Chapter 3

The fear that hung heavy over the town of Crescent Valley was reflected in the faces of its citizenry the following morning. On the streets, in the shops and within its several bars, men gathered to recount the terrifying rape of little Annie Purcell in solicitous tones punctuated with vile curses, their anger at Deputy Sheriff Mark Blakely for refusing to allow a hunting posse into the hills, an open vent for their concealed inner-panic. Something had to be done and right away! It wasn't just a matter of protecting their livestock any longer, not when a ferocious wild dog dared to slink into town and with incredible beastliness actually force a defenseless young girl to her knees and rape her right on the streets!

"Hunt the bastards down, I say!" a whiskey drinking, sallow faced customer at the bar of the Crescent Inn Tavern exclaimed with fist-thumping emphasis. "Chief Morgan's right! Take a posse into those hills and gun the sonsofbitches... !"

"Easier said than done, Dirk," a second drinker put in. "I was with 'em the other night when Link got the fawn bitch. That pack's as tricky's a bevy of minx. If it hadn't been that she was pregnant, the bitch would've gotten away, too... and she was running alongside the big German Shepherd with the gold medal..."

"You saw that medal... I mean actually saw it with your own eyes?" the first drinker questioned.

"Hell yes, I saw it! Didn't I say so?" the second one proudly insisted. "A big friggin' brute he is too, I'll tell you!"

"The way I hear it, the Purcell girl saw that thing around the dog's neck last night when it... it attacked her!" the first drinker said, his liquored eyes growing slanted, a certain lewd glint mingled with uneasiness mirrored in them.

"I hadn't heard that," the other replied; then, lowering his voice and leaning closer, he added with an obscene little grin: "But if it was that big bastard, she sure got that tight young pussy of hers full up with cock, I'll tell you... !"

"Watch it, here comes Link," the first drinker warned. "Morning, Chief. How's little Annie?"

"As well's can be expected," the big man glowered, accepting the space at the middle of the bar the group quickly made for him. "Poor kid's still half scared to death. Sits in a corner staring out the window when she ain't crying. Goddamnit, I'll tell you straight out, I'm going to get that fucking brute, and when I do it'll wish it'd never been born!"

"What do you mean, Link, a posse... ?"

"That's the only way, and you all know it as well as I do!" the burly police chief snapped.

"What about Mark Blakely, Chief?" someone questioned.

"He's got twenty-four hours to do whatever he's going to!" Link authoritatively replied. "And if he ain't brought in that beast and its raping pack by then, I'm getting together a bunch of guns to go up into those hills with me, and I guarantee you that I'll bring the fucking bastard back!"

You're right, Link... ain't he, boys?" someone loudly prompted, raising an enthusiastic clamor of approvals... as if in numbers they had lessened the uncanny menace they shared in fear...

While in kitchens throughout the town, and over backyard fences, women spoke in whispering, apprehensive tones, their unhideable anxiety causing their voices to tremble, as did those of the children and teenagers walking in groups toward the schools, their young faces ashen with frightened expressions. No one of the small town's populace had seemed to have been spared their share of the spectral horror, Jean thought, hurrying toward the Obert's down the street, determined to learn what she could from the withered, pipe-smoking old lady who stared blindly from her rocking-chair and spoke in an aged, cackly voice.

Jean had fitfully slept without Mark beside her the remainder of the night, and at dawn when he'd finally arrived home, his haggard face had frightened her. In reluctant bits and pieces while she'd prepared his breakfast, he'd choked out scraps of the abominable rape, leaving her to piece them together and stare at her young husband in shocked awe. Then, before she could question him further, he was on his feet and moving toward the door.

"You're not leaving now, Mark? Darling, you haven't slept all night. You must be exhausted..."

"I'm fine, Baby," he'd replied forcing a smile as he bent down to kiss her. "I've got some things to do... should be back in a few hours."

"Mark... please... there's something terribly weird and unreal about all of this, and I'm not exactly an educated scaredy- cat... but why don't you talk to Granny Obert... ?"

"Please, Jean!" he had snapped her up short. "I've got enough to contend with this morning without listening to a conglomeration of stupid myths. Why don't you bake a pie, or something? l won't be too long..."

And with that, he was gone, his patrol car "laying rubber" as the teenagers said, when he'd sped away from the curb. She'd been angry, but that, too, had soon passed once she had reviewed what he'd told her, the terrifying story bringing her to sit on the edge of a chair before the wrinkled, parchment-like skinned woman who puffed incessantly at a corn-cob pipe.

"Heh... !" the old woman grunted, her mouth spreading wide in a display of toothless gums. "I futured you coming Jean Blakely. Saw you in this old brain o' mine... an' I know why, too! It's him, Caesar, the wild one, ain't it, girl?"

"Th-the dog... the leader... yes. Is that his name?" Jean heard herself question, her voice trembling at the aged woman's revelations and tone, watching the other rhythmically rock her chair in tempo to her puffing at the pipe.

"Yes... that was his name then... and that's it now," she cackled. "You can see it on the medallion... the eagle, the symbol of the Roman battle standard... and the name... Caesar! Near... near a century ago, girl, when... when I was just a squallin' child, he came with his pack... but I remember... remember well! Yes... I remember well!"

"He... they... the pack came last night, Granny," Jean said, fighting the dryness of her throat. "A girl... a young girl was raped... actually raped by him, or one of them... !"

"It was him! He did it! Caesar... and I can tell you why!" the little wizened woman said, momentarily leaning forward. "They killed his mate! Link Morgan, that filthy brute killed Caesar's mate! Revenge, girl! That's what he come for, revenge!"

"But... but... my God, Granny, you're talking about... a... a dog!"

For a long moment, the aged woman didn't answer, only puffed unseeingly at her pipe as she rocked. Then: "Thinking, young lady... that's what I been doing. Tryin' to decipher the most positive way to make you understand." She doubtingly shook her head. "It ain't the same anymore... young folk just don't listen..."

"Please, Granny, tell me!" Jean pleaded.

Again, the old woman sat in silence, letting spurts of bluish, tobacco smoke out with colorless lip-popping sounds. Then: "All right, little golden girl, I'll tell you! But don't question me... just accept, or forget what I tell you. Understand... ?"

"Y-yes, Granny... I understand..."

"Well then, he ain't just a dog... oh, he's a dog now, and has been that for a century or more... but he ain't just a dog!"

"Wh-What... ?"

"Hush up and listen, girl, 'cause I'm only going to tell you this once!" the small, shriveled woman exclaimed. "What he was before, or what he'll be again, ain't important either. What he is right now is what counts! And he's a beautiful animal, wearing the medallion he once earned 2,000 years ago in battle! Yes, he raped the Purcell girl, and there may well be more! They won't catch him, stop him, shoot him... and neither will they drive him off! This was his valley a hundred years ago, and well do I remember that! A handful of people lived in the settlement, and my own daddy was the lawman! Posses went out to hunt the raiders when the sheep were killed, and time after time they rode in exhausted, and empty-handed. There was no catching the wild-pack, let alone its leader... a great German Shepherd with a medallion around its neck... !"

"M-My God! Are you saying that this... this Caesar was their... ?" Jean cried, spellbound in her spine-chilling, mesmerization.

"Hush, girl! Hear me out this one time!" the old woman insisted, lowering her voice. "Soon, my daughter will make you leave... so listen now! My mother was a Cherokee squaw. My father, an Indian trader, bought her and took her away from her people... brought her here and claimed land in the valley. When Caesar and the pack came, she warned him about what would happen, but he didn't believe her. Girls were raped, and scared, drunken men died in the hunt, shooting each other as they tried to destroy the pack! But there was no destruction, no elimination of that passel of wild beasts! Nothing... until one day they suddenly left of their own accord... but with them went my mother and several more Crescent Valley women and girls... went of their own accord because they wanted to... and to what, blonde girl? To what?... heh... what do you think?"

Jean could only sit there and gape at her unseeing, aged, story-teller in breathless awe. She shook her lovely head as if to throw off the illusory cobwebs the old woman had spun. It had to be the monotone of her voice, Jean thought, getting to her feet. She had nearly hypnotized her... !

"I know... I know," Granny Obert said, rocking her chair and puffing at her pipe. "You've decided I'm some sort of old witch, haven't you, Jeannie girl! Well... that's the first stages of belief, my mother used to tell me... recognizing a witch when you see one... !"

The withered woman was still laughing when she left, rocking, smoking, laughing, and Jean doubted if she'd heard her goodbye... but that hardly mattered to her. As she waked slowly toward her own house, she was only concerned with how soon Mark would return home...

"Let's have another round of drinks, here, Ted!" Link Morgan ordered, grinning and massaging his heavy-bearded chin. "The men are with me. Blakely has twenty-four hours... and that takes him up to shortly after midnight tonight... then, we take over. Right, boys?"

"Right!" the resounding answers came from the men moving in tight to the bar for their free drinks.

"Take over what, Link?" Mark questioned, standing inside the doorway to the Inn's barroom. "What do you have in mind?"

Slowly, the powerful, barrel-chested man turned to face his chosen enemy, his drinking cohorts falling into a sudden silence. A dozen, maybe more, verbal retaliations raced through Link Morgan's brain at that particular moment. But none of them seemed appropriate. He ran his tongue wetly over his thick lower lip and said, "The girl raped was my niece, Deputy! Had it been that new young wife of yours with her cunt split wide open by that dog, how would you feel?"

Mark stood fast, his strong face ungiving. But he hadn't expected that jab. He took several steps into the room and stopped again, his tired brain racing for answers. He suddenly had a whole town to placate, he realized.

"I'm not questioning the nightmare that's happened, Link," he replied in a level tone. "There isn't a man in here, along with myself, who doesn't feel the utmost sympathy for Annie... and who doesn't want to see that dog pack destroyed! But it has to be... is going to be, done by proper authorities! Just as I told you last night, Link, I don't intend to see a flock of wild, half- drunken men with rifles and shotguns out there blazing away at each other!"

The big man resoundingly set his drink on me bar, turning fully to face the uniformed deputy sheriff. Accordingly, his own shrewd brain was racing for answers. He said: "And supposing your proper authorities don't bring that sonofobitch down, Deputy? Suppose we move into another night when wild dogs can slink into town and gang-fuck young, innocent girls?"

"I've thought of that, too," Mark replied. "The best thing I believe we can do is post armed sentries... volunteers to guard the streets..."

"Oh Christ, that's wonderful!" Link grinned. "Now, we've got to put guards on our streets to safeguard our homes and families... !"

'That ain't a bad idea, Chief," one of the big man's friends put in.

"Shut up!" Link barked at him without moving his head.

Mark couldn't help but momentarily relive the episode of his Dad's controversy with Link Morgan in this very room those seven years past! And that had been over nothing more than a sporting bet on a horse race, one word leading to another until they'd met bare-chested in the street and his father had unmercifully beaten Link with his fists. Less than two weeks later, his dad had been accidentally shot on a cougar-hunting posse... shot and killed by Link Morgan... !

"It's your jurisdiction, Link," Mark said, moving further into the room. "Do whatever you think best. That was only a suggestion."

"Some goddamned situation when you've got to post sentries in a modern town to protect its citizens!" the gray-haired, huge man spat, picking up his drink. "You might just as well know, Blakely, that I've called Frank Hester about this! I don't think he's going to sanction any wild dog pack raping a town's women, either... !"

"Deputy Blakely! Sir... telephone!" Ted Green, the bartender motioned. "You can take it in the lobby... right over there, Sir."

"Thanks," Mark replied, thinking of Link calling the Sheriff as he walked toward the phone booth. He'd undoubtedly done it, all right, called Sheriff Hester at the County Seat to try and throw some weight around. But Mark wasn't worried about that. Sheriff Frank Hester had taken link Morgan's measure a long time back. Frank was a dedicated man, unmoved by politics...

"Hello," he said, tiredly reclining against the booth's wall.

"Mark... ?" an unmistakable feminine voice questioned.

"Yes, Lydia, this is Mark," he answered, suddenly wondering what had kept her from calling this long. "How are you?"

"So so, I suppose... but that isn't why I called you, Mr. Deputy," the husky female voice proclaimed. "We lost four sheep and three dogs last night. The sheep we can stand, Darling, the dogs... no. It's that goddamned pack again. What're you going to do about it?"

"Join it, I think."

"What... ?"

"Nothing... just babbling. I'll be out to take a look?"

"Well... I'd hoped you might. How's the new married existence?"

Mark detected the acid in her tone. "Beautiful," he snapped. "Absolutely beautiful!"

"She doesn't befit you, Markey baby," the throaty voice came back, evenly, yet cutting. "From what they tell he, she's quite a doll. Has the appearance of being unplucked... that right, Darling?"

He sensed the hackles on the nape of his neck rising. "I'll be right along, Lydia."

"And I'll be at the front gate waiting with two horses and a picnic lunch. It's all up on the west range, Lover."

"Never mind any lunches," he said, remembering the untold number they had partaken of on the A and B. "I only have a few minutes..." and that's what he repeated as he climbed onto the back of the waiting sorrel she had readied for him. "I only have a few minutes, Lydia..."

"I know," the auburn haired girl in riding shirt, blouse and boots replied, sitting tall and lovely in the saddle and holding her big bay with skilled horsemanship. "Word carries fast here in the valley, Deputy. My hands tell me that Annie Purcell was deflowered last night, and by dear old Caesar."

Mark couldn't help but glare at her severly attractive young face. "That's not to be taken lightly, Miss Newell," he snapped, reining the sorrel to his presence on the animal's back, and simultaneously weighing his proximity to this twenty-six year old girl he'd known too many years. "The town's is in an uproar."

"I'd expect that... with Link Morgan spiking it. Right?

"Right."

"Well... while that Caesar bastard was cavorting in town his uglies were raising hell with our sheep, Darling," she said, her large green eyes engulfing him. "We can stand the herd loss, but they killed three of my best dogs. Something has to be done, Mark."

"We're contemplating that, Lydia," Mark said, heeling the sorrel into motion. "In the meantime, you can make a government claim for your losses..."

"Oh? don't be ridiculous, Lover. You know me better than that... besides, I wouldn't know how to begin without Daddy here," she answered, moving along beside him in a walk, making him remember the untold, numerous hours and days they had spent together.

He might have married her, he abruptly thought; it had been that intimately close between them. In fact, he'd carried the supposition for years... before he'd come to realize that he was below her station. He said: "Is Aaron still in Australia?"