The Weirdo Read Online Free PDF Page B

boat touched land, Sam could see that the sole occupant wore a dark jacket, probably wool, and a black baseball cap. He hopped out, tossing ashore a pronged anchor to make sure the small craft wouldn't drift away.
    Sam guessed she was looking at Clewt's son. He
had no beard, wasn't a man in size. Wasn't the swamp-walker. Here was the weirdo few people had seen.
    The dogs jumped on him gleefully, and he bent to scruff them, talk to them.
    When he was about a hundred feet away, limping toward the house, Sam thought she'd better let him know someone was on the roof. "Hey, there!" she yelled.
    The boy stopped, surprised at the voice.
    "I'm up here, on your roof."
    He looked up.
    Sam felt idiotic.
    Coming closer, he finally spoke. Gruffly. "What are you doing there?" A pair of binoculars hung from his neck.
    "Your dogs chased me."
    "They guard the place." He sounded annoyed at the intrusion.
    Sam laughed weakly at the understatement.
    He was almost directly beneath her now, looking up, and she could see that the right side of his face was normal—but the left side was slick and almond-colored. His left eye drooped at the corner, and there was no eyebrow above it. His left ear was a brown rosette. It was almost as if he had two faces, the marred left side making him a "Phantom of the Opera" without a mask. He wore a glove on his left hand, none on his right. Several wisps of hair curled out from under
the baseball cap. No wonder people who had seen him said he was weird.
    Spotting the wader, picking it up, he asked, "This yours?"
    Sam nodded.
    "I'll get you down."
    "Thank you."
    However weird he looked, he didn't seem threatening, and the dogs, docile at the sight of their master, were now acting as if they hadn't attacked in the first place. He disappeared around the side of the house and came back a moment later carrying a ladder.
    Sam swung her feet out. Her socks had turned a reddish black from the dried blood, almost the color of old fireplace brick.
    "What happened to your feet?" He was now at roof level. The gruffness had gone out of his voice at the sight of her bloody socks.
    "I walked five miles through the swamp yesterday afternoon and this morning."
    "You had the wrong boots."
    "I had the wrong everything."
    She stood up and let out a cry, almost losing her balance. The needled pain was so intense it brought tears. She grabbed at the top of the ladder to keep from falling.
    The boy said, "Don't try to come down. I'll carry
you." He moved up another two rungs. "Put your arms around my neck and hold on."
    It couldn't hurt any worse if he dropped her. She nodded and, closing her eyes, locked her arms around his neck.
    "Just hang on."
    She did as instructed, feeling herself being lowered to the ground; then he cradled her and began limping around toward the front of the house. Whatever was wrong with him, there was no lack of strength.
    "Why were you in the swamp?" he asked.
    "A dog that I was taking care of chased a bear. I chased after the dog."
    "I guess you didn't catch it."
    "I guess I didn't."
    As they went through the door, she said, "I'd like to make a phone call. My parents don't know where I am."
    He put her down on a chair by the kitchen table and brought the phone over.
    ***
    "OH LORD, Sam, we've been so worried. You're all right?"
    "I'm okay, Mama. I swear I am."
    "Where are you?"
    "At the spillwayman's house."
    "Hang on a minute. I've got to tell your papa. He's with a search party moving south. There's another going in from the east...."
    Then Sam heard her mother on a walkie-talkie: Samantha had called and was okay at John Clewt's house. She heard her father say a relieved, tinny, "Well, thank God! Thank God!"
    Delilah came back on the phone. "I jus' knew you were in the swamp when Buck showed up looking like he'd been in a threshing machine."
    "He's okay?"
    "I doubt he'll ever go into the Powhatan again."
    "I'm glad," Sam said. "For both our sakes."
    "You sure you're all right?" said a still-worried