“But that’s a different tale. I was about to tell you what happened to poor old Gordie,” Buster said. “We blackmailed him into telling us. Have either of you ever been to a hypnotist?”
Alan shook his head.
“No,” Bob said.
“They say a hypnotist can’t make you do anything you don’t really want to do. That’s the way I feel about Gordie talking about the migrators. On the one hand, he knew it was trouble. But there was something in his eyes—he wanted to tell that story. He wanted to unburden himself. He and Dad loaded that story onto their backs and carried it for all those years. He couldn’t give himself permission to let the story go, but as soon as everyone ganged up on him, it looked like the telling was a big relief.”
Buster settled deeper into his recliner, shooting his feet out a little farther down the footrest.
“Like I said, Dad took an interest in our education when we were just little tykes. For me, he gave me a gun and told me what to point it at. For Gordie, I suppose he showed him how to set a trap and bait a hook. Then he’d leave you alone until you had some reading under your belt. His next burst of instruction was intense. He’d give you a book or two so you could study up and then he’d just pour everything he knew into your little ear. God help you if you forgot one of his lessons by the next morning. You didn’t get many second chances without earning a spanking to go along with the second lesson. The boy was expected to listen and learn. You didn’t ask questions. You could just assume that Dad wouldn’t have an answer that could be heard, only felt.”
“Sounds like a prince,” Alan said.
“He did what he thought he had to,” Buster said. He smiled at a memory. “He was trying to ensure that each of us went farther than he did. Gordie was far enough down the chain that he knew when to keep his mouth shut. The other brothers told him what to expect for his training, so when Dad taught him how to set a line, Gordie kept his mouth shut and just listened.
“Gordie’s last day with Dad’s instruction was when he finally asked his first question. It was near the end of October and Gordie had a trap he couldn’t clear.”
“I thought you didn’t work in October,” Bob said.
“Not after that one, we didn’t,” Buster said. “Of course I was just a little one, running around with my first twenty-two then. Gordie had set a trap down near the water’s edge. Dad wouldn’t let him shoot a trapped animal. Gordie had to beat or drown anything still alive. He liked to use a little leg trap that was weighted underwater. It would snag a beaver and then hold them under until they drowned. Gordie would get a perfect pelt—no need to bash in the skull. The problem was, he didn’t catch a beaver. He caught something much bigger and it was still alive. He went and fetched Dad. Gordie worked up his courage and then asked, ‘What do I do if I can’t kill something I trapped?’ He said that Dad was excited at first. He figured that Gordie had trapped something big. Since Dad was a shitty hunter and I wasn’t pulling in game yet, the family was mostly living on small stuff that Gordie brought home. Dad was itching for a big hunk of venison or bear.
“Gordie took him down to the edge of the lake and pointed. He said that Dad didn’t believe him for awhile. The thing he’d caught was so good at lying on the muddy bottom of the lake that you had to know exactly what you were looking for or you didn’t see it. Gordie got a big stick and poked at the thing. It started thrashing. It came all the way up out of the water and almost grabbed ahold of Dad before my old man backed away. Dad told Gordie to keep an eye on the thing and then he went back to the house for his gun.
“That’s the only thing I think I remember about the event, but I can’t say if it was a true memory or not. They say I cried and cried when Dad left the house with a gun and I didn’t get to come along. Of course, I don’t have any memory of Sophia, so maybe I just think I remembered it. Dad shot the thing five times, according to Gordie. The thing thrashed and jumped each time, but didn’t seem any closer to dying.”
“What did it look like?” Alan asked.
Buster ignored the question and kept going. “After that, Dad had Gordie rig up a rope to loop around the beast. They used a come-along anchored to a tree. Gordie said the thing was too strong to pull out by hand, even with both of them working together. They pulled it on shore and Gordie said it was stuck between the two tethers. There was the trap holding its leg in the water, and the rope pulling its arm up on land. The trap was fixed to a submerged log that must have weighed a ton. Even so, Gordie said that the thing pulled so hard that the log moved.
“When it stopped moving, Gordie said it was like magic. It settled down into the leaves and just seemed to disappear. Dad shot it again, maybe because he was frustrated. Gordie said the bullet went right through and puffed up dirt on the other side of the thing.”
Buster stopped talking. He folded his hands on top of his belly.
“Well?” Alan asked.
“Well what? You can guess the rest, can’t you?”
“You’re saying that the thing we saw is the same kind of thing your brother caught in the trap?” Bob asked.
Buster nodded.
“You don’t want to tell us the rest of the story, do you?” Alan asked.
Buster didn’t reply. He looked at Alan with wide open eyes and didn’t reply.
“You think that if you tell us the story, then they’ll smell it, right? That’s what you asserted earlier—they can smell when someone talks about them,” Alan said. “If that’s true, then surely you’ve already said too much.”
“Maybe I have and maybe I haven’t. It’s hard saying, not knowing,” Buster said. His next burp must have been the grandfather of all his previous. It ripped from between Buster’s lips and caused him to lean forward. The footrest on his recliner clicked down a notch. “Pardon me,” he said. Buster frowned. “Dad cried. He sat down on a big rock, let his gun fall to the ground and put his fists to his eyes. Gordie welled up just telling us about it, all those years later. Dad told Gordie that he knew there was a price to pay. He didn’t let on what he’d bought. Quid pro quo.
“I’m not sure how we lived there so long without trouble. Maybe it was just because we were naive. But Dad knew that the easy days were over as soon as he saw that thing thrashing in Gordie’s trap. He told Gordie that it would just be a matter of time before more would come. They would find a way to spring the one he’d caught and then they’d come after the family. They wouldn’t stop until they’d taken one of ours as payback.”
“How did your dad know about them if nobody talked?” Bob asked.
“I don’t know. Maybe some old timer wanted to get it off his chest. Maybe my Dad pieced it together from all those books he read before he gave them to us. Like I said, he was a Jack of all trades, and one of those trades was local legends. Lots of people had theories where the migrators came from originally, but none make much sense in the light of day. People say believe half of what you see, and none of what you’re about to hear, but this is my understanding.
“For every living thing that builds, there’s something that evolves to break it down. It’s just all part of the natural ebb and flow of things. Species rise and fall. That works for our physical bodies and the things we create, but what are the worms and beetles that help decompose our souls?”
“I don’t follow,” Alan said.
“You grow as a person, spiritually, as you live on this planet,” Buster said. “You build up your character and your soul. What happens to those when you die?”
“I don’t believe in that stuff,” Alan said.
“You go to heaven,” Bob said. “Or your soul rejoins the sea of souls, right?”
“I think your spirit lays there quietly, right alongside your body. The undertaker burns up your body, but then your soul, your character, your will, all that other stuff is left behind. That’s where the migrators come in. They move downhill and gather up all the leftovers of human spirit. They gobble it up and break it down into whatever the equivalent elements are. That’s what I think.”
“So why wouldn’t they hang out at cemeteries then? Or why would they only move through one patch of land to go to the Kennebec river? People all around the world should know about them,” Alan said.
“You can’t touch a soul. You can’t hold it in your hands. What makes you think it adheres to the physical laws that govern other matter?” Buster asked. “As far as we know, they do live everywhere. Maybe there’s some bigger reason it got caught in Gordie’s trap.”
“And this is the nonsense your father told your brother?” Alan asked.
“Nope,” Buster said. “The information Dad passed to Gordie was completely pragmatic. He told him that migrators are devious, intelligent, and vengeful. If you interfere with one or even talk about them, then you’re on the list. Nothing can get you off that list but flesh.”
“So they feed on souls, but if they’re pissed, they’ll eat a baby,” Alan said.
“Yup, kinda like a priest,” Buster said. He laughed at his own joke.
“And nobody has ever seen one or heard of one. Science has never documented them. No naturalist has a picture. They’re more elusive than a yeti,” Alan said.
“That’s right. And I’ll add to your description—they migrate through a very small area, or maybe areas, they’re perfectly camouflaged, and then hunt down anyone who traps or talks about them. How’s anyone supposed to document that?” Buster asked.
“You assume that they have the ability to magically track down people who talk about them—that words leave a scent somehow,” Alan said.
Buster raised his shoulders in a shrug. A bubbling gurgle rumbled in his belly and Buster patted it down gently with his hand.
“You made Gordie tell,” Bob said.
Buster nodded. For a second, Alan thought that Buster wouldn’t continue. He thought the old man was going to leave the story half told and never let them know what happened to the little sister. But, now that the story was rolling out, it seemed that it would keep rolling.