Ln
9780671672522

Don Faraday, Ice Island's Only
Police Officer, Drove Out lo the
Cmpty Summer Cabin
Where Old Tim Landers Had Found
a Body • • •
The corpse was in the living room—a guy about
thirty-five, dark-haired, wearing jeans and a flannel
shirt. The shirt had been unbuttoned and his
T-shirt pushed up where the kitchen knife pro-
truded from his stomach.
The knife had been plunged into the guy so deeply
it had nearly gone all the way through him. And it
wasn't a simple stabbing. The knife had been
worked upward, toward the guy's chin, leaving a
six-inch-long gash. The blood flowing from the
wound had run down both sides of his stomach and
onto the floor, where it had puddled and frozen
into red ice . . .
That knife was a wicked-looking thing, Don
thought, the blade about ten inches long, the kind
of knife the crazed killer usually wielded in splatter
films. Yet Landers was sure there'd been only one
set of tracks in the snow—one set going in, nothing
coming out. It had to be suicide, but how the hell
did someone jam a knife like that into his own gut,
slicing through his insides while blood oozed out
around his fingers? What kind of single-minded
determination did it take to do something like that?
What madness could have driven the man? . . .

Books by Warner Lee
Into the Pit
It's Loose
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To Jim Wofford,
who's been a friend for more than thirty years

pening the oven, Charles Capwell stared at the TV
dinner, wondering whether it was done. With the thing
covered with foil the way it was, you couldn't tell whether
the food was bubbling or still frozen in the center. Although
he knew how long the package said you were supposed to
cook a sliced-turkey-with-stuffing-and-carrots frozen din-
ner, he hadn't noted the time when he put it in the oven. He
almost always forgot to do that, which meant he had this
problem often, since frozen dinners were the mainstay of his
diet.
Capwell eyed the foil-covered rectangle, trying to make up
his mind. The small oven was in dire need of cleaning. Black
crud God knew how thick coated its interior walls. Not
surprising, he supposed, since he'd lived here for eight years
and had never cleaned it. But then cleaning ovens was
woman's work, simply not the sort of thing a guy did.
You made the oven all shiny, and it looked better, but it
didn't work any better. What difference did it make
how it looked—especially inside where nobody could
see it?
1
Prologue
1
o

IT'S LOOSE
Finally Capwell did what he always did: he got a fork and
poked a hole in the foil. Steam came out. His meal was
ready.
Seated at the scarred wooden table, he peeled back the foil
and stared at compartments containing steaming portions
of turkey and stuffing and carrots and a square of some sort
of dessert. You were supposed to tear off the foil covering
the dessert, but Capwell never bothered with that. You did,
you didn't, the stuff tasted the same.
Like the house itself, the kitchen was small. Worn linole-
um with a faded flower pattern, a few cabinets whose white
paint had turned a yellowish brown, the result of years of
fried eggs and bacon for breakfast. The sink had a perma-
nent brown stain where the faucet dripped. It was nearly as
bad as the toilet, whose bowl had turned grungier and
grungier over the years Capwell had lived here. He cleaned it
occasionally—grudgingly—but the rust-colored crud just
kept getting thicker.
Although he wasn't much for the inside stuff, the woman's
work, he kept the outside of the place immaculate. Failure to
do woman's work didn't affect his self-esteem, but letting
the lawn go or watching the weeds take over the flower beds
would make him look bad in the eyes of his neighbors.
They'd think he was lazy, slovenly. So Capwell worked hard
in his yard, keeping it among the best maintained in his
working-class Pittsburgh neighborhood.
Capwell figured most of the people living on the block
thought of him as a good neighbor! He was quiet, never
bothered anyone, always wished people a good day if they
walked past while he was outside working in the yard.
Except for his job, that was the extent of Capwell's social
contact. He was what people called a loner. He had no
friends. Not one.
Capwell had been married once, back when he lived in
Kentucky. He was eighteen, just out of high school, and Lori
Ann was sixteen and pregnant. The marriage lasted two
years. Lori Ann divorced him so she could marry an
evangelist she met at a revival. Got religion, she said,
wanted to spend her life in the service of the Lord. That was
2

IT'S LOOSE
twenty years ago, and Capwell had seen neither Lori Ann
nor his son since. Sometimes he wondered what Jimmy
looked like now that he was all grown up. And sometimes he
wondered whether Lori Ann was still married to the preach-
er, whether she still had religion.
Sometimes. But not very often.
Lori Ann was just one of the things he'd lost during his
life. He'd had a new Cadillac convertible, a business, a
chance to be a major league baseball player. They were all
gone now, as if they'd never been, as if they'd happened in
someone else's life. He bought the Cadillac when he was a
young guy, just starting out. His uncle had gotten him into
the electricians' union, and he was making good money. Not
good enough to afford the Cadillac, but he wanted it, and he
could make the payments if he skimped on other things, and
Lori Ann thought it was the sexiest car she'd ever seen. (The
preacher she ran off with had one, now that Capwell thought
about it.) He lost the car when he lost his job. Four hundred
dollars' worth of tools and copper wire had been stolen from
the company, and somehow he got fingered for it. Wrongly.
He'd never taken even so much as a three-cent wire nut. But
his boss didn't believe him. Capwell lost his job. Then,
unable to make the payments, he lost the Cadillac.
He lost the business years later. He and a guy named
Herschel Sniezek had opened a meat market. Capwell did
most of the butcher work, cutting up meat for freezer orders
and things like that, while Herschel did the paperwork. The
business was barely better than marginal, but it was a living.
At least it was until Herschel died in his sleep of a heart
attack one night. Under their partnership agreement,
Capwell got Herschel's share of the business, but he wasn't
good at doing Herschel's part of the work. He didn't know
how to keep records, which got him into trouble with the
IRS. He forgot to order ahead, then overreacted and
overordered. The business struggled along for six months
before Capwell declared bankruptcy.
Perhaps the loss he regretted most was his chance to be a
major leaguer. He'd always been good at baseball. Just
sandlot stuff with other kids, but he could pitch so well that
3

IT'S LOOSE
his team nearly always won. No matter who else played on
it. Could have been all girls, wouldn't have mattered, almost
no one ever got on base. So one day, after Lori Ann had left
him, he decided to go to Florida and try out for the Dodgers.
He had another car, a used one, and he was working as a
forklift operator, which he hated. He had a few hundred
bucks. And he'd never been to Florida.
There were closer places to go, of course, but he'd always
liked the Dodgers, and if he was going to play baseball, that
was who he wanted to be with. He tried out in Vero Beach.
And was selected. His record was seven-one when he was
advanced to the double-A San Antonio team. He pitched
only one game for San Antonio. During it he was struck by a
hard-hit ball. It broke his arm. Which mended, but not well
enough for him to pitch again.
He went back to Kentucky. Back to being a forklift
operator.
And as time went on, he discovered that he'd lost some-
thing else. The ability to have a relationship with a woman.
Maybe Lori Ann had taken it from him; he wasn't sure. All
he knew was that he'd tried to get along with women, tried
lots of times, but it never worked, for they were all alike.
They'd smile and laugh and come on to you. They'd make
love to you. They'd tell you you were the one, the only, the
best. And then they'd hurt you. Always. Without exception.
He'd relearned that the hard way just last week. There was
this girl named Janey at the grocery store where he worked.
Kind of thin, with curly blond hair and the biggest, brightest
smile he'd ever seen. She was a checker, and whenever
Capwell saw her, she flashed that smile at him, said hi, asked
how he was doing. At first he thought it was just friendliness,
and then he decided that she was coming on to him, that she
liked him. Before long, Capwell was so infatuated with her
that she was all he could think of. He'd lie in bed at night,
thinking of Janey. He'd fry his bacon in the morning,
thinking of Janey. A part of him knew better, kept warning
him to leave her alone because she was poison just like all
the rest of them. But Capwell hadn't wanted to hear that. He
wanted Janey. She was all he wanted.
4

IT'S LOOSE
It had taken him a month to work up the courage to ask
her out.
On the surface, she was nice about it. If you just looked at
her words, at what they meant if you looked them up in the
dictionary, she wasn't being mean about it. "I like you and
enjoy working with you," she'd said, "but I'm pretty much
going steady with this guy, and I just don't see us having a
relationship beyond what we have here at work."
Nothing you could point your finger at. No derogatory
words. No obvious attempt to hurt. But that's what it had all
been about. Hurting. Making you crawl. Making you feel all
twisted up and ashamed inside. Sometimes he thought
women practiced it, took lessons in it, maybe even went to
college and got Ph.D.'s in it.
Doctor Janey, expert in giving pain.
Capwell angrily stabbed a piece of turkey with his fork,
puncturing the bottom of the foil tray. He studied the spot a
moment, but it didn't look as though any gravy was leaking
out.
He'd started getting even with Janey after that. Once,
when she'd stepped away from her cash register, he rang up
a fifty-dollar sale just so she'd come up short. If she called
over to the meat department to get a price on something,
he'd always give her the wrong one, hoping the boss would
notice and think she was screwing up. When she said good
morning to him, he just scowled at her. He became sullen
and grouchy, not just around Janey but all the time he was at
work.
The store manager, Fred Jamison, had called him in for a
talk, told him he had an attitude problem, he wasn't getting
along with his fellow employees. Capwell said he was just in
a bad mood, it would pass, nothing to worry about. Jamison
said he hoped that was right, because if there was one thing
he didn't like it was people with attitude problems.
Capwell stabbed another piece of turkey, and this time he
embedded the fork's tines in the table. He stared at it, his
mind churning with emotions he was unable to sort out.
And then he found he was picturing the fork sticking out of
Jamison, sticking out of his back.
5

IT'S LOOSE
You can make it happen, something said to him. It was a
voice, and yet it wasn't, as if human speech was the closest
he could get to describing it and thus the term he was forced
to use. It came from behind him, from inside his head—
from everywhere and from nowhere. And yet it was real. He
had not imagined it.
Capwell looked around the room. He knew there was no
one else there, but it was the instinctive thing to do. The
voice hadn't frightened him. There was something comfort-
ing about it, seductive, and he wished he could hear it again.
When he shifted his gaze back to the table, Janey lay on it,
naked, the fork protruding from her belly, blood seeping out
around the tines. She looked at him, her eyes pleading. For
just a second, his heart went out to her, and he wanted to
pull the fork from her stomach, get help, beg her to forgive
him. But it was too late for that. Looking into her pleading
eyes, he thought, Bitch!
Yes, the voice said soothingly, yes, yes, yes.
And then they were both there on his scarred kitchen
table, Janey and Jamison, lying beside each other, looking as
though they were about to make love, right in front of him,
mocking him. Getting up so fast he knocked the chair over,
Capwell dashed to the drawer in which the knives were kept,
grabbed a butcher knife he'd stolen from the store.
Yes, yes, yes. Do it. Do it!
With a roar, Capwell rushed to the table, raising the knife.
They were still there, Jamison caressing her now, one hand
on her breast, the other on her pussy, neither of them paying
any attention to the fork sticking out of her. Capwell swung
the knife downward with all his strength, its blade passing
right through Jamison's chest and sinking into the wood of
the table top.
Yes, yes. Wonderful. Oh, how wonderful! Feel it, how good
it feels. Feel it. Feel it.
And Capwell did feel it, a hot surge of power and vitality
and elation. It was as if he'd just won a million bucks in a
contest, had a triple orgasm, received a shot of a potent
narcotic, drunk deeply from the Fountain of Youth. Simul-
6

IT'S LOOSE
taneously. All the gloriously good feelings chasing each
other around inside of him.
And then the image vanished. There was a fork sticking
out of a TV dinner tray and a butcher knife protruding from
the table's wood surface about a foot and a half from the
fork. The good feelings vanished. Capwell stood there,
confused, trembling, afraid.
You can get them back, the good feelings.
"How?" Capwell asked the empty room.
You know.
And he did, too. If he accepted the voice, just sort of drew
it in like a breath of air, the good feelings would be back.
Power instead of helplessness. The ability to hurt those who
had hurt him.
Something icy slipped down his spine, like the time Eddie
Mertz had stuffed a Sno-Cone down his shirt at the county
fair when they were ten. Except that chill had just been on
the outside. A quick squeal of surprise, and then the sun was
warming him, and he and Eddie were scuffling in the dirt,
laughing and throwing half-hearted punches at each other.
The cold he felt now was different. It was inside. Inside
his marrow, inside that core part of him that made him
what he was, inside his essence, his very being. And a part of
him was screaming for him to say no, to reject this thing that
wanted to . >. to what?
"What do you want?" he asked.
You know.
And at least on some level he did. Although it was July
and hot and muggy and the air conditioner was broken,
Charles Capwell shivered, his summer tan turning a whitish
blue, his skin crawling into gooseflesh. No, he thought, no,
no, no. But the refusal was weak, for he wanted the good
feeling back, needed it the way a heroin addict needs his
next fix. Now that he'd experienced it, without it he was cold
and hollow and afraid.
"Who are you?"
I am you.
"No."
7

IT'S LOOSE
I am everyone.
Capwell just stood there, shivering, not knowing what to
do.
I'm leaving now.
"No!" The trembling was worse now, as if he were having
a seizure or in the grip of St. Vitus's dance.
You want the good feeling back?
Capwell didn't hesitate. "Yes," he said. "Oh, please, yes."
2
Janey Donovan was at her cash register when Charles
Capwell came in and headed for the meat department. He
walked past Janey, deliberately not looking at her, making it
clear he was still pissed. Jesus. She hadn't done anything to
encourage the guy. She'd been friendly to him, the way she
was to everybody. Her daddy always called her his little
chatterbox. Talking and being nice was simply her way.
Capwell had always seemed to be a decent enough guy, a
quiet man who was usually sort of withdrawn, in there with
himself, needing his own company more than anybody
else's. A tall, thin guy with dark hair, he was neither
good-looking nor bad-looking. He reminded her a little of
Ernest, the guy in the TV commercials who was always
getting windows slammed on his fingers and things like that.
Except Capwell was a lot less talkative.
Janey had been taken completely by surprise when he
asked her out. Capwell just didn't seem the type. For one
thing, he was around forty, which made him twice her age.
Although that in itself might not have been enough to make
her say no, Janey was all but engaged to a guy named Brad
Houghton. When she'd tried explaining this to Capwell, he
looked something like a hurt puppy, and then his eyes glazed
over. Ever since then he'd been acting freaky.
Janey was ringing up the purchases of a woman with two
obnoxious boys who'd been shoving each other and knock-
ing batteries and disposable lighters from their display by
the checkout counter. One of the boys picked up a candy
8

IT'S LOOSE
bar, peeled off the wrapper, and began eating it. Janey made
a point of looking at the kid, then at the mother, and then
ringing up the price of the candy bar.
The mother said, "Ricky, behave yourself."
Ricky was about five, runny-nosed and brown-haired, and
he looked at his mother as if to say, Get stuffed. His brother,
who was about a year younger, tried to take the candy bar
away from him and got knocked down for his efforts. The
younger kid began to wail.
His mother pulled him to his feet. "You're all right,
Davey. Let's not make a scene."
He too gave her a contemptuous look. Janey had always
figured she'd raise two, maybe three kids, but watching this
scene was giving her second thoughts. Perhaps a childless
marriage would be best.
She kept ringing up the purchases. Eggs 80<P, ground beef
$2.35, canned dog food 49<t. The store was thinking about
computerizing everything, putting those machines in the
checkout counters that could read the bar codes and auto-
matically ring up the price. But for now Janey and the other
checkers were doing it the old-fashioned way.
She rang up the last item the woman had in her cart and
punched the total button. "A hundred and three fifteen,"
Janey said.
Pulling out her checkbook, the woman shook her head.
"Every time it costs more. Pretty soon nobody will be able
to afford to eat anymore."
The woman finished writing the check and started to pass
it over, but it never reached Janey's hand. A loud bang had
just sounded to Janey's left, causing her to jump. The
woman with the obnoxious boys was staring in the direction
from which the sound had come, and although she was still
holding out the check, her outstretched hand was nowhere
near Janey. She looked like someone passing out handbills
to passersby. Even her two bratty kids had stopped pushing
each other and were staring in the direction of the sound,
everybody in the store thinking one thing: gunshot. But at
the same time they were thinking it, they were also telling
themselves that it couldn't really have been a shot, because
9

IT'S LOOSE
things like that happened on the six o'clock news, not in real
life, not to them. The store was absolutely silent. No cash
registers eating up the weekly grocery bill. No bag boys
putting the milk on top of the bread. No rattle of grocery
carts.
Janey realized she was staring at the door to Mr.
Jamison's office, which was back near the meat counter.
What had happened in there? But before she could even
attempt to answer that question, the door opened and
Charles Capwell stepped out. He was holding a handgun, a
huge one with a barrel that looked as long as a length of pipe,
one of those magnums, Janey supposed.
All of a sudden, people started shouting, screaming,
moving. Janey was moving, too, toward the door, as fast as
she could go. If Capwell had just blown away Jamison, there
was no reason to assume he wouldn't kill a few others as
well, and Janey knew where she stood on Capwell's list of
admired people. These thoughts flashed through Janey's
mind in a fraction of a second, and then they were replaced
by mindless terror that recognized only one need: escape.
She was going so fast that she nearly smashed right
through the automatic door, which opened under the as-
sumption that those passing through it would be carrying
groceries, not running for their lives. As she squeezed
through the still-opening door, another shot rang out, and a
plate-glass window two feet from her shattered. Then she
was out into the parking lot, dashing between a compact and
a station wagon. The wagon's windshield exploded. Cap-
well was shooting at her. She ran as hard as she could,
weaving between parked cars, her legs pumping, her heart
pounding. When she finally looked back, she saw Capwell
standing in the doorway to the supermarket, holding the
huge gun but not aiming at her anymore. And not coming
after her.
Some people were standing in the parking lot, staring at
her and at the grocery store, looking frightened and con-
fused. Janey hurried toward them, trying to find enough
breath to speak.
"Police," she managed to say. "Get the police."
10

IT'S LOOSE
3
Lieutenant Steven Kesselring was in charge at the scene. He
stood beside the SWAT team van, which was located at the
edge of the parking area, out of the line of fire from the
grocery store. Only one person had made it out of the store,
a terrified woman employee named Jane Donovan, who'd
identified the man with the gun as Charles Capwell, an-
other employee. She'd guessed there were maybe forty
people in the store, including employees. Although she
hadn't seen anyone actually get shot, she was worried
about her boss, Fred Jamison. The first shot had come
from his office.
While Kesselring was thinking all this over, another shot
was fired in the store. Then another.
The lieutenant wished he knew what he had in there. Was
the guy blowing pickle jars off the shelves, or was he killing
people? The woman had seen one gun, probably a magnum.
Did he have any other weapons? How much ammo did he
have? What the hell did he want?
But then the last question was pointless. The guy probably
didn't want anything, at least not anything that would make
sense to someone with a normal brain. People who did this
sort of thing just sort of went bug-fuck. Something in the
brain shorted out, blew a fuse, whatever. There was no way
to reason with them, second-guess them, for they were
communicating with themselves in their own wacko lan-
guage, which nobody else could understand.
"We're tied in to the phone lines," the SWAT team
sergeant told him. His name was Mathers, and he was a tall,
thin black guy, looked like a basketball player.
"Let's see if he'll come to the phone," Kesselring said.
They climbed into the van, and Mathers dialed, handed
the phone to Kesselring. The lieutenant listened as the
phone in the grocery store rang. Ten times. Fifteen. Twenty.
Twenty-five. Kesselring tried to make himself stop counting,
but he was unable to do so. Someone answered on the
thirty-second ring.
"Hello," a woman said, her voice barely above a whisper.
11

IT'S LOOSE
"This is Lieutenant Kesselring of the Pittsburgh Police.
Who am I talking to?"
"Judy. Judy Steinmetz."
Mathers, who had slipped on a pair of earphones, was
listening in.
"What's happening in there, Judy?" Kesselring asked.
"The ... the man with the gun told me to come in here
and answer the phone. He says he can't do it himself because
he can't see the door from here."
"Is anyone hurt?"
"Yes. There's a man in here. He's on the floor. He
looks . . . dead."
The woman was still speaking in her whispery monotone.
Shock, Kesselring supposed. At least she wasn't hysterical.
She was reasonably coherent; she could answer questions.
"Is anyone else hurt?" he asked.
"He ... he shot two other people. I don't know if
they're ... I don't know how bad they're hurt. He won't let
anyone go to them."
"Where are the people in the store? Where does he have
them?"
"They're lined up along the meat counter. He just stands
there with the gun, watching them." Then she lowered her
voice to a barely audible whisper. "He wasn't able to round
everybody up. Some of them made it to the back of the
store. They can get out that way."
Mathers picked up a microphone. "Sam one to Sam
three."
"Sam three," came the response.
"There are supposed to be some people trying to come out
your way."
"They're coming now, about ten of them. It's okay. They
made it."
Over the phone, Kesselring said, "They're okay. They
made it out."
"Good," the woman said. "Wait, he's yelling something
to me." She was silent for a few moments, then she said,
"He says ... he says he wants you to send him the girl that
12

IT'S LOOSE
got out—Janey Donovan." She was silent again, apparently
listening. "He says he'll kill one person every five minutes if
you don't do it. He says I have to hang up now." The line
went dead.
"I need those plans," Kesselring said to Mathers.
Into his microphone, Mathers said, "Sam one to six
Adam twenty-four."
"Six Adam twenty-four."
"What's your ETA?"
"About ten minutes. I've got the blueprints and a guy who
used to be the manager of the store."
"Ten-eighteen and code three," the SWAT sergeant said,
which meant to rush and use all his emergency equipment,
both lights and siren.
"Call the store again," the lieutenant said.
Mathers dialed, handed the phone to Kesselring. He let it
ring fifty times. No one answered. A uniformed officer stuck
his head into the van and said, "Someone's coming out the
front of the store."
Kesselring and Mathers scrambled out of the truck. A
man was emerging from the grocery store, walking slowly,
holding his hands up.
"That him?" Mathers asked. "Or one of the hostages?"
"I don't know," Kesselring said. "I wish that Donovan
woman was still here." Janey Donovan had become hysteri-
cal, and an ambulance had taken her away.
The man who had emerged from the store stopped when
he was about fifteen feet from the entrance. "He says he
wants to know if... if you're ready to give him Jane
Donovan."
"Sam four to Sam one" came over Mathers's hand-held
radio.
"Go," Mathers said.
"I can see a guy inside the store. He's got a large handgun,
and he's using a woman as a shield. No clear shot." Sam
four was one of the SWAT team members. He was on the
roof of a two-story building across the street from the
supermarket.
13

IT'S LOOSE
The man who'd come out of the grocery store was about
fifty, gray-haired, dressed in slacks and a white shirt with tie,
no jacket. He looked terrified.
"What do we do?" Mathers asked.
"Stall," Kesselring answered. To the man standing in
front of the store, he said, "Tell Capwell the Donovan
woman's in the hospital. We might not be able to get her
here."
One of the store's plate-glass windows had been shattered.
Capwell was using the opening to communicate with the guy
outside. Kesselring was unable to make out the words.
"He says the woman wasn't hit," the man said. "There's
no reason for her to be in the hospital."
"She was hysterical. She had a breakdown."
Again the voice from within the store; then the man said,
"He says that if... if you don't get her right now, he'll kill
me.
"We can send for her," Kesselring said quickly. "But it'll
take a little time."
This time there were no words from within the store. The
man standing there with his hands raised looked on the
verge of collapsing. Sweat glistened on his face. He was
swaying slightly. Suddenly, as if someone had just given him
an enormous hypo of adrenaline, the man was running,
cutting to his left, trying to get out of the line of fire from the
grocery store. A loud bang came from the store, and the man
was shoved forward as if he'd been hit by a truck. His arms
flailing, he landed face-first on the asphalt parking lot.
"Can we get him?" Kesselring asked. "Maybe roll a
vehicle between him and the shooter?"
"We can try." Mathers's tone made it clear he thought the
guy was dead. So did Kesselring.
"Set it up," Kesselring said. He hurried back to the SWAT
van, climbed inside, and dialed the number for the grocery
store. The phone was answered on the fifth ring.
"Hello," a man said. "This is Capwell."
"This is Lieutenant Kesselring."
"I got everybody locked in a room back in the produce
section, so I can talk to you in person now."
14

IT'S LOOSE
"Give this up, Capwell. Leave the gun inside and come
out. Nothing will happen to you."
"No way."
"Why? What's in it for you to hurt a bunch of innocent
people?"
"You wouldn't understand."
"Try me."
"No. There's no point. The next one dies in a few minutes
if you don't send me Janey."
"We're working on it. You have to give us time."
"How's three minutes grab you?" The line went dead.
A police car pulled up, lights and siren going. A uni-
formed officer and a chunky bald guy wearing a business suit
climbed out, headed for the SWAT van.
"George Thompson," the civilian said as Kesselring
stepped out of the van. "I'm the regional manager for the
chain, and I used to manage this store." He held up a roll of
papers. "These are the plans of the store."
"Let's see what you've got," the lieutenant said. Mathers
joined them as they rolled the plans out on the hood of the
police cruiser, and Kesselring said, "Capwell says he's got
the hostages locked in a room in the produce section. Where
would that be?"
"Here," Thompson said, tapping the plans with his finger.
"It's for cold storage, and it can be locked from the outside."
"Where's the office?" Kesselring asked.
"Here."
"If he's in the office, can he see the place he's holding the
hostages?"
"No," Thompson said without hesitation.
"How do you know Capwell's telling the truth?" Mathers
asked.
Kesselring sighed. "We don't. But he's obviously put the
hostages somewhere. There're about thirty people in there.
He can't have them running around all over the store." To
Thompson he said, "Is there anywhere else he could put
them?"
"Meat locker." He tapped the plans. "Here."
"Visible from the office?"
15

IT'S LOOSE
"No."
Kesselring and Mathers exchanged glances. The lieuten-
ant said, "If I can get him on the phone again, we can hit the
place from the front and back. We'll know where Capwell is,
and there'll be no danger to the hostages."
Mathers nodded. "I sent for a bus we can roll in between
the store and the guy he shot. We going to need it?"
"No. If he's in the office, he can't see us. As soon as I get
him on the phone again, we can simply drag the guy away."
Mathers frowned. "What's going on here, Steve? The way
this guy's going about all this don't make sense. He's leaving
himself wide open. He has to know we'd get plans of the
place. Hell, the Donovan woman could have told us what we
needed to know if she hadn't freaked."
"Just because the guy's gone wacko doesn't mean he's
smart."
"Doesn't mean he's dumb either." Mathers frowned,
staring at the plans, obviously not liking the feel of it.
From within the store came a series of muffled shots.
Kesselring, Mathers, Thompson, and the cop who'd deliv-
ered him all jumped.
"We gotta move," the lieutenant said. "Your guys ready?"
"They're ready," Mathers answered.
Kesselring scrambled back into the van, dialed the num-
ber for the grocery store. It took twenty-two rings, but the
guy answered.
"Hi, Lieutenant," Capwell said.
"What happened in there?"
"I just shot a bunch of people." There was something
about his voice, a quiet excitement, the way a normal guy
might sound if he was about to make it with the woman of
his dreams, some plasterer's assistant about to score with
Cybill Shepherd. The guy was getting off on killing, getting
high on it.
"Tell me about it," Kesselring said, and Capwell started
explaining how he'd shot a woman first, then a guy in a
brown shirt because he hated brown shirts. Mathers looked
at the lieutenant questioningly. Kesselring nodded, waved
him toward the store. Capwell was still talking about it,
16

IT'S LOOSE
telling him how he'd shot another woman, then a little boy.
He was in midsentence when the phone went dead.
Scrambling out of the van, Kesselring ran toward the
store, drawing his service revolver. Once inside, he made his
way toward the office. He spotted one of Mathers's SWAT
guys in his dark blue jumpsuit uniform. He was carrying an
M-16. Mathers appeared from behind the meat counter and
motioned to the lieutenant.
"He's still in here somewhere," the SWAT sergeant said.
"Watch your ass, Lieutenant."
"What about the hostages?"
"Five dead in the produce department, plus those two
there." He inclined his head toward two bodies sprawled by
the meat counter. One was a man, the other a woman. "Guy
in the office makes eight, and the one outside makes nine."
"Jesus," Kesselring said.
"All the exits are covered. He can't get out. I told my guys
to give him one warning, then take the fucker out. That okay
with you?"
Kesselring nodded. "How you handling the search?"
"We're starting with the part of the store the customers
usually don't see, the place where they bring in the deliveries
and the meat locker, like that. Once we're sure he's not in
any of those places, we'll move into the rest of the store."
"I'll keep you company."
Two of the SW\T cops hurried the survivors past the spot
where Kesselring and Mathers were standing, everybody
keeping low because a crazed killer was still in the store
somewhere, still armed. They seemed to be in shock, most
of them drained of color, staring straight ahead, moving
along like a group of zombies. A woman was sobbing softly.
A man moaned.
"Anybody need medical attention?" Kesselring asked.
Mathers shook his head. "If he shot them, he killed them.
No wounded. Just the dead and the uninjured."
Kesselring thought of the group of survivors who had just
gone past, the zombielike looks. Uninjured in the physical
sense maybe, but ahead of them lay a lot of nightmares, a lot
of vividly recalled horrors.
17

IT'S LOOSE
"You ready?" Mathers asked.
"Let's find the son of a bitch."
They went through the meat locker, moving hanging sides
of beef, looking behind boxes of lamb chops, prepackaged
chicken breasts. They moved on, using a small forklift to
move a stack of cartons containing canned vegetables,
looking behind boxes containing everything from catsup to
sanitary napkins. Finally they moved into the main part of
the supermarket, cautiously working their way up to each
aisle and taking a quick peek before going on. They moved
all the way across the store, looking behind the deli counter,
the movie rental displays, finding nothing.
They gathered at the produce counter. Mathers used his
hand-held radio to check with his guys outside. No one had
come out except the surviving hostages, they assured him.
"Could he have somehow been among them?" Kesselring
asked.
"No way they'd have let the son of a bitch slip out with
them," Mathers said. "Not after what he did."
"What about the bodies? Could he have been one of them,
just pretending to be dead?"
Mathers sighed. "Ordinarily I'd say no chance, but shit,
the guy's got to be pulling something or we'd have found
him." Using his radio, he told the officers outside to make
sure none of the hostages left the scene and to start IDing all
of them. "Let's go check the bodies," he said. "Make sure
one of them wasn't just being creative with a bottle of
catsup."
"Where would you find catsup in a place like this?" one of
the SWAT guys said.
Mathers gave him a dirty look.
All the red stuff on the bodies was indeed blood, and they
were all unquestionably dead. The cops outside reported
that all the hostages checked out and confirmed that the
man who'd been gunned down outside was dead. The SWAT
team got ready to comb the store again.
"I'm going to use the phone in the office to let downtown
know what's happening," Kesselring said. He wasn't happy
having to be the one to explain that nine people were dead
18

IT'S LOOSE
and that the guy who did it was still in the building
somewhere—they thought—but, well, they couldn't exactly
find him.
The office was nothing but a cubbyhole with a desk, a
computer, and some file cabinets. Stepping over the body he
presumed to be the store manager's, Kesselring reached for
the phone, then hesitated. Should they dust the thing for
prints? He decided it wasn't necessary. The shooter had
been identified, and there was a whole group of witnesses to
what had happened. He picked up the receiver, started to
dial. Particles of something sifted down on him from above.
Dropping the phone, Kesselring spun around, pulling out
his service revolver. He was too late. The office had one of
those suspended ceilings, and Capwell had pushed up one of
the panels, climbed up in there, put back the panel. At the
moment he was looking down at Kesselring, aiming a big
magnum at him.
Although he knew he had no chance—none whatsoever
—Kesselring went through the motions, trying to raise his
weapon and shoot before the man above him could squeeze
the trigger and make one less cop in the world. To his
amazement, he had his weapon aimed at the man, and
Capwell still hadn't fired. Kesselring did, though, and he did
it so hastily that he missed, his .38 punching a hole in the
ceiling about a foot from Capwell's face.
The two men stared at each other.
Still Capwell didn't shoot, didn't do anything except look
blankly down at him.
"Throw down the gun," Kesselring said, his voice so
shaky he wasn't sure Capwell could hear it.
Capwell cocked the magnum. "It made me do it," he
whispered.
Kesselring fired again, and a hole appeared just below
Capwell's right eye. Then the man tumbled from his posi-
tion in the suspended ceiling, crashing onto the desk, the
phone squirting from under him and hitting the wall.
Kesselring stared at the body on the desk, realizing that
what Capwell had done was commit suicide. Often these
guys blew a bunch of people away, then turned the gun on
19

IT'S LOOSE
themselves. Capwell had made Kesselring do it for him.
There was no other explanation for why Capwell hadn't
killed him when he had the chance.
Kesselring could hear the SWAT guys coming on the run.
They must have been clean over at the other side of the store
somewhere. And then he saw something that made him
blink, because he couldn't really be seeing it, because it was
impossible—absolutely, totally impossible.
Capwell lay on his back on the desk, his legs spread and
his arms out to the sides, as if he were trying to make an
angel in the snow. And something was rising from him, a
darkness that seemed to be coming out through every pore
in his body, creating a shadow that hovered an inch or two
above him. Kesselring blinked again, shook his head. He
was imagining this, had to be imagining this. Shadows could
not be suspended in the air, could not rise cloudlike from
corpses.
Abruptly the darkness swirled, started congealing, taking
shape. Kesselring backed away, his ass hitting the wall. He
heard himself gasp, and the sound seemed muffled and
distant, like the barely perceived noises you heard when you
were sound asleep.
Kesselring was looking at. .. something. The word crea-
ture came to him, but it was more an assemblage of
creatures than any particular one. An assemblage that could
not possibly exist. He was holding his service revolver with
both hands, but it was shaking so badly he probably couldn't
hit the thing even though it stood no more than five feet
from him. Not that shooting it would do any good. Despite
the jumble of fear and confusion tumbling through his
brain, at least on some level he understood this much: a
thing that took shape after emerging as shadows from a dead
man wasn't the sort of thing you could shoot. He stared at it,
knowing he could not blink it away but wishing with every
fiber of his being that he could.
It was big and furry like a bear.
Its feet were hooves.
It had the face of an iguana.
It stared at him with glowing red eyes, and then it opened
20

IT'S LOOSE
its mouth, revealing sharp alligatorlike teeth. Suddenly a
gust of wind slammed into him, swirling through the small
office and sucking wadded-up papers out of the trash can,
which flipped over and rolled across the room. The wind
was hot and sticky and fetid, the stench so overpowering
that Kesselring had to look down to make sure he wasn't
standing in a room full of rotting meat.
No way can this be happening, a part of him asserted.
This is impossible, abso-fucking-lutely impossible. He felt
as if he'd been watching a horror movie and one of the
monsters had reached into the audience and grabbed him,
dragged him into the images on the screen, and made him a
part of the film. He was the guy who was about to be eaten
by the monster. And then the creature did move toward
him, reach for him with its claws. Kesselring tried to back
up, but he was already against the wall. Some primitive
instinct told him the monster was not going to devour
him—at least not in the conventional sense. What it wanted
from him was something more complicated, much more
profound than just a meal, and although Kesselring wasn't
religious, he found himself fearing for his soul. A rivulet of
icy sweat trickled down his spine.
"No," Kesselring said, although he wasn't sure why he
was saying it. "Never."
The wind stopped, the papers from the trash can dropping
to the floor like enormous snowflakes. The odor was gone.
And so was the creature.
The SWAT guys poured into the room.
"You okay?" Mathers asked.
Kesselring nodded, but he wasn't okay. Nothing was okay.
Maybe nothing would ever be okay again. "You . . . you see
it?" he asked.
Mathers shook his head. "It was all over by the time we
got here. You better sit down, Steve. You look terrible. It
must have been a pretty close call."
Kesselring took the sergeant's advice and sat down. He
felt brittle, as if moving too quickly might cause him to
break. Inside was a chill, a chill so deep his core could have
turned to ice. Charles Capwell was spread out on the desk in
21

IT'S LOOSE
front of him as if he were being served for lunch. Put on a
little A-l sauce and carve him up. Clearly no one else had
seen what Kesselring had. Though confused and in a state of
shock, he knew he had indeed seen it. He knew that after a
few days he would try to write it off as imagination or
hallucination. And he knew he would fail.
"We heard two shots," Mathers said, inviting him to tell
them what had happened.
"Yeah," the lieutenant said, not sure how he was going to
tell it but knowing his report wouldn't exactly be the truth.
It would make no mention of furry, hooved creatures with
iguana faces and alligator teeth.
22

One
*
i
Clad in pajamas, Don Farraday stood at his second-story
bedroom window, looking out at the gray morning, the
snow-covered rooftops of Ice Island. Smoke was rising lazily
from the Sanderses' chimney. An icicle hung from the
Hansens' big fringe-area TV antenna. The O'Gradys' garage
door was open, white exhaust coming from the tailpipe of
their station wagon as it warmed up.
All the homes within Don's field of vision were two-story
clapboard houses like his. Snow flurries sailed past the
window as a gust of wind moaned in the eaves. Despite the
dreary, wintry day, it was almost time for the Split. All the
islanders, including his family, had already laid in enough
supplies to see them through.
Looking beyond the Hansens' place, he could see the twin
lines of orange barrels stretching across the ice toward the
mainland, three miles away. The state police checked the ice
daily now. Soon it would be too mushy-looking, or it could
crack, lift in places, and the Michigan Highway Department
would put barricades up on both the mainland and island
23

IT'S LOOSE
ends of the winter roadway. Ice Island would be cut off from
the rest of the world until the surface of Lake Superior had
thawed enough for the ferry to start running.
People who didn't live in this part of the country found it
hard to believe that a state highway could just keep right on
going across frozen water. But up here on the northern side
of Michigan's Upper Peninsula, there were days in January
when the high was twenty-five below. Although Lake Superi-
or didn't freeze out in the middle, this close to the shore the
ice got thick. You could drive an eighteen-wheeler across it,
it got so thick.
Another gust of wind howled in the eaves, and it occurred
to Don that he should be getting dressed instead of standing
at the window in his pajamas. After a quick shower, he
donned his blue trousers and shirt. Using the full-length
mirror on the back of the bedroom door, he checked to
make sure his badge was pinned on straight. Six-two and
broad-shouldered with dark hair, Don looked good in the
uniform. It used to be the Ice Island constable just pinned a
badge to his shirt, but a couple of years ago the town council
had decided that a more official-looking police officer would
command more respect from the tourists. Don had made
sure a uniform allowance was added to his salary.
The smell of breakfast cooking wafted up from the
kitchen. Hotcakes unless Don's nose was playing tricks on
him. He headed downstairs.
"I was beginning to think you'd gone back to sleep,"
Allison said as he stepped into the kitchen. She was at the
stove, flipping a hotcake.
"When have I ever done that?"
She faced him, frowning. "Let's see. There was November
fifth, December twelfth, not to mention January twenty-
seventh, and then there was—"
"Stop. You couldn't possibly remember the exact dates."
"She's just teasing you, Daddy," Sarah said. "It's her way
of telling you that you can be a little hard to get out of bed
sometimes."
"Oh," Don said. "Good thing I've got you here to explain
it to me."
24

IT'S LOOSE
Sarah gave him a look that probably said paragraphs to
another teenager but was meaningless to him. The girl
turned her attention to her half-eaten stack of pancakes.
Don sat down at the table, and Allison put a steaming cup of
coffee in front of him.
As he sipped the hot liquid, Don watched Allison use a
ladle to put circles of batter on the griddle. Like him, she
was nearing forty, but while he was thickening around the
middle, Allison seemed as trim as she'd been at twenty-two.
Her hair was shorter, and a little gray was getting mixed in
with the brown, but she still had the same pleasant smile,
the same girlish laugh. She reminded him of Susan St.
James.
Sarah looked so much like her mother Don sometimes
joked that his daughter must have been a clone. He was sure
he had contributed some genes in there somewhere, but they
were hard to find. Sarah looked like a sixteen-year-old Susan
St. James—one with a frizzy, fluffy high-schooler's hairdo.
Allison put a stack of pancakes in front of him. He added
butter, then some of the maple syrup they'd made them-
selves, the sap coming from trees on the east end of the
island. The land belonged to A1 McDougall, who said any
islanders who wanted to tap his sugar maples in the spring
were welcome to do so.
"We going to make our own syrup again this spring?" Don
asked. He washed a forkful of pancakes down with coffee.
Sarah rolled her eyes. "Daddy, you can get it in the
grocery store without doing all that work."
"I know, but, well, it's not the same."
"Why not?"
"Because this is something you make yourself, with your
own hands."
"Yeah, and if you counted the time it takes you, the stuff
would cost a thousand dollars a bottle."
"Well, maybe not that much."
Allison chuckled, turned off the stove, and picked up her
plate.
"You're not helping," he told her.
"Ummmm," Allison replied.
25

IT'S LOOSE
"I get the feeling you're on her side."
"Well," Allison said, "cooking the stuff down was kind of
a mess."
"I can't believe this," Don said. "Nobody wants to get out
and do anything the old-fashioned way, make anything from
scratch."
The remark was greeted with silence.
Finally Sarah leaned over and kissed him on the cheek.
"We love you, Daddy, even if you do like to do weird stuff."
2
The town's police cruiser was a white four-wheel-drive Jeep
Cherokee wagon with police written on its sides in blue
letters. Don used it to drop Sarah at the one-story brick
building that housed the island's combination junior and
senior high school. Allison worked out of the house, from
which she ran her combination real estate and insurance
business. It seemed that everything on the island was
combined with something else. Coleman's Pharmacy, for
instance, was also the post office, Joe Coleman being both a
registered pharmacist and the postmaster. The bank was
located in the grocery store, a branch of Citizens Bank of
Commerce in Marquette.
Island Avenue was the main drag, a two-lane street lined
mainly with white wooden buildings, the First Lutheran
Church almost looking out of place with its stone facade.
The town gave the appearance of a fishing village, and there
actually were a couple of people who eked out a living
catching smelt and walleye pike, but Ice Island's economy
could be summed up in one word: summer.
June, July, and August. When the tourists arrived to spend
a few weeks away from the heat in Detroit or Milwaukee or
Chicago. Businesses that were closed most of the year rented
boats, sold fishing equipment, offered weekly and monthly
rates on cabins. The fishing was good, the boating was good,
the hiking trails through the woods were good, but the thing
that made Ice Island what it was was its temperature.
26

IT'S LOOSE
Surrounded by all that cold water in Lake Superior, the
island was constantly being air-conditioned. On a hot July
day, the temperature might creep up to seventy-five.
Quite a few people owned summer cabins here, so be-
tween the influx of part-time residents and the tourists, the
island's population swelled significantly during the summer,
which was when most of Don's law enforcement problems
occurred. They were usually nothing serious, mainly things
like speeding, minor accidents, or overdue pleasure boaters,
but they kept him busy.
The police station was in a white wooden building on
Island Avenue. It also served as the town hall and firehouse
—another example of the way Ice Islanders liked to com-
bine things. Don pulled through a cut in the snowbank and
drove around to the rear of the building, parking by a sign
that said police cars only. He'd often wondered about that
sign, since it reserved only one parking space and the town
owned only one police car.
Stomping the snow off his feet, Don walked down the
short wooden-floored hallway that led to his office. Actually
it was a space behind a counter with two old wooden desks,
his and the one used by Corrine Matthews, the town clerk.
Corrine was another combination. She also served as his
dispatcher and helped people file complaints when he
wasn't around. Once, when Don was real busy, she even
took a report at the scene of a traffic accident.
"Morning, Corrine," he said, hanging his uniform jacket
on the coatrack. The coffeepot sat on a small table against
the wall. He poured himself a cup, took it to his desk.
"How do you like this weather?" she asked. "Last week it
looked like an early spring, and today it's January again."
She was a big-boned woman, with red hair turning gray and
a face full of freckles. She was wearing light green slacks, a
green sweater, and hightop shoes with big treads on the
soles. Don heard her say once that she ordered most of her
clothes from L. L. Bean.
"This is just a front moving through," he said. "Tomor-
row or the next day, it'll be sunny again."
She closed the file folder she'd been studying, swiveled her
27

IT'S LOOSE
desk chair so that she was facing him. "Hank Bergstrom
called a little while ago. Says today's the day."
"Think he's right?"
"Seems a little early. We're barely into March."
"Yeah, but Hank's never off by more than a day or
two."
Hank Bergstrom was an old guy who rented boats and
fishing equipment during the summer and spent the rest of
the year watching TV on his satellite dish. Although he'd
been furious when Showtime and HBO and some of the
other networks started scrambling their signals, he'd finally
calmed down, concluding that there were still nearly a
hundred unscrambled channels he could pull in. He also
made a yearly prediction about when the Split would occur.
Said he could tell by the vibrations in his basement. The way
he explained it, the ice was under pressure just like the
continental plates that pushed together at an earthquake
fault. When the pressure was great enough, the ice cracked,
releasing energy in a sort of mini-earthquake, which he
could feel in his basement. The intensity of the vibrations
told him when the Split was coming.
They were still discussing the likelihood of the Split
coming early this year when the phone rang. Don answered
it.
"Don, it's me, Tim Landers." He sounded out of breath.
"I found something at a cabin off Forest Road. You better
get out there."
"Wait a minute, Tim. What cabin?"
"The one with the red roof. . . uh, the one owned by
what's-their-names." He was clearly distraught, having
trouble thinking straight. "The ones from that rich suburb
outside Detroit."
"The Abelsons?"
"Yes, that's them, the Abelsons."
"What's wrong at their cabin?"
"There's a dead man inside."
"You sure?"
"Yeah, I'm sure. I can see him through the window.
There's a knife sticking out of his gut."
28

IT'S LOOSE
3
The road to the Abelsons' cabin was passable, but just
barely. Because none of the cabins in the area was occupied
during the winter, the road was only half-heartedly cleared
and almost never salted. Occasionally people going ice
fishing off Arrowhead Point came this way, but that was
about it. Don's Cherokee was bouncing and sliding over
thickly packed snow that had turned slushy during last
week's warm spell and now was frozen, all ruts and dips and
slick spots. The road wound through thick woods, the trees
nothing but stalks now, naked without their leaves.
Wearing a red-and-black-checked jacket, Tim Landers
was standing beside his blue Toyota four-by-four, which
was parked at the side of the road. There was no cut in
the snowbank where the Abelson drive met the road, so
this was as close as you could get in a car. Landers's
pickup was parked directly behind a brown Chevy Blazer
with Minnesota plates. The Blazer was nosed into the
snowbank.
Over his radio, Don said, "I'm ten-ninety-seven at the
Abelson place. Can you run a plate for me, Corrine?"
"Ten-four."
Don gave her the tag number of the Blazer. Getting out of
the car, he walked over to where Tim Landers was still
leaning against his truck. The old man was using the hood of
his coat to keep his ears warm. He was one of those
extremely fair-skinned people whose natural pallor was that
of someone who was bedridden, although the cold air had
given his face a bit of a flush. He had a drinker's nose, full of
little red blood vessels, but Don had never known him to be
a boozer. Landers was probably in his early seventies. His
face was covered with about three days' growth of snow-
white whiskers.
"I was on my way over to Arrowhead Point to talk to Todd
Vorhees," Landers said. "His wife told me he's ice fishing
out there today. I stopped when I saw this Blazer here all by
itself. I looked around and didn't see any sign of anyone,
and then I saw the holes in the snowbank where somebody
29

IT'S LOOSE
had climbed over it. I climbed up on top of the bank, and I
could see that the tracks went directly to the Abelsons'
cabin. So—"
"How many sets of tracks were there?"
"You mean how many people had gone in there? Just one.
One set of tracks going in, none coming out. And I knew
there wasn't supposed to be anybody at the Abelson place,
so I went in to see what was going on."
"Shouldn't have done that, Tim."
"Why not?"
"If somebody'd been burglarizing the place, and you'd
caught them at it, you could have got hurt."
Landers frowned. "Never thought of that."
"Let's go see what you found."
The two men climbed over the snowbank. The snow on
the other side of it had a thick crust because of the warm
spell, but not thick enough to support a man's weight, so
every other step or so you suddenly sank in up to your
knees. Fortunately the cabin was only about fifty feet from
the road.
"The tracks went to the front door, then around to the
back of the house," Landers said. "But instead of following
them, I went right up to that side window there and peeked
in."
Don followed him to the window and, cupping his hands
around his eyes, looked into the cabin. A man lay on the
floor. A large knife was protruding from his abdomen.
"You sure you only saw one set of tracks?" Don asked.
"Of course I'm sure. The way this snow is, how could I
miss another set of tracks?"
"I guess you couldn't."
The cabins on Ice Island were all made of wood; other
than that, there was no uniformity to their appearance. This
particular one was made of logs with cement chinking. It
was large as summer cabins went, and well made. Some of
them were only slightly classier than tarpaper shacks. Don
knew guys who kept them that way on purpose, so they
could come up and go fishing with their buddies, and the
wife and kids wouldn't want to come along.
30

IT'S LOOSE
Stepping onto the cabin's snow-covered porch, Don tried
the front door, which was locked. He followed the tracks in
the snow around to the rear of the cabin, where a window
pane had been broken out. Landers accompanied him.
"Guess this is how he got in," the old man said, express-
ing the obvious.
Don raised the window. "I'd like you to wait out here, if
you wouldn't mind," Don said.
Landers nodded. "Don't want to have too many people
messing up the evidence. I can see that."
Don climbed into the cabin, finding himself in a bed-
room. It was a spacious room with a queen-size bed and
furniture that looked new, bought especially for the cabin.
That was unusual. Ordinarily people furnished their sum-
mer places with stuff from the attic or the church junk sale.
The husband was a big-time executive in Detroit, worked
for some company that supplied parts to the auto industry.
He'd spend a couple of weeks here each summer, but the
wife and kids usually spent the entire three months.
Don moved out of the bedroom and into a short hallway.
The floors throughout the place were pine. They creaked
under his weight. He passed another bedroom, this one with
bunk beds for the kids. The bathroom had a tub with a
shower. The kitchen was large and modern, with a big
refrigerator-freezer and even a dishwasher. Clearly the
Abelsons didn't like to spend their summers roughing it.
The body was in the living room. The guy was about
thirty-five, dark-haired, wearing jeans and a flannel shirt.
The shirt had been unbuttoned, and his T-shirt had been
pushed up where the knife protruded from his stomach. It
was a kitchen knife, the type you saw chefs use on TV,
chopping up vegetables so fast the blade was a blur.
Don squatted by the body, studying the knife. It had been
plunged into the guy so deeply it had nearly gone all the way
through him. And it wasn't a simple stabbing. The knife had
been worked upward, toward the guy's chin, leaving a
six-inch-long gash. The blood flowing from the wound had
run down both sides of his stomach and onto the floor,
where it had puddled and frozen into red ice.
31

IT'S LOOSE
Getting up, Don went into the kitchen and examined the
knives in the wooden block on the counter. They had the
same black handles as the one sticking out of the dead man.
One slot in the wooden block was empty, the largest one,
where the chef's knife should have been.
Returning to the living room, he picked up the dead man's
jacket, which had been tossed on the couch. Going through
the pockets, he found nothing but a matchbook from a
motel in Liberal, Kansas. He patted down the corpse,
finding no weapons, nothing in the shirt pockets or the front
pants pockets. He tried to lift the body. It resisted because
some of the dead man's clothing was frozen to the floor, but
it finally pulled free, small pieces of red ice popping loose,
tinkling as they landed on the pine floorboards. The body
itself was frozen solid, a man-shaped chunk of ice. The man
had no gun at the small of his back. Nor did he have a wallet.
Letting his eyes travel around the living room, Don took
in the expensive couch, the console color TV set, the
paintings on the walls. It amazed him that people would
leave all these goodies unattended like this, but then the
Abelsons probably had so much money that the cost of
something like a console color TV was nothing. The whole
damn cabin was probably nothing.
Don wondered whether he'd like living like that and
found he really didn't know. It sounded nice, on the surface,
but everything had a price. Maybe Mr. Abelson would have
a stroke at forty-five, or maybe he had ulcers from worrying
that the market would crash and he'd lose it all, or that his
company would go belly-up because Lee Iacocca would
decide to let the Koreans make the parts now manufactured
by Abelson. Maybe Mrs. Abelson was an alcoholic after
going to all those cocktail parties. Maybe their kids were
supporting hundred-dollar-a-day coke habits. And maybe
Don was full of shit, but he didn't think so. He thought
somehow the Abelsons were paying the price of having all
that money.
He pushed the Abelsons from his thoughts. He'd been
thinking about them just to get his mind off the body on the
floor, let his thoughts settle. Now he reconsidered every-
32

IT'S LOOSE
thing he'd learned so far, and he still came to the same
conclusion. There was only one explanation for what had
happened here, even if it was crazy—absolutely fucking
crazy.
Unlocking the front door, he stepped out onto the porch.
Landers was waiting for him. "Come on," Don said, and the
two of them went back to the road. Don looked into the
Blazer, seeing that the keys were still in the ignition. He'd
have to look through the car, but that could wait.
Climbing into his Cherokee, he picked up the two-way
radio microphone. "Unit one to Ice Island."
"Go ahead," Corrine said.
"You run that plate?"
"Ten-four. It's ten-seventy-five out of Minnesota."
Corrine loved to use the ten codes. With just the two of
them using the radio and no one caring enough to listen in,
it was probably unnecessary, but Don saw no reason to spoil
her fun. Ten-seventy-five meant a stolen car.
"When was it reported stolen?" he asked.
"Two days ago in Duluth."
"Ten-four, Corrine. Thanks."
"You got a signal one out there?" she asked, her curiosity
getting the best of her. Signal one meant homicide.
"I got a DOA. I'll tell you the details later."
Getting out of the car, Don found Landers standing there,
eyeing him expectantly, wanting to hear Don's explanation
for all this. When Don didn't offer one, the old man said,
"Got any ideas yet who killed him?"
"Tim, there was only one set of tracks."
Landers considered that. "You mean he did it to himself
... did that to himself?"
"He was the only one there."
Landers let it sink in for a moment, then he said, "It's like
the Japanese used to do, the samurai. They'd commit
suicide by cutting out their guts. Did you know that?"
Don didn't answer.
"I learned about it by watching Shogun. I saw a rerun of
the whole series last week over at Hank Bergstrom's—on
one of those satellite channels he gets. Even with scrambling
33

IT'S LOOSE
he still gets over a hundred channels on his satellite dish,
you know. But you know what?"
"What?" Don asked absently. He was wondering why
anyone would steal a car in Duluth, drive all the way to Ice
Island, then commit such a bizarre suicide in the Abelsons'
cabin.
"When the samurai did it, they had a guy standing by with
a sword to chop off their heads, because the pain would be
so bad that a guy could only stand it for a few seconds."
"Uh-huh."
"Well, this guy didn't have anybody like that. How the
hell could he give himself so much pain? I mean, there are a
lot easier ways to commit suicide. Why didn't he use one of
them?"
"I've been asking myself the same question," Don said.
He'd been asking himself a lot of other questions, too.
Something, some instinctive part of himself, was feeling real
uneasy about all this. He had the feeling he was knee-deep in
shit and slowly sinking, and he had absolutely no idea why
he felt that way.
34

Two
1
It was early afternoon before Don got back to the police
station. He had to photograph the scene of the suicide,
fingerprint the dead man, dust the handle of the knife
protruding from his belly, and arrange for an ambulance
from the mainland to pick up the body and take it to
Marquette for autopsy. He also had to get Phil Deemis at
the Shell station to come out with his wrecker and tow the
stolen Blazer to the parking lot behind the station, which
served as the impound area.
After a quick stop at home for a ham sandwich, Don set
about doing all the paperwork that went along with some-
thing like this. He had to type up a report, a copy of which
had to be sent to the coroner. The Duluth police had to be
notified concerning the recovery of the stolen Blazer. And
since the dead man was a John Doe, Don would have to
send a copy of his prints to the FBI.
Meanwhile, Corrine Matthews was taking phone calls
from Ice Islanders curious to know about the man who'd
broken into the Abelsons' cabin and committed suicide with
35

IT'S LOOSE
a kitchen knife. Tim Landers had undoubtedly told every-
one he saw about it. Not much happened in a place like this,
so something as bizarre as a guy trying to eviscerate himself
with a chef's knife was grist for the gossip mill.
Hanging up the phone, Corrine got up and walked over to
Don's desk. "Anything I can do to help?" she asked.
"Thanks for the offer, Corrine, but most of this is stuff
I've got to do myself."
She stood there a moment, not saying anything, then she
asked, "Don, you sure this is a suicide?"
"There was only one set of tracks."
"I know, but. . . well, couldn't someone have stepped in
exactly the same holes in the snow, to make it look like only
one person had been there?"
"I dusted the knife, Corrine. The only prints on it were
the dead guy's."
She frowned, making furrows in the freckles on her
forehead. "Couldn't someone have wiped off the knife, then
wrapped the victim's hand around the handle to leave his
prints?"
"Corrine, you've been reading too many mystery novels."
"Well, it is possible, isn't it?" she persisted.
Don gave in. "Yes," he said. "It's possible. But I think it's
all pretty improbable."
Corrine shook her head. "Not as improbable as someone
doing . . . doing that to himself."
"I'm only telling you what I think, Corrine. I'm not
dismissing the possibility of murder out of hand. I'm
sending the guy's prints to the FBI. There'll be an autopsy,
and I've still got the Blazer. If anything suspicious turns up,
I'll see if I can get the state police techs to go over it."
"I know you know what you're doing, Don. That's not
why I'm asking. It's just that it's so hard to believe someone
could do that to himself. I mean, how could he?"
"People do crazy things, Corrine. Something snaps, and
all of a sudden they're not thinking normally anymore. Look
at Son of Sam. Guy was taking orders from a dog. There's no
way to figure it, no way to make sense out of it."
Corrine nodded. Although she knew such things hap-
36

IT'S LOOSE
pened, apparently she didn't understand them, not deep
down where it really counted. The phone rang, and she went
back to her desk to answer it. Don picked up the card
bearing the dead man's fingerprints. Getting the prints
hadn't been easy, the body being frozen the way it was, and
it would probably be a good idea to have the pathologist take
a second set after the corpse thawed. It would also be up to
the pathologist to remove the knife, which had been lodged
in the frozen corpse as tightly as King Arthur's sword had
been embedded in the stone.
Don frowned, thinking about the knife. It was a wicked-
looking thing, the blade about ten inches long, the kind of
knife the crazed killer usually wielded in splatter films.
Corrine had a good point. How the hell could someone jam
a knife like that into his own gut, then work it upward,
slicing through his insides while blood oozed out around his
fingers? The pain must have been excruciating. What kind
of single-minded determination did it take to do something
like that? What madness could have driven the man?
Don Farraday had no answers for those questions, for
deep down where it really counted he didn't understand
what had happened any better than Corrine did.
Corrine was doing something in the rear of the building
when a heavyset man with close-cropped gray hair showed
up. Stepping up to the counter, he looked at Don with
authoritative blue eyes. His bearing was military, shoulders
back, spine flagpole straight. Don wondered whether the guy
had ever been a drill sergeant.
"Help you?" he asked.
"I'm looking for someone, and I thought you might be
able to help me."
"I'll try. Who you looking for?"
"Edward Dwyer."
"There's no Dwyers on the island."
"He's not local. He would have just arrived."
Although Don hadn't put his finger on it yet, there seemed
to be something odd about the way this was going. He said,
"What's this Dwyer's business on the island?"
The man hesitated—only a fraction of a second, but Don
37

IT'S LOOSE
noted it. "I don't know what he's doing here, but I have
reason to believe that he should be here."
"You check the Superior Motel? It's the only one that's
open right now. Everything else is closed till summer."
"I've already checked it."
"What does he look like?"
"White male, mid-thirties, five-ten, a hundred eighty
pounds, brown hair, brown eyes."
Don studied the man. Although he'd avoided saying
things like "brown over brown" or "no distinguishing
marks" when giving the guy's description, he still sounded
like a cop.
"You seen him?" the man asked.
Don had indeed seen someone matching that description.
He'd been lying on the floor of the Abelson cabin with a
chef's knife sticking out of his gut. "Come on in," Don said.
"Have a seat."
The man did. "You seen him?" the guy asked again as he
sat down. He was carrying a long case that looked as if it
might contain a flute, or maybe one of those expensive pool
cues that came in sections.
"You a pool hustler?" Don asked, eyeing the case.
The guy shrugged. "I play an occasional game of eight
ball. You seen Dwyer?"
Instead of answering the question, Don said, "I'm the
town constable, Don Farraday." He looked at the man
expectantly.
"Steven Kesselring."
"What's your interest in Dwyer?"
"He owes me some money."
"Just a personal thing, between you and him."
"Yes," the man said, frowning. "May I ask why you're
being so inquisitive?"
"It's just unusual for a stranger to come here at this time
of year looking for another stranger."
"It's not illegal, is it?"
"No, it's not illegal." Don smoothed his hair. "But I'd
appreciate it if you'd show me some identification."
38

IT'S LOOSE
The man produced a driver's license. Steven A. Kessel-
ring, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He watched as Don copied
down his address, date of birth, and Social Security number.
Don handed the license back.
"You ever been to Liberal, Kansas, Mr. Kesselring?"
The man studied him. "Why do you ask?"
"How about Duluth, Minnesota?"
"Yes," Kesselring said. "I followed Dwyer from there."
"What about Liberal, Kansas?"
Kesselring sighed. "I followed him from Liberal to
Duluth."
"And yet your home's in Pittsburgh."
"That's correct."
"Which is all the explanation you're going to give me."
"Why do you need to know? Do you know Dwyer? Has
something happened to him?" .
Although Kesselring was looking at Don calmly, some-
thing in the man's eyes belied his casual manner. Behind the
facade, Kesselring was worried, maybe even afraid.
Opening his middle desk drawer, Don took out a Polaroid
of the dead man, handed it to Kesselring. "That him?"
He studied it. "Yes. What happened? How did he die?"
"Suicide."
"I see. Well, I can't collect money from a dead man, can
I?" Kesselring started to rise.
"Hold it," Don said. "I think you'd better tell me what all
this is about."
"I did tell you. Dwyer owed me some money."
"Back in Pittsburgh?"
"Yes, back in Pittsburgh."
"And he took off."
"That's right."
"Must have been a lot of money."
"It was."
"So much that you'd forget about everything else and
follow him all over the country."
"Yes."
"You a loan shark, Mr. Kesselring?"
39

IT'S LOOSE
Apparently the question caught the man off guard, be-
cause he seemed stunned. Finally he managed a small smile.
"No one ever accused me of that before."
"So you're not a loan shark?"
"No."
"But you're free to travel around in pursuit of a guy who
owes you money?"
"I'm retired. And it's the principle of the thing."
"No wife? No family?"
"My wife divorced me twenty years ago, and my children
are married and raising kids of their own. And the amount
of money Dwyer owed me was twenty-five thousand dol-
lars."
"So Dwyer committed suicide because he owed you
twenty-five thousand dollars. The shame got to him."
"I don't know why he committed suicide."
Don watched him closely. "What would you say if I told
you he was murdered?"
Kesselring's only reaction was a hint of amusement, as if
he could easily see through everything Don was trying to do.
He studied Don a moment before answering. "Was he?"
"No—at least I don't think so."
"How did he take his life?"
"Stabbed himself in the belly with a kitchen knife."
Kesselring nodded, said nothing.
"You don't seem surprised," Don said.
"It's an unusual way to commit suicide, but then suicide
itself is an irrational act."
Corrine returned from the back of the building and sat
down at her desk. As if it had been waiting for her return,
the phone rang.
"I'm going to have to get a complete statement from you,"
Don said to Kesselring. "I need to know everything you
know about Dwyer, where you met, how long you've known
him, the details of your pursuit of him around the country."
Kesselring took a moment to collect his thoughts, then
plunged in. He'd met Dwyer after retiring from the army,
and Dwyer had talked him into investing in a plumbing
40

IT'S LOOSE
supply business. Kesselring did, and the business prospered,
and Dwyer sold it for a profit three years later, still owing
Kesselring twenty-five thousand dollars. He quickly left
Pennsylvania. Angry, his pride hurt, Kesselring had traced
him through relatives, finally catching up with him in
Kansas. Dwyer had fled north, again with Kesselring hot on
his tail.
Don said, "Dwyer sure did a lot of running over a bad
debt. Was he afraid of you for some reason?"
"All I wanted was the money. I wasn't out to hurt him."
"I need the names of the relatives in Kansas," Don said.
"Lydia Gait on East Paulsen Avenue. I don't have the
number anymore, and I'm afraid I don't recall it. Sixteen
something."
"Any others?"
"Yes, in Pittsburgh. Uh, Gerald Mercer on Allegheny
Avenue. There were others I talked to on the phone, but I
don't recall their names right now."
Swiveling her chair so that she faced him, Corrine said,
"Guess what, Don?"
"What?"
"That was the state. They've just ordered the Split into
effect."
"You're kidding. This early?"
"They say they've got a separation, a three-foot gap.
Looks like Hank Bergstrom's right again."
Don shook his head, amazed at Bergstrom's reliability.
Kesselring was staring at him, clearly puzzled. When Don
didn't offer to explain, the man said, "I have all the
information you need back in Pittsburgh. When I get back
there, perhaps I can phone you."
"You won't be going back for a while."
"Why? You have no reason to hold me."
"No, I don't. How'd you get here—to the island?"
"I rented a car in Duluth."
"I hope you got a good rate."
"Why?"
"You can't get off the island. The state has just closed the

IT'S LOOSE
ice bridge for the season. You're here until the ferry starts
running."
"How long will that be?"
"Depends on the weather. At least a few weeks."
Kesselring rubbed his brow. "Does this happen often,
people getting stranded here?"
"Last time was five or six years ago."
Kesselring nodded. "Couldn't someone walk to the main-
land? It's only three miles."
"Not once the ice starts breaking up. The only way it can
be done is to carry a canoe with you so you can get across the
gaps. I'd discourage anyone from trying it, because it's
dangerous. A guy died once attempting it. Somehow, I don't
know how, he fell into the water."
"He drowned?"
"No, he was able to pull himself back onto the ice, but
that water's just a fraction of a degree above freezing, and
the air temperature's usually a lot colder than that. You die
of hypothermia."
Don had expected Kesselring to be upset, but instead he
seemed thoughtful. "And when exactly was the ice bridge
closed?" Kesselring asked.
"Just now."
Kesselring was lost in his thoughts for a moment, then he
said, "Maybe."
"Maybe what?"
"Oh, uh, I was thinking about something else." Again
he seemed to ponder something, then he said, "Have
there been any other unusual deaths here in the last few
days?"
"No. Why?"
"Nothing. Just idle curiosity."
"Look, Mr. Kesselring, you can't ask a question like that
and then just dismiss it as idle curiosity. You must have had
some reason for asking it."
"Dwyer could be dangerous. He had a bad temper. I just
wanted to make sure he didn't harm anyone other than
himself."
42

IT'S LOOSE
Don wasn't sure he believed that. He wasn't sure
he believed a great deal of what Kesselring had said. But
then the man wasn't going anywhere. He'd have plenty of
time to question him again.
"You know where the Superior Motel is," Don said. "My
advice would be to get yourself a room. Ask about the
weekly rate."
For a long moment, Kesselring just looked at him, and he
seemed to be debating with himself, as if there was some-
thing else he might say. But then he stood, saying, "I'll go see
about a room at the motel."
Don watched as he let himself through the gate in the
counter, walked to the door, and left. Instantly Corrine was
up and standing beside Don's desk. "Did he know anything
about the guy in the Abelsons' cabin?" she asked.
"He identified the guy as Edward Dwyer, said he owed
him some money. Put Dwyer into NCIC, see if the comput-
er recognizes him."
"You have a DOB or Social Security number?"
"No, just the name."
Corrine looked doubtful. "I don't know what you'll get
back with just a name."
"Try it and see. Last known address was Liberal, Kansas.
Also run Steven A. Kesselring." He gave her Kesselring's
date of birth and Social Security number.
Corrine turned to the computer that stood on a small
table beside her desk and punched in the information. A few
minutes passed, then she swiveled around to face Don.
"NCIC's down," she said.
"For how long?"
"Who knows?"
"Keep trying. I've got to go set up the signs and barricades
for the Split before somebody drives off the ice into Lake
Superior."
"What else did he say, that guy Kesselring?"
"I'll tell you when I get back, Corrine. I don't have time
right now."
Although she was all but twitching with curiosity, Corrine
43

IT'S LOOSE
understood that imparting the juicy details to her was of
much lower priority than seeing to the barricades for the
Split. Looking resigned, she said, "I'll help you get the
barricades out of the storeroom."
2
At the edge of town, Island Avenue became a state highway,
which curved to the right, ran a short distance, and ceased
being a road in the conventional sense. In the warmer
months the highway ended at the ferry landing. But now it
cut left, around the landing, and onto the frozen surface of
the lake. Don stopped the Cherokee and got out.
Standing in front of the Jeep, he stared off toward the
mainland, which was invisible in the grayness of the over-
cast day. A gust of wind pushed against him, sending snow
flurries eddying across the ice that covered the lake. Stretch-
ing off into the distance were the two rows of barrels that
marked the ice bridge, their safety-orange color seeming out
of place in this scene of grays and whites.
He felt lonely standing there, although he wasn't sure
why. Though cut off from the mainland, he was here with his
wife and daughter, along with the island's other permanent
residents, people he'd known all his life. And yet, staring
into the gray day, watching the two lines of orange barrels
shrink and converge, he was as forlorn as the lone survivor
of a shipwreck, all by himself in a lifeboat. Don shook his
head, trying to make the strange, lonely feeling go away.
But it didn't go away. He kept thinking there were only
two links to the outside world, the ferry and the ice bridge,
and both were severed. Ice Island was isolated.
But then isolation was relative, wasn't it? You could still
call anywhere in the world on the phone. You still could see
TV, watch basketball live from New York, or see news in the
making from Japan or England or Egypt. And you got the
mail once a week. Jerry Atwell flew it over from the
mainland in his Cessna. The island didn't have a landing
strip, so Jerry had to get his wife, Estelle, to push the
44

IT'S LOOSE
mailbags out, let them float down on a parachute. Strangely,
nothing had ever been damaged coming down that way. Two
years ago during the Split, Vivian Rogers got a package of
French crystal left to her by an aunt in Arizona, and not a
single piece was broken. Of course, you couldn't send any
mail out for a few weeks, but for Ice Islanders that was just
something you had to live with.
Which meant Don wasn't going to be able to send the
dead man's fingerprints to the FBI. No matter. The ambu-
lance would have made it off the island before the Split, so
the body would be on the mainland. He'd have the patholo-
gist send the guy's prints to the FBI.
Don opened the back of the Cherokee and began taking
out the barricades: sawhorses with battery-operated flashing
lights and signs that said road closed. The highway depart-
ment would take care of the orange barrels on the mainland
side of the ice separation. Vince Terrell, who read water
meters and did odd jobs for the town, would pick up the
ones on the island side, put them in his stakebed Dodge
truck. It wasn't safe to go too far from shore, where the ice
was thinner, so a few of the barrels out toward the midway
point were lost each year. One time Vince had been sick
during the Split, and five hundred twenty-eight official State
of Michigan orange barrels had simply sunk when the ice
melted. The highway department guy in charge of this area
still got mad about it sometimes.
Don was standing there admiring the way he'd set up the
barricades when Corrine's voice came over the radio in the
Cherokee. She sounded excited. Don got into the Jeep,
picked up the microphone.
"Go ahead, Corrine."
"I got the NCIC check back on that name you gave me."
"And?"
"Well, maybe I shouldn't go into it over the radio. Can
you ten-nineteen?" Which meant return to the station.
Never before had Corrine considered anything too sensi-
tive to discuss over the air, so Don was puzzled. He said,
"I'll be right there."
45

IT'S LOOSE
3
Hank Bergstrom stood in his basement, listening to the pops
and groans of the deteriorating ice. His house was only a
couple of hundred feet from the lake, just high enough so
that he didn't have to guard against lake water seeping into
the basement.
Crack! Thump!
There were tons and tons of ice out there on the surface of
Lake Superior, millions of tons, he supposed. The pressure
that much ice could generate was enormous. The creation of
even a hairline crack could release huge amounts of energy.
Pop! Ting! Rumble!
Transmitted through the frozen ground, the noise was
amplified by the basement. For some reason the ice was
deteriorating rapidly this year. He'd been right on the
money, predicting an early Split. The basement never let
him down. The ice would start making a certain thunk-ping
sound, and when that happened the Split was five to six days
away. He'd been off by four days once, the worst guess he'd
made in a lifetime of predicting the Split.
Clunk! Grumble!
The basement was a dingy place, damp in the summer,
cold in the winter. Cement floor and walls painted gray.
Gray wooden steps with a loose railing. The old oil furnace
took up a lot of the space. It was a mammoth thing with
metal ducts coming out of it, running in all directions like
tentacles. He had a workbench down there, with a rusty vise
that he never used. Along the back wall were the shelves
containing the vegetables Ruth had put up in mason jars.
Carrots, peas, rutabagas, green beans, corn, and the other
things Ruth grew in the backyard. No tomatoes. The sum-
mers were too cool and too short to grow tomatoes. Same
for peppers.
Stuff in the mason jars probably wasn't good anymore.
Ruth had canned all of it the fall before she died, five years
ago. He'd taken her to the hospital in Marquette for an
operation on her knees, and they'd discovered leukemia.
Ruth had never come home from the hospital.
46

IT'S LOOSE
Hank had left the food there on the shelves. Sort of a
monument to Ruth, who'd worked so hard tending the
garden, then had spent hours with the pressure canner
putting up the harvest. There was no way he could ever
throw the stuff out. When he died someone else would do it,
but for Hank to do it himself would be like telling Ruth he
didn't love her anymore.
A tear trickled down Hank Bergstrom's cheek. He'd been
married to Ruth for forty-one years. The five he'd spent
without her had been the loneliest time of his life. He
shook his head. It was being in the depressing basement,
seeing all those mason jars. And it was the Split. There
was something about the Split that drew people into them-
selves, got them thinking about the past, made them a
little sad.
Rattle! Snap!
Turning away from the shelves with the mason jars, Hank
Bergstrom moved toward the wooden steps that would take
him back to the main part of the house. He was planning to
switch on the TV, see what was coming in on his satellite
dish. Nothing good, he suspected. He could pull in a
hundred channels, and there was nothing good on any of
them. Said something about the people who decided what
went on television. If there wasn't anything worth watching
when you had a hundred choices—
Hank.
He stopped with his hand on the railing, his foot poised
between the cement floor and the first wooden step. What
he'd heard had been just another noise caused by the ice,
and yet it sounded as though someone had spoken his
name.
Clank!
That's what he'd heard. It had just sort of sounded like
Hank. He started up the steps again.
Hank!
Again he stopped, his stomach constricting a little bit, a
chill starting to form at the base of his spine. The ice
couldn't be calling his name. It just wasn't possible.
Clump! Flump! Thwak!
47

IT'S LOOSE
Hank!
Hank Bergstrom stood there at the bottom of the stairs,
frozen. He had unquestionably heard his name. But it
hadn't been a voice exactly. Rather, it had been as if he were
sensing an unspoken communication that had no identifia-
ble source, that came from no specific direction. He was
shivering.
You can end the loneliness, Hank.
Still frozen there like a Hank Bergstrom statue, he stared
off into the shadows of the basement, seeing his workbench,
the big old oil furnace, the mason jars. A coldness more
absolute than that of a January night had spread throughout
his being. This was the coldness of space, not just a biting
chill but the total absence of warmth. He sensed he was in
th® presence of something beyond his experience, beyond
his comprehension. Something unspeakable.
Don't be afraid, Hank. Let's chat, you and me. Talk things
over. See if there isn't some way we can deal with this
problem of yours.
Problem? Hank communicated without speaking aloud.
What problem?
Your loneliness, Hank.
I'm not lonely.
Come on, Hank. You can confide in me. I know you miss
Ruth. I know how you feel. Let me help. What do you say?
He was communicating with . . . with something. And yet
he wasn't speaking. This couldn't be happening. This was
impossible. But then why was he so afraid?
You need a friend, Hank. Let me be your friend.
There was something seductive about the voice that
wasn't a voice. Something about it seemed to say, Trust me,
let me in. And Hank Bergstrom found himself beginning to
wonder why he was resisting. Maybe he needed a friend. A
new kind of friend. A special friend. No one would know.
His friend would be with him. Always. Inside. The loneli-
ness would be gone forever.
Yes, Hank. Yes. Let me in. Let me end the loneliness.
Suddenly Ruth was there, her once slim frame rounded by
48

IT'S LOOSE
age, her gray hair neat and short, her clear blue eyes studying
him lovingly. She was smiling at him warmly.
You need a friend, Ruth said.
Oh, Ruth. Oh, my Lord, Ruth.
She turned, studied the mason jars, then faced him again.
Come to me, she said. She was wearing one of her favorite
house dresses, white with pink flowers.
Hank took a step toward her. Then another.
That's right, Hank. Come to me. Come to me.
He took still another step toward her. Then two more.
Then he was rushing to her, spreading his arms wide, ready
to embrace his Ruth, hold her, tell her how much he missed
her.
She vanished.
No! Something inside him was screaming. He'd lost her
once. To lose her again would be intolerable.
You can have her back. «
How?
You know.
Hank Bergstrom had wanted nothing more in his entire
life. If he could have Ruth back, nothing else would matter.
He was on the verge of saying, Yes! Screaming it, repeating
it. But something buried deep within him prevented Hank
from doing so. Maybe it was the rigid Scandinavian up-
bringing that had taught him nothing was free, everything
had to be earned, the price paid. Maybe it was all those
Sundays in the Lutheran church, when he'd learned that
salvation comes through faith. Somehow, on some level,
Hank understood that to say yes to this voice that wasn't a
voice would be to take a step away from the faith he'd
learned about in church. A step away from salvation,
toward . . . toward something else. Damnation, he sup-
posed. And then, of course, there was the price, which
hadn't been mentioned, but which would unquestionably be
exacted.
Suddenly Ruth was there again, smiling, looking at him
lovingly. Come to me. Come to Ruth.
He shook his head.
49

IT'S LOOSE
Ruth's smile vanished as tears ran down her cheeks. She
looked hurt, miserable. Hank Bergstrom felt his resolve
draining away. How could he hurt Ruth? How could he?
Although he desperately wanted to go to her, tell her he was
sorry, wipe away her tears, he remained where he was. Ruth
was dead. This couldn't be Ruth. And the price of embrac-
ing this illusion was much too high.
Damnation. The opposite of salvation.
"No," Hank said. And this time he said it aloud. "You're
not Ruth."
Abruptly Ruth was gone. And so was the presence that
had been there, communicating without speaking aloud.
Hank was cold, colder than he'd ever been. The flesh all over
his body had goosebumps. He was shaking so violently he
wasn't sure he could climb the steps to the kitchen. He
forced himself to ascend the stairs. He had to get out of the
basement.
When he reached the kitchen, he sat down at the table,
rested his head on his arms like a first-grader at nap time. He
was sure he had just come within a whisker of falling into
the grip of something bad, something evil. He had always
thought losing Ruth was the worst thing that could ever
happen to him. Now he knew there was something even
worse than that. And he knew there was a thing in the world
that was totally evil, so vile it would use his love of Ruth to
lure him, trap him, make him its own.
Hank Bergstrom began to cry.
He had never missed Ruth more than he did at this
particular moment. He felt completely alone, as if he were
the only person on the planet.
50

Three
1
The name Edward Dwyer's a hit on NCIC," Corrine said as
Don entered the police station. He moved to his desk, and
she followed him, holding a computer printout. She was so
excited she could barely contain herself.
"They give a description?" he asked.
"Male Caucasian, DOB six twelve fifty-five, five-nine, one
seventy to one eighty, brown over brown."
"Matches," Don said. "What's he wanted for?"
"Quadruple homicide. Blew away his wife and two kids,
then drove across town to his brother's house and blew him
away too."
Don shook his head. "Another crazy with a gun nice and
handy."
"There's more," Corrine said. "He's also wanted for
questioning in connection with a murder in Utah and
another in Colorado."
"Guy took his killing spree on the road."
"Sounds like it."
"Where's he from?"
51

IT'S LOOSE
"Blake, California. That's where he killed his wife and
kids and brother."
Don considered what he'd just heard. Dwyer was from
California, where he was wanted for murder. So why had
Steven Kesselring from Pittsburgh been after him? And why
had he lied about Dwyer's being a business associate who
owed him money? And about where Dwyer was from? Was
Kesselring some kind of a bounty hunter? Did he carry a
disassembled sniper rifle in that case? Maybe someone out
in California had put up a reward, and he was trying to
collect it. It seem farfetched on the surface, but stranger
things had happened.
"What's going on here?" Corrine asked.
"The guy who was in here earlier was looking for Dwyer,
but I don't know why."
"Who is he?"
"Says he's a retired businessman from Pittsburgh."
"But you don't believe him."
Don sighed. "I think everything he told me was a lie,
except for his name. You got anything back from NCIC on
him?"
"He was negative."
"Okay," Don said. "Let's see if we can find out who
Steven Kesselring really is."
He picked up the phone, dialed long-distance information
for Pittsburgh, and got the number of the police depart-
ment. Although Corrine had returned to her desk, she
watched him with unabashed curiosity. It took ten minutes
of being transferred and put on hold before he was con-
nected with a Sergeant DiLorenzo, who was apparently in
charge of inquiries from other departments.
Don explained who he was. "I was wondering if you could
check on a Pittsburgh resident for me. His name's Steven
Kesselring." He gave DiLorenzo Kesselring's address, date
of birth, and Social Security number.
"I don't have to run a check on him," DiLorenzo said. "I
know who he is."
"Who is he?"
52

IT'S LOOSE
DiLorenzo hesitated, then said, "One of ours."
"A cop?"
"Used to be. A lieutenant. Took early retirement a few
years ago. Why do you want to know about him?"
"Because he came here looking for a guy who turned up
dead."
"You saying Kesselring might have done it?"
"No. It was a suicide. But the guy was wanted in
California. Can you tell me why a former Pittsburgh police
lieutenant would be looking for a guy wanted in Califor-
nia?"
A long moment of silence passed, then the police officer in
Pennsylvania said, "I don't know what Kesselring's been
doing since he retired. All I can tell you is a while back I got
another inquiry just like this one—about Kesselring."
"Tell me about it."
"Not much to tell. Department somewhere down in
Florida wanted to know about Kesselring."
"Where in Florida?"
"Don't remember. Is it important?"
"I don't know. It could be."
"I guess I can look it up. You want to hold?"
"Sure."
Don sat there with the phone to his ear, listening to the
gentle background hiss of the long-distance connection,
burning up the taxpayers' money. Corrine was still watching
him, taking in every word. After several silent moments had
passed, DiLorenzo came back on the line.
"West Palm Beach. Inquiry came from a Detective Aaron
Leibowitz. Wanted to know about Kesselring and whether
he knew a guy named Joseph Oldfield. That's all it says."
Don wrote down the information. "Did the name mean
anything?"
"Oldfield? No one around here had ever heard of him."
"Does Kesselring have any friends or family there who
might know what he's up to?"
"I don't think so. Hang on." Papers rustled in the
background. "He was divorced a long time ago, never
53

IT'S LOOSE
remarried. Parents both dead. No brothers or sisters. Two
kids, both married and living out of state. No current
addresses on them."
"How about friends?"
"He had some friends here in the department, but I don't
think he's seen any of them for a long time. After he retired,
he sort of lost touch. That's how it usually goes. Guys retire,
they lose touch."
"You got any idea why he'd be pursuing a guy who's
wanted in California?"
"No, can't figure it at all."
"Well, I won't waste any more of your time," Don said.
"Thanks for talking to me."
"Hold on, don't hang up. I need the name of the guy
Kesselring was asking about and whatever details you can
give me. So I can make a report on your inquiry."
Don told him everything he knew. Corrine listened so
intently Don halfway expected her to start taking notes.
After hanging up, he said, "Corrine, I hope you realize that
what you hear about this isn't for general dissemination."
She looked hurt. "Of course I know that. Why do you
think I didn't tell you about Dwyer over the radio? I know
when something should be confidential."
"I was only reminding you, Corrine. Not impugning your
trustworthiness."
"What are you going to do now?" she asked, any slight
already forgotten.
"Call Florida."
"Why?"
"Kesselring was down there asking questions, and the
police checked on him. That's all I know." He picked up the
phone. Detective Leibowitz was in, and Don explained who
he was and what he wanted to know.
"Yeah, I remember Kesselring," Leibowitz said. "We had
a real mess on our hands. This guy—Joseph Oldfield—was
fired from a burger joint. All the other people working in the
place were Latins, and this Oldfield was a cracker from up in
the northern part of the state. Didn't get along with anybody
who wasn't white. Anyway, the attitude got him fired. So he
54

IT'S LOOSE
went out to his pickup, got a three-fifty-seven out of the
glove box, came back inside, and blew away the manager.
Then he just started shooting people at random. When we
showed up, he took hostages, threatened to kill them. It was
on all the networks. You remember it?"
Don said he didn't.
"Oh. Well, anyway, it was a standoff. Oldfield couldn't get
out, and we couldn't get in because of the hostages. Lasted
for eighteen hours, and then Oldfield ate the three-fifty-
seven. Put the back of his head all over the wall. You ever
notice how often these guys do that? They kill a bunch of
innocent people, then eat the piece. You know what I don't
understand?"
"What?"
"I don't understand why the crazy assholes always have to
take a bunch of innocent people with them. They want to eat
the piece, fine. One less psycho in the world. But why the
hell do they always have to take the wife and the kids or a
bunch of people who just happened to be there with them?
I've always wondered about that."
Don said he didn't have the answer. "What was
Kesselring's connection with all this?" he asked.
"He just showed up, said he knew Oldfield and was
willing to try to talk to him. Well, let's just say I had my
doubts about the guy. He plainly wasn't from North Flori-
da, and him knowing some cracker like Oldfield just didn't
seem likely. So I asked him about it. He was kinda vague
about where he knew Oldfield from, but he said he was a
retired cop from Pittsburgh. I guess he figured that would
make me trust him, him being a cop and all. Anyway, I did
the only thing I could do, I checked on him. Pittsburgh said
he used to be one of theirs all right, but if he knew anyone
named Oldfield they weren't aware of it."
"Did he get to talk to Oldfield?"
"No. It was right about then that the guy ate the three-
fifty-seven. As soon as that happened, the guy disappeared."
"How many people died in the restaurant?"
"Four dead, two wounded. Five dead if you include
Oldfield."
55

IT'S LOOSE
"How many hostages got out alive?" Don wasn't sure why
he was asking that. He just wanted to find out as much as he
could, he supposed. You never knew what might turn out to
be important.
"Five," Leibowitz replied. "I wasn't there, but from what
I hear they were in pretty bad shape mentally. One woman
insisted she saw a ... I don't know what to call it—a
monster, I guess. A thing with red eyes and big teeth. I'm not
poking fun at her. If I'd spent eighteen hours in there with
Oldfield, I would have been in never-never land too."
Don said anyone might be a little crazy after a thing like
that. Leibowitz asked him why he was interested in Kessel-
ring, and Don explained what had happened.
Leibowitz said, "So Kesselring's up there in Michigan
now, looking for some guy killed some people in California.
You think he's a groupie, likes mass murderers?"
"Maybe he's a vigilante."
Leibowitz was quiet a moment, considering that.
"Doesn't make sense as far as what was happening here. I
mean, we had the place surrounded, snipers on the rooftops,
SWAT guys ready to storm the place if necessary. What
could one guy do?"
"If he somehow managed to get inside, he could have
tried to take the guy out."
"Maybe. If that's the case, then Kesselring's only slightly
less crazy than the people he's after."
They talked for another few moments, but nothing they
said shed any light on Kesselring's apparent preoccupation
with mass murderers. When Don hung up, he saw that
Corrine was staring at him expectantly. He could under-
stand her curiosity. Life on Ice Island was dull. Some
stranger trying to disembowel himself with a kitchen knife
was exciting. And when he turns out to be a mass murderer,
it's downright thrilling. You toss in Kesselring, and you've
got enough to keep the island buzzing for months.
When Don repeated what Leibowitz had told him,
Corrine said, "This is really something." She seemed awed.
"Dwyer was crazy," Don said. "He was running, and he
came here."
56

IT'S LOOSE
"And killed himself," Corrine reminded him.
"Sometimes that's what crazy people do. They kill them-
selves."
"Like . . . that?"
"As I said, he was crazy."
"What about Kesselring?"
"I don't know why Kesselring's here—although I know
it's not the reason he gave me."
"What are you going to do?"
Don stood up. "I'm going over to the Superior Motel and
see if Kesselring's checked in yet." He got his jacket from
the coat tree, slipped it on.
"Don."
"Yeah?"
"Be careful, okay? All this is just sort of weird. It makes
me uncomfortable."
It made Don a little uncomfortable too, but he didn't
mention that to Corrine.
2
The Superior Motel was a collection of white cabins on the
east edge of town. Coming in from the mainland, you drove
north a short distance from the ferry landing (or the ice
bridge), and then the road curved to the east, becoming
Island Avenue. The motel was on your left, the first thing
you came to.
Don stopped at the office. Patsy Brock, who ran the place
with her husband, Stan, told him Kesselring had checked in
but she'd seen him go out. Don decided that there were only
two places Kesselring could have gone, the Icicle Lounge or
the Islander Cafe—no one ever said the people here had a
lot of imagination when it came to picking names.
The cafe was on the south side of Island Avenue, next to
Ace Hardware. The island had two restaurants, the Islander
and a more expensive place that catered to tourists. The
Michigander Inn served walleye pike prepared in various
ways, steak, lobster, and desserts made with local wild
57

IT'S LOOSE
raspberries. It was open only during the warm weather,
when the ferry was running. Local people ate at the Islander,
which specialized in meals that could be served with instant
mashed potatoes.
The decor was as unpretentious as the menu. Booths with
black vinyl seats, tables with speckled Formica tops. On the
walls were paintings of local scenes—lighthouses, Lake
Superior, snowscapes. Don stood just inside the door,
looking over the handful of customers. Kesselring was not
among them.
"Hey, it's the chief of police," Nancy Nowaski said,
stepping up beside Don. Nancy was the waitress. She was
plump and middle-aged, and she wore her blond hair in a
mass of tight little curls.
"I may be the chief," Don said, "but I'm also the school
crossing guard and the meter maid. Oh yeah, and I have to
wash the police car too."
"Who you looking for?" Nancy asked.
"Guy named Kesselring. Gray hair, looks like a retired
drill sergeant."
"The guy who got stuck here when they declared the
Split?"
"That's the one. You seen him?"
"Yeah. He was here just a few minutes ago. Ate the
special. Hamburger steak and mashed potatoes with carrots
and peas."
"Where'd he go, do you know?"
"Didn't say, but he's got to be staying over at the Superior
Motel unless he knows somebody on the island."
Don nodded. "You talk to him?"
"Yeah. And you know what he asked me? He wanted to
know if anybody had been acting strangely. I asked him
what he meant by strangely, and he said different, weird. I
asked him in what way different or weird, and he said in any
way at all."
"What'd you tell him?"
"That if anybody had been acting weird I hadn't noticed.
Why was he asking me that?"
"I wish I knew," Don said.
58

IT'S LOOSE
3
Sensing the life around it, it moved past the wooden houses
of Ice Island. It was invisible to those living in the houses,
for their sensory abilities were limited to their own narrow
plane of existence. It, on the other hand, could occupy many
worlds, and it could be seen only when it was in a transition-
al state.
It was very old, as old as the Earth itself. Maybe older.
Maybe its kind had floated in space even before the universe
was formed. It was unable to remember.
It had many names, but they were all names invented by
humans and thus of no significance. It had no name of its
own, designated by its own kind.
Ahead was a two-story house with green shutters. It felt
drawn to that house, for someone within was ready, open,
waiting. Waiting for it.
And it would feed.
4
After leaving the Islander Cafe, Don drove to the Icicle
Lounge, which was in the next block, on the other side of
Island Avenue. It was a white clapboard building with a
neon Special Export beer sign in the window. Kesselring
was by himself in a corner booth, drinking a Budweiser. The
long, narrow case he carried was by his feet. Don joined
him.
"Is there anything unique about this area?" Kesselring
asked. "You know, a special local beer, a distinctive cui-
sine?"
"We have a restaurant that serves wild raspberries and
fiddlehead ferns, but it's not open."
Kesselring nodded, didn't say anything.
"And there's a place on the mainland makes pasties, sort
of folded-over beef pot pies."
Again Kesselring just nodded.
The Icicle Lounge could pass for a neighborhood bar in
59

IT'S LOOSE
Milwaukee or Detroit or Cleveland. It was a place to drink,
shoot the breeze, get away from the rest of the world for a
while. It had no theme, no fake icicles hanging from the
ceiling or anything like that. And it had no jukebox to rattle
the walls with heavy metal music. The customers were
mainly people middle-aged or older, and they'd probably
take a sledge hammer to anything that spewed out the top
forty. This was Lawrence Welk country. A wild tune was a
polka.
"You travel around a lot?" Don asked. "Sample a lot of
local brew, local cooking?"
"When you're retired you get to travel," Kesselring said.
"Been to Florida?"
"Sure."
"How about California?"
"There too."
"Ever been to Blake?"
"Yeah, I've been to Blake. It's a farming community in the
San Joaquin Valley."
Before Don could ask anything else, the cocktail waitress
arrived. She was about fifty, with salt-and-pepper hair. Her
name was Sally Wolfe. She and her husband owned the
place.
"How you doing, Don?" she asked. "Get you anything?"
"How about a Special Export?"
"We're out. The truck didn't arrive before the Split was
declared."
"You have enough brew on hand to see you through?"
Don asked.
"We should. We'd already stocked up on most brands.
Just the one distributor didn't make it."
"Give me a Bud then."
"You got it." She asked Kesselring whether he wanted
another, and he said yes.
"You used to be a police officer," Don said after Sally
Wolfe was gone, "A lieutenant in Pittsburgh."
"You've been checking."
"That's what you do when you're a cop. You stay skepti-
cal, you check to make sure."
60

IT'S LOOSE
"That's true," Kesselring said.
"Why'd you lie to me?"
Kesselring sighed. "I'm sorry about that. Not much
professional courtesy in lying to another officer. I did it
because it was easier, that's all."
"Easier than what?"
"The truth."
Sally put their beer on the table, turned, and left.
"What is the truth?" Don asked.
"I was following Dwyer because someone had to do it."
He took a swallow of beer. "Look, I felt useless being
retired. I hated it. I missed being a cop. To keep this short,
let's just say that eventually I figured out what I could do to
be useful again. People commit a crime in one place and
take off. It takes years sometimes before they're caught—if
they're ever caught—because there's no one to stay on a
criminal's tail, follow him across the country if necessary,
stick with him until he's apprehended. I decided to be that
person."
He smiled sheepishly. "Listen, I know it sounds like some
comic-book hero nonsense, but it's not. Look at Dwyer. I
followed him all the way from California, and I damn near
got him. In a way, I guess you could say I did get him. At
least I'd like to think so."
"The pressure you were putting on him caused him to
commit suicide?"
"It contributed anyway."
"Why didn't you tell me this before?"
"Because you'd see me as some kind of vigilante. You'd
mistrust me."
"And you're not a vigilante."
"No. I make a citizen's arrest. I'm not a self-appointed
executioner."
"How many of these citizen's arrests have you made?"
"A couple. Caught a guy in Arizona a few months ago."
"And you use your own money to do this."
Kesselring shrugged. "I guess you could say it's my
hobby."
"Expensive hobby."
61

IT'S LOOSE
"But very rewarding."
Kesselring took another swallow of beer.
Don was unable to figure him out. The guy wasn't
mocking him, wasn't acting superior, talking down to the
small-town cop. And yet he was lying his ass off. A cop who
loved it as much as Kesselring claimed to would never have
taken early retirement; he'd have hung on until the last
second of the last day before he reached maximum retire-
ment age. If Don asked him for the name of the guy he'd
arrested in Arizona, Kesselring would give him a name. Don
would check it out, find out it was a lie, and then Kesselring
would tell him another lie. What was going on? Why was
Kesselring really here?
"Why did you lie to the police in West Palm Beach?" Don
asked.
"About what?"
"You said you knew the guy who was holding hostages in
a burger place."
"I handled a similar situation in Pittsburgh," the ex-cop
said. "Hostages were being held in a grocery store. I thought
I might be able to help because of that experience."
"So you lied. To enable you to help."
"Precisely."
For a long moment Don just looked at him, letting him
know it wouldn't wash. Finally he said, "What were you
doing in Florida?"
"I'd followed a suspect there."
"From where?"
"North Carolina."
Again Don considered asking for the name of the suspect,
then decided doing so would be pointless. Kesselring would
make one up, Don would check it out, and Kesselring would
tell him another lie. What was the point?
Don said, "I understand you were asking some questions
over at the cafe."
Kesselring looked at him as if to say, There's nothing
wrong with that, is there?
"You were asking whether anyone had been acting
strangely."
62

IT'S LOOSE
"I'm just curious. I've never been to a place where
everyone gets stranded for a few weeks once each year."
"Twice. It happens when the ice starts to freeze too."
"Of course," Kesselring said. "You'd have a winter Split
too."
"Except that one's called the Freeze. Anyway, you were
wondering whether this isolation makes us act strangely."
"Exactly. That's why I was asking. Just curiosity."
They looked at each other. Again Don tried to find
something mocking in Kesselring's eyes, and again he failed
to find it. What he did see was a grimness, a powerful
determination. And, though Kesselring tried to hide it, fear.
What was he afraid of?
Don wondered whether Kesselring was simply stuck here
because of the Split or whether he had unfinished business
on the island. An unexplained chill trickled down his back
like a glob of melting slush. He didn't like the idea that
Kesselring might have unfinished business here.
63

Four
1
Reverend Douglas Pfeil sat at the antique rolltop desk in
his study. To his left, on its own small table, was an IBM
Selectric II. The sheet of paper he'd rolled into it forty-five
minutes ago was blank. His intention had been to type an
outline for Sunday's sermon, but no words of inspiration
had come to him.
He leaned back in the wooden chair, folded his hands in
his lap. They were big hands, even bigger than was fitting for
his six-foot three-inch frame. Farmer's hands, blacksmith's
hands. Hands that could do big jobs, command obedience,
inflict pain. And yet he was in the gentlest of professions,
one in which his hands were supposed to comfort, guide,
and inspire.
Douglas Pfeil tried to recall how he'd become a Lutheran
minister and found there was no precise point at which it
had happened. In the past, when he'd tried to sort out how
he'd come to be what he was, he usually begged the
question, asserting that it was God's will. Now that explana-
tion seemed terribly inadequate.
64

IT'S LOOSE
Tilting the chair forward again, he took in the room. The
walls were lined with built-in bookshelves, all of them
crammed full of volumes. The floor was polished hardwood,
wide solid-looking planks. In the center of the room was one
of those braided rag rugs that his wife, Carolyn, liked to
make.
Carolyn was into crafts. The painting over the desk was
one of hers: a stream winding through a meadow. Similar
scenes adorned the house's other walls, along with her
needlepoint samplers. She also made ornate candles, which
she sold for outrageous prices at the annual church bazaar.
Her other interest—other than crafts—was antiques, which
was why the house was furnished with them.
They'd been married for twenty years, Carolyn and
Douglas. Like most young people, they'd been filled with
youthful enthusiasm, which slowly faded as they aged. For
some people the verve of youth was replaced by a growing
closeness, a deepening commitment, but for Carolyn and
Douglas the passage of two decades had simply resulted in
familiarity. And indifference. They had become like people
who rode the subway together each morning. They recog-
nized each other, smiled, talked, acted politely, but the
relationship was shallow, without commitment.
How could that happen to two people who'd lived togeth-
er this long, raised a child, owned cats and dogs, scraped to
make the payments on a new car, made love countless
times—and were still making it? How? The question hung
there unanswered. He was forty-five years old, his life was
probably more than half over, and all he'd managed to do
was come up with more and more questions. He'd found
very few answers.
Again he turned his attention to the typewriter. He
switched on the machine, thinking that if he typed some-
thing on the paper—anything—it would loosen the logjam
in his brain, and ideas would start spilling out. His fingers
rested on the keys. The motor hummed, the little ball ready
to go into its dance as it printed letters on the page, letters
that would become words, words of inspiration.
65

IT'S LOOSE
But the page remained blank.
Type something, he ordered his fingers. They seemed
dead, a corpse's fingers, stiff with rigor mortis.
A droplet of sweat trickled down his face. Type some-
thing, damn you! a part of his mind shrieked. And his
fingers finally moved, typed out a word: SERMON.
Okay, it was a beginning. The next thing he needed was
the title. What should the sermon be about? Finding salva-
tion through faith? How Jesus' death on the cross freed us of
sin? Why you should love your neighbors? The evils of
drugs? He shook his head. He was getting confused. More
than two decades of sermons tumbled in his . head like
clothes in a dryer. A hopeless churning jumble. And yet he
had to type, for if he didn't he'd have no sermon for Sunday.
What would he do, stand up before the congregation, smile,
say, Well, gosh, I just couldn't think of anything, so instead
of doing the sermon let's sing another hymn—any requests?
Type, his brain commanded, and his fingers reluctantly
complied. Then he looked at the word he'd typed on the
paper: shit.
He yanked the sheet out of the machine, crumpled it up,
and tossed it in the wastebasket. Closing his eyes, he tried to
calm himself. Forcing it wouldn't work; nothing would
come until he relaxed.
Once more he thought about his marriage. And about his
profession. Nothing in his life had ever been planned. He'd
drifted into studying theology, drifted into marriage. He'd
been twenty-five when he married Carolyn. It had been time
to get married, so he did. His father had been a minister, so
Douglas became one too. He'd ridden along on the flow of
life like a leaf in a stream, going where the currents and
eddies took him, never exercising any control over his
destiny.
No, he thought. You had commitment to things once. You
were deeply religious, excited about becoming a minister,
eager to help people, anxious to spread the word of God.
You were madly in love with Carolyn when you first met her;
you courted her for all you were worth.
Then where had it gone, the enthusiasm and commit-
66

IT'S LOOSE
ment? But that was another question for which he had no
answer. Maybe this was just the classic case of a minister
who'd lost his faith.
But he didn't think so. He still believed in God, and that
faith was unshaken. This was more like a midlife crisis.
Burnout. He wasn't sure that he'd taken the right steps in
life, and it was too late to start over. He was stuck with what
he had done, what he had become. And even though he still
loved God, he was tired of being one of His ministers.
Sermons had become a grind. The demands people made on
him were wearing him down. If a member of his flock was
ill, he had to comfort. If a member of his flock had a
problem, he had to listen. In return they gave him a salary
lower than the Rotorooter man's.
He put a new sheet of paper into the typewriter, turned
the machine on, looked at the paper, turned the machine off.
He sighed.	H
Through the study window he could see the gray day. It
looked more like the first day of winter than the day the Split
was declared. A gust of wind moaned softly in the eaves, and
the green shutter on the window's left side creaked on its
rusted hinges. It was frozen at about a thirty-degree angle
from the wall. He'd tried pushing it back flat against the
clapboards so he could secure it, but it wouldn't budge. It
needed new hinges. He should install them before a big
storm came along and tore the shutter from the house.
Actually, since the house was the property of the church,
he should be able to call a repairman, have him bill the First
Lutheran Church of Ice Island. But he knew that if he
wanted the job done he would have to buy the hinges and do
the work himself. I'm being selfish, he thought, when I
expect others to do things for me. Maybe he was; maybe he
wasn't. At the moment he was too depressed to care.
The phone on his desk rang, and when he lifted the
receiver Carolyn said, "Mrs. Neuhaus is on the line."
"What does she want?"
"To talk to you."
"Put her through," he said, resigned. Mrs. Neuhaus was
one of the congregation's most active members, the princi-
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IT'S LOOSE
pal force behind the bazaar and the bake sale and many of
the church's other activities. She was also quite demanding.
Anything she was unable to get volunteers to do she
expected him to do.
"How are you today, Mrs. Neuhaus?" he said, putting as
much cheer into his voice as he could.
"Just fine, Reverend. Thank you. Uh, the reason I called is
that I'm having a little bit of trouble with Brooke." Brooke
was her eighteen-year-old daughter. "As you know, she's
graduating from high school this year, and she refuses to
apply to any colleges. She's applied for a job as an airline
stewardess, and she says if she doesn't get it she's going to go
out to California with some other girls and spend the
summer bumming around—to use her term." It was clear
by the tone of her voice that Mrs. Neuhaus found the idea
shocking.
Inwardly the minister sighed. "Young people don't always
know what they want to do, Anna. Sometimes they just need
a little time to figure things out."
"Brooke is not cut out to be an airline stewardess,
Reverend. How could she possibly be happy as an airborne
waitress? And as for going to California, can you imagine
how much trouble a naive eighteen-year-old could get into
out there?"
"Maybe if you just gave her a little time—"
"Reverend, a young woman can ruin her reputation—her
whole life—if she makes the wrong decision at this point in
her life. She needs straightening out, and I'm hoping you're
someone she might listen to. She certainly won't listen to me
or Conrad. She becomes obstinate if either one of us so
much as opens our mouths."
If I had you for a mother, I'd rebel too, the minister
thought. "I'm not sure I can be of any help, but if you want
me to, I'll be happy to talk to her. Uh, how about sometime
next—"
"Can you make it tomorrow evening about seven?"
"Tomorrow evening at seven will be fine."
After hanging up, he leaned back in his desk chair. His
68

IT'S LOOSE
own daughter, Carly, who was sixteen, had problems too.
She was going out with a guy who reeked of tobacco smoke
and had an IQ that had to at least qualify him as a gifted
moron. He drove a car with no muffler and kept Carly out
until the wee hours of the morning. Douglas Pfeil kept
expecting his daughter to come home pregnant and then
give birth to something that wasn't human. If he tried to
exercise some parental authority, they'd have a scene.
Carolyn stayed out of it. Guiding her daughter took too
much time from her other interests.
How about it, Mrs. Neuhaus? Want to help out with my
daughter, have a little talk with her, tell her she's going to
catch some incurable disease from this creature she's run-
ning around with, tell her she can't see him anymore? You
talk to my daughter, and I'll talk to yours. What do you say?
Fair's fair, right? You tell Carly to stop trying to prove that
everything they say about preachers' daughters is true, and
I'll tell Brooke to let you run her life and stop complaining
about it. We got a deal?
Suddenly he wanted a drink. He didn't like alcohol very
much, but the thought of being in the bottle appealed to
him. Really in the bottle. Inside where no one could bother
him, floating along on the alcohol fumes, too plotched to
give a shit.
The green shutter squeaked, moved about a quarter of an
inch, as the wind came up, blew some flurries past the
window. And then the wind gusted again, letting out a long,
pitiful wail as it blew through the eaves.
Douglas, lean give you more than just escape into a bottle.
He sat there, confused, listening intently. Had the wind
spoken to him? That was crazy. Impossible.
You don't have to put up with this.
The voice—or the sensation of a voice—whispered in the
wind, as if it were the branches of a shrub hitting the
clapboards, a window rattling, the power line pulling against
the anchor that held it to the house. And yet it was none of
those things, and it came from no discernible direction.
Your wife doesn't love you, Douglas.
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IT'S LOOSE
He was starting to tremble.
Your daughter's a slut. Carly spreads her legs for that guy
every chance she gets.
No, the minister thought. Don't say that.
She sucks him off.
Shut up, he thought. Just shut up.
Once she humped him while another guy took pictures.
You're lying.
The pictures are in her dresser. See for yourself.
No. I won't listen. I'm imagining this. There's no voice.
It's all in my head.
Look in Carly's dresser, Reverend. See for yourself.
The minister felt as if something prickly were crawling
around in his stomach, something alien, with many legs.
And he realized with an absolute certainty that the voice
was evil. It was tempting him as surely as the serpent
tempted Eve. Take a bite of this, my friend. Smell the
tantalizing aroma? See the pretty red color? Just say yes.
"No," he said to the empty room. It was like the antidrug
commercials. Just say no. The ad campaign made it sound
so easy. Say no. One little word. Forget about all the other
pressures. Like drugs being everywhere in your neighbor-
hood, like everybody using them, like the guys who push
them having more money than you've ever seen.
"No," he said again.
The word was empty, meaningless. Because it didn't come
from the heart. He was just saying it because he knew he
should. There was another part of him that was fed up with
his life, a part that agreed with the voice about his wife not
loving him, his daughter being a slut. And that part wanted
to take a chance. He'd never done anything risky in his
entire life. His father had been a minister, and Douglas had
followed in Daddy's footsteps. He'd become a clergyman,
married a dull woman, settled into a dull life in which he
made mediocre wages and had to listen to the problems of
people like Mrs. Neuhaus.
Mrs. Neuhaus eats shit, the voice said.
"A-men," Pfeil said and issued a bitter chuckle.
70

IT'S LOOSE
There's a better way. The words floated on the wind. Say
yes. Just take a bite of the apple.
The minister stood up. There was no voice. This whole
thing was ridiculous. Did he truly believe Satan was here in
the room with him, tempting him? It was nonsense. His
theological notion of the devil was that Satan was basically a
metaphor. He represented the bad things, evil. Pfeil did not
believe that the devil spoke to people or appeared to people
or tried to steal their souls. Satan was the personification of
an idea, nothing else, no more or less real than Santa Claus.
The minister looked at his hands. They were trembling.
He made them stop. The voice in the wind had been nothing
more than his thoughts. He was confused, having doubts,
wondering about his life. What he'd been listening to was
the internal conflict of a man on the threshold of a midlife
crisis. There were things he was unwilling to admit fully to
himself, so he created an evil voice to do the job for him.
I wouldn't think those thoughts. No, sir, not me. That was
the devil.
Well, I don't need the devil's voice, Pfeil thought. Here's
the truth, in my words. My commitment to being a minister
faded into oblivion a long time ago. Now it's just a job, one I
don't like very much. And I don't like living on this island
very much. My wife is as thrilling as a bowl of corn flakes.
My daughter's out of control. If I told her not to see that jerk
anymore, she'd see him behind my back. And—
He stopped himself. He didn't want to go too far down
this road. It led to self-pity and thoughtless anger. Sure he
was disappointed with Carly. He was disappointed with lots
of things right now. But he loved Carly. And he had to
remember that sixteen was a disastrous time of life. One
crisis after another, things that seemed earth-shattering at
the time. The inability to adjust drove a lot of kids to
suicide. Maybe what she was going through wasn't that
different from what he was going through. The midteen
crisis and the midlife crisis.
Maybe we should take this problem to our minister, he
thought.
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IT'S LOOSE
He smiled then, a Pfeil smile. Throughout Carly's girl-
hood, he'd always been able to get her to grin by asking for a
Pfeil smile. He thought of the little girl with the honey-blond
hair, the big brown eyes, the ready smile, the smug catch-
me-if-you-can look she would give to her playmates. She was
the same girl now, except she'd blossomed physically into
womanhood, becoming tall and shapely and pretty. Carly
would be okay. Being a teenager didn't last forever—thank
the Lord.
As for his problems, he simply had to deal with them.
Either he could continue doing what he was doing and make
the best of it or he could seek a new line of work. Changing
careers wasn't easy at his age, but it wasn't impossible
either. His fate was in his hands. He could do something, or
he could feel sorry for himself. The choice was his.
Feeling better, he opened the door to the study and
stepped into the hall, looking for Carolyn. He heard a noise
that came from the other end of the house, so he headed that
way. He found his wife in the kitchen, scrubbing the painted
white cabinets.
"Wish we had oak cabinets," she said. "These white ones
are so hard to keep clean, and they don't go with all our
antiques."
"I don't think I can go to the board of elders and ask for
oak cabinets."
Carolyn sighed. "I know."
Her mood was depressing him again. Instead of asking
him about the sermon he'd been unable to write, Carolyn
complained about the cabinets—as if he could do some-
thing about them.
She continued scrubbing, not looking at him. She was
dressed in jeans and checked shirt. Carolyn was a thin
woman, small-breasted, with rather a plain face. He noted
how time had changed his choice of terms. When he
married her, he thought of Carolyn as quiet, unpretentious,
the ideal minister's wife. Now he used words like plain,
small-breasted.
Carly had her mother's honey-blond hair, which was one
of the few features they shared. He wasn't sure where the girl
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IT'S LOOSE
had gotten her good looks, since both her parents were so
ordinary-looking. Why was Carly back on his mind again?
Thoughts of her seemed to be poised at the edge of his
consciousness, just waiting for the chance to grab his
attention.
Suddenly words were circling in his head, words he'd
imagined were spoken to him by a voice in the wind, but
words that were really his.
Slut . . .
Humped him . . .
While another guy took pictures . . .
The pictures are in her dresser . . .
Look in Carly's dresser . . .
No, he thought. Carly wouldn't do that, not sleazily like
that, not with some guy taking pictures. And then a new
thought occurred to him. If she had done it, what was the
purpose of the pictures? Would they be shown around
school? Hey, look at this, Carly Pfeil getting her brains
humped out. Would they appear in some porno magazine
whose cover said words like teenage girls, hot, wild, and
ready?
Forcing the image to go away, Pfeil said, "I couldn't come
up with a sermon."
"You'll have to keep trying," Carolyn said with no real
interest.
He watched as she squatted by the bottom cabinets,
dropping the sponge in a yellow plastic bucket, wringing out
the suds, then scrubbing a new spot on the white-painted
wood. He wanted to yell at her: Don't you see we've got a
problem here? We're slipping into bottomless apathy! We
need to do something quickly, before it's too late! Before we
accept boredom and dullness and not caring about anything
as the norm!
But he didn't, for Carly was back in his thoughts. The
pictures are in her dresser. The words seemed to float in front
of his eyes like the stock prices electronically displayed at
the exchange in New York. Traveling from right to left.
The . . . pictures . . . are ... in .. . her . . . dresser . . .
Well, it was easy enough to put an end to this nonsense.
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IT'S LOOSE
All he had to do was look in his daughter's dresser and find
out. But he wasn't going to do that. It would be snooping.
And Carly would know she had no privacy in the house, she
wasn't trusted.
Besides, there were no pictures. Sure Carly was running
around with a guy old enough to be out of school. The guy
rented out boats during the summer and did nothing the rest
of the year. No ambition except to have a good time. Maybe
she had made it with the guy. Teens were pretty anxious to
hop into the backseats of cars with each other these days, see
what it was like. But Douglas Pfeil knew his daughter. She
wouldn't let some third party take pictures.
Abruptly the minister turned and headed for the stairs,
telling himself he was just going to the bathroom, which was
located on the second story. But when he reached the short
upstairs hallway, he realized that he'd just been deluding
himself. He wasn't going to the bathroom. He was going to
look in Carly's dresser. He stepped into her room.
The bed was unmade; clothes had been tossed on the
floor. The pink floral wallpaper was hidden behind posters
of people the minister didn't recognize. Some were clearly
rock musicians; others could be movie stars. The only
furnishings were the bed, the dresser, and a desk, everything
maple. They were the things Carly had picked out when she
was younger, and none was antique. Carly had never shared
her mother's love for things old.
Pfeil moved to the dresser. It was a mess. The top was
covered with diet soft drink cans, lipstick tubes, bottles of
perfume, eye makeup in various shades, jewelry, a clock
radio that was still set to daylight time. He put his hands on
top of the dresser, then hesitated. Did he really want to do
this? Yes, he told himself, for all he was doing was proving to
himself that there was no picture here of Carly making it
with some guy. He wasn't prying; he was proving that he'd
been foolish to even think Carly would do something like
that.
He opened the dresser.
Inside was more clutter, scarves and mittens mixed in
with jewelry and makeup, a rolled-up poster, a scribbled
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IT'S LOOSE
note that Pfeil didn't read. The next drawer had sweaters on
one side, underwear on the other. It was much neater. The
bottom drawer held still more clothes. And a box of panty
shields. The minister felt guilty, seeing the panty shields.
In the corner, under some heavy socks, was a packet of
processed photos. We use Kodak paper, it proclaimed
proudly. The minister picked it up, looked at it, but didn't
open it. Do I really want to look in here? he asked himself.
And then it occurred to him that you wouldn't send certain
kinds of photos to the regular processor. The photos in here
would have to be innocent. He pulled out the pictures and
found himself looking at the photos Carly had taken two
years ago at the church picnic. A boy in a Detroit Tigers
T-shirt trying to eat an enormous hunk of watermelon. Two
girls in shorts grinning stupidly. Carolyn serving potato
salad. Pfeil himself roasting a marshmallow. Nothing even
remotely pornographic. This was Americana, the stuff of
Norman Rockwell paintings.
Feeling relieved and ashamed, he slipped the pictures
back into their yellow envelope. One squirted out, dropping
to the floor, and as he retrieved it, he glanced up. The top
drawer was open an inch or two, and there was a piece of
Scotch tape there, on the bottom, as if something had been
hidden there at one time. Reaching up, he pulled the drawer
out a little farther. Another piece of clear tape came into
view. This one was holding an envelope to the underside of
the drawer. Pfeil peeled it off.
He held it, staring at it, for whatever was in the envelope
was secret, not meant to be found. Carly's secret. Something
she wanted to hide from her parents. Taking a deep breath,
the minister slipped out the only thing in the envelope. A
single Polaroid photo. It was a picture of Carly and her
boyfriend.
Naked.
On a bed.
Doing it.
The photo was shaking in his hand. It wasn't just an act of
love he was looking at. This was something dirty, porno-
graphic. The kind of thing some grimy character might try
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IT'S LOOSE
to sell you on a shadowy street in a Mexican border town.
Hey, you wanna buy some dirty peek-chures? And adding to
Pfeil's revulsion was the knowledge that someone had to
have taken this photo.
Although Pfeil wanted to run from the room with the
disgusting Polaroid, burn it in the fireplace, he simply stood
there, mesmerized by it. The naked couple was lying on a
blue bedspread. The wallpaper behind them had a silver and
gray pattern. They were in the classic missionary position,
the guy on top.
The guy. Pfeil always thought of him in impersonal terms.
Carly's boyfriend. That boy she was seeing—although he
was really a young man, not a boy. The jerk. Not thinking of
him by name was a way to dehumanize him. But the
minister knew his name quite well. It was Paul Edley.
Edley was Ice Island's version of a disreputable character.
He wasn't a murderer or a drug pusher or a thief, but he
wasn't much good either. His father had died, leaving him
the family's boat rental business. Paul had let the boats
deteriorate until they were in pretty bad shape. Allison
Farraday, the local insurance agent, had cancelled Edley's
insurance because she was afraid the boats were unsafe.
Instead of taking care of the business, Edley pursued his
other interests. He liked to ride the old Harley Davidson
motorcycle he'd fixed up. And he liked to chase women.
Edley was twenty-two years old, a tall, good-looking
young man with dark curly hair, a friendly but slightly
wicked grin. Women liked him. There were rumors about
things that happened with a couple of the island's married
women. There was another rumor about a high school girl
who had to sneak off to Detroit for an abortion.
Why, the minister wondered angrily, didn't I forbid Carly
to see him? Yes, it would have made him and his daughter
adversaries. Yes, they'd have fought. Yes, Carly might have
defied him. But look what doing nothing had accomplished.
The result was in his hand. Carly screwing this creep while
someone else took pictures. He stared at the photo, rage
welling up inside him. Suddenly he saw himself with his big
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IT'S LOOSE
hands around Edley's neck, squeezing, the slimy son of a
bitch begging for his life.
Instantly the image vanished, Pfeil's fury swirling away
like dishwater going down a drain. He heard a squeak, a
brief startled cry that could have been made by a terrified
animal, and then he realized that the sound had come from
him.
The naked couple in the photo was moving.
Writhing on the bed.
The still photo had become a motion picture.
Paul Edley's ass rose and fell. Carly squirmed, her lips
were parted, her eyes closed, her expression showing she was
lost in the pursuit of animal pleasure. As the minister stared
at the scene, it seemed less and less like a movie and more
like a magic window through which he could see what was
actually happening, as if he were a voyeur, spying on what
his daughter was doing at that precise moment.
The photo slipped from his fingers, fluttered to the floor.
For a long moment, he simply stared at it, reluctant to touch
it. A part of his brain, the part that could only accept logical,
rational, scientifically explainable things, was screaming at
him, telling him that this wasn't real, that still pictures could
not move and therefore he had imagined it.
Still photos don't come to life, Doug, old buddy. Uh-uh.
No way. You start believing that, and the next thing you
know they'll come and get you and put you in one of those
places with padding on the walls. You just pick up that
picture and see for yourself.
The minister bent down, hesitated, then picked up the
photo. The two naked people having intercourse were frozen
in a split second of time. Okay, Pfeil thought. It was just my
imagination. The picture upset me so much that my brain
went haywire for a moment. That's all.
But deep down inside, where unvarnished truth lived, the
minister knew better.
77

IT'S LOOSE
2
"I've got to get out of here," Irene Waggoner said, tucking
her shirt into her jeans.
Smoking a cigarette, Paul Edley sat on the edge of the bed,
watching her. He was unable to decide whether he thought
she was pretty. She was a bit on the thin side, wiry, sort of
athletic-looking, with a plain face. On the other hand,
she had long, slender legs and shiny dark hair, a nice
smile.
"What's the rush?" he asked. "Kevin's down at the
hardware store, selling nails and screwdrivers. He won't be
home for a couple of hours."
"But I've got to get dinner ready for him. And sometimes
he calls to find out what's on the menu. I should be there in
case he does."
"Guy like Kevin, guy that big, must think about food a
lot. Must always be hungry."
Irene had moved into the bathroom. Looking through the
open doorway, he could see her combing her hair. "Yeah,"
she said. "He likes to eat."
"Too bad for you his other appetites aren't like his one for
food."
She stopped combing her hair and looked at him. "But it
worked out real well for you, didn't it?"
Jesus, he thought. She thinks she's giving away something
special, doing me some big favor by getting into the sack
with me. It was really the other way around. Her husband
hadn't had a hard-on in a year and a half, and she came here
to get what she needed.
Edley wondered whether he should try to get her to let
him take her picture for his album. He'd convinced many of
the other women he'd had here to let him do it. He'd set up
the camera on a tripod, set the time delay, then hurry back
to the bed. Some of them, like the preacher's daughter, had
made him take two pictures, so they could have one too. So
far he'd filled up four pages in his photo album. He
wondered how long it would take him to fill the whole thing.
Ten years? Twenty?
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IT'S LOOSE
It was surprising how few of them refused to go along with
the picture taking. When he'd first come up with the idea, he
thought most women would object out of fear that someone
would find the pictures or that he might decide to use them
for blackmail. What he hadn't figured on was how much
women liked to do things they considered naughty. And
having your picture taken making it with some guy was
certainly naughty. It made the whole thing seem more
daring, more risky. For some women the camera was like an
aphrodisiac; it made them twice as horny.
The photo album was Paul Edley's way of keeping score.
In it were pictures of wives and daughters who'd come up to
spend a portion of the summer fishing and boating and
getting away from it all. But it wasn't exclusively summer
people. Oh, no. He got laid in the winter too. In fact, a lot of
Ice Islanders would be shocked to learn who was in the
album, making it with him in living color. Come take a look
at my photo album, he thought. See what your neighbors are
doing when they think nobody's looking. He chuckled to
himself.
"See you tomorrow?" Irene asked as she emerged from
the bathroom.
"Naw, not tomorrow. I got stuff I gotta do."
"What?"
"Work on the boats."
She eyed him skeptically. "Paul, you haven't worked on
those boats in years."
"Yeah," he said. "That's why I've got to do some mainte-
nance. I don't, one of'em will sink someday, and I'll get my
ass sued off."
"Day after?" she asked, studying him with her dark brown
eyes.
"Probably," he said. "But call me first."
"Okay. You going to walk me to the door?"
He stood up. He'd been sitting there, wearing just his
pants. Now he slipped on a shirt and accompanied Irene to
the door. He knew what was expected, so he stopped her at
the door, pulling her gently to him, kissing her softly. When
she started responding, he stopped, pushed her gently away.
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IT'S LOOSE
"If we don't stop," he said, "Kevin'll come home to an
empty house."
Taking in a slow breath, she nodded. "You sure about
tomorrow?"
"Hey, I gotta work on the boats. Honest."
Looking resigned, she pulled on her coat, gave him a
quick kiss, and hurried out the door. Edley decided Irene
was ready to become part of his album. He watched through
the window as she climbed into a red Ford Bronco, started
the engine, and drove off. He hadn't been entirely truthful
with Irene. Although the boats did need work badly, his
plans for tomorrow didn't include working on them. Carly
Pfeil was planning to play hooky and spend the day with
him.
He was going to have to do something about Carly. She
was starting to talk as though this were true love, a perma-
nent relationship, and Paul Edley didn't see any permanent
relationships in his future. Uh-uh. He had an entire photo
album to fill up before he could think about permanent
relationships.
He went into the kitchen and looked into the refrigerator,
wondering what he should have for dinner. Seeing nothing
that looked interesting, he grabbed a beer, popped open the
top, and took it to the living room, where he sat down on the
couch. Edley wasn't much of a housekeeper. Old motorcycle
magazines and back issues of Penthouse were strewn
around, cobwebs hung in the corners, and the sink was full
of dirty dishes. A while back he'd been making it with
Debbie Lewis, a summer person whose father stamped out
hubcaps or something down in Flint. Debbie had hated
clutter and dirty dishes, and she'd kept the place spotless.
That's what he needed, another woman like Debbie. Some-
one who liked to clean. Maybe he should tell Carly that if
she wanted a permanent thing, she should demonstrate her
cleaning skills. He'd have to think about that.
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IT'S LOOSE
3
Reverend Douglas Pfeil drove west on Island Avenue. He
passed the closed Michigander Inn, and then he was out of
town. He stared at the road, uncertain what he was going to
do, but knowing he had to do something.
Memories floated through his consciousness. Five-year-
old Carly, eyes wide in anticipation, as she opened the
biggest present under the Christmas tree, the one that
contained a stuffed animal nearly as large as she was. Carly
in the school play, momentarily forgetting her lines and
staring at the other actors, the silence lengthening, then
abruptly remembering, the words coming in a rush. Carly
crying her eyes out because the boy on whom she had her
first crush was unaware of her existence.
He passed the Forest Road turnoff.
The minister recalled Cariy's first spoken word. They'd
guessed it would be Mama or Dada and if not one of those
maybe bottle or blanket or the name of some other familiar
object. Instead, baby Carly had said "Uke," which he and
Carolyn had finally decided was Duke, the name of their
cocker spaniel.
Midway between the town and A1 McDougall's sugar
maples on the west end of the island was the intersection
with South Point Road. Pfeil turned, headed south. A red
Bronco passed him, going the opposite direction. It was
driven by Irene Waggoner, whose husband, Kevin, worked
at Ace Hardware. She sped past the minister, looking
straight ahead, as if she hadn't noticed him. Pfeil scowled.
Except for a few unoccupied summer cabins, the only thing
on South Point was Paul Edley's place.
He drove another three or four minutes before a faded
hand-painted sign came into view: boats for rent, daily
rates. Beyond the sign were two white clapboard buildings,
a one-story house with a bent TV antenna on its roof and a
boathouse. The drive forked, one branch going to each
structure. Pfeil drove to the house.
He had to watch his step as he walked to the front door,
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IT'S LOOSE
because both the drive and front steps were covered with ice.
Although he knew a lot of Ice Islanders who were bad at
keeping their walks and drives shoveled, the minister
chalked it up as one more example of Edley's laziness. He
wasn't feeling terribly charitable toward Edley at this partic-
ular moment. He pushed the button beside the aluminum
storm door, and the barely perceptible sound of chimes
came from within. Paul Edley opened the door.
The minister didn't know Edley very well—the young
man wasn't a churchgoer—so he found himself staring at
him, taking a moment to form an impression. Pfeil could
see why women were taken with Edley. Tall and muscular,
the young man had a face that combined boyish innocence
with masculine ruggedness. His dark hair was thick and
curly; his brown eyes combined intelligence with a devil-
may-care sparkle. And he had the standard-issue mustache
that all hunks seemed to possess these days.
"Reverend Pfeil, isn't it?" Edley asked. "You here to sell
tickets for the church raffle?"
"No. I'm here to talk to you. May I come in?"
"Sure." Edley held the door open as Pfeil stepped into the
living room. "Have a seat, Reverend."
The minister shook his head. "I'd rather stand, thank
you."
"Suit yourself," Edley said, lowering himself onto the
couch. "Now, what's on your mind?" He smiled knowingly,
as if to say, I know what's on your mind, but we'll play it out
anyway. It'll be fun.
When Pfeil had left the house, all the words he'd been
planning to say had bubbled within him, ready to be spewed
like white-hot lava. But now, standing here before this
young man who grinned at him mockingly, the minister's
anger and determination evaporated. He felt as awkward
and unsure of himself as he had when, as a fledgling
minister, he'd stood before a congregation to give his first
sermon.
Edley simply stared at him, waiting. Taunting him with
that silent grin.
Suddenly Pfeil's fury began to bubble again. This creep
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IT'S LOOSE
had taken advantage of a sixteen-year-old girl. Used her.
Toyed with her. All for his own satisfaction, food for his
hungry ego. And now the son of a bitch had the nerve to
smirk at him with his damn superior, knowing grin, as if
Edley were a bully about to teach some stupid little kid a
lesson.
"Stay away from my daughter," Pfeil said, the words
coming out like blasts of hot steam.
Edley raised an eyebrow. "Why?"
"Because I said so. That's all the reason you need."
For a long moment Edley just stared at him. Then he
shook his head. "You can't tell me what to do."
"I just did. Stay away from her."
Edley folded his arms. "Get fucked."
Pfeil wasn't sure what to do next. This wasn't supposed to
have gone like this. Finally he said, "You ever hear of
statutory rape?"
"Sure. But I think sixteen'5 old enough."
"It's not. You could go to jail." The minister was bluffing.
He had no idea what the age of consent was in Michigan.
Edley shrugged. "You going to drag Carly into court?
What will your congregation say, your daughter involved in
a scandal like that?"
Pfeil knew that Edley was right. He wasn't going to court
over this, even if Carly was below the legal age of consent—
and he wasn't sure she was. He was beginning to feel useless
and foolish. Embarrassment, hot and sticky, surged through
him, made him feel like turning and running.
But he didn't run. He simply stood there, confused.
Suddenly unwilling to look Edley in the eye, Pfeil shifted his
gaze away. The living room was cluttered—motorcycle
magazines, issues of Penthouse, a crumpled beer can. De-
spite the mess, the place seemed to be in fairly good
condition. Neither the furniture nor the carpet was badly
worn. A console TV set occupied one corner; a brick
fireplace occupied another. Wood was stacked by the fire-
place.
Pfeil realized that just standing there, not looking at the
guy, was making him seem even more laughable. The
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IT'S LOOSE
minister took a slow breath, shifted his gaze back to Edley.
Reaching deep down inside himself, he found the embers of
his previous anger, fanned them.
"I'm telling you, flatly, never to see Carly again. I mean
it."
"Okay," Edley said, "and I'm telling you, flatly, to get
fucked."
"If you do, I'll come back," Pfeil said. "I'll put an end to
this one way or the other."
"If you come back, I'll throw you out," Edley said. "As a
matter of fact, that's what I'm going to do right now."
Rising, he made shooing motions with his hands. "Go.
Leave."
"Remember what I said," the minister said emphatically.
"Just go," Edley said, making it clear he wasn't taking
Pfeil seriously.
When they reached the door, the minister exploded. It
happened so fast even Pfeil hadn't known it was coming. As
Edley opened the door, Pfeil grabbed him and shoved him
out onto the icy stoop. The younger man slipped, fought
for balance, then skidded off into the snow, landing face-
first.
Pfeil stood over him, trembling. "I mean it," he said.
"Never come near Carly again."
Edley sat up. For a moment he looked surprised, but then
the smirk was back. He stood up. "I thought you ministers
were nonviolent and all that. I didn't think you believed in
fighting."
"I believe in protecting my own."
"Me too," Edley said.
He took a quick step forward, and his fist landed in Pfeil's
gut, doubling him over and knocking the wind out of him.
Pfeil's lungs struggled for air that didn't seem to exist. But
the minister had very little time to worry about that,
because Edley hit him with an uppercut that sent him
sprawling backward into the snow. Edley moved in quickly
and kicked him in the side, brought his foot back and kicked
him again. Then again.
When the punishment stopped, Pfeil realized he had
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IT'S LOOSE
curled into the fetal position. He was in pain. He could
barely breathe. And tears were running down his cheeks.
He felt more ashamed than he had ever felt in his life. He
recalled thinking about his big hands earlier in the day, how
they were strong like a blacksmith's. He'd been so stupid.
He was a middle-aged man who got very little exercise.
What muscle he'd had once was now flab. He was soft,
ineffectual. He'd been deluding himself when he thought he
could prevent Edley from seeing Carly. Maybe another
father could, but not him. He was useless, worthless. He
wished he were dead.
A gust of wind blew loose snow in his face, as if even God
were letting him know how unworthy he was.
It doesn't have to be like this.
Go away, Pfeil thought. Leave me alone.
I can help you.
No one can help me.
I can. Look.	»
The minister saw Carly with her legs wrapped around
Edley, the two of them squirming on the bed, Carly moan-
ing, telling him she loved him. Abruptly the scene changed,
and Pfeil saw Edley punching him, knocking him down,
then kicking him.
Stop! Please! I don't want to see any more.
Instantly he was watching a new scene. In this one he was
walking up to Edley's door with a tire iron. And then he was
inside the house, with Edley. And Pfeil was swinging the tire
iron, hitting the young man again and again and again,
blood splattering on the wall, on Pfeil, and still he kept
hitting him. It was a glorious, wonderful sensation.
I hate him! the minister thought. I hate him!
A momentary doubt peeked out from the reaches of
Pfeil's consciousness. You should not hate, it cautioned.
You're a man of God. You must love your enemies, leave
vengeance to the Lord. But the angry, bitter, hating part of
Pfeil silenced the doubt with a mental hammerblow. He
hated Edley more than he'd ever hated anyone, and that
hatred picked him up and carried him away as a wave
propels a surfer.
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IT'S LOOSE
No! something inside him screamed. Evil! Evil! Beware!
But the warning had come too late, for Douglas Pfeil,
Lutheran minister, was standing on the surfboard of his
wounded pride, riding the wave of hatred, at the mercy of a
raging surf over which he had no control.
Do you want to get even? Just say yes.
And Douglas Pfeil said yes. A hundred, a thousand times
yes.
4
After making it clear who would come out on the losing end
of any future physical confrontations, Paul Edley left the
minister lying in the snow and went back inside. He got
another can of beer and switched on the TV. Eventually, he
supposed, he'd have to break off his thing with Carly. It was
just too much of a hassle to be worth it, what with her
hinting about a permanent relationship and now with her
father coming around. But he wouldn't do it right away.
First he'd let the preacher stew a little bit. At least a few
weeks.
A talk show was on the TV. Edley got up and changed to a
game show, returned to the couch. A woman with lots of
blond curls guessed Richard Nixon as the answer to a
question Edley hadn't heard. A buzzer sounded, indicating
she was wrong. Edley was taking another swallow of beer
when his door opened. The minister was standing there with
a tire iron in his hand. Edley couldn't believe it.
"That's not going to do you any good," he said confi-
dently.
But as Pfeil stepped toward him, Edley saw the minister's
eyes. They were distant, like a sleepwalker's eyes, and yet
behind that faraway look danced all sorts of powerful
emotions. Hatred and confusion and burning rage. And
suddenly Edley had the feeling that he was looking into eyes
that weren't human. He felt his confidence evaporating.
The minister advanced, raising the tire iron.
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IT'S LOOSE
5
Less than a quarter of a mile from the Edley house, Karl
Zellner's German shepherd, Brute, was exploring the
woods. He could smell the scent of squirrels everywhere,
which was frustrating, because the snow made it impossible
for him to chase them. Chasing squirrels was one of Brute's
favorite pastimes. They always escaped by scampering up a
tree, but it was fun all the same. At least when there wasn't
any deep snow, it was fun. When there was snow, as there
was now, the squirrels scooted across its surface with ease,
while Brute sank in up to his belly. He had to leap and
plow his way through it, which was slow and took a lot
of effort.
He sniffed the bark of a pine tree, smelling bark and
wood and sap and beneath those odors the scents of the
squirrels that had climbed the tree. Although Brute had
no perception of the seasons, he sensed at some instinc-
tive level that the time would come when he could again
chase squirrels without sinking into the snow, a time
when there would be warmth, and along with it would
come other things to chase, such as chipmunks and rac-
coons and skunks. He hated skunks. One of Brute's
doggy obsessions was his intense desire to rip apart every
skunk in the vicinity.
Claiming this territory as his own, the German shepherd
raised his rear leg and directed a stream of urine at the
trunk of the pine tree. Then, sinking into the snow with
every step, he moved on to another tree. Again he sniffed
the trunk, his sensitive nose detecting a myriad of scents.
Suddenly, the tree forgotten, Brute tensed, raising his
ears, listening intently. He was hearing a sound too
high to be detected by human ears. The dog began to
tremble.
The sound was intense and prolonged, and there was
something primeval about it.
It was a howl, and yet it wasn't.
It was a shriek, and yet it wasn't.
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IT'S LOOSE
It was a wail, and yet it wasn't.
The big German shepherd, which had never feared any-
thing before in its life, felt the hair raising along its back.
Then, in total panic, the dog fled, lunging through the deep
snow with every bit of strength it had.
6
Karl Zellner was a retired schoolteacher. After spending
most of his adult life teaching math to noisy, uncontrollable,
unmotivated inner-city kids in Chicago, he'd come to Ice
Island to just plain get away from people. He'd never
married, for which he had no regrets. Brute was all the
companionship he required.
Zellner was sitting in his reclining chair, reading a maga-
zine, when a loud thump came from the back door. Before
he could put down the magazine and get up, there was a
crash that made it sound as if something were trying to tear
the door down.
"Hold on, Brute," he muttered. "I'm coming as fast as I
can."
By the time he'd made his way into the kitchen, Brute had
banged on the door three more times. From the way he was
carrying on, Godzilla could be after him, Zellner thought.
He opened the door, and a tan streak shot past his legs, pads
slipping on the linoleum floor.
"My God, Brute. What the hell's going on?"
Zellner looked out the door, seeing nothing except
the sidewalk leading to the detached garage and a yard
full of deep snow. Closing the door, he went to find
the dog. Zellner made one complete trip through the
house, seeing no sign of the German shepherd. On his
second pass through the bedroom he heard a whine.
Getting down on the floor, Zellner peered under the bed.
Two wide, terror-filled eyes stared back at him. A long
string of drool hung from Brute's mouth; the dog was
shaking.
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IT'S LOOSE
"Jesus, Brute, how the hell did you fit under there?"
Zellner asked.
But Brute was unable to answer that, as he was unable to
tell his friend and master what had so thoroughly terrified
him.
7
Carolyn Pfeil was cooking dinner when her husband came
in through the back door, stomping the snow off his boots.
She was making one of her standards, hamburger and
macaroni casserole, which she always served with peas and
Jell-O salad.
"Dinner will be ready in half an hour," she said.
Reverend Douglas Pfeil walked past her without saying a
word. She started to go after him, then stopped herself,
sensing that this was probably not the time to talk to him.
She'd have to do it eventually, though, for he'd been acting
strangely lately, unhappy, as if he didn't care about anything
anymore. And his behavior just now seemed to indicate that
he was getting worse.
Carolyn didn't like the thought of having a talk with
Douglas. A discussion could lead to hurt feelings or an
argument, and she generally wasn't one to rock the matri-
monial boat. Still something had to be done about Douglas.
Maybe it was the island. Maybe moving somewhere else
would help, someplace with more things to do, someplace
without the long, cold winter, someplace where you weren't
cut off from civilization twice a year.
Maybe she should try to convince him to get counseling,
and maybe that's what the counselor would say: Get off the
island.
Carolyn Pfeil realized she was wringing her hands. She
dreaded having to deal with her husband's problems, and
she wished with all her heart they would simply go away.
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IT'S LOOSE
8
Douglas Pfeil stood in the bathroom, looking at himself in
the mirror. He saw himself on two levels. The outer level
was a six-foot three-inch man with light brown hair and big
hands. But because he was no longer entirely Douglas Pfeil,
he could see below that exterior appearance to what was
beneath, the two images superimposed like a photograph on
which two pictures had been taken without advancing the
film. The other image looked nothing like the first.
Behind Pfeil's blue eyes were two glowing red orbs.
Behind his pale cheeks were reptilian scales.
Behind his chest and shoulders was a mass of fur.
Behind his human teeth were sharp, deadly fangs.
Carolyn hadn't noticed that the coat he was wearing was
the one he kept in the station wagon for emergencies. Nor
had she noticed the bloodstains on his pants, but then the
material was dark brown, and the stains were hard to see. It
was probably just as well for Carolyn that she hadn't
noticed.
He'd heard her ask him about dinner. He hadn't an-
swered, because the thought of eating such food was repul-
sive. And yet, as he stared at the two images of himself in the
mirror, he knew that he had an extreme hunger.
Abruptly he turned and walked out of the bathroom. As
he returned to the kitchen, still wearing the same coat,
Carolyn looked up from the stove and said, "Dinner in
twenty minutes."
"Fuck dinner," Pfeil said, and he walked out the door.
90

Five
1
The sun was just beginning to send shafts of yellow light
through the trees as Tommy Quirk drove his garbage truck
along South Point Road. Tommy liked to get an early start,
get his work done, and have the rest of the day to himself. He
and his brother, Guy, owned Quirk's Refuse Removal,
which consisted of the two brothers, their wives, and a pair
of garbage trucks. Tommy and Guy drove the trucks; their
wives ran the office and did the paperwork. There were no
town-owned garbage trucks, so Ice Islanders either paid the
Quirks to haul away their refuse or they did it themselves.
Most people paid the Quirks.
Tommy slowed the truck and pulled into Paul Edley's
drive. Edley was one of those people who forgot to pay his
bill. He wasn't a deadbeat—at least Tommy didn't think he
was—he just forgot. Jean, Tommy's wife, would send him
an overdue notice, then a second notice, and finally notifica-
tion that his service would be discontinued if he didn't pay
up in ten days. Edley always paid up. It was a matter of
getting his attention, Tommy supposed.
He stopped the truck in front of Edley's house and got
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IT'S LOOSE
out. A large drum-shaped container was fastened to the rear
of the truck. Tommy took it with him as he headed for the
rear of the house. It was large enough to hold the contents of
several garbage cans. Though heavy when full, it enabled
him to carry all the refuse to the truck in one trip.
Because the snow in the yard was too deep to move
through, Tommy followed the walk, which branched as it
reached the house, one part going to the front door, the
other part leading around to the rear of the house, where the
garbage cans were located. Edley did a lousy job of keeping
it shoveled. It was all ice and packed snow underfoot.
Abruptly Tommy stopped. He'd just noticed that the
front door was standing open about a foot. He could see a
portion of the living room—carpeting, the arm of a chair.
Although the weather had slowly been getting warmer, it
was below freezing this early in the day, and nobody left a
door open.
Putting down his garbage-carrying container, Tommy
walked as far as the cement steps. "Hey, Edley," he called.
"You in there?"
From inside the house came nothing but silence. Puzzled,
Tommy stared at the foot-wide slice of living room, still
seeing nothing but carpeting and a chair arm. Edley wasn't
known as an early riser, so he could still be asleep. Maybe
the door hadn't been closed tightly, and it had come open by
itself, letting all Edley's heat out while he slept. It was none
of Tommy's business, when you came right down to it, but
he hated to see anyone wasting money on natural gas or
heating oil. Besides, an open door could mean something
was wrong. So Tommy moved to the door, put his hand on
it.
And all at once, an uneasiness came over him, a cold,
tingly sensation that settled in the pit of his stomach. It was
a feeling he hadn't experienced since childhood, when he'd
stare at the shadows on his bedroom wall and know they
were made by the monsters lurking just outside the window,
just waiting for the chance to get him.
He tapped lightly on the door. "Edley!"
Through the opening he could see magazines on the floor
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IT'S LOOSE
now. One was a men's publication, which had fallen open to
a full-page picture of a nude woman with large breasts.
Tommy pushed the door, and it swung open, revealing more
magazines. They were blood-spattered. The door continued
to swing away from him, revealing blood on the walls, the
carpet, the furniture. And when the door stopped because it
was open all the way, Tommy was staring horrified at a
pulpy-looking mess with a tire iron lying beside it.
For a moment Tommy just stood there, transfixed. Then
he turned and ran back to his garbage truck. He had to call
the police, he knew that, but he wasn't going into that house.
No way.
Although Tommy usually took good care of his equip-
ment, he spun the truck's tires pulling away from the house
and plowed through the snowbank getting back on South
Point Road.
2
Carly waved as her mom pulled away from the school in the
family's white station wagon.
"Hi, Carly," a voice behind her said. "You going to the
game tonight?"
Turning, Carly found Brittany Uhl, the green tights that
were part of her cheerleading costume showing beneath her
coat. The school colors were green and white. She was a
pretty girl—brown hair, green eyes, freckles—who was
always trying to get Carly involved in things. Try out for the
cheerleading squad, Carly. Go out for girls' basketball,
Carly. Sign up for this, try out for that. She was worse than
the damn guidance counselor.
"How can there be a game with the Split in effect?" Carly
asked. "The other team can't get here."
"Girls' team's playing the boys' team," Brittany said
enthusiastically.
"Won't that be fun," Carly said, making sure sarcasm
dripped from each word. Nothing that went on at Ice Island
Junior/Senior High concerned her. The place was a stupid
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IT'S LOOSE
waste of time. The students seemed to fall into three
categories: innocents like Brittany, obnoxious delinquents,
and nerds. There were a few who thought they were hot
shit—some of the prettier girls, some of the jocks on the
football team—but to Carly they were just conceited asses.
"It'll be fun," Brittany protested. "It's just a matter of
everybody getting into the spirit of the thing."
Carly sighed. "Are you for real, Brittany?"
"Huh? What do you mean?"
"All this enthusiasm over a dumb basketball game."
Brittany stared at her, apparently trying to decide how to
deal with this heresy, then she said, "What's wrong with a
little school spirit?"
"Why should I have school spirit?"
"Because . . . well, because this is where you go to
school."
"Brittany, if you want to think that stuffs important, go
ahead. But don't try to sell it to me, okay?"
"You've changed," Brittany said. "You're not the same
girl who used to be my best friend."
"You're right," Carly said. "I'm not."
Brittany searched Carly's face for a moment, apparently
trying to determine the exact meaning of her words, and
then she wheeled and walked away, clutching her books and
notebook to her chest. Carly watched her walk past the
flagpole, heading for the entrance to the one-story brick
building. As soon as Paul and I are married, Carly thought,
I'm going to talk him into selling the business so we can
move off this damned island.
She considered the places she and Paul might go. She
hoped it would be someplace big and exciting, where there
were lots of things to see and do. Somewhere like New York
or Los Angeles or Chicago. San Francisco would be okay
too. They could have an apartment on top of one of the hills,
ride the cable cars. The thought made her tingle all over.
Carly glanced at her watch. It was almost time to meet
Paul. She walked away from the school.
The town part of Ice Island was laid out with avenues
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IT'S LOOSE
running east and west, streets running north and south. The
avenues, except for Island Avenue, were named after the
Great Lakes. The streets were named after cities in Michi-
gan. There were four avenues and eight streets. Ice Island
Junior/Senior High was located at the intersection of Sagi-
naw Street and Huron Avenue. Because Paul didn't think it
was a good idea to pick Carly up at school, they met two
blocks away, at Huron and Dearborn.
As she walked, Carly thought about Paul. She was anxious
to see him, anxious for them to strip off their clothes and
slip under the covers of his heated water bed. It wasn't just
sex she was having with Paul; Carly had no doubts about
that. Sex was just the physical expression of their love. And
Carly's love for Paul was intense and pure and wonderful.
She thought about almost nothing else, sometimes sitting in
class and writing his name again and again in her notebook.
One day last week she'd written it a thousand times, then
switched to her own—as Paul's wife. She'd written Carly
Edley, Carly Ann Edley, C.A. Edley, Mrs. Paul Edley, Mrs.
Carly Edley .. .
Soon, very soon, she'd marry him. The thought sent
tingles through her body. Sure, her parents would scream,
and people like Brittany Uhl would think she was stupid,
but what did they know? Her parents weren't in love the way
she and Paul were. Her parents seemed to simply exist with
each other. If one of them disappeared, it would probably be
a week before the other one noticed. She and Paul, on the
other hand, were totally committed to each other. Each
second apart was sheer hell for both of them. Even the
people in the greatest love stories didn't have what she and
Paul did. They were incomplete when they were separated,
so great was their love.
And as for Brittany Uhl, who cared about the opinions of
someone naive enough to wear a stupid cheerleader costume
and go around spouting off about school spirit? Carly shook
her head. How could Brittany ever have been her best
friend? Brittany was a shallow person who would lead an
empty, pointless life. Like Carly's mom.
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As her thoughts swung back to her parents, Carly won-
dered about her father's strange behavior. He'd been down
in the dumps a lot lately, as if he was bored with everything.
Then last night he'd just walked out of the house, not
coming back until after midnight. This morning, he'd still
been in bed when Carly got up, and her mom had been tense
and snappish.
Carly pushed these thoughts away. Soon she would be
Mrs. Paul Edley, and her parents' affairs wouldn't be her
concern. The only problem she could see was her age. Not
that Carly considered herself too young to get married. She
was mature, capable, sure of what she wanted. But she was
uncertain what the law was. Would she have to get her
parents to sign something? If so, it would be a real battle. It
would be stupid to have a law like that. Girls got married at
fourteen in some places—she'd read about it. And she was
almost seventeen, old enough to make her own decisions
without interference from her parents. What gave them the
right to mess around in her life anyway?
Carly was getting mad, so she pushed these thoughts
away. The day was sunny, rapidly warming. Soon the
winter's accumulation of snow would be gone, leaving a
mucky mess. You wouldn't even be able to go out in the
backyard without sinking into the stuff, having it squish up
around your shoes. Carly hated this God-forsaken island,
and she hoped she'd be able to talk Paul into selling the
business and getting the hell out of there as soon as they
were married.
Carly arrived at Huron and Dearborn, discovering that
Paul wasn't there yet. She waited.
3
Half an hour later she was still waiting. She paced back and
forth, watching water from the melting snowbank trickle
across the sidewalk.
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IT'S LOOSE
4
After forty-five minutes, the water had formed a little
stream in the gutter, running down the street until it reached
a drain, gurgling through the grate. Carly was worried about
Paul. He'd be anxious to be with her, hold her in his arms.
He wouldn't be late unless . . . unless . . .
She refused to complete the thought. If anything had
happened to him, she'd die. Carly felt cold all over, as if
she'd stepped naked into a January night.
5	
She waited an hour. Then she started walking toward South
Point, four miles away.
6	
Tommy Quirk's breathless, disjointed description hadn't
prepared Don Farraday for what he found at Paul Edley's
house. The living room looked as though the special effects
people working on a splatter movie had been turned loose
with the instructions: Do your worst, boys. Make the
audience puke.
Blood had been splattered on the walls and furniture.
Quantities of the stuff. More than a single human being
should contain. A few droplets had even hit the ceiling.
There was a picture of an old sailing ship on the wall, and a
bloody glob of something had landed in its upper right-hand
corner, trickling down like runs in a sloppy painting job. A
bloody hand had left its imprint on a lampshade. Squiggly
marks slid down the wall, as if a child had been creating a
macabre fingerpainting there.
For some reason the image popped into Don's head of a
teacher standing before a class, saying, Okay, kiddies, today
we're going to fingerpaint. Everyone got paper and blood
ready?
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IT'S LOOSE
But then this was a scene that called for bizarre fantasies.
It was too gruesome, too unbelievable, to be accepted as
hard, cold reality. The brain had to come at it sideways, find
ways to make it seem less real, less ghastly. If Don had a
partner, he supposed the two of them would have made
tasteless jokes, tried to trivialize the horror by making it
seem routine, just something to be dealt with in the course
of an ordinary day. But Don didn't have a partner, so his
mind invented fantasies, little private sick jokes that it told
itself.
He stood in the center of the room, staring at what he
assumed was Paul Edley's body. It was even more hideous
than the rest of the scene. Paul Edley had been reduced to
raw meat. His arms, legs, trunk, head—all of him, every last
inch—had been pounded mercilessly with the tire iron that
lay beside his remains. His face had been beaten until it was
nearly featureless. The ears were gone, and so were the nose,
the lips, the teeth. A hole that had once been Edley's mouth
gaped in a soundless shriek of terror. A single eye looked at
Don from its bed of bloody, pulpy tissue.
It was hard to believe that this thing lying here at his feet
had ever been a human being. Who could have done
something like this? He knew everyone who lived on the
island. He was unable to picture any of them murdering
anyone, especially in a manner such as this. Doing some-
thing like this went beyond rage. It had taken a while, and a
lot of effort. Don was unable to imagine the murderer's rage.
How could someone be that furious, that intent on mutila-
tion? Surely no one among these people he'd known all his
life could do something like this.
Of course, there was one stranger on the island right now,
someone who had come here in pursuit of a man who had
committed suicide by trying to gut himself. A man who'd
lied about his purpose on the island and then lied about it
again when he changed his story. But why would Kesselring
kill Edley? What possible connection could there be be-
tween Edley and a former Pittsburgh cop?
At least the murderer wasn't going anywhere. Until the
ferry started running, no one was getting off the island.
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IT'S LOOSE
Don had never handled a murder before, and he knew
that on something like this he was in way over his head. He
needed help from people who knew how to collect minute
bits of evidence, fibers and hairs and tiny particles. People
who had access to print-lifting equipment more sophisti-
cated than his jar of fingerprint dust. They used special
chemicals now and lasers, techniques that could detect
prints left fifty years ago—prints left by Moses, for all he
knew. These were things he had neither the experience nor
the equipment to handle, so he'd radioed Corrine
Matthews, told her to ask for help from the Michigan State
Police. Don would secure the scene and wait for them to get
here by helicopter.
Glad to get away from the bloody room for a few
moments, Don went out to his car to get his camera. The
state investigators would take photos, but there was no
reason he shouldn't take his own set as well. He was
unlocking the rear of the Cherokee when Corrine's voice
came over the radio.
"Ice Island to unit one."
Don got into the car, picked up the microphone. "Go
ahead, Corrine."
"State advises their helicopter is ten-seven."
"How long will it be out of service?"
"They don't know. Mechanics have the whole thing torn
apart, and they've ordered parts."
"Okay, Corrine. I guess I'm on my own."
For a few moments he simply sat there, feeling daunted.
Then, taking his camera with him, he got out of the
Cherokee. He recalled what Lyndon Johnson had said when
Kennedy was assassinated and Johnson suddenly found
himself president. Words to the effect that he would do the
best he could do, because that was all he could do. Don
knew how he felt.
Maybe Corrine would radio him any moment now to let
him know that the murderer had walked into the office and
confessed. People did that in crimes of passion, and this was
certainly a crime of passion—more than passion. Rage.
Unbelievable hatred and bloodlust. Paul Edley had a reputa-
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IT'S LOOSE
tion for being a cocksman. Maybe he'd dipped his wick in
the wrong place, run afoul of a husband or a boyfriend with
a hell of a temper. Don's first task after he finished here
would be to find out whom Edley was fooling around with,
see where it led him.
Don was stepping back into the blood-spattered living
room when he heard a car approaching. Stepping back
outside, he saw that it was a yellow Chevy. He didn't
recognize it. The day was the warmest so far this year, and
the Chevy splashed through the melting ice and snow in the
drive. Don went to see who it was. The car stopped. And
Steven Kesselring got out. He was carrying what Don had
come to think of as his pool cue case.
"What are you doing here?" Don asked.
"I heard what happened," Kesselring said. "That garbage
man—what's his name?"
"Quirk?"
"Yeah, Quirk. Told everyone he could find. Story's all
over town."
"That doesn't mean I need sightseers getting in the way,"
Don said.
"Hey, I'm a cop, I—"
"An ex-cop."
"Okay, an ex-cop. I was a police officer for thirty-five
years, and I thought I might be able to help. Like I told you,
that's what I do now. I try to help."
For a moment, Don just looked at him, trying to figure out
where he was coming from, what he really wanted. "You
mind if I take a set of your prints?"
"My prints? Oh, I get it. The only stranger on the island.
Sure, you can take my prints. They won't match any you'll
find inside the house."
"Look at it as a loose end, something I want to get nailed
down so I can dispose of it."
"I'd do the same thing if I were in your shoes. No
problem. 1 understand. You mind if I take a look at what
you've got?"
Don hesitated, then said, "You can see it from the front
door. Don't go inside, and don't touch anything."
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IT'S LOOSE
"I know the rules," Kesselring said. He went to the front
door, and Don followed. Looking into the living room, the
ex-cop said, "Tire iron. Must have beat him with it until he
was too tired to swing it anymore."
"And then he left the murder weapon lying right there,
maybe with his prints all over it."
"Maybe he wasn't worried about getting caught," Kessel-
ring said.
"Because he's too smart to be caught, or because he
doesn't care?"
Kesselring didn't answer the question. He stared into the
living room for a few seconds, then asked, "Know anyone
who hated this guy enough to do this to him?"
"No."
The ex-cop stared silently into the room.
Don said, "You know something about this you're not
telling me?"
"What could I know? I'm a stranger here."
"How come every time someone dies you show up?"
"I've explained my connection to Edward Dwyer, and
I've explained why I've come here this morning." He was
still looking into the room.
Don thought about the posters that had shown a picture
of Richard Nixon with the caption, would you buy a used
car from this man? He pictured Kesselring's face above the
caption instead of Nixon's. Don wasn't sure what the ex-cop
was selling, but he wasn't buying any of it.
"Come on," Don said. "I've got some fingerprint cards
and some ink in the car."
After taking Kesselring's prints, Don sent the ex-cop on
his way, saying this was something he'd have to handle by
himself. He took photos, dusted the tire iron, then dusted
the entire house. Because the ambulance couldn't get there
to take the body to the mainland for autopsy, he got Doc
Ingram, the local physician, to pick it up in his station
wagon, the remains wrapped in an improvised body bag
made of a plastic drop cloth from Ace Hardware. After Doc
looked the body over, they'd have to figure out what to do
with it, since the closest mortuary was on the mainland. The
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IT'S LOOSE
only idea Doc Ingram could come up with was to freeze the
corpse until it could be sent to Marquette for a proper
autopsy. He did not volunteer the use of his freezer.
Once the body was removed, Don used his own household
vacuum cleaner—Doc had picked it up for him—to vacu-
um Edley's house, using a different bag for each room and
labeling it. It probably wasn't the best way to go about it, but
it was all he could think of. After the Split, he could send
the vacuum cleaner bags off to the state police lab for
analysis.
It took Don nearly six hours to finish up at the crime
scene. During that period no one walked into the office and
confessed.
The last thing Don did at the Edley house was lock the
front door and put up a handmade sign that said it was a
crime scene and no one was allowed in, by order of the Ice
Island Police. Then he stood there, looking at the melting
snow. It was a beautiful sunny day. Winter was over.
Ordinarily this would make him happy. But Don Farraday
saw nothing to be happy about. And not just because Ice
Island had just had its first homicide in the fifteen years he'd
been its constable—its first murder ever, as far as he knew.
Maybe it was just the Split, which always made him feel a
little uneasy because the island was cut off from the rest of
the world. Maybe. But Don didn't think the Split was all of
it. There was something going on here, something he didn't
understand. Kesselring figured into it somehow, but Don
didn't know how.
Don shook his head. Maybe it was just the grisly scene
he'd witnessed playing on his mind. That and the Split. And
Edward Dwyer trying to disembowel himself with a kitchen
knife. And maybe Kesselring was nothing other than a weird
ex-cop. Maybe.
But somewhere deep down inside him, Don Farraday
didn't think so.
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IT'S LOOSE
7
After Don Farraday left, Carly Pfeil stepped out of the
woods that surrounded the house. She'd been there for
hours, watching, keeping out of sight. She'd seen Doc
Ingram arrive, the two men carry out a plastic-wrapped
lump on a stretcher. Though certain that something awful
had happened, Carly had stayed in the woods. She was
playing hooky from school; she'd sneaked off to make love
with a man. Despite her desperate need to know what had
happened, she couldn't just rush up and demand an expla-
nation. She was still a high school girl, still subject to her
parents' authority, and to reveal her presence would be to
step into deep shit.
Now, terrified of what she would find, Carly moved
toward the house. The snow was a slushy mess. She sank
into the stuff, and it filled her shoes, making her feet cold
and wet. When she reached the house, she stopped, pushed
some strands of honey-blond hair from her face. She was
shaking.
All the time she'd been hiding in the woods and watching,
Carly had feared the worst. But it was still just speculation,
without proof. Hope, like the dim glow from a flashlight
with a dying battery, lingered. But once she went inside
Paul's house, she would know. And Carly wasn't sure she
could live with the knowledge that awaited her in Paul's now
deserted house.
And yet how could she turn away? Putting one foot in
front of the other, she walked to the house, ascended the
cement steps, and stopped before the front door. A sign was
taped to it. In broad blue felt-tip was written: crime scene.
keep out. by order of ice island police.
Carly put a shaking hand on the doorknob. A tear trickled
down her cheek. She turned the knob. It was locked. A piece
of one-by-eight about two feet long was resting against the
side of the house. During the warmer months, Paul used it
as a rest for the side stand of his motorcycle, so it wouldn't
sink into the soft earth and let the bike fall. Carly's mind
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IT'S LOOSE
took her back to last fall, before the weather turned cold and
the snow came, forcing Paul to put the motorcycle up for the
winter. She remembered how they'd gone riding, the bike's
powerful engine shooting them forward, her hair floating
out behind her, Carly holding onto Paul, feeling safe because
he was in control. More tears were rolling down her cheeks
now.
Carly grabbed the one-by-eight, rammed it through the
window next to the door. Reaching in through the shattered
pane, she unlatched the window, slid it up. It wasn't until
she was through the opening and in the living room that she
saw the blood. Over everything. As if kids had filled squirt
guns with it and played war.
Carly Pfeil slumped to the living-room floor and began to
wail.
8
Carly didn't know how long she lay on the bloodstained
carpet and cried, but eventually her sobs stopped. She sat
up, feeling drained and dazed. Her tears had stopped
because she had run out of the strength to make them.
Instead of the wrenching feelings of loss she'd experienced
when she finally admitted to herself that Paul was dead, now
she was filled with an overwhelming emptiness. She felt
lethargic, too weak to move.
Maybe I should just lie here and die, Carly thought. The
idea seemed strangely neutral, as if whether she lived or died
was unimportant. For several minutes, she just sat there,
befuddled, having no idea what to do next. Her life
was over. Instead of marrying Paul, she would remain in
school, continue living with her parents. Her dreams
had been snatched away, replaced with an unbearable
emptiness.
Abruptly it occurred to her that the picture Paul had taken
of them making love was still here somewhere. It was
something for just her and Paul, that picture, and she
couldn't let anyone else find it. It was something private and
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IT'S LOOSE
sacred, and it shouldn't become public. Not to mention all
the trouble she'd be in if her parents ever got hold of it.
Carly stood up, trying not to see the blood. Don Farraday,
the constable, would have searched the place; she knew that.
But maybe, just maybe, he hadn't found it. Carly was sure
Paul would have kept it in his bedroom, so that's where
she'd start her search. She dashed down the hall and
stopped in the bedroom doorway. She was looking at the big
king-size water bed on which she and Paul had made love.
More tears welled up, filled her eyes, but Carly wiped them
away. She had to find that photo.
As soon as she stepped into the room, Carly knew that it
had been searched. Although Paul wasn't neat, there was a
pattern to his messiness, and that pattern had been dis-
turbed. Clothes that should have been piled on the chair
were on the floor. The bed wasn't just unmade; the covers
had been stripped off, revealing the water-filled plastic
underneath. Had the photo been found? Were people at the
police station even now looking at her and Paul as they
engaged in something that was private and personal and
beautiful?
Again her tears welled up, along with confused emotions
Carly was unable to identify. She blinked the tears away, but
the emotions remained, hot and bubbling and strange.
Carly made herself think. Paul wouldn't have left the
snapshot lying around for just anyone to find; he would have
hidden it. And then she remembered where she'd hidden
her own photo of their love. Carly hurried to the dresser,
pulled out each drawer, looked underneath, finding no
photos taped to any of them. She yanked the drawers
completely out, dumped their contents on the floor, pawed
through them, finding no photos of any kind.
All at once she recalled something Paul had said: that he'd
put the photos in his special hiding place. But he hadn't said
where it was. Memories flitted through her mind, confused,
shifting, a blur of intertwined recollections. Abruptly one of
the memories detached itself from the jumble, floated to the
surface, and became clear. She'd been in the kitchen, fixing
them some lunch, and she'd come looking for Paul to ask
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IT'S LOOSE
him something. He was doing something in the closet, on
the floor of the closet, and he looked startled when she
stepped into the room and found him.
Carly went to the closet, got down on her hands and
knees. At first she didn't see anything, but then she noticed
the baseboard. It seemed loose on the left side. Carly pulled
on it, and it easily came away from the wall. Lying flat on her
stomach, Carly looked into the opening. It was about two
feet wide, four inches high. And it extended through the
wall. Suddenly Carly realized she was looking into the
bathroom, into the space beneath the built-in linen closet,
space that would be concealed from anyone in that room.
There was something in the space. A large book. Carly
pulled it out. It was a photo album. When she opened it, she
found herself looking at other photos of Paul making love.
With other women.
Some were strangers.
Others she recognized.
Trembling, Carly shook her head as fresh tears rolled
down her cheeks. A part of her was still grieving for Paul.
Another part suddenly hated him. And that portion of her
demanded to know how he could have done this to her,
thought of terms like bastard, son of a bitch, asshole. It was
all too much for Carly to handle. It was like losing him twice
in the space of a few hours.
The album was blue, and on its cover was a single word in
gold script: photos. Carly shook her head, for even at her age
she had enough sense to know that this was a trophy book,
the pictures it contained as grotesque in their own way as
the mounted heads of slain animals.
She closed it with a decisive snap. Getting up, she took the
album into the living room, tossed it onto the bloody carpet.
Then she gathered Paul's magazines—Penthouse, Cycle
World, Motorcycling—and began tearing out the pages,
crumpling them up, tossing them into a pile on top of the
photo album. She knew where the matches were. Carly got
them from a drawer in the kitchen, returned to the living
room. She struck one of the wooden matches, then stood
there staring at the flame. The pain was gone now. Carly was
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IT'S LOOSE
empty inside, as if the part of her that manufactured feelings
had been removed. She was hollow, numb, not even sure
why she was doing what she was doing.
She dropped the match on the pile of wadded-up maga-
zine pages. At first it looked as though the match would go
out, but then the flames caught, began to spread. The orange
fire engulfed a pair of people riding a new Honda, then
spread to a blonde proudly exposing her breasts, moved on
to an ad for Bell helmets. The pages curled, turned black,
more motorcycles and nude women being consumed by the
blaze. It was the size of a campfire, then a small bonfire.
Carly stepped back from the heat.
She waited until she saw the cover of the photo album
start to crinkle and burn, then she turned and walked out of
the house. At the edge of the woods, she stopped and looked
back at the house. Flames, bright and orange, danced in the
living-room window. Carly watched until they poked
through the roof. Then she turned and walked toward the
lake.
She wasn't going back home.
She wasn't going back to school and listen to idiots like
Brittany Uhl extol the wonders of school spirit.
Slipping and sliding in the slushy snow, Carly made her
way to the boathouse. She went past it, onto the still-frozen
surface of the lake. South Point was probably closer to the
mainland than the place where the ice bridge and the ferry
landing were located. It was only a few miles. She could walk
it. You weren't supposed to go out on the ice after the Split
was declared, but only a few days ago the ice had been
supporting cars. It could hold her without difficulty.
But today was unusually warm, something inside her
cautioned. Carly ignored the warning. The ice would sup-
port her.
It was difficult walking because, despite the ice beneath it,
the snow on the lake was also turning to slush. Her shoes
were low-cuts, for school, and her wet, cold feet were
becoming numb.
She'd been struggling through the slush for an hour when
she saw the break in the ice. A four-foot-wide gap that ran as
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IT'S LOOSE
far as she could see in each direction. Gray, icy water. Carly
stared at it. Although all her survival instincts told her to go
back, she had no intention of doing so. Back meant school,
her parents, life on the damned dull island.
And what was ahead?
She didn't know. But at least it wasn't what was behind
her.
She backed up, turned, and ran at the break in the ice. It
should have been no problem to jump such a short distance,
but the slush slowed her down, and her numb feet didn't
seem to want to work right.
Carly reached the edge, leaped.
Her foot reached the other side, and for a moment she
stood there, balancing precariously, waving her arms, and
then she fell, splashing into the icy water. As did anyone
living this far north, Carly knew about hypothermia. So she
knew that her only chance was to pull herself out as quickly
as possible, hope the sun could warm her enough to keep her
alive. But when she tried to get out, her arms seemed unable
to get purchase on the ice. Instead of pulling herself out, she
was pulling the slush in. Although she knew she was doing
something wrong, she seemed unable to figure out what. Her
next attempt was feeble, as if she no longer had any strength.
She tried again and seemed barely able to lift her arms.
After that the water didn't seem as cold, and Carly
stopped trying altogether.
9
Kesselring stood at the ferry landing, staring off across the
deteriorating ice. He had what he'd so desperately wanted.
The thing he'd been pursuing for three years was trapped
here. Now he had to find it. Before the ice thawed and the
ferry started running. And before it could turn this place
into its own private slaughterhouse.
Anyone on the island could be its host. He had to find that
person. And then he had to do what he had come here to do.
Three and a half years had passed since that day in the
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IT'S LOOSE
Pittsburgh grocery store. Although he'd known it wouldn't
work, Kesselring had tried to convince himself it hadn't
happened, that he was suffering from overwork or an
overactive imagination—or that maybe someone had laced
the squad room coffeepot with LSD. He was reminded of
Scrooge telling himself that the strange things visited upon
him were just products of indigestion. It hadn't worked for
Scrooge, and it hadn't worked for him. And Kesselring's life
had been changed even more drastically than Scrooge's.
He had truly seen it.
A thing that emerged from a dead man.
Reason could not explain what he'd seen, for reason
denied the existence of such things. Reason said there were
no werewolves, no zombies, no vampires. Reason said
monsters did not rise from corpses, then vanish as if some
unseen dude in a control room had pressed a button. That
was the first thing Kesselring had to do, stop relying on
reason. Under ordinary circumstances, that would have
been an impossible task for a pragmatic career cop like him.
But he had unquestionably seen the creature. And he
sensed—as clearly as he could sense music or cold droplets
of falling rain or the heat of a flame—that it was something
ancient and evil and vile. And after what had happened in
the grocery store, he knew it was a bringer of death.
He dreamed about it, dreams in which the thing touched
him, and through that contact he experienced a coldness
that went beyond a mere drop in temperature, a coldness
that did not exist in the world as Kesselring knew it. And
wherever it touched him, his flesh began to fester, then rot,
turning greenish yellow, then brown, and finally falling off
in putrid tendrils, like molten toffee.
Before long, he was thinking about nothing else. When
someone touched him, his flesh tried to shrink from the
contact, for the monster could be hiding in anyone. Kessel-
ring was going crazy. Though aware of it, able to see it
happening, he'd been unable to stop it. It was the firsthand
experience, the knowing. The thing was totally evil, repug-
nant, an anathema. That something so awful, so contrary to
everything he held sacred, should exist was intolerable.
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IT'S LOOSE
Though not religious, Kesselring knew he'd been face-to-
face with something from hell.
Although these things simmered and churned within him,
overwhelming him and playing a constant tug of war with
his sanity, he told no one. Anyone he revealed his experi-
ence to would think he was crazy.
Six months after that day in the grocery store, Kesselring
took early retirement.
He couldn't do what he had to do and still keep his job. It
was going to mean a lot of traveling around the country—
and the world, as it turned out—and if he was successful, it
was going to mean breaking the law. The traveling would
have been too extensive to do on weekends and vacations.
And he didn't want to break the law while he was supposed
to be enforcing it. Not all cops felt that way, but for
Kesselring it was a matter of principle, and principles had
always guided his life.
Or maybe these were just the reasons he gave to himself.
Because he was unwilling to admit that he was hopelessly
obsessed.
Kesselring shrugged. If he was obsessed, what difference
did it make? He knew what had to be done. He knew how
important it was. You could probably say Churchill was
obsessed with defeating the Nazis. Maybe Jonas Salk was
obsessed with finding a vaccine to prevent polio. Being
obsessed wasn't always bad.
And what Kesselring had set out to do wasn't unlike
finding a vaccine for polio, for he too wanted to thwart a
horrendous evil. The monster could well have caused as
much death and suffering as the disease. Maybe more. The
monster had been at it every bit as long, possibly longer.
Knowing. That was the key. Kesselring knew it existed,
knew what it did. Only a handful of people had seen what he
had seen. Most tried to resume their lives. Kesselring could
not. Not knowing what he did.
At first he'd called it the Charley, after Charles Capwell,
the man he'd killed in the grocery store. But the word failed
to convey the vileness and destructiveness of it. Later, after
he'd learned how it thrived on death, he'd called it the Grim
110

IT'S LOOSE
Reaper. Finally, he'd settled on the Evil. Because that's what
it was, evil, pure and monstrous, its only function to cause
death. Again and again and again.
The Evil had been here for a long time. Maybe it was as
old as the earth. He didn't know. Other people in other
times had bogey-beasts that could have been the same one
he sought now. There were tales of goblins and demons and
ghouls, thousands of such stories, and Kesselring had quit
trying to sort them out.
What the Evil was didn't matter.
Only destroying it mattered.
As Kesselring turned away from the ferry landing and
walked back to his rented car, he felt the weight of his
responsibility. He was probably the only person on the
planet who could destroy it.
4
111

sis
1
Leaning against the door of his Cherokee police car, Don
Farraday watched as members of the Ice Island Volunteer
Fire Department hosed down the smoldering remains of
Paul Edley's house. Karl Zellner stood beside him. Karl had
reported the fire. He'd taken his dog, Brute, out to A1
McDougall's place—A1 was a semiretired veterinarian—
and on his way back he'd spotted smoke coming from South
Point. The blaze had apparently gone unnoticed for quite a
while, because by the time the firemen arrived, only one wall
had still been standing, and that had collapsed when the
spray from a firehose hit it.
"Think there was anyone inside?" Zellner asked. He was
one of those people who seemed to grow ever thinner as he
aged. When he'd come to the island three years ago, Zellner
was lean. Now he was scrawny. The only thing that hadn't
shrunk was his large rudder-shaped nose. If he kept on
losing weight, the nose would be all that was left.
"Shouldn't have been. The place was empty, and I locked
up when I left it."
"You think this had anything to do with Edley's murder?"
112

IT'S LOOSE
"I don't know," Don said. He'd asked himself the same
question.
"First Edley gets murdered, and then his place burns
down. And before any of this happened, that guy broke into
the Abelson cabin and committed suicide." Zellner shook
his head. "If I'd known Ice Island was going to be like this,
I'd have stayed in Chicago. At least the winters weren't as
bad."
Don had nothing to say to that. He had absolutely no
suspects in Edley's murder. Not even Kesselring. Don had
managed to lift several good prints from the tire iron used to
kill Edley, none of which had matched the ex-cop's. It was
good that he'd managed to get the murderer's prints, of
course. The problem was that the prints were useless unless
he had a suspect. With the information he had now, the
murderer could be anyone on the island—anyone but
Kesselring.
He wasn't happy with the idea that an Ice Islander had
killed Edley. Although he wasn't equally friendly with
everyone on the island, he'd known most of its residents for
years, and he had trouble imagining any of them being
vicious enough to do what had been done to Paul Edley.
Jealousy still seemed the most likely motive. Edley's murder
was an act of rage. And Edley was known to be a womanizer.
"You know Edley?" Don asked.
"I recognized him when I saw him," Zellner said, "but I
really didn't know him."
"What'd you hear about him?"
"Not much. I understand he, uh, had a way with the
ladies."
"Hear anything about which ladies?" Don asked.
"No, nobody ever mentioned any names."
Don nodded. He hadn't really thought Zellner would
know anything that would be helpful, but the only way to
learn anything about Edley's love life was to ask around, and
the retired schoolteacher was standing right there. The
stream from one of the firehoses hit a particularly hot spot,
causing steam and sparks to spew from the charred remains
of Edley's house.
113

IT'S LOOSE
The two men watched the firefighters in silence for a few
moments, then Zellner said, "Never did find out what was.
wrong with Brute."
Don glanced over at Zellner's car. It was one of those
Eagles, a high-centered four-wheel-drive sedan. The Ger-
man shepherd was in the backseat, peering through the
bottom portion of the back window.
"What seems to be wrong with him?" Don asked.
"He's afraid of everything. If the phone rings, he runs and
hides in the bedroom. An icicle fell off the roof this
morning, and he actually squealed." Zellner shook his head.
"It's just not like him."
"What's McDougall say?"
"Said something probably scared him, and that he'll get
over it."
"Doesn't sound like it's anything to worry about."
Zellner frowned. "But what could have scared him that
much? I mean, Brute's gone from being absolutely fearless
to being afraid of his own shadow. I've never seen an animal
that scared."
The fire looked as though it was pretty much out. The men
from one of the two fire trucks were rolling up their hoses.
Brian Young, the fire chief, joined Don and Zellner. He was
wearing a fireman's hat with chief on the front. Beneath the
hat was a round, soft face with blue eyes and a thick gray
mustache that was turning white. He owned the grocery
store.
"Everything's under control," he said. "It'll be hot for a
while yet, so I'll leave one of the trucks here, just in case it
flares up."
"Any idea what caused it?" Don asked.
"With that much destruction, there's no way to tell.
Could have been wiring, could have been the heater, could
have been anything."
"Arson?"
"Sure, could have been arson. Like I say, there's no way of
telling. We need the state arson investigator, I guess, but
with the Split there's no way to get him here."
Don had always looked upon the Split as just something
114

IT'S LOOSE
you had to put up with if you lived on the island. A little
inconvenient, and it made you feel lonely sometimes, but
otherwise no big deal. All of a sudden, he was discovering
how difficult the Split could make things.
"You figure this ties in with the murder?" Young asked.
"I don't know," Don answered. He could see that he was
going to get asked that question a lot in the next few days.
"Any idea who killed him?" Young asked.
Don shook his head. That was another question he was
going to be asked a lot. And he wondered whether a week
from now he'd still be answering it by shaking his head and
feeling overwhelmed.
2
"Well, aren't you at least a little bit concerned?" Carolyn
Pfeil asked.
She and her husband, Reverend Douglas Pfeil, were in the
living room of their church-owned house. He was sitting on
the couch. She was pacing.
"She's late, that's all," the minister said.
"It's nine o'clock. We haven't heard from her, and no
one's seen her."
"She'll come home when she's ready to come home."
She stared at him, not believing he could be this calm and
unconcerned. What was the matter with him? "Douglas,
that. . . that man she was seeing was murdered this morn-
ing."
"Do you think Carly did it?"
"No! Of course not! But doesn't it worry you that Carly
hasn't come home, and then that man was bludgeoned to
death?"
He looked at her, but his eyes seemed distant, as if his
thoughts were elsewhere.
"And then his house burned down." She waited for a
reaction, got none, and continued. "Don't you see? Carly
could have heard about the murder and gone there—to the
house. Maybe she was inside when it burned down."
115

IT'S LOOSE
"They didn't find any remains."
"They probably haven't had a chance to look yet."
"She'll be home when she's ready. I already told you
that."
For several seconds, she just looked at him, as if doing so
might somehow help her to understand what was happen-
ing. "Douglas . . . you've been acting so ... so strangely
lately."
He didn't respond.
"I'm going to call the police," she said. "Something could
have happened to—"
Suddenly Douglas was on his feet, towering over her,
looking at her with eyes that were cold and cruel and full of
feelings she was unable to identify. Taking a step back,
Carolyn Pfeil realized she was afraid, afraid of her husband.
"Don't call the police," he said. It was an order, stated
flatly, to be obeyed without question. Carolyn experienced a
sensation similar to that of walking into a spider web,
feeling it stick to your exposed skin, which instantly crawls
into gooseflesh. Except in this case the web was inside her.
And the spider was crawling around.
"Douglas . . . I . . ." She let her words trail off because
she didn't know what to say.
"Don't call the police," he repeated, and this time his eyes
were burning into her like those lasers they used to cut
metal. They seemed hot, so hot she could swear they were
glowing.
"I won't," she said, her voice a tremulous whisper. And
she wouldn't. She was afraid for Carly, but she was absolute-
ly terrified of her husband.
"Good," he said. "I'm going out." He turned and walked
out of the room.
Carolyn was shaking. She didn't understand this at all.
Why was Douglas acting so strangely? And why was she
suddenly so terrified of him? But then that was a question
she didn't want to examine too closely, for she knew, at least
on some level, that the emotions burning in his eyes, eyes
that seemed to glow when you looked at them for a moment,
were intense and cruel beyond her understanding.
116

IT'S LOOSE
What was happening here? Was her husband going in-
sane? No, she didn't think so. Insanity was something you
could understand, cope with. What she'd seen in Douglas's
eyes just now went way beyond insanity. It was like looking
at two people. On the outside was Douglas Pfeil, but
underneath was something else, something composed of
energy or thoughts or feelings or ... or something. And it
exuded menace and hate and sensations for which she had
no words.
Impossible, she thought. I'm going crazy.
But she knew she wasn't.
Then she thought about Carly again, looked at the phone
she knew she dared not touch. Tears started streaming down
her cheeks. Tears of worry about Carly. Tears of fear for
herself. Tears born of suddenly being in the middle of
something she wasn't equipped to handle and could never
even hope to understand.
Sinking to the floor, she sobbed.
3
Samantha Gordon had just put her eight-year-old daughter,
Stephanie, to bed when the doorbell sounded. Her son,
eleven-year-old Robert, was allowed to stay up a little later
by virtue of his superior age. Feeling this was quite unfair,
Stephanie had put up an argument, which Samantha had
finally ended with the uncompromising use of strict parental
authority.
She was coming down the stairs from Stephanie's room
when the doorbell sounded, so she shouted, "I'll get it," and
headed for the front door, wondering who it could be at this
hour. She'd about decided it must be a neighbor asking to
borrow something, when she opened the door and found out
she was wrong.
"Who is it?" her husband called from the living room.
"It's . . . it's the minister," she said, suddenly unable to
recall his name. Not being Lutherans, they went to a church
on the mainland.
117

IT'S LOOSE
"May I come in?" the clergyman asked.
Something made her hesitate, some dimly perceived
internal warning.
"It's very important," the minister said.
"Hello," her husband, Michael, said, joining them. He
looked inquisitively at Samantha, and when she made no
response, he said, "Invite him in. We're letting all the heat
out."
Samantha stepped back from the doorway. As the clergy-
man moved past her, a coldness settled over her that seemed
to penetrate to her core, as if the minister moved within an
envelope of glacial iciness that could instantly suck the
warmth from anything it came into contact with.
4	
Karl Zellner was sitting in his recliner, watching a news
special about Pentagon waste. Brute, who still insisted on
staying close, was curled up at his feet. The reporter had just
started talking about a billion-dollar cost overrun, when
Brute leaped up as if the information had startled him. The
dog stared intently across the room, his ears cocked forward,
his eyes wide. Zellner looked where Brute was looking and
saw nothing.
"What is it?" he asked, leaning forward to pet the dog.
Brute jumped when Zellner's hand touched him. Growl-
ing softly, the dog pressed himself against Zellner's leg. The
German shepherd was trembling.
5	
Don Farraday lay in bed with Allison, knowing sleep
wouldn't come. Although he was a pretty good small-town
cop, he'd never handled a murder before. He'd talked the
town council into putting up the money to send him to a
fingerprinting course at the state police academy, but with
that exception he'd never been trained in investigatory
118

IT'S LOOSE
techniques. And this whole thing was beginning to come off
like something in a mystery novel.
First comes the stranger who breaks into a cabin to
commit suicide with a kitchen knife. Then comes the
ex-cop, Kesselring, who lies about why he's here. Then
someone murders Paul Edley by converting him into ham-
burger with a tire iron. And finally the house in which the
murder was committed burns down. Dwyer and Kesselring
were connected, although Don didn't know exactly how
because Kesselring wouldn't tell him the truth. Was Kessel-
ring also connected with Edley in some way? Was the
murder connected with the fire? Don rolled over, groaned,
tried to make all these questions stop tumbling through his
mind.
Allison put her hand on his shoulder. "Can't sleep, huh?"
"Can't stop thinking about it."
"Want to talk?"
"I'd just keep you awake too."
"You're already keeping me awake with all the tossing and
turning."
Don was silent for a moment, then he said, "You tuned in
to the Ice Island grapevine?"
"Is that a polite way of asking me whether I'm a gossip?"
"If I answer that, I'm going to get into trouble."
Allison laughed. "Well, between my real estate business
and my insurance business, I'm talking to people all day, so
I'd say I've probably got a pretty good idea of what's going
on."
"Okay, what do you know about Paul Edley?"
"He didn't take very good care of his boats, and the
company canceled the policy."
"You have anything to do with that decision?"
"The company asked me to inspect the boats and make a
recommendation."
"And you recommended they cancel the policy."
"Actually I recommended they warn him. Nobody wants
to lose a paying customer."
"What else do you know about Edley?"
"Well, mainly the things I'm sure you already know. His
119

IT'S LOOSE
mother died a long time ago, and he was raised by his father,
Bert. When Bert died a few years ago, Paul inherited the
house and the boat renting business—which immediately
started going downhill. Bert took good care of the boats. To
him it was just good sense, a matter of protecting his
investment. Paul was lazier, didn't have the same head for
business."
"How about Paul's personal life?"
"Gossip? Me? How would I know about such things?"
"Don't think of it as gossip. Think of it as rumor and
innuendo."
"Well, that's different. In the rumor and innuendo depart-
ment, I hear that Paul Edley spent a lot of time with the
wives and daughters of the summer set."
"Someone had to keep those sex-craving city women
satisfied or Ice Island wouldn't have been safe for the rest of
us."
Allison punched him in the ribs.
"Husband abuse," Don said. "Did you see that, ladies
and gentlemen? Husband abuse. Right here on our own
little island."
"Shhhh," Allison said, laughing. "Sarah will hear us and
think her parents have gone bonkers."
"Bonkers? You're the first person to use that word since
October 22, 1969."
"You're asking for more husband abuse. I hope you know
that."
Don laughed. No matter how upset he was, Allison could
always get him into one of these silly conversations and
make him laugh. He slipped his arms around her, gave her a
hug. "What about local women?" Don asked.
"Ummm, I don't think any of them are your type."
"I meant what about Edley and local women?"
"I hear he was involved with a few of them."
"Any names?"
Allison considered that. "I heard there was a teenage girl
who had to get an abortion. And I heard a rumor once
about. . ."
"Yes?"
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IT'S LOOSE
"I hate to spread gossip."
"Think of it as helping the police with a murder investiga-
tion. The innocent have nothing to fear."
"My God," Allison said. "He's started talking in slo-
gans."
"Come on," Don said. "Give."
Allison sighed. "Irene Waggoner."
"What did you hear?"
"Just that she was fooling around with Edley."
Don thought about her husband, pudgy Kevin Waggoner,
who worked at Ace Hardware and had about as much sex
appeal as a stump. The times he'd seen the Waggoners
together they hadn't seemed real loving toward each other,
but then a lot of couples didn't. He and Allison were loving,
but he didn't know whether other people saw them that way.
"Anyone else?" Don asked.
"That's all the rumor and innuendo I've heard."
They fell silent then. Night sounds, kept at bay by their
conversation, sneaked back into the room. A car passing by
a block or two away. A dog barking. The creaks and groans
of the house.
"Kesselring was my first suspect," Don said. "But his
prints weren't on the tire iron."
"I know," Allison said. "You told me."
"You know what that means? It means someone who lives
on the island killed him."
"It's a little scary to think that someone who lives right
here with us could do something like that."
"Think about it," Don said. "Can you picture anyone on
the island beating a guy to death?"
"No."
"But one of them did."
"You're thinking it might have been Kevin Waggoner,
aren't you?"
"I'm going to check it out, yes. But there may be others,
women you haven't heard about. Maybe one of their hus-
bands or boyfriends murdered him."
"Can you see Kevin Waggoner as a murderer?" Allison
asked. "He's just sort of chubby and lethargic."
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IT'S LOOSE
"On the outside. Who knows what's on the inside—of
anyone?"
The night sounds crept back in again, then Allison said,
"Maybe there's another stranger on the island, someone you
don't know about, someone who's hiding out somewhere—
one of the summer cabins maybe."
"I considered that," Don said. "It's possible, but if
someone's here, no one on the island has seen him. If
anyone spotted a stranger—or even a strange car—I'd have
heard about it. The murder has people jumpy. I've already
had half a dozen calls from people who've spotted Kessel-
ring."
Allison snuggled against him. "Hold me," she said.
He squeezed her gently, thinking that somewhere out
there was a person who'd beaten a man until there wasn't
much left of him. And that person was trapped with Don
and Allison and their daughter on a chunk of land four miles
wide and ten miles long. The cop part of him was glad that
the murderer couldn't get away. The husband and father
would have been just as happy if the murderer had fled—to
Cambodia or Africa or the South Pole.
6
It was after two in the morning when Reverend Douglas
Pfeil left the Gordons' house. His clothes were covered with
blood. So was his face, most of it concentrated around his
mouth.
The hunger had been satiated.
But he knew it would stir within him again.
Soon.
122

Seven
1
I've got a bone to pick with you," Doctor Allen Ingram said
when Don stepped into his office.
Don sat down in a black swivel chair that seemed lower
than the doctor's seat behind the desk. Maybe this was
intended to give the physician an air of authority, so his
instructions would be obeyed by patients. On the other
hand, maybe it was just Don's imagination.
Doc Ingram was probably about seventy; no one seemed
to know his precise age. He had a mane of white hair that
gave him a resemblance to William Hartnell, the original
Dr. Who. He had a kindly face with clear deep blue eyes and
a warm smile, which made him look like everyone's favorite
grandfather.
His office looked more like a college professor's than a
doctor's. The walls were lined with built-in bookcases, all of
them full of volumes, and a large globe stood on its floor
stand in one corner. He was the island's only doctor, and
he'd been there for more than forty years.
"What bone is that?" Don asked, rubbing his eyes. He'd
managed to get about three hours' sleep last night.
123

IT'S LOOSE
"You had me bring that body back here so I could look it
over, then left me to figure out what to do with the damned
thing."
"What did you do with it?"
"Phil Deemis has got it."
"He's keeping it at the Shell station? Doc, that body's
evidence. I entrusted it to you so that—"
"It's in his freezer. He had a twenty-three-cubic-foot
model he bought for deer hunting, but he didn't get any deer
last fall, so he let us put the body in it. No charge to the
town."
"Thanks for taking care of it," Don said. Ingram wasn't
really put out, he was just stringing Don along a little—
letting him know he owed him a favor.
"Now that I've resolved that messy problem, what else
can I do for the Ice Island constabulary?"
"What did you learn from examining Edley's body?"
"I can tell you the cause of death."
"You can?"
"Sure. Somebody beat the hell out of him. If you want to
get more specific than that—failure of a vital organ due to
extreme trauma or some such thing—you'll have to wait
until you can thaw him out and have a pathologist perform
an autopsy."
"What I really need is a time of death."
"I can't be very precise."
"Do the best you can."
"Judging by body temperature, lividity, and the degree of
rigor mortis, I'd say he died in the afternoon or the evening
of the day before he was discovered."
"That's a period of eight hours or more. Couldn't you
narrow it down just a little?"
"Between two and eight p.m. That's the best I can do."
Don rubbed his brow. To eliminate anyone as a suspect,
he'd have to account for six hours, which included the time
people usually get off work and go home, maybe stopping for
a beer or picking up some groceries. It was going to be
impossible.
124

IT'S LOOSE
Don said, "I understand Edley had affairs with some of
the local women."
The physician frowned. "I've heard that."
"Do you know who any of them were?"
"Just one."
"Who?"
"I can't say. It would violate the doctor-patient relation-
ship."
"This is a murder investigation, Doc."
"I know. And you're wondering whether this could be a
reprisal because Edley was involved with someone's wife or
lover or something."
"That's what I was thinking."
"What I know can't help you. I'll tell you this much. It
involved a high school girl. She had an abortion. I know her
and her parents well, and there just wouldn't be any
question of revenge. Besides, this was two years ago. No one
would wait that long to get even."
Don decided not to push it, since doing so would be
fruitless. Doc had his code of ethics, and absolutely nothing
could get him to violate it. The phone rang, and the
physician answered it. Don stood up, motioning to Ingram
that he was leaving.
"Hold it," the doctor said. "It's for you."
Don took the receiver. "Farraday."
"Don, this . . . this is Hiram Bellamy." Hiram was the
principal at the junior/senior high. His voice sounded
as thin and brittle as a leaf preserved between the pages
of a heavy volume. "I ... I just came from the Gordons'
place. They're all dead. All four of them. They've been
murdered."
"Wait a minute, Hiram. How do you know they've been
murdered?"
"Oh, Jesus," Bellamy said, his voice wavering. "You only
have to take one look to know they've been murdered."
125

IT'S LOOSE
2
Don took Doc Ingram with him. The Gordons' house was a
log A-frame, which they'd built in the woods off Island
Avenue, about a mile west of South Point Road. Samantha
and Michael Gordon were both teachers at the junior/senior
high. Hiram Bellamy was waiting for Don and Doc outside
the house.
"Neither of them showed up at school this morning,"
Bellamy said as Don and Doc climbed out of the Cherokee.
"I called and didn't get any answer, so I came over to see if
anything was wrong."
Bellamy was a heavyset man with a bushy mustache and
curly gray hair that stuck out at the sides. He almost always
wore pinstriped suits, and he looked like the political
cartoon caricature of a nineteenth-century fatcat. He even
smoked cigars. He wasn't smoking one at the moment,
though. His face was ashen, and he was making nervous
little gestures with his hands. He looked as though he might
collapse any second.
"Oh, God," the principal said. "It's terrible, just terrible.
I don't know what's happening here on the island. I just
don't know." He hung back as Don and the doctor went to
the front door, which was standing open.
"Was this how you found the door?" Don asked.
"No," Bellamy said. "It was closed but not locked. I went
in to make sure everything was okay. I guess I left it open
when I ran out."
Don stepped into the house. It was the scene at Paul
Edley's house all over again. Except worse.
The living room looked as though a mad artist had been at
work, one of those guys who made pictures that were just a
bunch of globs and spatters of paint. Except this artist had
only used one color: red. The bodies of two children lay in a
corner of the room, one partially atop the other, as if they'd
been used then thrown away. The body of a woman lay by
the couch, her lifeless eyes staring at the ceiling. There was
terror in those eyes, terror that was absolute and pure. All
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IT'S LOOSE
the bodies were bloody, their clothing ripped and shredded.
At first Don didn't see the fourth body, but then he saw a
pair of legs sticking out from behind an upholstered chair.
He went to investigate.
"Oh, Christ," he said when he saw what was behind the
couch.
It was a man, presumably Michael Gordon, bloody like
the others, with his clothing torn. There was a ragged,
bloody stump where the head should have been.
"Wh—" Don's mouth was so dry he had no voice.
"Where's his head?"
"There," Doc Ingram said, his voice barely above a
whisper.
Don followed the direction of the physician's gaze. Mi-
chael Gordon's head was sitting on the stairway leading to
the second floor. Its lips were pulled back in a hideous grin,
and its eyes were open, lookingat Don. He had the feeling it
was still alive, watching him and grinning that grotesque
grin, thinking what a dumb shit this hick constable was. The
feeling passed. Michael Gordon's eyes were lifeless; they saw
nothing. And the grin was some trick of muscles that had
lost their life-giving blood and could no longer receive
directions from a dead brain.
"I'm going to be sick," Doc Ingram said. But he just stood
there, stunned, making no move to leave the room.
"I'm going to need your help here," Don said.
"What can I do? You need a mortician, not a doctor."
"You know what I need," Don said. "Look them over and
tell me what you can."
The physician just stood there, staring, not moving.
"Come on," Don said, leading him outside. "You stay out
here and get some fresh air while I take pictures."
Hiram Bellamy, who'd been waiting for them outside,
said, "What do you think happened?"
Before Don could respond, Doc Ingram said, "The devil
got loose in there."
Don got his Polaroid camera from the Cherokee and went
back inside to take photos before anything was disturbed.
127

IT'S LOOSE
When he was finished and rejoined the others, Doc Ingram
seemed to be feeling a little better.
"Can you give me a hand in there now?" Don asked.
Ingram nodded. "Let's go."
The physician started with the woman. He squatted
beside her, feeling her flesh in places, examining her
wounds, checking her limbs for the degree of rigor mortis.
"I'd say she died last night, between eight and midnight.
That's just a guess, however, no guarantees."
The physician grunted and continued his examination of
the body. "Look at this," he said.
"What?"
"Here on her neck, where the flesh is missing."
Don looked. There was a hole in her neck, a red and
ragged pit. The doctor lifted the body up, pushed away the
shredded material of Samantha Gordon's clothing, and
studied the flesh. What had happened to these people? What
kind of a maniac would indulge in such a bloodbath? Don
recalled what Doc Ingram had said a few moments ago. The
devil got loose in there. He pushed the thought away.
"I don't understand this," the doctor said.
"What?"
"Any of it."
"Could you be a little more specific?"
"Yeah. This hole in her neck I was showing you. The flesh
was bitten off."
"You mean an animal did this?" As soon as he said it,
Don realized how ridiculous the notion was. The only wild
animals on the island big enough to do something like this
were bears. The snow cover hadn't melted away yet, so the
bears would still be hibernating. Besides, who ever heard of
a bear closing the door? And the Gordons sure as hell
wouldn't let one into their house.
"No," Doc Ingram said. "No animal did this. Look at
those marks on her wrists. She was tied up."
Don shuddered. There was a psycho loose on the island. A
psycho who bit off pieces of his victims.
"There's something else I've got to tell you," Doc Ingram
said. "And you're going to think I'm crazy when I say it." He
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IT'S LOOSE
look a slow breath. "I think her cause of death was loss of
blood."
"That's not surprising," Don said. "Just look around."
"I don't mean she bled until her heart stopped. I mean
there's no blood in her at all. She's dry."
"How?"
"I don't know how."
"You mean that. . . that whoever killed her . . ." Don let
his words trail off. Was there a vampire loose on the island?
He saw himself discovering the monster's hiding place,
raising the lid of its coffin, placing a stake against its heart,
raising the hammer . . .
"I don't know what I mean," Ingram said. Almost as an
afterthought he added, "There're bite marks on her shoul-
der."
"What kind of bite marks?"
"Human bite marks."
Don muttered something that was incomprehensible,
even to himself.
They examined the other bodies. All of them had bite
marks and places where the flesh was missing. All of them
had been bound. One of the children, the boy, still had a
piece of cord dangling from one wrist. Doc Ingram esti-
mated the time of death for all of them was between eight
and midnight.
"He must have made the others watch," Don said. A
shiver hit between his shoulder blades, traveled down into
his midsection.
They were standing over the two dead children. Was this
the work of the same person who killed Paul Edley? The
scene looked so similar with the bloody corpses, the spat-
tered walls. If this was the work of the same person, then his
earlier assumption that the motive for Edley's death was
jealousy or revenge was now worthless. This was mindless
slaughter. This was the work of a raging maniac, somebody
whose thought processes were going around and around like
a cracked record, screaming, Kill! Kill! Kill! Kill! Over and
over and over.
"It's so terrible when it's children," Doc Ingram said.
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IT'S LOOSE
"Wasn't any picnic for the adults either."
"No," the doctor said. "Not for any of them."
"Doc, can you get someone to come out and pick you up?
I'm going to be here for a while."
"No problem."
"Also, I'm going to need you to come back later on so we
can load up the bodies."
"I've only got two patients coming in today, both in the
afternoon. Unless there's an emergency, there shouldn't be
any problem. Are you going to leave it up to me to find
somewhere to put the bodies?"
"It would be a big help."
The physician nodded. "You're really going to owe me. I
hope you know that." Without waiting for Don to respond,
he added, "Could one person do this to four people?"
"Probably," Don said. "Line everybody up against the
wall, hold them at gunpoint, tie them up one at a time—or
make them tie each other up."
"How many people do you think did it?"
"I don't know. Why?"
"I was just wondering how many psychos we have run-
ning around."
They went back outside. Hiram Bellamy was standing
there, looking as ashen and close to collapsing as he had
before.
3
Mrs. Anna Neuhaus walked purposefully into her kitchen,
put the wall-mounted phone's receiver to her ear, and dialed
Reverend Douglas Pfeil's phone number. Irritably, she
pushed some errant strands of blond hair out of her face. In
the back of her mind, she noted that she'd have to check the
roots, see if any gray was showing up yet.
Anna Neuhaus was getting more annoyed by the moment.
Reverend Pfeil had promised to come over yesterday eve-
ning and have a chat with Brooke, and he'd never shown up,
never even phoned to say he couldn't make it. All day she'd
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IT'S LOOSE
been trying to get in touch with him, and he hadn't been
there.
The Pfeils' phone rang for the third time.
Every time Anna had called, Carolyn Pfeil answered,
sounding tinny and distant, as if the conversation were
being held over a phone nearly as primitive as the one
Alexander Graham Bell had built. But it wasn't the connec-
tion; it was Carolyn, who sounded as if she were talking in
her sleep.
The phone rang for the tenth time.
Anna Neuhaus disliked being treated with so little re-
spect. She was, after all, a member of the church's board of
trustees. And her husband was on the town council. They
owned the Michigander Inn and Lakeview Cabins. All of
which put them among the town's leading citizens, and
Anna Neuhaus expected to be treated accordingly.
The phone rang for the twelfth time.
Mrs. Neuhaus was simmering now, each ring of the phone
just that much more fuel for her anger. She let it keep
ringing, as if that would somehow make a statement, show
that Mrs. Anna Neuhaus was no one to be trifled with.
The phone's fifteenth ring hummed in her ear.
On the sixteenth ring, someone picked up the receiver.
But no one spoke.
"Hello," Anna Neuhaus said.
Silence.
"Hello," she said, making her annoyance plain. "Is some-
one there?"
Silence.
"This is Anna Neuhaus," she said. "I have no time for
games."
"Oh, hello, Mrs. Neuhaus." It was Reverend Pfeil.
"I've been trying to reach you all day."
"Oh?"
"You promised to come over and talk to Brooke."
"Hmmmm. I did, didn't I?"
"You never showed up."
"I didn't, did I?"
"No, you certainly didn't." Anna Neuhaus was beginning
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IT'S LOOSE
to feel vaguely uncomfortable about the way this conversa-
tion was going. Why did the reverend seem so nonchalant,
almost mocking? And then a truly horrible thought oc-
curred to her. What if the minister was on drugs? A man of
God corrupted, corrupting them.
"Is there anything else?" Pfeil asked.
For one of the few times in her life, Anna Neuhaus was at
a loss for words.
"In that case, I've got something to say to you," the
minister said. "Something I've been dying to tell you for
years, Mrs. Neuhaus."
"What?" she managed to say.
"Stuff it up your ass, Mrs. Neuhaus."
Anna Neuhaus wasn't sure she'd heard correctly. "I beg
your—"
"Mrs. Neuhaus, you listening?"
"Yes. And I—"
"Get fucked."
The line went dead.
4
Don sat at his desk, feeling the weight of five murders
pressing down on him. Five particularly gruesome murders
in a place where the leading cause of death was old age. The
second most common reason for people dying was drown-
ing, which usually only happened to summer people. Now
someone had bludgeoned a man to death, and someone—
maybe the same someone, maybe someone else—had mur-
dered a family of four.
Literally ripping off chunks of the victims' flesh with
his—or her—teeth.
Decapitating one.
Draining the blood from another. (He refused to think of
it in terms of sucking. There were no Bram Stoker elements
to this. Uh-uh. No way.)
As far as Don could tell, the prints on the tire iron used to
kill Paul Edley didn't match any of those he'd found in the
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IT'S LOOSE
Gordon house. But that didn't mean a whole lot. The killer
could have worn gloves while butchering the Gordons. And
the prints from the tire iron could have come from the
murderer's right hand, while prints taken from the Gordons
could have come from his left—or even different fingers on
the same hand. But then Don's knowledge of fingerprinting
was rudimentary. Maybe an expert could match prints he
thought were unalike.
Doc Ingram and he had loaded the bodies into the
Cherokee. They'd put the children on top of the adults, but
then none of the victims was going to complain about
the cramped, uncomfortable ride. The corpses were now
at Doc Ingram's office, where the physician was giving
them a more thorough examination than he had at the
scene.
Don was sure everyone on the island knew what had
happened. Despite her love of gossip, Corrine knew enough
to be circumspect about discussing police matters. But
Hiram Bellamy and Doc Ingram were also aware of what
had happened, which meant the gory details of the Gordons'
bizarre deaths had been told in stunned tones to numerous
shocked listeners.
Corrine looked somewhat dazed, the expression on her
face asking, What the hell's going on here? She had not
asked Don that question, apparently realizing he had no
answer for it. The phone rang, and Corrine answered it.
"Doc Ingram," she said.
Picking up his phone, Don said, "Whatcha got for me,
Doc?"
"I'm going to have a bill for you shortly."
"Besides that."
"The others had some blood left in them. Only the
woman was dry."
"Doc, how .. . how do you drain someone like that?"
"I don't know."
"How could it be done? With a mechanical device of some
sort?"
"What, pick up the Sears catalog and order a mechanical
bloodsucker? I just don't have an answer for you. Draining
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IT'S LOOSE
the blood from people's something I've never been too
heavily into."
The doctor's reference to a mechanical bloodsucker made
Don think of Kesselring's pool cue case. But he didn't know
what to do with the thought. Even with everything that had
happened, he wasn't ready to think the ex-cop was carrying
around a machine that drained people's blood.
"How do funeral homes drain the blood when they
embalm people?" Don asked.
"They make an incision in the neck, exposing the carotid
artery and the jugular vein. They make an incision in the
vein, pump embalming fluid into the artery, and as the
blood is displaced by the fluid, it flows out of the vein and
into the drains on the table."
"I take it Mrs. Gordon's blood wasn't displaced by
anything."
"No. She was just dry."
"Jesus."
"Here's something else for you to chew on. Michael
Gordon's head was gnawed off."
"Gnawed?"
"Yes, gnawed. At least the flesh was. The bone was simply
snapped."
"Snapped?"
"Are you going to repeat everything I say?"
"How much strength would it take to ... to do something
like that?"
"I don't know. I've never had occasion to sever any
human heads. I suppose someone who's determined to do it
could get the job done somehow."
Don was unable to think of an intelligent-sounding ques-
tion.
"Phil Deemis says he doesn't want any more corpses in
his freezer. What am I going to do with them? Right now
I've got them on planks stretched between chairs in the back
room. They can't stay there."
"You don't know anyone else with an empty freezer?"
"Not anyone who wants a corpse in it, no."
"Buy one, charge it to the town."
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IT'S LOOSE
"You kidding?"
"Okay, I'll handle it. If I can get O'Connor to send one
over, will you store the bodies for me? It'll be easier than
hauling them over here."
Doc Ingram sighed. "Yeah, I've got room."
They were silent for a few moments, then Don said,
"What kind of a person drains the blood out of a woman?"
The physician had no answer for that.
Don said, "I don't even know whether the killer took the
blood with him or just used it to add to the splatter on the
walls."
"Maybe he drank it," the doctor said.
"You're not serious, I hope." Don didn't like that notion
at all. It was getting entirely too close to good old Bram
Stoker.
"It's not that unusual," the physician said. "Warriors in
some cultures drink the blood of their enemies. Some
people consume the blood of animals."
"As a rule, here on Ice Island, they restrain themselves."
Don massaged his forehead. "Doc, what am I looking for
here? A psychopath who carries a bloodsucking device
around with him?"
"I don't know what you're looking for," the physician
said. "I don't understand this any better than you do."
After ending the conversation with Doc Ingram, he called
Dennis O'Connor, who operated a used-appliance shop and
appliance repair service. He persuaded Dennis to send his
biggest freezer over to Doc Ingram's and bill the town. Then
he called the state police office in Marquette and asked for
Lieutenant Roper.
"Hey, Don," the lieutenant said. "What's happening?"
Don told him.
"Jesus Christ! You got a real mess on your hands there.
Got any suspects?"
"No. And I really need some help. Need it badly. I'm
having to buy freezers to preserve all the bodies."
"I can't tell you anything encouraging about the chopper.
We checked on the parts, and the outfit we ordered from
seems to have lost the paperwork."
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IT'S LOOSE
"This is urgent," Don said. "I can't handle this."
"I tried to get another chopper out of Detroit, but I
couldn't. I got another idea, though. Let me try that."
"Whoever's doing the killing might not be through yet."
"I know your situation's serious," the state policeman
said. He paused, then added, "What kind of a person
decapitates one victim and sucks the blood from another?"
Don wished Roper hadn't used the word suck. "A very
sick person," he said. "A very dangerous person."
"Let me get back to you," the lieutenant said. "With what
you've got on your hands out there, I'm sure I can find some
way to get some help to you. Just let me work on it."
After hanging up the phone, Don leaned back in his chair
and rubbed his eyes, making little gold lights dance on a
field of blackness. And he recalled Doc Ingram's reaction to
the gruesome scene in the Gordons' house.
The devil got loose in there.
No devil. No Bram Stoker. The killer was a bloodthirsty
lunatic, a crazy person, someone with a brain in which the
psychological equivalent of a computer chip had burned
out—or maybe a whole bunch of computer chips. And that
was scary enough all by itself.
And yet Doc Ingram's words continued to taunt him. The
devil got loose in there. Don shivered.
136

Clght
1
It started about noon.
The rush to buy heavy-duty locks and ammunition.
By three o'clock, Kevin Waggoner, the clerk at Ace
Hardware, was selling his seventeenth box of Remington
cartridges that afternoon. He was wondering whether there
was some way he could jack up the price without the boss
finding out and pocket the difference.
"You been selling lots of ammo?" the latest customer
asked. He was Joe Coleman, the owner of the pharmacy and
the mayor of Ice Island. Coleman was one of those people
whose skin was so white he looked anemic. His slight frame
and thin gray hair added to the perception. The veins in the
backs of his hands stood out like the secondary highways on
a road map.
"Yeah," Kevin said. "Cartridges and locks. We'll be out of
both by tomorrow if it keeps on like this." He handed a box
of .38 Remingtons to Coleman.
"Man's gotta protect what's his," the mayor-pharmacist
said.
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IT'S LOOSE
Kevin nodded. No one had ever tried to take anything
away from him, so he'd never given too much thought to
protecting what was his. But then, as Irene was always
pointing out to him, he didn't have a whole lot of posses-
sions. Marrying Irene, Kevin was coming to realize, was
probably not the smartest thing he had ever done.
"I don't know who this psychopath is," Coleman said.
"But if he comes into my house he's going to go out in a
body bag."
Although Kevin Waggoner would be the first to admit he
wasn't the most perceptive person in the world, even he
could see that Coleman was trying to convince himself. His
jerky hand movements gave him away, as did the breathy
quality of his voice, the haunted look in his eyes. The eyes
were the main thing. All the people who had come in to buy
cartridges and heavy-duty locks had that look in their eyes.
The whole damn town was scared.
"Later on, I'm going to talk to Don Farraday," Coleman
said. "See what progress he's making. Whoever this maniac
is, we need to get him locked up as quickly as possible."
After Coleman was gone, Kevin Waggoner got a box of
.45-caliber ammunition and slipped it under the counter.
He had a U.S. government type .45 automatic pistol at
home. Maybe he should get it out, clean it and oil it, have it
ready. Just in case.
2
Kesselring wasn't in his room. As Don drove away from the
Superior Motel, heading west on Island Avenue, he tried to
concentrate on the familiar surroundings as a means of
getting his mind off the five murders he was supposed to
solve.
On his right was the elementary school, a long one-story
building with the U.S. and Michigan flags waving out front.
On his left was Phil Deemis's Shell station, which was across
the street from the town's only park, a square block of trees
and picnic tables and playground equipment. In the next
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IT'S LOOSE
block, across the street from the city hall and police station,
was the grocery store. He passed Coleman's Pharmacy and
then the island's only stone building, the First Lutheran
Church. Reverend Pfeil was up on a stepladder, attaching a
banner to the front of the building that said revival 7 p.m.
friday.
Although Don wasn't terribly interested in religion,
Allison was into it, and she insisted that he accompany her
and Sarah to church on Sunday mornings. Don's mother
had had an attitude like Allison's, so he had been attending
the First Lutheran Church of Ice Island most of his life. He
had never known it to hold a revival, something he associ-
ated with more fundamentalist denominations. Inwardly he
shrugged. Reverend Pfeil probably wasn't going to get much
of a turnout. Ice Islanders tended to be staid, conservative,
Germanic types. Waving their arms in the air and praising
Jesus wasn't their style.
Don decided he'd try the Icicle Lounge first. It was where
he'd found Kesselring last time, and even if the ex-cop
wasn't there, he still needed to talk to Sally Wolfe, the
co-owner and principal cocktail waitress.
Kesselring wasn't there, so he sat down in a booth and
waited for Sally to come over and take his order. The only
other customer in the place was old Ralph Higgins, a retiree
who'd spent most of his life working as a maintenance
engineer at the Soo Locks at Sault Ste. Marie, where Lake
Superior met Lake Huron. Superior was twenty-one feet
higher than the lower Great Lakes, and the locks were the
only way for the big ore carriers from Duluth and other Lake
Superior ports in the United States and Canada to get out of
(or onto) the lake. It was a subject Higgins could talk about
for hours, and Don was glad the old man hadn't noticed
him.
"Hi, Don," Sally Wolfe said, stepping up to his booth. Her
smile faded almost as quickly as it had appeared. "I guess
you've really got your hands full, huh? I mean, with the
murders and everything."
Don said that was true.
"Nothing like this has ever happened around here be-
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IT'S LOOSE
fore," Sally said. She let it hang there, as if she was
waiting for Don to tell her it would be all right, that she
didn't have to go to bed with a gun under her pillow and
try not to sleep too soundly. When Don failed to do that,
she said, "I'm a little scared. I think everybody's a little
scared."
Unable to think of anything he could say that would help,
Don motioned at the booth's unoccupied seat. "Would you
mind joining me for a moment?"
"Oh, sure." She sat down, patted her salt-and-pepper
hair, looked at Don expectantly.
"Have you seen the man I was talking with the last time I
was here?"
"Kesselring? Sure, he's in here all the time. Always has
that black case with him that looks like there's a flute
inside—except it's too long for a flute, isn't it? What's he got
in there? You know?"
"No," Don said. "I don't. Does he talk to you when he
comes in?"
"A little. He's asked me twice about people acting
strangely."
"Did he explain that?"
"No, he just wanted to know if anyone was acting
strangely."
"What did you tell him?"
"That everybody was acting strangely what with all these
murders. They don't know who to trust."
"And if I asked, what would you tell me?"
"Same thing."
"What else has he talked about?"
"When he was here earlier, he was talking about the
murders, but then that's what everybody's talking about."
"What exactly did he say about the murders?"
"Not too much. He mainly listened. Said he used to be a
policeman, so whenever the subject came up, he was usually
drawn into the conversation because he's an ex-cop. Because
he knows more about murders than we do, I guess."
Suddenly her face drained of some of its color, and her eyes
widened. "Don ... is he a suspect?"
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IT'S LOOSE
"I don't have anything on him, Sally. I'm just checking
him out because he's the only stranger on the island."
She nodded slowly, keeping her eyes on him. "Don, do
you have any idea who it is?"
A jillion answers went through Don's mind. Yes, but I
can't discuss it in public right now. I'm following several
promising leads. An arrest is imminent. But Don had never
been very good at lying, especially to people he knew well.
So he took in a slow breath and said no.
Sally Wolfe seemed to be trying to find something encour-
aging to say. Like she had every confidence in him. Or how
that maniac had better watch his step with Don Farraday
after him. But she said none of these things. She just stared
at him, looking frightened.
"Sally," Don said, breaking the uncomfortable silence, "I
don't want you to take this the wrong way, but people in
your line of work hear things."
"I hear a lot of things," she said. She smiled faintly. "I'm
a good listener."
"What do you hear about Paul Edley?"
"I hear he was promiscuous."
It was the first time Don had heard the term applied to a
man. Like calling a guy a bitch. It just didn't sound right.
"What do you mean?" he asked.
"He made it with every woman who was willing."
"You hear any names?"
"Only one lately. Irene Waggoner."
"Thanks, Sally." Don slid out of the booth. It was the
second time he'd heard Irene Waggoner's name in connec-
tion with Edley. Although he had nothing to connect her
with the Gordons, he was still going to have to check out
both Irene and her husband, Kevin.
"You think Irene had something to do with it?" Sally
asked. The frightened look was back on her face.
"I'm just checking out every lead," he said.
As he walked through the lounge, he nodded to Sally's
husband, Todd, who was tending bar. Todd nodded in
return. Don could feel both the Wolfes watching him as he
stepped through the door.
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IT'S LOOSE
3
The Islander Cafe was on the same block as the church, on
the other side of the street. Don parked in front of the
restaurant. As he got out of the car, he noticed that the
minister had finished putting up the banner announcing a
revival.
He found Kesselring in the restaurant, drinking a cup of
coffee at a table. The pool cue case was resting on the seat of
an unoccupied chair.
As Don sat down, Kesselring said, "I hear you've had
another murder."
"Another four, to be exact."
"Am I to assume I'm a suspect?"
"Let's just say you're still the only stranger on the island."
"Did you check the murder weapon you found at Edley's
for prints?"
"Yes. I found prints, but not yours."
"How about at the Gordons' place? You find my prints
there?"
"No."
"So I'm not a very good suspect for any of the murders."
"Not in terms of physical evidence, no." Don's tone made
it clear Kesselring was far from being off the hook, however.
Nancy Nowaski came over to see whether Don cared to
order anything. He asked for a cup of coffee. After she
brought it, he said, "Lieutenant, where were you between
eight and midnight last night?"
"Icicle Lounge. You can ask the barmaid."
"The whole time?"
"It's the only thing in town that's open after eight."
"I'll check that."
Kesselring nodded. "I'm not responsible for what's hap-
pening here," he said.
Don was almost certain that Kesselring knew more about
what was going on than he was willing to admit. Had he
chased two killers here, Edward Dwyer and someone else,
someone whose presence on the island wasn't known? Was
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IT'S LOOSE
he a bounty hunter, afraid of losing his commission? But
then these were just wild guesses. Very wild. And probably
very inaccurate.
Don said, "Why do you keep asking if anyone is acting
strangely?"
For several moments, Kesselring just stared at him. He
took a slow breath, let it out. "I don't want any more people
to die."
"Me neither," Don said. "Tell me what you know. Help
me stop this."
"Look for people acting strangely."
"Why?"
"If someone is acting strangely, it's probably the killer."
"What are you talking about?"
"If you find someone acting strangely, call me. Immedi-
ately." His eyes bore into Don's. The ex-cop was utterly
serious about this.	„
"What do you mean by strangely?" Don asked.
"In any way. People being withdrawn, not being them-
selves, sudden shifts in behavior—anything like that."
"What. . ." Don let his words trail off. He had no idea
what to ask.
"There will be more killing," the ex-cop said.
"How do you know?"
"You wouldn't believe me."
"Try me."
Kesselring shook his head.
"I could arrest you for withholding information," Don
warned.
"Save your breath. You're talking to a career cop."
"I don't want anyone to die because you didn't tell me
everything."
"Neither do I." Kesselring stood up, picking up his pool
cue case.
"We're not through talking," Don said.
"Do what I told you," Kesselring replied. "Watch for
people acting strangely. And if you get a lead, let me know. I
can help."
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IT'S LOOSE
"Why should I believe that?"
"Because it's the truth. Because I know how to deal with
what you've got here."
"What do I have here?" Don asked, rising so he'd be on
Kesselring's level.
"A . . . sickness. A killing sickness. If you find one killer,
it can move to another, and people will start dying again.
You can't stop it." He grabbed Don's arm, squeezing it
tightly. "I know how to stop it. So, for God's sake, call me if
you learn anything." He whirled away from Don and strode
out of the restaurant.
Don stared after him, totally befuddled. What the hell
was the man talking about? A killing sickness only Kessel-
ring could stop? Don's first inclination was to dismiss the
former policeman as a nut case. The things he said simply
made no sense.
Or was this just a way to avoid telling Don what
Kesselring's real purpose was? Give crazy answers and the
man will think you're nuts and leave you alone.
Don finished his coffee, wishing more than ever that he
had some help. Maybe the state police would know how to
deal with Kesselring. Don had no idea what to make of
him.
A killing sickness.
Nonsense, Don thought. And yet the words hung there.
Ominously.
4
The hardware store was right next to the restaurant. As Don
walked from one door to the other, he glanced at the church.
revival 7 p.m. Friday. He wondered whether he was wrong
about how many would attend the meeting. Maybe people
were so unnerved by the murders that they'd go just to be
with others, forget the horror for a while, and maybe stand
together as a community.
Don found Kevin Waggoner at the cash register, talking to
Hank Bergstrom, who was buying a dead-bolt lock. Both
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IT'S LOOSE
men eyed him somberly, without the customary smiles and
small talk.
"That was terrible what happened to the Gordons,"
Bergstrom said, breaking the silence.
Don agreed.
"Were they really . . . eaten?" Bergstrom asked, making a
face.
"The killer used his teeth to tear them up."
"I heard that Michael's head was . .. was removed."
"He was decapitated."
No one spoke, the silence getting more palpable by the
moment. Hank Bergstrom again broke it. "Do you have any
idea who did it?"
"Not yet," Don said.
The silence settled in again, nobody saying it but every-
body thinking it: It's your job to protect us, Don Farraday,
As long as this bloodthirsty lunatic is still out there, we're all
in danger, and it's all your fault, because you're not doing
your job well enough. The unspoken accusation seemed to
float in the air like dust particles caught in a sunbeam.
Maybe it was just Don's imagination. Maybe they weren't
thinking that at all. But they would be if there were more
murders and no arrests. And maybe they'd be right. A real
cop, one trained to handle things like this, might be able to
apprehend the killer. This was the first time Don had ever
had doubts about his ability to do the job, and he was
learning that doubts were like cockroaches. Let a couple in,
and you had hundreds, then thousands, skittering through
the dark corners of your consciousness, nibbling away at
your self-confidence.
Hank Bergstrom paid for his lock and left, saying he
hoped Don caught the crazy son of a bitch before he could
hurt anyone else. Don said he hoped so too.
"Been selling a lot of locks and ammo," Kevin Waggoner
said.
Don studied him. Kevin weighed at least two-fifty. His
bely hung ov er his belt. He had flabby arms, a puffy-looking
face, a double chin. Anywhere you touched him, he'd
probably'be soft, like a woman's breasts. And he had a
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IT'S LOOSE
problem with body odor. There was always something
vaguely acrid about him, even in the dead of winter, when
most people's sweat glands seemed to hibernate.
"How well'd you know Paul Edley?" Don asked.
"Didn't," Kevin Waggoner replied. "I'm about six years
older than he was, so we didn't even go to school together.
You looking for people who might have known him?"
Ignoring his question, Don said, "How about the
Gordons? You know them?"
Kevin shook his head. "Naw. They only moved here a few
years ago, and everyone I know is a native—like us." He
grinned, and for a moment Don thought Kevin was going to
wink. Native to native, pals, kindred spirits.
"Where were you last night between eight and midnight?"
Don asked, and Kevin's grin vanished. His jaw dropped
about half an inch. He stared at Don as if to say, Why you
asking me—your pal and fellow native—that question?
"Hey," Kevin said. "I mean, you don't think . .."
"It's just routine, Kevin." The line always worked for Joe
Friday.
"If it was just routine, you'd have asked Hank. But you
didn't. You're only asking me. How come?" Kevin was
starting to look worried.
And what the hell was Don supposed to say? That Kevin's
wife was boffing Edley, which gave Kevin a motive for
killing him? That maybe Kevin enjoyed murdering Edley so
much that he decided to make it his hobby, see how much
bloodier he could make each one than the one before?
"I heard that you and Edley didn't get along," Don said.
"Who said that? I told you I didn't even know the guy."
"Kevin, I've just got to check out everything I hear, that's
all. Now if you'll just answer my question, I'll go away and
leave you alone."
"Which question?" Kevin Waggoner's eyes were small,
and at the moment he was staring at Don like a frightened
rodent.
"Where were you last night between eight and midnight?"
"Home. Ask Irene."
"All night?"
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IT'S LOOSE
"Of course. We watched TV and went to bed about
ten-thirty. What else is there to do on the island?"
"And when—"
"When Paul Edley was murdered? I was either here or at
home. The Split's on, man. The only movie theater's on the
mainland. The only bowling alley's on the mainland. When
you can't get off the island, work and TV's all there is."
Not for your wife, Don thought, but he kept the comment
to himself.
"You going to check up on me?" Kevin asked.
"I've got to, Kevin."
He shook his head. "Jesus, man. You'll have Mr. Kohler
and Irene thinking I'm a suspect."
"Don't worry about it, Kevin. Before this is over, I'll be
checking on lots of people."
Kevin Waggoner looked at him unhappily, his expression
making it clear he felt he was being persecuted.
5
Hank Bergstrom set about installing the new lock on his
back door as soon as he got home. The front door had a good
lock on it, but the kitchen entrance just had one of those
flimsy things you could open with a credit card. He assem-
bled his tools, then started drilling a hole through the wood
with a brace and bit.
As he worked, Hank kept recalling that voice that wasn't a
voice, how it had urged him to accept it, welcome it,
and . . . and what? Had it promised to bring Ruth back?
That was impossible. That he'd even heard such a voice was
impossible.
And yet. . .
Hank Bergstrom thought about the five particularly grue-
some murders that had just occurred in a place that had
always been practically crime-free. And he thought about
the . . . the whatever it was. It was evil, that thing that had
communicated with him, as if Satan himself had been
whispering to him, bypassing his ears and going directly to
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IT'S LOOSE
that part of the mind where evil thoughts were born. And
evil lived in all of us. We were born with it. Although most of
us were able to conquer the evil, suppress it, hide it away, it
was still there, seething, waiting. That was what the good
Reverend Pfeil had said.
Bergstrom wasn't sure exactly what he was thinking. He
had no proof that there was any connection between the
murders and the seductive communication that had seemed
to promise the impossible. He wasn't even sure there had
been a communication. And yet he felt cold all over. And
contaminated somehow, as if he had brushed against some-
thing vile.
When he finished installing the lock, he tried it a couple of
times, finding it worked perfectly. And he knew that if there
was a determined evil force at work on the island, the lock
would be useless. But then that was just a lonely old man's
fantasy, wasn't it? Silliness concocted by an aged, deterio-
rating brain that was having trouble functioning properly.
But the coldness persisted.
As did the feeling that he had rubbed up against some-
thing unclean.
6
Before leaving the hardware store, Don checked with Larry
Kohler, the owner, who confirmed that Kevin Waggoner
had neither been absent from work nor had the opportunity
to slip away at any time during the past few days. Not that
that helped too much, since the store closed at six, after
which time Kevin could have committed all five murders.
Still, it seemed like something Don should nail down, so he
did.
Returning to the Icicle Lounge, he talked to Sally Wolfe
again, who confirmed that Kesselring had been there last
night until the bar closed at midnight. Kesselring had not
murdered the Gordons. But the ex-cop could still be in-
volved. The question was, did Kesselring know things he
wasn't admitting or was he just a crackpot? Although the
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IT'S LOOSE
ex-cop didn't seem like the typical screwball, the stuff he'd
said was from out in left field somewhere. A killing sickness,
as if murderousness were a communicable disease. How
could a sane guy say stuff like that?
Although Don still needed to talk to Irene Waggoner, it
was getting late, and he was tired, so he went back to the
police station. Irene Waggoner could wait until tomorrow.
Don had been at his desk about a minute when Joe Coleman
came in, let himself in through the gate in the counter, and
walked purposefully up to Don's desk.
"Have a seat," Don said. "You here as my pharmacist, the
postmaster, or the mayor?"
"Mainly as a concerned citizen," Coleman said, sitting
down. "I want to know what progress you're making on the
murders."
"At the moment, not a hell of a lot."
"We have to stop this madman," Coleman said. "The
island's in a panic. Everyone's scared to death."
Don sighed. "I know everyone's scared. They've got a
right to be. But there's nothing I can do that I'm not already
doing. I tried to get some help from the state, but their
chopper's down, and they've got no way to get here.
Lieutenant Roper's working on it. He knows the situation."
Looking over at Corrine, he asked, "Anything from the state
police?"
She shook her head.
Coleman said, "Until they can get here, it's up to you,
Don. We have to find this guy before he does it again."
"I'm doing my best," Don said.
"We have to find him so people can sleep at night,"
Coleman said. "People here didn't even lock their doors
before this happened. Now everybody's over at Ace Hard-
ware buying locks."
"And ammunition."
"Phil Deemis over at the Shell station is organizing a
civilian patrol so people will feel safe at night."
Don nodded. "As long as they remember that they're not
vigilantes, I can use all the help I can get."
"I understand you're only one guy," Coleman said. "But
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IT'S LOOSE
we have to get a handle on this thing, Don. We have to have
results. We just have to." Coleman looked Don in the eye,
driving home the seriousness of the situation, and then he
stood up, turned, and walked out of the office.
To Corrine, Don said, "By any chance did someone come
in to confess while I was out, and just maybe you forgot to
mention it?"
Corrine said no one had.
For several minutes Don just sat there, staring across the
room, feeling the responsibility of being the one who had to
deal with all this. It was a weight that just kept pressing
down on him, getting heavier, and he wondered how long it
would be before it crushed him.
For the first time since his Labrador retriever, Rex, died
nearly ten years ago, Don felt like crying.
7
Kevin Waggoner was in a rotten mood as he drove home
from the hardware store that evening in his ten-year-old
Plymouth. He signaled for a left turn from Island Avenue
onto Lansing Street and stopped because he had to wait for
an oncoming car. His Plymouth sputtered and almost died.
He revved the engine, causing gray smoke to billow behind
him. Irene drove a shiny new Ford Bronco with four-wheel
drive. She'd nagged at him until he bought it for her. Now he
had killer car payments that he could barely keep up with.
And while Irene drove her snazzy red Bronco, he drove a
heap.
He turned onto Lansing, passing between the park and the
elementary school. In the next block were some fairly nice
three- and four-bedroom houses. In the block after that were
small, inexpensive houses. Two bedrooms, neither of which
was large enough to hold a queen-size bed. A tiny kitchen. It
was the block on which he and Irene lived. On his salary at
the hardware store, it was the best he could afford.
Suddenly Kevin didn't want to go home; he wanted to
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IT'S LOOSE
drive and think. He turned left onto Michigan Avenue. Ever
since Don Farraday had talked to Mr. Kohler about him, the
boss had been eyeing him suspiciously. No matter that he
hadn't done anything. The thought had been planted. What
did the boss see when he looked at him? A crazed killer,
dripping with his victims' blood? Jesus.
Kevin couldn't figure out why Farraday suspected him in
the first place. The constable said he'd heard that Kevin and
Paul Edley didn't get along. Where could he have heard
that? Kevin had never had any kind of relationship with
Paul Edley.
And then it occurred to him that this could have just been
something Farraday said because he didn't want to admit
the real reasons for his suspicions. But then what would the
real reasons be? Kevin tossed that one around inside his
head for a while, coming up with nothing.
He tried a new approach. What did he know about Paul
Edley? Edley's father had died a few years ago, and Paul
inherited the boat rental business and the house. What else?
Edley rode a motorcycle. No help. What else? Edley wasn't
much of a businessman—or at least so he'd heard. So what?
It had nothing to do with him. That couldn't be all he knew
about Edley. What else did he know? What had he heard?
Paul Edley was a good-looking guy. He had lots of girls.
There were rumors that—
Kevin Waggoner jammed on the brakes, stopping in the
middle of Michigan Avenue. A kid walking along the
sidewalk looked at him curiously over the top of the melting
snowbank, then went on his way.
Kevin had heard that Paul Edley was carrying on affairs
with some married women. He tried to make the thought go
away, because he didn't like where it was leading him. But it
wouldn't go away. It kept taunting him. Hey, Kevin, betcha
Irene was over there making it with Paul Edley, and that's
why Farraday thinks you might have killed him.
He saw Irene rubbing herself up against Edley, kissing
him, the two of them undressing each other. You're just
guessing, he told himself. You don't really know that Irene
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IT'S LOOSE
and Edley were getting it on. But the scene continued to
unfold in his head. He saw Irene panting and puffing and
moaning in pleasure—as she never did for him.
Stop it! He slammed the steering wheel with the palm of
his hand.
But now that the notion had crawled up from the shadows
of his subconscious, it wasn't going to be denied. If Irene
was seeing Edley, and if Farraday knew about it, then
everyone in town knew about it. People were probably
snickering behind his back, talking about how old fat
Kevin's wife was spreading it around town and the dumb
shit was too stupid to figure it out. They even had a name for
a guy like that. Kevin struggled to remember it. Cockhold.
Yeah, that was it. Because all a guy like that could do was
stand around and hold his cock while his wife spread her
legs for someone else.
Shame, hot and sticky, rushed through Kevin's massive
body. And then it changed to anger. Even though the car
wasn't moving, he was gripping the steering wheel so hard
his hands hurt. He'd been staring at nothing, his mind
occupied with visions of its own creation, but now he
shifted his gaze to the box beside him on the seat. It was the
box he'd reserved for himself by sticking it under the
counter at the hardware store. He studied it for a moment,
his eyes picking out a single word: remington.
Kevin Waggoner started the car, used a driveway to turn
around, and headed for home. Where the little woman was
waiting for him.
8
Carolyn Pfeil was beside herself.
She sat at her sewing machine in the spare bedroom,
trying to make some new curtains for the kitchen. She'd
bought the brown calico material a few weeks ago, thinking
she could make curtains that went better with her antique
kitchen table than the drab blue ones that had come with the
house. At the moment she couldn't care less about the
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IT'S LOOSE
curtains, but working on them gave her something to occupy
her hands and thoughts. Especially her thoughts.
Carolyn Pfeil's entire life had fallen apart in the space of a
few days. Her husband had abruptly gone from being
moody and discontented to totally weird. Her daughter's
boyfriend had been murdered, and on the day his body was
discovered Carly had disappeared. Although she was wor-
ried sick about Carly, Douglas still refused to let her contact
the police.
Carolyn was certain that something awful had happened
to Carly. The girl couldn't have gotten off the island, because
of the Split. Even if she was distraught over Edley's murder,
surely she wasn't foolish enough to attempt walking across
three miles of rapidly deteriorating ice. No one on the island
would take her in without letting her parents know their
daughter was safe. To Carolyn's mind that left just one
horrifying possibility. Carly was dead.
She had been in Edley's house when it burned down.
Or the same person who'd killed Edley had bludgeoned
Carly and left her body in the woods somewhere.
A tear spilled from Carolyn Pfeil's eye, ran down to her
chin, clung there for a moment, then dropped, making a soft
spat as it hit the calico material she'd been feeding into the
sewing machine. Why wouldn't Douglas let her call the
police? She'd considered doing it anyway, even getting as far
as picking up the phone and starting to dial. But she'd
stopped herself. And although she didn't like to admit it, she
knew why she'd been unable to make the call.
Because she was afraid of her husband.
Another tear hit the material.
It wasn't supposed to be like this. You weren't supposed to
be in a situation in which you had to balance your fear that
something awful could have happened to your daughter
against your fear that your husband might do something
awful to you. But she had no doubt that Douglas would hurt
her without hesitation. Maybe . . . maybe even kill her.
Part of her insisted that this wasn't so, couldn't be so. In
all the years she'd been married to Douglas, he'd never
exhibited even a trace of meanness. He'd always been
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IT'S LOOSE
reluctant to discipline Carly, which was probably one reason
she was so difficult to control as a teenager. The man was so
completely nonviolent that swatting a fly had always seemed
out of character.
But not anymore.
Douglas had changed. And the new Douglas was mean,
potentially violent. She could see it in his eyes.
He never spoke to her anymore. She'd stopped cooking
for him, because he didn't eat what she fixed. He went out
all the time, even in the middle of the night. Carolyn had
started sleeping here in the spare bedroom so she could
avoid him, and he'd never mentioned it. She wasn't even
sure he'd noticed her absence from their bed. And some of
his clothes had disappeared. They weren't in the hamper.
They weren't in the bedroom. They weren't anywhere. And
Carolyn couldn't figure out what had happened to them.
And then there was this revival he was organizing. The
whole business made no sense. Douglas was no Bible-
thumping fundamentalist. Carolyn doubted he'd ever so
much as seen a revival.
Pat. Pat. Pat. Three more tears hit the calico.
Why was he so indifferent to Carly's disappearance? Why
was he so adamant about not letting her call the police?
Suddenly, surprising herself, Carolyn Pfeil reached deep
within herself and found a reserve of maternal protective-
ness that was great enough to overwhelm her fear of
Douglas. Pushing her chair away from the sewing table, she
stood up, and then she walked out of the room, a few steps
down the upstairs hall, and into the master bedroom.
Douglas was out; she'd heard him leave. Carolyn sat down
on the bed, picked up the phone, which stood on a small
table. She had to tell the authorities about Carly. She just
had to.
But she didn't.
Instead she hung up the phone and lay back on the bed,
floating on the dreamy mellowness that had just come over
her. She closed her eyes, feeling weightless, narcotized. And
she recalled that calling the police would have been all
wrong. The thing for her to do was go to the revival.
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IT'S LOOSE
That part of her from which she'd drawn the sudden burst
of maternal protectiveness fought this abrupt change that
had come over her. Call the police, it urged. Think of
Carly. Think of your daughter. The name swam around
in Carolyn's foggy consciousness. Carly . . . Carly ...
Carly . . .
But she didn't call.
Going to the revival was all that mattered.
9
Kevin Waggoner had walked into the house without saying a
word. He was sitting on the bed, cleaning his .45 automatic,
when Irene walked in and stood there, hands on hips,
looking at him.
"So what's your problem?" she asked.
He didn't answer her. He "Just kept sliding the cleaning
tool in and out of the barrel, in and out, in and out. Just like
Edley had done to her. He wondered whether she saw the
symbolism.
"You're not talking today?" she asked.
He looked up at her. He wondered what Edley had seen in
her. She was too thin and damn near flat-chested. Her face
was ordinary at best, with a nose that was too big. Her legs
weren't too bad, and her dark hair was thick and shiny, but
those things were about all she had going for her. So if Edley
was so damned good with women, why didn't he pick
someone better-looking? But the answer was obvious,
wasn't it? She'd gone after him, thrown herself at him.
"Hey," Irene said. "Don't put that filthy thing on the
bedspread. What's the matter with you today?"
She was referring to the cleaning tool, which he'd just put
down beside him. He'd done it on purpose. The bedspread
was a blue and white frilly thing that he'd always hated. It
matched the curtains, which he also hated. Along with the
wallpaper that had little flowers all over it. Irene was always
making him buy things he didn't like. Never asking if they
could afford it. Never asking him what he liked. He shoved
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IT'S LOOSE
the loaded magazine into the pistol, thinking, How'd you
like one of these bullets, bitch?
Irene was saying, "Dammit, Kevin, I told you not to put
that—"
"Don Farraday came into the store today," he said,
cutting her off. "Wanted to know whether I knew Paul
Edley."
She studied him, said nothing.
"Said he'd heard that Edley and me didn't get along. Why
do you think he might have said a thing like that, since I
hardly even knew Edley?"
Irene was looking just a little bit nervous. She hadn't been
paying much attention to the gun; now she kept glancing at
it.
"Could it have been because he knew something I didn't,
something that would have given me a reason to kill Edley?"
"I don't know what you're talking about," Irene said. She
looked a little pale.
"That right?"
"Yeah, that's right," Irene said. She was trying to put
some feeling into it, but the words seemed limp.
He pulled the slide back and let it go, jacking a cartridge
into the chamber. "Why is it I get the distinct impression
you're lying to me, Irene?"
"Why would I lie? I've got nothing to lie about."
"How about you and Edley?"
"Me and—Jesus, Kevin, I don't know what's wrong with
you." She was looking confused and hurt. Kevin didn't
believe it for a minute.
He sprang up, catching her by surprise. Despite his
flabbiness and general poor physical condition, he was
stronger than Irene. Grabbing her, he spun her around and
threw her on the bed, falling on top of her. She stared up at
him with terror-filled eyes.
"Kevin," she said. "Please—"
He shoved the barrel into her mouth. "I've been a
laughing stock all over this town, haven't I? I bet they've
been saying all sorts of things about me. Laughing their asses
off at fat, old, stupid Kevin."
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IT'S LOOSE
Unable to speak with the barrel of the gun in her mouth,
she shook her head, two widened brown eyes staring at
him, pleading. He could make her beg if he wanted to; he
knew that. But the rage churning and clamoring inside him
didn't want to wait that long. Pull the trigger, it demand-
ed. Blow the bitch's brains all over the stupid, frilly bed-
spread.
The rage traveled to his finger, which began to move the
trigger.
Inside Kevin's head, emotions he'd never experienced
before were dancing and leaping.
Abruptly he relaxed his trigger finger. Though uncer-
tain where the idea had come from, he knew what he was
going to do with Irene. He removed the gun from her
mouth.
"You're not going to ... to shoot me?" she asked. Tears
were running down her cheeks. She was shaking.
"Nope," he said, feeling quite content with his new plan.
"I'm going to do something else."
"What?" she whispered, looking at him fearfully. She was
still crying and shaking.
"I'm going to take you to the revival," he said.
10
From a spot near the altar, it surveyed the inside of the
church, pleased with the plan it had devised. Never before
had things been this good. An entire island from which no
one could escape and to which no help could come. It had
been feeding well—oh, so very, very well.
And because of that, it was very powerful now. Soon it
might be as powerful as it had been after it caused the plane
crash in Dallas. And its increased strength would enable it
to feed even more greedily.
The best thing of all, of course, was war. In a war it could
truly gorge itself. But then it was here in this part of the
world now, and all the wars were very far away.
The only thing that troubled it about its situation here on
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IT'S LOOSE
the island was the presence of the man who pursued it. The
only human in the world who was able to harm it. Because
of the man, it would have to be careful.
But not so careful it couldn't take advantage of this
glorious opportunity to feed. Someday, perhaps, it could
even feed on the one who pursued it.
158

Iline
1
The next day, Don went to see Irene Waggoner. The house
in which she and Kevin lived was a tiny place, maybe seven
hundred square feet. It was another warm day. Water from
the melting snow was puddling on the Waggoners' sidewalk.
On the way there Don had seen a front yard in which enough
snow had melted to reveal a small oval of lawn. It was the
first grass he'd seen since December. He rang the Wag-
goners' doorbell.
Lying in bed last night, he'd asked Allison about Irene.
Allison said she didn't know her too well, but she had some
impressions. "Irene always seemed to be one of those people
who didn't know what to do with her life," Allison said.
"She just sort of marked time and did nothing. Meanwhile
all her friends were getting married or leaving the island,
and one day she found herself single and with no prospects.
The only available guy was Kevin Waggoner, so she took
him."
"Not much of a basis for marriage," Don had replied.
"You'd be surprised how many people get married for
reasons like that."
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IT'S LOOSE
"That why you married me?"
"No, I was prepared to search the entire planet until I
found someone who was just right, but I got lucky and found
him right here on the island."
Don squeezed her, told her he felt the same way, and then
spent the rest of the night tossing and turning and thinking
about the five murders.
He rang the Waggoners' doorbell for the third time. He
could dimly make out the sound of chimes coming from
within the house, so he knew it was working. Apparently
Irene wasn't home.
Don walked back to his car, which he'd parked at the
curb. The puddles in the Waggoners' walk had become a
little stream that trickled along the cement surface to the
street, where it joined the bigger stream flowing in the
gutter. It was definitely beginning to look like an early
spring.
2
Inside the small house on Lansing Street, Irene Waggoner
struggled with her bonds. She was stretched out on the bed
like a big X, ropes extending from the four bedposts to her
hands and feet. A sock had been jammed into her mouth,
held in place by one of her scarves.
When the door chimes sounded, she'd struggled with all
her might, but all she could do was flop about on the
mattress and make muffled noises through the gag. No one
outside the house would ever hear her. The bedroom
curtains were drawn, so no one could look in and see her.
The night had been terrible. After removing the gun from
her mouth, Kevin had let her up. They'd eaten, watched TV,
Kevin always keeping an eye on her to make sure she didn't
bolt for the door. Then they went to bed. Irene had lain
there, feeling his weight beside her, smelling that sweaty
odor that clung to him even after he bathed. At first she was
afraid he'd force her to do things, sexual things, things that
might hurt her—just to get even with her for making it with
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IT'S LOOSE
Paul. But he didn't. He just lay there. And Irene lay beside
him, terrified.
Thinking she might sneak away after he was asleep, Irene
waited until she heard him snoring. When Kevin snored, it
was like no other sound on earth. His snorts and wheezes
seemed loud enough to drown out a jet engine, unearthly
and eerie, as if his mouth were letting out sounds of hell. She
lost her nerve. If she woke him while slipping out of bed,
he'd be furious. Maybe furious enough to get the gun. And
maybe this time he'd pull the trigger.
And while she was lying rigid in the bed, listening to her
husband's thunderous snores, an unnerving thought had
stepped unbidden out of that place in her mind where dark
suspicions lurked. Maybe Kevin had killed Paul. Until
yesterday she never would have believed him capable of
such a thing. But that was before he'd stuffed the barrel of a
gun into her mouth, leaving little doubt that he could damn
well pull the trigger if that was what he decided to do. Which
meant he was capable of murder. Maybe something inside
him just snapped when he learned that she'd been seeing
Paul, snapped so completely that Kevin had pounded him
into a pulp with a tire iron.
So she'd lain in bed all night, too terrified to move,
knowing she could get away after Kevin went to work in the
morning. Now she realized not trying to escape while Kevin
slept had been a mistake. She might never get another
chance.
Her ankles and wrists were sore from struggling with her
bonds. The effort had been useless; the ropes held her as
securely as manacles. And her pants were wet. When the
door chimes had sounded, her battle with the ropes had
turned into panic, and her bladder had let go.
Kevin had waited until they finished a tense and silent
breakfast before taking her into the bedroom and ordering
her to lie down on the bed. While he tied her arms and legs
to the bedposts, Irene had pleaded with him. He'd made
only one comment: "Gotta make sure you're here so I can
take you to the revival tonight."
She had no idea what he was talking about. Kevin had
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never been religious. When he saw Jerry Falwell or Jimmy
Swaggart or Jim Bakker on the news, he'd often mutter
some contemptuous remark like "Bible-thumping assholes
are nothing but a bunch of hypocrites, and I wish they'd
leave the rest of us alone."
So why was he going to a revival? Sometimes crazy people
got religion, like the mass murderer you'd see on "Sixty
Minutes" or "20/20," sitting in his death-row cell and
reading the Bible. She wished she hadn't thought of that
particular example, because it made her think that Kevin
might be trying to atone for Paul's murder, trying to get God
to forgive him for it.
Irene also had no idea what revival he was talking about.
She'd lived on Ice Island all her life, and as far as she knew,
no one had ever held a revival there.
She gave a halfhearted tug on the rope attached to her
right wrist, and abruptly tears were streaming down the
sides of her face, soaking into the bedspread. Suddenly Irene
Waggoner was certain that this would be her last day on this
earth. She let out a wail of despair, but, muffled by the gag, it
was a hollow, meaningless sound that was heard by no one
but her.
3
Ice Islanders found the banner on the church puzzling.
Anna Neuhaus was on the phone with Barbara Kohler,
whose husband owned the hardware store and, like Anna's
husband, was a member of the town council.
"I don't know what's gotten into Reverend Pfeil," Anna
Neuhaus said. "He's been acting very strangely."
"The last thing we need right now's a revival," Barbara
Kohler said.
"No kidding."
"You're on the board of trustees. Why don't you talk to
him, find out what's going on?"
"I've tried to talk to him. You wouldn't believe what he
said to me."
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"What did he say?"
"I couldn't repeat it."
"You mean he used profanity?"
"Yes. And that's all I'm going to say."
"Oh, my goodness. What are the trustees going to do?"
"They're meeting next week. I think I'm going to suggest
that Reverend Pfeil be sent for psychological treatment of
some sort. If he refuses, I think he should be terminated."
4
Nora Stromberg, a retired elementary schoolteacher, was in
Coleman's Pharmacy, getting her blood-pressure prescrip-
tion refilled. She told Joe Coleman how worried she was
about the murders, especially being a woman who lived
alone, and then the conversation shifted to the revival.
"What's it all about?" she asked, watching Coleman
count out the pills.
"Beats me. Just about everybody comes in asks me about
it, but I don't know any more than they do."
"Maybe Reverend Pfeil wants to get everybody together.
Because of the murders. Because we're all so worried."
"I don't know," Coleman said, handing her the refilled
bottle of pills. "Nobody I've talked to said they were going."
s
At the Ice Island Junior/Senior High School, Hiram Bella-
my, the principal, had just finished dictating a letter to his
secretary, Cloris Iverson, a prim gray-haired lady who
always reminded him of an English nanny. For the past two
days, the sole subject of conversation in the shocked school
had been the gruesome deaths of two of its teachers and
their children. Now, as he sat at his desk, watching Cloris
close her notebook, Bellamy realized he wanted to talk
about something else—anything else.
"Have you seen the sign on the church?" he asked.
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"About the revival? Yes. Yes, I have."
"What's supposed to happen at this revival?"
"I don't know anything about it."
"Really?" he said, genuinely surprised. "I thought you
hadn't missed a Sunday service in twenty years."
"Fifteen," she said, blushing slightly. "Nothing's been
said about it at church. I was as surprised as anyone when I
saw the banner."
"Are you going?" Bellamy asked.
She hesitated, as if making up her mind. "No, I don't
think I will. I don't like to go out at night just now."
"Knowing people here as well as I do," Bellamy said, "I'd
be surprised if the reverend gets much of a turnout."
6
Ralph Higgins, the retired maintenance engineer who'd
worked at the Soo Locks, stepped into the Icicle Lounge
shortly after it opened at three in the afternoon. Sitting
down at the bar, he said, "Think I'll drink beer today,
Todd."
Todd Wolfe, the owner and bartender, said, "What kind?"
"Whatever brand your fingers touch first."
Wolfe put a bottle of Schlitz and a glass on the bar.
"They catch the murderer yet?" Higgins asked, pouring
the beer into the glass.
"No, but I sure wish they had."
"Me too." He took a swallow of beer, and the two men fell
silent. They'd talked about the murders yesterday, and there
didn't seem to be anything else to say about them. They both
knew they were trapped on the island with a madman who
might kill again. Talking about it some more wasn't going to
help the situation.
"Going to the revival tonight?" Higgins asked, breaking
the silence.
"Naw," the bartender said. "Gotta work. Don't know
anybody who is."
"Ever been to one?"
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"Can't say as I have."
"Aren't you curious?"
"Not really," the bartender said, absently wiping a spilled
drop of beer off the bar with a cloth. "You thinking about
going?"
"No. Don't think it's anything I'd be interested in. I was
just curious to know exactly what happened at a revival."
7
About four o'clock that afternoon, Don Farraday made his
third trip to the Waggoner house, and again no one was
home. He drove to the police station, where he sat down at
his desk, feeling exhausted.
He'd spent most of the day talking to friends and associ-
ates of the Gordons, asking whether the dead family had any
enemies, whether they'd been acting strangely of late,
whether they were happy or on the verge of divorce,
financially secure or deeply in debt, good parents or bad.
What he got was a picture of a pair of happily married
teachers who were content with their lives, good parents,
and responsible with their income. They were into nothing
unsavory and had been well liked by everyone.
He wondered whether the Gordons were chance victims,
targets of opportunity. Did they die simply because the
killer was passing by their house and saw the lights on? Or
was there someone on the island who didn't share the widely
held opinion that they were such nice people?
Having two killers loose on the island at the same time,
working independently—especially two such brutal killers
—seemed too much of a coincidence to accept, so Don had
decided to work under the assumption that both Paul Edley
and the Gordons had been killed by the same person—or
persons, he supposed. Therefore he was looking for some-
one who had randomly selected both Edley and the Gordons
or someone who had something against both Edley and the
Gordons.
He sighed. With brilliant thinking like that, he ought to
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solve the murders in no more than a decade or two. Without
meaning to, he expressed his thoughts aloud. "I'm in way
over my head," he muttered. "Way, way, way over it."
"You've got no leads, I take it," Corrine said. She was
sitting at her desk, staring at him, looking scared. Don had
seen that look on a lot of people lately.
"I've got nothing," he said.
"What are you going to do?"
"I'm going to call Lieutenant Roper and see if he's found
a helicopter, so I can get some help on this thing." He dialed
the number for the state police office in Marquette and
asked for the lieutenant.
Roper said, "I'm working on getting a chopper from the
National Guard. They've got one we can have, but I'm hung
up in bureaucratic bullshit. The Guard says the request has
to be approved by its state headquarters, and the state
headquarters says the request has to come through the
governor's office, and the governor's office says it has to
come through the chiefs office in Lansing."
"How long is all this likely to take?"
"A day or two."
"Why so long?"
"Both the chief and deputy chief are at a law enforcement
conference in Florida."
"We're talking five murders here, Lieutenant. I need help
bad."
"A day or two. I promise."
When Don hung up the phone, he found Corrine looking
at him expectantly. "A day or two," he said glumly. "Maybe
those people who want the Upper Peninsula to secede from
Michigan are right. At least we'd have our own state police
force, with its own helicopter."
Corrine nodded, the worry still apparent in her eyes. Don
wished she wouldn't look like that. It was a constant
reminder of the situation they were in. Don, Corrine, and
everyone else on the island was trapped here with a murder-
er who didn't just kill but committed unspeakable acts. Like
decapitating a man, biting chunks out of people, beating a
man until he was unrecognizable. For the duration of the
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IT'S LOOSE
Split, neither the killer nor his potential victims could get
away from each other, and the local police had no idea who
the murderer was.
Otherwise everything was great.
"You going to the revival?" Don asked, just to say
something.
"No," she said. "I don't feel like being around a lot of
other people right now." She was still looking at him
the same way. Her eyes seemed to be saying, This is real,
isn't it?
He knew how she felt. This was something from the
nightly news, not the stuff of real life. Five die in brutal
murders on Ice Island. Film at eleven. You sit there in front
of the TV set and watch, seeing what happened to other
people and not really feeling as though it's real—as though
maybe all the dead people get up and walk away after the
camera's turned off.
But these dead people wouldn't get up and walk away.
They were in freezers in Phil Deemis's place and Doc
Ingram's place. And they weren't strangers; they were
people he'd known, living, moving people who'd bled real
blood when their bodies had been violated. And whoever
had done it was still out there. And could do it again.
Corrine was continuing to look at him like that.
"Smile," he told her.
She looked away. She was crying.
8
Brooke Neuhaus sat at the dinner table, glowering at her
mother. The two of them had had a "discussion" a little
while ago. Her mom's word, discussion. To Brooke it was an
argument. Her mother had absolutely refused to listen to
reason. She saw only one side of any situation. Hers.
Anna Neuhaus, looking unperturbed, took a bite of the
pork roast she'd made, then turned to her husband. "Con-
rad, do you see anything to be gained by taking a break
between high school and college?"
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"I was in the Army between high school and college," he
said.
"But you're a man, and there was a draft then. I'm talking
about Brooke."
Looking uncomfortable, Conrad Neuhaus said, "It was
good for me. I matured in the service."
His wife looked sternly at him, as if to say, You take the
other side, then you'd better know what you're getting into,
bub.
Brooke said, "How's it feel to always be right, Mother?"
"Don't talk to me that way, Brooke," Anna Neuhaus said,
turning the stern look on her daughter.
Brooke exploded. "Look, it's my life too, you know!
What's wrong with working for a while or traveling? I
can still go to college in a year or two. What's the big
deal?"
"At your age, you don't know what's best."
"Right. And when I'm your age, I'll know everything."
"Brooke, I don't like your attitude one bit."
The words tough shit hung on Brooke's lips, but she
settled for thinking them. Seeing no point in continuing the
argument, she shifted her eyes to her plate and stabbed a
piece of pork roast.
To Brooke, her parents didn't look as though they be-
longed together. Her mother, after numerous failed diets,
was overweight and round-faced. Her blond hair was curly,
and the overall effect was of an aged cherub. Her father, on
the other hand, was tall and bony, almost gaunt, and he
looked as she'd always pictured Ichabod Crane.
Anna Neuhaus drew in a slow breath. "Brooke," she said
slowly, "this matter is closed. You are not going to Califor-
nia. And you are not working as a stewardess. You are going
to college in the fall. That's the end of it."
"Like hell," Brooke muttered.
"What?" her mother said, sounding shocked.
Oh, crap, Brooke thought. Here we go. "I said, 'Like hell,'
Mother."
"Now you listen, young lady," her mother said, her face
reddening. She looked at Brooke with blue eyes that simul-
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IT'S LOOSE
taneously seemed icy cold and angry hot. "I have absolutely
no intention of—"
Anna Neuhaus stopped as if she'd been switched off. For a
moment, Brooke just stared at her. Then she realized her
father, too, seemed a little weird. Both of them were staring
at the table, glassy-eyed.
Anna Neuhaus looked at her watch. "It's time to go to the
revival," she said.
"Yes," Conrad Neuhaus said.
Together, like a pair of Earthlings under the influence of
alien creatures in an old fifties sci-fi movie, they rose and
walked out of the room. Brooke stared at them in stunned
disbelief.
9
Hiram Bellamy and his wife, Gwen, were sitting in the living
room, watching television. Abruptly Gwen got up and
walked out of the room.
"Honey," Bellamy said.
When she didn't answer, he called to her again. He heard
the front door close. Getting up, he hurried to the window
and looked out. Gwen was walking down the sidewalk, away
from the house.
He quickly ran to the door. "Gwen!"
She seemed not to hear him.
"Gwen! Where are you going?"
She turned a corner and disappeared from sight.
10
Joe Coleman, Ice Island's mayor, postmaster, and pharma-
cist, was filling a prescription for Tad Tyler, a junior high
boy with a bad acne problem. The medicine wasn't for his
complexion, however; it was penicillin for an ear infection.
He was typing the label for the bottle when the urge to go to
the revival came over him. For a few seconds, he simply
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stood there, the label half completed in his typewriter,
trying to understand what was happening. He'd had abso-
lutely no intention of going to the revival until this moment.
Why had the urge suddenly come over him? And why was it
so intense? It drew him like the smell of baking bread drew a
starving man.
No, he thought. I don't want to go to the revival.
But he turned from the typewriter and walked toward the
gate in the counter. The urge was absolutely compelling
now, and it pulled him toward the church as if he were being
reeled in by a winch. He opened the gate in the counter and
walked toward the exit.
"Mr. Coleman?" Tad said hesitantly.
The pharmacist walked past a counter full of cold reme-
dies and cough medicines, put his hand on the door, and
opened it.
"What about my prescription?" the boy said.
Coleman stepped outside. The door closed behind him.
"What about my prescription?" Tad asked again, al-
though there was no one in the store to hear him.
11
Ralph Higgins was still sitting at the bar in the Icicle
Lounge, drinking beer, when both Susan and Todd Wolfe
abruptly walked out of the place without a word to any-
body.
12
Carl Zellner was fixing himself a dinner of canned stew and
toast, while Brute lay a few feet away, watching him.
Suddenly the dog sat up and emitted a long, eerie, wolflike
howl.
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IT'S LOOSE
13	
Don Farraday had just gotten home. Stepping through the
back door and into the kitchen, he found Allison at the
stove, stirring the contents of a pot, while Sarah set the
table.
Abruptly Allison turned from the stove, frowning. "It's
time for the revival," she said.
Surprised, Don said, "You're not going, are you?"
"Of course," she said and walked out the door.
"Mom . . . ?" Sarah said, clearly puzzled.
"I didn't know she was going to the revival," Don said,
bewildered.
"Neither did I," Sarah said. "Dad, what's going on?"
From outside came the sound of Allison's car backing out
of the driveway.
14	
Irene Waggoner recognized the sound of Kevin's Plymouth.
The way the engine clanked and sputtered. The rattle of the
door as it closed. Then she heard the door of the house
opening.
She was still spread-eagled on the bed. Her efforts to free
herself had only served to burn and abrade her wrists and
ankles. During the day she'd heard the mailman at the box
by the front door, and three times someone had rung the
door chimes, but all she could do was pull against the ropes
and mumble her muffled pleas.
For a few minutes, she heard the sounds of Kevin moving
through the house. Then he appeared at the doorway and
stood there, just looking at her. His eyes seemed distant,
unfocused, and at the same time they seemed merciless. Not
cruel like a sadist's eyes, but simply uncaring, as if her
well-being were unimportant. Something icy popped into
the pit of her stomach, as if she'd just developed a hailstone.
And then it grew, spreading through her middle, out to the
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IT'S LOOSE
ends of her limbs, causing her flesh to crawl into
goosebumps as it went.
Moving to the bed, he removed the gag from her mouth.
"How have you been?" he asked.
Her mouth was so dry she was unable to speak. She
moved her lips, but no sounds came out.
He produced a pocket knife, opened it, studied the silvery
blade.
"Y-you going to cut me?" she managed to ask.
"No." He severed the ropes. The blade passed through
them with ease, and she wondered whether he'd spent the
day honing it, preparing for this moment.
"Kevin," she said, "why . . . why are you doing this to
me?"
"You know."
"I ... I didn't do what you said."
"Don't lie to me, Irene."
"I'm not lying." She crawled over to him, started to slip
her arms around him, but he backed away. "Please," she
said. "Please don't hurt me."
"You never cared about me. Why should I care about
you?"
She sat up, began untying the ropes, which were now just
one-foot lengths hanging from her wrists and ankles. After
the first one was off, she winced as she rubbed her red, raw
wrist.
"I'm your wife," she said. "I cook and clean for you. I take
care of you when you're sick. I'm good to you, Kevin." She
was crying, the tears dripping on the rope she was trying to
get off her right wrist. "I don't understand how you could
treat me like this."
"Irene, you married me because you didn't want to get a
job. You needed someone to support you."
She shook her head, but she could see by looking in his
eyes that nothing she said would make any difference. He
would do what he was going to do. Nothing could change his
mind.
"Kevin," she sobbed, "please."
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"Hurry up and untie those ropes," he said, his voice
emotionless.
She finished untying her wrists and started on her ankles.
"What. . . what are you going to do to me?"
"I already told you. We're going to the revival."
She had no idea what he was talking about.
But she knew something awful was going to happen to her.
173

Ten
1
Irene felt better when they arrived at the church and saw the
banner above the front door. There would be other people
around, which meant she'd be safe. She could even refuse to
leave with him. There'd be nothing he could do. Although
her parents were both dead, her niece, Nicola Effington,
would take her in.
Kevin drove slowly past the church in her Bronco, looking
for a parking space. The area was crammed with cars and
pedestrians, and Irene was beginning to realize just how big
a deal this revival was. It could well be the biggest event Ice
Island had ever seen. Kevin finally found a parking space in
the grocery store's lot, two blocks away from the church.
When they got out of the car, he grabbed her arm, as if he
were escorting some dangerous criminal. It was unneces-
sary, for if Irene was going to break loose and run, it would
be to the exact place he was taking her. To the church.
Where all the people were.
As they neared it, they encountered other Ice Islanders
who'd been forced to park some distance away and walk to
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IT'S LOOSE
the revival. She spotted Joan Faulk, with whom she'd been
friendly in high school, but when she tried to catch Joan's
eye the woman walked past as if she hadn't seen her. And
then Irene noticed that everyone seemed to be walking like
that, as if lost in their own thoughts, unaware of what was
around them. Suddenly that hailstone was back in Irene's
midsection, not growing but not going away either.
The very idea of a revival on Ice Island was ridiculous. Ice
Islanders were practical, sober people, hardly the sort to go
in for faith healing or talking in tongues or whatever.
And she didn't understand why Kevin was taking her
here. Had he suddenly gotten religion? Was he bringing her
to the church so she could see the error of her ways? She
promptly dismissed the notion. Kevin with any kind of a
cause was impossible to picture. He was a fat, lazy slob who
didn't give a shit about anything.
He gave enough of a shit to stick a gun in your mouth and
look like he was going to blow your brains all over the
bedspread, a part of her warned.
Reluctantly Irene considered that. Somehow he'd found
out about her and Paul. And it hurt him in a way that had
surprised her. It wasn't losing her affections that bothered
him—not that they were all that affectionate—but a more
personal, basic thing. She had hurt his pride, his ego. Until
now Irene hadn't known he had any pride. He seemed
content to work as a clerk in a hardware store, making
slave-labor wages. He did nothing about his weight. He did
nothing about his subtle but constant body odor. But Irene
had been wrong in assuming he had no self-respect at all.
There was something in the center of him, deeply buried,
that was sensitive, easily hurt. And she had wounded it by
seeing Paul Edley.
Irene felt badly about that. True, she didn't really love
Kevin. And nothing—except maybe a complete change in
the man—would ever make her respect him very much.
Still, she hadn't deliberately set out to hurt him.
But then that particular damage had been done. Her
pressing problem was how to keep him from hurting her.
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IT'S LOOSE
There are people around, she reminded herself. He can't
do anything to you here. And yet he still gripped her arm as
if she were a prisoner.
They started up the wide walk, toward the big double
doors. Irene had never thought too much about the small
stone church, but now it seemed strangely menacing to her,
as if she were walking into the castle of Bluebeard or the
wicked witch. They were in a press of people now, some of
whom she knew better than others, but all of whom were
familiar. Faces that stared straight ahead, unaware of her,
unaware of anything except the church, the big wooden
doors. Reverend Pfeil stood at the entrance, smiling at the
people passing through the doors. Neither he nor they
spoke.
As Irene stepped inside the stone building, the cold pebble
in her gut began to grow. This was not what the inside of a
church was supposed to look like.
Black material covered the walls, blocking out the colored
light from the stained-glass windows.
The big cross behind the altar was upside down.
On the front of the pulpit was a five-pointed star inscribed
within concentric circles.
Within the star was a horned head.
A little voice inside Irene was saying, Uh-uh, no way is
this happening, because you just stepped into a horror flick,
Irene, old girl, like the ones you used to go and see on the
mainland when you were a teenager, and Ricky Claussen
tried to feel you up. The ones where the devil worshippers
had taken over the town and the innocent couple driving
through found themselves knee-deep in shit.
Irene had the feeling she was the stranger passing through.
Suddenly the icy chunk within her seemed to be alive,
sending out tendrils that were encircling her heart. Calling
up every drop of adrenaline she could find, Irene yanked her
arm free of Kevin's grasp, whirled, and dashed for the door.
Instantly her way was blocked, and she was looking at the
faces of Ice Islanders, expressionless faces that seemed to
stare through her.
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IT'S LOOSE
She spun around, hoping to find the way clear in another
direction, but she was surrounded. And the bodies were
moving, as one, toward the altar. She was being herded, she
realized.
"What are you doing?" she screamed.
No one answered. No one even spoke.
"Kevin! Oh, God, Kevin, please help me!"
And still the only sound other than her screaming was the
shuffling of feet as the dazed-looking people surrounding
her moved her toward the altar.
Suddenly the crowd parted.
Reverend Pfeil stood at the altar, and beside him was a
long table with candles burning on each end.
Hands grabbed her, and she was dragged to the table,
lifted, laid on top of it.
"Kevin! Please!" But then she realized that Kevin was one
of the people who'd put her on, the table.
Her hands and feet were bound, the ropes digging into the
sore spots where she'd been tied before. This is a nightmare,
something inside her asserted. You're dreaming an old grade
B horror flick, but don't worry because you'll wake up
before the unthinkable happens, because that's the rule, you
always wake up.
Reverend Pfeil was addressing the congregation in a
strange-sounding language. They rose as one, moaning,
waving their arms in the air, and swaying, the movement
eerie and rhythmic. Then he turned, stepped toward Irene,
and she saw what was in his hand. A long, very sharp-
looking knife. Time to wake up. Now. Please.
Pfeil slipped the blade under the cloth of her blouse, slit it
with a single upward motion. The cloth slipped to the sides,
exposing her bra. He slit that as well, the blade passing
between her breasts. Starting at the ankles, he slit her pants
legs. A few moments later, she was naked.
The minister turned toward the congregation, again
speaking in that strange language. Wake up, she thought.
Wake up! Wake up!
Reverend Pfeil turned back to Irene.
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IT'S LOOSE
Wake up! Wake up!
The minister raised the knife, its shiny blade reflecting the
flickering orange light from the candles.
Wake up! Wake up!
Staring up at him, Irene realized she could see the candles
flicker in his eyes, too. And then she saw that his eyes were
actually glowing, turning from orange to red. He looked
down at her, smiling, and for just an instant he seemed to be
something else. Irene saw sharp pointed teeth; scaly, leath-
ery flesh; a furry body; and a subtle stench like rotting eggs
filled her nostrils.
She tried to scream, but her mouth had gone dry. She saw
Reverend Pfeil, and she saw the other thing as well, and she
was relieved because she knew that this was definitely a
nightmare. That it could be reality was inconceivable, so
what else could it be except a bad dream? The knife would
start downward, and she would wake up. That's all there
was to it.
The blade, still reflecting the candle flames, plunged
downward.
Irene did not wake up.
2
"Weird," Sarah said. "The way Mom just walked out in the
middle of getting dinner."
Don and his daughter were sitting in the living room. The
TV set was on, but they weren't paying much attention to it.
Allison had walked out of the house an hour and a half ago.
"Do you think you should have gone after her?" Sarah
asked. She was sitting on the couch. Don was in his favorite
chair.
"By the time I thought of it, she was already gone," he
said. "I would've had to chase her in the patrol car."
"Maybe you should have."
"Sarah, she didn't seem to be in any danger. And I knew
where she was going."
"Yeah, but it was so weird. Aren't you worried?"
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"Of course I'm concerned. But chasing after her in a car
just didn't seem like the right thing to do. Besides, we drove
by the church and saw her car there. Half the town's at that
revival. We know where she is, and we know she's not in any
danger, not with all those people around."
Sarah sighed. "I think you're just trying to keep me from
worrying."
There was some truth to that, because Don was every
bit as concerned as Sarah. When your wife walks out of
the house in the middle of cooking dinner, you know
something's not right. Especially when she says she's going
to a revival she earlier said she had no intention of attend-
ing. Especially when the wife in question was a level-headed
businesswoman who got embarrassed if she rooted too
enthusiastically for her favorite team while watching the
World Series. Allison was a born conformer, a person who
believed in doing the "right thing," being responsible, not
making too many waves. Such people did not walk out of
the house in the middle of fixing dinner.
"How long do revivals last?" Sarah asked.
"I don't know. I've never been to one."
They fell silent then. Don studied his daughter, thinking
how much she looked like Allison—and how much they
both looked like Susan St. James. Allison resembled the
actress the way she looked now. And Sarah resembled her as
she had looked when she'd been the wife in "MacMillan and
Wife."
Don loved Allison and Sarah tremendously, and he was
worried about what was happening to their quiet life here on
the island. People were getting murdered in a manner that
would shock even the most hardened New Yorker. The
Lutheran minister was holding a revival. And Don's wife
had decided in the middle of cooking dinner to attend one
of the services. Life here had always been simple and safe,
even if not too terribly exciting. Suddenly everything was
... what? The only word that came to mind was wrong.
Everything was wrong.
Look for someone acting strangely. Kesselring's words
slammed into Don's consciousness like a wrecking ball
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smashing into a building. But Kesselring was crazy. He said
things that made no sense.
If someone is acting crazy, the ex-cop had said, it's
probably the killer.
That proved Kesselring was a fruitcake. Allison was
acting strangely, but she certainly wasn't the killer.
Allison was gone for two hours. Don and Sarah heard the
car pull into the garage. Using the remote control, Don
switched off the TV set, and a moment later Allison stepped
into the living room.
Don and Sarah stared at her, uncertain what to say.
Finally Don broke the silence. "How was the revival?" he
asked.
"Fine," she said, joining Sarah on the couch.
The room became silent again. Don was waiting for her to
offer an explanation for her behavior, but it was becoming
clear that none was forthcoming. He said, "Sarah and I
finished cooking dinner. Yours is in the fridge. Would you
like Sarah to warm it for you?"
"Don't bother. I can take care of it myself."
Allison seemed her usual self. She was neither nervous
nor upset; there was no dazed look in her eyes. She was
sitting there, acting as if what she had done was the most
normal thing in the world. Don was growing uneasier by the
moment. He had no idea what was happening.
"Allison," he said slowly, "don't you think it was a little
unusual for you to abruptly leave in the middle of cooking
dinner?"
"I had to get to the revival."
"But you said you weren't interested in the revival,"
Sarah said.
"I changed my mind." Just a hint of puzzlement appeared
on Allison's face, as if even she was having difficulty
accepting her explanation.
"What made you change your mind?" Don asked.
"I... I don't know. I guess it was because I go to all the
church activities."
"Why didn't you tell us beforehand—instead of walking
out of the house like that?"
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"I guess I didn't know until that moment that I was
going." Apparently realizing how strange that sounded, she
frowned.
Again a silence settled over them. Sarah was looking at
her mother intently, the concern and confusion in the girl's
eyes obvious. She said, "What did you do at the revival,
Mom?"
"We just got together . . . all of us . . ." Her words trailed
off.
"Mom . . ." Sarah said.
"Honey, I ... I don't seem to remember what we did,
except that we all got together. There were lots of people
there. Even people who don't usually go to church. Like
Kevin and Irene Waggoner. I don't think I've ever seen them
in church before."
"I've been looking for Irene Waggoner," Don said.
"To talk to her about the murders?"
Don nodded. As they were talking, the color had slowly
been draining from Allison's face. Don looked into her eyes,
seeing bewilderment mixed with fear.
"I—" She faltered and had to start again. "I don't know
why I decided to go to the revival. It happened while I was
cooking dinner. I ... I just decided." She slowly shook her
head. "And I don't remember exactly what happened there.
Don, why don't I remember?"
"Tell me what you do remember," he said.
"I remember arriving, and all these people were there,
and . . . and I remember leaving . . . and . . ." Again she
shook her head. Her brow was full of deep furrows. She
seemed to be on the verge of tears.
Don joined her on the couch, slipped his arm around her.
She rested her head on his shoulder. "I don't know why I
went to the revival," she said. "And I don't know what I did
while I was there." She looked at him, tears glistening in her
eyes. "I don't understand."
"I don't either," he said.
Allison was sitting between Don and Sarah. She took her
daughter's hand, as if trying to draw strength from the two
people she loved most.
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"Mom, I think you should see the doctor," Sarah said.
Don said, "I think so too. Let's get Doc Ingram to check
you over, just to be on the safe side." Although he didn't say
so, he was concerned that Allison's behavior might have
been caused by a mild stroke or some other problem that
could affect the brain. He guessed Sarah had come to the
same conclusion.
Allison said okay, she'd see the doctor.
"Promise?" Sarah asked.
"Promise."
Allison turned to smile reassuringly, but her lower lip
began to quiver after a moment, and the smile slipped from
her face. A tear slid down her cheek.
Don was trying real hard not to think about Kesselring's
words concerning people acting strangely. Kesselring was
nuts, had to be nuts. No other explanation made any sense.
3
The next morning Don drove to the Waggoners' house
again. He arrived just as Kevin was leaving for work.
"Irene inside?" Don asked as he walked up to the drive to
where Kevin was standing beside a red Bronco.
"No," he said, unlocking the Bronco's door.
"Where is she?"
Kevin hesitated, then said, "I don't know."
"What do you mean, you don't know?"
Kevin looked confused for a moment, then defiant. Was
he hiding something? Don wasn't able to read him. "Why
do you want to know?" Kevin demanded.
"I need to talk to her."
"Well, I don't know where she is."
"You were at church with her last night."
Kevin looked puzzled. "Church?"
"You know, stone building with stained-glass windows."
"That's right. We did go to the church last night. To the
revival."
"Didn't think you were a churchgoer."
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"I'm not."
"But you went last night."
"That's right."
Don was perplexed by the way this was going. Although
Kevin Waggoner wasn't exactly acting guilty, he was certain-
ly behaving oddly. "When did Irene leave?"
"Leave?"
"You said she wasn't here, so she must have left."
"No, she didn't leave."
"Then where is she?"
"I don't know."
"Kevin, you're not making any sense."
"She didn't come home with me."
"Rom the revival?"
"Yeah."
"She went home with someone else?"
"Yeah."
"Who?"
"I don't know."
"Kevin, how could you not know?"
Kevin Waggoner's face turned an angry red. "Because I
don't!" he snapped. "She probably left with Paul Edley's
replacement, how's that? She's probably got the hots for
some guy and left with him. I don't know what guy."
"Kevin—"
"And," he shouted, "I don't give a shit what guy!"
Kevin Waggoner climbed into the Bronco, started the
engine, and roared backward into the street. Shifting into
drive, he left a strip of rubber as he drove off.
Watch for people acting strangely. Don pushed the
thought away.
4
Still angry, Kevin Waggoner drove along Lansing Street, the
part of his brain not consumed with being pissed off noting
that the snowbanks had shrunk to a mere eighteen inches or
so in the unusually warm weather of the past few days. But
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then that was the weather. One day it looks like the coming
of the next Ice Age, and on the next it looks like summer's
almost here.
They had a saying here: If you don't like the weather on
Ice Island, just wait a minute and it'll change. Wasn't that
the truth? Kevin wondered whether they used that same
saying anywhere else.
His anger was gone now, and Kevin tried to recall just
what happened at the revival last night. Even though he'd
been pretty upset with Irene, he'd gone to the revival with
her. And he left alone, which should serve him right for
taking her. But what had happened in between?
He couldn't recall.
And come to think of it, why had he gone to a damned
revival in the first place?
Unnerved, Kevin cut in front of a car at the intersection
of Lansing and Huron, and the other driver honked his
irritation. What the hell? he thought, paying little attention
to the annoyed driver. What the hell?
5
Don spent half an hour talking to a teacher who was a friend
of the Gordons and who'd been off sick when he'd inter-
viewed people at the high school. Agnes Gross spent the
whole time telling Don how horrible it was, what happened
to the Gordons, and provided no particularly helpful infor-
mation.
As he was heading for the police station, Cindy Thornley,
the weekend dispatcher, used the two-way radio to let Don
know that Lieutenant Roper of the state police had called
and wanted Don to phone him.
"Your wife called," Cindy informed him when he arrived
at the station. Although she was about thirty and the mother
of two, Cindy's short blond hair and smooth, lightly freck-
led face gave her a sort of well-scrubbed, high-school-girl
look. She reminded Don of Doris Day. If there were a Miss
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IT'S LOOSE
Wide-Eyed Innocence pageant, Cindy would win it hands
down.
Sitting down at his desk, Don called Allison, who told
him, "Doc Ingram says that as far as he can tell I'm fine."
"Did he have any idea what might have caused it?"
"No. He said it's probably nothing, but that after the
Split's over I might want to arrange for some tests at the
hospital, just as a precaution."
"I think you should do it."
"Don, do you know what those hospitals charge?"
"The insurance will cover it."
"Not the deductible."
"Hey, you and Sarah are the most important things in my
life, kiddo. And I don't want anything to happen to you. So
if you need a few tests, we'll get them."
"Yes, sir."
"Good. That's the way I like my women. Nice and
respectful and obedient."
"Oh, boy, are you going to be in for a pile of grief when
you get home."
They both laughed, then Don said, "By the way, do you
recall who Irene Waggoner left the revival with last night?"
She was silent for a moment, then she said, "Didn't she
leave with Kevin?"
"He says she didn't."
"I guess I don't remember seeing them leave—either of
them. There was a really large crowd. The church was filled
to overflowing. So it would have been pretty easy for me to
miss them in the crush."
When he hung up, Don turned to Cindy. "Go to the
revival last night?"
"No. I hear they had a really big turnout."
"That's what I hear, too," Don said. He picked up the
phone and called Lieutenant Roper.
"I got you a chopper," the state policeman said.
"That's sure a relief," Don said.
"I'm afraid there is one slight problem."
"It doesn't have any rotor blades."
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"Do I detect a note of sarcasm?"
"No, I'm just developing a real good understanding of
how these things work."
"That's what I thought. Sarcasm. Anyway, I got a helicop-
ter from the National Guard. They were going to fly out
there this morning, but the chopper developed a small
mechanical problem."
"And it'll only take six weeks to get the part."
"No, they have the part. And they'll have the machine
ready to go on Monday."
"By any chance did you get them to swear it, sign in
blood? No, wait, scratch that. I shouldn't be taking my
frustrations out on you. I appreciate your help. I really do."
"Don't worry about it," Roper said. "I know you're really
up against it out there. In your situation I'd be getting a little
upset too."
After hanging up, Don looked over at Cindy and said,
"You know Irene Waggoner?"
"I know who she is, but I don't really know her."
"Have you heard anything about her fooling around with
other men?"
"I heard she was making it with Paul Edley." It seemed
odd for someone who looked so innocent to say something
like that so matter-of-factly.
"Paul Edley," Don repeated. He was wondering whether
he was the only one on the island who'd been unaware that
Irene was fooling around with Edley. "Anyone else?"
"Edley's the only one I've heard about."
He called Allison again, asked her the same question. "I
don't know about anyone other than Edley," she replied.
Dan was uncomfortable with this Irene Waggoner busi-
ness. Why had Kevin acted the way he had—maybe not
guilty but odd? Where was Irene? Had something happened
to her? And then there were all those other questions. Such
as who killed Paul Edley and the Gordons. Was Kesselring
involved in some way? Don suspected he could fill a whole
page with questions. And he had no answers. Not one.
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IT'S LOOSE
6
It was late in the afternoon when sixteen-year-old Wes
Brock finished painting the interiors of cabins sixteen and
seventeen at the Superior Motel, which was owned by his
parents, Stan and Patsy Brock. He put the lid on the paint
can, took the brushes into the bathroom, and began washing
them in the sink. It was the annual thing, painting the
unoccupied cabins during the Split. It was the best time to
do it, since any cabin unoccupied when the Split began was
guaranteed to stay that way until the ferry started running.
Painting was something Wes absolutely hated, and he was
glad the day's work was done. Tomorrow he'd paint eigh-
teen and nineteen, but he didn't have to think about that
now.
Leaving the cleaned brushes in the cabin with the paint,
Wes headed for the portion of the motel in which he and his
family resided. It was a pretty nice place to live, he
supposed. If you opened the door at one end of the living
room, you found yourself behind the counter of the motel's
office; except for that, it was like any other house.
Wes hoped he had done a good enough job. If he hadn't,
his dad would show him all the places he missed and make
him do them again. Wes wasn't very good with his hands.
He was overwhelmed by the simplest automotive repair.
The complexities of changing a tire or replacing a worn
windshield wiper blade were beyond him. When the seat on
his bicycle slipped, he lived with it until his dad could adjust
it. If anything, he was even worse at sports than at doing
things mechanical. In elementary school, when they'd cho-
sen up sides for softball games, he'd been chosen after the
girls.
There was one thing he was good at—not just good but a
master. It was in the back room of the house, and he was
heading for it now. His mom would make him come out for
supper, but except for that lone interruption he planned to
spend the evening with his computer. He'd check the mail,
as he called it, which meant entering the secret access code
to see whether any other computer enthusiasts had left him
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IT'S LOOSE
any messages. He had contacts all around the country,
kindred spirits who communicated via their home comput-
ers. After answering any messages that needed answering,
he'd get down to some serious hacking. It was illegal, of
course, but he was careful not to pry into places where he'd
be likely to get caught. He'd never tried the Defense
Department or the CIA. However, he managed to get into
the computers of airlines and other companies. Pretending
to be a nonexistent police department, he'd gotten informa-
tion from NCIC, the national crime computer. And once,
probably the most illegal thing he'd done, Wes had knocked
twenty dollars off his folks' electric bill.
Wes had almost reached the combination office and
residence when a blue Buick rolled into the motel's parking
area and headed toward him. It was an old model, built back
when cars were enormous, and it glided toward him like a
whale. Like any northern car that had been around for a
while, its sides were full of rust holes. Inside were four boys.
Jock types with small minds and big muscles. Wes experi-
enced a flash of anger. It was bad enough seeing these jerks
in school. He didn't need to encounter them on the weekend
as well. He prepared himself for what he knew would come.
As the car pulled to a stop beside him, the driver rolled
down the window. It was a big blond kid named Derek
Aldrich, who had once filled Wes's shirt with snow, packing
it in there until Wes was as huge as Santa Claus and he was
standing there shivering and feeling humiliated. Derek had
told him that he should leave the snow in there for five
minutes if he wanted to be his buddy, the unspoken threat
being that bad things would happen to him if he wasn't
Derek's buddy. Wes had tried to comply, but when he went
into the school and started dripping, his teacher, Mrs.
Norton, made him get rid of the snow and take off his wet
shirt and dry it out on the radiator.
"Hey, Wes, how ya doin'?" Derek asked.
"Fine," Wes said.
The others in the car were Russ Dowling, Ben Jones, and
Scott Bender. Like Derek, these were boys he'd grown up
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IT'S LOOSE
avoiding. They called him things like Spaghetti or String or
Blade (of grass) because he was so skinny. And Four Eyes
because he wore glasses. And when Wes had developed a
case of acne, Russ called him Pimple Puss.
"We came over to see what you were up to," Derek said.
His three companions grinned. It was like looking into the
mouths of circling sharks.
"Painting," Wes said.
"Hey, man," Derek said, "no buddy of ours should be
wasting his time painting. Come on with us. We'll have a few
beers, maybe chase up some pussy. How about it, Wes? You
ever been laid?"
He wasn't about to answer that. "I've already got stuff I've
got to do," he said.
In the backseat, two cans of beer were popped open.
Derek said, "Come on, man. Let's have some fun."
"I'm sorry, but—"
"Look, we're not just going to party. We're going to start
the evening off right. Before we do anything else, we're going
to get some religion."
"Religion?" Wes asked, confused.
"Sure. We're going to the revival."
"The revival?" Wes wasn't sure he'd heard right.
"Sure. Come on." Again the grins.
"Yeah," Scott Bender said. "It'll be fun."
"Yeah," Ben Jones said.
"You want to be our buddy, don't you?" Russ Dowling
asked.
"Why would you guys want to go to a revival?" Wes asked.
"Everybody in town gets together," Scott Bender said.
"You ever seen how many girls go to those things?" Derek
asked. "That's where all the pussy on the island will be.
Don't you want to get laid?"
In truth, Wes wanted very much to get laid. Getting laid
was right up there with computers when it came to things
that occupied his mind. However, he wasn't at all certain
that going with these guys was the way to go about it.
"If you don't want to get laid," Ben Jones said, "we'll
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IT'S LOOSE
think you're a queer. You wouldn't want us to think you're a
queer, would you?"
The back door opened, and Scott and Russ got out, stood
on each side of him. Scott was the bigger of the two, a
heavyset kid with hair that was shaved to within a quarter-
inch of his scalp. He looked like a Marine recruit, fresh from
the base barber shop. Russ was just the opposite, thin with
long dark hair and a mustache so sparse that it was nearly
invisible. He looked as if he were attempting but not
succeeding at looking like a hippie.
Wes wanted to run, but he didn't because he probably
wouldn't get very far and because it would reveal how
thoroughly intimidated he was.
"Come on," Scott said. "Let's go to the revival." They
began pulling him toward the car.
Just then, Wes's mother stepped out of a door behind
them with a load of folded bedsheets in her arms. "Every-
thing all right here?" she asked.
No matter how much he wanted these boys to go away and
leave him alone, there was one thing Wes was unwilling to
do. He wasn't going to have his mother rescue him. He
would never, ever live it down. At ninety, he would still be
hearing things like, Hey, Wes the Mess. I hear you're a real
mommy's boy. I hear you cry to your mommy when
someone's mean to you.
Nothing these guys could do to him would be as bad as
that.
To his mother, he said, "We're going to the revival."
"The revival?"
"Yeah. They asked me to go, so I thought I would." He
was not going to ask permission in front of Derek and
company.
"What about your dinner?"
"We'll have a burger or something."
His mother gave him a disapproving look, but she didn't
try to stop him. Wes got into the backseat with Scott and
Ben.
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IT'S LOOSE
7
As he had the day before, Karl Zellner's dog, Brute, sat up
and howled, as if communicating with some primitive
wolfish ancestor.
8
Below Don Farraday's desk, in the basement of the city hall
and police station, the cockroaches that lived year-round in
the warmth provided by the building's old and cantanker-
ous boiler suddenly erupted through crevices in the walls
and swarmed over the chipped cement floor like a brown
wave, their numbers so great they made a low rustling sound
as they moved. There was no purpose to their frenzied
movement. They were neither seeking food nor escaping
danger. They were moving simply because something had
triggered a primitive response.
They swarmed around the floor, changing directions only
because the walls or other obstacles dictated. They collided
with each other and whatever was in their path. A few died,
then a few more, and still they continued to run, blindly but
en masse.
They ran until there were only a dozen of them left, then
six, then three, then one. And the last one scurried up the
hot side of the metal compartment that housed the boiler's
burner.
Tiny puffs of smoke came from the roach's feet.
And it fell to the floor dead.
9
Ray Loubet, who oversaw the produce section of the grocery
store, was heading for the cold storage locker to take a quick
inventory. By the time the Split was over a lot of fresh
produce items would be unavailable on the island. He'd still
have potatoes and onions and carrots, but tomatoes and
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IT'S LOOSE
zucchini and the like wouldn't keep that long. And you
never knew for sure when the Split would be declared.
All of which made running the produce section a tricky
business.
He walked along the meat counter, thinking how glad he
was that he'd be off tomorrow. The store was closed on
Sundays. Thinking about Sunday made him think about
church, which made him think about his brother. Henry
and Gloria had been in the store a few minutes ago. They'd
walked out, leaving behind a grocery cart full of canned
goods, and when he'd asked them where they were go-
ing, Henry said to the revival. Was there going to be
a revival every night? What on earth were they doing at
those things?
Ray Loubet pushed through the double metal doors that
led to the part of the store in which deliveries were received
and nonperishables were stored. He was reaching for the
handle to the cold storage locker when he saw movement
from the corner of his eye. What the hell? he thought,
turning to look.
Something shot across the floor, disappearing behind a
stack of cartons containing toilet paper.
Then something came from behind a box of Stokley's
green beans and raced across the open space to another
stack of boxes. Something gray.
Then two more gray streaks came from opposite direc-
tions, nearly colliding in front of him. Then another. And
another. When one^ came within six inches of hitting his
foot, he realized what they were and began backing slowly
out of the room.
They were rats. Rats that had gone totally berserk.
He backed through the metal doors, and they swung
closed in front of him. Then he heard a thump as something
hit the doors from the other side. There was another thump,
louder. Then two more, the doors opening slightly, then
closing again.
Loubet moved farther away from them. He was behind
the meat counter, but there were no butchers there now.
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They'd finished their work and gone for the day. From the
front of the store came the familiar sound of a cash register
ringing up someone's purchases. Loubet headed for it.
From behind him came more thumps against the metal
doors. Loubet moved faster.
10
Click!
Thunk!
The sounds of the ice breaking up reverberated in Hank
Bergstrom's basement. Accustomed to the vibrations these
releases of energy caused in its web, a brown, fuzzy spider
sat in its silken home, unconcerned. The gossamer strands
ran from the cement wall to the back side of the water
heater, whose warmth had enabled the spider to survive
beyond its time.
Abruptly the spider twitched, and then it began frantically
scrambling out of its web, responding to a signal it was
unable to resist, a signal that touched a part of the spider as
primitive and basic as the need for food. But having lived
well beyond the few months it was allotted, the spider was
too feeble to go very far. As it reached the edge of its web, it
simply stopped, its legs curling beneath it as it died.
11
The message went out.
From the center of the church, it emitted the signal for all
on the island to receive. It was a simple message: Come to
the revival. Although that was its meaning, the message
didn't actually consist of words, for it was received by the
human brain's least civilized part, the part it shared with
animals and even insects, the place in which the most
primitive emotions lived and to which words were meaning-
less.
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IT'S LOOSE
It had no idea how many people on the island would obey
the command to come, although it was sure many would.
Though primitive, the part of the mind that received the
signal was in the subconscious and quite susceptible to
suggestions; it was the part tapped by hypnotists. But then
these were things it only fuzzily understood. What mattered
was that the message would be received, and that it would be
obeyed by many.
And it would feed.
Usually a solitary being driven entirely by its cravings, it
found this a brand new experience. Never before had it
arranged to have its food brought to it. Cunning and
conniving were not its strong points. It took direct action,
moved on. That had always been its way. But this opportu-
nity had presented itself. And it had seen the possibilities.
It sent out the second part of the message: Think of
someone you don't like, someone you'd like to hurt. And
bring that person to the church.
Many people harbored no such feelings toward anyone.
Others would not receive the message, or would not obey
it.
But a few would.
Enough would.
And it would feed.
12
Don Farraday arrived home, feeling tired and defeated. He
hadn't found Irene Waggoner. He hadn't worked up a single
lead in the five murders. Looking back on the day, he
concluded that he'd devoted most of his time to worrying
and feeling useless as he patrolled the island. As he pulled
into the driveway, Allison and Sarah came out of the house.
At first he thought they were coming out to greet him, let
him know that they were aware of what he was going
through and were on his side.
But they didn't. Instead they walked to the detached
garage and opened the door, as if unaware of his presence.
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IT'S LOOSE
Puzzled, Don got out of the car. "Where you off to?" he
asked.
"We're going to the revival," Allison said as they got into
the car.
"But. . ." Don didn't know what to say. Why were
Allison and Sarah going to the revival? An uneasiness was
rapidly swirling up from his gut, spreading throughout his
body.
"There's one every night," Sarah said as she pulled the
passenger-side door closed.
Then, as if that was all there was to say, Allison started the
engine.
"Hey," Don said, rapping on the window.
Allison rolled it down. "Is something wrong?"
"Hang on," Don said. "I'll go with you."
"No!" his wife snapped.
"You can't," Sarah said. *
Allison began backing the car down the driveway.
Confused and with a growing feeling of foreboding, Don
watched as Allison backed into the street, then pulled away
from the house. Neither his wife nor his daughter waved.
For about a minute, Don stood in the driveway, staring at
the now-empty street. Finally he turned and walked into the
house. He sat down at the kitchen table. What was going on
here? Why were Allison and Sarah going to the revival? And
why didn't they want him to go with them?
Watch for people acting strangely . . .
"Shit," Don said to the empty room. He rushed outside
and climbed into his Cherokee.
13
It looked like Easter morning with all the cars around the
church. Even the yellow curb in front of a fire hydrant was
occupied by a green Isuzu. Don thought about leaving a
ticket under one of its wiper blades but instantly discarded
the notion. He had more important things to worry about
than parking citations.
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IT'S LOOSE
As he walked toward the building, he heard singing. A
familiar hymn he was unable to name. Don opened one of
the big wooden doors and stepped inside. The place was
packed, people standing along the walls. He spotted Allison
and Sarah sitting together in a pew to the right of the center
aisle.
When the singing stopped, Reverend Pfeil said, "The
Bible tells us, 'Love thy neighbor.' It's especially true in
times like these, when someone is murdering our neighbors.
In such troubled times, we must band together and let our
ties of love and respect-—our greatest strengths as a
community—see us through."
Pfeil was looking toward the back of the church, and all at
once his eyes seemed to find Don's, hold them as if studying
him, then move on. Don felt a peculiar sensation, like a
chill, except this coldness wasn't exactly physical. As soon as
the feeling passed, Don was sure he'd imagined it.
The reverend went on, talking about pulling together,
putting faith in God's word. He said the same thing about
five times, in five slightly different ways. And when he
finished, he asked everyone to rise for the singing of another
hymn. After about fifteen minutes, Don left. He stopped to
put a citation on the windshield of the Isuzu. It was just a
warning, however; tickets requiring the payment of fines
were usually reserved for summer people.
As he drove home, Don considered what he'd just wit-
nessed. It was an ordinary church service. The minister's
message had been about pulling together. Apparently Pfeil
was just trying to raise everyone's spirits, and maybe get
people to keep an eye out. No harm in any of that.
And Don remembered everything that had happened. No
blank spots. No mysteries.
So why couldn't Allison remember? And why had both
Allison and Sarah acted so weirdly just a little while ago?
Maybe they were just scared. Having a bloodthirsty killer
loose on the island was understandably terrifying. For the
family of the island's only police officer, the one who was
supposed to stop the murderous lunatic, it would have to be
especially frightening.
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Don clung to that explanation.
When Allison and Sarah got home, perhaps he should
have a long talk with them, see whether discussing the
situation would make them feel better.
14
Holding the case he rarely let out of his sight, Kesselring
stood in the doorway of the hardware store, watching
the church across the street. He'd seen the place fill up.
He'd seen Farraday arrive and go inside. He'd seen the
constable come out and drive away a quarter-hour ago.
He hadn't liked seeing the policeman at the church, for
it could mean Farraday was part of whatever was going
on.
And what was going on? Kesselring didn't have the
vaguest idea. In all his experience with the Evil, nothing like
this had ever happened before. Of course, he was only
assuming this was connected with the Evil. It could be the
normal reaction of a frightened community. Go to church,
pray, ask God for help.
But Kesselring didn't think so. Something, some small
spot in the farthest reaches of his subconscious, a place that
was apparently attuned to such things, knew for certain that
the activity at the church was the work of the Evil.
The singing of hymns had stopped.
Kesselring walked across the street and up to the doors of
the church. He pulled on the handle. The building was
locked. Kesselring knocked, waited. Nothing happened. He
knocked again, louder this time. Still no response. He
knocked still more loudly. This time the door opened. Two
men stepped out, closing the door behind them.
"I'd like to go to church," Kesselring said.
"Sorry," the bigger of the two men replied. "The church is
full." He was about thirty, tall and muscular, with curly
brown hair. The other guy was middle-aged, bald, chubby,
and he had blue eyes that stared at Kesselring blankly, with
all the warmth of camera lenses.
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"I'll stand," Kesselring said.
"Can't," the man said. "It's a violation of the fire code."
"So's locking the door of a public building that's full of
people."
The men said nothing.
"Let me in," Kesselring said. "I need divine inspiration.
Badly. My soul's been claimed by Satan."
"Constable was just here to warn us. No more people, or
he'll shut us down."
The two men went back inside. Kesselring heard the door
being locked again.
15
Allison and Sarah got home about two hours after they'd
left. They were unable to remember what had happened at
the revival—except for right at first, when Reverend Pfeil
had talked to them about pulling together as a community.
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Cloven
1
Don sat at his desk the next morning, staring glumly at the
pencil holder, from which a number of Bic pens protruded.
He could hear Cindy Thornley making a pot of coffee, but
he didn't bother to look in her direction. He'd come to work
today simply because it wouldn't look good for him to take a
day off—even a Sunday—when a crazed killer was loose on
the island. In short, he was there strictly for appearances. He
had nothing to do. No leads to follow. No witnesses to
question. No good suspects.
Earlier he'd gone by the Waggoner house again. Kevin
said Irene still hadn't come home, and he didn't give a shit if
she never did. Don was beginning to wonder whether Kevin
Waggoner had done something to his wife. That would be all
he needed. A sixth murder.
And then there was the revival. His wife and daughter
remembered the same portion of it he did. After that,
nothing. It made no sense. Why could they remember part
but not the rest? Every time he thought it through, he came
up with the same bizarre possibility.
The portion he saw could have been staged for his benefit.
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IT'S LOOSE
Pfeil had waited for him to leave before getting down to
business.
But what business? What had happened that Allison and
Sarah were unable to remember? And how did Pfeil prevent
them from remembering? Or did Pfeil himself remember?
Don shook his head. He had no idea what was going on. He
was simply guessing wildly.
One thing was certain. If there was another revival
tonight, he was not only going, but he was staying for the
whole thing.
And if he found he was unable to remember? What then?
He didn't know. He didn't like to think it was possible to
erase his memory, for it meant that something outside of
him could take control of his mental processes. Your mind
was your most personal, private, sacred place, where the real
you lived. To tamper with it was tantamount to mental rape.
Last night as Don lay in bed, thinking about the revival—
one more thing to keep him awake—he'd found himself
picturing some sort of bizarre mass hypnosis, which had
made him think of Jonestown, Guyana, everybody having a
little spiked punch because that's what the leader said to do.
He imagined Reverend Pfeil starting his own cult, getting
the people on the island to turn over their property, maybe
getting them to slip hallucinogens into the food of others,
then bringing them to the next meeting. Was that what had
happened? Had Allison slipped Sarah drugs? Was he next?
Although Don knew a lot of these notions were probably
silly, his wife and then his daughter had started going to
Pfeil's revivals, and neither of them seemed able to remem-
ber a whole lot about what went on there. That was the part
Don disliked most, their not knowing.
The door opened, and Patsy and Stan Brock stepped
inside, both of them looking worried. "Can we talk to you a
moment?" Patsy asked Don.
He joined them at the counter. The Brocks owned the
Superior Motel, did all the cleaning and bed changing and
maintenance themselves. Stan was a bony, awkward-looking
guy, wiry like a long-distance runner, and he stood about
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IT'S LOOSE
six-five. Patsy was more than a foot shorter, a slight woman
with olive skin, dark hair, and eyes that were nearly black.
Her coloring was unusual for an Ice Islander, most of whom
had northern European ancestry. But then Patsy wasn't a
native. Stan had met her while he was in the Army.
"I'm worried about Wes," Patsy said. "He didn't come
home last night."
"I told her it's possible he's just out being a teenager,"
Stan said. "But Patsy's pretty worried, and she wanted to
talk to you."
Don could tell Stan was worried too. Men did that
sometimes. If it was something that made them seem
emotional or caring, they said the wife was concerned about
it. He wondered whether he was guilty of the same thing.
"He's never even gone on a date," Patsy said. "Why
would he suddenly decide to stay out all night and then not
even call to say he was okay?" *
Stan gave his wife's arm a gentle squeeze. "I'm not saying
we shouldn't be concerned. I'm just saying that a boy his age
could be out having his first time with a girl or something
like that."
"Stan, he doesn't even know girls exist, except for the
ones on his computer network."
Don said, "Why don't you tell me what happened?"
"Yesterday evening, just before supper," Patsy said,
"these boys came by in an old car, and Wes went with them.
That's it. He's never gone out with those boys before, and he
hasn't come back."
"Did you recognize any of the boys?" Don asked.
"The one driving the car was Derek Aldrich. I'm not sure
who the others were."
"Did they say where they were going?"
"The revival."
Stan said, "But I don't believe that for a moment. That
was just so we'd think they were going someplace whole-
some, instead of what they were really doing. Those boys
most likely had some booze in the car, and I wouldn't be
surprised if they had some girls lined up as well."
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IT'S LOOSE
Don wasn't so sure about that. His wife and daughter had
gone to that revival and couldn't recall what had gone on.
Irene Waggoner had gone to the revival, and now he was
unable to locate her.
"Did they say anything else?" Don asked.
"No," Patsy Brock said. "Only that they were going to the
revival and that they'd grab some burgers for dinner. That's
it."
"How many boys were in the car?"
"Four."
"What kind of car was it?"
"An old one. Big, with a lot of rust. I guess the color was a
sort of flat blue-gray."
Don promised the Brocks he'd check into it and get back
to them.
2
The Aldriches lived on Flint Street, between Huron and
Michigan Avenues. Don found Derek in the garage, sweep-
ing out the salt and sand that had dropped from the
Aldriches' station wagon over the winter. Because it was a
one-car garage, Derek's rusty Buick presumably lived out-
side. At the moment it was parked at the curb, looking like
something that had escaped from a wrecking yard.
"Did you see Wes Brock last night?" Don asked.
"The little nerdy wimp?"
Don gave the kid what he hoped was an authoritative
look. "I'm not interested in your opinion of him. I want to
know whether you were with him last night."
Derek Aldrich stared at the policeman, apparently trying
to figure out what was going on. "Yes, I was with him last
night. Why do you want to know?"
"Anyone else with you?"
"Yeah. Scott Bender, Ben Jones, and Russ Dowling. How
come you're asking me this stuff?" The boy eyed Don
warily, his initial cockiness fading.
"Where'd you go?"
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IT'S LOOSE
"The revival."
For a long moment, Don just looked at him. Then he said,
"A revival? I can see you and your pals drinking beer or drag
racing on that straight stretch of Pine Road, but all you guys
getting together to go to church just doesn't seem to fit."
"We did. Honest."
"Why?"
"I .. . well. . ." He seemed puzzled. "I guess we figured
there could be lots of chicks there." Then, in an apparent
attempt to reassert his cockiness, he added, "They say the
ones who go to church are all just dying to get laid."
"Why'd you take Wes Brock along?"
"I . . ." He looked confused.
"Wes isn't one of your regular buddies, is he?"
Derek Aldrich shook his head.
"You went by the motel and picked him up, that right?"
The boy nodded.	*
"He know you were coming?"
"No. We ... we just went by."
"Whose decision was that?"
"We .. . we just did. I don't remember who suggested it."
"What'd you do at the revival?"
The boy looked blank. "I... I don't remember."
"How could you not remember?"
The teenager opened his mouth, closed it. He seemed
helpless, bewildered.
"How long were you there?"
"Couple of hours."
"And you can't remember what you did for two hours."
"I... I can't," he said. "It's the truth. I just don't
remember."
"What'd you do when it was over?" Don asked.
"We cruised around a little bit, then went home."
"Wes Brock too?"
"No. He ... he ..." Derek frowned. "He didn't leave the
church with us."
"How'd he get home?"
"I guess he got a ride with somebody else."
"Why didn't he leave with you?"
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IT'S LOOSE
"I don't know."
"You don't know?"
"I don't. . . remember." He rubbed his forehead, as if
trying to massage his brain, make its recollective functions
begin to work again.
Although Don had managed to conceal it from Derek
Aldrich, he was stunned. Talking to the teenager about the
revival had been like talking to Allison and Sarah. And
Kevin Waggoner. Why were people unable to remember
what happened there? Don was beginning to find this whole
thing more than just a little unnerving.
As he walked from the garage back to his car, Don thought
about mass hypnosis again. And the power a fanatic could
hold over his followers. Okay, gang, it's hot out here in
Guyana, so we're all going to drink some of this spiked
punch. Don tried to push the image away, but it refused to
go. Over and over again, he saw the people drinking the
Kool-Aid or whatever it was, dropping one by one, convuls-
ing, their faces twisted in agony. And then the scene
switched to the church. And the guy handing out the punch
was Reverend Pfeil.
3
Russ Dowling, Ben Jones, and Scott Bender all told the
same story Derek Aldrich had. None of them could remem-
ber what happened at the revival. None of them could recall
why Wes Brock didn't leave with them. Nor did any of them
know with whom the Brock boy did leave. It was just like
talking to Kevin Waggoner.
Don was kicking all this around in his mind—mixed in
with the image of a smiling Jim Jones passing out the
punch—when he got back to the station. Jake Spindler was
waiting for him, pacing back and forth in front of the
counter. Spindler and his two sons were the island's only
professional fishermen.
"Valerie's missing," Jake said, getting right to the point.
He looked across the counter at Don, his expression full of
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IT'S LOOSE
confusion and worry. His limp gray hair, colorless expres-
sion, and lusterless blue eyes gave him a sort of weathered
look, as if he'd been out in too many Lake Superior storms.
Valerie was his wife.
"What do you mean, she's missing?" Don asked.
"She went out last night and never came back."
"Where'd she go?"
"To that revival at First Lutheran. The whole thing just
doesn't make any sense. Roberta Carnes came by and
picked her up. I thought she and Roberta were mad at each
other, not speaking to each other." He waved his hand, as if
dismissing that particular point for the moment. "Until
Roberta showed up, I didn't even know she was going to the
revival. She . . . she never came home."
"You talk to Roberta?"
He nodded. "She says Valerie got a ride home with
somebody else, but she doesn't-know who." He slowly shook
his head. "When I tried to pin her down, she started saying
she couldn't remember. Before I came over here, I tried to
see Reverend Pfeil, but Carolyn said he wasn't home."
Suddenly his eyes grew moist, and he looked at Don
beseechingly. "Val would have called me if she was going to
be late. She'd never stay away and not tell me. Something's
happened to her, Don. I know it has."
"Why were Roberta and Valerie mad at each other?"
Jake shrugged. "All I know is they'd been pretty good
friends, and then they had a big fight about something."
"I'll see if I can find out what happened to her," Don said.
"I don't understand how Roberta could say she doesn't
remember. It was just last night. How could she not
remember?"
"I'll—"
"I don't know what I'd do without her. I... I just don't
know." Tears had formed in the corners of his eyes. He
wiped them away, looking a little embarrassed. Men who
fished the lake for a living weren't supposed to cry.
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IT'S LOOSE
4
Roberta Carnes behaved as the four teenagers had. She
didn't recall anything about the revival, and when Don
pressed her, she became confused. She remembered taking
Valerie Spindler to the church, but not how the woman got
home. She said the reason Valerie and she had had a falling
out was rather silly, looking back on it. When Valerie's son,
Marshall, got married, Roberta had been left off the invita-
tion list. An oversight, Valerie had insisted, but Roberta's
feelings were hurt, and she wasn't ready to forgive, so angry
words were exchanged.
Why did she decide to take Valerie to the revival?
Roberta just stared at him, unable to remember. She
recalled going over to Valerie's, apologizing for her behav-
ior, saying they should go to the revival, Valerie reluctantly
agreeing because she wanted to make up. But not why. She
couldn't even remember having decided that she did forgive
Valerie.
When Don left, Roberta Carnes was very upset, troubled
by things she was unable to remember and by things she was
unable to understand.
5
Next, Don went to see Reverend Pfeil. The church seemed
deserted, so he tried the minister's residence, located be-
hind it. Carolyn Pfeil opened the door.
"He's not here," the clergyman's wife said. She looked
haggard. Her clothes were rumpled, her hair mussed; her
eyes were red and had shadows under them.
"Know where I can find him?"
She nervously nibbled on her lower lip. "I don't know
where he is. He's making arrangements for the revival
tonight." She paused, then added, "They've been real
successful. He's having another one tonight instead of
regular Sunday services."
"I've never been to a revival," Don said.
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IT'S LOOSE
Carolyn Pfeil said nothing.
"What are they like?"
She frowned. "Uh, well, I'm not sure."
"You haven't been attending the revivals?"
"No, no, I've been there. I mean, I'm the minister's wife. I
have to be there."
"Then tell me what I'm missing."
"Something wrong?"
"It's just that I seem to ... to draw a blank."
"You can't remember?"
"No. Isn't that odd?" She didn't look as though it seemed
odd. She looked as though it seemed terrifying.
The two of them stood there at the Pfeils' front door, the
minister's wife looking bewildered and afraid while Don
tried to figure all this out. Three people had gone to the
revival and disappeared. And it seemed that anyone who'd
been there and hadn't disappeared was unable to remember
anything about it. He pictured Allison coming home with-
out Sarah, looking puzzled when he asked her about it, then
saying, "She must have gotten a ride with someone else, but
I don't remember who."
As gently as he could, Don said, "Is there something going
on here you should tell me about?"
She nibbled her lip again, except this time it looked as
though she was literally biting it. "No," she said.
"You sure?"
She said nothing.
"Look, you can trust me. I can help. It's my job to help."
She opened her mouth as if to speak, but no words came
out. She seemed to be having a battle with herself, her eyes
filling with all sorts of intense feelings Don could only guess
at. Finally she just seemed to go emotionally limp. She
slowly shook her head.
"Look, Mrs. Pfeil—"
"Come back later. Maybe he'll be here." She closed the
door.
Don drove back to the station, trying to put it all together
and not getting anywhere. Too many bizarre things were
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IT'S LOOSE
happening on the island at the same time. First a man was
murdered, then an entire family. Right after that the
revivals started. Coincidence? Or was there a link? Don was
unable to see a connection. What could Reverend Pfeil's
revivals have to do with the murders? And yet all these
peculiar things had happened together.
He stopped trying to link the revivals and the murders
and concentrated on the revivals alone. Three people at-
tending the revivals had disappeared. Irene Waggoner,
Wesley Brock, and Valerie Spindler. If a store clerk's adul-
terous wife, a teenage computer buff, and a woman who'd
been married to a fisherman for thirty years had anything in
common, Don was unable to see it.
What exactly was going on at the revivals? Pfeil was a
down-to-earth Lutheran minister. Surely he wouldn't be
involved in anything untoward. Still, just holding the
revivals was peculiar. And it was downright chilling the way
the people who attended them were unable to remember
what went on there. Don kept trying to explain it in terms he
understood, like mass posthypnotic suggestion. And then
he'd find himself thinking about Jonestown and all those
people drinking that spiked punch.
Whatever was going on here was scary. And his wife and
daughter were involved in it. He could all too easily envision
one of them coming home from a revival without the other.
Well, tonight he was going to the revival and staying for the
whole thing.
Since becoming the island's policeman, Don had never
fired his weapon except on a pistol range. He had never even
drawn it in the line of duty. But now, as he drove toward the
police station, he was uncomfortably aware of the weight on
his hip.
Suddenly he was sure something was riding in the car with
him, but when he turned his head, nothing was there. He
thought he'd seen a shadowy shape, glimpsed from the
corner of his eye. It was just stress and lack of sleep playing
tricks on his mind. He was being revisited by all the old
childhood monsters that lived under the bed or in the closet
and sometimes peeked in through his bedroom window at
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IT'S LOOSE
night. But the monsters weren't real, then or now. He was
entirely alone in the car.
And then he realized that wasn't true. He did have one
companion: fear. It was riding along with him, keeping him
company, an undeniable presence. And Don had the feeling
that he could reach out and touch its cold, clammy flesh.
He shivered.
6
As soon as she closed the door, Carolyn Pfeil leaned against
it and started crying. She'd had her chance. Why didn't she
tell Don Farraday about Carly? Something awful had hap-
pened to Carly, she knew it. Didn't she care enough to
report that her little girl was missing? It wouldn't have been
such a hard thing to do. Move ypur lips. Speak some words.
Let the policeman know that something awful had hap-
pened to Carly. But she hadn't done it.
And if Don Farraday came back and gave her another
chance, she still wouldn't do it.
She sobbed, her body shaking violently.
She wouldn't do it, because she was terrified—no, more
than just terrified, for she wasn't merely frightened of the
physical harm that she could bring on herself. She was afraid
of what might happen to her core, that place where her
innermost thoughts were kept, that private, sacred place
where the true Carolyn Pfeil lived.
And she had no doubt that Douglas could hurt her there,
reach in and destroy her. The thought made her shrivel up
inside, for Douglas had become vile and corrupted and
loathsome. He was evil. And not just evil in the manner of
child molesters and rapists and torturers. This evil was pure
and basic, and just thinking about it made her feel dirty,
contaminated, and more afraid than she'd known it was
possible to be.
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IT'S LOOSE
7
Don drove to the church at seven o'clock. The place looked
deserted. There were no cars parked out front, no people
milling around, and the banner proclaiming a revival had
been removed. Don parked his Jeep wagon at the curb and
went up to the wooden doors, finding them locked. Carolyn
Pfeil could have been mistaken about there being another
meeting tonight, he supposed. Or it could have been can-
celed at the last moment. Although he didn't think anyone
was inside the building, he knocked on the door. To his
surprise, he heard the thunk of a bolt being slid back. A
young woman stuck her head out.
"Yes?" she said.
Don recognized her. She was a teacher at the elementary
school. Jessica Bjorklund. She had short blond hair, and she
was wearing bright red lipstick that made her look as if she'd
been drinking blood.
"I thought there was a revival here tonight," Don said.
"It's been moved," she said. "I'm here to let people know
in case they didn't get the word."
"Where has it been moved to?"
"A1 McDougall's barn. The reverend needed more room
because so many people were coming."
She looked spacey, sort of like the man from Ann Arbor
Don had arrested one summer after the guy had driven his
Porsche into a maple tree. He'd been carrying a bag of
cocaine, a good bit of which was also bubbling in his brain
cells. Although Don doubted Jessica was on drugs, she had
that same dazed, distant look in her eyes, a look that said
this person had given over part of his or her control to
something else.
Don headed for A1 McDougall's place. Fear, cold and
clammy, rode with him.
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IT'S LOOSE
8
Kesselring knocked on the door of the church.
It was opened by a young woman who said, "Revival's
been moved to A1 McDougall's place."
"I'm not interested in the revival," Kesselring said.
She looked at him blankly.
"I'm here because I need to be in a church."
"You'll have to go to the revival," she said. "This church
is closed."
"But I need to pray very badly. My soul needs saving."
"You'll have to go—"
He took her by the shoulders and pulled her out of the
building. Then he stepped inside and bolted the door. The
woman hadn't resisted; she'd simply seemed confused.
It looked like an ordinary church. Polished wooden pews,
stained glass, an altar of the same light wood as the pews. He
walked down the aisle, his footfalls echoing in the empty
chamber. The pews were clean and empty, no clues left
behind for curious policemen. He kept moving toward the
altar. And then he noticed something that wasn't as it
should be.
The big cross behind the altar was slightly crooked, as if it
had been removed and hurriedly replaced.
He walked up to the altar, turned, surveyed the church.
He pictured the pews full of people. Our sermon today is
about evil, specifically the Evil.
He walked around the altar, returned to the same spot. He
looked down. Then he squatted, rubbed his fingers over a
spot on the floor and examined them. There was a trace of
something dry and brown. Blood?
Moving a few feet to his left, he found another spot. This
time he was sure. It was blood. He knew what had happened
here, but he didn't know why it had happened in a church.
Or why there had apparently been an audience.
Despite the thirty-five years he'd spent as a policeman,
seeing every imaginable horror, he shuddered. Someone
had died here. Died horribly.
211

Twelve
1
As Don headed toward the west end of the island, where
McDougall lived, the last of twilight's gray surrendered to
the night. There was no moon, and the blackness appeared
thick and heavy, almost impenetrable. The headlights of
Don's Cherokee seemed to struggle to push it back even
momentarily.
Generally speaking, when you thought of Ice Island, you
thought of Lake Superior and the woods, a summer cabin
with a small boat dock or maybe an A-frame tucked away
among the trees. But A1 McDougall's place was different. He
had a large white house with a screened porch, a traditional
big red barn, a small heated dairy barn, an apple orchard, a
field in which he grew hay for the dairy cattle, another in
which he grew crops that could tolerate the cool summer
and short growing season—spinach, lettuce, broccoli, tur-
nips, radishes, and the like.
Men with flashlights were showing people where to park.
Don told them he was there on official business and drove
past them, toward the barn. As he passed the house, he
noticed two small signs suspended between a pair of low
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IT'S LOOSE
posts. The one on top said: island animal hospital, albert
mcdougall, dvm. The other said: mcdougall dairy, raw
milk, fresh butter.
Don stopped his car in front of the barn and got out. One
of its big double doors was open, and people were filing in,
familiar people, most of whom Don had known all his life.
Looking at a big guy with a curly beard, Don said, "How you
doing, Dean?"
But Dean Vanetti, who owned Dean's Plumbing and
Heating, walked past Don as if unaware of the policeman's
presence. Don started to follow him, then hesitated. There
were two men, one on each side of the door, watching the
people entering the barn. They neither spoke nor were
spoken to. They just watched. Instead of just walking right
up to the men to find out what would happen, Don moved to
his left, his shoes sinking into the muddy earth, which had
yet to freeze for the night. He kept moving until he could see
through the open door, into the barn.
Candles burned in tall candelabra, their flickering orange
light showing more than a hundred people, who were just
standing there, patiently waiting. No murmur of voices. No
walking over to say hi to someone you hadn't seen in a
couple of weeks. No gathering in small groups to discuss
mutual interests or exchange gossip.
The two men at the door looked at Don, and he looked at
them. One was J. L. Pick, who owned Spring Fresh Laundry
and Dry Cleaners. The other was Rod Donahue, who
operated RD Clothiers, where you could buy things like
insulated boots and parkas along with fishing hats and
T-shirts that said Ice Island in snow-topped icy blue letters.
Liking the whole scene less and less by the moment, Don
drew in a slow breath, then walked purposefully toward the
entrance to the barn.
J. L. Pick blocked the way. "Sorry," he said. "The
revival's by invitation only."
Rod Donahue joined him; now they were both blocking
his way. Don said, "This is police business."
"Doesn't matter," Donahue said.
Don studied them, finding they had that same look in
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IT'S LOOSE
their eyes that the woman at the church did, as if they were
floating along on some controlled substance. Don wondered
whether there was a drug that could give someone control
over a group of people and then erase their memory of
having been controlled. He imagined the CIA using Ice
Island as a field test, Reverend Pfeil the agent in charge and
not a minister at all. Such thoughts were foolish, he knew
that, but then outlandish explanations were the only ones he
had.
"Rod," he said, looking at the clothing store owner he'd
known all his life, "what's going on here?"
Rod Donahue was an old guy with a big red-veined nose
and white hair, who reminded Don of Tip O'Neill. "Re-
vival," he said.
"And just what happens at these revivals?"
For a moment Donahue looked puzzled, then he said,
"About what you'd expect, I'd guess."
"Dammit, Rod! Talk to me. Something's going on here,
and I want to know what it is."
"Private," the old man said. "Gotta have an invitation."
"I've got one," Don said.
Donahue and Pick exchanged looks. "You don't have
one," Donahue said.
"Yeah, I do. Want to see it?"
They just stared at him.
Don thought about simply shoving them aside. Donahue
was an old man, and Pick, though only about forty, was
slight and short. Don didn't do it, because he had no legal
right to do so. He had no warrant and no reason to believe
that a crime had been committed—not to mention all the
constitutional implications due to this being a religious
event.
"Where's A1 McDougall?" Don asked.
"Don't know," Donahue said.
"How about Reverend Pfeil?"
"Don't know."
"Well, can you find out? I'd like to talk to them."
Donahue shook his head. "Can't leave the door."
Again Don considered simply muscling his way in, and
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IT'S LOOSE
then he noticed that two other men had drifted over toward
the door, younger, beefier men than the two blocking his
way. It was becoming clear that he was as welcome here as
Ralph Nader at a board meeting of General Motors. If he
talked to A1 McDougall or Reverend Pfeil, the answer would
be the same. He wasn't invited.
"I can get a warrant and come back," Don said. "If you let
me in now, it will be a lot less hassle for everybody."
Don was bluffing, of course. There was no way he could
get a warrant before tomorrow—if he could get one at all.
Unintimidated, the two men at the door looked at him in
silence.
A line had been forming behind Don, people waiting to
get inside the barn. He stepped out of the way, and they
began filing inside, more familiar faces—on people who
seemed unaware of his presence. Don returned to his car.
He'd just started the engine when he saw something that
made him suck in his breath.
Allison and Sarah.
Walking into the barn.
Scrambling out of the Cherokee, Don ran to the barn,
getting there just as the doors closed. He pulled on them.
They were locked.
2
In the morning, Don sat at his desk, trying to figure things
out. When his wife and daughter came home last night, they
were unable to remember what had happened at the revival,
uncertain why they had even attended it.
Having a crazed killer on the island who decapitated and
took bites out of his victims was scary all by itself. But this
was scarier. Because it affected his family. It was as if
something had crawled into Allison's and Sarah's heads and
taken up residence. Something alien that could take control
whenever it wished.
Something that only needed them for two hours a day.
For the revivals.
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IT'S LOOSE
Don shook his head, as if he could throw olf these
thoughts like a dog shaking off water. There was no entity
inside the heads of Allison and Sarah and God knew how
many other people on the island. This behavior was hypnot-
ically induced or maybe narcotically induced. This was
some kind of weird mind control. He knew it was possible.
If all those folks in Jonestown would drink that spiked
punch, it was possible to get people to do anything.
And what did Reverend Pfeil want?
What had Jim Jones wanted?
Power? Money? Was this a psycho's weirded-out ego trip?
Don tried to apply those things to Douglas Pfeil and came
up with nothing. The man was quiet, usually boring. If he
harbored any fantasies about becoming the next Napoleon
or Hitler or Jim Jones, they were buried deep in the farthest
reaches of his subconscious, totally undetectable to those
around him. But then Don was no psychologist. And—
Don abruptly cut that thought off, because something new
had occurred to him, something he should have realized all
along. How did Pfeil get Allison and Sarah or anyone else to
go to the revival the first time? Before they'd been there to
get hypnotized or drugged?
The only answers Don could come up with were too weird
to even consider. Something in the island's drinking water.
Subliminal suggestion carefully inserted in the TV program-
ming by a device here on the island that overrode the signal.
Or maybe everybody in TV land was getting it, but it only
affected people on the island. How about barely audible
signals somehow produced by the telephones while they
weren't in use, too low to be heard consciously but under-
stood by the subconscious?
But all this was ridiculous. He hadn't stepped into a
science fiction story. This was real life, and it had a real-life
explanation. Cultists didn't need subliminal TV or drugged
drinking water to attract and control their members. So
there were ways it could be done, believable ways, non-
science fiction ways. The trouble was he had no idea what
they were.
The phone rang. This was Monday, so Corrine was back
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IT'S LOOSE
at work. She answered it, looked at Don, and said, "Lieuten-
ant Roper."
Don picked up his phone. "Got a chopper?" he asked.
"One that's running?"
"Would I let you down?"
"Hey, fantastic." It was the first thing Don had heard in
several days that sounded like good news. "When will you
be here?"
"Tomorrow. The repairs took a little longer than ex-
pected, but they promise me they'll have it ready to go for
tomorrow morning."
"For sure?"
"I've been promised a case of beer if it's not."
"What time tomorrow?"
"About nine. I'll call you before they leave."
"Who's coming?"
"Lab guy and two detectives.^That's all the chopper will
hold unless we bump the pilot."
"Any chance you can fly the bodies out? They're frozen,
so they'll take up a lot of room. It might mean several trips."
"I'll ask the pilot and see what he says. In the meantime,
just hang on for one more day. Help's on the way."
"Thanks, Lieutenant. I appreciate it. I really do. On my
salary I can't give away cases of beer, but I owe you a
six-pack."
"Imported?"
"Will Detroit do?"
Roper laughed. "Detroit, Milwaukee, St. Paul. Any of
those exotic places. Just as long as it makes foam when you
pour it in the glass."
Don thanked him again and hung up, feeling a little better
about things. Then he thought about Allison and Sarah and
the revivals, and the good feelings evaporated. He wondered
why he hadn't asked Roper about cults. Maybe the state
policeman knew something or knew someone he could talk
to. Inwardly Don sighed. He couldn't expect the state police
to solve all his problems for him. Besides, two state detec-
tives would be here tomorrow, and he could talk to them
about it.
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IT'S LOOSE
Looking over at Corrine, he said, "Call the church and
ask whether they're having another revival today. And don't
say you're calling for the police department."
Corrine gave him a curious look, then picked up the
phone and dialed. Don heard her asking someone about the
revivals. When she hung up, she turned to face him and said,
"Yes, there's one today."
"Where?"
"A1 McDougall's. Three o'clock this afternoon."
"This afternoon?"
"That's what Mrs. Pfeil said."
"Did she say why it isn't scheduled for the evening like the
others have been?"
"No." Corrine was staring at him. "Don, what's this all
about?"
"People who go to the revivals disappear," he said.
She waited for him to go on, and when he didn't she said,
"I already knew that, Don. What I don't know is what's
happening to them."
"That's the question, isn't it?" A few silent moments
passed, then Don said, "Have you been to any of the revival
meetings?"
"No."
"Know anyone who has?"
"Yes, of course. All sorts of people are going."
"You ask them about the meetings?"
She nodded.
"What'd they say?"
"Well, they were sort of. . . vague."
"Anybody at ail tell you what happened at the revivals?"
She thought about that. "No, I guess not."
"Don't you think that's a little strange?"
Again Corrine took some time to consider the answer.
"Yeah," she said slowly, "it is a little strange." She frowned.
"In a way, it's like they can't remember. I mean, like when I
asked Donna Baumgartner about it. She sort of looked
blank, looked real confused, and then she changed the
subject."
"That's been happening with a lot of people."
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IT'S LOOSE
"Don . . ." Corrine let the sentence trail off. For several
seconds, she stared at him, then she looked away. Maybe she
didn't know what to ask. Or maybe she knew that Don had
no answers for her.
3
It was another warm, sunny day, and the road Don was
following was becoming muddier by the moment. It was like
that every spring. First the snow melted, and then the sun's
warmth began penetrating deeper and deeper into the
frozen earth, turning people's yards into quagmires and the
dogs who lived in them into mud monsters. But unpaved
roads were the worst. Some got so bad you could only drive
over them at night, after they'd refrozen.
The rear tires began spinning, and the Cherokee lurched
to the side, scraping against the limbs of a bush. Don shifted
into four-wheel drive. The road was a narrow track that
wound through the woods on the west end of the island. It
was used only in summer, usually by high school kids
looking for a secluded place to park. Again the Cherokee
tilted sharply and slid sideways, all four tires spinning in the
muck, flinging it up into the wheel wells, where it hit with a
rapid thump-thump-thump.
Don had no choice but to use this road. It was the only
way he could approach A1 McDougall's place without being
seen.
The road came to within a quarter-mile of McDougall's
property, then swung away to the north. Don left his car
there and went the rest of the way on foot. Walking proved
easier than driving.
The first indication that he was getting close to his
destination was a glimpse of something red through the
trees. McDougall's barn. Then the woods abruptly ended,
and Don found himself at the edge of McDougall's vegeta-
ble field, which was surrounded by a low chicken-wire fence
to keep the rabbits out. Don stood there a moment, recalling
the time he'd tried to order some chicken wire for his own
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IT'S LOOSE
backyard garden from Ace Hardware. Kevin Waggoner had
gone through all his catalogs without finding it. He finally
phoned the distributor, who informed him he was looking
under the wrong thing. Its official name was poultry netting,
not chicken wire.
Don wondered why he was standing there thinking about
chicken wire when he should be trying to figure out how to
get into the barn unseen. Maybe he was trying to give
himself a chance to change his mind before he went ahead
and did this thing. What he was doing was illegal. He had no
warrant. He could have called a judge on the mainland,
asked for verbal authority—he was obviously unable to get
the official paper—but the reason he hadn't was simple. He
knew the judge would have said no. Don had a whole lot of
vague suspicions and no concrete evidence. Which meant
the only way for him to find out what went on at the revivals
was to commit unlawful entry.
But then it was silly for him to stand there and have a
debate with himself, for there was absolutely no chance that
he would turn around and leave. Illegal entry didn't matter.
This was more than just a cop doing his job. This involved
his wife and daughter. It was personal.
Don slipped back into the woods, using the trees for cover
as he moved around the vegetable field. He was able to get
within fifty feet of the barn before being forced to leave the
protection of the woods. He was behind the barn, out of
sight from the house or the dairy barn, so he covered the
fifty feet at a fast walk, more concerned with being quiet
than with moving quickly.
When he reached the barn, he stopped and listened, trying
to determine whether anyone was nearby. He heard a car
door slam, but it was impossible to judge how far away it
was. There were a few pieces of rusty farm equipment lying
around, the sorts of things you'd pull with a tractor to dig up
the soil. Terms like till and cultivate floated around in his
head, but not being a farm boy he was uncertain what they
meant. He knew about turning over his backyard plot with a
digging fork, and that was all. He peeked around both
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IT'S LOOSE
comers of the structure, seeing no doors on either side,
which meant the only way in was through the front.
One side of the barn was visible from the house, the other
from the dairy barn. Figuring that it was better to be spotted
by cows than people, he chose the side that was visible from
the dairy barn. As he moved, he tried to figure out what he'd
do if he got caught. What could he say? It's okay, guys. Since
I'm the whole police force, that means I'm the SWAT team
as well, and I'm practicing my sneaking-up techniques.
Helping to keep Ice Island safe for democracy.
When he reached the lone window in the side of the barn,
Don tried to look through it, but it was covered on the inside
with dark cloth. At the front of the barn, he peeked around
the corner, seeing no one. The doors were open. Don
quickly moved to them and slipped inside.
The building was empty except for a long, sturdy wooden
table at one end and a number of wrought-iron candelabra
on tall stands. The candles in them were of various colors—
whatever had been available, apparently. There were three
posts sticking out of the earthen floor to the left of the table.
Puzzled by the posts, Don went over to take a closer look at
them. They were about seven feet tall and thick, like short
phone poles. The freshly dug earth piled around their bases
indicated that they had only recently been put there, which
meant they probably had something to do with the revivals.
There was nothing churchy about this place. Where was
the pulpit, the cross, the other religious accoutrements? This
was nothing but a big empty room that didn't even have
chairs. When he thought of a revival, he thought of a
brightly lighted place with seats for everybody, probably a
PA system for the preacher so people in the back could hear
him. When he looked at this place, he thought of a hoedown
—except for the candelabra, which reminded him of a
medieval castle, something from a Vincent Price movie. He
wished he hadn't thought about Vincent Price.
Don heard voices coming from outside. Instantly he
began looking for a place to hide, and he spotted the hayloft.
Quickly climbing its wooden ladder, he slipped behind the
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IT'S LOOSE
bales of hay. He was invisible up there and wouldn't be
discovered unless the loft was searched for some reason.
The voices—two men—became louder, almost clear
enough for Don to make out the words, and then they faded
as the speakers moved farther from the barn.
Peering over the tops of the bales behind which he was
hiding, Don studied the three posts sticking out of the floor.
There was something about those posts that bothered him,
but he couldn't put his finger on it. He checked his watch.
One-fifteen. The revival was supposed to start in an hour
and forty-five minutes.
222

Thirteen
About two-thirty, Carolyn Pfeil entered the barn and
began lighting the candles.
She was still lighting them when people started showing
up. From his hiding place, Don watched them come in.
Derek Aldrich, Ben Jones, and Scott Bender. Brian Young,
the fire chief. Kevin Waggoner. Vince Terrell and Ray
Loubet. Rod Donahue and Dean Vanetti. Brittany Uhl and
some other girls from the high school. They kept coming in,
forming themselves into rows that faced the table and the
three posts. Nobody speaking. The only sounds the moving
of feet on the earthen floor and the rustling of clothing.
And then Don saw someone he was hoping against hope
he wouldn't see: Allison. A few moments later he spotted
Sarah. He was uncertain whether they'd arrived together.
They made no effort to stand together. Although Sarah
moved into the same general area as her mother, there were
a half-dozen people between them.
Still they kept coming. Joe Coleman, the pharmacist-
postmaster-mayor. Ralph Higgins, the guy who'd worked
most of his life at the Soo Locks. Larry Kohler, the owner of
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IT'S LOOSE
Ace Hardware and Kevin Waggoner's boss. Phil Deemis,
who owned the Shell station and who was keeping Paul
Edley's body in his freezer. And then for Don another
disappointment, because Doc Ingram had just arrived.
When the place was full, the doors were closed, and
Reverend Pfeil, wearing a long black robe, walked to the
wooden table, turned, and faced the crowd. For a moment
he and the people eyed each other silently. Then the
minister began chanting, speaking rhythmically and slowly
in words Don was unable to understand. The people were
swaying. All at once they joined in the chant, repeating the
words after the minister, softly, like a chorus of moans.
Don focused on Allison and Sarah, watching them sway,
as if in a trance. He had no idea what had drawn them or any
of the others to this bizarre ceremony. If the people were
drugged, he had not seen the narcotic administered. If they
were mesmerized, he had not witnessed the hypnotizing.
Why had they come? Why were they cooperating? Pfeil had
given no verbal instructions. So how did they know what
was expected of them?
Don had no idea what to make of the disturbing ceremony
going on below him. Bathed in flickering orange candlelight,
the people were still swaying and chanting in a language they
couldn't possibly understand. The scene was more than just
eerie and disquieting; there was something decidedly evil
about it.
The devil got loose in there. That's how Doc Ingram had
described the carnage at the Gordons' house.
Suddenly Don felt certain that what was going on here
was somehow connected to what had happened to the
Gordons. He recalled the blood-spattered walls, Michael
Gordon's severed head, its lips pulled back in a ghastly
smile, watching Don mockingly as he examined the muti-
lated bodies of what had once been the Gordon family. The
scene Don was watching now was part of everything that
had been happening on the island. The murders of the
Gordons. The murder of Paul Edley. The macabre suicide of
Edward Dwyer. Somehow it was all connected. Don wasn't
sure how he knew, but he knew.
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IT'S LOOSE
The devil got loose in there.
Don watched Reverend Pfeil chanting and swaying. The
devil's loose in this barn, too, Don thought.
He shifted his gaze to Doc Ingram, who had spoken those
words. The physician was swaying and chanting with the
rest of them, swinging like a sapling in a gentle breeze, his
eyes fixed on Pfeil, but distant-looking, as if they really
weren't seeing the minister at all. Devil's loose in you, too,
Don thought. Then he made himself watch Sarah and
Allison. They, too, were watching Pfeil with rapt attention
while they swayed and chanted, and Don had the distinct
feeling that they were lost to him, that they were no longer
the two people he thought of as his wife and daughter.
Again Don tried desperately to figure out what kind of
control Pfeil had over them, how he caused them to come
here, how he controlled them once they got here, how he
made them forget afterward. Whatever it was, it apparently
didn't affect him. And there were other Ice Islanders—
many others—who weren't here. Were they spared because
Pfeil didn't need them or because they were immune to his
techniques of control? Then Don realized he could ask the
same question about himself. Was he really unaffected by
Reverend Pfeil's methods of control, or was he being held in
reserve, to be used when needed?
He didn't know. He didn't even have a wild guess. And
there were other crucial questions for which he had no
answers. What was the purpose of all this? Pfeil had gone to
a lot of trouble. What was in it for him? Was he going to get
all the people who came here today to sign over all their
worldly goods to him, the way many cults did? Don liked
that explanation, because it was something he could get a
handle on. Good old-fashioned greed. A normal, under-
standable motive even if the means were bizarre. The
trouble was that deep down inside where things like instinct
and intuition lived, Don knew that whatever was going on
wasn't nearly that simple.
Watch for people acting strangely . . .
Christ, Don thought, the whole island's gone crazy. It was
time to have a talk with Kesselring, a serious talk, the kind
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IT'S LOOSE
in which Kesselring provided answers, not evasions. Maybe
the ex-cop was just a fruitcake. Maybe. On the other hand,
perhaps there really was a killing sickness. People on the
island were certainly dying—and disappearing. And if the
ex-cop knew anything about what was happening, Don was
going to learn it.
The front doors of the barn opened, white daylight
overpowering the orange glow from the candles, and sud-
denly the chanting grew louder, faster. Four people had just
entered the barn: Tommy and Jean Quirk, who were part
owners of the island's only garbage removal firm, along with
Conrad Neuhaus and Hiram Bellamy, two of the town's
leading citizens. The Quirks' hands were tied behind their
backs. Neuhaus and Bellamy pushed them forward, the
crowd parting to make way. The doors closed, shutting out
the daylight.
The Quirks were looking all around, taking in the scene,
their faces displaying bewilderment and fear. The people in
the barn chanted and swayed, their expressions rapt, trance-
like.
"Hey, Al," Tommy Quirk called. "Hey, what's going on?"
When he got no response, he looked in another direction.
"Danny, hey, look at me. What's this all about?"
Don watched, not knowing what was going to happen, but
not liking this new development at all. Others got up to help
as they guided the Quirks to the three posts. They took
Tommy to the one on the right, Jean to the one on the left.
She screamed and began to struggle, which triggered
Tommy's protective instincts. He was a big man, strong
from all the garbage cans he lifted, and he pulled away from
the men holding him, knocking one of them down and
trampling on him as he lunged toward his wife. But others
swarmed out of the crowd like angry ants, surrounding him.
Tommy let out a bellow of frustration and rage, but he was
quickly subdued by superior numbers.
He was tied to a post.
So was Jean.
The chanting was growing ever more intense, angry and
excited, like a swarm of furious bees. While Tommy Quirk
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IT'S LOOSE
strained against the rope holding him to the post, looking
like a riled bear, Pfeil approached Jean. She was a thin
woman with hair the color of weathered wood, and she
seemed to have passed beyond screaming and struggling, as
if she were frozen, too terrified to so much as twitch. Her
eyes were filled with a mixture of abhorrence and helpless-
ness, and she stared at Pfeil as a doomed prisoner might eye
the hangman.
Don watched from the loft, transfixed. He realized that
the Quirks were probably going to join the other Ice
Islanders who had gone to the revival and never been seen
again. At least on some level he understood this, although
his conscious mind was too confused to sort things out
logically. Other notions churned at the periphery of his
consciousness as well, thoughts about responsibility and
odds. The responsibility was his: to stop this. The odds were
terrible: one of him and about two hundred of them.
His fingers automatically went to the butt of his service
revolver. The gun he had never even drawn in the course of
duty. What exactly did he think he was going to do with it
now? Shoot his friends and neighbors? Shoot Allison and
Sarah? On the other hand, how could he just stay put and let
something awful happen to the Quirks?
Whatever his decision, it would have to be made quickly,
because Douglas Pfeil had just produced a wicked-looking
knife, which he placed against Jean Quirk's throat.
"No!" Tommy bellowed. "Reverend, for God's sake,
think about what you're doing!"
Holding the blade against Jean's throat, Pfeil just stood
there, smiling at her. She was trembling. Don still had
absolutely no idea what to do.
"Reverend Pfeil," Tommy pleaded, "you're a man of
God. You've got to ... to come back from wherever you're
at. The devil's got you, Reverend. Can't you see that? The
devil's got you."
Moving so quickly that his hands were a blur, Pfeil
grabbed a handful of Jean Quirk's hair and cut it off. She
emitted a sound that was part scream, part gasp.
"Pfeil, you son of a bitch!" Tommy shouted.
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IT'S LOOSE
The minister touched Jean's ear with the tip of the knife.
Having no plan but knowing there was no way he could
just watch and do nothing, Don began pushing bales of hay
off onto the crowd. The bales were heavy, and they knocked
people to the floor. Because the group was so tightly packed,
the people who fell took others down with them, who in turn
caused others to fall. Startled, Reverend Pfeil backed away
from Jean Quirk and was knocked flat by a man with a red
shirt. It was like dominoes. Hoping he'd go unnoticed in the
confusion, Don quickly climbed down from the loft and ran
to the Quirks.
"Thank God," Tommy said as Don untied him. "That
fucker's crazy. He was going to ... to ... / ' He seemed
unable to complete the sentence.
When Tommy was free, Don said, "Untie Jean. Hurry."
Quirk rushed to do so.
The reverend was getting to his feet. The others were
untangling themselves. Don drew his gun. For a moment, no
one seemed to know what to do. Then Pfeil raised his arms
and began to chant in that strange language he used.
Suddenly the people stopped milling around and started
toward Don. He fired two shots over their heads. The people
stopped. Pfeil's chant became louder. The people started
forward again.
Quirk had freed his wife. She was standing, but she looked
like a zombie. "What now?" Quirk asked.
Don looked at the two hundred or so people blocking his
escape. "The window!" he shouted. It was to his left,
covered by heavy black cloth. No one was in the way.
Leading his dazed wife, Tommy Quirk ran to it and
yanked down the makeshift curtain. He tried to raise it, but
it wouldn't budge, so he grabbed a candelabrum and
smashed the window, knocking out glass and mullions.
Then he pushed Jean through the opening and followed her.
The people were still closing in on Don, but slowly, as if
uncertain what to do. The way to the window was still clear,
so he dashed to it and climbed out of the barn. The Quirks
were waiting for him.
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IT'S LOOSE
"Come on," Don said. "My car's in the woods."
He led them into the trees. They had to go slowly because
of Jean, who, still in a state of shock, was stumbling along
blindly, unable to keep up. "She has to go faster," Don said.
"Or they'll catch us."
"I'll carry her," Tommy said, picking her up. She was
quite thin, and he bore her with ease.
"If you get tired, I'll spell you," Don said.
"I should be okay," Quirk said.
Don glanced behind them, seeing no sign of pursuit. He
thought for sure they would follow. Don had interrupted
Pfeil's ceremony, stolen the . . . what? Human sacrifices?
"I don't know what's going on around here," Quirk said.
"The whole damned island's gone bug-fuck."
"I don't know either," Don said.
Quirk said, "They were going to kill us, weren't they?"
"I think so."
After that they saved their breath for moving through the
woods. Several times Don looked behind them, seeing no
one. It was too easy. Why wasn't Pfeil coming after them?
Don asked whether he could carry Jean for a while; Tommy
just shook his head.
Finally the Cherokee came into sight. Don pointed to it,
and both men put on a final burst of speed to get to it, for the
vehicle meant escape, safety. At least temporarily. Don
hadn't lost sight of the fact that he was on an island with at
least two hundred people who could be turned against him.
But he could deal with that later. First he had to get himself
and the Quirks out of there.
Suddenly Pfeil and a half-dozen of his followers appeared,
blocking the way to the Cherokee. The minister was still
clutching the knife he'd used to terrify Jean Quirk. Don
drew his gun.
"Move out of the way," he said, putting all the authority
into his voice he could muster.
The two groups stood there, staring at each other, nobody
moving. Quirk, who was still carrying Jean, glanced at Don
questioningly, his eyes asking, What are we going to do?
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"If you don't move aside," Don said, "someone's going to
get hurt." His palms were growing sweaty, making the gun
in his hand feel slippery.
Looking at the men who'd accompanied the minister,
Don found himself staring into the eyes of A1 McDougail,
Derek Aldrich, Todd Wolfe, and others he knew well. But
they were no longer the eyes of his friends and neighbors,
and they looked at him distantly, as if he were a stranger.
And even more chilling was the way those eyes exuded cold
indifference, as if everything that made them warm and
caring and human had been extracted.
Don knew he could wait no longer. He was giving the
others from the barn time to get there, and their numbers
would simply overwhelm him and the Quirks. Glancing at
Tommy Quirk, trying to communicate that the time had
come to make their move, Don began walking slowly,
purposefully, toward Pfeil.
When he was about five feet from the man, he said,
"Move. You don't, I'm gonna blow your fuckin' head off."
Pfeil moved, but not the way Don had meant. His eyes
suddenly sparkling with rage, the minister hurled himself at
Don, slashing at him with the knife. The blade knicked the
left arm of Don's jacket. And then the stinging in his flesh
told him that the blade had cut all the way through the
material and into his arm. Don was backing up. The
minister's attack was ferocious. He just kept coming, slash-
ing crazily with the knife, emotions Don was unable to
identify dancing in his eyes.
"Pfeil!" Don yelled. "Stop or I'll shoot."
The minister had no intention of stopping. He pressed his
attack even more fiercely, the knife swishing through the air
so fast Pfeil could have been cutting down weeds with a
sickle. Don was still backing up. He knew he should shoot,
but a part of him refused, because he'd be gunning down the
Lutheran minister. The knife made a swooshing sound as it
passed within an inch of Don's nose.
Don tripped, nearly losing his balance, and Pfeil leaped at
him.
Don aimed at the minister's legs and fired.
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Pfeil dropped, falling face-first into the wet leaves that
covered the thawing earth. Quickly Don swung his weapon
toward the men who'd accompanied the clergyman, but
they were just standing around, looking bewildered. Tommy
Quirk was still holding Jean, looking as if part of him
wanted to help Don while another part wanted to flee with
his semiconscious wife as fast as he could.
"Look out," Tommy Quirk shouted, and Don whirled.
Pfeil was getting to his feet. Don stepped toward him,
intending to take the knife away from him, but the minister
slashed at Don with it, forcing him to back away.
"Drop it," Don ordered, leveling his weapon.
Pfeil stood up, took a wobbly step, then another. He
raised the knife. He was grinning.
"Pfeil," Don said, but he never got to complete the
warning because the minister charged. Don shot him again,
the bullet hitting the clergyman in the shoulder. This time
he didn't fall. He swayed, looking at Don with eyes that were
filled with something approximating glee.
"Die," Pfeil said, his words raspy, barely audible.
"Gonna die."
Then, despite his wounds, he attacked once more. And
again Don shot him.
The bullet hit the minister in the chest. He stood there, a
perplexed expression on his face, still holding the knife in
front of him. Then he smiled, and it was the smug, self-
satisfied grin of one who'd just had the last laugh. I win, it
seemed to say. And you're a dumb shit. Dropping the knife,
Pfeil sank to the ground. Again Don turned to check on the
men who'd accompanied the minister, but they were still
simply standing there, appearing dazed.
"Oh, shit," Tommy Quirk said. He was staring at some-
thing, wide-eyed.
Don followed Quirk's gaze and found himself involuntar-
ily sucking in his breath. Pfeil was lying face-up, two red
stains on the front of his shirt, his eyes open and staring
heavenward, as if asking God to forgive him. But they were
dull and lifeless eyes that were seeing nothing. Don had to
blink to make sure he was truly seeing what he was seeing.
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Something was rising from the dead clergyman.
A shadow and yet not a shadow.
An undulating darkness.
It seemed to be seeping from every pore in Pfeil's body,
congealing above him into an oblong blackness. Looking at
it was like staring into an endless darkness. And yet it had
no thickness, cast no shadow. Unable to comprehend what
was happening, Don's mind desperately tried to find an
explanation. It was an opening, a portal into the world of the
dead, through which Pfeil was passing. It was the minister's
soul rising from the body. And then Don quit trying to make
sense of what he was seeing, because doing so was beyond
his ability. How did you explain the impossible?
The shadow rippled, shifting from a horizontal oblong to
a vertical one. Then it wavered again, sending out tendrils,
narrowing in the middle. It was taking on a distinct form.
And it was absolutely nothing Don had seen before—even
when as a boy he'd watched all those old science fiction
movies on TV. Watching those movies, you indulged in
fantasy, temporarily closing the door on that part of your
mind that knew it was all a crock, nothing but a guy in a
monster suit. Well, the monster he was seeing now wasn't
wearing any suit.
The wavering image was there, and it wasn't there, as if it
was occupying two planes of existence simultaneously. And
then, for just an instant, the thing seemed solid. The air
turned so cold Don could have just stepped into a walk-in
freezer. And a dank, vaguely fetid odor filled the air.
It was big and furry like a bear.
It stood upright on two hooves, and its massive arms
ended in claws.
It had the face of an iguana.
It opened its mouth, revealing sharp, alligatorlike teeth.
It was staring at Don with glowing red eyes.
Remembering the gun in his hand, Don slowly raised it,
aimed it at the creature. It opened its mouth as if it were
grinning at him, as if it were trying to tell him that if he was
stupid enough to think the gun would have any effect, then
he should go ahead and fire it. Don didn't shoot. He
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IT'S LOOSE
doubted he could have pulled the trigger no matter how
hard he tried. He felt as if his whole body had turned to ice,
as if he were frozen solid.
And then the thing was gone, simply winking out of
existence as if it were a holographic image that had just been
switched off.
For several long moments no one spoke. Then Tommy
Quirk broke the silence. "Jesus," he muttered. "Oh, holy
Jesus."
"You did see it too, didn't you?" Don asked.
"Big furry sucker with the face of a lizard? Yeah, I saw it."
"At least I'll have company when the men in the white
suits come for me."
The men who'd come with Pfeil were muttering to
themselves now, looking groggy, as if they'd just been woken
from a sound sleep. A1 McDougall looked at Don.
"How'd we get here?" he asked.
"What happened to Reverend Pfeil?" Todd Wolfe asked.
The others were coming out of it now, too, and they all
began asking questions. Don told them to go back to the
barn, find their cars, and go home.
Jean Quirk was also coming out of it. Tommy put her in
the Cherokee, then helped Don get Pfeil's body into the
wagon's rear. No one said much on the way back to town.
233

Fourteen
1
Me and Jean were in the office when Ozzy Nordquist and
some of his buddies came in and jumped us," Tommy Quirk
said. "He'd been mad at me ever since his dog chased my
garbage truck and got caught under the wheels. I guess I
didn't think he was that mad. Wasn't my fault, you know. I
like dogs."
He and his wife were sitting in chairs that had been pulled
up by Don's desk. They both looked a little befuddled.
Corrine had checked Don's knife wound and pronounced it
minor. To prove the point, she put a Band-Aid on it: She was
sitting at her desk now, spellbound by what she was hearing.
"They tied us up, got us into a car, and drove us to A1
McDougall's place," Tommy Quirk said. "Kept us in the
dairy barn until they were ready for us."
"I ... I don't understand," Jean said weakly. It was only
about the third time she'd spoken. "What. . . what was
wrong with Reverend Pfeil?"
"I don't know," Don said. But her husband's words to the
minister came back to him. The devil's got you. Don let the
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IT'S LOOSE
words hang in his mind. He didn't know what to do with
them..
"What was he going to do?" Jean asked.
"He was going to kill us," Tommy said. "We were going to
be human sacrifices." His chair was right next to Jean's, and
he slipped his arm around her. She shivered.
Tommy said, "All the people at the barn . . . I've known
most of them for years. Why were they going along, just
letting it happen?"
"They were being controlled," Don said.
"You mean like mass hypnosis or something?"
"I don't know how it was done," Don replied. "But I
don't think it was hypnosis, because of the way McDougall
and the rest of them began snapping out of it when Pfeil
died. I mean, they wouldn't come out of a hypnotic trance
just because something happened to the hypnotist."
"What did happen to Pfefl?" Quirk asked, a haunted look
appearing in his eyes. "What was that thing? What exactly
did we see?"
Which brought them to the matter they'd been skirting,
because in all of them there was a part that refused to
believe what had happened. Sure, it was damn near unex-
plainable that a minister could somehow turn a couple
hundred people into zombies who'd do his bidding—and
that part of the bidding would be human sacrifices. It was
incredible, inconceivable. But it wasn't impossible. The
mind rejected it as very unlikely, but didn't go so far as to
say such a thing could never, under any circumstances,
occur.
The beast rising from a dead minister was another matter.
Shadows did not seep through a corpse's pores. Period.
Furry, cloven-hooved iguanas with glowing red eyes did
not exist. Period.
These were not mere improbabilities. These were things
that simply could not be. The eyes saw what they saw, but
the brain rejected it, for to do otherwise would be to
undermine the whole system of logic upon which the mind
operated. What could not be could not be. No exceptions.
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IT'S LOOSE
"It was something from some other place," Jean said.
"There's nothing like that in this world."
"You mean it was from space?" asked her husband,
frowning.
"No," she said. "Space is still part of the universe we live
in. This came from someplace else."
No one asked her to explain that.
"We're getting off the island," Tommy Quirk said.
Jean took his hand, squeezed it. She seemed to be saying
that's what she wanted, too. To get away from this place, for
the island had gone mad, and it would drag everyone on it
down into the abyss of its insanity.
"You can't get off," Don said. "We're in the middle of the
Split."
"We'll take an aluminum canoe," Quirk said. "Carry it
over the ice."
"But the ice is breaking up. Step on the wrong chunk, and
you're in ice water. You've lived here long enough to know
what happens then."
"I'll take my chances with the ice," Quirk said. "Ice I can
understand."
"We've got to get away from here," Jean said softly.
"We've got to." She had a distant look in her eyes, but not at
all like the look he'd seen in the eyes of the people at the
barn. Jean was withdrawing from the horror. The people in
the barn hadn't known there was any horror.
"I wish you'd think about this," Don said.
The Quirks just stared at him. Their minds were made up.
Not that Don blamed them. People they'd known all their
lives had been willing to watch the Quirks sacrificed. A
whole barn full of their friends and neighbors, all of them
groovin' to the signal from Reverend Pfeil's own private
little radio station, the DJ saying, Okay, gang, now we're
going to play that golden oldie "Let's Murder the Quirks" by
that incomparable rock superstar, the Knifewielding Minis-
ter.
Don had shut down the radio station.
And they'd all seen the real DJ.
Don started to tell the Quirks about watching out for
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IT'S LOOSE
breaks in the ice, testing each chunk before they stepped on
it, and all the other things the Quirks should think about
before attempting to travel the three miles to the mainland.
But he didn't. The Quirks had lived there all their lives.
They knew as much about the ice as he did. So Don simply
said, "Be careful."
The Quirks said they would.
2
After the Quirks left, Don fingerprinted Pfeil's body. When
he got the chance he'd compare Pfeil's prints with those he'd
lifted from the Gordon and Edley houses.
Not knowing what else to do with it, he took the corpse
over to Doc Ingram's, so he could put it in one of the
freezers. Although the physician wasn't there, he'd appar-
ently left without remembering to lock the door. Don put
the minister on top of Samantha Gordon, who stared up at
Don with eyes in which ice crystals had formed, giving them
the look of shattered glass.
Don hoped the state police would be able to take the
bodies out by helicopter tomorrow. Otherwise, if anyone
else died, he'd have nowhere to put the corpse—or corpses.
There won't be any more, he thought. But he wasn't sure he
believed that. Violent death, once unknown to the island,
had become the norm.
Don had killed the man whose body he'd put in the
freezer, but he wasn't ready to deal with that yet. Too much
had happened, too many puzzling, impossible things.
He closed the freezer, cutting olf his view of Samantha
Gordon's bluish-white, frosty-looking face, which now had
one of Reverend Pfeil's feet on each side of it. Leaning
against the freezer, he wondered what Doc Ingram would
have been like, had he been there. The physician was one of
those at the barn, listening to the radio station that played
requests from Bedlam. Now that Pfeil was dead, would all
those people be normal again, as if nothing had happened?
It had worked that way previously for Allison and Sarah,
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IT'S LOOSE
who'd been completely normal except for the holes in their
memories.
Allison and Sarah.
Quickly leaving the doctor's office, he got into his police
car and sped toward home. At that moment he hated being
the island's policeman. His responsibility to the community
was getting in the way of his responsibility to his family.
Allison and Sarah had been part of that crowd, prepared to
sway and chant while the Quirks died. He hoped they were
home. He prayed they were home. Home and well. Safe.
Although he was already speeding, he pushed the accelera-
tor down a little farther.
3
His wife and daughter were home. They both looked dis-
traught, and when Don came in they took turns hugging
him.
"I was at school," Sarah said, tears streaming down her
cheeks, "and Mr. Bellamy announced over the PA system
that anyone who wanted to could leave to go to the revival,
and . . . and then I was out at the McDougall place, and
everybody was standing around looking sort of weird, and
nobody knew how they got there."
"It was the same for me," Allison said. "One minute I was
here, and the next I was standing around A1 McDougall's
place with a whole bunch of other confused people. The
time in between is just. . . well, gone." She looked at Don
as if waiting for him to tell her what was going on.
What was he supposed to tell her? That she and Sarah
were part of a group of people who had been about to
use the Quirks for human sacrifices? That something that
looked like a cross between a bear and a crocodile had
floated out of Reverend Pfeil's body? They'd talk about
these things in time, he knew, but not now, while every-
thing was still so confused, while the horror was still so
fresh. Still, there were a couple of things he had to tell
them.
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IT'S LOOSE
"Reverend Pfeil was behind it," Don said. "He's dead, so
everything should be okay now."
"What happened?" Allison asked. Her color was gone.
She looked as frightened as Don had ever seen her.
"He attacked me with a knife. I shot him."
"Oh, my God," she whispered. "Oh, Don. How did it
happen?"
"I'll tell you everything, but not right now. There's
something very important I have to do."
His wife and daughter clung to him. Allison said, "Don't
leave. Not now, Don. Please."
"I'm afraid," Sarah said, starting to cry.
"I have to," Don said. "Stay here and keep the door
locked. You'll be okay." He fervently hoped he was telling
them the truth.
4
Don drove to the Superior Motel. This time Kesselring was
in his room. When the retired policeman opened the door,
Don pushed him back into the room and closed the door.
"Sit," he said.
Noting the expression on Don's face, Kesselring sat down
on his bed.
"I want to know what you know about what's happening
on this island," Don said. "And don't even think about
telling me you don't know what I'm talking about."
Kesselring studied him appraisingly. "What do you
think's going on?"
Don stepped toward him, bunching his fists.
"All right, all right," the retired policeman said, holding
up his hands. "Calm down and we'll talk."
"I'm listening," Don said.
"If you'll tell me what you already know," Kesselring
said, "I'll fill in the gaps—at least the gaps I'm able to fill
in."
Don told him, starting with the first murder and ending
with Pfeil's death.
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IT'S LOOSE
Kesselring nodded. "I knew it was the minister. I've been
watching him, waiting for my chance."
"Your chance to do what?"
"Kill him."
"I've taken care of that for you."
"You killed the minister, but the Evil got away."
Don stared at him. "The what?"
"The Evil. That's what I call the thing you saw emerge
from Pfeil's body. That's why I'm here. I followed it here to
kill it."
The first thought that popped into Don's mind was that
the ex-cop had to be psycho-ward material to say anything
like that. Don instantly dismissed the thought, for it was a
product of the old reality, the one in which furry iguanas
with hooves did not rise shadowlike from the bodies of
Lutheran ministers. There was a new reality now, and
having sampled it, Don would be very careful about calling
anyone crazy.
He sat down beside the ex-cop. "All right," he said. "Tell
me about the Evil."
Kesselring thought for a moment, as if deciding where to
begin, then said, "The first time I encountered it, it was
using the body of a man named Charles Capwell. Capwell
went to the grocery store where he worked one day and
started blowing people away. There're lots of Capwells out
there. They climb a tower and start sniping. They walk into
a girls' dorm and start stabbing coeds while they sleep. They
come home and kill everyone in the family. The quiet guys
who just go crazy, start killing. But they're not the ones
doing it. Not really. The Evil's just using them."
"What is this Evil?" Don asked. And he remembered Doc
Ingram's words: The devil got loose in there. And Tommy
Quirk's words to Reverend Pfeil: The devil's got you.
"Choose your term," Kesselring said. "An evil spirit, a
demon, one of Satan's minions." He shrugged.
"What do you call it?"
"I think of it as an evil spirit, something that figuratively
—if not literally—comes from hell. I think of it as the
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IT'S LOOSE
enemy. I think of it as something that has to be destroyed."
There was a hardness in the ex-cop's eyes as he said these
things, along with a smouldering passion. He truly hated the
Evil. He had appointed himself its executioner.
"Getting back to my first encounter with it," Kesselring
continued, "I went into the grocery store along with the
SWAT team. Capwell was in there somewhere, and we had to
find him. We swept the store once without spotting him. As
we were getting ready to search the place again, I went into
the office to make a phone call. Capwell was above me, in
the false ceiling. He could have shot me, but he didn't.
Instead he made sure I shot him. As he died, I saw it coming
out of him. It was exactly as you described it. A furry
upright thing the size of a man, with hooves for feet, a
reptilian face, glowing red eyes. It was there for an instant,
and then it was gone. No one saw it but me, but I knew I had
seen it. I wasn't crazy."
Don knew the ex-cop had a lot more to tell. He remained
silent, waited for Kesselring to resume his story.
"I couldn't get it out of my head, what I'd seen," the
former policeman said. "So I started trying to find out if
anyone else had ever seen anything like that. I figured that,
as a group, cops were most likely to have run into this thing,
because they're so often at the scene of death. So I put an ad
in some of the law enforcement magazines, described what
I'd seen, and asked anyone else who'd seen it to get in touch
with me. I used a blind box number provided by the
magazine. I got five replies. One from Vermont, one from
Georgia, one from New Mexico, one from Missouri, one
from British Columbia. I used vacation time and days off to
go and talk to them. They'd all seen exactly the same thing I
did—and you did. A lot of them seemed relieved that
someone else had seen it too, that there was someone they
could talk to.
"It was always the same. Some guy would kill a bunch of
people, usually with a gun, and then either turn the weapon
on himself or force the cops to take him out. In Missouri,
three cops had seen it. This dude blew away four of his
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IT'S LOOSE
co-workers at the office, then ate the gun when the police
showed up. The three officers got inside in time to see the
Evil come out of him. One of them, a Cambodian, had seen
it before." He hesitated, collecting his thoughts—or maybe
just for effect.
"He was a refugee, fled the Khmer Rouge. He said that
when he was just a kid he was on hand when one of Pol Pot's
lieutenants, a particularly bloodthirsty son of a bitch who'd
all but wiped out three surrounding villages, was captured
by some local guerrillas. The Khmer Rouge hadn't been
expecting any resistance, so his squad was small. The locals
surprised them, then simply overwhelmed them with sheer
numbers, mostly using sticks and other makeshift weapons.
Most of the soldiers they just killed outright, but this
village-destroying lieutenant of Pol Pot's, him they gave
special attention. And when he finally died, they saw the
Evil coming out of him. Scared the hell out of them, and
they all ran like hell.
"Anyway," Kesselring continued, "the more I learned
about this thing, the more I knew it had to be destroyed. The
other cops who'd seen it had families, so I figured it was up
to me. I was eligible for retirement, so I turned in my shield.
"I kept the ad going in the magazine, and I started doing
research on the supernatural. I've been all over the world to
talk to people and to look at rare books that the owners
won't let out of their sight. And every time I hear about a
mass murder where the killer's still alive, I try to get there.
Just in case it's the Evil."
Don said, "How long have you been at this?"
"I first encountered the Evil three and a half years ago,
and I guess you could say it's been the focus of my life ever
since."
"But. . . why did you quit your job, take up this one-man
crusade?"
"Because it has to be destroyed. It's evil in all senses of the
word, and it kills people. It exists to kill people."
Don didn't know what to say to that. He'd seen it too, and
he hoped it would go away and leave him and his family and
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IT'S LOOSE
his community alone. The notion of pursuing it would never
have occurred to him. Did that make him a pragmatist or a
coward? And how about Kesselring? Did he have the stuff
heroes were made of, or was he an obsessed lunatic? But
then who was Don to judge? There was probably some
obsessed lunatic in most heroes and a bit of the pragmatist
in most cowards.
"These people," Don said, "the murderers, it possesses
them like in The Exorcist?"
"Sort of, yes."
Don saw an image of the possessed girl's head going
around and around like a record while she spit out stuff that
looked like pea soup. Pfeil hadn't done anything like that.
Nor had his face broken out in running sores. But then Don
was thinking of Hollywood's version of possession. The real
thing was apparently different.
"Why does it kill?" Don,asked.
"It feeds on death. Don't ask me how. Perhaps there's an
energy given off when a person dies, and the Evil can absorb
it."
Don took a moment to let that sink in. A creature that fed
on death. Jesus. "But why does it have to possess people?"
he asked.
"Because it's from another plane of existence. To survive
for any length of time on our plane of existence, it has to find
a host. I guess you could say it's a parasite. The worst kind of
parasite, because the host always dies."
"Why?" Don asked. Yesterday he wouldn't have believed
he could be sitting here, holding this conversation, asking
serious questions. But then a lot had happened since
yesterday.
"That's the only way it can escape the body of the host,"
Kesselring said.
"That's why Dwyer—"
"Yes. I'd identified Dwyer as the host. I'd been right
behind him all the way from California. I almost had him in
Omaha and again in Duluth."
"Wait a minute," Don said. "If all the Evil has to do to
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IT'S LOOSE
escape from the host is make sure the host dies, why was it
running from you? Why not just drive into a telephone pole
or something like that? I mean, I don't understand why it
was running from you at all. There are all sorts of ways to
commit suicide if that's all it had to do."
"True," Kesselring said. "But Dwyer didn't have a gun,
and I never gave him the chance to get one. And anything
else was a risk the Evil wasn't willing to take. You try to
jump off a bridge, someone may stop you; you may wind up
in jail. Drive into a phone pole, and you may end up in the
hospital with a bunch of broken bones, but still alive. In a
hospital or jail, the Evil's trapped; I can get it. As I said,
these are risks the Evil isn't willing to take unless it's very
desperate. Because if I get it, I'll kill it. And I'm probably the
only one on this earth who can."
The ex-cop hadn't shaved in a while. He ran his hand over
the gray stubble on his left cheek. "Think about it and you'll
see why the Evil wouldn't risk being trapped where I could
get my hands on it. It's been alive—if alive is the right
word—for thousands of years. It's been here since the
planet was formed, for all I know. And it will live forever. If
I die, what do I lose? Ten, fifteen years? But if the Evil dies,
it loses eternity."
Don recalled how Pfeil, though seriously wounded, had
attacked him again and again. And now Don knew why. The
Evil had to make absolutely certain that Douglas Pfeil died.
"A thing that could be as old as the earth and lives
forever," Don said, shaking his head. Despite what he'd
seen, a part of him was having trouble accepting what he
was hearing. You built a lot of barriers against believing in
such things. The barriers were strong; they crumbled reluc-
tantly.
Apparently realizing how insane all this must seem,
Kesselring said, "I've done a lot of research. There are
legends of evil supernatural creatures that go back thou-
sands of years. I don't know how many of them might relate
to the Evil, but everything I've learned suggests that such
creatures are extremely ancient and that they go on forever
—unless we find some way to stop them."
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"You said creatures," Don said. "With an s. You mean
there are more of these things running around?"
"As far as I know this is the only one that lives off death
the way it does. Legends can be very vague, and they change
over time, get farther away from whatever kernels of truth
they contained at the beginning. So it's often impossible to
say whether a given story or passage in a book refers to this
creature or some other."
"So you're not sure this is the only one," Don said.
"Not positive, no. All I can tell you is that when I get near
it, I can feel it. I can tell that it senses my presence and that
it knows me. And, at least on some level, I know it. I know
it's the same creature I met in the grocery store."
Don tried to recall the mass murders he'd heard about.
Guy blows away his family, then turns the gun on himself.
Guy shoots up the finance company that turned him down
for a loan, then eats the gun. Guy murders his boss and a
number of co-workers, then gets wasted by the cops. It
seemed the "crazed killer" almost always died after the
murdering was over.
How many mass slayings was it responsible for? Were
most so-called crazed killers really victims themselves,
puppets to be used by some ancient evil thing, then simply
discarded once enough blood has been shed to satisfy the
monster?
A thing that fed on death.
Was it there for the Trojan War, the First World War, the
Vietnam War? Did it grow fat and happy on so much death
and suffering? Did it frequent the torture chambers in places
like South Africa and Chile? Did it rejoice when the Reagan
administration funded the contras, because still more would
die? Did it delight in the chemical weapons used in the
Iran-Iraq war? As innocent villagers writhed in their death
throes, did it gloat?
"As I told you, I've been all over the world," the ex-cop
said. "I talked to people in England and France and Italy;
Yugoslavia, Hungary, and Rumania; the Caribbean, the
Middle East, China. People who know about the supernat-
ural. I learned a lot about my enemy by talking to them. For
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instance, I learned that to possess someone, it must be
invited in by the host."
"Invited in? Why would anyone be crazy enough to invite
it in?"
"I can't tell you exactly how it works, because no one has
ever survived to tell us. But I can tell you it's very subtle.
The Evil's victims tend to be sad, lonely people. Or bitter
people. A feeling comes over them that there's a way to
improve things or get what they want. All they have to do,
on some mental level, is say yes. You don't know you'll
become a murderous tool. You don't know you'll have to
die. You only know that saying yes just seems almost
irresistible."
Don said, "I take it people can resist, can say no."
"Oh yes. If you're a content, well-adjusted individual, you
probably will say no. You may not know exactly what you've
done, but something within you will be aware of the Evil
and reject it."
"Has it ever tried to possess you?"
Kesselring got a distant look in his eyes. He was remem-
bering. "Oh yes," he said. "Many times. I'm the only one
who knows how to kill it, don't forget. It would like nothing
better than to get a hold of me. It waits until I'm discour-
aged, all but ready to give up, and then I hear it talking to
me."
"What does it say?"
Kesselring massaged his forehead. "It's hard to explain. It
says things can be better or that you don't have to put up
with what you're being subjected to. The words are sort of in
your head and sort of not. You don't know exactly where
they're coming from. You're not even sure you've heard
anybody talking. Still, you know that what it wants is for
you to say yes. It's telling you that saying yes is the way to
make things better."
"And if you agree, it moves in, takes over."
"Yes."
Don said, "How did this thing get everyone to go to
the revival meetings? Were my wife and daughter.. .
possessed?"
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"More like influenced. The only one possessed was Pfeil.
The Evil wasn't within your wife or daughter."
"What was the point of the revivals? Why get a bunch of
people out to a barn so they can chant while Pfeil offers up
human sacrifices?"
"I don't think they were sacrifices," Kesselring said. "I
think they were just food. As far as the ritualizing of it. . ."
He frowned, slowly shook his head. "I can't be sure, because
as far as I know, it's never happened before. I think the
Evil's playing games with us. It's found itself on an island
with people who are trapped here. It no longer has to be
discreet. It can feed whenever it pleases. I mean, to the Evil,
the people on this island are little more than cattle in a pen,
awaiting slaughter. We're dinner, that's all. And the Evil's
been gorging itself." He fixed his eyes on Don's. "And one
result of having all this readily available food is that it's
growing stronger. Much stronger. I think that's why it was
able to exert so much influence over so many people. And I
think the revival was simply a means of getting people to
bring in food. It wanted to be waited on."
"Shit," Don said softly, thinking about people being
dragged to the revival so the thing within Reverend Pfeil
could absorb their life force as they died. "Just how power-
ful is this influence?" he asked.
"I don't know. But I don't think it works on everyone. If it
did, the Evil would have used it on me. Did you feel an urge
to go to the revival?"
"No."
"Along with a lot of other people. Most of the people on
the island weren't affected. And as far as I can determine,
some of those who were affected didn't go to all the revival
meetings."
"Does this . . . this Evil know you're on the island?"
"Oh yes, it knows."
"Then why doesn't it send people to kill you?"
"I think this ability to influence people is very general. It
can draw people to a revival, but I doubt it can draw specific
people. As for the people who were brought to it—the
food—the signal it sent out was probably just to bring food.
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The Evil was probably unable to control who was brought or
who did the fetching. It's like when it tried to use the people
in the barn to stop you from rescuing the Quirks. From what
you tell me, they really didn't do much to hinder you."
"No," Don said. He was thinking about Irene Waggoner
and Valerie Spindler and Wes Brock—and maybe others he
hadn't learned about yet. All of them food. He saw Pfeil
standing in front of Jean Quirk, tormenting her with the
wicked-looking knife.
Food.
Not the flesh, but the act of dying, as if this thing could
snatch the life force away and consume it before it reached
the ether. And then Don recalled that on one occasion it did
eat the flesh.
"The Gordons weren't just killed," he said. "They were
mutilated. Decapitated, eaten."
"That's happened before," the ex-cop said. "It doesn't
have to be overly brutal to feed, but it's brutal by nature.
Also, I think some of the Gordons may have been forced to
watch what was happening to the others. Although death is
its primary source of food, it likes fear as well. I guess you
could compare it to sprinkling a little extra sugar on your
dessert. It doesn't add to the nutrition, but it's nice." There
was nothing nice about the expression on Kesselring's face.
It was twisted and full of hate for this thing he called the
Evil.
"Can't this creature just hang out at a hospital, eat up the
souls or essences or whatever of people who die naturally?"
For a long moment Kesselring simply looked at him. "It's
evil," he said finally. "That's its whole purpose in being
here. To do evil."
Don just shook his head; the whole thing was unbeliev-
able, dizzying. And yet he had seen the Evil. A thing that
had risen as shadows from the body of a dead man. A thing
he could easily believe was evil.
"What happens now?" Don asked.
"The Evil will find another host," Kesselring said. "And
then it will go on killing." He drew in a slow breath. "And I
will try to kill it."
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IT'S LOOSE
"But how can you kill something that's not. . . not really
alive? I mean ... I don't really know what 1 mean."
"It's a supernatural being," Kesselring said. "But it can
still be killed. You just have to know how."
The ex-cop's black case sat on the dresser, within reach.
He put it in his lap, popped the catches, and lifted the lid.
Inside was a metal spike about two and a half feet long.
"This is how you kill the Evil," he said.
Don stared at the thing, having no idea why it would kill a
supernatural adversary. It was shiny and silver-colored, and
it tapered to a needle-sharp point made of a dull gray
material. It was a very deadly looking weapon.
Kesselring said, "This, driven through the heart of the
living host, will kill the Evil."
Not to mention the host, Don thought. But then if
Kesselring was right, the host was dead anyway. "Why not
use a wooden stake, like in the vampire movies? Or a silver
dagger?"
Kesselring shook his head. "Wouldn't work. Only this'll
work." He lifted the spike from its case. "It's made of silver,
but silver alone isn't enough. The tip's the main thing. It was
made from an ancient stone amulet discovered in England,
not far from Stonehenge."
Ancient stone amulets from England? Silver spikes? The
notions swirled through Don's mind, getting mixed up with
images of Merlin the magician and the Wicked Witch of the
West. Don felt as if he'd stepped into a fairy tale. Next he'd
start finding trolls under the bridges.
"How can you be sure that'll kill this thing?" Don asked.
"I had a lot of help from people who know about these
things. Until I started looking into it, I never knew how
many people there are in the world who believe in the
occult. There's a wealth of old books and papers on the
subject, and all sorts of people who hang on to them. For
some it's just a hobby. Others own little shops that special-
ize in unusual things."
Don saw himself stepping up to the counter in some dingy
place and asking for eye of newt, a lock of hair from a virgin,
and two shrunken heads. He pushed the image away. Eye of
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IT'S LOOSE
newt didn't sound nearly as weird as it would have a few
days ago, before he'd seen the Evil.
"I bought the amulet from a shop in London," Kesselring
said. "A company in Germany ground the stone into a point
and made the spike. It's not solid silver, by the way, just
silver plate, but that should be good enough."
"But you don't know if it'll work," Don said. "You think
it'll work, but it's never been tested."
"No," the ex-cop said. "It's never been tested." Reaching
into the case, he picked the spike up, held it a moment,
almost fondly, then handed it to Don.
Don nearly dropped it.
It was pulsing with energy.
"Jesus," Don said. "It's like grabbing hold of a live wire."
"It's done that ever since a very special ceremony was
performed over it in Greece. It's the first time that ceremony
has been performed in over two hundred years, and I had to
work very hard to convince the people who conducted it to
do so."
The thing in Don's hand tingled with so much energy it
seemed to be alive. The pulsations were slow, rhythmic, like
a heartbeat. Don had indeed stepped into something akin to
a fairy tale. Pull the silver spike from the stone, and you will
be king.
No, not king, but executioner. And the execution would
be very much like driving a stake through the heart of a
sleeping vampire. He was back to Bram Stoker again. Even
though it was impossible to rule out the existence of other
such creatures—somewhere—at least there was only one
on the island. And it couldn't spread its sickness through its
bite, creating ever more monsters as each victim in turn
searched for new necks into which it could insert its hollow
teeth and suck like a kid drinking through a pair of straws.
This ain't real, something inside Don insisted as he held
the pulsing spike. Look real close, you'll find the place where
the batteries go. But there were no seams in the shiny metal,
no compartment to hold the batteries. And yet some mys-
terious energy flowed through it, beating with that slow,
steady rhythm. And it seemed to be getting warmer as Don
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IT'S LOOSE
held it. Suddenly he didn't want to touch it anymore, and
Don thrust it at Kesselring as if he'd just discovered he was
holding a poisonous snake.
"You felt it, didn't you?" the ex-cop said, taking the spike.
Don nodded.
"It'll do what it's supposed to do," Kesselring said.
Don believed him. "How do we find it?"
"We wait. The Evil will need a new human body to
occupy, and when he locates one, we'll have more murders."
"You always this cheerful?"
Kesselring said nothing. He put the spike back into its
case and closed the lid.
"I notice you said we when you were talking about what to
do next," Don said.
"Yes," Kesselring said without looking up from the case.
"We're going to need each other's help."
"I've got the state police coming in tomorrow by helicop-
ter to assist with the murder Investigation."
"They can't help you with this." Now Kesselring did look
up, his eyes fixing on Don's. "If you told them about the
Evil, they'd never believe it."
And Don knew he was right. The state police could do
some of the lab work, maybe transport some of the bodies to
the mainland, where the medical examiner could look them
over, but they couldn't help him with the Evil.
"I do need your help," Don said.
Kesselring nodded. "And I'm probably going to need
yours."
5
It was dusk as Tommy and Jean Quirk walked across the ice,
carrying an aluminum canoe on their shoulders. They
hadn't wanted to wait until darkness was this near, but the
canoe had been behind a bunch of other stuff in the garage,
and they'd had to move everything. Then it took another
forty-five minutes to find the paddles.
They hadn't told their families they were leaving, not even
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IT'S LOOSE
Tommy's brother, who was half-owner of the garbage collec-
tion business. Jean had wanted to let them know, but
Tommy had said no, there wasn't time, and besides they
could always phone from the mainland.
Tommy squinted, trying to see whether there were any
breaks in the ice ahead, but the dim dusk light turned
everything into a bleak grayness that seemed to absorb the
details of their surroundings. They trudged along, Tommy
in front, Jean in the rear, looking like some bizarre four-
legged canoe creature making its way through the twilight.
"What was that?" Jean asked.
"What?" Tommy followed the direction of her gaze,
seeing only ice that seemed to stretch off endlessly through
the dusk.
"I ... I thought I saw someone."
"Who?"
"I don't know. A man, I think."
It flashed through Tommy's mind that Reverend Pfeil was
pursuing them, but the minister was dead. "There's no one
out there," he said. "No one goes on the ice during the Split,
especially at dusk."
Several silent seconds passed, then Jean said, "I ... I
guess I imagined it."
We could have waited for morning, Tommy thought. And
he knew they really couldn't have. They'd have left at
midnight if that was how long it had taken them to get the
canoe out of the garage and find the paddles. They had only
one goal, and it overrode everything else. Get off the island.
Now.
For Ice Island wasn't safe anymore. Or sane. It was the
home of a monster that had wanted to murder them while it
made their friends and neighbors chant and watch. A
monster from hell, from the devil. Maybe it was the devil
himself. Ice Island was a dangerous place, where sanity no
longer existed. To stay there would be like moving into the
house of horrors at the carnival, with the door locked so you
couldn't get out.
Locked in the house of horrors with the devil.
The way ahead was flat. And gray.
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IT'S LOOSE
"I'm scared," Jean said breathlessly. She was tiring.
"It won't be long now," Tommy said, having no idea how
long it would be. At least they hadn't needed the flashlights
in his backpack yet. When it got that dark, they were going
to have to be extremely careful.
They hadn't needed the canoe yet. Although the ice was
breaking up, the chunks were still large, more than large
enough to support two people, and the Quirks had had at
least one piece of luck. The wind and lake currents that
steered the ice when it began to break up had jammed it all
up against the south side of the island, which was why they
hadn't needed the canoe so far. And when they got to the
edge of the packed ice, they could canoe from there all the
way to the mainland across open water.
Tommy slowed as he reached a spot where two pieces of
ice had met. The chunk ahead seemed large enough, con-
taining as much square footage as a bedroom in a medium-
size house. Still, it paid to 'move to a new ice raft with
caution, so Tommy stepped over the crack gingerly, testing
the new chunk to make sure the edge wouldn't break off
when he put his weight on it. It didn't, and he and Jean
moved onto it, continued southward.
Tommy had no compass. At the moment he was keeping
the brightest part of the dimming sky to his right. If he was
still on the ice when it became fully dark, he'd be able to see
the lights on the mainland. It was only three miles, and
they'd already covered half of it.
He stared into the grayness, seeing nothing but ice in all
directions, its surface as pockmarked and bumpy as a lunar
landscape from the melting and freezing of the snow that
covered it. The footing was slushy and slippery, and they
had both come close to falling. Tommy was starting to tire,
too. He was beginning to feel as though he were walking
uphill.
He was walking uphill.
The slab of ice on which he and Jean were walking was
rising in front of him.
Going up like a drawbridge.
Jean yelled something unintelligible as she slipped and
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IT'S LOOSE
fell. They dropped the canoe, and then Tommy was slipping
too. The drawbridge was still rising, Tommy, Jean, and the
canoe sliding down the ice, faster and faster, out of control.
Tommy's mind flashed back to the time he'd been a ten-
year-old taking his first ride down a water slide, his body
bumping into the sides as he rushed downward, powerless to
alter his speed or course, but knowing deep down inside that
everything would be okay.
But this was no water slide, and everything was not okay.
It was a piece of ice, and he should have stopped sliding by
now, should have reached the level ice. You're going to go
right into the water! something inside him was screaming.
And sliding into the water meant death. No, he thought, it'll
be all right; we'll slide onto the level ice, because it's all
packed tightly against the island and there aren't any places
where the water's exposed.
But then Jean screamed as she hit the water with a splash.
Then the canoe hit.
Then Tommy.
Pain shot through his knee as it hit the canoe, but Tommy
immediately forgot about that, for he was under water, and
the need to breathe was much more pressing than the pain.
Although a part of him knew he was dead already, his
survival instincts took over, making him kick desperately
toward the surface. His mind put everything aside except
the overriding need to get his head above water, breathe,
take in air, lovely, wonderful air.
He was moving upward now. Soon he would break the
surface, take in the oxygen his lungs were screaming for, and
he hoped—prayed—that Jean would be there too, waiting
for him. Maybe they could figure something out, some way
to survive. Maybe they'd make it. Maybe.
And then he saw the surface, only inches above him, a
gray ceiling that covered this freezing watery world of
blackness. His eyes broke the surface, then his nose, and he
was sucking in air, big, huge lungfuls of wonderful, life-
giving air. He looked for Jean. She wasn't there.
"Jean!" he yelled, thinking, No, God, not this, no, please.
Oh, please, oh, please, oh, please.
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IT'S LOOSE
And then Jean broke the surface, spitting out water and
greedily drawing in air.
"Jean!" he shouted. "Jean . . . Jean." All he could do was
say her name. She seemed unable to speak, but their eyes
met, communicating all that needed to be said.
And then Jean's head vanished beneath the water as if
she'd been yanked from below.
"Jean!" Tommy shouted. "Je—"
Something had just grabbed his leg. Something big and
powerful.
Suddenly Tommy was pulled down, and his head was
under water again, and he could see Jean, almost close
enough to touch, struggling, trying to wriggle upward, her
hair flowing like a flag in a gentle breeze, bubbles escaping
from her mouth. As they had on the surface, her eyes met
his, and they were filled with terror.
They were still being pulled down.
Though still nearly close1 enough to touch, Jean was
disappearing into the water's icy blackness. Tommy's lungs,
which had been struggling to hold out, gave up and sucked
in water. He choked, drew in more water. He looked down,
trying to see what had them, finding only bottomless
blackness. And then something took shape just below him.
Two glowing red dots.
Like eyes.
For an instant, he could see the entire head, and he
realized that the thing pulling him down was Red Olafson,
the mechanic at Phil Deemis's Shell station. Red was
looking at him, grinning a crazy, mindless grin, as if he'd
just smoked a truckload of marijuana and couldn't stop
giggling. Bubbles came out of his mouth.
And then blackness closed in around Red Olafson.
And Tommy Quirk stopped struggling.

Fifteen
1
The chopper's ready," Lieutenant Roper said, "but it can't
fly in weather like this."
"Yeah," Don said, because he didn't know what else to
say—unless, of course, he decided to tell the lieutenant that
the Evil was loose on the island. And what's the Evil, you
ask? It's sort of an evil spirit from hell. You know, one of
those dudes who goes around possessing people. This par-
ticular one turns them into mass murderers. I'll bet you
didn't even know that a lot of these people who just sort of
snap and start killing people aren't really crazy at all. It's the
Evil. It's got 'em. By the short hairs.
Uh-huh. And here come the guys in white suits and big
butterfly nets, looking for that constable, Don Farraday,
who's nuttier than a fruitcake, goes around talking about
evil spirits and shit like that.
Don hadn't told the state police about Pfeil, the revivals,
any of it. He'd wait until the chopper could make it. He
needed time to figure out how to tell it.
"I guess you'll just have to hang on until the weather
clears," Roper said.

IT'S LOOSE
"Yeah," Don said. Realizing that he was being monosyl-
labic and repetitious, Don added, "This is something, isn't
it? Weather like this in March."
"First time I've ever seen anything like it. One bitch of a
late-winter storm, that I can see. Mother Nature letting us
know that she's just been teasing us with all this warm
weather. But not this. This has to be a fluke."
"For sure," Don said.
"Weather bureau says it's small and localized, but a slow
mover. Could be like this for days."
"Hope not," Don said.
"Well, all we can do is wait for it to break. When it does,
we'll get out there and give you a hand."
They agreed it would be best if that happened soon and
ended the conversation. Don walked over to a side window
through which he could see the intersection of Marquette
Street and Island Avenue. Wind-driven rain slithered down
the glass, flowed like smalf rivers through the gutters, the
water grayish-brown from all the salt and sand that had been
applied to the streets over the winter. What was left of the
snowbanks was rapidly disappearing. Nothing removed
snow like rain did, and when it was all gone, the island
would be nothing but a huge mass of mud. Even the paved
streets would be mucky, because the cars would collect mud
on the dirt roads and drop it everywhere. The stuff built up
in wheel wells and then fell out on the pavement, like globs
of automobile shit. A gust of wind rattled the window
through which Don was looking, howled in the eaves.
"I've lived here all my life," Corrine said, "and I've never
seen weather like this in March."
"Me neither," Don said. He returned to his desk.
Corrine's eyes followed him. "Don . . ."
"I know what you're going to ask, Corrine, and I don't
know."
"Don't you even have any idea what's happening?" Her
eyes were looking at him so intently Don wanted to look
away.
He considered telling her about the Evil, then dismissed
the notion. He had seen the thing that emerged from
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IT'S LOOSE
Reverend Pfeil's body, and Corrine had not. She'd probably
think he was crazy, and he had enough problems without
having Corrine looking at him from the corner of her eye all
the time because she was worried that he might be danger-
ous.
"Reverend Pfeil was the killer," he said.
"I know, but—"
"His fingerprints were on the tire iron that was used to kill
Paul Edley, and they were in the Gordons' house too. You
already know that." The prints at one murder scene had
come from Pfeil's right hand, and at the other they'd come
from his left, which had prevented Don from learning early
on that all the killings were the work of the same person.
"It just doesn't make sense," Corrine insisted. "How
could he do something like . . . like that?"
"I don't know, Corrine. I'm not a psychiatrist. Crazy
people do things that only make sense to them. Their brains
burn out or short circuit or something. But there's no doubt
that it was him. I found bloody clothes in his car, and I'm
sure the blood types will match the victims' blood types.
You don't have to worry about the murderer anymore. He's
dead."
"The murders were bad enough," she said. "But there's
more to it than that." Her look was challenging now. You
haven't told me everything, have you?
"Corrine, I don't know how he lured people to the
revivals, got them to bring him his victims. How did Jim
Jones get all those people to drink poison? I know things like
that go on, but I sure can't explain them."
Corrine nodded, shifted her eyes back to her desk.
Corrine's reaction was typical. There was some relief among
Ice Islanders that the apparent murderer was dead, but there
was a lot of apprehension left. That it was the minister made
them uneasy. And too many strange things had been going
on. Even this freak rainstorm.
Last night he'd told Carolyn Pfeil that her husband was
dead. Her first reaction was confusion, almost as if she
didn't know how to react, and then, just for an instant, relief
had spread across her face. Then she'd begun to cry.
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IT'S LOOSE
Through the sobs, she told him that Carly was missing and
that her husband had prevented her from notifying him.
Don promised to look for Carly, but he was fairly certain
that he wouldn't find her—not alive, anyway. She had
joined Wes Brock, Valerie Spindler, and Irene Waggoner.
Missing and presumed dead.
Carolyn Pfeil had given him permission to search the
house for evidence. Crying, she'd followed him as he
searched, and whenever he'd caught her eye, she'd been
giving him the same look Corrine had: Explain it to me.
Make me understand what's happening.
And how the hell am I supposed to do that? Don
wondered. I don't understand it myself.
He hoped the Quirks were safe on the mainland, that they
wouldn't end up on the list of missing and presumed dead.
The phone rang, and Corrine answered it. After talking to
the caller a few moments, she pressed the hold button and
turned to Don. "It's Guy Quirk," she said. "He says Tommy
and Jean have disappeared."
Don just stared at her, not wanting to pick up the phone.
"Don .. ." she said, frowning.
He nodded, reached for the receiver.
2
Ten-year-old Ben Upchurch was pissed.
Pissed at his mother.
Wearing a yellow slicker and matching hat, he trudged
along Pine Road, which ran through the woods along the
eastern edge of the island. The rain beat on his hat and
slicker, stung his face. The puddles were three and four
inches deep, over the tops of his shoes. Ben didn't care; he
slogged right through the deepest parts of them. Maybe he'd
ruin his shoes, and his mom would have to buy him another
pair. Would serve her right.
What happened this morning had been building for a long
time. Ben had trouble getting up in the mornings. Actually,
Ben hated getting up in the mornings. His mom would shake
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IT'S LOOSE
him, and he'd just roll over, go back to sleep. When he did
get up, he was groggy, uncoordinated. He'd do things like
bump into the door frame as he was walking out of his
bedroom, stare at his breakfast, too stupefied to have any
appetite.
He hated getting up so much he simply stopped doing it.
For a while his mom was able to drag him out of bed and
get him out to the school bus with a second or two to spare.
But Ben wasn't cooperating, and he soon started missing the
bus, which meant his mom had to drive him to school. That
suited him just fine, because it meant a few minutes' extra
sleep in the mornings. It was not fine with his mom, who
took him to a doctor.
The doctor said he was what they call a night person,
someone who's naturally geared to staying up late and
sleeping late, the sort of person who's befuddled and
grouchy in the morning and slowly wakes up as the day goes
along. It's natural for some people, Doc Ingram said; you'll
just have to live with it.
This m orning his mom had decided she was tired of living
with it.
She'd just let him sleep.
He was surprised to discover that he'd awoken on his
own, without any help. He was even more surprised when he
found out it was nearly ten o'clock. Then the crunch had
come. He walked downstairs, less groggy than usual because
he'd woken up gradually, and his mom was standing there
with her arms folded, looking at him stonily.
"I see you're finally up," she said.
"You didn't wake me," he said, wondering whether she
had and he just didn't remember it.
"No," she said. "And I'm never going to wake you again."
He stared at her, not sure what was going on.
"From now on it's your responsibility to get up on time
and catch the school bus." Her eyes were fixed on his, hard
eyes that were driving home the point. "You set the alarm
clock or do whatever you have to do, but you be out there in
time to catch the school bus in the morning. Understand?"
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IT'S LOOSE
"But what if—"
"No what ifs. Just do it."
She obviously meant it. This was not one of those things
where she'd give in later on, and the new rule would just sort
of be forgotten after a while. Not this time. She was royally
pissed.
"Get dressed," she said. "You're going to school."
"But—"
"You're going. Get dressed."
He got dressed, found his mother in the kitchen, mopping
the floor. "I'm ready," he said.
"Good," she replied. "See you this afternoon."
"But. . . aren't you going to drive me?"
She stopped mopping, looked at him as if she couldn't
believe he'd said anything so stupid. "If you wanted to ride,
you should have gotten up in time to catch the school bus."
"But. . . it's raining." ,
"I noticed."
So here he was, walking through the puddles on Pine
Road, rain beating on his slicker so hard and fast it sounded
like static on a radio. I could catch pneumonia, he thought. I
-could die, and it would be all her fault. He stomped his foot
in a deep puddle to vent his frustration, sending cold water
splashing in all directions.
He had a long way to go. He had to follow Pine Road to
Island Avenue, which would take him to the school grounds.
Then he'd have to walk around the building to the Lansing
Street entrance. Finally, he'd have to explain to Mrs. Baxley,
his teacher, why he was so late.
Ben was sick of being out in the rain. If he had to go to
school, he wished he could just get there, so he could dry
out. He'd been hoping someone would come by in a car and
offer him a lift, someone he knew. But no cars had come.
Hardly anyone lived out this way year-round. Most of the
houses were summer cabins, all of which were deserted at
this time of year.
As he walked, Ben found himself looking more and more
frequently into the woods on his right. By cutting through
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IT'S LOOSE
the woods he could shorten the distance between himself
and the school considerably. Of course, everything in the
forest was dripping, but then he was already soaked, so what
difference did it make? And then he found what he'd been
looking for, a path through the trees that came out on
Lansing Street, about a block from the elementary school.
He hesitated, knowing it could be quite muddy, then
decided to hell with it and plunged into the woods.
It wasn't as muddy as he'd feared, but the ground was
covered with wet fallen leaves, which were slippery. Low
branches of bushes and young trees seemed determined to
slap him wetly in the face.
Ben Upchurch!
The boy jumped when he heard his name, wondering who
could be there in the woods with him on a day like this. And
at the same time noting that he was alone, out of sight, and
very vulnerable. He listened intently, hearing nothing but
the raindrops slapping the leafless trees, tapping on his
slicker, pattering on the forest floor.
And then Ben realized what he'd heard. A branch squeak-
ing as it rubbed against his wet slicker. He continued
making his way along the barely discernible path. Again a
branch squeaked along the slicker's rubbery surface.
Beeeeeeeeen!
He ignored it. Woods were spooky any time. When you
were alone and it was pouring rain as cold as ice water, they
were even spookier. You imagined things. He came to a
place where a narrow dirt road crossed the path. Someone
had been through here in a car or truck recently, he noted.
There were deep ruts in the mud. Following them with his
eyes, Ben noticed that they led to a clearing about twenty-
five feet away. The earth in the clearing was all messed up, as
if someone had been digging there.
Hidden treasure.
The thought all but leaped into his mind. Sure, deep down
inside, he knew that no one on Ice Island had any treasure to
bury, that no one had robbed the grocery store or anything
like that. Besides, robbers wouldn't have been so obvious
about burying the loot. Still, someone had been doing
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IT'S LOOSE
something, and Ben Upchurch wanted to find out what. The
rain momentarily forgotten, he headed for the clearing.
Upchurch!
His foot had sunk into the mud, and he pulled it out,
making a sucking sound. That was all he heard. No one had
called his name.
As he approached the clearing, he saw something sticking
out of the mud. Immediately his mind told him it could not
be what he thought it was. You didn't see things like that,
not in real life; therefore it had to be something else. But as
he drew nearer, the thing he was staring at began to look
more and more like what he'd originally thought it was.
A hand.
Sticking out of the earth.
As if it belonged to a drowning person. Reaching up one
last time for help before sinking forever.
Ben stared at it, mesmerized. Someone had buried a body
here. No, he thought, it's just a joke. He took a step closer.
Then another. And another. And the hand still looked like a
human hand. Not a mannequin's hand. Not a trick. But a
real live human hand. Except not live. Dead. Very dead. He
was trembling.
Abruptly he turned, found the path, and ran as hard as he
could toward Lansing Street, slipping in wet leaves,
branches whipping his face. He slapped them away, ran
harder. He thought he heard something moving through the
woods, olf to his right, running parallel to him. He glanced
in that direction, seeing nothing. Even so, he tried to run
still faster. Suddenly, getting out of the woods was the most
important thing in his life. More important than getting up
on time every morning for the rest of his life. More
important than being mad at his mom. More important
than anything.
Finally, when he thought he'd never get out of the woods,
that he'd be there forever, that whoever had murdered the
person whose hand was sticking out of the earth would
surely find him and kill him too, Ben broke out of the trees
and found himself on Lansing Street. There were houses
around; he could go knock on the door of one of them, tell
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IT'S LOOSE
whoever answered what he'd found, but he decided not to.
The school was only a block away, familiar territory, and he
ran for it.
A few moments later, he dashed into the office, nearly
colliding with the counter and startling Mrs. Schultz, the
secretary.
"I. .. in the woods ... a hand ... I mean a body . . ."
3
The body whose arm had been sticking out of the earth
belonged to Irene Waggoner. It had been shallowly buried,
and the downpour had washed off some of the soil covering
it. When Don and Doc Ingram pulled her out, they found
another corpse underneath. And then they found another.
Six of them in all.
Roy Murdoch, who worked as a power-boat mechanic
during the summer and did pretty much of nothing during
the winter.
His wife, Bernice.
Wes Brock.
Earl Watt, a retired snowplow operator for the State of
Michigan, who'd lived alone.
Valerie Spindler.
One by one, they were pulled from the muck, which made
sucking noises, as if it didn't want to let them go. The
torrential rain washed the dirt off them, revealing bodies
that had decomposed very little because of the cold earth
into which they'd been put.
Some of them had been dismembered.
Wes Brock was missing an arm and a foot. Bernice
Murdoch's left ear was gone, along with three fingers from
her right hand. They'd been killed cruelly. By a monster.
Literally.
When all the remains had been unearthed, Don and Doc
Ingram simply stood there, looking at them. "Did . . . did
Pfeil do all this?" the physician asked, his voice filled with
disbelief.
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IT'S LOOSE
"Yes," Don said. "Pfeil did all this." Don had no inten-
tion of telling him the rest. The doctor would think he was
bug-fuck.
"How . . . how could he?" Before Don could answer, the
physician said, "When? When did he do it?"
"At the revivals."
"Oh, Jesus. I ... I was at one of those revivals. I... I
don't remember what happened." The doctor looked at
Don, his eyes pleading for Don to tell him none of these
people had died at the one he'd attended.
"That was in the afternoon, out at McDougall's place,
right?"
"Yes." The doctor looked haunted.
"None of them was killed then."
"Thank God," Ingram said.
But Tommy and Jean Quirk would have died if I hadn't
showed up, Don thought. But that was something the doctor
didn't need to know. "It's over," Don said. "Pfeil's dead.
Everything's okay now."
Just as he'd told Corrine. But it wasn't over. The Evil was
still loose on the island. A thing that took over people's
minds and bodies, turned them into killers so it could feed
on the death they caused.
"Why did I go to that revival?" Doc Ingram asked.
"Pfeil drew you there. I don't know how."
The physician nodded as if that had told him something,
although Don suspected it was just a thing done mechanical-
ly. You hear enough stuff you don't understand, maybe you
just start nodding. Oh, sure, I got you. Makes perfect sense.
Don had expected Carly Pfeil to be here too, covered with
dirt and maybe with pieces of her hacked off. Her body
would turn up eventually, he supposed. She had to be dead.
He thought about Tommy and Jean Quirk, how close they'd
come to being here. He hoped they'd make it, although they
hadn't contacted Tommy's brother, which was clearly a bad
sign. Phoning from the mainland would have been easy.
And it's what they would have done if they'd made it.
Don had gone to see Guy and Lois Quirk. He told them he
believed Tommy and Jean had fled the island, taking a canoe
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IT'S LOOSE
with them to get across any open water they encountered.
He also told them why Tommy and Jean had taken such a
chance, explaining everything that had happened at the
revival, omitting only the part about the Evil. Guy and Lois
Quirk had given him the same look he seemed to be getting
from everybody these days, the one that asked, How can this
be happening? Explain it. Make us understand.
He wondered how they'd look at him if he told them
about the Evil.
"I'm surprised the ground's thawed enough to dig this
deep," Doc Ingram said, staring into the hole that had been
a mass grave. It was filling up with muddy rainwater.
"Maybe he used a pick and just kept chipping away at it,"
Don suggested. And maybe the Evil just melted it with a
flame from hell.
The remains lay side by side in the muddy roadway, the
rain washing the mud from their faces, eyes staring lifelessly
at the gray sky. Surveying the carnage he'd pulled from the
earth, Don noted that Wes Brock's amputated body parts
had been recovered—an arm and a foot—but Bernice
Murdoch's had not. But then fingers and an ear were small
things that would be nearly invisible in the muddy earth.
No one had reported the Murdochs or Earl Watt missing,
but it was entirely possible no one knew they were. Earl Watt
was a widower who lived alone, and the Murdochs kept to
themselves so much they were almost reclusive.
"You got any idea what he used on them?" Don asked.
"I've got to get them on a table and clean them up before I
can tell you anything," the physician said.
And then they just stood there in the wind-whipped rain,
staring at the six bodies in the mud, all in a row, Wes Brock
looking like one of those statues that had lost its arm. Except
the arm wasn't lost. It was lying beside Earl Watt. Along
with Wes Brock's foot.
Don wished they were statues, for statues didn't matter.
Sure, they could be vandalized; great, historic art could be
lost and all that. But you couldn't torture or murder one.
And no small-town cop would have the responsibility of
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IT'S LOOSE
notifying the statue's next-of-kin. Don would have to tell
Kevin Waggoner that his wife was dead. And he'd have to
tell Stan and Patsy Brock about Wes. He'd have to tell Jake
Spindler about Valerie.
"Let's load as many of the bodies as we can in the wagon,"
Don said, glancing toward the Cherokee.
Doc Ingram slowly shook his head. "I'm not a god-
damned coroner, you know. The town doesn't pay me a
cent. And yet here I am digging up bodies and getting
drenched, taking all these corpses back to my office, for
Christ's sake. It's not a morgue. It's a doctor's office, where
people come to get treated in sanitary conditions." He
looked at Don, his blue eyes hard. And then the hardness
left them, and he sighed. "Once we get them there, where are
we going to put them? I'm out of freezer space."
"Buy some more freezers from Dennis O'Connor, charge
them to the town. When all this is over, maybe the town can
have an auction on all the freezers."
As they were carrying Roy Murdoch to Don's Cherokee,
Corrine Matthews's voice came over the radio. "Ice Island
to unit one."
They put down Murdoch, and Don slipped into the front
seat, instantly soaking the upholstery. He grabbed the
microphone. "Go ahead."
"It's still going on, Don. I thought it was over, but it's not,
it's still going on."
"Corrine, what are you talking about?"
"Hollis Jurkowski. He just killed his wife and one of his
kids. Strangled them. And he tried to kill his other kid, but
the boy got away, and . . . and when he chased him out of
the house, Vince Terrell was reading the meter, and Vince
chased Hollis, and a couple of the neighbors helped,
and . . ." Corrine seemed to just run out of steam.
"Jurkowski. Did he get away?"
"No, they caught him."
"Is he okay?"
"Jurkowski?"
"Yes, Jurkowski."
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IT'S LOOSE
"I think so."
"Where is he?"
"Detroit Street. Two-oh-seven Detroit Street."
"Get a hold of somebody over there, and tell them to
make sure he isn't hurt."
"Jurkowski? Why would they hurt him?"
"Corrine, just do it, okay? And tell them I'm on my way."
268

Sixteen
i
t^on took Doc Ingram with him, since the physician did
not care to be left behind in the rain with a bunch of corpses.
In the two-hundred block of Detroit Street, he found a
group of people standing outside a yellow house in the rain.
Don got out of the Cherokee and joined them. They were
standing over Hollis Jurkowski, who sat on a soggy lawn that
only a few days ago had been covered with snow. He looked
up at Don with eyes that were filled with mindless rage.
Don felt something cold and clammy slithering around
inside him. He had the Evil. Still trapped within the body of
the host. It can be killed, Kesselring had said. You just have
to know how.
As if suddenly becoming aware of Don's presence, every-
one began talking at once.
"His little boy's at our place. Wife's with him."
"Marky came running out of the house, screaming like
he'd seen the devil, and then his father came after him, and
I've never seen Hollis look like that. There was murder in
his eyes. Murder. For sure."
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IT'S LOOSE
"Vanessa and Lauren are inside. He strangled the both of
them. Woulda strangled Marky if he'd got a hold of him."
"Took three of us to hold him down. Just kept screaming,
fighting like a crazy man."
"Whatcha mean, like a crazy man? You shoulda seen
him."
"He was wild."
"Yeah, wild."
"Berserk's what I'd call it."
"Yeah, that's even better: berserk. That says it all."
Then they all fell silent, as if they'd simultaneously run
out of words. Don thought he knew what had happened.
The Evil had found its new host, Hollis Jurowski, a janitor
at the elementary school. The victims had been strangled,
which probably meant there were no weapons inside the
house. Especially no guns. No axes or chainsaws. The only
knives most likely old and dull and cheap. The Evil,
according to Kesselring, had to go where it was invited to go;
it couldn't enter just any victim. Jurkowski had been what
was available. And despite the less than ideal circumstances,
the Evil had decided to kill. And it got caught. Without the
means to slay the host and escape.
Looking down at Hollis Jurkowski, Don saw a rather
ordinary-looking guy in his fifties, tall and thin, with blond
hair turning gray. Their eyes met, and a silent communica-
tion passed between them. I know you know. Don shivered.
He knew about the Evil, knew the things Kesselring had
told him. And the Evil knew he knew. The thing inside
Hollis Jurowski was his enemy. And he was its enemy. Don
looked away.
To Doc Ingram, he said, "As soon as I cuff Jurkowski, I'm
going to talk to the boy. Why don't you come along? Maybe
he'll need a sedative or something." He reached for his
handcuffs.
Before his fingers found them, Don was knocked back-
ward. He fell, and suddenly Jurkowski was on top of him,
his hands ripping at Don's holster, trying desperately to get
his service revolver. Don tried to fight him off, but
Jurkowski clawed at him furiously. Then hands grabbed the
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IT'S LOOSE
man and pulled him off, Jurkowski writhing, swinging his
arms, kicking frantically, trying to free himself.
If the Evil dies, it loses eternity, Kesselring had said.
The Evil wanted very badly to live.
Jurkowski flung one man away from him, whirled,
punched a man on his other side, and suddenly he was free.
He leaped over one fallen man, dashed toward the street.
Don scrambled to his feet, drawing his gun. Jurkowski
turned to face him, staring at him with those knowing eyes
in which all sorts of alien emotions danced, swirling around
like the cartoon creatures in Fantasia. Instantly Jurkowski
leaped at Don. He fired at Jurkowski's legs, missed, and the
man was on him, again trying to get the gun. But this time
he had no chance, for hands instantly grabbed him, pulled
him off Don, pushed him to the ground. A couple of blows
landed in Jurkowski's midsection, and the struggle was
over. Jurkowski lay on his back, three men on top of him,
watching him very closely.
Getting up, Don slipped his handcuffs from the back of
his gunbelt. "Hold him while I put these on him," he said.
The men complied, and Jurkowski was handcuffed. Don put
him in the back seat of the Cherokee, locked him in. "Watch
him," Don said.
Inside the yellow house, they found four-year-old Marky
Jurkowski, who was sitting on the couch, with two women
hovering over him. Tears were rolling down the boy's
cheeks. He looked bewildered.
"I... I saw Daddy choking Lauren," he said weakly.
"And he came after me, and . . . and I ran." He stared at
Don with wide blue eyes. "Are Mommy and Lauren okay?"
He started to sob, his small body shaking.
Uncertain what to do, Don glanced at one of the women,
who shook her head, apparently indicating this wasn't the
time to try explaining that the boy's mother and sister
weren't okay at all. And before this tragic episode was over,
his father was going to be dead too. Leaving Doc Ingram to
check the boy over, Don went across the street to the
Jurkowski house.
Vanessa Jurkowski was in the kitchen, lying face-up on
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IT'S LOOSE
the floor, her deep blue eyes staring lifelessly at the ceiling,
and still filled with some of the confusion and surprise of
being attacked by her husband. The girl, who was a couple
of years younger than her brother, was lying on her bed,
face-down, her silken hair fanned out on the pink spread.
She looked like a large doll that had been tossed there by a
child. Don had heard something about the Jurkowskis and
their children, and he tried to recall what it was. It hung just
out of reach for a moment, then he had it. The Jurkowskis
had tried unsuccessfully for years to have children, and
then only a few years before Vanessa would probably
have gone into menopause, she gave birth to Marky. A
couple of years later, Lauren was born. The Jurkowskis,
devout Catholics, had said it was a miracle, two gifts from
God.
What the Lord giveth, Satan taketh away, Don thought.
Don did what he had to do. He took photos, got state-
ments, filled out forms. Then he took Jurkowski to jail,
removed everything from the cell that could conceivably be
used to aid the man in killing himself, and locked him in,
giving Corrine strict instructions that no one—not the
mayor or the president or even God—was allowed to see the
prisoner under any circumstances. Next he bought three
more freezers from Dennis O'Connor and had them sent
to Doc's office. Then Don and the physician began col-
lecting the bodies. Six from the woods. Two from Detroit
Street.
"If this keeps up," Doc Ingram told him as they were
heading for his office with the last of the bodies, "we're
going to run out of freezers."
Don said nothing.
The rain was still pouring down, sizzling on the roof of the
Cherokee like a burger on the grill, the windshield wipers
flailing valiantly at it, the tires splashing the water out of
muddy puddles, only to have them re-form as soon as the
Jeep had passed.
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IT'S LOOSE
2
"It's like a sickness," Corrine said, looking at Don from her
desk. "A killing sickness."
Sitting at his own desk, Don looked up, startled. "You
been talking to Kesselring?" he asked.
"No. Why?"
"That's his term for what's going on here."
She nodded, then looked away, and the office became
silent except for the constant sound of rain pattering on the
roof, running down the drainspouts, gurgling into the
gutters.
Don shifted his gaze to the door that led to the building's
three jail cells. The Evil was in there. And Don didn't know
what he was going to do about it. The part of him that
refused to accept such things as evil spirits that looked as
though they were built from the component parts of as-
sorted nightmare creatures liad long since given up. For
although it was programmed to reject such notions, it had
been overwhelmed by events. Unable to deny what had
happened and unable to deny that Kesselring's explanation
fit all the facts, it had become silent.
And now that Don had the Evil trapped within the body
of the host, what was he going to do? He'd been mulling that
over ever since getting back to the office. And he still had no
answer.
The door burst open with such suddenness that Don
jumped. It was Kesselring. He was dripping wet and out of
breath. And he had the case with him, the case that looked
as though it contained a fancy pool cue.
"Do you have him here?" he asked, stepping through the
gate in the counter.
"Jurkowski?"
"Of course Jurkowski. Who else?"
"I have him."
"He's alive?"
"Yes."
"Oh, sweet Jesus," he said as he sat down by Don's desk.
He looked pale.
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IT'S LOOSE
For a few moments the two men just looked at each other,
then Kesselring said, "We have to do it."
Don couldn't think of a response.
"And quickly," the ex-cop said.
Don noticed that Corrine was staring at them, taking in
every word. He stood up. "Come on. Let's go for a walk."
"In the rain?"
"A ride then. We need to talk."
"But there's no time. We've got to do it now, right away."
There was desperation in his voice, and his eyes were wide,
intense.
"If you need me for anything," Don said to Corrine, "I'll
be in the car." Standing up, he took Kesselring's arm and
guided him toward the rear exit. "Come on. We're going for
a ride."
When they were in the Cherokee, rain beating on the
wagon's roof, the wipers flapping back and forth at full
speed, Don said, "You're talking about killing a man, and
that's not the sort of thing we should discuss in front of
Corrine."
"Not a man," the ex-cop said. "The Evil."
"What do you call Hollis Jurkowski?"
"He's dead no matter what we do."
"That's not the way the law sees it. If you and I conspire to
drive a spike through that man back in the jail, we're guilty
of first-degree murder. For you, maybe that's fine. I mean,
you're retired, you've got no family, and this thing's an
obsession with you. You want to rid the world of this Evil,
no matter what."
"I have to destroy it," Kesselring said. "I have to."
"Well, I don't. I'm just a middle-aged guy with a wife and
daughter and a lot of years ahead of me that I'd just as soon
not spend in Jackson pursuing a new career in license plate
manufacturing."
"I'll do it. You'll have no part of it."
"It's too late for that. I'm already part of it."
Kesselring shook his head. "I can keep you out of it. I can.
I promise. Please don't try to stop me."
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IT'S LOOSE
"I haven't decided what to do," Don said.
"Think about what's happened here. Think about what
Jurkowski just did. And about what happened to the
Gordons. And about the bodies in the woods. Don't you see
that it has to be stopped? How can you balance the death of
one man against that—especially when he's dead already?
Sure there's a risk, but it'll be my risk, not yours. I may never
get another chance like this to destroy it. Please don't do
anything to interfere. Please."
Don said nothing. He was driving west on Island Avenue.
The water in the gutters was nearly up to the tops of the
curbs.
"The Evil found a new host and got greedy. Instead of
taking the time to make sure it had some way of killing the
host—a gun, whatever—it decided to feed, find the means
of killing the host later. Well, it got caught, and we have it,
and it may never happen again."
Don sighed. "I know."
"Every second counts. While we're here riding along
in the rain, Jurkowski is desperately trying to find some
way to kill himself. And sooner or later, he'll come up
with one."
"There's nothing in the cell with him he could use."
"How about a fork?"
"When I feed him I'll sit there and watch him."
"How about his finger?"
"His finger?"
"There's a way you can pop your eyeball out and jam a
finger through the opening into your brain."
"Jesus," Don said. The image of someone actually doing
that popped into his head, and his stomach constricted. He
fought off a wave of queasiness.
"It's got to be done as soon as possible."
"Jesus," Don said again. "I'm in a nightmare, you know
that? I've got to be in a nightmare, because there's no way
this can be real."
"It's real. Look at the Gordons, the Jurkowskis, the
others."
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IT'S LOOSE
"Yeah."
"I've got to do it."
Don nodded. "Yeah, you've got to do it."
"Right away."
"Not while Conine's there. Not while I'm there either—
unless you can't do it without my help."
"I don't need any help. When can I do it?"
"Corrine will be off in about forty-five minutes. There's
no night dispatcher. Town can't afford one. I'll leave as soon
as Corrine's gone."
"Will the building be open?"
"No. You'll have to break in. Use the back door. No one's
likely to see you. If you know how to pick a lock, that one
ought to be a snap. If you don't want to do that, a crowbar
will work fine. It's a pretty flimsy door."
Don felt himself pulled in different directions. A part of
him wanted to help Kesselring, because the Evil should
unquestionably be destroyed. He'd seen it. And he'd seen
what it did to people. He'd seen how it could influence his
wife and daughter, and he knew that Sarah and Allison
stood the same chance of being its victims as anyone else on
the island did.
And yet. . .
And yet he did have a responsibility to his family and
himself. He knew about the Evil. He believed. But the rest of
the world did not. If he helped Kesselring, he could truly be
stepping knee-deep into shit. Convicted of murder, he
would go to Jackson, where the life expectancy of impris-
oned cops could be very short. And what would happen to
Allison and Sarah then?
Dilemmas were easily resolved; all you had to do was
choose. I'll take this one. I'll do it that way. But then the
doubts come. What if you made the wrong choice? That's
what Don was wondering now. What if he'd made the wrong
choice?
He said, "Jail's through the door to the left of my desk.
Keys are in my top right drawer."
"Does it always rain like this in the spring?" the ex-cop
asked.
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IT'S LOOSE
"No. This is very unusual."
"The help you were expecting can't make it in this
weather."
"No."
"Very convenient."
"Convenient?"
"For the Evil. No one can get off the island, and no one
from the outside can get in."
"You mean it's responsible for the weather? How could it
be?"
"I don't know. I'm just saying that the weather is unusual
and seems to suit its purposes."
Don let Kesselring off at his car, which was parked in
front of the police station. Then he drove around to the rear
of the building, parking the Cherokee in front of the police
vehicles only sign. Before doing anything else, Don
checked on his prisoner. Jurkowski was still in his cell, still
alive, and there were no indications that he'd tried to kill
himself by beating his brains out against the bars or
anything like that. He looked at Don knowingly, his eyes
aglow with all sorts of unidentifiable and frightening emo-
tions.
When Don sat down at his desk, Corrine was staring at
him questioningly. Having no explanations to offer, he
stared back, and she looked away. Don's mind was awhirl
with conflicting emotions. He should help Kesselring. He
should not under any circumstances help Kesselring. He
should pinch himself and wake up, for this could not
possibly be happening—uh-uh, no way at all.
Corrine went home at five.
For a long time, Don stared at the door through which
she'd left. Then he checked again on the prisoner. Jurkow-
ski was simply lying there, doing nothing. Why hadn't
he tried to bash his head against the wall, something—
anything?
"I'll bring you something to eat in an hour or two," Don
said.
The creature on the jail cot stared at him, said nothing.
Don left the building.
277

IT'S LOOSE
3
Steven Kesselring had never learned to pick a lock, so after
the constable dropped him off, he went to Ace Hardware
and bought a crowbar. Now, five minutes after Don
Farraday left the building, Kesselring stood at the rear
entrance. Putting down the case that contained the instru-
ment of the creature's death, he worked the end of the
crowbar between the wooden door and its frame, then
pulled. There was the cracking and splintering of old wood.
The door popped open.
He stepped into a hallway with a wooden floor. He knew
that the man at the hardware store would remember selling
a crowbar to the stranger who was stranded here during the
Split. And he knew someone might have seen him entering
the building. He wasn't worried about it. As Farraday had
pointed out, Kesselring was retired and alone. If killing the
Evil meant he had to spend the last few years of his life in
prison, so be it. It was a small price to pay.
The monster was evil, pure evil, something sent here from
hell.
It had to be destroyed.
The black case was in his left hand. He could feel tingly
pulsations through the handle as if the object within were
aware of the Evil's nearness and growing restless.
He'd been worried that the beast would find some way to
kill the host before he got here, but now he was sure it hadn't
happened. The creature was here, waiting for him. The
ex-cop entered the police station part of the building, got the
jail keys from Farraday's desk, moved toward the unmarked
door in the west wall of the room.
Opening the door, he found three cells. Each had a single
bunk, a sink, and a toilet. The walls, floors, and ceiling were
cement. Each cell had a drain in its floor. Only the center
one was occupied. Jurkowski, the school janitor, was sitting
on the bunk, looking at him. The tingling from the handle of
the case grew more intense, as if it were connected to an
electrical source and someone was turning up the juice.
278

IT'S LOOSE
"I see you've been expecting me," Kesselring said.
The monster said nothing. Looking into its eyes, Kessel-
ring saw hatred, and something else, something it took him
a moment to identify. It was fear. And he knew why the
creature hadn't attempted to kill the host. If it tried to leap
headfirst into a wall or strangle itself or almost anything else
it might try, it ran the risk of injuring the host but not killing
it. With the host incapacitated but still alive, the Evil would
be at Kesselring's mercy—and he would show none.
The monster had decided that it wanted the host in one
piece. Because this was where it was going to make its stand.
The Evil versus Kesselring. Winner take all.
Suddenly Kesselring wasn't seeing the beast at all, but a
man in his early fifties. A school janitor. Just another guy
getting by as best he could. The ex-cop shook his head. This
man before him had been a normal guy once, but now he
was the Evil's host. He was doomed to die no matter what
Kesselring did.
"Got greedy, didn't you?" Kesselring said.
The man on the bunk said nothing.
"You got greedy, pal. And now it's going to cost you."
Kesselring held up the key to the cell. The man's eyes
followed it, showing no other reaction. Then Kesselring put
down the case, popped the catches, and raised the lid. He
lifted out the silver-plated spike with the sharp stone tip.
The man's eyes fixed on it, and this time the fear was
obvious. The metal pulsated, all but vibrating in the ex-
cop's hands.
Kesselring sized up the man. Though thin and not espe-
cially powerful-looking, he was about fifteen years younger
than Kesselring, who was experiencing all the problems that
came from being a senior citizen. He had a bad back,
arthritis that occasionally flared in his knees, physical
stamina that diminished with each passing year.
He wished Farraday were here to help him. But then the
constable had barely acquiesced as it was, and Kesselring
had not wanted to admit that there might be difficulties. So
here he was, about to attempt something of monumental
279

IT'S LOOSE
importance, all by himself. Rise to the challenge, he told
himself. You can do it. Because you have to.
Inwardly Kesselring sighed. He had always thought peo-
ple who espoused the wonders of positive thinking were
deluding themselves.
He hadn't brought a gun with him, because he hadn't
wanted to take the chance that something might go wrong,
that the creature might get hold of the weapon and end the
life of the host before Kesselring could do what he had to do.
Although he still thought coming unarmed was the right
decision, he had to admit that shooting Jurkowski in the leg
to incapacitate him would certainly have made things
easier. Perhaps he could have wounded the host, then locked
the gun away somewhere before entering the cell. The
ex-cop dismissed the idea. The monster would not obliging-
ly sit still and get wounded. It would be a moving target. If
Kesselring's aim was off, he could kill the host. And even the
slimmest chance of that was too great a risk to take.
Kesselring unlocked the cell door, pulled it open. The Evil
rose, turned to face him. Aiming the silver-plated spike at
the host's heart, the ex-cop stepped into the cell, closed the
cell door, locked it, slipped the key into his pocket.
"Time for you to go back where you belong," Kesselring
said.
Time for you to die, the creature said, the words coming
not only from the mouth of the host but from the air, the
floor, the bars, and from inside Kesselring's head.
A blackness seemed to seep from the ceiling of the cell,
like a cloud descending. And out of that blackness blew a
breeze so fetid Kesselring had to fight to keep from gagging.
You think you can destroy me, old man? ME! Look at you!
And Kesselring saw himself. He was a withered old man, a
bag of bones that didn't weigh more than eighty pounds,
with pale, almost translucent skin through which veins
showed like blue spaghetti. He was crouched over in a
permanent stoop, barely moving on decrepit, arthritic
joints, using a cane to keep himself from collapsing.
No! Kesselring thought. Get out of my head, damn you!
Get out!
280

IT'S LOOSE
The image vanished.
"Your tricks won't work," the ex-cop said. "You're not
welcome in my head. You're not welcome in my world."
The monster looked at him through Hollis Jurkowski's
eyes, hating him. The blackness swirled above him, no
longer looking like a cloud. Now it seemed to be an opening,
as if it marked the spot where dimensions or worlds or
parallel universes joined. But the only thing on the other
side of the opening was blackness, an almost living black-
ness, as if it had substance, and Kesselring wondered
whether he was looking on pure evil, the stuff that could be
molded into hatred and sadism and all the other horrors
humanity inflicted upon itself.
The metal spike was growing warm in Kesselring's hands,
throbbing. He tightened his grip on it.
Suddenly Kesselring was unable to move, as if held by
invisible hands. And the darkness above him was lowering.
He struggled to blink, to move £f finger, to twitch any muscle
in his body, but he was frozen in position so solidly he could
have been a statue of himself. The blackness was still
moving downward, getting closer.
It touched the top of his head.
Settled over his eyes, nose, mouth.
And he was enclosed in it, and it was absolutely dark, like
being sealed in a coffin.
Except coffins were designed to be comfortable-looking,
nice places to rest, spend eternity. And this was like sinking
into a cesspool. The blackness touched his skin, sending
revulsion throughout his system. His brain cried out for him
to move, to get away from this loathsome stuff at any cost,
for it was repugnant and vile and sickening beyond imagin-
ing. Its touch made him feel violated, contaminated, and his
flesh wanted to turn itself inside-out and shrink into his
bones.
It's not really happening, Kesselring told himself. It's just
the monster messing around inside my head.
The black stuff vanished.
He was in the cell, facing Jurkowski, the darkness still
hanging above them.
281

IT'S LOOSE
Cockroaches, a reddish brown tide, scurried from the
base of the walls, so numerous they made a hissing sound as
their feet propelled them across the cement floor and their
bodies bumped together. They covered his shoes, and when
he stepped back they crunched beneath his feet.
They began climbing up his pants legs.
And inside his pants legs.
"Enough!" he screamed, and this image, too, vanished.
Aiming the spike at Jurkowski's heart, Kesselring lunged
forward. The needle-sharp point dug into the man's flesh,
hissing like a red hot piece of iron being plunged into water
by a blacksmith. But the creature had moved quickly, and
Kesselring's spike had only caught it in the fleshy part of the
upper arm.
Even so, the Evil screamed in pain, and it was like nothing
Kesselring had ever heard before. It was the agonized cries
of a thousand torture victims, and yet there was nothing
pitiful about it, for it also was clearly a sound of hatred and
rage and menace, and it was unquestionably evil.
Kesselring pulled the spike free. It seemed alive in his
hands, so full of energy he could be holding a live wire.
Jurkowski was backing away from him, the two men circling
each other within the confines of the cell. Kesselring was
already beginning to weaken. In a prolonged confrontation,
the younger man would prevail simply because of his greater
stamina. The ex-cop faked a lunge to his right, then shifted
to his left. Jurkowski threw himself backward, avoiding the
sharp point, but he lost his balance and fell, landing on the
bunk. Instantly Kesselring was on top of him, raising the
spike, then bringing it down with all his strength.
The creature swung its arm in a desperate attempt to
deflect the descending death. Jurkowski's fist connected
with Kesselring's wrist, and the spike flew from the ex-cop's
grasp, rolled under the bunk.
Suddenly there was a crackling, buzzing sound.
The odor of ozone filled the cell.
The creature grabbed Kesselring's throat, began choking
him. But Kesselring was still on top, and he used it to his
advantage. He kneed his adversary in the balls. The man
282

IT'S LOOSE
gasped. Although the monster wasn't flesh and blood, the
host was, and what the host endured the beast endured.
Kesselring kneed him again. And again. The hands on his
throat relaxed their grip a little. Instantly Kesselring
grabbed Jurkowski's wrists, rotating them and pulling them
apart—just as he'd been taught years ago in self-defense
courses at the police academy. As soon as he was free, he
quickly backed away, looked for the spike.
It lay on the floor, near the foot of the bunk, and a big
wiggly line of yellow-white electricity was flowing from it to
the cell door, leaping from bar to bar, buzzing and sputter-
ing. It looked like a continuous lightning strike, one that had
come from a cloud with unlimited stores of energy.
Jurkowski came off the bunk as if he'd been yanked by an
invisible hand, threw himself at the spike. Kesselring, who'd
played football in high school, gave him a body block, and
the man slid into the bars. Hq, screeched when he hit them
because the electricity was suddenly wiggling around his
arms, like snakes of white light. Kesselring dove for the
spike, grabbed it, and the electrical arcing abruptly ceased.
Before the ex-cop could move, Jurkowski kicked him
viciously in the side. Then in the face. Kesselring tried to sit
up, get the spike into position to defend himself, but
Jurkowski kicked him in the head, knocking him back onto
the floor. The kicks came again, harder, faster. Kesselring
heard himself groan, and then he saw swirling lights that
were not images created by the monster. The foot hit his
ribs, and pain shot through him. A moment later, the kicks
were just dull thuds, and he felt almost nothing at all.
And then the punishment stopped.
Through eyes he was barely able to hold open, Kesselring
saw Jurkowski reaching down toward him, and the ex-cop
realized the Evil was trying to take the spike. Kesselring
summoned what strength he had left and found he was
already using it just to hang on to consciousness.
No! something in his mind cried. You can't let him have
it.
But Kesselring lacked the strength to stop him from
taking it.
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IT'S LOOSE
It was over, and he had lost. The Evil would take the only
weapon that could destroy it. The spike was irreplaceable,
for the stone amulet from which its tip had been fashioned
was one of a kind. The monster would go on, killing and
killing, as long as there was life for it to destroy.
No! Damn it! No!
But the protestations of his brain were wasted, for the
body had no strength left with which to change the inevita-
ble outcome. Smiling at him, Jurkowski put his hand on the
spike.
Green and orange sparks flew from the metal.
And within the janitor's body, the Evil screeched in
frustration and pain. Hesitantly the creature reached for the
spike again. More green and orange sparks flew from the
metal, and again the beast shrieked.
Can't touch it, you bastard, can you? Kesselring tried to
force his face into a knowing smirk, but he was incapable of
it.
The creature approached again, but this time it reached
for Kesselring's pocket instead of the spike. It took the
ex-cop a moment to figure out what was going on. The
creature wanted the keys. He swung at it with the spike, and
instantly it backed away. Then Jurkowski's foot struck
Kesselring's side. Three more kicks followed before the
ex-cop lost consciousness.
284

Seventeen
1
I blew it," Kesselring said, his voice slurred by the pain-
killers.
"I should have helped you," Don said. "It's as much my
fault as yours."
Kesselring was in a small room at Doc Ingram's place. It
had two beds, and it served as a sort of mini-hospital at
times such as this, when the Split made it impossible to get
sick or injured persons to the hospital on the mainland. The
retired cop had an IV in his arm, its plastic tube connected
to a bottle hanging upside-down from a stainless steel stand.
Don was sitting in a chair beside Kesselring's bed. The other
bed was unoccupied.
After eating dinner, Don had gone back to the police
station. He'd found Kesselring on the floor, badly beaten
and unconscious but still clutching the metal spike.
"The Evil got away," Kesselring said groggily.
"I should have helped you," Don said. "I'm sorry."
"The best chance I could have hoped for, and it's gone."
"I was trying too hard to cover my ass. I wasn't thinking
of anything else."
285

IT'S LOOSE
"It would have taken the spike, but it couldn't touch it."
"Why not?"
"Green and orange sparks."
"You took a pretty good beating," Don said, "but the doc
says you'll be okay. Couple of cracked ribs, some knots on
the head, and a lot of bruises. He doesn't think there's any
damage inside, at least nothing real serious."
"Screamed like nothing you've ever heard, he was so mad.
But he couldn't touch it. Couldn't."
They were silent for a few minutes. Don thought Kessel-
ring had gone to sleep. Then the ex-cop said, "Farraday, the
spike, where is it?"
"Here." Don held up the case so Kesselring could see it.
"It's inside?"
"Yes."
"He couldn't take it from me."
"I know. You told me."
"You have to keep it. I'm not strong enough."
"But—"
"You have to. The Evil's still here, still trapped. There
could be a chance for you to use it."
"Listen, I—"
"You're the only hope. I can't do it."
Don said nothing. He was thinking about being the keeper
of a custom-made metal spike that tingled his flesh when he
held it. A thing with magical power. A thing designed to slay
a creature from hell. It was a symbol of all this madness, and
he didn't want it in his possession. He opened his mouth to
say this to Kesselring and found he couldn't.
"I'll keep it for you," he said.
"Good," Kesselring said. "Take it with you wherever you
go. Don't let it out of your sight."
"I won't," Don promised.
A moment later, the retired cop was asleep. Taking the
case containing the spike, Don left the room. Doc Ingram
was waiting for him, standing in the hall with his arms
folded.
"He took a pretty good beating from somebody," the
physician said. "Who did it to him?"
286

IT'S LOOSE
"Hollis Jurkowski."
"Jurkowski? But—"
"He escaped."
"Escaped?"
"Don't ask," Don said.
Doc Ingram gave him a peculiar look but didn't press
for an explanation. Lowering his gaze to the case in Don's
hand, he said, "What's that, carrying case for your billy
club?"
"That's some more of the same craziness," Don said and
let it go at that.
The physician studied the case, as if trying to look
through it, and then his eyes rose, meeting Don's. Silently
the doctor communicated all the fear and bafflement he was
experiencing. It was that same haunted look Don had been
seeing all over the island.
"All those freezers in the back room are using a lot of
electricity," Doc Ingram said*. "The town going to pay me
for it?"
"Give me a bill. I'll see it gets paid."
"There're no more freezers," the physician said almost
absently. "Dennis O'Connor said that's the last one he had,
so please don't bring me any more bodies."
"I hope there are no more bodies," Don said.
The two men just stood there for a few moments, neither
speaking, then the doctor broke the silence. "You won't be
able to sell those freezers."
"Why?"
"Who'd want them after they've had corpses in them?"
"I don't know," Don said. Nor did he care. The fate of the
freezers was the least of his concerns.
Telling the physician to call him if there were any unex-
pected problems with Kesselring, Don left. As he climbed
into the Cherokee, putting the black case on the floor, he
considered the responsibility he had assumed. If he encoun-
tered the Evil, it would be up to him to drive the spike
through the monster's heart. No, not the monster's heart.
The host's heart.
Jurkowski would live only long enough for the monster to
287

IT'S LOOSE
find a sure way of killing him. Who would the new host be?
Stan or Patsy Brock? Joe Coleman? Corrine Matthews?
Vince Terrell? Brittany Uhl? How could he use the spike on
any of them? Maybe they were monsters on the inside, but
on the outside they were still the same familiar people.
And then another thought occurred to Don, one that
made him feel cold all over.
What if it was Allison? Or Sarah?
The rain beat down on the Cherokee, swirled in the wind,
coming first from one direction, then from the opposite one.
Dirty water flowed through the gutters, carrying away the
salt and sand that had accumulated over the winter, bub-
bling and churning as it ran into the grates of the storm
drains.
As Don drove through the curb-deep water, he muttered,
"Evilslayer." It was the name he'd made up for the object in
the black case.
It was not a term that gave him comfort.
2
The Evil stood in the basement of the elementary school. It
was night, and the building was deserted. Although
Jurkowski was the janitor there, his keys were in Don
Farraday's desk. The Evil had to break a window to get in.
The basement was dingy and musty. Several stacks of
moldering out-of-date textbooks stood along one wall, their
covers puckered and warped, their pages brown with age. In
the corner were a number of broken desks. One rested on its
side. Scratched into the top in big awkward letters were the
words fuck school. Kids were always writing/mc/c on things.
Hollis Jurkowski had always wondered whether the stu-
dents, ranging in age from five to twelve, really knew what it
meant or whether they just wrote it because they knew the
word was particularly upsetting to grownups.
But then Hollis Jurkowski no longer worried about such
things.
288

IT'S LOOSE
Sometimes the host would try to resist, and some hosts
were better at it than others. But Jurkowski's efforts had
been feeble, almost nonexistent. The school janitor had
possessed neither the will nor the intellect to do anything
other than surrender and invite the Evil in. In fact, it had
been a long time since anyone had possessed the strength to
resist the Evil after having allowed it to enter. The last
person to truly put up a good fight had been an officer in the
Roman army, a soldier in the service of Julius Caesar. In a
moment of weakness, far from home and having just
suffered a defeat in battle, the soldier—whose name the Evil
had long ago forgotten—had let it in. Then, realizing his
mistake, the soldier had struggled to regain control. Al-
though the struggle had taken the best part of a day, the Evil
had prevailed.
It always prevailed.
Although it used the human concepts of time, time was
actually meaningless to it. It never slept. It never grew old. It
had been here as long as mankind had, and it still looked
exactly as it had when it was created. It had passed through
neither a childhood phase nor a nymph stage nor any other
stage of development.
It had no master. It did, however, have a creator, and it
believed it resembled that creator. And it had a purpose. To
feed. Its food was death itself, or more precisely the energy
released by death, energy that had to pass through the plane
of existence in which it lived. Death, any death, was
satisfying, but death accompanied by terror was an exqui-
site delicacy.
The thought kindled the hunger. It was time to feed.
But not yet. There were things to do first.
The monster feared only one thing. The metal spike that
could end its existence. The metal spike it could not destroy,
for it could not touch it. The existence of that oversized
stone-tipped needle was the reason the monster had come to
the basement. It had to be sure, absolutely sure.
The building was old. A more prosperous community
would have torn it down years ago, but Ice Islanders just
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IT'S LOOSE
kept fixing it, making do. The prevailing attitude seemed to
be that good teachers and not fancy buildings were the key
to a solid education. A teacher needed books, a blackboard,
chalk, and a classroom. Period. The function of the building
was to keep the students warm and dry; anything else would
be extravagant.
So the building was old. And so was its heating system.
Lagging-covered pipes criss-crossed the basement ceiling,
carrying steam to the radiators. They all met at the gas-
burning boiler at the far end of the room. It was rusty and
ancient-looking, but not as old as what stood next to it. The
original furnace. A floor-to-ceiling brick structure with an
iron door on which raised letters spelled out geo. watson and
sons ironworks, Cleveland, ohio. It had originally burned
coal and was later converted to natural gas, before being
replaced by the present boiler in 1951.
The old furnace still worked. It was still connected to
the gas pipes, so it could be used as a backup in case the
other system failed. The monster knew all this because
it had absorbed the information in Hollis Jurkowski's
mind.
The creature walked to the old furnace. The gas line
feeding it descended vertically from the pipes that ran along
the ceiling. There was a valve in the line, at about eye level.
The monster turned it.
A hissing came from within the furnace.
Opening the iron door, Hollis Jurkowski's body climbed
inside, the gas from the burners stirring up dust mixed with
finely powdered ash from the furnace's coal-burning days. It
blew in his face, giving off that vaguely unpleasant odor
peculiar to natural gas. The term ill wind flitted through
what was left of Hollis Jurkowski's consciousness, but it
seemed to have no significance. The furnace was supposed
to have a safety device that prevented the gas from coming
on if the pilot light was out, but the device had broken long
ago. Jurkowski had ordered a new one but never installed it.
After all, the old furnace was never used.
Reaching into his pocket, Jurkowski's body pulled out a
book of matches.
290

IT'S LOOSE
Peeled off a match.
And struck it.
The gas ignited with a foom! Instantly the inside of the
furnace was an inferno.
Hollis Jurkowski writhed in pain.
The monster writhed with him.
And then it fed on his life's energy.
3
Elementary school students were sitting at their desks
shivering the next day, because the building's heating system
wouldn't work properly. In the absence of the janitor, the
principal went down to the basement to investigate, discov-
ering the old, normally unused furnace going full tilt. The
janitor from the high school was called in to get things
working properly again. After the old furnace had cooled, he
checked it out, finding what appeared to be fragments of
human bone.
Although by themselves the bones were unidentifiable,
Don Farraday was sure they were all that remained of Hollis
Jurkowski.
4
It was still raining two days later, when Phil Deemis walked
out of the office of his Shell station with a .357 magnum in
his hand, blew away two customers, then walked down the
block, crossed the street, and stepped into the grocery store,
where he shot two employees and two customers. Then he
stuck the gun into his mouth and pulled the trigger, blowing
his brains all over a display of Nabisco crackers.
His aim was good. Everyone he shot, including himself,
died.
291

IT'S LOOSE
5	
A few days after that, Todd Wolfe, the owner-bartender of
the Icicle Lounge, got up in the middle of the night to take a
leak. When he returned to the bedroom, he got his .38 from
the closet, loaded it, and blew away his wife, Sally. Then he
walked across the street and began ringing the Nowaskis'
doorbell. When Ike Nowaski opened the door, Wolfe shot
him, then walked inside and shot his wife, Nancy, and their
two children. Next he put the gun to his eye, as if wanting
to watch death as it came down the barrel, and pulled
the trigger. Nancy was the only survivor of the shooting
spree.
It was still raining.
6	
Don Farraday stood at the window, watching the rain fall
outside the police station. "It's never going to stop," he
muttered.
Corrine Matthews either didn't hear him or didn't care to
reply. They didn't seem to talk much anymore, he and
Corrine. Like everyone else on the island, they waited
nervously to see what would happen next, not talking
because there was only one thing to discuss and talking
about that was just too scary. So people fidgeted, worried,
and waited in silence.
Don had been afraid there would be some sort of mob
hysteria. Someone says it's all Joe's fault because Joe's
a Unitarian or a Christian Scientist or a Jew or practices
black magic in his basement, but nothing like that had
happened. No one had pointed an accusing finger. No one
had sought a scapegoat. It made Don think Ice Islanders
were a cut above the settlers of Salem, Massachusetts,
and a lot of the people living in Germany during the
'thirties.
Corrine got up and walked to the coffeepot, her move-
292

IT'S LOOSE
ment stirring the air in the room, bringing the fetid odor of
death to Don's nostrils. Having nowhere else to put the
corpses, he'd begun storing them in an unused room in
the back of the building. Although he'd shut off the heat to
the room, it wasn't cold enough to preserve the bodies,
which were decomposing. Despite his efforts to con-
tain the smell—he'd taped the door and jammed rags
underneath it—it was seeping into the rest of the building.
Every day it got a little worse. Soon it would become in-
tolerable.
The phone rang, and Corrine hurried back to her desk to
answer it. "Really?" she said after listening for a moment.
"That's great! I'll spread the news." When she hung up, she
was actually smiling. Don had nearly forgotten what a smile
looked like.
She said, "The Split, it's over. That was the Highway
Department. They said the rain has melted so much of the
ice that the ferry can start running."
Don just grinned at her. Could they really be over, these
weeks of isolation and madness? He'd thought the Split
wouldn't end for another week at least, but the rain was
doing to the ice on the lake what it had done to the ice and
snow on the island, all of which had long since been washed
away.
"When will the ferry start running?" he asked.
"Tomorrow morning." Corrine was so happy she seemed
barely able to restrain herself from jumping up and down.
Instantly she was on the phone, spreading the word.
The phone rang again, and because Corrine was on
another line, Don sat down at his desk and answered it. It
was Lieutenant Roper of the state police, who told him what
Corrine had just told him.
"Help's on the way," the state policeman said. "We'll be
there tomorrow on the first ferry run of the afternoon."
"Bring plenty of body bags."
"How many do you need?"
"How many have you got?"
When Don ended the conversation with Roper, he saw
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IT'S LOOSE
that Corrine was still happily spreading the word. The Split
was over. It would make everyone joyous. Not only was the
isolation over, but the horror that had accompanied the
Split, by inference, was over as well. At least that's what
everyone would be hoping.
But was it true?
Help was on the way. The bodies would be removed. The
killings would be investigated by competent professionals.
On the other hand, the Evil was still here. Don glanced
down at the black case on the floor by his desk. Although
Kesselring was up and around now, he was still recovering
from the beating he'd received. So the thing in the case was
still Don's responsibility.
The Evilslayer.
He'd named it, as if it were a magical sword in a fantasy.
After all, he couldn't deny that the pulsating spike was
magical. And he was living a fantasy, a dark and horrible
fairy tale in which one of Satan's minions was indulging in a
sanguinary frenzy.
The thing would try to leave the island now that the Split
had ended. Don sighed, slowly shaking his head, for he
would have to try to stop it.
No, he thought, why the hell should I? Let the damn
thing go. The island'll be free of it. I'll be free of it. It may
go on killing, but at least it won't be killing here. What
right does Kesselring have to lay this on me? If I run
someone through with the Evilslayer, I'll be guilty of mur-
der.
He could hear himself in court. You don't understand. I
had to kill him. He was dead anyway, and it was the only
way to kill the Evil.
The Evil? Why, that's a hairy thing with a crocodile
face, one of Satan's minions. I thought everybody knew
that.
Uh-huh. They'd either send him off to the funny farm or
declare him guilty of murder and send him off to Jackson,
where he'd have great fun being a combination sex object
and punching bag—until they tired of their fun and killed
him.
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IT'S LOOSE
To hell with you, Kesselring, Don thought. You can
have your damn Evilslayer back. I'm resigning from the
Ghostbusters. From now on you're on your own. Over and
out. This boy's gone.
With his foot, he pushed the black case a little farther
from him.
7
Ten minutes later, Kesselring phoned, said he was leaving
on the first ferry in the morning, and asked Don to meet him
there with the black case.
295

Eighteen
The Split's officially over!" someone in the assembled
group yelled, and they all cheered. The big yellow ferry
gently nudged the rubber bumpers at the edge of the
landing. Two crewmen jumped off with lines and secured
them to the large metal cleats on both sides of the landing.
A white truck that said always fresh bakery on its side
rolled off the boat, the first of many deliveries to the island
that would be made today. There were about a dozen cars
lined up, waiting to board. Not all of the thirty or so people
who were there had come to take the ferry, of course. Some
of them had just come to see it arrive for the first time that
year. It was like a ceremony celebrating the end of winter,
the beginning of a new season of life.
Even the weather was cooperating. The rain had finally
stopped. Though still overcast, the sky was brightening.
Looking at the faces of the people around him, Don saw
hope mixed with a sort of dazed uncertainty. Hope seemed
to dominate. The people of Ice Island were ready to believe
the madness was over. Soon, Don thought. He looked for
Kesselring but didn't see him.
Don was holding the black case containing the Evilslayer.
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IT'S LOOSE
The case seemed lifeless, as if the thing inside had lost its
energy. Allison and Sarah had asked him about it, the black
case he always took with him, and he'd answered with
statements like, "Oh, just something I'm working on." After
a while they quit asking, but they never stopped looking at
the case with a mixture of curiosity and uneasiness.
Now he was getting rid of it.
The cars had begun driving onto the ferry. Don watched
as they went past him, seeing familiar faces. A few people
waved. He waved back. And he wondered whether one
of them was more than he seemed, whether one of them
was carrying along a parasite that would turn him into a
killer.
Although he felt a little guilty about it, Don hoped so. Not
because he wished any of these people bad luck, but because
someone was serving as the host, and if it was one of these
people, the creature would soon be off the island. Along with
Kesselring and his Evilslayer. All gone. And life on the
island would return to normal. It would again be a safe place
to live, a place where you didn't have to lock your door,
except maybe when the summer people were there. A place
where nobody was getting rich, but where most folks were
pretty content with what they had.
Don watched the cars driving onto the ferry. Be in one of
them, he thought. Be gone. Leave us alone.
The last car in line was Kesselring's rented yellow Chevy.
The ex-cop drove past Don as if he hadn't seen him standing
there. Don ran after him, stepping onto the ferry, and
moving up beside Kesselring's car. He tapped on the
driver's-side window. The ex-cop rolled it down.
"So you're really giving up," Don said. It was both a
question and a statement.
"Yes."
"I'm surprised."
"Why? I'm old and I'm tired. If someone else wants this
fight, they can have it. I'm through."
"Because you got so close, then failed."
The ex-cop sighed. He really did look tired, beaten.
"That's a lot of it, yes. I should have shot Jurkowski in the
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IT'S LOOSE
legs. I guess I was stupid not to. It was just that I was afraid
something would go wrong and I'd kill him. Or maybe he'd
get the gun away from me. I've spent a lot of years working
under the rule that you never, under any circumstances, take
a gun into a jail."
"So, what are you going to do?"
"Go back to Pittsburgh, try to relax, try to start living like
a retired person's supposed to live."
Don nodded.
"The beating I got did a lot to convince me. I'm not young
enough to take that anymore."
"It's not that easy on young guys either," Don said. "I
think you're doing the right thing. This isn't a battle either
one of us is equipped to wage."
Reaching in through the car window, Don put his hand on
Kesselring's shoulder. The ex-cop nearly flinched. Don
could feel the tension in him. It was as if the man's muscles
were twisting and untwisting beneath Don's fingers, pulling
in opposite directions, fighting with themselves.
"It's been here, I guess, for thousands of years," Kessel-
ring said. "Maybe it's been here since the earth was created.
I was out of my league to fight a thing like that. Hell, maybe
it's meant to be here."
"Maybe it is," Don said.
Two more cars pulled onto the ferry.
The island had fresh bread again, and it would soon have
fresh meat and produce as well. Within the next few days, all
sorts of things merchants were out of or nearly out of would
be restocked. And the mail would arrive again. The weath-
er that had kept the state police helicopter away had also
kept Jerry Atwell from flying over to drop the mail by par-
achute. Now mail could go out again, too, something
that was impossible during the Split, regardless of the
weather.
People who needed things that were unavailable on the
island would again be able to get them on the mainland.
Churchgoers who weren't Lutheran would be able to attend
services. You could see a chiropractor, take a vacation, order
something from Spiegel's or L. L. Bean. You could buy a
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IT'S LOOSE
new car, replace your stereo system, buy a hardcover book
or a compact disc.
The end of the Split meant you were part of the United
States again, reconnected with the mainstream of American
life, once more in contact with the world. Sure, you could
watch satellite TV from anywhere in the world during the
Split, and you could call your aunt in Miami or your
granddad in Tucson, but you could do all those things from
Antarctica too. The end of the Split always felt good.
"I think you're doing the right thing," Don said again.
"You gave it your best shot. There's nothing more you can
do."
"In any case," Kesselring said, "it's over."
"Here," Don said, holding up the case containing the
Evilslayer. "This belongs to you."
The ex-cop shook his head. "I don't need it anymore."
"You went a long way to find the parts for it and get it
made."
"It would just be a reminder."
"That's all well and good," Don said, "but if you don't
want it, then it's up to you to dispose of it." He pushed the
case partway into the open window.
Kesselring moved away from it. "Just. . . just throw it
into the lake."
Kesselring was leaning away from the Evilslayer as if it
were a poisonous snake. The man was serious about having
nothing further to do with this whole business. He didn't
even want to touch the case.
"Please," Kesselring said. "Just throw it in the lake for
me. If I do it, it'll be the ultimate act of failure. I know, it's
just silliness, but I can't help it. It's the way I feel." His eyes
looked into Don's, pleading. "Just let me drive away and
forget."
Don understood where the ex-cop was coming from. He'd
spent years on a quest he was giving up. The Evilslayer was
something special. Kesselring had put a lot of time and
effort and travel into obtaining it. Now he wanted to get rid
of it, felt he had to get rid of it, but he just couldn't bring
himself to do the act himself.
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IT'S LOOSE
"All right," Don said. "I'll get rid of it for you."
"Thank you," Kesselring said. "Thank you."
Threading his way between the cars, Don moved to the
rail, looked down at the lake. This close to shore there were
still chunks of ice floating in the water, but they weren't
large enough or tightly packed enough to prevent the ferry
from getting through. He held the case over the rail. As if
aware of its fate, the Evilslayer had come to life within its
box. Don could feel its energy gently pulsating in his
fingertips.
Don just stood there, holding it, not letting go.
And he thought about Kesselring, how he'd abruptly
given up something that was an obsession with him, how
he'd moved away from the case as if Don had thrust a
decomposing piece of meat at him. And while he thought
about these things, the Evilslayer's case gently pulsated in
his hands.
A crewman hopped off the ferry and walked toward one of
the cleats to which it was tied. The boat was getting ready to
leave. Don stood by the rail, holding the Evilslayer, thinking
about Kesselring, thinking about the things the retired cop
had told him, thinking about all the people who had died so
pointlessly on the island, and all the people who might die
that way in the future.
The ferry was pulling away from Ice Island.
Don made no move to get off.
Nor did he drop the Evilslayer into the lake.
A part of him was saying that what he was thinking was
impossible, that anyone who would believe such shit was
stark raving bug-fuck. That portion of his mind was also
screaming that even if he was right, he should just forget
about it, throw the damned Evilslayer over the side, walk
away. He had the chance to put all this behind him, get back
to a normal life with Allison and Sarah, and nobody but a
goddamned idiot would pass that chance up.
And yet he kept thinking about Kesselring.
And about all the people who'd died on the island.
Allison and Sarah could have been among them. It was
probably just luck they weren't. Any one of their neighbors
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IT'S LOOSE
could have walked in and blown them away. Or Allison
could have been the killer. Or Sarah. Or him.
His left hand, the one in which he held the case, was
beginning to tingle, as if the Evilslayer were sending him
messages. Yes, yes, yes, it seemed to say. Do what you have
to do, what we have to do.
No, Don thought. Walk away. You don't even know
whether you're right.
But he knew he was going to find out.
The ferry was picking up speed, Ice Island growing
smaller. The people who'd shown up to watch its arrival
were leaving now, getting into their cars and driving away.
Don went back to Kesselring's car, rapped on the passenger-
side window. Kesselring looked surprised. He made no
move to open the window. Don tapped on it again. This
time the ex-cop rolled it down.
"I didn't know you were.going to the mainland," the
retired cop said.
"Changed my mind. Mind if I join you?"
Kesselring hesitated, then reached over and pushed open
the door. Don got in, putting the Evilslayer on his lap.
Instantly Kesselring's eyes found the black case.
"I thought you were going to throw that in the lake," the
ex-cop said, still staring at the case.
"Haven't got around to it yet."
"Would you mind doing it now, so I don't have to look at
it anymore?"
Don unsnapped the two latches.
"What are you doing?"
"I want to look at it one last time."
"I'd rather you didn't."
"Why's that?"
"I explained all that. I just. . . well, I just feel bad about
giving up."
Don opened the case. Kesselring looked away. The
Evilslayer was glimmering, as if it were reflecting the sun.
But, although the day was brightening, there was still no sun
to reflect. The glow grew and decreased in brightness, as if
reacting to the pulses of the spike's energy. It was indeed a
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IT'S LOOSE
magical thing. No matter that a few weeks ago Don would
have flatly denied the existence of magical things. Now he
believed. He would always believe.
"Why don't you want to look at it?" he asked.
"I told you."
"Yeah, but did you tell me the truth?"
"I don't understand."
"Look at it," Don said. "I want you to take one last look
at it before it goes into the lake."
Kesselring continued looking out the window for a few
seconds, then he slowly turned his head until he was seeing
the Evilslayer. He looked as though he were in pain, his face
contorted, droplets of perspiration traveling down his fore-
head. Abruptly he looked away.
"Bothers you, huh?"
"You know it does."
"I'll tell you what, Kesselring. You touch the spike, and
I'll lose it. We got a deal?"
"I don't want to touch it."
"I know you don't want to, but that's the deal. You touch
it, and I'll toss it. What do you say?"
"No."
"No?"
"That's what I said."
"You've handled this thing before. Probably hundreds of
times. Why not touch it just once more when that's all you
have to do to be rid of it? You won't even have to watch it go
into the water. What do you say? We got a deal?"
"I don't want to touch it!" Kesselring snapped. "Why are
you doing this to me?"
"Because I know," Don said.
"Know? Know what?"
"That you're the host."
Now Kesselring did look at him. He seemed stunned.
"Me? You're out of your fucking mind. How the hell could I
be the host?"
"Because you let it in, that's how."
Kesselring shook his head. "This is absurd. The Evil
would love to get me, but it never can. I'd never let it in."
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IT'S LOOSE
"Then pick up the Evilslayer."
"The what?"
"That's what I call it. Pick it up."
"No. You have no right—"
"So call an attorney."
Kesselring simply sat there, looking confused and afraid.
"Pick it up," Don said. "And all this will be over with. If
I'm wrong I'll apologize."
"What will it prove?" The ex-cop was shaking.
"You told me yourself. The host can't touch it. Pick it up,
and I'll throw it in the lake."
"Please," Kesselring said softly. "Just stop this nonsense
and throw the damn thing away."
"Maybe you're right," Don said. "Maybe I shouldn't ask
you to touch it." He lifted the Evilslayer from its case.
"Maybe I should just toss it overboard."
Not looking at it, Kesselring nodded vigorously. "Yes,
that's what you should do."
Don thrust the spike forward. Kesselring gasped, tried to
deflect it with his arm, but he was too late, for the point had
already brushed against his cheek. Green and orange sparks
filled the car's interior, and the ex-cop screamed. Don
pulled the Evilslayer back. A black mark about three inches
long smoked on Kesselring's cheek.
"Don't even think about trying to get away," Don said.
He held the Evilslayer threateningly. It throbbed in his
hands.
"Please," Kesselring said. "Don't. . . don't touch me
with that thing again. It's the Evil, but it's me too. I'm
fighting it." He was trembling, almost vibrating, as if he'd
been stretched piano-wire tight by invisible forces. "I have
to fight for control with everything I have, and I'm slowly
losing."
"If you're Kesselring, why'd you lie to me?"
"Didn't," the man said, the words catching in his throat,
as if he were in pain. "It did, the creature."
"But now it's you I'm talking to?" Don asked skeptically.
"For a few minutes."
"Why—"
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IT'S LOOSE
Kesselring waved him to silence. "Please. Let me speak.
That's why I called you last night, told you to meet me here
with the case."
"You were planning to let it in."
Kesselring shook his head. "I'd already let it in."
Don understood. The ex-cop had invited the monster in
so he could trap it. He'd arranged for Don to get there with
the Evilslayer. Kesselring was sacrificing his own life to kill
the monster.
"Please," the ex-cop said. "If you don't, I'll have done it
for nothing. The—" Kesselring sucked in his breath. The
struggle going on within him was obvious on his twisted
face. "Don't. . . don't let the monster have the last laugh."
And then something in Kesselring's expression changed.
Though unable to say exactly what had happened, Don was
sure a subtle transformation had just occurred.
"You won't do anything here," the retired policeman said,
his voice mocking. "Too many people around."
And Don knew what the change was. The Evil was in
control now. And the monster was right. Don wouldn't try
to slay it on a crowded ferry. He was going to try to end its
existence, but not at the cost of his own.
They sat there in silence until the ferry reached the
mainland. As it nudged the rubber bumpers at the landing,
Don said, "Drive where I tell you to drive."
Kesselring looked at him. His eyes were like Reverend
Pfeil's eyes had been, full of rage and madness and things
Don could only guess at. The ex-cop yanked open the door
and leaped out of the car.
Quickly returning the Evilslayer to its case, Don ran after
him, weaving between the parked cars. He banged one with
the Evilslayer's case, and the driver hollered at him, asked
him whether he knew how much a new paint job cost.
Behind him, drivers began to honk because Kesselring's
unoccupied car was blocking the way.
Don saw Kesselring leap in front of a car that was pulling
off the ferry, causing the driver to jam on his brakes. And
then the ex-cop was on the mainland. Don hurried after
him. The ferry landing was in a wooded area, about two
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IT'S LOOSE
miles from town. Kesselring was running down the edge of
the two-lane blacktop. Two of the cars coming off the ferry
passed him, and then he leaped in front of the third one,
waving his arms. When the car stopped, the retired police-
man ran to the driver's door and pulled on the handle, but it
was locked. Kesselring let out a howl of rage, a sound no
human being should have been able to make. He wheeled
and dashed into the woods.
Don ran after him. As he reached the trees, the sun came
out for the first time in weeks. For Ice Island, the horror was
over. But for the rest of the world, it still existed. Unless
Don was able to stop it here. At least if he caught up with
Kesselring in the woods, there would be no witnesses to
what occurred. Maybe he could make up a story, say
Kesselring was wanted for something and resisted arrest.
Don lost his footing and nearly fell. The leaves on the forest
floor, soggy from the spring thaw and all the rain, were
treacherous.
The branches of the trees and bushes slapped his face, tore
at his clothing. Kesselring was just dashing madly through
the trees, not following any path. Although Don was unable
to see him, he could hear him, and Don thought he was
gaining. The monster might be supernatural, but it had to
deal with the limitations imposed by an old man's body.
And Kesselring, still recovering from the beating he'd taken,
wasn't in the best of shape. Don ran between a pair of pine
trees and found himself in a clearing. Kesselring stood there,
facing him, panting. His face was twisted again, revealing
the war going on within.
"Do it now," the ex-cop said. "Through the heart
quickly."
Instantly Don popped the catches on the case and re-
moved the Evilslayer, which vibrated in his hands like a
tuning fork. He stepped toward Kesselring, whose face still
revealed the inner struggle between the Evil and the retired
cop. The man just stood there, his chest exposed, vulnera-
ble. Don raised the spike, tensed his muscles . . .
And found he was unable to do it.
"Go on," Kesselring pleaded.
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IT'S LOOSE
But Don was unable to move. How could he plunge this
thing into Kesselring's heart? He knew the ex-cop was dead
anyway. He knew the man was host to something vile and
evil, and yet his hands would not bring the spike forward.
Kesselring took off his jacket, as if making it easier for
Don to do what he had to do. But that, Don realized too late,
wasn't his intention at all, for as soon as the coat was off, the
ex-cop threw it over the Evilslayer and grabbed it. Sparks
flew, but not as intensely as when the spike had actually
touched his flesh. He was struggling to hold on to it. Don
tried to yank it away from him, but Kesselring didn't let go.
Don could feel the Evilslayer's power surging through his
hands, traveling up his arms, through his organs, his legs.
The monster screamed, a sound that was part human,
part animal, part the stuff of nightmares. With a rush of
strength, Kesselring tore the spike from Don's grasp. It
flashed and sparked in his hands, but the jacket provided
enough insulation for him to hold on.
Don drew his gun. If he had to kill Kesselring in the
conventional way and in so doing set the creature free, then
so be it. If it killed him it would be free anyway. Then he
recalled how Kesselring had lamented his failure to attempt
wounding the host, immobilizing him so the job could be
finished. Don lowered the gun to Kesselring's legs.
But he didn't shoot, because the tormented look of inner
conflict was back on the ex-cop's face. "Resist!" Don yelled.
"Fight it, Kesselring. Fight it."
Although Don knew in the back of his mind that he
should still shoot Kesselring in the leg, he couldn't do it. He
wanted Kesselring to win this battle by himself, to overpow-
er the monster through sheer force of will and send it back
where it had come from. He wanted the ex-cop to live,
maybe because he desperately needed to see just one person
who'd been condemned by this madness survive. Just one.
Suddenly Kesselring was whipping his body from side to
side, his face contorted in sheer agony. Don yelled. "Fight
it! You can win! You can, you can!"
Abruptly, the Evilslayer still sparking in his hands, Kes-
selring stopped moving. For a moment he just stood there,
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IT'S LOOSE
looking bewildered. Then he slowly turned the spike so that
the point was against his chest, the jacket hanging from it as
if it were a clothesline.
"You're no fucking help at all," he said.
And then he fell on the Evilslayer, the way a Roman
soldier might have fallen on his sword.
Sparks filled the clearing, as if a high-tension line had
been downed, buzzing and popping and crackling, giving off
light as bright as a welder's arc, which shifted from green to
orange to white with the quickness of a strobe light. Don
had to shield his eyes to see Kesselring. The man had rolled
over onto his back, the spike protruding from his chest. But
something was wrong, because Kesselring, still using the
jacket to protect his hands, was struggling to pull out the
Evilslayer, succeeding in pulling it out. And Don realized
that it had penetrated only partway, not to the heart, not far
enough to kill the monster.
Frantically, Don scanned the clearing, spotting a large
rock that lay beneath a rotting tree stump. Holstering his
gun, he rushed to the rock, picked it up, moved quickly to
Kesselring, who was still struggling with the spike.
"Do it!" Kesselring screamed.
You'll be a murderer! The Evil said.
"Kill me! You have to!"
You'll go to jail.
"No, do it. It'll be okay."
The scum of the earth will fuck you in the ass!
"Trust me!"
Allison and Sarah will hate you, because you'll be a
murderer who gets it in the ass from scum.
"Just do it." Kesselring sounded weak. He was fading.
As Kesselring and the Evil vied to sway Don, the ex-cop's
face twisted and untwisted, his eyes in focus one moment,
rolling into his head the next, his mouth opening and
closing, drool running down his cheeks. And Don realized
that even if the retired policeman somehow survived the
experience, he would be insane.
"You'll be all right. Trust me."
Your asshole will be as big as a mineshaft.
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IT'S LOOSE
"Please, just do it."
Your wife and daughter will have a scumbag convict for. a
father. A scumbag convict with AIDS and a reamed-out
asshole. How will they survive? Will Sarah sell blow jobs in
the restroom at the bus depot? Will she spread her legs for—
Don smashed the rock down on the head of the Evilslayer,
driving it completely through Kesselring and into the
ground beneath him.
A tremendous green and orange flash of lightning snaked
through the clearing, hitting the old stump and exploding it,
the pieces falling from the air like wooden snow. Thunder
boomed, and the ground shook so violently Don was barely
able to stand. The odor of ozone filled the air. Wind swirled
through the clearing like a tornado, picking up the wet
leaves, which danced as if on strings.
And then Don was looking into the glowing eyes of the
Evil.
A blackness was oozing from the beast, filling the clearing,
enclosing it, isolating it from the rest of the woods, cutting it
off from the world. The beast stood there before him, glaring
at him, the Evilslayer sticking through its chest as if the
monster were a cardboard cut-out on a paper spike. It stood
on its hooves, its hairy body rippling with energy, its
alligatorlike mouth opening and closing, its pointed teeth
flashing.
It reached for him with its claws.
And then it was gone.
And so was the blackness and the thunder and the
lightning. There was just the woods. And Kesselring.
Don stood there, trembling, confused. Then he realized
there was no bloody wound in the ex-cop's chest, not even a
hole in his shirt. And yet he was turning blue, the way Don
had seen heart-attack victims turn blue. And then, although
there should have been no life left in him, Kesselring's eyes
opened, focused on Don. His lips parted, and he whispered,
"Thank you."
His eyes grew lifeless, staring skyward but seeing nothing.
It was only then that Don realized the spike, the
Evilslayer, wasn't protruding from Kesselring's chest. It was
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IT'S LOOSE
nowhere to be seen. It was a magical thing, and not really
part of this world, Don supposed. So it had gone with the
Evil into oblivion.
For several moments Don stood there, staring at
Kesselring's body, listening to his own frantic heartbeats.
Then he turned and walked back toward the ferry landing.
309

Epilogue
Pass the syrup," Don said. Sarah handed the bottle to
Allison, who handed it to him, and he poured some of the
amber liquid onto his pancakes.
"Ummm," Don said, taking a bite. "Sure beats store-
bought."
Sarah rolled her eyes. "Here we go again."
"I have a confession to make," Allison said.
"Yes?"
"I can't tell it from the stuff we buy in the grocery store."
"Me neither," Sarah said.
Don sighed. "Okay. We won't make our own this year."
"Good," Allison and Sarah said together, and they both
laughed.
Don shook his head, trying to look disappointed. They
knew he wasn't really upset, of course. It was a game they
played with each other, nothing more. Even Don had to
admit that tapping A1 McDougall's sugar maples, collecting
the stuff, cooking it down . . . well, it was all kind of a big
hassle. And Allison was right, it really wasn't that much
better than store-bought, not enough to justify all the work.
And in the overall scheme of things, maple syrup didn't
matter. What mattered was that life for the Farradays—for
BOOK S

IT'S LOOSE
everyone on the island—was back to normal. People would
never forget the bad things that had happened, but they were
learning not to dwell on them. No one who'd been to the
revivals was able to remember anything about them, so
those horrors, at least, would not have to be dealt with.
Sure, for some people what had happened was worse than
it had been for others. Stan and Patsy Brock, for example.
They'd lost their son, Wesley. Or Carolyn Pfeil, who'd lost
both her husband and her daughter. There was no shortage
of people left behind to grieve.
Carly Pfeil's body had washed up on the mainland at
Grand Marais. The bodies of Tommy and Jean Quirk
washed up farther east, at Whitefish Point. The Quirks had
been badly chewed by something. Some people speculated
that they'd been caught in the propeller of a passing ship.
Others said fish had probably done it.
The media had learned about the Ice Island murders.
Reporters had come from Detroit and Chicago and New
York. The killers had been tested for any chemicals that
might have affected their brains, but nothing was found. The
state police even had the water supply tested, again without
results. Finally—and a little reluctantly—the investigators
concluded they'd encountered a very rare instance of people
succumbing en masse to cabin fever. The media picked up
on it, dubbing the story the "Cabin Fever Murders."
Newsweek ran a cover story in which psychologists ex-
plained how being cooped up inside the house all winter
could affect human behavior.
Ice Islanders didn't talk about it very much, although
Don suspected a lot of them were more than a little worried
about next winter. Would it happen again, people going
crazy because of cabin fever? Don wished there was some
way he could reassure them, for he knew it wouldn't happen
again. Not next spring or the spring after that or the one
after that. Not ever.
When the state police officers finished their investigation,
all they could do was shake their heads. There was no one to
arrest. All the murderers were dead. Most of them had taken
their own lives. And Don had fatally shot Reverend Douglas
311

IT'S LOOSE
Pfeil. Edward Dwyer's death was ruled a suicide. And—
more important to Don—Kesselring's death was ruled to
have been the result of natural causes, specifically a heart
attack. Don had explained what happened, saying that he
wanted to question the retired cop about Jurkowski's escape
from jail, in which the ex-cop was a suspect. Kesselring had
run, and Don had pursued him until the retired cop
collapsed in the woods. He had no idea why Kesselring ran
from him. Nor did the state police, but in the end they
accepted Don's explanation. Sometimes people did things
like that, even former cops.
Only Don knew what had really happened on Ice Island.
There was no one he could tell, not even Allison and Sarah.
It was a strange feeling to know he'd been a party to ridding
the world of a terrible evil. He supposed other people had
done similar things, and they too had found themselves with
no one with whom they could share the experience. It
seemed likely, because if the monster existed, other crea-
tures of evil had to exist as well. And other humans had
battled them.
Of course, the real credit for the Evil's destruction went to
Kesselring, who'd pursued the monster until he caught it.
And then he'd made the ultimate sacrifice. Don was a minor
player.
When they'd finished breakfast, Don took Sarah to
school. Before leaving, he hugged Allison for a moment.
And when he left Sarah off, he leaned over and squeezed her
hand. The Farradays had been doing a lot of that lately,
hugging and kissing and just being close. Don suspected a
lot of people on the island were doing that.
312

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