Van Syke wasn't there-that was the important thing Mike had checked on even before stepping in. Not much was there: a bunch of shovels and spades-standard equipment for a graveyard, he figured-some shelves with fertilizer and jars of dark liquid on them, some rusted and barbed iron bars, obviously part of the fence that had been removed for replacement, stacked in one corner, some attachments for the tractor that mowed the grounds, a couple of small crates-one which had a lantern on it and looked as if it had been used as a table, some thick canvas straps which Mike puzzled over for a moment before he realized that they were the straps that went under a coffin so it could be lowered into the grave, and, directly under the grimed window, a low cot.
Mike checked out the cot. It smelled strongly of mildew and there was a blanket thrown on it that didn't smell much better. But someone had obviously used this as a bed recently-a Wednesday edition of the Peoria Journal Star lay crumpled against the wall on it-and the blanket lay half on the floor as if someone had thrown it off in a hurry.
Mike knelt next to the cot and moved the newspaper. Under it was a magazine with slick, glossy pages mixed in with cheaper paper. Mike lifted it, began to thumb through it, and then dropped it in a hurry.
The slick pages held glossy black and white photos of naked ladies. Mike had seen naked ladies before-he had four sisters-and he had even seen magazines with naked ladies in them: Gerry Daysinger had shown him a nudist magazine once. But he had never seen photos like this.
The women lay with their legs open and their private parts showing. The nudist pictures Mike had seen had been air-brushed-no pubic hair, only a modest smoothness between the legs-but these photos showed everything. Hair, the ladies' slits, the open lips down there . . . often held open by the ladies themselves, lacquered nails tugging apart the opening to their most secret parts. Other women were on their knees, rump to the camera, so you could see their bum hole as well as the hairy parts. Others were playing with their titties.
Mike felt his blush fade, but at the same second, as if the blood had to flow somewhere, he felt his penis getting hard. He touched the magazine-although not picking it up again-and flipped pages.
More women. More spread legs. Mike had never imagined that ladies would do such a thing in front of someone with a camera. What if their families ever saw these pictures?
He felt his erection throbbing against his jeans. Mike had touched himself before-even rubbed himself all the way to the climax that had surprised him so much the first time it happened a year earlier-but Father Harrison had gone to great lengths to explain the consequences of self-abuse, both spiritual and physical, and Mike had no intention of going insane or of getting the special type of acne that self-abusers always suffered-thus letting the world know they were self-abusers. Besides, Mike had confessed his particular sin the few times he'd done it, and while it was one thing confessing something like that to Father Harrison in the dark and getting bawled out for it, it would be quite another telling Father Cavanaugh. Mike had realized that he would rather become an atheist and go to hell than confess this sin to Father C. And if he did it and didn't confess . . . well, Father Harrison had described the punishment in hell that awaited sinners who were depraved.
Mike sighed, stuck the magazine back where he had found it, arranged the newspaper over it, and got to his feet. He'd jog down the hill and walk briskly up the next one; that should get rid of the bad thoughts and the hardness against the inside of his fly. The blanket slipped off the cot as Mike rose and a raw smell filled the room. Mike backed away and then came closer, lifting the blanket away.
A stench of raw earth . . . and something worse . . . rose from beneath the cot. Mike held his breath a second, and then he lifted the cot and set it against the packing crate.
There was a hole there. It was more than two feet across and perfectly round, as if it were an open manhole in a city street. But the edges were packed dirt. Mike got down on all fours and peered in.
The smell was very bad. Mike had gone to a slaughterhouse near Oak Hill once, and this stench was sort of like the room where they'd tossed the entrails and other bits and pieces they couldn't sell. The blood smell was the same. It mixed with the rich, raw earth scent to make a stench so strong that it made Mike dizzy. He teetered for a moment, eyes closed.
When he opened them, he caught a flicker of movement far down the hole as if something had just scurried from the light. Mike blinked. The edges of the hole were weird-raw red, although the soil around here wasn't clay, and striated, evenly ridged. It reminded Mike of something, although he couldn't think of what for a minute. Then he remembered.
Dale Stewart had a set of Compton's Pictured Encyclopedias. The boys liked to look at the section about the human body; there were transparent overlays there. One of the pictures was of just the digestive system, with cross sections and colored cutaways.
The sides of the hole looked like a section of human gut. Red and raw.
As Mike watched, the red ridges seemed to move slightly-contracting, then relaxing. The smell from the hole grew worse.
Mike crawled backward on all fours, breathing shallowly. There was a scraping, scrabbling sound from somewhere. Rats outside . . . or something down there?
Mike had a sudden image of this tunnel running into the cemetery, connecting to the graves there. He imagined Van Syke crawling headfirst into this hole, disappearing down this raw gut into the deeper bowels of the earth . . . Van Syke slithering like a snake, sliding out of sight as he heard Mike's whistling a minute before.
Van Syke . . . or something worse?
Mike shivered. The filthy window suggested that it was already dark outside, although the crack in the door showed pale light.
Mike shoved the cot back in place, making sure the newspaper and magazine were as he had found them, and readjusted the blanket so it concealed the hole. It wouldn't take the blanket to hide it, he realized. It's so dark in here, somebody night not notice the hole even if the cot weren't here if the smell didn't tip you off.
Mike was still on his knees when he imagined a grub-white hand and arm sliding out from the blackness beneath the cot . . . sliding out and grabbing his wrist, gripping his ankle.
Mike's sexual excitement was completely gone. For a second he felt like he was going to throw up. He closed his eyes, opened his mouth to lessen the smell, and concentrated on saying a Hail Mary and an Our Father.
It didn't help.
He imagined that he heard stealthy footsteps in the grass stubble outside.
Mike flung the door open and threw himself outside, not caring if he ran into whoever it was, wanting only to be away from the hole . . . out of there.
The cemetery was empty. The sky was darker, one star hung in the east above the treeline there, the woods looked dark, but it was still summer twilight. A red-winged blackbird sat on a tall gravestone twenty yards away and seemed to stare at Mike.
He started to leave, walking quickly away, but then remembered the lock. He hesitated, realized that he was being an idiot, and then went back and began pounding in the screws. The last one had to be screwed in, and Mike noticed that his hand was shaking slightly as he used his penknife to do it.
If something comes out of that hole, how does it get out of the shed? Maybe it slithers through the window.
Shut up, stupid. The knife blade slipped and sliced his little finger. Mike ignored it, driving the screw the last quarter inch, oblivious of the drops of blood dripping onto the wooden frame.