I don’t know how Poston did it, but he always seemed to know my location. I’d considered giving myself pat-down searches for a homing device. A crusty old bird, he made a career of terrorizing his reporters. He slammed the phone in its cradle and focused on me, shaggy brows converging over his meaty nose.

"Billups, I’ve had word about a devil-worshipping cult that’s raising hell over in Arkansas. I think you’re the man for the job." I read malice in that last sentence in spite of his twisted smile. "Drive your own car, make damned sure you record your mileage, and hang onto your receipts." He gave me the fish-eye, daring me to protest. "You can leave in the morning, save one night’s motel bill." He began pawing through papers on his desk, and I realized I’d been dismissed.

"Uh, Boss, I don’t suppose you know what part of Arkansas I’m headed for?" Without looking up he pushed a paper through the desk clutter toward me. I gave him a mock salute and made for the door.

The note read: See Fason DeWitt in Harmony, AR. It was mid-afternoon the next day, and I pushed my eight-year-old Lumina down I-40 faster than prudence would dictate. I’d made a late start due to my commiserating with O’Grady far into the previous evening. I munched an apple from the bag of mixed fruit I’d purchased. My stomach, in its delicate condition, grumbled.

A confirming glance at the open road atlas on the seat next to me, and I took the Clarksville exit. On a secondary road I located the town of Harmony, a blue dot on the map, not many miles into the hills. I stopped at DeWitt Grocery & Gas. Inside I found Fason.

"Cadaverous" is the only adjective I could come up with to describe the man. Thin and leathery, his face had the look of taxidermy failure. One pale gray eye sighted at thirty degrees to its brown counterpart. He sat with one hip on the checkout counter, a feather duster sticking out of a rear pocket and a can of Mountain Dew clutched in his hand. "Good afternoon," I greeted him.

He nodded and took a swig from the green can. "Sir, my name is Harry Billups." I offered my hand, which he ignored. "I’m with The Mid-South Times-Mirror."

"You selling subscriptions?" he croaked. His voice had the quality of a spring night in the wetlands.

"No sir, I’m a reporter, and I understand you can tell me something about a devil cult operating in this area." His eyes did something funny. I’d swear that the last time I noticed, the brown one was on the left and the gray one on the right. No matter.

He stood and faced me or, rather, looked down on me. The man was six-eight if he was an inch. "Can’t tell you nothing about that," he said, his mounted-trophy face inches above mine. "Outsiders aren’t welcome. It could be hazardous to your health"

Not easily deterred, I pushed ahead. "Sir, I drove all morning to get here. This assignment is important to me." His eyes may have changed back, I couldn’t be sure. The brown one seemed to bore into me.

"I can take you to a meeting tonight so you can see for yourself, but don’t say I didn’t warn you." I agreed to meet him right here "at the crack of dark," as he put it.

There being no business district in Harmony, I returned to Clarksville to while away the remaining hours of daylight in a tavern I’d be ashamed to die in. But the beer was cold and the bartender not unfriendly.

With only a smudge of gray on the western horizon, I parked in front of DeWitt Grocery & Gas. No more than five minutes passed until a caravan of assorted vehicles stopped on the highway. A pickup truck rolled up beside the Lumina. A figure clad in a white sheet and a Richard Nixon rubber mask motioned for me to follow. God, I loved that nose.

Several miles upcountry on the secondary road we branched onto a tertiary road. A mile or so farther, the parade turned onto a quaternary road, a dirt track, and I followed for a quarter-mile to an abandoned barn.

More ghostly figures, twenty or so, exited cars and trucks and milled about in my headlights. All wore facemasks; several Ronald Reagans, two Jimmy Carters, a couple of David Lettermans, a few Henry Kissingers and one Hillary Clinton. Either they had attended a Halloween grab-bag sale or the cult had an eclectic pantheon of deities. I wished I’d brought my Groucho getup. All sported the linen-closet motif. Wal-Mart must have had one helluva white sale. My car door opened, and Hillary beckoned me to follow.

The Springmaid brigade closed around us, and we all entered the board-and-batten building. Gas lanterns, hanging from support posts, lit the cavernous interior. The bed-sheets formed a circle with me standing ill at ease in the center. I had my notepad and ballpoint at the ready, as if to record impending events, but my hands shook.

A king-size percale broke through the outer ranks, a swaying censer held out front. It had to be DeWitt behind the Nixon mask. Bilious green smoke rolled from the metal container and settled earthward.

"O Burning Focus! I have come into Thee; I have cast about me the robe of the waters; I have girt myself with the girdle of knowledge," he intoned in DeWitt’s amphibian voice. This was pretty flowery language for Milhaus. I hoped it wouldn’t be a long service.

He held the pot over my head while fog the color of pond scum descended over my body. "From the skull of his head hang down a thousand thousand myriads of hair. All are in order." I couldn’t guess what this guy’s reading habits were, but they gave me the creeps.

While I reached up to scratch an itchy spot on my head, the lights blinked out as one. In the next minute, automobile engines coughed and started. I could hear them leave amid the sound of grinding gears and bad mufflers. I was alone.

I groped my way to the door and saw my car, solitary in the moonlight. Geez, my head itched. I retraced the rough roads, roared through Harmony well above the posted limit and pulled into a motel at Clarksville. The Pakistani night clerk darted furtive glances at me while I registered and offered my credit card.

In room 106 I opened my bag and retrieved my shaving kit. I felt grungy, in need of a shower and shave. I walked into the bathroom and stopped short, almost turned and ran. I’d seen dogs do that; come tearing up to something that turned out to be scary, then flip ass-over-tea-kettle to get away.

An unfamiliar image stared back from the mirror. Reddish-gold hair, thick and four inches long, tufted from its head. The growth started above the eyebrows and extended inside the shirt collar, covered the ears. I could be mistaken for a rain-forest tree-dweller.

I tore open my shirt and choked back a scream. A deep-pile, brassy-red growth carpeted my chest. The thing in the mirror glared at me, Harry Billups transformed into a Clint Eastwood co-star.

A hot shower and shampoo did little but expose the extent of my pilose condition. Like a creeping fungal infection, the hair spread southward. Naked, I leaned toward the mirror for a closer look and shuddered.

Divorced and alone, semi-alcoholic, facing a mid-life crisis, I was sunk in despair. And that was yesterday, before the hair thing.

Restless, I swung with one hand from the swag lamp, until it tore loose from the ceiling. In my car I found a leftover banana. I scampered up a huge oak tree next to the parking lot, finding solace among its lofty branches.

It’s funny how a banana and a high perch can change one’s perspective. A few minutes ago, despondent, I reflected on suicide. Now I felt purged, re-born. I leaped from branch to branch in an expression of joy. In my best Tarzan imitation I thumped my chest and shrieked with gladness. Motel room lights popped on. How delightful, how utterly marvelous to be alive, filled with animal vitality.

I could hardly wait to see the look on old Poston’s face when I reported back tomorrow. Banana in hand, I’d request Workman’s Comp.

Copyright ©2001 Leslie Combs.  All Rights Reserved