The Hag Read online

  Greg’s heart was in his throat, making it difficult to swallow. “Tell me what to do!” he shouted.

  I wouldn’t do that, either, Greg. I wouldn’t speak out loud, were I you.

  Greg’s head swiveled back and forth, searching for something—anything—that might help him, or he could use, but there was nothing. He was in the middle of the lake, after all.

  If you keep on as you are, the kayak will fill with water, and if that happens, you’ll be in the water with her.

  Who? I’ll be in the water with who?

  The Woman in White. The Lady in the Lake, if you’d rather.

  Greg finally convinced his arms to stop, to rest the kayak’s paddle across his lap, but kept both hands on it, his knuckles shining white in the dim light. Either help me or shut up!

  I’ll overlook that because of how scared you are, but my patience does have bounds, kid. All I do is help you. Such as right now…I told you not to get in the water, didn’t I?

  Yes! And I listened! Tell me what to do next!

  Above his head, the sky split, and purple lightning danced across it. Thunder rumbled, sounding far away—almost an afterthought—nothing close to the brutal growl of thunder in Florida.

  His friend had been right, though. As soon as he stopped paddling, the boat leveled out. It made little sense. If something is pulling the bow down and I paddle backward, that should make the boat stop bucking, right?

  Not if that something pulls harder when you paddle. Never thought of that, did you?

  Tell me what to do! Tell me…tell me how to get away!

  Ah, finally, a good question. Let’s see…how to get away…okay, I can do this… Oh, it’s so easy! Give her whatever she wants.

  What does she want? The bow of the boat broke the rough surface of the lake. A hand wrapped around the point—a gray, dead-looking hand with long cracked fingernails.

  Want? How would I know?

  How do I give her what she wants, if you don’t know what she wants? The fingers on the hand relaxed but then clenched the pointed bow of the little red kayak and shook it back and forth with more violence than it had before.

  Look, kiddo, I’m not omnipotent here—or is it omniscient? I always get those two mixed up.

  Frustration boiled in Greg’s throat. His imaginary friend was getting to be a pain.

  Back to that? I told you—

  Shut up! Just shut up so I can think! He slammed back and forth in the cockpit of the red plastic boat. Without conscious thought, he shifted his hands on the paddle until he held it as he would a baseball bat, and then he swung for the fences.

  5

  Joe sat in the right rear corner of his twelve-foot Alumacraft fishing boat. He had one arm on the starboard gunnel and the other steady hand on the throttle of his Mercury outboard. His gaze was riveted to the little red kayak in the center of the lake.

  The kayak was shaking side to side and pitching forward and back at the same time—much more than the chop of the water indicated. Greg still held the paddle but wasn’t using it. “What’s he doing?” Joe muttered.

  As Joe watched, the boy took the kayak paddle in a two-handed grip as if he were holding a baseball bat and swung it hard at the bow of the kayak. The wide blade on the end of the paddle hit the point of the bow with a solid-sounding thunk. For a moment, the kayak stopped thrashing on the surface of the lake, but then it began again, same as before, but with greater violence.

  Joe twisted the throttle, and the Mercury responded with a roar. He didn’t know what was going on out there, but any fool could see that Greg was in trouble.

  6

  Greg slammed the paddle into the disgusting hand holding onto the bow, and the hand disappeared under the waves. His eyes danced around the kayak, peering into the black depths of the lake.

  After a moment, the hand slapped across the deck of the kayak halfway between the bow and the cockpit where Greg sat, and along with it came a long forearm the color of moldy, decaying cabbage. Once the creature got a grip on the opposite edge of the boat, the boat rocked from side to side and pitched forward and back like a bucking bronco.

  Greg’s teeth slammed together on his tongue, and red splotches flashed before his eyes. He kept his grip on the paddle, however, and this time raised it straight above his head before bringing it down like a samurai swinging his sword.

  The blade hit edge-on, square in the middle of the forearm, making the sound of an ax chopping into a wet log. The blade sank into the spongy flesh about a quarter of an inch, releasing a noxious odor. A strange noise came from underneath the boat—part scream of rage, part shriek of pain—but the arm didn’t let go.

  “Leave me alone!” Greg shrieked. He jerked the paddle high into the air and brought it down again, the blade whistling through the wind. His blow struck above the wrist with enough force to send a shockwave coursing up his arms.

  The thing in the water shrieked a second time, but this time it was much louder—as though it were right up next to the boat.

  Greg jerked the paddle out of the spongy gray flesh, and it made the same squelching sound as when he pulled his foot from thick mud. “Get off!” He brought the paddle down, again and again, putting as much force behind each blow as he could. With each strike, the thing in the water made the shrieking noise, and each time it did, it sounded louder and angrier.

  Peering into the water to his right, he could see stringy, greenish-black strands of something—maybe hair—moving in a sinuous manner, though knotted and snarled. Beneath it, he thought he could see the gray outline of a person’s shoulders.

  He shifted to his right and brought the paddle down, blade flat to the water, onto the mass of black strands. The paddle made a loud slapping noise, but he hit nothing but water.

  The thing in the water tilted her head back and glared at him with hate-filled eyes. Her irises were the color of dank graveyard earth, and the sickly yellow sclera of her eyes glowed in the water. The skin of her face bore a greenish tint over the mottled gray and black of decaying flesh. Her nose fluttered to the side as though it had been broken one too many times. Below her nose was a lipless slit that must have served as her mouth. She opened her mouth and shrieked, exposing ugly, crooked fangs—fangs that looked sharp enough to puncture steel.

  Greg screamed in mindless terror, lifted the paddle above his head, and rained a frenzy of blows down on her forearm. He struck her again and again and again, each strike sending a numbing jolt racing up both of his arms, and each blow eliciting another shriek from the monster in the water.

  Her forearm looked as if it had lost a battle with the propeller of a boat—deep cuts and gouges appeared at random intervals, and out of them a viscous ichor dribbled and mixed with the water from the rain and the lake.

  Greg continued to chop at her arm, bringing the paddle down on her forearm faster and faster, harder and harder. He was screaming the same phrase over and over, “Go away!”

  She let go of the kayak and jerked her arm back into the black water, but she continued to float there, staring daggers of hate up at Greg. He changed his grip on the paddle and pulled for the other shore as hard as he could. Tears streamed down his face, and he continued to scream “go away” like it was a mantra of redemption.

  He felt the impact the first time he dipped the paddle into the water on the right side of his kayak, but he kept going, kept pulling. Greg dug deep into the water on the left side and hauled back with all of his strength. He switched sides and dug deep into the water of the right side, but the paddle stopped dead in the water.

  7

  John Morton slid into the booth across from Tom Walton. He glanced around Jenny’s Diner, a small smile creasing his face. “Never changes, does it?”

  Tom cocked his head to the side and treated him to a wry grin. “Some things change, John. You for instance…I’m not sure you’ve ever been on time for one of these things, let alone early.”

  John chuckled. “A man can’t get too predictable.”<
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  “How is Izzy? Your son?”

  A tremor twitched across John’s face—his flesh-and-blood son had died in Vietnam in 1972, though the fourteen years hadn’t dulled his pain in the least. He glanced away. “Isabel is doing great—especially since we took in our foster-son, Eddie. How’s Janet? The kids?”

  “All good.” Tom cleared his throat. “Sorry about—‍”

  “So, what do you think of this new Sherriff?”

  “Well, going strictly by the election results he’s the right man for the job, but other than that…” Tom said in a dry tone. “What about you?”

  John shrugged and put his thick hands on the table on either side of his plate. “He’s no Bobby Jefferson.”

  “That he ain’t.”

  Jenny strolled over and put her hand on her hip. “I guess I better go check.”

  Tom cocked an eyebrow at her. “Check what, Jenny?”

  She threw a wink at Tom and turned a stoic gaze on John. “I better go check and see if Hell’s frozen over. I don’t think you’ve ever been on time to anything in your life, John Morton.”

  John chuckled and shook his head.

  “I guess it is possible to teach an old dog new tricks,” said Jenny, pulling an order pad out of her apron. “Anyone else coming today, or do you two want to order?”

  “I guess it’s only the two of us.”

  “That Dave Wallace has never once stepped in here. Not once.”

  John shook his head.

  “They broke the mold after Bobby,” said Tom.

  “That they did. Matt, too.”

  It had been seven years since the murders in Oneka Falls, but some days it felt much more recent to John. He cleared his throat. “Good men are hard to find.”

  “Present company excepted,” said Jenny. “Although, why you’d want a man, John Morton, I’ll never understand. Me on the other hand…”

  “Jenny, I bet you have them lined up from here to Buffalo,” said Tom with a grin.

  Jenny almost blushed. Almost. “Yeah, yeah. What do you two bastions of the law want to eat?”

  “Almost got her, Tom,” said John with a grin.

  “Liver and pig ears for John, then. How about you Tom?”

  With a grin, Tom winked at John. “I’ll have what he’s having.”

  “You’ve been coming here too long, boys. You know all my pranks.” Jenny jotted their orders down. The whole business of taking their orders was ninety percent joke, and ten percent a chance for them to order something new.

  They never did.

  “Give me the usual few minutes.”

  “I’ll tell you, Jenny, ninety-minute waits for two cheeseburgers seems extravagant.”

  Jenny had half-turned to walk away but stopped, pulled out her pad, and wrote something on it. “Extra pig ears for Tom.” Without another word, she turned and walked through the swinging doors into the kitchen.

  John’s gaze lingered on the swinging doors. “I miss Bobby’s weekly meetings.”

  Tom nodded. “Wallace doesn’t even seem aware we exist.”

  “Or care. He ain’t no Bobby Jefferson.”

  “Nope, but you already said that.” Tom leaned back and heaved a sigh. “Anything on your missing persons?”

  “You mean the boy and girl that disappeared back in 1979?”

  Tom arched an eyebrow. “You have others?”

  “Well, now that you mention it, no. And to answer your question, I’ve got nothing. Never had nothing, don’t expect to ever have nothing.” John twitched his shoulders in a shrug. “You?”

  “Not a thing. I don’t much like it, but at the same time, I don’t know what to do about it. At least those families over in Oneka Falls either got their kids back or found out what happened. Well, sort of, anyway.”

  “Ayup. Not that the family of my two care, but the community sure would appreciate knowing what happened to them.”

  “Yeah. Everything points to Ferguson—I mean Gray—but until we have proof…” Tom shook his head.

  “Exactly. I’m not sure we ever will.”

  “Have you heard anything about the search for Gray’s girlfriend?”

  “No.” Tom cleared his throat and leaned forward as though to whisper a secret. “I’ll tell you, John, since Jonas Gregory left the NYSP, it appears the case is dead.”

  “Ayup. He drove things for a while, but… I still don’t understand how all that went down up at the hospital.”

  “Neither do I. Matt Greshin was a big man. Armed, experienced.” Tom shook his head again. “And by all accounts, Gray’s girlfriend wasn’t very big. I can see how she might’ve gotten Jim Cartwright—sneak in there while he’s asleep and do the deed, him being already hurt—but Matt was wide awake and already amped up from the fight with Gray.”

  “We’ve got to be missing something.”

  Tom spread his hands. “Unless we find her, I doubt we’ll ever understand what happened.”

  “Ayup. And too much from that timeframe fits in that category. At least that Ferguson bastard got locked up and won’t ever get out.”

  “You mean Gray.” A slow smile broke across his face, and Tom chuckled. “Want to hear what I heard about his stay in Sing Sing? He’s playing crazy to stay out of general population.”

  John shrugged and smiled. “It doesn’t surprise me a tremendous amount, Tom. I don’t expect a man who hides up in the trees to shoot women and children would be much other than a coward.”

  Jenny came bustling through the swinging door with their lunches.

  Neither one of them had to eat pig ears.

  8

  Fear surged in Joe’s mind, and adrenaline dumped into his bloodstream in copious amounts. His grandson swung the paddle up and down, up and down, as fast as he could. He kept striking at the front of the kayak, and Joe saw something thin and gray wrapped around the bow of the little red boat. Can’t be a snake, Joe thought. No snakes here. Innertube? He twisted the throttle to wide open, and the light aluminum fishing boat leaped forward.

  As he got closer, Greg’s screams reached him over the whine of the outboard. The boy started paddling hard, reaching deep into the water and pulling. On his second stroke on the right side, however, the paddle stopped dead in the water. Greg pulled and pulled, but he couldn’t budge the plastic thing.

  “What the hell?” Joe murmured.

  9

  Greg jerked at the paddle but that didn’t help. He wiggled it side to side and then pulled straight up, but that only sent the kayak skittering sideways across the choppy lake.

  Let go of it, boyo.

  “Are you crazy?” Greg shouted.

  It’s the only way.

  No way! Greg tried to twist the paddle, but the woman in the water held the blade, and he only had the part in the middle—plus his hands were wet, and so was the plastic paddle. He pulled the kayak sideways through the water and jerked the oar straight up. He couldn’t move the thing in any direction.

  “Let go!” he screamed. Panic clawed at him, and he thrashed the paddle back and forth, up and down, left to right. Nothing made any difference.

  The thing in the water pulled the paddle straight down, and Greg’s only choice was to either let go or follow it into the water. He slackened his grip and the paddle slid through his hands. He watched it sink beneath the waves, and his stomach with it. Now what?

  See? Now she’s gone away. Now’s your chance to escape.

  Greg scoffed and slapped his hand flat on the surface of the red kayak. That’s your big plan? Tell me, genius, how am I supposed to get away without the paddle?

  Well, I’ll tell you, sport: I’m not here to solve all of your problems for you.

  “Stop helping me! Stop talking to me!” Greg’s panic seemed distant, replaced by fury. He considered dipping his hands into the water and paddling, but he didn’t want that gross hand wrapped around his wrist. He didn’t want that…that…dead woman pulling him into the water with her.

  Then he heard it
or rather paid attention to it. The sound of an outboard motor.

  10

  Joe’s mouth dropped open as the paddle slid through Greg’s hands. He already had the little Mercury outboard wide open—there was nothing more he could do to get there faster.

  Over the sound of the motor, and the waves slapping against the bow of the aluminum hull, Greg’s screams were thin, barely audible, but Joe heard them. He glanced at the Mercury. “Come on, you bastard! Faster!”

  He snapped his gaze back to Greg and the red kayak. Something broke the surface of the water behind Greg and to his left, something dark gray with a hint of green. “What in the hell? Is that an arm?”

  His heart skipped a beat, and his breath came in ragged gasps. He no longer saw anything but his grandson and the red kayak…and the arm coming up out of the water to grab him.

  11

  Greg stared into the water to the right of the kayak, willing his eyes to see into the depths, to discern her form from the blackness of the water. All he could think about was the hate in the woman’s eyes. He didn’t understand why she would hate him, but she did.

  He’d forgotten about the cold wind, the icy rain. Greg had forgotten about the candy, the five-dollar bill, his parents—even the yellow and white cabin. He no longer felt the chill, but he was freezing.

  Her hand was colder.

  The hand slapped down on his left shoulder like a wet snowball, and Greg shrieked at the top of his lungs. He swept his hand over hers, trying to dislodge her grip, trying to shove her away, but he might as well have tried to dislodge gravity’s grip, to shove the planet away.

  She pulled him back, toward the water, toward the black depths. Greg slammed his hands down into the cockpit of the kayak and wedged them underneath the deck of the boat. His head swiveled back and forth like a dog with a chew toy, looking for his grandfather. He could still hear the whine of the outboard motor, and now the sound of the hull slicing through the choppy water was audible as well.

  But she continued to pull him back, back, back—as inexorable as the sun rising in the morning. His ploy of holding onto the kayak was doing nothing. She pulled and pulled, and the bow of the kayak lifted out of the water.