The Portal Read online

  She bounced up and down a little to test its strength. The rung protested again, but did not give way.

  “Reverend Snow comes up here every year to mount the star,” she said. She realized she should have used the past tense and shook off the realization. She began to climb.

  Each footstep on a rung sent the sharp creak of weakened wood echoing up the tower. Twenty feet up, slivers of light through louvers lit the top. At the top yawned the open mouth of the bell, without a clapper, forever silenced. Dust coated everything like a covering of gray snow.

  At the top, she went to the far end of the bell platform. Zebra stripes of light from cracked and missing louvers painted the old bell. The bell’s clapper lay on the floor, a long iron shaft, flattened at one end, with a bulbous round tip at the other. She had a quick vision of a severed tongue, and put it out of her mind.

  Scott got to the top of the ladder and stood on the platform. He peered out one of the missing louvers that faced the front of the church.

  “Hell’s watchdog is still waiting for us out there,” he said.

  Allie peeked out. The German shepherd had planted itself between the truck and the church, and was intently watching the big black doors for the slightest movement. A small puddle of blood lay under its belly. “How can that thing still be alive?”

  She began to search the steeple’s inner wall of the steeple. Something was written on the north side. She bent down and looked at the marks more closely, ran her fingertips along the letters. A list of names, carved into the wood. The lettering style changed from name to name, with earlier names containing archaic underscoring at the base of the W and M letters. The names read:

  Jacob Snow

  Joseph Snow

  Timothy Snow

  John Snow

  James Snow

  Aaron Snow

  Abraham Snow

  Benjamin Snow

  Zachariah Snow

  Beside each one was a dark rectangular smudge, about an inch tall and half-an-inch wide.

  “Scottie, look at this.”

  Scott abandoned his canine surveillance and bent down next to Allie.

  “I was right,” she said. “These are the names of the nine generations of Snows that tended this church. I’ll bet that each boy carved his name here when he reached the age when he would join his father here on Christmas Eve. What do you think these smudges are?”

  Scott gave the wall a closer inspection. “Thumbprints. In some I can just make out the swirls of the patterns. Based on the color, I’m guessing that the boys didn’t make them with ink. Looks more like blood.”

  “Can’t you imagine a very solemn ritual at that first reading, where it culminates in the boy carving his name in the wall with his knife, then sealing his promise with blood drawn by that same blade? The story of the Portal has to be here.”

  She reached up into the shadow under the sill over the names. She touched something soft and supple, a tube of some type. Two thin leather straps tied it in place. She worked the knots loose, and the object fell into her hands. She pulled it out into the light of the tower.

  A foot-wide roll of dark brown leather lay in her hands. A strap fastened it in the center using a small handmade buckle. Allie unbuckled the strap and unrolled the tube in a patch of light on the floor. It crinkled as it unfurled to about two feet long. Thread attached a yellowed parchment to the inside. A precise flowery cursive, reminiscent of the Declaration of Independence, covered the scroll. If this was what she thought it was, the last time it had seen the light of day was some seventy years ago when her Reverend Snow had his father lay the family secrets out for him. She was probably also the first non-Snow ever to see it.

  A date in the upper left-hand corner read 1720.

  “Allie Cat,” Scott said with a mixture of reverence and amazement, “you were right.”

  Tires ground against gravel outside in front of the church. Scott stepped back over to the hole in the louvers and looked out.

  A police cruiser rolled across the parking lot. As it approached the front of the church, the German shepherd looked at the car, let loose a sharp yip, and loped back off into the woods, as if relieved of duty. A trail of blood drops speckled the ground in its wake. The cruiser parked between Scott’s truck and the church. From the spire viewpoint, the car’s roof blocked any view of the interior.

  “That’s got to be Scaravelli,” Scott said, “and for once, the police arriving in a dire situation is not good.” Scott pointed at the scroll in Allie’s hands. “He can’t get a hold of that thing.”

  “He won’t,” Allie said.

  She rolled it back up. Scott started back down the ladder.

  “I’ll stall him at the door. Stay here. I’ll close the access way door. He won’t even know where to look.”

  Allie fastened the leather scroll back under the sill, frustrated she’d have to wait to read it. Scott vanished down the ladder. Someone banged on the front door of the church. She peered out the louvers. The roof blocked any view of the front stoop.

  Armed police on the wrong side of the law. What did Scottie think he was going to do to stop Scaravelli? Talk him out of killing the two of them?

  From downstairs came a loud wooden snap, then more, louder banging on the door.

  She gave the scroll a glance to make sure that it was tied up and out of sight.

  It stayed hidden that way for three hundred years, she thought. That better be good enough.

  Whatever was about to go down in the church, Scottie wouldn’t face it alone. Allie grabbed the ladder’s top rung and headed down.

  If the Lord wasn’t giving her more than she could handle, he was sure nudging the upper limit with it.

  * * *

  A pair of red eyes burned from beneath the shadowy cover of the lowest branches of the spruce. The German shepherd crept forward a few inches for a clearer view of All Souls Church. The end of its severed chain jangled across the ground with each step.

  The pain from the gash in its belly was somehow distant, muffled. The dog knew its life was draining away, though something external seemed to keep it going.

  A police cruiser idled in front of the church. An officer banged on the door.

  The dog hunkered down to the ground. It would wait, as Oates commanded, keeping an eye on what the master called ‘his sure thing’.

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Blood splattered the walls in Franklin Clark’s South Avenue house. Kyler had held an impromptu quiz show called Show Me the Portal. Franklin Clark didn’t seem to know any of the answers.

  Clark was the third direct descendant of the original islanders who got to play. The other two had fared no better than Clark. Neither knew about the Portal.

  Most civilians broke once a family member died before their eyes. Kyler rarely had to go past the first slit throat before he found out what he wanted to know. But old Clark endured the beheadings of his wife and two children, crying and screaming that he had no idea what Kyler was looking for. This took a level of courage Kyler knew the man didn’t have. Kyler believed Clark, so he’d been generous. He’d have let a liar live with the vision of his slaughtered family, a memory guaranteed to eat away at the man’s sanity. Instead, Clark got the favor of a 9mm through his temple. Kyler had to admit a bit of frustration as he left Clark’s house and reentered his pickup.

  “He was telling the truth, sir,” Kyler said over his shoulder to Oates in the back seat. “He would have cracked if he’d known.”

  Oates stared out the window, oddly undisturbed by their lack of progress.

  “I didn’t expect nothing from any of ’em,” Oates said. “We’re just playing the long shots, waiting for the sure thing.”

  Kyler looked at Oates in the rearview mirror and waited for some elaboration. Oates looked out the window.

  “For now,” Oates sai
d, “take me down this street here.” He pointed right. “Fifth house on the left.”

  Up the next side street, an old, low stone fence ran the length of the road. Early settlers used the most abundant, useless natural resource, rocks, to fence their property. Well behind it stood the original farmhouse where Harry Rogers had lived in 1720. The Rogers barn hadn’t fared as well, and newer homes now covered its location and the grazing area that used to surround it.

  The Dodge Ram pulled into the driveway of one of the homes, a nice, white, two-story Cape Cod. Two rocking chairs sat on a welcoming covered porch. The attached garage was closed. A small sign at the end of the polished stone walkway read: The Greenes Welcome You!

  It didn’t look like anyone was home, but that was hard to judge today.

  “Burn it to the ground,” said Oates. “I need this space clear.”

  “Yes, sir,” Kyler said. A smile broke out across his face. “The occupants?”

  “Save ’em the trouble of relocating,” Oates said.

  Kyler stepped out of the truck and slung his assault rifle over his shoulder. He shut the door and strode to the Cape Cod’s porch. He tried the front door. Locked. He swung the submachine gun off his shoulder. A short burst from the barrel disintegrated the doorframe in a shower of splinters. He kicked open the door and entered.

  Even from the outside, the soundtrack was enough to know what was happening within. Screams. Several bursts of gunfire. Bangs and clatters from within the garage.

  Minutes later, Kyler backed out the front door, laying a trail of gasoline from a two-gallon can. He threw the can back inside the house. Stepping off the porch and into the front yard, he grabbed a grenade from his web belt and pulled the pin.

  In the cathedral quiet of the day, the handle made a ringing ping as it released from the grenade and cartwheeled to the ground. Kyler lobbed it, underhand and easy, like he was tossing a ball to a child. The grenade almost floated through the air and through the front door. A sharp thump said it hit the far wall inside.

  Kyler turned away and bent down. He covered his ears, cracked open his mouth, and closed his eyes.

  An explosion rocked the house hard enough to make the ground tremble. Balls of orange flame blew out the glass in every window. Bits of burning curtain and window frame landed in the yard and set miniature bonfires. Kyler stood and appraised the house.

  Both stories were ablaze, and burning nicely. Smoke alarms screamed warbling warnings that soon stopped as they too succumbed to the flames. He gave it an hour or so before it was nothing but a concrete pad covered in charcoal dust. He gave his handiwork an approving nod and then took his seat in the pickup.

  “Do we need to check out that ‘sure thing’ you mentioned to get the Portal, sir?”

  “No,” Oates said, completely dispassionate. “I got my eye on that. We’re heading to the marina.”

  Chapter Forty-Three

  Charlie Cauble shivered in the marina dock house. The propane heater was on, but it took a while to get the chill out of everything inside the little shack, and the weak morning sun wasn’t helping out at all. He’d opened on time, despite the power outage that looked like it turned most of the town dark. He was prepared to brag about his old-fashioned wind-up alarm clock to the first person blaming a late start on the lack of electricity.

  The vacant dock out the window made him smile. The black speedboat must have slipped out during the night. Charlie thought good riddance to that and the creepy owner, Oates.

  While he certainly had no problem keeping his own company, it struck him as strange that he hadn’t seen anyone else so far that morning. No one fished the harbor, no one drove down Main Street.

  He tapped on his cell phone. No signal at all, and harborside usually had the strongest reception, right near the downtown cell tower. He picked up the dock house landline. No dial tone. He slipped the phone back into the cradle.

  The light, happy feeling that bubbled up when he first saw the black boat missing drained away, replaced by the sensation that something had gone very wrong on the island.

  The roar of twin motors sounded in the distance. Charlie raised a set of binoculars to his eyes. A boat traversed the harbor breakwater, enveloped in a blast of white spray from the slap of the ocean’s chop. Then a black bow cut through the white and the low-slung shape of the black boat he dreaded emerged. It entered the calmer harbor waters and its engines cut back to half throttle. Charlie dropped the binoculars back on the table.

  Charlie felt a lot less excited about making it to work on time.

  The boat slowed as it approached the dock. Five young, rail-thin women sat in the cockpit. The breeze blew back their long, straight black hair, exposing a tattooed ring of thorns around the base of each one’s pale neck. Three of the women were white, one Hispanic and one Asian. Heavy, kohl-colored eyeliner rimmed their eyes and extended to an upswept tip over cheekbones powdered bright white.

  The boat glided up to the dock and stopped without reversing engines. It didn’t roll, didn’t pitch, didn’t move one inch from horizontal. The women stood. All wore different cuts of black leather coats, the Hispanic woman’s as long as a Western duster. Underneath, two wore long, flowing, high-slit skirts, two wore black pants, and the Asian woman had a black leather mini and fishnet hose. All wore thigh-high boots with five-inch heels.

  Back when his wild oats still needed sowing, Charlie’d had his fair share of the opposite sex. At his age now, he’d gone from a quick succession of female purchases to merely window-shopping. But something about these women made his blood race hot, made his heart throb in his chest, something more than their obvious physical allure. They had an aura, a sensation about them.

  The Asian woman led the group as they disembarked. She paused on the twin-triangle design carved in the cockpit floor, and turned left. She stepped up onto the gunwale.

  The boat still repelled Charlie. Its unnatural arrival made his skin crawl. The women’s thorn tattoos were so ultra-realistic that they made him wince and their pale skin reminded him of corpses. Yet he felt hypnotized, even magnetized to approach them, to help them. He walked to the edge of the dock, reached across to the motionless boat, and offered the Asian woman his hand. She laid her palm in his.

  Her touch sent a shudder up his arm, like touching a block of ice on a hot summer day. His palm burned, his fingertips went numb. She stepped up and onto the dock. He looked into her eyes and felt the promise of fulfillment of every physical desire he’d ever had, or ever would have. His member went to full, pulsing attention. He sighed and nearly forgot to inhale again.

  She released his hand and he felt adrift on a vast ocean. He reached down and took the next woman’s hand. The sensation repeated as he helped the next three women from the boat, three more encounters with bliss, three more crashes at its departure.

  The Hispanic woman was the last to leave. She carried a twisted wooden staff topped with a golden goat’s head. The goat’s ruby eyes sparkled as if the thing were alive.

  Perfect eyebrows arched over her deep brown eyes, eyes that promised all manners of paradise. The plunging neckline of her jacket revealed her voluptuous breasts. She lowered her chin, and one sweep of her thick black lashes made Charlie’s knees weak. His hand shook as he extended it to her.

  She took his hand and alighted onto the dock. Charlie stared at her perfect profile and his heart raced.

  Something dark and dangerous flashed in the woman’s eyes. She bent forward and kissed Charlie’s lips. Her mouth was ice-cold but his body caught fire. She squeezed his cheeks with her hand and forced his mouth open. Her tongue darted in, caressed his, and swept him to the edge of ecstasy.

  Her warm tongue turned cold and scaly. It thinned and coiled itself around Charlie’s like a snake. Every ounce of passion, every drop of desire, fled Charlie. The cold in his hand swept through the rest of his body. Pictures flashed by: blood s
acrifice, people tortured, flames, the symbol in the boat cockpit, Oates’ face. He jerked his head away, mouth opened wide in terror.

  The woman opened hers in a smile and showed a damp, bright red palate, blazing white teeth, and a long forked reptilian tongue. She flicked it out and swept it around her lips. She released Charlie’s hand, winked and walked away.

  One Thanksgiving, Charlie’s mom had prepared a beautiful, golden-brown, glistening turkey. But when his father carved it, a rank stench filled the air. Beneath the golden skin hid a rotting carcass, black as coal. The turkey had spoiled. Decayed flesh oozed as the knife ran across it.

  His reaction to that fetid bird filled Charlie’s mind as he understood the empty, evil interior of the woman’s soul. Anything good in there was long-dead, or more accurately, sacrificed.

  The five walked up the dock, symbols of seduction as their butts swayed with each synchronized step of their stiletto heels. The women moved with authority, like five dark queens entering their kingdom at last. They formed a tight, perfect V, led by the Hispanic woman with the goat’s head cane.

  Witch, he corrected himself. The kiss had given him that much insight. They are witches.

  The Ram pickup pulled up to the end of the dock, the same pickup he’d seen leave the ferry the day before. The five climbed into the cab in the rear and closed the tailgate. The truck drove off up Main Street, turned a corner, and was out of sight.

  Charlie fought back the urge to vomit at the realization of what had been in his mouth, and his dazed acquiescence to take it. He grabbed a piling for support. Then he remembered the boat beside him. Oates was still onboard, and whatever evil force those witches commanded, he could certainly best them.

  Then he remembered. At the captivating sight of the women, he didn’t realize Oates wasn’t at the wheel when the boat arrived. No one was.

  He spun to face Killin’ Time. Half-inch lines secured the motionless vessel fore and aft to cleats on the dock. Seconds ago, they hadn’t been there. Charlie retreated a few steps back across the pier, then bolted for land.