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Read Ebook: The Night of the Trolls by Laumer Keith Finlay Virgil Illustrator Nodel Norman Illustrator
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Ebook has 526 lines and 20225 words, and 11 pages
I went back into the hall, tried the bedroom door, looked in at heaped leaves, the remains of broken furniture, an empty window frame. I went on to the end of the hall and opened the door to the bedroom.
Cold night wind blew through a barricade of broken timbers. The roof had fallen in, and a sixteen-inch tree trunk slanted through the wreckage. The old man stood behind me, watching.
"Where is she, damn you?" I leaned against the door frame to swear and fight off the faintness. "Where's my wife?"
The old man looked troubled. "Come, eat now...."
"Where is she? Where's the woman who lived here?"
He frowned, shook his head dumbly. I picked my way through the wreckage, stepped out into knee-high brush. A gust blew my candle out. In the dark I stared at my back yard, the crumbled pit that had been the barbecue grill, the tangled thickets that had been rose beds--and a weathered length of boards upended in the earth.
"What the hell's this...?" I fumbled out a permatch, lit my candle, leaned close and read the crude letters cut into the crumbling wood: VIRGINIA ANNE JACKSON. BORN JAN. 8 1957. KILL BY THE DOGS WINTER 1992.
The Baron's men came twice in the next three days. Each time the old man carried me, swearing but too weak to argue, out to a lean-to of branches and canvas in the woods behind the house. Then he disappeared, to come back an hour or two later and haul me back to my rag bed by the fire.
Three times a day he gave me a tin pan of stew, and I ate it mechanically. My mind went over and over the picture of Ginny, living on for twelve years in the slowly decaying house, and then--
It was too much. There are some shocks the mind refuses.
I thought of the tree that had fallen and crushed the east wing. An elm that size was at least fifty to sixty years old--maybe older. And the only elm on the place had been a two-year sapling. I knew it well; I had planted it.
The date carved on the headboard was 1992. As nearly as I could judge another thirty-five years had passed since then at least. My shipmates--Banner, Day, Mallon--they were all dead, long ago. How had they died? The old man was too far gone to tell me anything useful. Most of my questions produced a shake of the head and a few rumbled words about charms, demons, spells, and the Baron.
"I don't believe in spells," I said. "And I'm not too sure I believe in this Baron. Who is he?"
"The Baron Trollmaster of Filly. He holds all this country--" the old man made a sweeping gesture with his arm--"all the way to Jersey."
"Why was he looking for me? What makes me important?"
"You came from the Forbidden Place. Everyone heard the cries of the Lesser Troll that stands guard over the treasure there. If the Baron can learn your secrets of power--"
"Troll, hell! That's nothing but a Bolo on automatic!"
"You saw me back there. Why didn't you give me away? And why are you taking care of me now?"
He shook his head--the all-purpose answer to any question.
I tried another tack: "Who was the rag man you tackled just outside? Why was he laying for me?"
The old man snorted. "Tonight the dogs will eat him. But forget that. Now we have to talk about your plan--"
"I've got about as many plans as the senior boarder in Death Row. I don't know if you know it, Old Timer, but somebody slid the world out from under me while I wasn't looking."
The old man frowned. I had the thought that I wouldn't like to have him mad at me, for all his white hair....
He shook his head. "You must understand what I tell you. The soldiers of the Baron will find you some day. If you are to break the spell--"
"Break the spell, eh?" I snorted. "I think I get the idea, Pop. You've got it in your head that I'm a valuable property of some kind. You figure I can use my supernatural powers to take over this menagerie--and you'll be in on the ground floor. Well, listen, you old idiot! I spent sixty years--maybe more--in a stasis tank two hundred feet underground. My world died while I was down there. This Baron of yours seems to own everything now. If you think I'm going to get myself shot bucking him, forget it!"
The old man didn't say anything.
"Things don't seem to be broken up much," I went on. "It must have been gas, or germ warfare--or fallout. Damn few people around. You're still able to live on what you can loot from stores; automobiles are still sitting where they were the day the world ended. How old were you when it happened, Pop? The war, I mean. Do you remember it?"
He shook his head. "The world has always been as it is now."
"What year were you born?"
He scratched at his white hair. "I knew the number once. But I've forgotten."
"I guess the only way I'll find out how long I was gone is to saw that damned elm in two and count the rings--but even that wouldn't help much; I don't know when it blew over. Never mind. The important thing now is to talk to this Baron of yours. Where does he stay?"
The old man shook his head violently. "If the Baron lays his hands on you, he'll wring the secrets from you on the rack! I know his ways. For five years I was a slave in the Palace Stables."
"If you think I'm going to spend the rest of my days in this rat nest, you got another guess on the house! This Baron has tanks, an army. He's kept a little technology alive. That's the outfit for me--not this garbage detail! Now, where's this place of his located?"
"The guards will shoot you on sight like a pack-dog!"
"There has to be a way to get to him, old man! Think!"
The old head was shaking again. "He fears assassination. You can never approach him...." He brightened. "Unless you know a spell of power?"
I chewed my lip. "Maybe I do at that. You wanted me to have a plan. I think I feel one coming on. Have you got a map?"
He pointed to the desk beside me. I tried the drawers, found mice, roaches, moldy money--and a stack of folded maps. I opened one carefully; faded ink on yellowed paper, falling apart at the creases. The legend in the corner read: "PENNSYLVANIA 40M:1. Copyright 1970 by ESSO Corporation."
"This will do, Pop," I said. "Now, tell me all you can about this Baron of yours."
"You'll destroy him?"
"I haven't even met the man."
"He is evil."
"I don't know; he owns an army. That makes up for a lot...."
After three more days of rest and the old man's stew, I was back to normal--or near enough. I had the old man boil me a tub of water for a bath and a shave. I found a serviceable pair of synthetic fiber long-johns in a chest of drawers, pulled them on and zipped the weather suit over them, then buckled on the holster I had made from a tough plastic.
"That completes my preparations, Pop," I said. "It'll be dark in another half hour. Thanks for everything."
He got to his feet, a worried look on his lined face, like a father the first time Junior asks for the car.
"The Baron's men are everywhere."
"If you want to help, come along and back me up with that shotgun of yours." I picked it up. "Have you got any shells for this thing?"
He smiled, pleased now. "There are shells--but the magic is gone from many."
"That's the way magic is, Pop. It goes out of things before you notice."
"Will you destroy the Great Troll now?"
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