GRAVEDIGGER Without Pictures?

Okay, here's a question for the readers of this blog - and the Gravedigger crime comics that I produce with Rick Burchett. If was to publish a short Gravedigger novel or novella through Amazon, would anyone buy it?

I'm not saying I'm even able to do it - I've never written a prose work longer than a short story - but I have about 4,000 words of a Digger story that I might be able to expand.... read an excerpt below and let me know what you think. (I've written more pages than this, by the way. And I ran this excerpt here on the blog some years ago in a slightly different form. If it sounds familiar, that's why.)

When the door burst open, I put two 9mm slugs into the first man's chest. The guy behind him looked vaguely familiar, but I didn't have time to take a second look as he raised an ugly, efficient-looking machine pistol and sprayed the room with hot metal.

The slugs didn't come anywhere near me, but they ripped the hell out of the small rented cabin. I waited on the floor behind the threadbare sofa, Beretta in my right hand, and when the guy with the squirtgun emptied his magazine, I shot him in the head.

I sidled carefully over to the two bodies and looked out through the open door and across the porch at the glass-smooth lake. Pale moonlight and flickering stars were reflected in its mirrored surface, and an aluminum rowboat I hadn't seen before was tied to the short dock.

I had no concerns about the gunfire. The nearest neighboring cabin was a good half-mile away, and was, at present, unoccupied.

I pulled the bodies into the room where I could see them clearly. I had been right about the second man; I knew him. His name was Wyatt, a burly, blond Australian ex-pat I'd worked with a couple years back on a payroll job in Nevada. The other gunman was unfamiliar; a blue jean and tee-shirt wearing kid, maybe twenty-five, with short, spiky black hair and a bad complexion.

I searched their pockets. Wyatt carried I.D. in the form of a Jersey driver's license and a Visa card that said his name was Porter. The younger man had apparently been going under the name of Joe Riley. I took their I.D. and credit cards and slipped them into my shirt pocket.

I wondered how they'd found me.

And why.

I'd been living in the two-room cabin in western Maine for three weeks. Not hiding out, exactly; just resting and recreating between jobs. Once a week, I took the rented outboard across the lake, hiked a mile and a half to the clearing where I’d left my Buick, and drove another few miles on mostly dirt roads into Rangely for supplies. The rest of the time, I sat on the porch, enjoying the solitude, smoking, and reading trash paperbacks, a habit I'd picked up during my one extended stay as a guest of the state.

I didn't think I was currently on anyone's shit list, but in my business you can never know for sure. Emotions often run hot when large amounts of cash are on the line, and those who make their living acquiring it at gunpoint tend not to be overly sensitive to other people's feelings.

I tried to think who might be carrying a grudge and who also knew Wyatt. The list was short.

Gavin. Fucking Gavin.

Of course, he was supposed to be dead.

Captain Midnight Chronicles Takes Off

After several years, the long-awaited Captain Midnight Chronicles short story collection is - according to the publisher - back from the printer and now available to purchase.

Edited by yours truly, and based on my reimagined version of the character - which incorporates the best features of the radio, film, comic book and television incarnations of the character - the book features some thrilling adventure stories by a stellar line-up of talent.

Here's the contents of the volume: "Countdown to Midnight" By Christopher Mills, "Captain Midnight at Ultima Thule" By Win Scott Eckert, "The Black Dragon" By Mark Justice, "Shipwreck In The Sky" By Robert T. Jeschonek, "Death Master of The Secret Island" By Trina Robbins, "Wind & Rain" By Tim Lasiuta, "Cushy Job" By P.C. Hamerlinck, "Captain Midnight Meets Airboy" By Chuck Dixon, "Fantastic Island" By Robert Greenberger, "The Dark of Midnight" By Stephen Mertz, "Witch of The Waning Moon" By Howard Hopkins, and "A Mission In Time" By James J. Nance. The hardcover version includes a brief introduction to the character by P.C. Hamerlinck and an additional short story by yours truly, "The Mediterranean Intercept."

Both versions of the book can be ordered now directly from the publisher, Moonstone Books, or through Amazon.

Hopefully, I'll be getting my copies soon. I'm looking forward to finally holding it in my hands. Hopefully, it will sell well enough to allow for a second volume.

Captain Midnight: "The Mediterranean Intercept"

At literally the last minute - the book was already at press - Moonstone asked me to write another (very) short story for the limited edition Captain Midnight Chronicles hardcover. Because of the page count, there were a few pages left blank, so instead of keeping them that way, the publisher thought we should include an exclusive-to-the-hardcover bonus story. They asked me on Monday to write it, and somehow I pushed through and turned it in on Wednesday afternoon.

Phew.

Anyway, the only way to read the story, "The Mediterranean Intercept," will be buy purchasing the limited edition hardcover. But that doesn't mean I can't present an excerpt here....

Fifteen minutes later, Captain Midnight was racing through the crowded streets of the Egyptian coastal city in a commandeered roadster, heading for the Café Albatros, where North had arranged to meet with the informer codenamed Fatima. It was late evening, and well past the designated rendezvous time, but the leader of the Secret Squadron prayed that the woman would still be there.

As he drove, he removed the soft leather aviator’s helmet, goggles and scarf, revealing the carrot-colored hair, slate gray eyes and rugged features of James “Red” Albright. He mentally reviewed the identification routine that Ed North had relayed to him before Joyce rushed the rescued agent to a hospital. When he arrived at the café, he parked the automobile at the curb and made his way inside, his eyes searching the restaurant for a European woman in a green dress.

He found a likely candidate at the end of the bar, an attractive brunette in her mid-twenties sitting alone, nursing a tall fruit drink. Her body language was the giveaway – she was obviously tightly coiled, as if prepared to bolt at the slightest provocation. He approached her slowly, and settled upon the empty stool to her right. There was little time to spare, so he spoke as soon as he sat down. “Excuse me, miss. Could you spare a cigarette?”

She eyed him warily. “I only have Gitanes,” she replied.

“ That’s all right,” Albright said. “I became accustomed to French tobacco during the war.”

“You’re very late, Monsieur North. I was about to give up on you.”

“I’m not Ed North, Fatima,” Albright said.

The girl’s eyes widened in panic, and she started to rise from her seat. Albright laid his hand lightly on her arm. “It’s okay, Ed sent me in his place. I’m SQ-1.”

“SQ-1? But that would make you…”

Albright nodded, and attempted a reassuring smile. “That’s right. Can we talk?”

The girl sat back down, and fumbled a pack of cigarettes out of her purse. They weren’t even Gitanes, but a local blend. “I suppose I have to trust you. There’s so little time…”

“What’s your real name?”

“Susanne Vigue,” She took a deep drag on her cigarette, exhaled. “For the last three years, I have been secretary to Pierre Lubec. You know him?”

“We’ve met.”

“Then you know that he deals in munitions. His best customer is a man who calls himself Shark. Ivan Shark.”

Albright wasn’t surprised. Ivan Shark was a megalomaniac genius with a private army of mercenaries and fanatics, whose mad desire for power would be satisfied by nothing less than world conquest. Such ambitions required substantial firepower. “Go on.”

“Shark plans an attack upon the canal, and Pierre has provided him with the special materiel he requires to carry out his plan.”

The Suez Canal, 192 kilometers in length, connected the Mediterranean with the Red Sea, and was one of the world’s busiest and most important waterways. If Shark was able to damage it and shut it down for any length of time, the consequences would be staggering.

“What is Shark’s plan?”

Coming Soon (maybe)

You'll remember that a week or two back, I was talking about my stillborn sword & sorcery comic, Ravenwulf, Swordsman of Tanar'r, and how I was considering turning it into a novel? Well, I'm still considering it, and further, I'm thinking about serializing it online as I write it.

Not on this site, though. The resounding silence last time I ran fiction on this blog has made it clear to me that this is not the proper venue for such literary indulgences. If I do follow through with this plan, I'll create a blog/site specifically for the purpose.

I hope to start writing this novel in March or April, and I see it very much as a "practice novel." I've never written anything in prose much over 10,000 words, and I see this as my first attempt at long form fiction. Of course, it won't be all that long, probably. I'll be deliberately trying to keep it at the length of a Sixties or Seventies' fantasy PBO. I don't even really plan on submitting it for publication – at least not to any mainstream publishers – after all, there's not much market for old school barbarian pulp outside of Robert E. Howard reprints. If it turns out well, maybe I'll submit to a small press, but that's still a long shot.

Anyway, I'm mentioning it here, publicly, in an attempt to light a fire under my own butt, and force myself – through threat of public humiliation – to actually follow through on this project and get it done. We'll see how that works.

Before I can get to it though, I have two short stories that I've promised to write (a pulp adventure and a ghost story) and several comic scripts. When and if I start posting chapters of Ravenwulf, Swordsman of Tanar'r online, I'll let you know.

Wish me luck.

The Walker Files: The Scroll of Solomon, Part 2

And here's the conclusion of "The Scroll of Solomon," a "Joe Walker" adventure:

Four burly tribesmen, wearing robes and turbans, worked in silence to remove the fallen stonework that barred the entrance to the chamber where my friend Doctor Richard Brendon and his young colleague, the lovely Egyptian Talia Khari, believed an ancient artifact, the Scroll of Solomon, was interred.

I had come to Northern Yemen to witness the excavation of the ancient city of Marib, believed by archaeologists to be the long-lost capital of the Queen of Sheba. More than 3,000 years ago, the Queen of Sheba had ruled a vast Empire that encompassed much of what is now Ethiopia and Somalia. For several years now, an international team of scientists had been using radar to map the city buried beneath the constantly shifting, sun-baked sands of the Arabian Desert. Using the radar data, they’d been slowly unearthing Marib’s secrets.

Now we stood literally on the threshold of possibly the greatest archaeological find since the Dead Sea Scrolls. Around 940 BC, the Queen of Sheba had traveled to meet King Solomon of Israel to seek the benefit of his wisdom. Talia, the beautiful young archaeologist from Cairo, had found inscriptions, which led Dick Brendon to believe that the chamber before us, deep in the bowels of the Maharam Biquis – or Temple of the Moon God – contained a scroll, penned by Solomon himself.

The tribesmen cleared the last of the fallen stonework from the heavy sandstone door. Dick inspected the seal carefully as Talia stood nearby, a camera around her neck and thick, leather-bound notebook in hand, ready to record whatever waited beyond the portal. Her eyes gleamed in the light of the bare electric bulbs strung along the ancient corridor.
I desperately wanted a cigarette, and absently scratched at the nicotine patch on my shoulder.

The look on Dick’s face was one of pure joy – this is what the old bonedigger lived for. "All right, men," he said to the robed workers. "Let’s give it a push. Carefully, now."

Two of the tribesmen stepped forward and put their weight against the sandstone.

After a moment, there was a slight rumble as the heavy stone slowly shifted. "Careful," Dick whispered as the burly laborers slowly pushed open the 3,000-year-old door. Once it was open, Dick, flashlight in his hand, ducked and entered the room. Talia and I followed, and the tribesmen were a few steps behind us.

The room was large and oval shaped, the ceiling coming to a dome above us. Six limestone columns ringed the room, and at least a dozen beautiful bronze statues, each a couple of feet tall, were set into alcoves even spaced around the room. In the center of the room was a raised dais, and upon the dais was a large bronze chest.

"It’s incredible," Dick said. "This chamber hasn’t been disturbed in thirty centuries."

Talia stepped forward toward the bronze chest. "Wait!" Dick cried. "We have to document this find. I need pictures, and we have to…"

Talia turned to him, her dark eyes shining. "I don’t think so, Dr. Brendon," she said. "I don’t have time for such foolishness." Suddenly there was a gun in her hand; a small revolver.

I started to step toward her when I felt a heavy hand on my shoulder. It was one of the tribesmen. In his other hand he held a long, curved dagger.

"What is the meaning of this?" Dick demanded, as another of the laborers stepped up to grab him.

Talia laughed. "Ever since I found the inscriptions, I knew that the Scroll, if it existed, would be priceless," she paused. "But rest assured, I intend to put a price on it, Doctor. A very high price."

"But you’re a scientist, Talia!"

"You should have checked my credentials more carefully, Doctor." She turned to the dais, and reached for the shining casket.

I watched helplessly as the beautiful Egyptian girl placed her hands on the lid of the bronze chest, and wished I had my Glock. I tried to think of a way to stop her, but the long knife pressed against my side was making it difficult to come up with a plan.

Talia opened the chest and reached inside. Dick gasped at the careless handling of the ancient treasure. "Careful! You’ll damage it!"

Talia lifted a tightly rolled scroll from the case. Her brilliant smile glowed in the beam from Dick’s flashlight. "Don’t worry, Doctor," she said. "I won’t let anything happen to the Scroll. It is my fortune, after all."

Suddenly, I felt a cool breeze across my neck, and the centuries of dust and sand in the chamber began to stir and lift into the air. The tribesmen began to mutter to themselves as the wind began to pick up. I looked around, but I couldn’t see where it came from.

Dick’s flashlight beam began to flicker. "What’s going on?" Talia demanded.

"I don’t know," Dick said, his voice cracking with fear.

"Put the scroll back, Talia," I said.

"No!"

Suddenly, Dick’s flashlight beam went out and the room was plunged into darkness. The unexplained wind picked up, and it was cold; arctic cold. My sweat-soaked shirt stiffened against my skin. My stomach tightened in a familiar way, and I knew that old fear.

When the ground began to tremble, the tribesmen started yelling in Arabic. I twisted away from my captor and dived to the stone floor. I rolled a few feet and came to a stop against a limestone column.

And then, without warning, the wind stopped. A warm, golden light filled the room, and I could make out the ghostly image of a woman’s face, beautiful, oval-shaped with large dark eyes and full red lips, in the air above the dais. Dick could see it too, and he stared in mute terror.

Talia looked up at the face and screamed. She fell to the floor, and the scroll rolled from her hand.

And then it was over.

The room was dark again, except for Dick’s flashlight beam, which had miraculously returned to life. The tribesmen fled down the long stone corridor. I rushed to Talia’s side as Dick gingerly scooped up the scroll and placed it back in the bronze casket. I checked for a pulse.

Talia Khari was dead.

"What was that, Walker?" Dick asked.

I thought about it for a moment before answering. Had we seen the shade of the Queen of Sheba, still watching over her treasures after 3,000 years? Or had it been some ancient Arabian deity, some guardian goddess?

I turned to Dick and replied: "What was what?"

"That… apparition –"

"Sorry, Dick," I cut him off. "I didn't see a goddamn thing."

The Walker Files: The Scroll of Solomon, Part 1

Here's one last "Joe Walker" adventure from my tabloid days. The second part of this story will post on Friday. Hope you folks have been finding these entertaining, at least.

The shifting sands of northern Yemen’s Rub al-Khali desert and the robed and turbaned local tribesman at my side were my only companions as I made my way to the excavation of the ancient city of Marib. I was perched uncomfortably on the back of a rank-smelling camel I’d named Otis, and I was exhausted from my travels. The incredible heat had sweat pouring down my back in rivers and my bones ached from the camel’s heavy, loping gait.

My guide led me to the base camp of the international archaeological expedition that was currently toiling in this desert hell to uncover the ancient secrets and treasures of Marib, the city of the legendary Queen of Sheba, long-buried here along the ancient trade routes to Oman.

I remembered from my school days that the Queen of Sheba had ruled a vast empire of wealth and power in this part of Arabia, encompassing land on both sides of the Red Sea, including much of what’s now Ethiopia and Somalia. It was an empire built on the spice trade in frankincense and myrrh.

Now that vast empire was buried beneath the ever-changing white sand, and all that showed of it were a few giant limestone columns and crumbling walls poking up from below the ground amid the tent city of the archaeological expedition.

Doctor Richard Brendon, one of the team leaders at the Marib dig, greeted me. He and I went way back – and I owed him a favor or three. About five-foot-eleven, with dirty blond hair and a frame that implied long and physical labor, Dick looked at least fifteen years younger than his true 67. I wish I’d aged as well.

At his side was a beautiful young woman in her late twenties. She wore khaki shorts and an olive-green tank top. Her skin was dark and dusky, and black sunglasses hid her eyes. A brightly-colored scarf was tied up on her head around her dark hair like a turban.

"Walker," Dick said. "You made it!"

"No thanks to this damned camel," I spat as I clumsily dismounted the kneeling beast. "I think he was trying to shake my tired old body apart."

"Worth their weight in gold, Joe," Dick said, a broad smile creasing his rugged face. "Even after thousands of years, there’s no better way to travel the sand."

I shook his hand. "Damn, but it’s good to see you," I said.

"You too, Walker." Dick turned his attention to the young woman at his side. "Allow me to introduce Doctor Talia Khari, an assistant curator from the Cairo Museum. She’s part of the international team, and she’s been a great help in our work."

"Thank you, Doctor," she said softly. Even though I couldn't see them but I was pretty sure she had her eyes fixed on me behind the dark glasses. For some reason, that made me nervous.

We retired to Brendon’s tent, where a makeshift field office greeted me. Wooden tables were covered with tools and old pottery. A few bronze statues shined amid the rubble. A couple of old Army cots and a small, portable refrigerator made the tent seem almost homey. Dick showed me to a battered folding chair and offered me a beer. "It’s cold, Walker. That’s the real reason we haul gas generators out here, you know: to keep our beer cold."

I took a deep pull on the green bottle. The brand was unfamiliar to me; the label unreadable. The cold liquid rushed down my paper-dry throat, washing away a day’s worth of sand and grit. It was the best beer I’d ever tasted.

"I’m glad you could come, Walker," Dick repeated. "I think we have something here that would be of great interest to your readers. You know the story of Solomon and the Queen of Sheba?"

"Only what I saw in the movies. Yul Brynner and Gina Lollobrigida, right?"

He grinned. "Forget Hollywood, old friend. Around 940 BC, the Queen traveled to meet with King Solomon of Israel. The Bible tells us it was to seek the King’s wisdom. But it’s all pretty vague what that wisdom actually was.

"For two years, teams have been using radar to map the ruins under the sand. We use the radar data to help determine where we’ll dig next. Just now, we've been concentrating on excavating the Mahram Biquis – the Temple of the Moon God. It’s a magnificent structure, still mostly intact, and full of new discoveries." He turned to Dr. Khari, who sat nearby; hands folded in her lap. There was an odd tension in her posture, but Dick seemed unaware of it.

"A week ago, Talia found references to a previously unheard-of document. If we can actually uncover it, it will be the greatest archaeological discovery since the Dead Sea Scrolls!"

"What is it?" I asked.

Talia Khari spoke up. She’d removed her sunglasses in the tent and her eyes were black and bottomless. "The Scroll of Solomon. The actual wisdom and word of Solomon, passed to the Queen of Sheba, who he regarded as a righteous woman. If it still exists, it would be priceless."

"And you think it’s buried out there somewhere?"

"We’re sure of it, " said Dick. "We’ve been working for the last five days to uncover the chamber said to be the reliquary of the scroll. It’s a small antechamber deep in the heart of the Temple."

He went to the small refrigerator and pulled out two more beers, untwisting the caps with a massive hand. "Your arrival is particularly well-timed, old friend," he said as he offered me one.

"Tomorrow we open the Chamber of the Scroll of Solomon."

To Be Continued

The Walker Files: Chupacabra, Part 2

And now, the exciting conclusion...

I was cold and sleepy, and I wished I were somewhere else. Anywhere other than here, downwind from a herd of sheep. A few feet away, his back against a large boulder, Miguel Martinez sat with an old Remington rifle across his knees, a stubby, hand-rolled cigarette dangling from his lips. I craved a Marlboro, but, since I’m trying to quit, I resisted the urge.

The sky was cloudless, black as velvet and casually strewn with stars. There was no moon. My butt was sore from sitting on the hard ground, and I stood to stretch my legs.

"Here, senor," Miguel whispered as he tossed me a thermos. "Have some coffee."

I had to admit my opinion of Miguel had improved a bit. I’d first met him in the local cantina, where he’d polished off a bottle of mescal all by himself. He’d been surly and not just a little scared, thoroughly shaken by his previous encounter with the night beast. But this evening he was sober and steady. He might still be scared, but he was determined to bag himself a goat-sucker, no matter what.

I poured myself a cup of strong, black Mexican brew, and leaned against a boulder to drink it. I checked my watch, and the softly-lit face of my Timex told me it was almost one in the morning.

I was getting too old for this kind of stuff.

I heard the scrape of boots on rock and heard gravel roll downhill. I turned, my hand reaching toward the .38 revolver I’d borrowed from Jim Gunn. I pulled it from my belt as lovely, raven-haired Consuela appeared from the shadows. Miguel’s sister held a basket in one hand.
"Damn it, Consuela," I growled. "I might have shot you."

"Sorry, Senor Walker," she replied. "I thought you and my brother may be hungry."

Miguel rose, a smile on his face. "Si," he agreed. "I am starving."

Suddenly, we heard a commotion amid the herd of goats. "Consuela, stay here." I whispered urgently, and then Miguel and I scrambled across the rocks to get a look at his livestock.

The herd was moving down the narrow valley, away from the spot they’d been grazing. We pushed our way through the panicked animals and there, in the glare of my flashlight beam, we saw something that froze my blood in my veins.

It was about five feet tall, with an oversized skull and giant, glowing eyes. Long spikes, like porcupine quills, lined its back and it had two vicious claws. Its mouth was filled with razor-like teeth, and it crouched on the body of one of Miguel’s goats, blood dripping from its chin.

It was the Chupacabra.

And it was real.

Miguel raised his rifle, but the creature sprang at the scrawny youth, knocking him to the ground with its body. Miguel screamed, and the rifle went off, sending a bullet harmlessly into the sky.

The creature made no sound of its own, but it tore at Miguel with its claws. I pulled the feeble .38 from my belt and fired off a shot that buried itself in the ground a few feet from the struggling forms. The creature stopped its attack then, and turned those giant eyes on me.
It came at me then, covering ground at an incredible rate, and as it leapt, I fired again. This time the bullet caught it in the right shoulder, and the hideous beast twisted in midair and plummeted to the ground.

It let out a blood-curdling hiss and scrambled off into the shadows.

For several moments I stood there, unmoving, arm and gun extended in front of me, breathing hard, my heart pounding in my chest. The entire encounter had taken but seconds.

"Miguel!" I heard Consuela cry and it snapped me out of spell. I found my flashlight and rushed to her brother’s side as she came scrambling down from the rocks. He was a mess. His shirt was torn to shreds, and there were long gashes in his chest and arms. He was breathing, thank God.

Suddenly Consuela was at my side. "Walker, is he…?"

"He’s alive. But we’ve got to get him to a doctor."

It took over an hour to carry Miguel back to his family’s farm, and it was nearly dawn before we were able to get a doctor from the village to come out and treat the kid. But by the time I finally gave in and lit up my first cigarette of the day, it looked like he was going to pull through. Jim Gunn picked me up at the Martinez house around seven.

As we drove through town back to his lakeside villa, I noticed a bearded peasant beside the road, watching intently as Jim’s dusty car drove past. His eyes were hidden beneath the brim of a straw sombrero, and there was a dirty burlap sling on his arm. His right arm.

As I watched the peasant recede into the distance, Jim said: "So, tell me the truth, old pal. Did you see it, Walker?"

"Yeah, Jim," I said. "I saw it."

The Walker Files: Chupacabra, Part 1

Here's another "Joe Walker" adventure. Hope you enjoy it.

James Mason Gunn looked at me across the table, bottle in hand, the cool breeze off the lake blowing his thin white hair. "This should be right up your alley, Walker, old pal. Tequila?"

"No thanks," I said. We were sitting on the porch of Jim’s villa in the beautiful village of Lake Chalapa, Mexico, an hour or so from Guadalajara. A former newspaper reporter from New York, Jim Gunn was an old-school newsman: hard working, hard drinking, and, frankly, hard to take. He and I had known each other for almost thirty years, but I wouldn’t really call us friends. Upon his retirement, Jim had moved to this quiet Mexican town, where there was already a small American community, to relax, drink Tequila, and write a novel. That was five years ago, and he seemed to have two of the three down. "So your letter said. What’s your interest?"

"Miguel is a friend of mine." He poured himself another shot of amber fire. "He does some handyman work around town, but his real livelihood comes from his family farm in the hills north of here. Lately, something’s been killing off his livestock."

"A mountain lion?"

"No," Jim said. "Mountain lions don’t drink goat blood and leave the carcasses to rot in the sun. Miguel – and the local villagers – believe it’s a chupacabra."

"Chupacabra? I thought that was a Puerto Rican folk tale."

"No. The chupacabras are real, old pal. And they’ve been reported all through South and Central America. Even north of the border."

"Anybody actually see one of these beasts?" I asked as I touched the flame from my Bic to the tip of a Marlboro, promising myself it would be the last of the day.

"Yes. Two witnesses. Miguel and his sister."

"I’d like to talk to them," I said.

"That’s no problem," Jim said. "Consuela works at the cantina, and this time of day, we’ll probably find Miguel there, too."

The cantina was a one-story adobe-and-wood structure at one end of a dusty street, away from the nice shops and white villas of the expatriate Americanos. This was a local watering hole, and while Jim seemed at home there, I felt a lot of wary eyes on me as we walked through the beaded curtain over the door. It was dark inside, and it took my eyes a few minutes to adjust, but when they did, I saw Jim heading for a long wooden bar. I followed.

I took the stool beside Jim and was pleasantly surprised by the bartender. She was about eighteen, tall and shapely, with long black hair that fell to the middle of her back. It was tied back, but not braided. Her skin was dark and smooth, her lips full, and her eyes were black obsidian. She was lovely.

"Walker, old pal," Jim said. "This is Consuela Martinez, Miguel’s brother."

"Pleased to meet you, senorita."

"Thank you, senor. Can I get you a drink?"

"I’ll take a cold Corona, if you have one."

"Si."

"Is your brother here, Consuela?" Jim asked.

She nodded and pointed towards the back of the room. "Si. He’s waiting for you, Senor Gunn."

She placed an ice-cold bottle of beer on the bar in front of me, beads of condensation running down the glass. "Go on back. I’ll get Maria to watch the bar, and I’ll join you in a minute."

I took my bottle and followed Jim to a dark booth in the rear of the cantina. I still felt like the other patrons were staring at me suspiciously. Miguel was about twenty-five, skinny, with dark circles under his eyes. He looked exhausted. He had a nearly-empty bottle of mescal in front of him. He hardly looked up as Jim and I slid into the booth across from him.

"Miguel," said Jim. "This is my friend Walker. Remember, I told you about him?"

Miguel muttered something in slurred Spanish. All I caught was "gringo."

"You must forgive my brother," Consuela said as she appeared suddenly at my elbow. "He hasn’t slept for three days and he’s been drinking far too much." She sat down beside him and put a hand on his arm.

"What happened?" I asked.

"We’ve been losing goats for almost a month. One, two a week. Three nights ago, Miguel took our father’s rifle and decided to watch the herd and see if anything attacked them. About midnight, I decided to take him some food and coffee. When I arrived, he was asleep."

"I was not asleep," Miguel muttered.

"Suddenly, there was a disturbance among the goats, and most of the herd broke and ran away. I took my flashlight and Miguel and I went to investigate. What we found chilled my blood, senor."

"What did you see?"

"It was a monster, senor. It had one of our goats down on the ground and was sucking the blood from it. I swear, senor. It was El Chupacabara."

She was completely serious. "Can you describe it, Consuela?"

"It was about the size of a child, but it had large eyes that glowed white in the dark. It had a row of spikes running down its back and a short tail. When we shined our light on it, it whipped its head around and stared at us with those terrible devil’s eyes. Its mouth was filled with sharp teeth."

"So, what do you say, old pal?" Gunn asked me.

"I don’t follow.’

"You’re a hunter, Walker. You want to help us kill this evil little goat-sucker?"

"I don’t hunt anymore, Gunn. Did anyone call the authorities?"

"The official line is that these little monsters don’t exist," Gunn said with a smile. "Even though I know the local cops believe in it. But there’s nothing they can do."

"So you want me to go out into this hills with a rifle and shoot the thing."

"No," said Miguel suddenly. "I will shoot the chupacabra. Tonight. And I will go alone."

"Miguel," his sister whispered. "Mr. Walker is a famous American reporter. Maybe he could go with you, so he can tell the story to his readers."

Miguel thought about it for a second. "Then I will be famous, too?"

"Sure," I said.

"Then he can come."

It was soon agreed that Jim Gunn would drive me out to the Martinez farm after dinner, and come nightfall, I would go with Miguel in search of the legendary goat-sucker. Before leaving the cantina, Consuela took me aside.

"Please, Senor Walker. Take care of my brother. He hasn’t been well since we saw the monster that night."

I looked into those dark eyes. What a damned fool I am for a pretty girl.

"I will, Consuela.

"And we’ll get the damned Chupacabra, too."

To Be Continued

The Walker Files: Hunting Bigfoot, Part 2

Here's the second part of my first "Joe Walker" tabloid adventure. For an explanation of this series of stories, scroll down and check out the previous post.

We set out before dawn the next morning, Mike Grayle’s gigantic black Hummer packed with camping supplies and hunting gear. We headed for the hills where the Bigfoot tracks had been found by his construction crew, the military-style vehicle climbing the muddy dirt roads like a mountain cat.

I rode shotgun as we drove in silence; each of us lost in our own thoughts. I guessed the old big game hunter was dreaming about the glory, fame and financial rewards that would come to him if he actually bagged himself one of the legendary man-beasts. Me, I was thinking what a damned fool I was for coming along on this insane hunt, and wondering how I could stop Grayle from killing a legend – if it existed at all.

We set up camp a mile or two up the mountain from the construction site where Grayle’s crew was building a hotel. It was there that the Sasquatch’s footprints had been found, but Mike figured that the creatures had to live in the caves that riddled the mountain higher up. Once we had a base camp established, we set out to hunt for Bigfoot. Mike carried his weathered and beaten Holland & Holland, while I carried a Nikon camera and my trusty Glock in a Bianchi holster, worn low on my hip.

The terrain was rocky and wet; water dripped from the trees and the rocks were slick with soggy moss. It was slow going. Every once in a while Mike would stop and inspect the ground searching for spoor, but he never found a trace of his quarry. Not so much as a footprint or clump of hair.

For three days we found nothing. We’d hiked what seemed like a couple hundred miles up and down that mountain, forged frigid streams, and poked our noses into countless dark caves. It had rained from dawn to dusk each day. By evening on the third, Grayle was getting ugly and short-tempered, and truth be told, so was I.

"How much longer are we going to traipse around out here, Mike? My feet are cold, my ass is wet, and I’ve had just about enough of this foolishness." We paused to rest beneath a massive outcropping of granite, our backs against the stone as we tried vainly to get out of the rain.

"They’re here, Walker. I know it. Just shut up and come on."

"I’m not kidding, Mike. I’m not going to spend the rest of my life on this mountain looking for a figment of some hoaxer’s imagination. If there are such things as Bigfoot, they’re not on this mountain.

"Face it, pal. You’ve been had."

I let that sink in. Grayle’s face, already pink from exertion, turned bright red with rage. "What’s happened to you, Walker? We used to hunt lions together, for chrissake.

"Maybe you’ve gone all lily-livered on me. What’s the matter, old man? Yellow?"

"Shut up, Mike," I warned. "We’re both tired and wet and miserable. Let’s just head back to camp – it’ll be dark soon. We can get out of these wet clothes and get something to eat. We can talk about it there."

"I’m not ready to go back yet, Walker," he said menacingly. I didn’t like the look in his eyes or the way he held his iron. I tickled the butt of my Glock with my fingertips.

"I’m going," I said, and took a step toward the trees.

He raised the massive Holland & Holland, and I stared down two gaping barrels. "You’re not going anywhere. I’m going to bag myself a Bigfoot, and you’re going to be there to document it, understand?"

"This is nuts, Mike."

"Hand over that fancy shooter of yours, Walker."

I stared into his face and wondered if he really was crazy enough to kill me. As if reading my mind, he thumbed back the hammers on his rifle. "Give me your gun."

I slowly pulled the Glock from its holster with two fingers and tossed it into the mud at Grayle’s feet. He crouched to pick it up, but the H&H was too heavy to handle with one hand. When the barrels dipped, I took my chance. I acted without thinking; if I’d given it any thought at all, I never would have been so reckless.

I dived for the old hunter and grabbed at the rifle, pushing it away from me. He lost his balance and fell in the mud. Thank God the gun didn’t go off. It would have cut me in two.

I stepped on it, burying it in the mud. "You crazy S.O. B!" I yelled, adrenaline surging through my body, my hands clenched into fists and shaking. "You tried to kill me!"

He shook his head. "No… I…"

Then he stopped.

His eyes were wide and fixed on some point behind me, back among the trees. "Walker..." he whispered. "Behind you."

"I’m not falling for that old trick, Mike." Did he think I was as crazy as he was?

"Walker, old man, I’m sorry. You really have to look. He’s there."

His whole manner had changed. His face was pale. All the rage and insanity had disappeared from his face.

I took a chance.

I slowly turned my head.

There, only thirty feet away, among the wet pines and half-hidden by the undergrowth, stood a tall, dark figure.

It had to be seven feet tall, massively muscled and covered with black, matted hair. It stared at us as we stared at it, and in the shadows of twilight I can’t be sure, but it seemed to me that there was sadness in its dark eyes. We watched it and it watched us for several minutes, and Grayle seemed to have completely forgotten about killing it.

After a while it moved, and I heard Grayle gasp. It turned and headed off into the trees. "Walker, your camera!" Mike hissed.

I had completely forgotten it. Quickly I pulled it from my jacket pocket and snapped off a shot.

We made our way back to camp and neither of us said a word about our encounter with a legend. I know the experience changed me, and I suspect it changed Grayle, too.

He left his gun on the mountain.

The Walker Files: Hunting Bigfoot, Part 1

Back when I worked on the Sun tabloid some years ago, we ran a series of short "true adventure" stories ostensibly written by one of our reporters. Needless to say, that reporter was a figment of someone's imagination, as were his adventures. Well, for a couple months, the editor responsible for actually writing these tales – which, from the mail, a surprising number of our readers thought were real – was unable to fit the weekly feature into his schedule, so I was asked to take it over for a while. As I'm off on my two week road trip with my wife, I thought I'd schedule a few of these to post here, for the amusement of this blog's handful of readers.

I've changed the main character's name and added a line or two, here and there, but here's my first two-part adventure.

It's not all that great, frankly, but considering the the super short word count, very short schedule and the limitations of working with the character as established, I think it's it turned out okay....

"Iron" Mike Grayle was a world-renowned big game hunter. Over six feet tall and built like a linebacker, he had to be at least sixty years old, but not a single gray hair showed in his jet black, slightly Satanic goatee. His craggy face was the color and texture of sandstone, and his grip was still a bone crusher.

"Walker, old boy! Glad you could make it," he said, shaking my hand.

"Well, your letter was intriguing, to say the least. What’s this all about, Mike?"

"It’s a story, Walker! The biggest of your career." He grabbed one of my suitcases and led me out of the Portland, Oregon airport towards the short-term parking lot. There, he tossed my bag into the back of a gigantic, black Hummer.

My name is Joe Walker, and I'm a reporter for the Weekly Eclipse, a national supermarket tabloid. Our offices are in Miami, Florida, but I'm rarely there. At my paper's expense – and my editor's disgust – I spend most of my time on planes, boats, horses, donkeys and camels, travelling to the world's most remote and unappealing tourist spots, pursuing stories about the bizarre and unusual. I find both with surprising frequency.

Two hours after Grayle picked me up in Portland, we were sitting in front of a fire at his twenty-room "hunting lodge" sixty miles to the North, drinking coffee after a huge steak dinner. I lit up a Marlboro and said, "Okay, Mike. It’s a nice place you’ve got here and the meal was great. But I haven’t seen or spoke to you since Kenya, back in '82, when we had that run-in with the ivory poachers. Your letter was vague and you’ve been avoiding my questions all night. If you want me to hang around, you’re going to have to give me something."

"You still hunt, Walker?" he asked, a glint in his eye, as he put a match to an elaborately carved Meerschaum pipe.

"No, lost my stomach for it."

"Too bad. But I can understand it. It’s a different world now; the days of the ‘Great White Hunter’ have passed. The true game animals have been over-hunted by amateurs and poachers, and there are damned few places in the world left to really get out in the wild and pit yourself against nature."

"Right," I agreed, but he didn’t understand at all. It was the killing I’d lost my taste for. At one time, I’d been caught up in the excitement of the hunt, too; but after that trip to Kenya and witnessing the savage butchery of the great elephants simply for profit, I’d had enough. Clearly Mike hadn’t. "So, is that what this is about? You want me to join you on a hunt?"

"Exactly! But a hunt unlike any you’ve ever experienced. Follow me." He led me down the hall to huge, high-ceilinged room. It was his trophy room. The room was an impressive tribute to the taxidermist’s art: the heads of nearly every variety of antelope, deer, and buffalo lined the walls. A lion, tiger and a black panther had given their lives to become rugs, and a grizzly towered over a chair of horn and leather, frozen forever in a pose of attack. Glass gun cabinets circled the room, filled with virtually every firearm known to man.

Mike led me to a large wooden table in the middle of the room. A sheet covered something on top of it. "Look around, Walker. I’ve hunted virtually every game animal in the world. I’ve stood down charging elephants and stalked jungle cats. If it runs, flies or swims, I’ve made a trophy of it. After almost thirty years, the challenge was gone. I retired here to the Pacific Northwest, made a few investments, and started work on my memoirs.

"But now I’ve found a new challenge… and right in my own back yard!"

He pulled away the sheet to reveal six plaster casts. Each was nearly two feet long and they were all almost exactly the same. They were footprints. Huge footprints.

"You’re going to hunt Bigfoot?"

"No, " he said. "We’re going to hunt Bigfoot. These casts come from up in the mountains near here. I’m a partner in a new mountain lodge and restaurant – it’s one of those investments I mentioned. Construction started two months ago, and one morning the crew found some prints. They thought it was a hoax, but new prints have shown up almost every night."

"It probably is a hoax, Mike. Has anybody actually spotted a Sasquatch?"

"A couple of the crew claim to have seen things moving in the woods. Maybe it is a hoax, but if it’s not, it’s got to be the greatest challenge yet. Will you join me, Walker? Your readers will eat it up, and we’ll both be famous."

"I don’t know, Mike…" I picked up one of the casts. "If these are real, the creature’s going to be gigantic."

"I’ve had experts look at these casts, and they say we’re looking for a humanoid creature over eight feet tall, weighing around six hundred pounds."

"Something that big is going to be tough."

"It’s not so big. Besides, I have just the gun for the job." He walked to the nearest cabinet and pulled out a battered rifle. It had seen a lot of use. It was a Holland and Holland Royal Ejector model, made in the Fifties, its two twenty-six inch barrels chambered for the Holland and Holland .375 Magnum cartridge. The .375 Magnum delivers a 300-grain slug with over two tons of stopping power.

Yeah, he had the gun for the job, all right. I remembered that gun from Kenya."When do you plan to start this hunt?"

"Tonight. The Hummer’s been loaded with gear. We’ll set up camp along a lumber road a mile or so up the mountain from the construction site. Most of the prints seem to go in that direction. There’s a lot of caves up there, maybe that’s where they live. It’s a place to start, anyway.

"So, are you with me, Walker?"

"I’m with you. Let’s go find ourselves a Sasquatch."

To Be Continued