Stones by Chanlin Marr

[Tweek]

"I'm finally finished."

Those words. That voice. Both were running through my head, as I'm sure they were many others, that night.

The slopes and thickets of the Black Hills forced me and the rest of the men to leave our autos, wagons and even our horses, far behind us in Burkittsville. It made a difficult journey that much harder. For, with each step on the dry, dead leaves of the forest, we all knew we drew closer and closer to a horror none of us were able to imagine. It was far worse for a few of the men with me that night. Some of them were the fathers of the missing.

* * * *

Seven of our town's children had disappeared over the course of six months, between November of '40 and May of '41. The whole situation had the town in a panic. Mothers stuck like glue to their children, and there was even talk of a curfew for "all" folks after the last disappearance.

And then, all our fears came true when that scruffy, dirty hermit, Rustin Parr, walked into the market, stood in the center of the place, and announced that he was "finally finished." He just stood there, saying nothing, until the Sheriff came to pick him up.

When he started talking again, he gave us our reason for being in the woods that night: He had kidnapped and killed our kids. It was all some could do not to jump across the table and throttle him til dead.

When a semi-cool head in the room asked him "Why?", he gave us an excuse that made us both cringe and see blood for him all the more: "Th'voices...the old lady told me t'do it."

[Tweek]

The "old lady". We all knew what he must be mumbling about. The thought that the Witch was out here among the trees was not lost on us. It was a tall tale, to be sure, but we'd all grown up with the Witch, and some of the more superstitious of us weren't all too sure that Rustin was "all" crazy.

Now we...all of us, were born of Burkittsville, and we knew where the house was. It sat deep in the forest, alone. Alone with the Witch.

Now, I'm not saying I necessarily believed there really was a Witch, but, there's evil in those woods. Outsiders might not see it, but us native to the place, we know.

* * * *

There was about 15 of us out there that night, hiking through the darkness, carrying our lamps to light our way. There was nary a word said between us the entire time. There really was nothing to say, I think. We knew our purpose, and it was then just a matter of steelin' ourselves up for what we were probably going to find.

As we walked, I tried taking my mind off of what was to come, and focused on where I was walking. That, of course, made me look at the rest of the place around me. It was like...like if you dipped the whole world in black India ink, and then tried to walk through it by candlelight. All I could see in the weak glows from the lamps were the upper bodies of the men around me, the spots of leaves beneath each of us, and the sudden appearance of dark trees in our path.

One of us, I think it was Fred Wilkes, carried the compass. He was our leader then, I suppose. We all knew where to go, but the woods have a way of wrappin' themselves around you sometimes, making you forget your up and down from your left and right.

I remember one of us stumbled; a rock, or branch or something. I helped him up, but as he scuffled in the leaves to right himself, I swear I heard a child.

Laughing.

I snapped my head in one direction, then the other. My eyes only saw the dark. My ears almost hurt, I strained so hard to hear. But whatever it was, if anything, was lost to me in the crunching and stomping of the other's progress.

Having gotten up, the man thanked me and went on. I stood still for a good minute, trying to make sure I wasn't losing my own head. But, as the others got father away, the dark around me got darker, so I turned and rushed to meet them.

[Tweek]

It was 10:26 at night, according to my pocket watch, when we finally caught sight of the house. I remember I was a mite shocked it wasn't later than that. From the amount of darkness around us, I would have thought it after midnight.

The house was an odd thing to behold. A simple, dirty-white place surrounded by nothing but black and wood. We all made the last few steps towards it, and, about ten feet from it, we all stopped. We just stood there, looking at it. I was thinking about how hard it was to believe that in this little shanty...

I remember it was Mike Burgess who spoke first. Hearing a voice after so long a walk in utter silence made me jump a bit. He turned his back to the house, and addressed us:

"I think it best if the fathers among us stay out here. Mike Cummings, Jim, Thomas, Dan, stay out here and keep watch."

Mike Burgess then turned to the fathers, who had tended to group together during the whole of the hike.

"It's not that I don't trust you fellas, God as my witness, but until we get this business sorted out, its best not to make a bad situation worse. Alright then? Fred, you and Mike Hanson take the top floor. David and John, you two take the ground floor. Douglas, you're with me in the basement."

I was a bit hesitant, to say the least, when Mike B. said my name. Who was that poet...the one who wrote about Hell and the different floors of it...Dante. Thats it. Knowing what we would find in there, and knowing I was going into the bottom of it, it made me think of Hell.

I wasn't far from right, I'd find out.

[Tweek]

We filed into the place in the order Mike B. had called: Fred and Mike H. first, David and John, then Mike B. and me.

It was the smell that hit us first. I've hunted many a time in my life, and I've come across a lot of dead animals in those woods. You never, ever, forget the sickly sweet stench of rotting flesh. It was made all the worse because we knew what was making that smell.

Fred vomited. Can't say as I blamed him.

Mike B. and I were just on the downward stairs when we heard a shout from behind and above us. We turned quick and ran back to the front hall.

The light from our lamps must not have cast on that wall when we first came in, because there was no way you could miss the dried blood-brown,child- size hand prints that covered that wall.

Tiny hands.

Innocent hands.

Dead hands.

I looked at the others, staring at the wall. Their faces were stone, just like mine. But I knew their hearts were shattered glass. Just like mine.

Mike B. nodded, and without a word we all turned back to our assigned places.

* * * *

Each step I took now towards the stairs was like wading through cold molasses. Mike stopped at the top of the flight down, and I stood next to him. To this day, I don't think I've seen a darker shade of blackness than where our lights ended on the way down those steps. We headed downward. The smell got worse.

We covered our mouths and noses, our eyes watering from a mixture of that putrid stink and the emotions we could not hold in. We came to the bottom of those stairs, the silence held in by the rock walls around us as we turned the corner, holding our lamps high to see....

[Tweek]

Hell.

I knew then, as I know now, what hell looks like. The horror of that place, that night, will never leave me. And as I knelt in those cracked, dry leaves outside the house, spilling the contents of my stomach onto the ground, the yells, cries and shouts of the fathers behind me, the smell and sight of death still filling my senses, I glanced up to see the seven small piles of rocks, neatly lined up along the edge of the house.

I wept then, as I weep now. For, I swear, at night, sometimes, in the dark, I hear the laughter of a child as I did on that darkest of nights. And yet, I still wonder if what I heard was not a child...but a Witch.