SHADE FRIGHT

Chapter 5

 "You alright Miss, er..."

"Stevens," I exhaled heavily, as Peter Orlowski helped me to my feet. "Just call me Valerie."

"Alright, then," he said, as he took a tentative step backward, just in case my knees planned on giving way again. "I never did ask you what you do for a living... you with the Mounties?"

"No, I'm not a police officer," I muttered, brushing myself off and feeling embarrassed as hell. "I'm a consultant."

Orlowski's grey eyes narrowed, revealing a deeply chiseled set of crow's feet.

"Sheeoot... this is gonna cost me some money, is that it?"

"No... not at all," I half-groaned, as my stomach started doing back flips. "Would you reach into the back seat of my car and grab the large leather satchel? I'm going to need it."

"Sure enough," he said, exhaling in relief as he opened the back door of the Maxima and reached inside. "Money's been tight lately, with the missus needing her medication and all. Goddamned Alberta Health Care don't cover crap."

I climbed into the box of the old Ford pickup and surveyed the area.

We'd parked along the forward slope of a waist-high stand of wheat that bobbed and weaved in the warm breeze. An ancient Massey Ferguson combine sat idly along the ridge of the hillside, and I could see the glint of the sun bouncing off the cone-shaped lid top of a series of eight grain bins. There was a noticeable gap between bin number six and bin number eight.

"I take it that's the location of your missing bin," I said, flipping down my sunglasses.

"Yep," grunted Orlowski. "Just what the hell happened when you got out of your car? You're not sick are you?"

I hopped off the box of the pickup, grimacing when I landed.

"No, I'm not sick... at least, I don't think so," I said, forcing another smile. "Mr. Orlowski, how long have you lived on this farm?"

Orlowski pumped out his chest and smiled proudly.

"I've been farming here for over forty years," he said. "My father farmed this land before me, and my great-grandfather cleared this land after it was granted to him by the Canadian Pacific Railway... why do you ask?"

It's rare that I'm immediately affected by negative energy, or what I like to call bad juju. When I walk past a cemetery, I normally experience some light-headedness or slight nausea if a murder victim or a criminal is buried there, and I'll often see a procession of spirits who've chosen not to cross over holding vigil at their final resting place. In the case of Peter Orlowski's farm, I assumed that a grave or two existed somewhere on his land, but the circumstances of their deaths shouldn't have affected me at all. Since the intensity of bad juju has to build up considerably before I feel any ill effects, the suddenness of my bout of nausea told me this was a serious case of hard-ass menace aimed squarely at me.

"I was just wondering," I said, holding my stomach. "Why don't you lead me to where you last saw your bin?"

Orlowski nodded and motioned for me to follow, so we headed along a cut line and up the hill. As we crested the hill, I spotted a depression in the ground between the bins, and I noticed a tidy row of dead poplars surrounding the barn.

"It's the twentieth of August, and you tell me why the hell those trees are dead," Orlowski griped, pointing to the barn.

I knelt down and placed my left hand on the ground, hoping there was enough spiritual energy in the earth to catch a glimpse of who or what had stolen the grain bin.