Rising Fears Read Online Free PDF Page A

anything since it happened," said Hatty at last. "Locked herself in her bedroom, mumbling nonsense."
    "What kind of nonsense?"
    Hatty paused pregnantly, long enough that Jason wondered if he was going to have to ask the question again. Then she spoke, and her voice was raspy and dry. "She said, 'Monster got my boy. Monster stole my baby.'"
    Jason blinked, then turned into the lane that led to the Rising Cemetery. It was an old-fashioned kind of place, misty and heavily treed. Beautiful in the full light of day, but in the morning when the fog still hung on it, or at night when the moon illuminated the older headstones that hunched like evil guardians in the midst of the newer and more well-maintained markers, this was the kind of cemetery that children would dare each other to enter.
    "What about Sean's father?" asked Jason. He turned up a small hill, following a line of cars that were obviously here for the funeral: the cemetery was small enough that there were only a few places where new burials might occur, and as the Sheriff of Rising, Jason knew them all.
    "He was at Poker night with Bill Thompson and Fred Whittaker when it happened. Ron came home and found the basement..." and here Hatty gulped as though it had been she that had made the horrifying discovery, "...looking like it did, his wife curled up on the floor."
    Jason stopped the car and got out, trudging up to the large group that stood just up the hill, clearly in the middle of the service. Christ, he thought, looks like the whole town is here. Out loud, he said, "What's the FBI said about this?"
    "Not a damn thing," answered Hatty. "First they wouldn't talk to me, just the Sheriff."
    Jason snorted. "I was on my vaca-"
    "Which I dutifully told them," Hatty interrupted. "They weren't interested. Then when I finally got through to someone who'd listen, reception on the phones started going all fuzzy. The FBI guy I talked to told me to fax him the details."
    "Did you?"
    "Day before yesterday."
    "And?"
    "No response."
    They quieted as they approached the mourners at the service, Jason whispering quietly, "Why would they do this?"
    Hatty looked at the assembled townsfolk. "Afraid. It's a way to keep the ghosts at bay."
    "He might not even be dead," said Jason, and his voice was loud enough that some of the group turned and stared at him.
    Hatty laid a hand on his arm. "Sheriff, I saw the place. Believe me, the boy is dead."
    "Not until I find him, he's not," said Jason through clenched teeth. But he said it quietly, recognizing Hatty's wisdom in not voicing such opinions aloud, particularly without having any kind of a handle on what had happened here.
    Daniel Wells, the pastor at Rising's one and only church, was speaking. "And though he has not been found," said the portly gentleman, "we know that all will once more be found, at the morning of the First Resurrection, when the innocent and the just will be called to Christ's side. Amen."
    Whispered "amen"s greeted the end of the pastor's homily. Jason glanced around as the pastor uttered a short benediction. He noticed little Sean Rand's mother, sitting beside her husband. Ron was on his feet along with most of the rest of the assemblage, but Amy-Lynn was in a wheelchair, vacant eyes staring at nothing. She twitched occasionally, as though minute electrical shocks were being run through her body, but other than that she looked as though she were already dead herself. Ron, for his part, clearly was trying to understand what had happened to his life. Jason felt his heart tug in sympathy. He knew what it was to lose a child. To lose a son. To lose -
    Stop it, he told himself. Now is not the time. Not the time.
    Never the time.
    The benediction ended, and mourners started shuffling past the small gravestone that had no casket beneath it. Flowers fell to the mown grass, and Jason noticed how many of the mourners were children: the Rand family was well liked in Rising, and Sean had been a rare delight.
    Pastor Wells came