"Yeah, you're right. We'll wait here," Rory said. "Be careful."

Clinton gestured for Travis. "Why don't you go with me, see if we can find anyone around."

Travis was still out of the loop, and he was growing angry. "What's going on?" he demanded. He studied Clinton for a long moment. "What's going on here?" he repeated. "What do you know?"

Anna stepped in. "Go with Clinton now. We'll explain the rest later." She placed a hand on his shoulder. How could she possibly explain that they thought all this was the work of Nephilim?

He turned a stiff shoulder to her. "There's some really strange stuff going on around here." He gestured past them, at the gloomy mountains towering above the town.

No one had an answer to that.

Clinton hustled away with Travis before he could ask more awkward questions. The others went into the store, each silently hoping they were not the only ones remaining in town.

CHAPTER 58.

While Anna and Myrtle fussed around in the store, fixing Nicholas something to eat and worrying about Clinton and Travis, Rory went into the small back room, booted up his laptop, and began perusing through the research material.

"What's all that?" He startled at the sound of Anna's voice.

"Stuff on paranormal phenomena. Strange things that haven't been explained, that kind of thing."

She came and sat down by him. "I can't stop thinking about Dad."

Rory wrapped an arm around her. She buried her head in his chest and cried. "I know it's hard, but you'll get through it." He continued to hold her tightly.

"I'll be fine," she finally said. She pulled away from him and wiped her eyes. "I need to think about something else. Can I look through some of it?" She pointed to the stack of photocopied papers.

"Sure." He handed her a stack of pages.

"Is there anything on the Nephilim here?" She thumbed through the pages.

"I don't know. It was stuff I hadn't read yet when I came out here."

They sat in companionable silence, each engrossed in what they were reading.

"Whoa, look at this," Anna interrupted the quiet. "Jubilees, another apocryphal book, makes references to the sons of G.o.d. Their offspring, the Nephilim, are The Watchers, beings who cohabitated with the children of men, condemning them to be fallen angels forever."

"But I would a.s.sume they don't want to be condemned," Rory said.

"Yeah, that's right. And listen to this." She ran a finger over a page. "This is an occult viewpoint of the Nephilim. According to this, 'the Nephilim have become beings that move from person to person, taking over a host body, and suppressing the host consciousness. They remain within the host until the host's death, when the Nephilim can be rejuvenated again into a new host. Since the Nephilim are fallen ent.i.ties, their ultimate goal is to attain spiritual ascension, an enlightenment, which they desperately try to attain through a complicated mystical ritual involving the eventual sacrifice of their human hosts. They need representatives of the four elemental forces: earth, air, fire, and water, and central hosts that know the ceremony rites. The Nephilim are so focused on gaining their freedom through this ascension that they will try to get their release in any manner, including violence and death to any human who stands in their way. They continue on this quest, from generation to generation, living in host after host, until they can attain ascension, or are eliminated.'"

"Eliminated how?"

Anna scanned through more pages. "It doesn't say. Wait, what's this." She continued. "'In order to achieve enlightenment, the Nephilim gather together and perform a releasing ceremony, where they conjure up the forces of darkness to help them. Once this is done, the forces of darkness can overcome the forces of good. The host bodies are then sacrificed, releasing the Nephilim into spiritual ascension, never to inhabit a host body again.'"

"Whoa," he said. He took the pages from her shaking hand, and read more, his mind swirling around the information about the Nephilim. "There's a bunch of theory about them in here."

"How did you miss this?"

"I didn't get to all of it before I left New York," he said in frustration. "See?" he said, grabbing another stack of papers. He explained how he found articles on the town and that's what brought him out here. "But none of this makes any sense. All this is just stories. It's not telling me anything."

"Let me see them."

He showed her the article, one about Burgess Barton's sudden departure to Colorado, where he intended to mine. She flipped more pages. "Oh, look, there's a picture of him." Rory looked over her shoulder. Barton had a rugged appearance, with mysterious eyes and wavy dark hair. Rory hissed as he stared at the picture. He felt like he was gazing into a black and white mirror. "Son of a gun," he said. "He looks like me."

Anna glanced at him and her face went white. "You're a double for him."

"Wait a minute." He s.n.a.t.c.hed up more of the articles on the town, flipping through pages. "Hey, look at this." He pointed out the article that he'd come across the other day: Evil presence in Colorado mining town. He reread the article about a murder and a number of disappearances in the Crossing. Only this time he paid attention to the names.

When he finished, he quickly scanned other articles as numbness crept through him like a drug. One described a drought that had fallen over the area in recent days, and a couple of others cited how more town residents were disappearing with no explanations for their departure, and no evidence of foul play. Some residents of Taylor Crossing were voluntarily leaving, fearful of the strange happenings.

Then another headline jumped out at him: Last residents of Taylor Crossing gone. His eyes fanned over the page, reading as fast as he could: Seemingly overnight Taylor Crossing has turned into a ghost town, as the last known residents of the town have vanished, leaving behind empty buildings, abandoned mines, and vacant streets. A few people in neighboring towns are aware of some acquaintances that have left, moving on into Nederland, Ward, and Boulder. But many in the mining community, nomadic by nature, are simply gone. Few people have been tracked down, but they are saying little. Their apparent fright makes the situation more disturbing, but none of the former residents are willing to talk, other than to say that the strange occurrences in the town were enough to get them to leave.

The article had a grainy photograph, taken at a town fair the previous summer.

"Look," Anna pointed. Rory studied it carefully. A number of men were lined up in front of the general store, their appearance rugged. A couple knelt in the front row, and behind them, others stood on the porch. They all stared seriously at the camera. Rory read through the names: William Cordt. He appeared like a jovial man. His face beamed with the hint of a smile underneath his walrus mustache.

Bryon Dillon. Obviously a miner, with overalls, leaning against a pickaxe with his right hand, his left hand resting on his other forearm. Rory squinted at the picture. The man's left hand was mangled. Something picked at Rory's subconscious.

"Wait a minute," he said. Pages started flying as he went back to the other articles. Then he found it, a small piece, barely a mention in the paper about a mining accident at Taylor Crossing. Two men were killed when their mineshaft collapsed. Bryon Dillon, a missionary who was mining for a time in Taylor Crossing, managed to escape with his right leg broken, his left hand crushed. The town doctor had to amputate his left thumb.

The pages seemed to pull away from him, like it was a thousand miles away, down a starry tunnel. Rory drew in a breath and let it seep out slowly. "Where's the journal?" he asked.

"Myrtle has it," Anna said. "Rory, what is it?"

He grabbed the notes he'd made the previous evening from the stack of photocopies and went into the front of the store, where Myrtle was sitting at the counter with the journal.

"Can I see that?" He took the journal from her, ignoring her surprised look, and consulted his notes. He turned to the list of names from the journal. Bryon Dillon was there, and so was William Cordt. Rory went back to the picture and read the names. Graham Johnson, next to the miner, stood with his hands crossed over a huge belly, his features a dark scowl like Gino D'Angelo. And Ignatius Brewster, a grizzled, mean-looking man with crazy eyes and flyaway hair. Old Man Brewster's grandfather!

He reread the articles about the disappearances in town. And then other pieces leapt from the page. The sheriff was a big burly man. And the post office worker was a British woman. He went back to the photo and studied it, then consulted his notes again. There was something else, something he'd read in the journal. He carefully turned pages. Then it hit him. The miner talked about the general store owner, Henry. Barton described him as an old man, thin as a sapling, with stooped shoulders. He was just like Jimmy.

He slowly lifted his head from his notes and gazed at the photo.

"Look. They're us." Rory swallowed a stone in his throat.

"What?" Anna and Myrtle asked simultaneously.

"Clinton's coming back!" Nicholas hollered from his perch near the front door.

Rory ignored the startled queries of Joan and Myrtle, seized the journal and went out to meet Clinton. Things were starting to make sense. He only hoped he hadn't figured it out too late.

CHAPTER 59.

With the journal in hand, Rory met Clinton on the porch of the general store. "There's no one around?" Rory asked him, but it was more a statement. The look on Clinton's face was answer enough.

Clinton shook his head. "We didn't see a soul. No signs of the volunteer posse. No people, no noise. No sign of anything, for that matter. It's quiet. Too quiet if you ask me."

Rory looked up the road, toward the higher mountain peaks. He wasn't sure if his newfound knowledge was feeding his fear, but he was spooked. He swore he could smell something just out of reach, something rank and dead. He also felt as if he were being watched, as if Ed and the other Nephilim knew exactly what he was doing this very second. "Have I got some things to tell you."

"What?"

They both jumped as the store door opened. "Sorry," Anna came out. "Where's Travis?"

"He took off," Clinton said. "He wanted to know what was going on. How can I tell him what we're dealing with when I don't even know?"

Rory held up the journal. "There's some amazing stuff in this thing. That miner had a lot figured out. From what I can make out, the Nephilim are gathering together, preparing for a final, big ceremony a releasing ceremony. But they have to gather a few select individuals, role players if you will, who perform specific tasks in order for the ceremony to work."

"We know how the ceremony works, too" Anna said, filling Clinton in on what she'd found out. "It fits with what Barton wrote."

"Yeah. And we're filling the roles," Rory said, describing the picture from the newspaper.

"Which ones of us?" he asked.

"Look at the list Barton wrote." Rory showed him the list from his notes. "Emily Graves, the British postal woman, Henry Calhoun who ran the general store, and William Cordt who owned the Silver Dollar Saloon."

"And Daniel Thomas was the town undertaker. He looks just like that hiker that disappeared," Anna said. Rory looked at her in surprise. "I saw him in the picture," she explained.

"Howard Stein? You knew him?" Clinton asked.

She nodded. "I've seen him around the store."

Clinton's jaw dropped as he leaned over and read from Rory's notes. "There's me, just like the sheriff a hundred years ago. And the journalist, like you."

Rory nodded slowly. "It's " He stopped. "Sh!" He put a hand on Clinton's shoulder and pulled him back on the porch. "Who's that?"

Clinton looked down the road, where someone had appeared on the far side of the cafe. "I don't know."

They watched for a moment. It was a man in jeans and blue plaid shirt, long white hair flying around his head. "That's Brewster," Rory whispered. He opened his mouth to call out, but Clinton hit him on the arm.

"Don't! He might be one of them now."

Rory gritted his teeth at his own stupidity. "Get inside!" he warned Anna. She blanched and hurried back into the store. Then he and Clinton crouched by the porch steps and spied on the old man. Brewster peered up and down Main Street, then disappeared from view.

"Where'd he go?" Clinton leaned forward.

"I don't know."

Brewster appeared again, this time dragging something.

"It's a man," Rory hissed.

"He's unconscious."

"Or dead." They exchanged a wary look.

"What's he doing?"

They watched as Brewster struggled to drag the man by the shirt across the dirt road and up to the lakesh.o.r.e, then all the way down to the end of the dock. He stared at the body for a moment, then walked back up the dock and went between some trees near the car shelter.

"Now what?" Clinton asked.

Before Rory could answer, Brewster emerged carrying large stones piled in his hands. He went back to the body, stooped down, and began stuffing the rocks into the man's clothing. He made another trip to the woods and returned, filling the man's pockets with more rocks. The clothing bulged. He went again to the woods, this time lugging a large stone, so heavy that he bent over as he carried it. He managed to get down the dock, where he took a rope from a canoe, tied one end around the stone, and looped the other around the man's neck.

"That's it," Clinton said, stepping forward. "I'm going to stop this."

"Wait. What if he's a Nephilim?"

Right then, Brewster got down on his hands and knees and shoved the body off the dock. It hit the water a few feet below with a sizeable splash. The large stone with the rope around it was yanked off the dock, creating a second loud splash.

"Hey," Clinton yelled, leaving the porch at a full run. Rory leaped off the porch after him.

Brewster looked up at them in surprise, but he didn't move. They ran down the dock, their footsteps thumping on the boards like cannon fire.

"You're drowning him!" Clinton said when he reached Brewster. Rory got there and looked into the lake. The body was nowhere to be seen; only a few bubbles popping on the lake surface gave any indication that something had sunk into the depths.

"Of course," Brewster said. "Only way to get rid of them properly."

"That's murder." Sheriff Truitt grabbed at Brewster's shoulder.

"Ya can't murder something that's already dead." Brewster stood up and harrumphed at Clinton, even though Clinton towered over him by six inches. Rory stared at Brewster, as the realization swept over him. Brewster wasn't a Nephilim.

"Wait." Rory pulled at Clinton's sleeve. "Let him explain."

Brewster narrowed his eyes. "I know things." He marched off the dock and toward the store, with Rory and Clinton in full pursuit.

"Wait! What do you mean?" Rory asked, finally stopping Brewster as he ascended the porch steps.

The old man turned to them. "Just like my granddaddy, I know things." He rubbed at a pinpoint on his chest as he talked. "He knew when the evil came to the town, and so did I. I knew it when I saw you."

"Why is my being here important?"

"Because you're the chronicler. Just like Burgess Barton."