Speaker 1: The Devil's Not by Nilma finn Well, I can't say
Speaker 1: that me and Bobby Domeier we was buddies. I don't
Speaker 1: reckon anyone was buddies with Bobby, but we's classmates. The
Speaker 1: old man leaned forward and injected a long stream of
Speaker 1: spit into a can between his feet. Then he closed
Speaker 1: his eyes and wrinkled his forehead in an effort to
Speaker 1: pull something from deep inside his memories. A quick smile
Speaker 1: creased his old cheeks, and he continued, Bobby lived over
Speaker 1: on the other side of the Devil's Knot. Most of
Speaker 1: us boys stayed away from there. We have legends about
Speaker 1: that place, stories kids tell around the camp fire. He
Speaker 1: leaned into the young man sitting beside him on the
Speaker 1: park bench and said, now listen here, I won't deny
Speaker 1: that kill blow anything up to scare each other, but
Speaker 1: there really was something wrong with that holler. For one thing,
Speaker 1: it may not be at all that wide, but they
Speaker 1: say it goes all the way from here to Canada
Speaker 1: without a single break in the woods. The young man's
Speaker 1: stifled to grin. Google Maps would have put an end
Speaker 1: to the old man's belief in that myth, but he
Speaker 1: was right about one thing. The hollow may have only
Speaker 1: been a mile and a half wide by three miles long,
Speaker 1: but it did spill into a patch of land that
Speaker 1: was more than two hundred and forty square miles of
Speaker 1: nothing but trees, brambles, gullies, vines, undergrowth, snakes and spiders
Speaker 1: and blood sucking insects. The sun never saw the floor
Speaker 1: of that forest. Bobby's daddy disappeared into that place, you know.
Speaker 1: The old man said, I understand that story, mister high Tower.
Speaker 1: But all the police reports state that he ran off
Speaker 1: and left his wife and kids fin for themselves. The
Speaker 1: young man offered he had been to the courthouse and
Speaker 1: gone through all the old reports that he could find.
Speaker 1: Back in the nineteen forties, when Truman County was a
Speaker 1: lot less populated, reports were written without as much as
Speaker 1: official language as they are today, and several times the
Speaker 1: man found notes indicating that the woman was crazy and
Speaker 1: that the husband probably couldn't take anymore. That's not so,
Speaker 1: the old man growled, and miss Dumeyer was a good woman.
Speaker 1: She grew up with my mama, and not a better
Speaker 1: woman ever lived. And that's my mama's word, not mine.
Speaker 1: He gave his companion a side eyed stare, as if
Speaker 1: challenging him to question his mother. What's your name, boy,
Speaker 1: he asked, for what the young man thought was probably
Speaker 1: the eighth time. Martin Chesterfield, he answered as politely as
Speaker 1: a man who was running out of patience could. But
Speaker 1: you can call me Chig. Everyone does. Chig, old Man grumbled,
Speaker 1: as if the name didn't sit well on his tongue. Well,
Speaker 1: my name's Gordon high Tower, he said, having forgotten that
Speaker 1: he had already introduced himself a half a dozen times.
Speaker 1: Chig worried that the story he was getting wasn't going
Speaker 1: to be very accurate, given the advanced age of the
Speaker 1: man and his inability to remember simple facts. However, there
Speaker 1: weren't many people left who knew Bobby Dumyer personally, and
Speaker 1: most of those who did were already too far gone
Speaker 1: with dementia to get any facts out of them at all.
Speaker 1: Now you wasn't here, and you don't know, mister high
Speaker 1: Tower spoke resentfully. Mister Dumier wasn't a bad man and
Speaker 1: his wife was a good woman. Now that's a fact.
Speaker 1: Their farm was over on the other side of Devil's Knoight,
Speaker 1: it siddled right up alongside it. Most folks around here
Speaker 1: wouldn't go near that place, so the Dumayers were left
Speaker 1: pretty much to themselves. That suited mister Dumer just fine.
Speaker 1: He liked being left alone, and he was fearless as
Speaker 1: all get out. He hunted that holler all the time.
Speaker 1: He'd take his gun and head down into those woods
Speaker 1: and bring out some of the finest bucks you ever
Speaker 1: laid eyes on. One of the few pictures I own
Speaker 1: of my own daddy was of him standing next to
Speaker 1: Will Dumar and a ten point buck he killed and
Speaker 1: devils not mister high Tower set up a little straighter
Speaker 1: with those words, as if it was his father who
Speaker 1: had shot the deer. Yes, but the police reports say.
Speaker 1: I don't give a one eyed jack what those reports say.
Speaker 1: Will Dumer would not have run out on his family. Now,
Speaker 1: I know Miss Dumier wasn't quite right in the head,
Speaker 1: but that wasn't until after her husband disappeared. Of course,
Speaker 1: she lost her mind. Then that holler swallowed him up,
Speaker 1: and not one member of this community was willing to
Speaker 1: go in there looking for him. What about the reports,
Speaker 1: Chig asked, what reports? Oh, you mean the ones when
Speaker 1: she complained that something was attacking their livestock, taking their chickens,
Speaker 1: getting in the barn and tearing it up. Well, yes,
Speaker 1: those reports all state that she wasn't I know what
Speaker 1: those dang reports saying. I'm telling you she wasn't wrong.
Speaker 1: I won't say she was right. Like I said, the
Speaker 1: woman's husband had up and vanished. I don't blame her
Speaker 1: for being a little squirrely, but that don't mean there
Speaker 1: ain't something in those woods and that it didn't get
Speaker 1: her husband. And then later mister high Tower let his
Speaker 1: voice trail off. He wasn't ready to share the latter
Speaker 1: half of the story yet, and Chig didn't push it.
Speaker 1: They sat for silence for a few minutes, and the
Speaker 1: old man was lost in his memories. His eyes already
Speaker 1: clouded with cataracts, welled with tears as he remembered you
Speaker 1: spent with his friends, swimming in the cold water creeks,
Speaker 1: green hills and valleys, and hunting patches of timber. Chigg
Speaker 1: used the time to mul over the information he already
Speaker 1: knew about Bobby Dumyer and his family. In nineteen forty five,
Speaker 1: will Dumeyer returned from World War II to resume running
Speaker 1: the farm that he and his wife had started shortly
Speaker 1: after their marriage in nineteen thirty three. The farm was
Speaker 1: a two hundred acre stretch of land that bordered the
Speaker 1: infamous Long Hollow on the west and Cinder Creek on
Speaker 1: the north, the Edward River on the east, and Postal
Speaker 1: Route forty four hundred north on the south. Several decades later,
Speaker 1: the road was renamed one seventh Avenue North. The nearest
Speaker 1: town to the Dumyrs was winter Rest. It sat on
Speaker 1: the other side of a holla and had a booming population,
Speaker 1: with a grand total of five hundred and seventeen people,
Speaker 1: half of which were the rural farmers that lived all
Speaker 1: around it. In every direction. No larger towns existed for miles.
Speaker 1: The Dumayers had two children, Bobby, who was born in
Speaker 1: nineteen thirty six and Cassandra, who came along in nineteen
Speaker 1: forty one. Georgia Dumayer was from all reports a good farmer.
Speaker 1: While her husband was away fighting the war, she never
Speaker 1: missed putting in a crop in the three and a
Speaker 1: half years her husband was away. She maintained the livestock,
Speaker 1: kept milk production, raised enough chickens to sell eggs at
Speaker 1: the market, managed a large victory garden, from which she
Speaker 1: was able to give produce to some of the less
Speaker 1: fortunate people in town, and did all of this while
Speaker 1: keeping her house clean and the children in order. Chig
Speaker 1: could not argue with mister high Tower's assertion that Georgia
Speaker 1: Dumer wasn't crazy before her husband vanished, but once he
Speaker 1: was gone, there was more than enough evidence that she
Speaker 1: was insane. It all happened on a cold November morning
Speaker 1: in nineteen forty seven. It was the opening day of
Speaker 1: deer season, and because no one else was willing to
Speaker 1: so much as passed through the devil's knot, Will Dumar
Speaker 1: had the veritable paradise of hunting opportunities. He left the
Speaker 1: house that morning, certain that he would be successful on
Speaker 1: the first day. As he crossed the hayfield that separated
Speaker 1: his house from the hollow, he might have been thinking
Speaker 1: about the strange events that had taken place recently. It
Speaker 1: had been only a week ago that he had been
Speaker 1: startled awake by the sound of the animals in the barn.
Speaker 1: Clearly something was attacking them. Without a second thought, he
Speaker 1: jumped up, dressed and grabbed his gun, and he ran outside.
Speaker 1: As he crossed the barnyard. He could hear the milkcows
Speaker 1: bleeding in a high pitched frenzy of anxiety and panic,
Speaker 1: and hogs screamed in fright, and geese honked and cackled
Speaker 1: in alarm. Will was almost there when the door flew
Speaker 1: open and something ran across the opening between the barn
Speaker 1: and the tractor shed that his mind would not allow
Speaker 1: him to accept. Inside the barn, he found a mass
Speaker 1: of carnage that tore his heart out of his chest.
Speaker 1: One of his best sous was lying on the ground,
Speaker 1: her tongue hanging out of her mouth as she struggled
Speaker 1: to inhale enough air to breathe. The entire contents of
Speaker 1: her abdominal cavity were spilled out on the ground around her.
Speaker 1: Will looked down into poor thing, who stared back in
Speaker 1: wild disbelief, and with a tear in his eyes, he
Speaker 1: placed the barrel of his rifle behind her ear and
Speaker 1: pulled the trigger. Two nights later, Will found himself running
Speaker 1: back out into the night, this time to his chicken house,
Speaker 1: where he discovered a half a dozen hens torn to pieces.
Speaker 1: Another half dozen were missing. Whatever got to them tore
Speaker 1: the door off the pin like it was a cardboard
Speaker 1: flap on a box. This time he noted the tracks
Speaker 1: that it left behind. The large, padded footprints were a
Speaker 1: solid twelve inches in length and just as wide, and
Speaker 1: the nailmarks at the end of each toe print indicated
Speaker 1: non retractable claws. K nine. Will muttered, except this canine
Speaker 1: walked on two legs. The night before hunting season, Will
Speaker 1: sat in his front parlor reading a book while his
Speaker 1: wife mended socks in her chair. Beside him. At a
Speaker 1: small table in front of the window, Bobby and Cassie
Speaker 1: were engaged in a game of dominoes. It was a
Speaker 1: kind of family scene that Norman Rockwell might have painted
Speaker 1: for the Saturday Evening Post. There was nothing special about
Speaker 1: this night. Will's preoccupation with his anticipated hunt in the
Speaker 1: morning might have required him to reread a page or
Speaker 1: two of his book, but aside from that, it was
Speaker 1: a peaceful evening. Then something thumped hard on the front porch.
Speaker 1: Georgia looked up from her sewing and asked, what's that.
Speaker 1: I don't know, Will answered as he slipped a bookmark
Speaker 1: into the pages of the book he was reading and
Speaker 1: laid it down. Bobby jumped up and crossed the room
Speaker 1: ahead of his father, anxious to see who or what
Speaker 1: was outside their front door. Georgia was right behind him,
Speaker 1: calling for him to wait for his father. Everyone was
Speaker 1: in motion at that moment except for Cassie. She sat
Speaker 1: quietly staring out the window. Her eyes grew wide and
Speaker 1: her little body trembled. Before stepping into the front hall,
Speaker 1: Will decided to stop at his guncase and grab his rifle.
Speaker 1: He had no answer for the inquisitive look on George's face,
Speaker 1: so he only shrugged. Bobby was at the door, already
Speaker 1: wrenching it open when Will grabbed his shoulder and pulled
Speaker 1: him backward. Georgia reached over and flipped on the switch
Speaker 1: that sent power to the small light that hung beside
Speaker 1: the front door. The porch was empty. Will stepped out
Speaker 1: onto the board and walked first to his left across
Speaker 1: the long stretch of wooden planks to that end of
Speaker 1: the house. Here the porch terminated into a set of
Speaker 1: steps that led to the side yard. He saw nothing.
Speaker 1: He then turned and retraced his path to the front
Speaker 1: door and beyond to the other end of the house.
Speaker 1: Here the porch turned and wrapped around the parlor without
Speaker 1: a flashlight, something he had not thought to grab. He
Speaker 1: couldn't make out much in the dark shadows beyond the
Speaker 1: white picket fence that surrounded the yard. At the end
Speaker 1: of the side porch, where another set of steps led
Speaker 1: down into the night, Will turn and faced the house. There,
Speaker 1: sitting silently in the window, her eyes full of images
Speaker 1: too frightening to describe, was Cassie. Her little mouth was
Speaker 1: formed into an oh, but nothing was coming out. Will
Speaker 1: tapped at the window, bringing her from her trance. She
Speaker 1: glanced at her father for only a moment before pouring
Speaker 1: into the yard, and finally, with a kind of exquisite
Speaker 1: agony that can only be achieved when every limit has
Speaker 1: been reached, she released a long, ear piercing scream. It
Speaker 1: was a long night, and Cassie couldn't voice what she saw.
Speaker 1: Georgia had tried to put her to bed, but she
Speaker 1: refused to be left alone. In the end, Georgia was
Speaker 1: only able to soothe her daughter by crawling into the
Speaker 1: bed beside her and holding her until she fell asleep.
Speaker 1: Even that wasn't enough. She tried to go back to
Speaker 1: her own bed several times in the night, and every
Speaker 1: time Cassie woke up, crying and begging not to be
Speaker 1: left alone with the monster. Will had slept a little better,
Speaker 1: but not much. Several times he had gotten up and
Speaker 1: gone downstairs to pace the front poor with his rifle,
Speaker 1: certain that whatever was there earlier was still lingering near Bobby,
Speaker 1: unfazed by any of it, slept like a baby. After
Speaker 1: a few nights of peace, Will woke up early that morning. Georgia,
Speaker 1: exhausted and sore from several nights of sleeping in her
Speaker 1: daughter's cramp bed, managed to put on a pot of
Speaker 1: coffee and fry up some eggs and bacon for her
Speaker 1: husband while he prepared himself for his hunt. Together, they
Speaker 1: ate and talked about the sort of things that most
Speaker 1: couples discuss at the breakfast table. The events of the
Speaker 1: previous week were pushed out of mind. Will hadn't told
Speaker 1: his wife everything yet. He thought maybe he would eventually,
Speaker 1: but first he had to find the right words. How
Speaker 1: does a man tell his wife that he had seen
Speaker 1: something that looked like a cross between line Cheney and
Speaker 1: the wolf Man and an actual wolf with a snout
Speaker 1: and large canine. Furthermore, it was nearly seven feet tall.
Speaker 1: All Georgia knew was that some wild animal was getting
Speaker 1: at their livestock. For now, he figured that's all she
Speaker 1: needed to know. All of these things might have been
Speaker 1: on Will's mind as he crossed the hayfield and entered
Speaker 1: the Devil's Knot. There would be much to consider and
Speaker 1: a lot to take care of, But first he needed
Speaker 1: to put a deer in the freezer. Venison was always
Speaker 1: an excellent alternative to beef during the long winter months
Speaker 1: of the year. That night, Georgia Doomera contacted the Truman
Speaker 1: County Sheriff's office. It was almost ten pm when she
Speaker 1: made the call. Her husband had not come back from hunting.
Speaker 1: The sheriff's deputy came out to investigate the situation. She
Speaker 1: explained that her husband had left shortly before daylight. She
Speaker 1: pointed out the route he took across the hayfield into
Speaker 1: the woods, showed the deputy where she had stood on
Speaker 1: the porch, drinking a cup of coffee and watching him
Speaker 1: until he had vanished behind the tree line. The deputy
Speaker 1: took notes positive theories and offered assurances that will Wood
Speaker 1: come walking back out of those woods at any moment,
Speaker 1: maybe dragging with him a record buck. The next morning,
Speaker 1: Georgia made another call. Her husband was not back. Yet
Speaker 1: another deputy came to the house. He wrote all the
Speaker 1: same things the first deputy wrote. He formed all the
Speaker 1: same theories the first deputy form, and he provided the
Speaker 1: encouragement the first deputy gave. But like the first deputy,
Speaker 1: he did not go down into the woods to search,
Speaker 1: nor did the next deputy who came out to the house,
Speaker 1: nor the next When Will Dumayer was reported missing, a
Speaker 1: lot of the men in Truman County got together to
Speaker 1: form a search party for him. They searched every meadow field,
Speaker 1: pass patch of timber Lake and pond in the county,
Speaker 1: but they did not search the devil's knot. Some of
Speaker 1: the men even walked around town, thinking maybe they'd find
Speaker 1: him hiding in an alley or drunk at the only
Speaker 1: town bar. He wasn't there either. A few days after
Speaker 1: Will Dumyer disappeared, Georgia Dumar made one more frantic phone
Speaker 1: call to the Sheriff's department. This time she claimed some
Speaker 1: sort of animal was in her barn, tearing up her livestock.
Speaker 1: She was hysterical as she screamed into the phone that
Speaker 1: someone needed to come out to the house and kill
Speaker 1: it before it killed everything else. And in the background,
Speaker 1: a dog could be heard growling and snarling and barking.
Speaker 1: A pounding could be clearly heard that sounded like something
Speaker 1: was trying to tear the doors off the house. And
Speaker 1: suddenly Georgia screamed, Oh my god, it's a were wolf,
Speaker 1: and the phone went silent. No one can say for
Speaker 1: sure what happened after that night. Her claim that the
Speaker 1: house was being attacked by a werewolf gave the sheriff's
Speaker 1: department a reason to dismiss her claim as being delusional.
Speaker 1: After all, the poor woman's husband was missing. It was
Speaker 1: then that people began to formulate the theory that Georgia
Speaker 1: Dumarer was insane, and that perhaps her husband had secured
Speaker 1: his own disappearance to get as far from her as possible.
Speaker 1: Additional calls to the sheriff's office for protection from the
Speaker 1: werewolf went unanswered. You wanted to know about Bobby, the
Speaker 1: old man said, interrupting Jiggs's thoughts. Yes, I did. His
Speaker 1: reply sounded as flustered as he felt at the moment. Well,
Speaker 1: I'll tell you about him. He was a kind of
Speaker 1: kid who never had to find trouble. Trouble just seemed
Speaker 1: to find him. Back in those days, if you was
Speaker 1: a boy, you owned the world. When we wasn't in
Speaker 1: school or doing chores, we were free to roam and ways.
Speaker 1: These young people today would never understand. Rivers and creeks
Speaker 1: were for swimming and fishing. Woods were for hunting and
Speaker 1: making forks. We all had bicycles, and those bikes took
Speaker 1: us everywhere we wanted to go. Mister high Tower felt
Speaker 1: silent again, wondering down the roads that no longer existed,
Speaker 1: or that had changed so much that they were no
Speaker 1: longer recognizable. After a minute, Chig said softly, mister high Tower.
Speaker 1: The old man turned and stared at the youth beside him.
Speaker 1: What was your name again, he asked, I'm Chig. Chig answered,
Speaker 1: no longer capable of the patients to provide his whole name.
Speaker 1: That's an odd name for a boy, Mister high Tower said, yes, sir,
Speaker 1: you were saying about Bobby Dumier. Oh yeah, Bobby. He
Speaker 1: didn't have the free them the rest of us boys had.
Speaker 1: With his daddy gone, He had all the chores of
Speaker 1: a grown man to tend to you before and after school.
Speaker 1: If that wasn't bad enough. He couldn't never sit still
Speaker 1: in school. If he wasn't squirming in his chair, he
Speaker 1: was wandering around the room, couldn't hold his attention for
Speaker 1: five minutes. You'd have thought he'd be too tired for
Speaker 1: shenanigans with all the work he had done at home.
Speaker 1: But no, not Bobby and the trouble he got into.
Speaker 1: If there was a frog in the teacher's desk, I
Speaker 1: guarantee it was Bobby put it there. The old man
Speaker 1: chuckled to himself. He likeed kids in the outhouse put
Speaker 1: glue on their hair and filled the water jugs with minnas,
Speaker 1: and he would soak the chalk in water. Chick didn't
Speaker 1: understand the last two statements, so mister high Tower had
Speaker 1: to describe the big stoneware jugs of water that stood
Speaker 1: in the hallway with ten cups hanging on hooks beside them,
Speaker 1: where kids could get a t drink before the water
Speaker 1: fountains were installed. He then had to explain that chalk,
Speaker 1: when soaked in water, becomes soft and unusable. When Chig
Speaker 1: explained that the schools he had gone to as a
Speaker 1: kid didn't have chalkboards, but dry erase boards, Gordon felt
Speaker 1: confused and uncomfortable. Yeah, it's a different world we live
Speaker 1: in now, he muttered, Yes, Sir Jigg said, before adding
Speaker 1: now about Bobby. Bobby, Gordon echoed, trying to focus. Now.
Speaker 1: He was a handful, and that meant that Bobby spent
Speaker 1: most nights after school writing his penance out on the chalkboard.
Speaker 1: Because he spent so much time paying for his sins
Speaker 1: after school, he rarely made it home before dark once
Speaker 1: winter set in. Gordon took a hard look at Chig
Speaker 1: before continuing. The tall young man seated beside him could
Speaker 1: not have been more than twenty two or twenty three
Speaker 1: years old. His pink face, splattered with apricot freckles, was
Speaker 1: a harsh contrast to the carrot red hair that wouldn't
Speaker 1: lie flat on his head. He was tall, with very
Speaker 1: little meat on his bones. As perhaps a misguided attempt
Speaker 1: to wear his profession like a badge, he had chosen
Speaker 1: a dark corduroy jacket with leather sleeve patches to wear
Speaker 1: over his button collar shirt and khaki pants. It only
Speaker 1: served to make his shoulder blades look more angular and
Speaker 1: his stomach punched to appear more prevalent and his long,
Speaker 1: bony fingers to look more skeletal. It occurred to Gordon
Speaker 1: that were this young man's hair a darker shade of red,
Speaker 1: he might have been Bobby dumer all grown up. Are
Speaker 1: you related to Bobby? He asked, No, sir, not that
Speaker 1: I know of. And what do you want to know
Speaker 1: so much about them? For? Well, my editor asked me
Speaker 1: to do a Halloween piece on odd legends in this area.
Speaker 1: It was not the first time that Chig had explained this.
Speaker 1: I remember hearing about Bobby Dumier when I was a kid,
Speaker 1: so I decided to find out if it was a
Speaker 1: real person. Well he was real, the old man assured him,
Speaker 1: before leaning forward and sending another stream of spit into
Speaker 1: the can, real as you and me. Well, if Bobby
Speaker 1: had to stay after school every night, how did he
Speaker 1: manage to get home to his family's farm clear over
Speaker 1: on the other side of Devil's Knot, Jig asked, Well,
Speaker 1: he walked, Gordon answered, matter of factly. I guess the
Speaker 1: better way to say it is that he ran the
Speaker 1: road there where Devil's Knot starts, curves around hard to
Speaker 1: the south, and then back again to the north in
Speaker 1: a great, big s curve. Now Bobby knew if he
Speaker 1: cut off the road there ran down through the hollow
Speaker 1: and then follows cinder Creek to where he could jump
Speaker 1: over it before the waterfall and scramble back up the
Speaker 1: hill to the other side, that he'd come out in
Speaker 1: the hayfill that separated his house from the Knight and
Speaker 1: himself saved twenty men. It would still take him more
Speaker 1: than half an hour, but he had a lot of
Speaker 1: work to do when he got home. He used to
Speaker 1: brag about it to us boys, who were afraid of
Speaker 1: that place. As the old man Chig found it easy
Speaker 1: to imagine Bobby Dumer walking down the gravel road that
Speaker 1: took him to the Devil's Knot. As it made the
Speaker 1: first turn to the south, it rose up and crawled
Speaker 1: along the edge of a bluff. An open meadow covered
Speaker 1: the top of that hill. The grass that grew there
Speaker 1: was dotted with tall prairie flowers, and blues and pinks
Speaker 1: and yellows and whites. Patches of clover spread across it
Speaker 1: in drifts of purple, and here and there the large, velvety,
Speaker 1: soft blossoms of thistle reached upward and burst out of
Speaker 1: deep green pineapple shaped cones. The northern side of the
Speaker 1: road was a devilish contrast, with massive trees draped in
Speaker 1: vines that hung over the world beneath them, like crippled
Speaker 1: old teachers hovering over classrooms full of children. The undergrowth
Speaker 1: of that hollow was stick with poisonous plants, thorny bushes,
Speaker 1: and anemic looking saplings that beg for their chance at
Speaker 1: the sun. But there was no shoulder between the road
Speaker 1: and the hollow, just to drop off that fell quickly
Speaker 1: into the black mire of green hell. Here and there
Speaker 1: a small gap revealed a game trail. Those gaps were rare,
Speaker 1: it was otherwise impenetrable, and then the road would turn
Speaker 1: sharply and make its way back to the north. As
Speaker 1: it did so, it fell well below the bluff on
Speaker 1: its right and slid through the portal of tree branches
Speaker 1: and vines into the hollow itself. This was as close
Speaker 1: as anyone ever came to entering the Devil's Knot, and
Speaker 1: even here it wasn't truly inside. After a quarter mile
Speaker 1: looping in and out of the knot, it turned again
Speaker 1: and went due east past du Meyer's farm. Those who
Speaker 1: rode their horses do here held their breath and prayed. Later,
Speaker 1: when people drove their cars through, they did so as
Speaker 1: quickly as the curves would allow. It was on the
Speaker 1: first curve where the occasional game trail opened small gateways
Speaker 1: into the primordial world of Devil's Knot that Bobby would
Speaker 1: slip into the mire. He had to pick his way
Speaker 1: carefully down that first hillside. Rocks jutted out here and
Speaker 1: there that he could place a foot on or grab
Speaker 1: with a hand to slow his descent. With each step forward.
Speaker 1: The world grew darker during the second half of November
Speaker 1: and all of December and January. In the first part
Speaker 1: of February, he was nearly always making his trek in
Speaker 1: the dark. He didn't like it. There were chores to
Speaker 1: be done at home. He had no choice. At the
Speaker 1: bottom of the hill lay a flat expanse divided in
Speaker 1: two by cinder creek. Although the stream was never deep,
Speaker 1: there was always fresh water running here. Rocks and stones
Speaker 1: provided ledges for it to trip over and gurgle out
Speaker 1: a natural melody. Bobby liked to stop when he could
Speaker 1: and looked for minnows in the occasional hole where the
Speaker 1: water would get two or three feet deep. He never
Speaker 1: lingered long, but he wasn't really afraid either, and in
Speaker 1: his mind his father lived here, he felt protected by him.
Speaker 1: The eyes that he always felt were on him when
Speaker 1: he walked through this place he attributed to being the
Speaker 1: eyes of his father. The long walk down the creek
Speaker 1: bed ended where the world dropped off and a small
Speaker 1: waterfall trickled down into a pool of water stretching a
Speaker 1: dozen feet in diameter. Here, Bobby always liked to stand
Speaker 1: on the ledge and look down into the black water below.
Speaker 1: It was too dark to make out anything down there,
Speaker 1: but he often suspected that someone or something was looking back.
Speaker 1: He liked to imagine that it was his dad. After
Speaker 1: a minute, he would then turn and head back up
Speaker 1: the hill on a zig zagging pattern through the trees
Speaker 1: and pass the boulders until he reached the fence that
Speaker 1: formed the barrier between the farm and the hollow. Then,
Speaker 1: and only then would Bobby feel the need to run.
Speaker 1: He always felt that he had to get as far
Speaker 1: from that tree line as possible because he was sure
Speaker 1: that something was back there, waiting for the exact moment
Speaker 1: when it could reach out and pull him back in.
Speaker 1: Like his father, forever. Halfway across the pasture, he would stop,
Speaker 1: his lungs burning for fresh oxygen and his legs cramping
Speaker 1: from the climb and then the run, he would double
Speaker 1: over and hold his gut for a second, silently reassuring
Speaker 1: himself that he was safe always. He turned his head
Speaker 1: at that moment and looked to the house. He knew
Speaker 1: his little sister, Cassie would be sitting on the front
Speaker 1: porch waiting for him, or maybe she'd be playing in
Speaker 1: the grass in the house yard, surrounded by the white
Speaker 1: picket fence. No matter how cold it was, no matter
Speaker 1: what the weather was like, Cassie was always there. Bobby
Speaker 1: walked Cassie to school every morning, but his eternal bad
Speaker 1: behavior left her to walk home alone at night. In
Speaker 1: the twenty first century, that might seem like an awful
Speaker 1: thing to ask a child so young, after all, she
Speaker 1: was only seven, but this was a different time. Back then,
Speaker 1: most children were expected to walk themselves to and from school,
Speaker 1: whether they had an older sibling to take them or not.
Speaker 1: Traversing the road that passed through the hollow terrified her.
Speaker 1: Unlike her brother, she had seen what lived there, so
Speaker 1: once she got home, she waited for him and prayed
Speaker 1: that he would be safe, and when she spotted him
Speaker 1: crossing the hayfield, her eyes would always light up, and
Speaker 1: she'd come to the gate and wait there for him.
Speaker 1: Then came the night that Bobby stood in the middle
Speaker 1: of the field and looked for his sister, but she
Speaker 1: wasn't there. He would never have admitted it out loud,
Speaker 1: but he was deeply disappointed that he had lost his
Speaker 1: importance to her. Trying not to feel too bad, he
Speaker 1: reminded himself that she wasn't a baby anymore. She was
Speaker 1: in the first grade. Now. He should have expected this
Speaker 1: day to come, but even so, as he opened the gate,
Speaker 1: he couldn't help but look around to see if maybe
Speaker 1: she had chosen to hide from him and jump out
Speaker 1: and scare him. Bobby was still reeling in the disappointment
Speaker 1: of a sister who was growing up when the front
Speaker 1: door opened and his mother stepped out. A year had
Speaker 1: passed since his father disappeared, it looked more like ten
Speaker 1: years on his mother's face. Her hair was graying, and
Speaker 1: her eyes were bathed in dark circles, and her frown
Speaker 1: lines were becoming permanent. She was showing signs of mental
Speaker 1: distress as well. Sometimes she would wake up up in
Speaker 1: the middle of the night calling for her husband, and
Speaker 1: then she would run out into the yard and stare
Speaker 1: at the hollow like she was going to run in
Speaker 1: there and find him. Bobby would always catch up with
Speaker 1: her by then and direct her back inside. He was
Speaker 1: afraid that she was slipping away from him, and he
Speaker 1: worried about what he and Cassie would do when the
Speaker 1: day came that their mother was gone too. Where is
Speaker 1: your sister, Georgia yelled, huh, Bobby stupidly answered, isn't she home? No,
Speaker 1: she isn't home. She didn't come home from school. I
Speaker 1: was hoping that she was with you. Georgie said, not
Speaker 1: bothering to mask her fears. She always comes straight home.
Speaker 1: Bobby turned and looked back at the hollow. Cassie would
Speaker 1: never have taken his shortcut. She wouldn't have known the route,
Speaker 1: and even if she had, she wouldn't have gone into
Speaker 1: that hollow alone. She was terrified of it. He looked
Speaker 1: back at his mother, who was now visibly trembling and
Speaker 1: staring at the dark patch of timber on the other
Speaker 1: side of the hayfield. The memory of that day when
Speaker 1: his father didn't come home washed over him. The thought
Speaker 1: of all those men from all over the county being
Speaker 1: too afraid to search inside the Devil's Not hit him hard.
Speaker 1: If Cassie was in there, he was going to have
Speaker 1: to find her himself. Mama, he said, with the most
Speaker 1: grown up voice he could muster. Call the sheriff's office.
Speaker 1: Tell them that Cassie didn't come home from school. Tell
Speaker 1: them I went into the Devil's Not to find her,
Speaker 1: so they don't have to. But they need to search
Speaker 1: the roads and everywhere else while I'm looking, in case
Speaker 1: she isn't in there. Georgia Dumayer looked at her son
Speaker 1: in disbelief. Tormented by the loss of her husband, the
Speaker 1: possibility that her daughter may have also been swallowed up
Speaker 1: by that horrible place, and the unimaginable choice of letting
Speaker 1: her son enter that place of hell or keeping him
Speaker 1: with her as her last remaining piece of happiness tore
Speaker 1: at her from all directions. She didn't move, Mama, do
Speaker 1: what I said, Do it now, Bobby ordered as sternly
Speaker 1: as he could. For a minute, he thought that his
Speaker 1: mother wouldn't move at all. He thought he was going
Speaker 1: to have to waste time making that phone call. But
Speaker 1: he couldn't do that. There wasn't any time. He had
Speaker 1: to find Cassie and Mama had to make the phone call.
Speaker 1: Just as he was about to open his mouth and
Speaker 1: scream at her, Georgia turned and ran inside, taking one
Speaker 1: deep breath to help bolster his courage. Bobby turned and
Speaker 1: faced the woods. Of course, no one knows for sure
Speaker 1: what happened that night, mister high Tower said, breaking through
Speaker 1: Chig's reverie. I suppose this is as close to the
Speaker 1: events as anyone can get. Jigg answered politely, mister high
Speaker 1: Tower was right, It was all conjecture. He made a
Speaker 1: mental note to Clara that when he wrote the story,
Speaker 1: didn't missus Dumer know that Bobby used the Devil's Knot
Speaker 1: as a shortcut every day. He asked, Mister high Tower
Speaker 1: only shrugged and continued his tale. She had closed his
Speaker 1: eyes and followed the story with his imagination. Bobby had
Speaker 1: turned and faced the dark hollow, knowing that he was
Speaker 1: going to have to enter it unarmed. Somewhere in there
Speaker 1: was a rifle that belonged to his dad. He doubted
Speaker 1: that anyone would ever find it now. Unfortunately, it was
Speaker 1: the only gun the Dumayer family owned. He had expected
Speaker 1: to get a shotgun for Christmas the year's father disappeared.
Speaker 1: Most boys his age got one for Christmas or a
Speaker 1: birthday back then, but by Christmas his father was gone.
Speaker 1: Eyes appeared at Bobby from inside the tree line that
Speaker 1: glowed brilliant and red, as if lit from within. He
Speaker 1: didn't see them. His focus was on entering where he
Speaker 1: it Each day. These eyes were farther down as he walked.
Speaker 1: He set a silent prayer that his father would be
Speaker 1: with him and protect him. The eyes blinked and moved away.
Speaker 1: By the time the sheriff arrived with some deputies, Georgia
Speaker 1: Dumer was inconsolable. She was crying that her children were
Speaker 1: in the knot and that they were going to be
Speaker 1: eaten by the werewolf. A doctor was summoned to administer
Speaker 1: sedatives to keep her calm. Two deputies volunteered to follow
Speaker 1: Bobby's path into the hollow, and although they were clearly terrified,
Speaker 1: how could they refuse to go when a twelve year
Speaker 1: old boy had so bravely gone in alone. They were
Speaker 1: in there for nearly three hours. Others who had gathered
Speaker 1: at the Dumayer farm stood in small groups around the
Speaker 1: barnyard or warm their hands on the fire someone had
Speaker 1: started in the burning barrel. And while Georgia Dumyer laid
Speaker 1: in her bed under the influence of heavy medication, other
Speaker 1: women from the area arrived with food for the men
Speaker 1: and boiled coffee on the stove. Every minute that ticked
Speaker 1: by on the clock felt like a hammer blow to
Speaker 1: Bobby and Cassie's chances of survival. Inside the knight, Bobby
Speaker 1: searched for his little sister in the dark, Cassie. He
Speaker 1: called as he walked up and down cinder Creek, Cassie.
Speaker 1: After each call, he stopped and listened. Sometimes he thought
Speaker 1: he heard her frightened voice answer back, and he would
Speaker 1: move in that direction. Other times he heard footsteps snapping
Speaker 1: twigs and crushing nearby leaf matter, and he would turn
Speaker 1: and he would follow that sound. Wasn't long before he
Speaker 1: heard the deputies in the hollow, looking for both him
Speaker 1: and his sister. He tried to call back to let
Speaker 1: them know where he was, but sound plays a devilish
Speaker 1: game in places like that. The dampness from the underbrush
Speaker 1: and the thousand captured rainstorms will absorb sound and deaden
Speaker 1: it before it has time to travel. What little noise
Speaker 1: that escapes bounces around on petrified bark jutting stones until
Speaker 1: it's difficult to tell the direction of its origin. And
Speaker 1: Bobby knew this even as he turned again and tried
Speaker 1: to follow his sister's pleading cries. Fear is the only
Speaker 1: true enemy of courage. It always outweighs it. It is
Speaker 1: louder and more convincing, and it never relents. Courage is fleeting.
Speaker 1: It stands strong against the task before it, but often
Speaker 1: crumbles in the undertaking. Bobby felt his courage struggling to
Speaker 1: leave him, and again and again he had to remind
Speaker 1: himself that this was his baby's sister that he was
Speaker 1: looking for. She relied on him. Her father was gone,
Speaker 1: their mother was losing her mind. She was all that
Speaker 1: he had He had to push forward. Lord. No atheists
Speaker 1: ever entered the Devil's Knot, or if they did and survived,
Speaker 1: they came out knowing God. The deputies saw things and
Speaker 1: heard things inside that patch of woods that they would
Speaker 1: spend the rest of their lives talking about to their
Speaker 1: children and their children's children. Red eyes glowed at them
Speaker 1: from behind trees. Footsteps followed them up and down the
Speaker 1: creek bed. Growling sounds from animals too big to be
Speaker 1: the wolves they sounded like, came at them from every direction.
Speaker 1: The smell of blood and death burned in their nostrils,
Speaker 1: and neither spoke except to give direction. But both men
Speaker 1: held one thought in his mind. As frightened as they
Speaker 1: were here together, what those two children were feeling alone
Speaker 1: must have been unbearable. As the moon rose over the
Speaker 1: hollow and the hope slipped away, the deputies turned and
Speaker 1: headed back to the house. They knew that neither of
Speaker 1: those children, whatever come out of that hollow alive. The
Speaker 1: batteries on their flashlights were losing power, and their legs
Speaker 1: ached from climbing up and down the slippery, rocky hillsides.
Speaker 1: The moonlight reflecting on the hay stubble of the field
Speaker 1: before them was a welcome sight to their shame. Each
Speaker 1: was proud that he had survived that place, despite not
Speaker 1: finding Bobby or Cassie. Less than two steps outside of
Speaker 1: that hollow, they froze in their tracks as a crack
Speaker 1: of a rifle shot followed by a long, menacing howl,
Speaker 1: split the night. People in the barnyard turned and stared.
Speaker 1: The two deputies turned and stared. Georgia Dumer sat up
Speaker 1: in her bed and screamed her own tormented howl. Afterwards,
Speaker 1: the sound of a child's cry could be heard. Everyone watched,
Speaker 1: No one breathed. Then little Cassie, her long red hair
Speaker 1: having come loose from its braids and now tumbling down
Speaker 1: her back, stepped out of the Devil's Not alive, Cassie
Speaker 1: was covered in blood. The doctor who was attending Georgia
Speaker 1: Dumayer gave her a full examination. Some of the neighbor's
Speaker 1: women helped to wash her up. She was bruised and scratched,
Speaker 1: but no major cuts existed to account for that much blood.
Speaker 1: Her frightened blue eyes swam and unshed tears that spilled
Speaker 1: out only when they laid her beside her mother on
Speaker 1: the bed. She never spoke again, except to utter one sentence,
Speaker 1: He saved me. When the morning came, most of those
Speaker 1: who had gathered at the du Meyer farm went home,
Speaker 1: a few of the ladies stayed to care for Georgia
Speaker 1: and Cassie, but most people, seeing that they had no
Speaker 1: real duties to fulfill, now decided that they would do
Speaker 1: better to go home and get out of the way. Besides,
Speaker 1: they might accidentally stick around so long that someone might
Speaker 1: ask them to go into the devil's for one more look.
Speaker 1: A dozen local farmers in the sheriff himself did exactly that.
Speaker 1: They searched the woods in daylight, not that it made
Speaker 1: any difference. They still had the use of their flashlights
Speaker 1: in the dense foliage, informed a grid pattern to ensure
Speaker 1: that they covered everything. No sign of Bobby was ever found.
Speaker 1: Over the years, many have questioned the events at that night.
Speaker 1: Did Bobby perhaps find his father's rifle and rescue his
Speaker 1: sister by killing something that was chasing her? Could a
Speaker 1: rifle that had been left in the woods for a
Speaker 1: year even work Everyone who was there that night swore
Speaker 1: that they heard the rifle shot. Was it Bobby who
Speaker 1: pulled the trigger? Likewise, they all knew they heard a
Speaker 1: wolf's howl. No wolves were known to be in that area.
Speaker 1: Had every person there, lifelong hunters, experienced lawmen and farmers alike,
Speaker 1: mistaken the sound of a tree branch cracking for that
Speaker 1: of a rifle shot? And how did Cassie come out
Speaker 1: of those woods alive when her brother was never seen again?
Speaker 1: It wasn't long after that night that the Welfare of
Speaker 1: People came and took Cassie away. Chigg found evidence that
Speaker 1: she lived out her life in a sanitarium, a mute
Speaker 1: with haunted eyes who lived in a tormented past. Georgia
Speaker 1: Dumayer was taken away as well. Her mind snapped that night.
Speaker 1: The loss of her husband and son was more than
Speaker 1: she could mentally accept. The farm was sold and new
Speaker 1: people moved in. Legends about the night grew over time.
Speaker 1: There had always been the stories, but now they had
Speaker 1: names to put with them, Bobby, Cassandra, will and Georgia
Speaker 1: the Dumyer family. By the time Chigg was a kid
Speaker 1: growing up in Truman County, there was another legend. It
Speaker 1: was the one he was most familiar with. It was
Speaker 1: the reason he chose this story to write about. Children
Speaker 1: whispered about the terrors of the Devil's Knot at sleepovers
Speaker 1: and around campfires. They said, if you enter that place,
Speaker 1: something will chase you. They say it's a wolf, but
Speaker 1: not a wolf. But not to worry. If Bobby Dumer
Speaker 1: knows that you're there, he'll chase it away. So when
Speaker 1: you enter the Knot, you called out the greeting to Bobby.
Speaker 1: Don't look at him because he's covered in blood. Just
Speaker 1: know that he'll get you safely to the other side.
Speaker 1: It was a legend that Chig knew better than most
Speaker 1: because Chig tested it out. He was twelve, the exact
Speaker 1: age that Bobby was when he entered the Knot and
Speaker 1: never came out. It started as a dare when he
Speaker 1: and some of his friends were camping out in a
Speaker 1: pasture of his family's farm. In the middle of the night.
Speaker 1: The boys got on their bicycles and rode over to
Speaker 1: that same place where Bobby's supposedly always entered the Knot. There,
Speaker 1: Chig got off his bike and walked inside, flashlight in hand,
Speaker 1: and called out a greeting to Bobby Dumar. It was
Speaker 1: a full hour before the other boys would see Chig again.
Speaker 1: They had ridden their bikes to the other side and waited.
Speaker 1: When he came out, his face was pale and his
Speaker 1: body shook violently with fear. He never told them what
Speaker 1: he saw. Who would have believed him? How do you
Speaker 1: tell your friends that a bloody, torn to piece's ghost
Speaker 1: carrying a rustic rifle led you through a little piece
Speaker 1: of hell on earth? Inhabited by creatures that should exist
Speaker 1: only in the movies.