SIXTEEN
A cheer went up from the crowd gathered by the stage and Ross’ attention was drawn to a balcony covered in lights and bunting to his right which looked down on the square. A grey haired man appeared and waved almost dismissively to the people below, as if slightly ill at ease with the attention. He was dressed casually in a white shirt with white flannel trousers and had on a cream coloured Panama type hat.
He shouted something in Spanish down to his audience and waved them away with his hands which raised a laugh from them then he sat in a chair and rested his elbows on the balcony’s ornate balustrade to watch proceedings.
“Hauser?” Ross said.
“Hauser,” Rosa confirmed.
A middle aged woman carrying a tray came out onto the balcony and placed a glass and a bottle of what looked like wine on a table next to the German. The two exchanged a few words, the woman laughed at whatever he said and made a friendly swipe at him with the tray which he easily ducked to avoid.
It was such a curious scene, the man had the air of reluctant authority about him. Not like a mayor or politician but something else. Ross looked at the almost adoring faces in the crowd, young and old alike, looking up at him. And could quite easily imagine Hauser as some kind of mythical revolutionary type. In only a few moments, Ross could tell this man had a hold over these people. More Che Guevara than El presidente but a hold nevertheless.
A shriek of feedback through the PA system brought everyone’s attention back to the stage. A young girl of perhaps twelve clutching a piece of paper walked onto the stage and over to the microphone with a quiet formality.
When she got to the mic the crowd moved away from the stage in a hushed silence and settled around the edges of the square leaving a large open area and waited for her to speak. The lights dimmed until one spotlight remained shining down on the girl.
Ross looked at the now shadowy faces of the crowd, set in anticipation of what was to come. The silence that had now descended on the square was almost oppressive compared to the cacophony of music and laugher it followed. The mood had changed in mere moments from one of carefree frivolity to one bordering on the ritualistic.
The girl began reading from her notes, her voice clear and confident as she spoke, but with a note of palpable emotion to it which caught Ross off guard somewhat. He had half expected an amateurish school play type performance from the girl, but this had a raw edge to it that took the priest aback. Although he had no idea what she was saying he felt his skin breakout in goose flesh despite the heat.
As she continued, another spot light came on hitting six children, three girls and three boys their ages ranging from perhaps six up to sixteen. It followed them as they came through the crowd in procession two by two and walked slowly towards the centre of the square. They were wearing what looked to Ross like choir cassocks and each had their hands were clasped together in front of their faces as if in prayer.
A rumble of whispers ran through the crowd and Ross saw, despite the obvious mistrust of the church here, several of the older people cross themselves. He caught Rosa out of the corner of his eye doing the same. He chanced a glance at her and could see the beginnings of tears glisten in her dark eyes.
Still followed by the spotlight the children stopped in the very centre of the square but continued to walk in place, eyes closed, hands clashed in prayer as the young girl went on with her impassioned narration.
Ross caught the odd word he understood here and there as she spoke. ‘Hauser’ came up several times as did ‘iglesia’ which he had heard one of his Spanish colleagues say a few times during his time in the seminary. That meant church if memory served. Then ‘padre’, but more disturbingly she ended with ‘diablo’. He didn’t need a degree in Spanish to know what that meant.
“Diablo!” The girl shrieked again after a moment of silence. Then a hiss as two large dry ice machines either side of the stage flooded the square with smoke. As it was a windless night the smoke soon settled until it was a blanket over the entire area, covering the taller children from their waists and up to the chests of the smaller ones.
The smoke drifted over to where Ross was seated and he had to waft it away, he noticed some of the audience actually taking a few steps back to avoid it getting too close to them.
Back over by the front of the stage, the dry ice shifted as if touched in a light breeze. Ross strained to see and thought he caught sight of a large dark shadow within its thick billowing mass. There was a murmur of discontent from the crowd at this and some of the smaller children watching clutched to their parents legs or demanded to be picked up so they could bury their heads in familiar bosoms. Again some of the older villagers crossed themselves others looked away altogether.
What kind of celebration was this? Ross thought to himself with a growing sense of unease.
Yes, as he peered into the gloom Ross could definitely see something moving now within the sea of dry ice like some aquatic predator moving towards where the six children were still blindly praying. The young priest got a sudden stab of fear. Just what exactly was he witnessing here in this small none descript village in the middle of nowhere? A harmless tradition? Or some horrendous, blasphemous ritual sacrifice?
What if Hauser didn’t just banish so called demons? What if he could create them too? Christ what if those six children weren’t players in a show, but lambs to the slaughter? After all hadn’t Ross thought that the way the villagers had first greeted Hauser’s appearance was bordering on the messianic?
Ross let out a low curse under his breath and tried to push the lunatic notion out of his mind, but failed as the dark shape moved fluidly just under the cover of smoke and began to circle the children. He looked up at were Hauser was holding court. The old man was just sitting watching passively sipping his drink. The woman who had brought him his drink however was standing with her arms wrapped around herself with the look close to horror on her face.
Jesus Christ, what was this? Ross was suddenly all too aware of just how out of place he was here, and just how far away from home he had travelled. And most of all just how much this place hated the church. He looked at the six children, dressed like a church choir in their cassocks. Or were they sacrificial robes?
Then Ross, along with most of the watching crowd, cried out in shock as the thing under the smoke suddenly reared up in front of the children. It was silhouetted where the suddenly blinding spotlight reflected off the dry ice it emerged from, making a nonsense of its physiology. It was big, Ross could make out that much, but its limbs seemed too long for its body. Then its black mass of a head almost split in two revealing a fleeting glimpse of dark vicious looking teeth.
“Jesus, God!” Ross shrieked as the thing lunged at one of the children. Many in the crowded echoed this but to his disbelief more still were whooping and laughing at the sight. Some threw their hands in the air and others actually clapped as the child screamed and his stomach seemed to explode in a shower of thin entrails. A moment later the child was gone, lost in the smoke.