The Industrial Elf Ch. 05

**A long way and a couple of years down the road, "Jack" is a lot more comfortable around people, though he's still cautious and doesn't trust many as he hides among them and works his way slowly to the place where his heart tells him that he must go. O_o

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Reaching for the towel on the passenger seat, he wiped the sweat from his forehead, making sure to get the last bits which were hiding in his eyebrows. Until his travels had brought him to the southwest, he'd never sweated a drop in his life.

A last pass over his upper lip and he tossed it back. The engine temperature was holding in the heat, so he was good there, he thought. For the first time in his life, he'd have liked to use the air conditioning, but in this part of the world, he didn't know if he'd need the little extra range that leaving it off might provide.

He looked at the GPS, and saw that it had pretty much nothing but little dots here and there which represented towns and settlements connected by the thin line that he was riding. He knew full well that it was pretty much a coin toss as to which ones might be alive and well, and which could just as easily be ghost towns out here. The ghost towns outnumbered the living ones. He'd know which category the next one belonged in about another minute now.

It was a mild surprise to see what looked like a functional gas station up ahead and he hit the turn signal to pull in as he pulled his hat down.

He waited at the pumps for some signs of life, but nothing happened for a few minutes until he noticed the old woman waving to him through the heavily-barred window, so he walked over.

"You pump your own gas here," she said in a distrustful sort of way, adding, "Pay first, then pump."

"That's ok," he said, "but I'd like to fill the tanks on the camper and then the ones on the bike there on the trailer. It'll take a little while."

"Pay first," she said.

He sighed and did the math before handing over $250 through the cash drawer. Twenty minutes later, he'd locked every tank and asked for his eighty-three cents change. She slid it through to him as though it was killing her to part with it.

"I could use a beer," he said just a little hopefully. He really didn't care all that much for what passed as beer here, but he'd found that stopping off to have one now and then could get him more information than if he'd bought the road atlas. Besides, he already had one of those.

The woman pointed to the bar next door.

He walked through the doors and found himself in another worn out old bar like about any other one that he'd seen out here in the past month. The woman who stood at the bar might have been the same one who ran the gas station if it weren't for her different outfit.

He ordered his beer and took a pull on it, offering up a mild prayer that this woman had nothing to do with the ancient sign out front which read "Topless Entertainment."

Since he was the only customer, he was already regretting his decision to stop in for a beer, unless he heard something interesting from her, he thought.

The waitress looked at the long blonde hair spilling over those shoulders topped by a lowdown Stetson. He was the nicest thing that she'd seen in a month of Sundays.

A look out of the dirty window told her the direction that he'd been going in. "Where you headed, Handsome?" she asked him. "There's nothing much out that way until you get to Handen."

"That's roughly where I'm going," he replied, "but my GPS says there's another dot on the way there. Someplace called Tanglewood, it says."

"Handen's 120 miles or so," she said, "Tanglewood's just under 50 miles out from here. But don't you be stopping there, friend. That ain't no place to be.

There's just a couple of old mines, they was for gold and lead, I heard back in the day, but that day's long over a hundred years gone now. There's a couple of people who live there still, but I don't know what's keeping them alive. They run a bit of a half-assed hotel, last I heard. I just hear bad things been going on there for the last fifty years or so. You'd do well just to keep motoring right on through there and don't stop if you're going to Handen."

He sucked on his beer and looked at her as he set it down. "What sort of bad things?"

She rolled her eyes, "Don't tell me you're one of them paranormal investigators or somethin'. We get them through here every once in a while and they ask, and then haul ass over to there, but we never see them come back through here."

"I'm nothing like that. I was just curious, that's all." He decided that he'd just finish the beer and get going.

She looked at him and decided that he sure couldn't be a bylaw inspector, so she poured herself a draft.

"They say there's some demon that runs around out there at night. She catches you out there alone after sundown and it's all over for you, bud."

He blinked at her, "What sort of demon? What does she do to people that she catches?"

"Oh, hell, I don't know," the waitress said, "The stories been coming out of there since I was a young girl. I've heard everything from she rips 'em apart to she sucks out every drop of their blood to she screws them to death. Maybe it's all three."

She laughed, "I'm just telling you not to stop off there for anything, that's all."

He slid a tip across the bar as he got up. "When was the last time that you were through there?"

"Oh, I haven't been there in I don't know how long. Must be forty years since I stopped there."

She looked a little sad and her voice turned a bit distant. "I was lookin' for my boyfriend. A bunch of us was shootin' the breeze one night, and his best friend said that he'd heard there was a really nice-looking girl there that he had it in his mind to meet, but we'd all heard the tales. My boyfriend went along the next day just to see if there was such a girl. Mostly he was going to keep his friend's courage up."

He'd almost gotten to the doors when she finished, "But they never came back," she said in that same distant voice, "neither one of them was ever heard of again. I went out with a few of my girlfriends a few days later. The place was crawling with Highway Patrol, but they never found anything."

He thanked her and walked to his camper. Starting the engine, he set the air conditioning on high and walked through to close all of the windows and latch them. He sat back down behind the wheel and pulled out, wondering if there was truth in what he'd heard beyond the bit that he'd felt in the waitress.

He also thought that maybe she was just trying to kill off the competition for the very slim tourist dollar available out here. It didn't matter much, he thought. He didn't plan to stop anyway.

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He eased up on the pedal as he neared the town line. He could see that it was a little place and had never grown much at all. There was the hotel, more of a large house, really, and it was about the only thing there with much of any signs of life to it.

There were bright flower gardens all around the place and they looked well-tended and watered. He took that as something like a miracle in this climate. It looked to him as though somebody really gave a damn. The place looked as though it had started out life as a farm and then the town grew around it and had since died off.

Not far from the house was a large barn, right next to a sign that offered power hook-ups for motor homes. It was the barn that gave him an idea, though. He pulled in.

He'd leaned on the bell for a while before he heard anyone coming. A lovely and petite young blonde woman of about twenty-one smiled cheerfully at him and stood behind the desk. "My name is Donna. How can I help you?"

"Pleased to meet you, Donna," he said, "I'm Jack."

He shrugged with a smile, "I don't know if you can help me yet, but I'm hoping, "he said. "If that barn there has about fifty feet of space in it, what I'd like to do is stay for a little while.

I need a place to do just a bit of maintenance on my camper and my motorcycle. Nothing major, so I wouldn't have the things all apart, but I've got to change out the oil and all of the fluids. I've been on the road for a while now and that has to be done. I'd rather not do that pulled off the side of the road somewhere in the dust. I won't make a mess and I'll leave everything as tidy as it was.

For that, I'd like to rent a room for about a week to ten days if I could. I'd pay you for the room, board if you offer that or have a dining room, and I'll pay for power hook-up and we can haggle over the rent for the use of the barn."

Donna considered, and then grinned at him. It didn't take long to come to a price.

With the camper and trailer in the barn, he got right to work and had the bike done a little before it was time for supper. He was just finishing up and was washing up in the sink when he felt that he wasn't alone.

He looked over and found a different young woman looking at him. She was just a little taller than Donna and had more of a darker complexion. He noted her large dark eyes and long black hair.

Most of all, he noted that she didn't really like the look of him all that much from what he saw.

"Supper is almost ready in the dining room," she said, "I'll take you there if you are ready."

He thanked her and introduced himself, but got nothing back for it.

Supper was a fairly quiet affair with Donna introducing her grandfather Tony and the other woman as Aggie. Tony was a blind man in his late seventies who said next to nothing. Aggie went all the way to nothing and stayed there. Any conversation which she chose to take part in had only Donna at the other end of it. If Donna engaged Jack, he saw only a barely concealed glare from Aggie once in a while. Mostly, she ignored him completely.

The dinner conversation, as strange as it was, didn't really bother him. He had a couple of other things on his mind. He'd seen a spring-fed stream out back of the barn and it offered a shady setting under the trees which flourished there. He spent a little time there after supper in reflection, thinking over his life for a time. Then he got up to close up the camper and head to bed.

As he walked toward the barn he looked up, but not noticeably at first, only enough to see under the brim of his hat. He only looked up enough to see a detail. After seeing it, he looked up all the way and watched the detail disappear instantly.

Donna and Aggie were walking to the stream. Jack wished them a pleasant evening, but only Donna returned it. Aggie's face was blank.

He walked on waiting to feel the glance on his back. After it had passed, he looked back himself and noted another detail before stepping into the barn.

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The next day found him in the dining room after Donna served him breakfast. She was very pleasant to him, but Aggie only watched in stony silence.

After a while, Donna poured herself a cup of coffee and asked Jack if he'd like some company. He smiled, and told her that he'd enjoy that. His glance at Aggie spoke volumes about the company that he didn't have as she sat almost directly across from him.

"We don't get many visitors here anymore," Donna remarked a bit sadly, "I'm not really sure why that is. The town is almost deserted, but there's a lot to see around here. We've tried to make our place attractive and appealing. I don't really know what's wrong."

Jack looked over, "Could you stand just a little well-meaning advice?"

"Sure," Donna replied.

"You live in a ghost town," he said, "that presents its own challenges, but it could also offer a draw to some people. I'm not really here for that. I just saw a possibility to do some maintenance while staying at a charming place. And it is that, Donna.

It looks very inviting when you're coming down the road. The town has some history to it that you might capitalize on, and part of that history seems to be a little dark, from what I've heard. One of your main difficulties is the people in the other towns. I heard a tale of unsolved murders from long ago, and was advised strongly not to stop here. I don't know what to offer as advice or as a solution to that, but I think that if you had a presence on the internet, it would go a way to get around things like that and let you reach more tourists who might have an interest."

He nodded at Aggie, "And I think that you need to work on a little more of a pleasant presentation, if you don't mind my saying so, Aggie. If you don't like the guests, then you just have to appear to be pleasant and interested until they're gone. You are after their business, after all."

"Thank you," the quiet young woman nodded. "I will consider your advice," she said as she rose to leave the room. Donna's face clouded over as she watched.

"She doesn't like strangers, and she's very shy. I'd like to talk with you some more a bit later if you wouldn't mind," Donna said as she got up. "I've got to get my granddad up."

Jack found himself alone. Finishing his coffee, he stood to get started on the camper. --------------

Before noon, he decided on a break, and strolled down to the stream. Sitting under one of the trees a bit away from the path, he just closed his eyes and thought of the love that he'd lost three years before. If he wasn't who he was, he felt that he might have been able to understand it better, but his people had always just tended to fall into a love and once it had been decided between the partners, it just stayed there for as long as they lived.

He opened his eyes again as soft sounds came to him. Jack didn't turn his head right away and when he did, it was very slowly, and then he wished that he hadn't come here at all, not wanting to be caught intruding. One of the things that he noticed was that Aggie was indeed capable of smiles and laughter. She seemed to light up when she and Donna were alone, but though he didn't listen, the feel of the tone that came to him was one of confused hopefulness from Aggie and very gentle and patient rejection on Donna's part.

It took him a while, but being what he was, he was able to eventually creep away far enough to stand up and walk off without being noticed. --------------

He was leaning against the side of the camper with a bottle of water from his cooler when his attention was drawn by Tony.

The old man was shuffling carefully in the dust holding out a cane, obviously going from memory. Jack watched in silence until Tony had gotten near enough to pass between the back of the camper and the trailer. Somehow, he'd missed running into the camper altogether. It was obvious that Tony expected to find no obstacles here and wasn't using his cane much. But in a few seconds, he was going to find the trailer tongue with his shin the hard way.

"Stop, sir, hold up a minute." Jack said, "There's the tongue of my trailer just in front of you. I can tell you that walking into that is going to hurt, take it from me. I've done it a lot."

The old man stopped and turned toward the voice. "Hello. I thought I'd come to see you. Donna says that you're here to fix your vehicle."

"Not really fix it," Jack replied, "I just want to change the oil, and check all of the fluids out of the sun and the dust. I've already finished with my bike on the trailer."

"Where you headed, once you leave here?"

Jack looked at the clouded-over eyes of age. "North, generally. I'm going to be heading roughly for the Canadian Rockies. I'm in no hurry, though. I always wanted to see this part of the country, so I'm just noodling around a bit on my way."

The old man's expression changed. "My eyes are shot to hell and they've been this way for the last ten years," he said quietly, "Are we alone here? Take a good look around before you answer."

Jack waited for a second and looked around before coming to a small decision. "Yes. I can't see anybody here but us."

"Then listen, Jack," Tony said earnestly, "Finish up what you need to do and get the hell away from here as fast as you can. It ain't healthy for strangers here."

Jack was a little surprised. "Why? I mean, I've heard a story about this town, but ..." he shrugged before realizing that the gesture would be lost on a blind man.

Tony lowered his voice. "There are lots of stories, young fella. And they're all true, pretty much. This town has been cursed for a long time. I was a boy when it started. The mines were still running a little then. You must have heard about the she-demon who lives around here. It's all true."

He paused to spit into the dirt in disgust. "She came here to kill, and she ain't never stopped. She's only slowed down, since nobody comes here much anymore. You'll be done if she gets it into her head that you're fresh meat."

Jack was a little amused that the old man had assumed that he was young, but he hid it. "Well, I don't know about any of that. I just need to get this done here, and then I thought I'd poke around the mines just to see them. I've heard that she comes out at night, and I won't be anywhere near the mines then." He tried to sound as though he was hearing Jack's warning and put as much friendly confidence in his tone as he could, "I'll be in my room."

"That won't save you," Tony said, "Look, I'm only trying to give you some fair warning. She used to live near the mines while there was easy pickings there, I suppose. She's lived right here since I was a twelve. You've met her. She's got some kind of hold on Donna."

Jack was a bit surprised, "You mean Aggie?"

Tony sounded very sad and bitter. "She's ruined our lives. Mine especially, since I wouldn't leave Donna alone here with her, not that it's made much of a difference. I'm sure that Donna is the only reason that the bitch hasn't killed me long ago."

He thought for a moment, and then said, "Look, you do what you want. I'm just telling you for your own good. If you've got a brain, then get the hell gone as quick as you can, that's all."

He turned and began to shuffle off. Jack walked over to guide him a bit, since he was going to miss the door by a good margin.

"Listen son," the old man said in a half-whisper, "things ain't what they seem here. Donna is only introducing me as her grandfather nowadays since I'm getting on. She used to introduce me as her father before, and before that, I was her older brother."

He stopped and whispered to Jack. "Donna is my sister, Jack. My older sister. She's nine years older than I am. That she-devil keeps her young somehow, that's all. If I was you, I'd run for my life before she gets hungry." They reached the door and Jack helped Tony through.

He walked back and picked up his water bottle from where he'd set it down on the trailer tongue. Finishing it, he leaned inside the back door of the camper to toss it into the small bin there before closing the door again.

"Listen," he said to the far side of the camper, "I've got a lot of stuff to do, but I'll talk with you if that's what you want. I know that you've been there for a long while now. You can keep ignoring me if you want to, it's up to you."

After a moment, Aggie stepped around to the back to face him over the trailer tongue. "I came to apologize."

She looked down and picked unhappily at a bit of lint on her dress. "Donna is very angry with me for being rude to you. Now that Tony has rambled at you. I have to apologize for something else as well."

She still looked a bit aloof, but she also appeared very embarrassed for what she'd overheard.

"I meant to speak with you before, but I had trouble forcing myself to do it. I'm just not very good with strangers. Then Tony came and I had to listen to that. I'm very sorry for all of this, Jack."

"Don't worry about it," Jack smiled at her a little, "People sometimes get pretty wobbly in their minds as they age. I've seen it before, believe me. I accept your apology, though that's making it sound pretty formal."