Free One-Eyed Jack by Lawrence Watt-Evans Page B

up, soaked in sweat, sitting in the driver’s seat of
my rented Chrysler, staring out at an empty street.
    “ Oh, crap ,” I said, and I reached for the key.
    Five minutes later I turned onto the
Wilsons’ block, and I had been so desperate to get to those bushes
and stop whatever was happening there that I had forgotten all
about my earlier worries.
    I shouldn’t have. There was the cop
car, parked in front of the Wilson house. A reddish night-thing was
crouched atop it, but I ignored that; I was more concerned with its
human occupants than any supernatural manifestations that might
have attached themselves to the vehicle.
    I had a pretty good idea what would
happen if I drove down to the dead end and got out of my car –
within two minutes there would be a cop with a flashlight asking me
what I was doing there, and the odds that he’d cut me enough slack
to get to those bushes and drag Jack out weren’t very
good.
    I tried to think of something I could
tell the cops that wouldn’t make me sound insane or dangerous, and
even as I did I was wondering whether the neighbors had talked to
them about the strange young man in the gray PT Cruiser.
    I didn’t have time to come up with
anything before I was driving past the police cruiser. I glanced
over and saw two cops sitting in their vehicle, both of them
watching me intently, and the red thing on the roof, also watching
me, and I lost my nerve.
    The cops weren’t going to believe a
word I said. I couldn’t think of a convincing lie, and the truth
sure wasn’t going to work. I flew out here from Maryland because I
was having dreams about this kid feeding a ghost woman his own
finger? Oh, they’d believe that, of course they would!
    Right.
    I turned at the next
corner, the last corner; I didn’t dare go on down the dead end. And
once I’d done that, I couldn’t circle back; that would definitely attract the
cops’ attention.
    I looked at the GPS, flipped it to map
mode and tried to figure out whether there was somewhere I could
park to come at those bushes from the other side.
    It looked as if there was, but it
involved getting back out on Winchester Road, then turning into the
next development over and making my way to the back, where there
was another dead end that should connect up. Except, of course,
there might be fences or ditches or other obstacles in there that
didn’t show up on the little diagram.
    Still, I didn’t have
a better idea. I
headed out of the development.
    It took about ten minutes to get to
the spot the GPS said was closest, which was directly in front of
someone’s house. I wasn’t eager to cut through someone’s yard, so I
cruised slowly up the block, looking for an alternative.
    I found one, a playing
field that backed up to a bunch of trees, and if I cut through
those trees I should come out at the end of the Wilsons’ street. I parked the car,
hoping it wouldn’t be too conspicuous.
    There was a fence around the field, of
course. Wouldn’t want stray balls sailing off into the woods. I
went around the end and hurried, stumbling over tree roots and beer
bottles in the dark, and uncomfortably aware of the things in and
around the trees that were watching me. Something big and white was
stalking up and down the field, and black or gray things crouched
or fluttered on every side.
    I was still trying to find
my way in the dark when I heard the whimpering, and saw something
moving ahead of me, something that wasn’t just the usual sort of
night-creature – though it didn’t look exactly right , either. “Jack?” I
called.
    I didn’t care about maintaining the
dreams anymore. If he was out there, hurt, bleeding, whatever, I
intended to find him and do whatever I could to keep that Jenny
thing away from him.
    The whimpering stopped for
a moment, and then that not-a-voice said, Help him!
    “ I’m trying!” I shouted.
“Jack, where are you?”
    “ Over here,” a boy’s voice
said, weak and unsteady.
    I followed the sound, and