Midnight Grinding Read Online Free PDF

the pastor’s prayer, they began to enjoy a meal of hot dogs, potato salad, and cold iced tea.
    It was during the churchyard meal that the town handyman, Old Redhawk, pulled his rickety pickup truck into the parking lot and staggered up to where the congregation sat eating. Redhawk was a full-blooded Cherokee, once a proud member of a local tribe that had made Glover County its home. But he had fallen on hard times and turned to drink. When he wasn’t cleaning out someone’s drainage gutters or roofing someone’s house, he could be found down at Boone Hollow Tavern, indulging in his favorite pastime. From the looks of him that May afternoon, it appeared that he had downed a few shots of sour mash whiskey before arriving to speak his mind.
    Deanna sat between her parents, gently holding little Timothy’s hand, as the old Indian ranted and raved about things long since past. She couldn’t understand a lot of what he seemed to be so indignant about…something concerning the desecration of sacred land and Indian burial mounds. Soon, Sheriff Harding and his deputy arrived and tried to talk Old Redhawk into leaving peacefully. The drunken man took a wild swing at the constable and, suddenly, they had him face down on the ground, not more than six feet from where the Hudson family sat.
    The seven-year-old watched, appalled, as they handcuffed the old Indian and pulled him roughly to his feet. For a second, the Indian’s eyes met Deanna’s. Those bloodshot eyes seemed to hold a dark message just for her.
    Better watch where you sit, little girl, they seemed to warn her. There are things buried beneath you that you could never hope to imagine. Arrowheads and pottery and the dusty bones of many a brave warrior. And, on top of that, despite the protests of the tribe, others were buried. Innocent children whose foolish parents interred them in sacred ground. There are nights at certain times of the year when the magic of the great Elders raise those tiny bodies from their earthen slumber and return them to the world of the living. Never mind what that comforting inscription atop the cemetery gate might promise. Whatever crawl this hallowed earth in the dead of night … they are far from being angels.
    “Come on, you crazy old coot!” growled the sheriff as he herded Old Redhawk off to the patrol car. “Let’s see if a week or two in the county jail will teach you to leave decent folks alone.”
    Mom handed Deanna a hot dog. “Just try to forget him, dear,” she said, stroking her long blond hair. “People do and say crazy things when they are all liquored up like that.”
    The girl absently took the food, her eyes glued on the tiny stones that jutted along the hillside—or was it burial mound?—on the other side of the fence.
     
    ***
     
    That night Deanna had the most frightening nightmare of her young life. She dreamt that she stood alone in the half-acre cemetery in the dead of night. A full moon was out, highlighting the tiny stones, making them look like bleached teeth sprouting from earthen gums.
    She stood atop the small hill beneath the thick foliage of the magnolia tree, barefoot, her pink nightgown fluttering in a cool breeze. She watched as the iron gate opened and a tall figure stepped within. It was Old Redhawk, but not the same drunken old man that she had seen earlier that day. He was now a proud Cherokee chief with a feathered headdress and streaks of warpaint smeared across his ancient face and arms. Behind him filed a silent gathering of braves and squaws. Old Redhawk began to chant, lifting his hands skyward. The clouds boiled like the depths of a dark cauldron. Lightning jabbed downward like gaunt fingers of blue fire upon the horizon.
    Before she could flee through the backwoods to her house, the ground beneath her began to buckle and heave. Clods of grass erupted, yielding a harvest of pale-fleshed heads. Soon, they had clawed the smothering confinement of dank earth away and were there before