The Sex Life of the Gods
Lancaster Dutch, recently imported, and they believe in the hex signs
they painted on the barn."
Brice nodded. "Okay, John."
The farm couple were strangers to Brice, but their type was familiar.
Pennsylvania was full of them. They were, as Cartwell had said, good
people. They were farmers, about three jumps above the witchcraft
believing stock that had given them birth and were hard to understand.
They were the stay-at-home type, to whom Pittsburgh was the Far West,
and if they were forced to move farther than fifty miles away from home,
their relations screamed that they would never see them again.
The woman, whose name Nolan hadn't caught, was plain appearing, with no
makeup and her hair pulled back into a severe knot at the base of her
skull. From the moment, she asked them in and poured their coffee, he
liked her. In her own, slow way she was a fine person, but her world
was the farm, her life was the soil.
"Have you found that poor pilot, yet?" She asked, setting the coffee
before them.
"No, ma'am," Cartwell told her.
The heavy set woman made a clucking sound with her mouth. "Honest to
true," she mused. "You'd wonder why a thing like that had to come to
be." She sighed heavily. "There'll be some poor woman in tears tonight.
D'you think he was married?"
"I don't know, ma'am," Cartwell said.
"It's the children that suffer..." she said softly and allowed the rest
of what she was about to say trail off as Dickson came in. He smiled at
the farmwife and she poured him a cup of coffee.
Dickson pulled off his hat. "I'd like to thank you," he told her, "for
being so kind..."
The woman looked pleased and flustered at the same time; there was a
tinge of flush about her face. "Bosh," she said, smiling. "It's the
least a body can do. I know I'd feel real glad to have someone helping,
were it my boy up there."
"Your boy flies?"
"He did." The woman looked a bit pained. "He was killed during the war."
"I'm sorry," Dickson said, and reached for a doughnut from the plate on
the table.
A silence fell over them as they waited for the coming of dawn and a
chance to really look the wreck over. Nolan was somehow glad to be
spared of conversation with the others. He felt like a criminal, with
the small gold watch in his coat pocket and he wanted to tell Dickson
and Cartwell about the thing. But he couldn't. For the first time in his
life he was delaying an investigation, hiding evidence. He was well
aware of the whole thing, but he was also aware of what the presence of
that watch meant. It was a personal thing now, and until he knew which
way to go, he had to keep the watch a secret.
If Nick Danson had somehow come back in that wreck and, if they found no
bodies, he would have gone to Beth ... the whole thing would be
complicated beyond belief. What would such a thing do? What would happen
to the woman he loved, if Nick Danson was back?
He stared moodily into the dark liquid in his coffee cup and wondered
where it would all end.
CHAPTER SIX
Nick awoke to sunlight streaming into his face and had a momentary
impression that it was dawn; then he realized that the sunlight had a
reddish cast to it. He blinked at the bedroom clock, amazed to find that
he had slept until late afternoon.
My God, he thought groggily.
His headache was nearly gone, he noticed as he threw off the covers and
swung his long legs to the floor. The soreness was still there, thumping
dully in his stiff muscles, but sleep had been deep and brought no fresh
nightmares to worry about. He cleaned himself up in the bathroom and got
a pair of slacks and a shirt from the closet, still feeling somewhat
like a stranger. While he dressed himself, he thought of the woman he
was married to.
Despite the feeling of being a stranger in a strange world, and of being
caught up in a strange set of circumstances, he found himself feeling
delightful tremors when he thought of Beth. Even now, there was a tight,
fluttering sensation in his insides when he thought of the talcumed
satin of her skin, the warm lift of her brightly nippled breasts and the
strong response of her rounded thighs. She was a beautiful woman. She
was sex all rolled up in a frame of gentle curves and soft flesh, and he
could see that to love a woman like her would not only be easy, it would
be a privilege.
He buckled the belt about his waist, trying to dispel the thoughts of
the woman, and went downstairs to the kitchen. Hunger gnawed at him
violently.
The coffee was cold. He turned the gas on under it and the note on the
table caught his eye. He picked it up to scan it briefly.
DARLING,
HAD TO RUSH OFF TO WORK. KISSED YOU GOOD-BY AND YOU SAID "GLUMPTH".
BE HOME SOON. LOVE YOU TERRIBLY.
BETH
He grinned at the note, balled it into his fist and threw it into the
paper can. When the coffee was hot, he poured himself a cup and fixed a
couple of sandwiches with what was left of the package of cold meat. As
he was finishing the last couple of bites of the sandwich, he heard the
thud of the evening paper against the front door. For a moment, it
startled him, then, when he had realized what it was, he was half out of
the chair... He paused there momentarily, then sank back into his seat.
He _couldn't_ go out there and get the paper - if the neighbors saw him
picking it up ... He sat there, waiting for Beth to come home, the
suspense digging into his guts with ragged teeth. Had they found the
plane? Were they onto him? Who were those two men? How did they know
where to find him? Why were they looking for him?
He drank damned near the whole pot of coffee and watched the hands of
the electric clock move with agonizing slowness. Finally, at five forty,
Beth drove up to the house and came through the door. Nick leaped from
the chair.
"The paper!" He snatched it from her hands and began tearing it open.
Damn newsboys for folding them!
"Nick! Aren't you going to kiss me?"
"Huh? Oh." He kissed her briefly, fleetingly, and returned to the paper.
The crash was on page one.
WRECKAGE OF PRIVATE AIRCRAFT FOUND
Everett, Pa. The smouldering wreckage of what was apparently a
private plane was found late yesterday evening in the heavily wooded
area north of the city by a young Boy Scout looking for a campsite.
Benjamin Talbot, aged 13, after locating the mangled aircraft,
promptly called local police who dispatched Detective Lieutenant
Nolan Brice, Everett Rescue Squad and FAA investigator Arron P.
Dickson to examine the wreckage.
"It's the most unusual crash site I've ever seen," FAA investigator
Dickson told local newsmen. "There's no evidence of wings or tail
assembly. The fuselage is also of a strange design."
Detective Lieutenant Brice, after checking with the airport tower at
Everett, and with CAP officials, informed newsmen that no private
aircraft had been reported in trouble, or even over the particular
area in which the craft was found. "Of course," Lieutenant Brice
added, "one plane may have gone unnoticed. This is highly unlikely,
but we cannot overlook the possibility. What is puzzling, to me, is
that the aircraft has not been identified and there have been no
bodies found."
"The Civil Air Patrol," Mr. Dickson commented, "has been most
cooperative and are now engaged in an air search of the area, while
rescue squads work in the mountains."
Mr. Dickson went on to state that the mystery crash will be
thoroughly investigated by authorities in an effort to determine the
make and model of the plane, as well as the fate of its occupants.
At present, the crash site has been roped off and placed under guard
by local Militiamen. Only authorized personnel will be allowed to
view the wreckage. Major Gilbert Donnoue, of the Air Force
Experimental Wing, refused to make a statement as to whether the
plane was of Air Force origin. "To my knowledge, we have lost no
test planes. However, an extensive check will undoubtedly be run to
verify this."
Test plane? Nick stared in amazement at the words that leaped at him
from the printed page. Test plane? What the hell was going on in this
screwy world? No wings? No tail assembly? No Mayday calls? No record of
the plane? The whole damned thing sounded ridiculous. Coupled with the
fact that he had been out of touch for thirteen months, it all became
weird.
And to top it all off, Nolan Brice was one of the men who had been
placed on the investigating staff at the crash scene. Suppose he, Nick,
had left something at the scene ... a fraternity pin, a slip of paper
... anything that would link the crash to the fact that he was alive and
in Everett. The whole damned bunch would be on his tail, before you
could say, "Jack Robinson." He...
"Nick," Beth pouted. "Will you pay a little attention to me for a
change?"
"I'm sorry, honey, but it's the plane." While she listened he read the
account aloud and, when he'd finished, they exchanged glances. "That's
the plane I was in," he told her.
"But you don't know how to fly."
"I must know, unless someone else flew it. That's the plane I woke up
beside. I must have been in the damned thing. But I don't know if anyone
else was." He buried his face in his hands.
"Nick. Should we call the police?"
"No!"
Alarmed at his violent outburst, she put her hand on his shoulder to
comfort him. "All right dear. I'm sorry."
"It'd been different, if those men weren't after me. I'd call the police
if they weren't dogging my tracks. I'd turn myself in just to find out
what the hell's going on."
"Me too," she said softly.
At first he didn't catch the meaning behind her words, then he blinked.
"What?" He asked.
"The car, the black one. It followed me to work this morning." She
paused, then added, "It didn't follow me home though."
Nick slammed the paper to the floor, his lean jaw muscles knotted in
anger. "That settles it," he snapped. "I can face whatever I'm mixed up
in, but there's no earthly reason why you should be subjected to it!
I'll have to get out!"
Beth threw herself into his arms, the ever ready tears welling in her
eyes. "No, Nick," she pleaded. "Whatever it is, we'll fight it. We'll
make out, but darling, don't leave me again!"
He held her tightly against him, his hands stroking the warm softness of
her back and spine. The perfume of her hair filled him with a heady
thought of summer fields of flowers, of sweetness and tenderness, of ...
love. Love. Nick Danson, he told himself, you _are_ mixed up. You're
falling in love with your own wife.
"... and we'll go away," Beth was whispering in his ear. "We'll pack
everything and go far away, where we'll never see these men again. Nick.
Please. Oh, please keep me with you."
"Going away won't settle anything, sweetheart. They'll always be there,
just outside the door. I've got to do something..."
He broke off suddenly and it flicked into his mind like a film of the
past, like a memory. The soft face of the girl, her hair a golden color
against the backdrop of the ochre mountains ... the softness of the pale
blue-green tree... She spun away from him, the loose, filmy blue dress
whirling about her trim ankles ... then she was coming back to him, arms
outstretched ... kissing him lovingly...
He shut it off, clamped it from his mind. A memory! A memory that made
no sense at all. A tremor of fear ran along his spine and trembled in
his flesh. What did it mean? What was happening to him?
"Nick?" It was Beth. "What is it, Nick? You look pale and frightened."
"Nothing. We'll go away."
She beamed. "I know just the place. The cabin. Far up in the mountains.
No one will know we're there. We'll learn to love each other again."