.”
Then, he lowered his voice and came so close that Sara could smell the cheese puffs on his breath and he said, as if sharing the most secret of secrets, “She says he’s laying there, under his desk...” he paused for dramatic effect, then continued, “...but he’s all in pieces.”
The excitement too much for him, Simon abruptly did an about-face and practically galloped down the stairs. From that direction, Sara could hear hushed voices where a crowd must have formed.
Despite her apprehension, she followed in Simon’s footsteps although she did not run like he did. Her feet were bare, the stairway as cold as a mortician’s slab.
She only made it halfway down the last flight of stairs before she saw the people crowded around the hotel owner’s desk. They stood in rapt attention in a circle around two men wearing uniforms that resembled hospital scrubs.
The paramedics had stretched out a large black bag and one bent to pick something up from the floor.
The crowd let out out a collective sigh, as if they had just been witness to a particularly clever magic trick. But what the few who stood on the tips of their toes to see, Sara saw clearly from her vantage point upon the stairwell.
The paramedic had picked up a hand that had been torn away at the wrist.
Sara felt the gorge rising in her throat as the screaming of crows echoed in her thoughts.
Low voices murmured in the crowd, and Sara heard Mr. Johnson from the third floor.
“They say there’s no blood...tapped like a maple tree, he was.”
Mrs. Johnson hushed her husband, then said with voice meant for anyone to hear, “No dear. Poor Mr. Jenkins must’ve met his maker somewhere else and then they brought his body back here.”
She nodded to no one in particular, then said, “That’s how they do it on the Friday night mysteries.”
There was a loud squawk from the hotel’s front entrance, then she saw men dressed in policemen’s blues forcing their way through the crowd.
Seeing them broke the spell that held Sara frozen in place.