The Toll Collectors
Ray McDaniel peered into the rearview mirror of his old Cadillac, paying little mind to the road as it stretched out before him. Behind him, the sun was a dull orange disk tracking westward toward the horizon, but he barely noticed, instead narrowing his eyes appraisingly at his own broad, rough-hewn face. A prizefighter's face, he thought, though he was not a prizefighter. A splash of crimson streaked across his hairline, partially obscured by the sandy white hair that spilled down his forehead. He tucked his hair behind his ear, exposing the stain. Blood, but not his own. He smiled, and made no attempt to wipe it away.
Ray McDaniel was a violent man.
His first time had been an accident. A drunk, in a bar, looking for trouble. Ray was seventeen, and too brash for his own good. The man was disheveled and reeked of cheap whiskey, and Ray had shouldered past him on his way to the bathroom. When Ray returned to his seat, he'd been forced to endure barb after drunken barb, each delivered louder than the next, until the whole place was humming with lurid anticipation. Through it all, Ray sat calmly atop his tattered vinyl barstool, sipping his beer and staring straight ahead as though he'd neither noticed nor cared what was going on behind him. When he finally tired of the man's insults, he rose from his stool, and broke the bastard's nose in so many places that his final drunken breaths were scarcely more than a gurgle and Ray's own knuckles were bloodied by the splinters. It was impulsive, and it was messy, and it was over far too quickly.
He'd been charged, of course, and the bar shut down for serving a minor, but the judge was lenient, and Ray was out in a couple of years. Prison was a rebirth for Ray; he read and he lifted and he fought, winning more than he lost. He learned that he enjoyed inflicting pain, and that he was good at it. When he got out, he found a more productive outlet for his talents than beating on drunks in bars or felons behind them. He'd learned control. He'd learned patience. And he'd learned that a man with his proclivities was always in demand.
He'd just finished a job in Detroit. An accountant, from Boston, who'd been skimming off the top of his employers' operation. The guy had bought himself a shiny new car, some orthodontia for his little girl, a new rack for his wife. He bought himself a new name, a new face, a new life. He thought he could hide. He didn't hide well enough.
Ray wasn't the guy you called when you wanted a clean kill. He was the guy you called when you wanted to send a message. Ray left the guy alive, but barely. Bound to a chair, a knife in his gut. Made him watch the rest. His little girl was a pretty one, a teenager now, with teeth as nice as you please. He sliced her from cheek to cheek before he choked her to death, a nice wide smile for her proud papa. The guy's wife, she was a bit of inspiration, he thought with a smile. From her he took a couple of souvenirs; he thought his employers might like to see where their money had gone.
The old Cadillac was barreling east on 70, its tires clattering against the uneven pavement of the road. Pittsburgh was a couple of hours behind him, and all that stretched out before him were the darkening shadows of tree-covered hills, the recent hard frost having sapped them of their color, blanketing everything in a dull gray-brown. Across the westbound lane, he could see the ghostly line of the old, abandoned turnpike, twisting its way through the valley below. He was making good time, he thought. With any luck, he'd be back in Philly before the bodies were found.
Ray depressed the in-dash lighter and fished a pack of Pall Malls from the pocket of his shirt, shaking one out and placing it between his lips. The road curved gently before him, and it had been nearly a half-hour since he'd seen another soul. Dusk was setting in, and in the failing light, Ray thought he could see a woman in the distance, standing on the shoulder, her pale white dress fluttering in the evening breeze. She might be stranded, he thought, his face splitting into a grin around the unlit cigarette. Perhaps he should give her a lift. You never knew what kind of people travel these lonely roads at night—she might not be safe out here.
The lighter ejected from its socket with a click. Ray removed it from the dash, raising the glowing coil to his cigarette and taking a long, metallic drag. The paper sizzled and snapped, and the cigarette caught. Ray filled his lungs, closing his eyes as that first blessed rush of nicotine flooded his head with calm. He never allowed himself to smoke during a job—he was in the system, after all, and one butt could be enough to put him away. Ray wasn't going anywhere. He was too good. Too careful.
He exhaled and opened his eyes, viewing the road through a haze of blue-white smoke. His breath caught in his chest. The girl was standing just feet in front of him, in the center of his lane. Her feet were bare, and what he thought was a dress was in fact a nightgown, ghostly white by the glow of his headlights. And her face. My god, he knew that face.
Rubber squealed against pavement. Ray's leg locked straight against the brake, pressing him tight to his seat. Brakes locked as well, and the car slid sideways. Ray tried to correct, spinning the wheel hand over hand, his cigarette falling to his lap, forgotten. Tires bit against the cold surface of the road. The car threatened to roll, and Ray hit the gas, jetting across the grassy median. He plunged into the empty westbound lane, cut across it. Too late to correct. The Cadillac cut through the metal guardrail like paper. A horrible rending sound pierced the night, metal against metal. And then, for a moment, there was silence.
Ray's car sailed through empty space for what seemed like forever. He was helpless, frozen. Then car met earth with a horrible crash, tearing through the dense underbrush and plunging down the steep embankment. The car rocked and shook as it plummeted down the slope, and Ray's teeth clattered in his head. He bit his tongue, hard, and blood welled coppery in his mouth. Briars and tree limbs clawed and scratched against the surface of the car, and Ray could see nothing save a fury of leaves and rocks and weeds out the cracked and battered windshield. And then, with a horrible crunch, all was still. All but Ray, who slammed forward into the steering wheel. He heard a dull snap as ribs gave way, and then, for a time, there was nothing.
When Ray awoke, there was darkness, only discernable from the void of unconsciousness by the throbbing in his chest, in his tongue, in his head. Gradually, though, he was able to discern shapes in the darkness. His dash, crumpled around him. The windshield, a maze of shattered glass, luminescent as it reflected the night sky. Himself, bloodied and broken in the rearview. He caught the faint scent of gas, and he could hear the engine ticking quietly as it cooled. He reached for the door handle and gave it a try. The door opened, just an inch, but it was something. The seatbelt, not quick enough to save his ribs, now held him tight to the seat back, its release pinned between the crumpled door and the seat. Ray depressed the button and yanked the buckle free, untangling himself from the belt. He threw his shoulder against the door. The hinge let out an awful squeal, but it gave. His ribcage exploded in white-hot pain, but he was able to climb out of the car, collapsing onto a fetid mat of decaying leaves beside it.
He'd come to a halt at the base of a withered old elm. His car was crumpled around it, smoking. It looked as though he'd come to rest at the bottom of the hill, a thick stand of old-growth trees stretching out in either direction at its base. Moonlight, watery and insubstantial, filtered through their leafless branches, dappling Ray in ghostly white light as he lay there, panting.
He staggered to his feet, peering back up the embankment. It was littered with low-lying brush and the stunted, contorted trunks of saplings clinging tight to the severe incline, too steep for him to climb. A broad swath of flattened brush and splintered timber marked his passing, and the guardrail twisted overhead like so much ribbon. It wouldn't be long before someone spotted it and called it in. It wouldn't do for Ray to be here when the Staties arrived—he had a sheet, and likely more than one or two warrants out for his arrest. Minor, given his line of work, but it wouldn't do to have someone digging around in his business.
He looked around, weighing his options. There, beyond the copse of trees, was a clearing of some kind—the light of the moon was brighter there, as though lighting his way. He approached the clearing cautiously, threading his way through the dense wood until he reached its edge. What he saw was a path of cracked pavement maybe twelve feet across and split down the middle by a patchy strip of grass, winding its way through the darkness. It was strewn with rubble and split by the weeds and gnarled roots that pushed up from beneath, as though the earth itself was trying to reclaim it, to erase its existence. The old turnpike, he thought. It had been abandoned in the Sixties, bypassed by a newer, wider route, left to rot here when the world moved on.
To his right, beside the road, he saw a broad rectangle of concrete, the splintered remains of posts rising from it. Beyond that was a second, smaller road, curving away into the dense thicket of brush and pine and oak. An entrance ramp, he thought, and a toll booth, or what's left of one, at least. He could follow the entrance ramp upward until it connected with the road above, but in his mind he saw the nightgown-clad girl, smiling in the glow of his headlights, and he knew that he would not.
He made up his mind then, breaking from the cover of the trees and striking out along the abandoned highway. There would surely be another ramp, one far away from her, and following the old pike assured him a night free of any unpleasant legal entanglements. There was nothing in the car that tied it to him—it was registered to a Raymond Michaels, who, apart from not existing, was a model driver who always obeyed the speed limit, never failed to signal, and had not a single citation to his name. He left it behind without so much as a glance, and started down the long-forgotten road.
His joints were stiff, but seemed fine; apart from the throbbing in his ribs and in his tongue, he was in pretty good shape. The bleeding in his tongue had slowed, at least, though it had left behind a thick, metallic film that made his stomach roil. As he reached the ruins of the toll booth, he spat, black by the rising moon. There, he thought. I've paid my toll in blood.
He thrust his hands deep into the pockets of his jacket, lowering his head against the chill night breeze, and walked. It seemed peaceful, at first, out here alone as he was, surrounded by the sounds of the night. As a child, Ray had been terrified of the dark—he would lie as still as he could, covers pulled over his head, a flashlight clutched tight to his chest that he dared not turn on, for fear of calling attention to himself. He'd been certain the dark was filled with terrible things; watching, waiting. As he grew older and honed his talents, he came to realize that he was the thing people feared—he was the monster in the dark. The thought gave him courage, and it gave him strength.
As he walked, though, he began to sense something, something at the periphery of his awareness. Elusive, disquieting. The trees gathered tight to the road, splitting the edges of the pavement and encroaching on the night sky above. And from somewhere within them, he sensed... attention. He caught the occasional glimpse of eyes in the darkness, marking his passing, and he quickened his pace, sticking close to the grassy median. Just animals, he told himself, unused to Man encroaching on their woods, but the eyes did not shine like an animal's would—they were cold, flat, and dead. And he heard noises carried on the breeze, faint but unmistakable. Slavering, gnawing sounds, from somewhere just out of sight. Ray pulled his jacket tighter around him and tried to stave off the thought that he was not the only predator in these woods tonight.
He'd been walking an hour when he reached the tunnel. The median strip ended abruptly beside him, and the road before him narrowed down to a single lane. By the light of the rising moon, Ray could make out a broad concrete wall maybe three stories high peppered with graffiti and cut into the hill before him. At its center was a broad semicircular arch, the mouth of a tunnel that disappeared into the hill beyond. A pinprick of moonlight glinted from the darkness—the other end, Ray assumed. Some plan this was, he thought. No way in hell I'm goin' through there.
He reached inside his jacket, finding his now-crumpled pack of cigarettes in his shirt-pocket. He tried to tap one free and got nothing for his trouble but some loose tobacco fluttering away on the breeze. He shook out the rest of the pack's contents into the palm of his hand, fishing out the broken, useless stubs and tossing them to the ground. Damn it. Only three left. He placed all but one of them back in the pack and fished a lighter from the pocket of his jeans. He lit his cigarette and took a long, contemplative drag. With a sigh, he made his decision to turn around and head back.
Ray turned and took a step, and then froze. She was there, her nightgown clinging to her legs in the breeze, no more than thirty yards away. Even in this light, he could see the dull reflection of the moon in her sunken and deep-set eyes. He could see her teeth, gleaming impossibly bright and tinged with blood from the slashes that cut her ear to ear, opening and closing in horrible anticipation. And he could see that she wasn't alone.
He stumbled backward and fell. His ribs sang with pain and his vision went white, but he recovered, scrambling toward the mouth of the tunnel. There were dozens of them. Hundreds. Mutilated, disfigured, angry. And he recognized every one.
The job in Jersey. Kid with sticky fingers. Ray had taken off the kid's hands and left him to bleed out, gagged and blindfolded in an alley. The snitch from Queens, whose pleading became a garbled moan once Ray cut out his tongue. The cop in Philly who'd gotten too close. Ray took his eyes before slitting his throat.
He could hear them behind him as he fled into the tunnel, all smacking lips and grinding teeth. The floor of the tunnel was cracked and uneven, and he struggled to keep his footing. He stumbled once, and then again, abrading the palms of his hands against the rough pavement of the tunnel floor as he struggled to stay upright. Ahead, the widening dot of moonlight that signaled the mouth of the tunnel was an anchor, holding fast Ray's fragile sanity, keeping him focused. He scrambled toward it, and rolled his ankle. Its throbbing joined that of his tongue and his battered ribs, all three in synch with the deafening roar of pulse in his ears.
The tunnel was not as long as Ray had feared it would be. As he approached the mouth of the tunnel, he stopped, listening. He could hear no sound of pursuit behind him, and a glance back at the western portal showed no wobble in its light, no tell-tale silhouette to indicate they'd followed him. He approached the eastern entrance with caution, clinging tight to the cold stone wall, but nothing awaited him but a desolate stretch of decaying highway.
Ray set out along the road as fast as his throbbing ankle would allow, gritting his teeth against the grinding pain that shot up his leg with each step. He pressed on for hours, he thought, watching his shadow lengthen as the moon passed overhead and began its descent toward the horizon. He'd taken for granted the light of the moon when he'd set out from the car, but after the oppressive blackness of the tunnel, he was thankful for its pale glow. He kept to the center of the road as he walked, sometimes staggering into the median, unwilling to get any closer to the ever-encroaching trees that loomed black in the night, choking out all light within their reach.
He'd seen or heard no sign of his pursuers since entering the tunnel some miles back. He'd begun to think they were imagined, though the thought did little to slacken his pace. It was crazy, he thought—wasn't it? After all, he'd been unconscious. He must be concussed, or delusional, or something. But he knew better. The sounds and scents of the woods at night, the cold sweat that had broken out across his face and neck, the cleansing pain in his ankle and in his chest—they were signposts to Ray, painful in their clarity. He was not addled, not foggy from injury.
No, he thought. He was being hunted.
The night seemed to deepen around him. He was aware of every noise, every hint of movement within the woods. He froze helpless at the sudden crashing of trampled brush, echoing like thunder in the stillness of the light, but it was a lone fawn breaking from the cover of the trees, young and unafraid. It tilted its head quizzically at him for a moment before turning and bounding back into the woods. Ray watched it go, envying its fearlessness.
Ray staggered onward. He was exhausted and thirsty, and a stitch in his side had nearly doubled him over. He couldn't keep up this pace much longer. He needed to rest.
The road curved gently before him, and as he stumbled on, a second tunnel came into view, looming in the distance. Tears welled in Ray's eyes, but he fought them back—he would not let his frustration get the better of him, not now. He couldn't bear the thought of plunging again into the darkness. Not yet. Maybe not ever.
In the middle distance, Ray saw that a large tree had fallen across the roadway, a dark gash against the pale sun-bleached asphalt. He fixed on it, made it his goal. When he reached it, he collapsed against it—safe, he thought, in the relative light. He faced back the way he came, his legs splayed out before him. He could rest here a moment, he thought. Catch his breath. Wait for sunrise.
The thought brought a smile to his face, for he could see the sky lightening in the east. Just a shade—morning was still a ways off, but Ray thought he could wait forever if he had to. He closed his eyes a moment and his head sank slowly toward his chest before jerking upward, suddenly alert. That won't do at all, he thought. No rest for the wicked.
He pulled the Pall Malls from his pocket and shook one out. Only one more left. He put the pack back into his pocket and lit up his cigarette, the flare from the lighter so close to his eyes, momentarily blacking out the night around him.
"You got another one of those?"
At the sound of the man's voice, Ray nearly jumped out of his skin. He did manage to swallow a goodly portion of his drag, which came out a rasping belch that set him coughing. He scrambled to his feet, or tried to. He lost his footing and sat down hard on the top of the tree trunk.
"I'm sorry—I didn't mean to frighten you."
The man who addressed him was just a few feet away, dressed in a wool overcoat and a tweed driving cap, a plaid scarf wrapped tight around his neck. A pair of pressed wool pants fell in a perfect crease over black boots so polished they shone in the moonlight. He must move like a cat, Ray thought—I didn't even hear him coming.
"You—you didn't frighten me," Ray stammered, his voice hoarse from the smoke. "I just thought I was alone."
"We're never as alone as we think," the man replied. Ray said nothing, so he continued.
"So, you got another smoke?"
Ray thought of his one remaining cigarette and wondered if the man saw him return the pack to his pocket. He shook his head. The man shrugged as if to say, No matter.
Silence stretched between them. The man looked at Ray, unblinking, expressionless. There was something disquieting in that look. Ray straightened, brushing absently at the seat of his jeans.
"So," Ray said,"you got a name?"
"We all got names," the man replied. "Mine's Finn."
Ray took a long pull off his cigarette and exhaled slowly, savoring the calm it imparted. "Good to meet you, Finn. I'm Ray." He extended a hand to the man, who took it in an iron grip. Cold, dry. Ray was relieved when it was over.
"Tell me Finn, you got a car around here somewhere? I ran into a bit of trouble up on 70, and I seem to have lost my way."
Finn shook his head. Not a talker, this guy.
"You got a place near here, then? I could clean up, maybe call a tow?"
Again a head shake. Ray was beginning to tire of this game.
"Well then what in the hell are you doing out here?"
"Actually," Finn replied, "I was looking for you."
Fear crept down Ray's spine like ice. "You a cop?" Though he was embarrassed to admit it, even to himself, he prayed the answer was yes.
"No."
"Do I know you?"
"Nah," he replied with a smile, "I just got that kinda face."
Ray instinctively backed away from the man, though the trunk behind him halted his progress. "I do know you," he said, stepping carefully over the fallen tree. "Baltimore, '89. You were a freelancer, trying to collect on the Strickland job."
The man sighed. "Yeah," he said.
"I killed you."
"Yeah."
"You can't be here. How can you be here?"
Finn smiled—a humorless smile, but not unkind. "Things are a little... thinner here," he replied, gesturing around them. "What's above, what's below. Easy for a man to get lost. Easy for a man to get found."
"So why aren't you with the others? Chasing me—hunting me?" The trunk between them now, Ray backing away.
He shrugged his broad shoulders, the wool of the coat whispering as he did. "I figure I had it coming—occupational hazard, you could say. I'd have done the same to you, if I'd gotten the chance. Besides, you did me quick. Clean. A single blow at the base of the neck. I appreciated the courtesy."
"So then why are you here?"
"Returning the favor," Finn replied.
"I don't follow."
Finn's eyes darted toward the woods. "They're still out there. Watching. Waiting. Biding their time until you're too weak to fight. And if you stay here, they will tear you apart."
Ray followed Finn's gaze with his own. Finn was telling the truth—there, deeper than before but unmistakable if you knew to look, were dozens of eyes, cold and dead and malevolent, watching him. The predawn sky had lightened almost imperceptibly, but Ray thought he could make out ashen faces staring back at him from within the brush.
"I guess I shoulda given you that cigarette after all," he said.
"Keep it," Finn replied. "A man deserves to know it when he's had his last." He turned and walked away, thrusting his hands into the pockets of his overcoat. "Oh, and Ray?"
"Yeah?"
"Have a lovely night."
Finn began to whistle, and Ray watched as he faded away into the waning darkness. And then, Ray began to run.
His ankle screamed in pain, and his lungs were on fire, but Ray ran toward the tunnel with all the speed his legs could muster. They hadn't followed him through the tunnel before—they'd gone around, surely, over maybe, but they hadn't followed him. He didn't know why, and he didn't care. His only thought was that in the tunnel he'd be safe. He'd get through it quick as he could, and when daylight broke, he'd find his way off this god-forsaken stretch of highway.
He plunged into the tunnel and kept up his sprint until the light of the tunnel mouth had disappeared. This tunnel was much larger than the last, and it curved slightly, obscuring the entrances and plunging him into oblivion. He did not hear them behind him, and so he slowed, mindful of the uneven ground beneath his feet and the throbbing in his ankle. He pulled the Bic from his pocket, working the flint with nervous hands. The tunnel sprang into being around him, seeming to pulse and sway under the uneven light of the flame. He saw the occasional graffito on the walls, but as he pressed on, they became fewer and farther between, until finally they stopped, as if decades of would-be artists had decided by consensus not to push any further. The lighter grew hot in his hand, and reflexively, his thumb released the button, extinguishing the flame. Here the darkness was a living thing, pressing ever closer, strangling all rational thought. He remembered as a child cowering beneath the blankets, with the night pressing in around him, struggling to creep through, and he knew that this is what he had feared. Darkness. Final. Absolute.
He flicked the lighter again, and again the flame sprang to life. He moved slowly, his free hand shielding the flame from the breeze of his passing. As he walked, his thumb blistered and peeled, but he refused to release the button. He inched along for what seemed like forever, until finally, the lighter's flame guttered and died, its fuel spent. Ray was plunged again into darkness.
His breath caught in his chest and he grew dizzy, disoriented. He staggered, grasping, toward the wall. He willed himself forward, one hand dragging along the wall to orient himself in this absolute blackness. He began to see things—phantom colors, shapes, odd flashes of light. Synapses misfiring in the absence of stimuli. He pressed on, his heart thudding painfully in his chest.
The ground grew yet more uneven, the route more treacherous. He slowed further. He raised his foot to take a step, and it came down on something soft, squirming, alive. It let out an animal squeal, and so did Ray. He lost his footing, spilling forward onto the floor of the tunnel. He heard the sound of sightless things scurrying around him, tasted blood as he was wracked with a searing fit of coughing.
He blacked out for a time. When he awoke, pain was his only indication. This time, there was no gradual lessening of the darkness. It seemed to deepen with every passing breath. Smothering. Close. Alive.
Ray struggled to his feet and staggered around in the darkness until he happened upon the wall. Relieved, he took a couple of halting steps, hands to the wall for guidance and for support. He halted, though, suddenly confused. He had no idea if this was the right wall, the right way. It might lead to freedom. It might lead back to them.
Ray began to shake. He could smell the acrid stench of his own sweat, his own fear. He realized that he had no idea how long he'd been out—they may have already circled around. Daylight may have come and gone. There might be nothing waiting for him but darkness. Darkness and them.
Fear paralyzed him, and he collapsed against the wall, sliding down it in a heap. He was wracked again, this time by sobs. They echoed through the tunnel, reverberating out into the countryside beyond.
And as dawn broke across the cold Pennsylvania countryside, Ray McDaniel sat alone in the darkness. For now. Forever.
-END-
