Authors: Gray Barker
The Silver Bridge (3 page)
That Monday she had turned on the television set to catch a noon report on the Viet Nam war. There had followed an entertaining program and she had been caught up in it. The young MC of the contest show had reminded her of a relative who had died in an accident—still in sin, though she felt that Jesus would suffer only the most wicked to burn in Hell, and that surely the young, weeping and looking heavenward as they entered those dark and awesome gates, would not be denied one last chance for repentance.
And she had not prayed for all sinners everywhere: those on drugs, those languishing in prisons, those uncorrupted children of heathen lineage who had never heard even the shortest biblical verse, “Jesus wept.”
Especially, she had not prayed for those lost souls, who according to the Bible, had not one hope, being damned forever, as had the rich man who begged Lazarus for one drop of water to moisten his tongue.
“Let me, O Lord, implore you,” she prayed, “to take my own precious life and soul, and place me in that fiery furnace, if but one of those lost souls there might be given a chance once more to bask in the brilliance of Thy golden light, and to experience Thy forgiving and redeeming power.”
Although she couldn’t understand why even the most wicked should be consigned to eternal suffering, she felt that the ways of God were mysterious and far beyond her mortal powers of understanding.
But she had forgotten on that day; she had neglected to offer this prayer. And shortly afterward the vision came over her.
Her prophecies usually came in such visions, but mostly they were less dramatic and not as frightening. Instead it would seem that a quiet voice would speak on such occasions and tell her of events to come.
This time the vision was different. It began with black clouds billowing toward her. Out of the clouds came lightning and flame. Then the clouds parted, and a huge airplane, its jets screaming, plunged out of them into her view. It was a vast, unearthly plane, with many engines, all spouting fire and fumes. It poised high in the sky and then plunged toward her, and the noise of the jets seemed to mingle with the screams of many passengers.
Mrs. Thomas felt this was a portent of a forthcoming plane crash, such as she had experienced before the collision of two planes over the Grand Canyon some years previous.
The plane became amorphous, and changed shape. Now it was a huge, awesome bird that still plunged toward her with terrifying swiftness. Its wings flapped wildly, and the screams of the passengers changed to a wild and unearthly croaking. Its eyes, red and glaring, seemed to hold her in a hypnotic trance. They became larger and larger, with the blackness closing in around them.
“Those eyes had gripping power over you,” she told her neighbors. “I feared it was going to tear me to pieces.”
By Wednesday, Nov. 16, Mrs. Thomas had recovered from the initial shock of the vision, but was worried about the events which it must have portended.
Mrs. Katherine Wamsley, along with Marcella Bennett, both Point Pleasant residents, had come to visit her, and they had cheered her up. Mrs. Bennett brought her new baby, and Mrs. Thomas saw it for the first time. As soon as the mother unwrapped her, the child confirmed Mrs. Thomas’s reputation with children. The baby opened her little eyes and made a gurgling noise, and tried to reach out and touch her large necklace, even though the child was only three months old.
“There, Baby, Baby, let me hold you,” Mrs. Thomas offered, a warm glow permeating her as she took it from its mother. It burbled pleasantly again.
“She’s been so cross lately,” Mrs. Bennett told her; “you work wonders with babies.”
“I like her little pink dress,” Mrs. Wamsley said, “I think she’s divine.”
A short distance from the Thomas home the old abandoned T.N.T. plant seemed to lurk, like something vast and living, where the preceding night had been one of horror for the two young couples. Mrs. Thomas had felt that her vision had indeed been prophetic, but that instead of a plane crash she had foreseen the advent of Mothman, the great bird which would terrorize Point Pleasant.
As the two women prepared to depart, she hoped her mind would not again begin to dwell on the subject, for the tale the young couple had told disturbed her in a peculiar way. She felt that not only had her dream been prophetic, but that the creature portended something even more horrifying and tragic. “Something will happen…something will happen,” she told herself, even then, under her breath, as she walked with her friends to the door.
As she hooked the night latch she heard Mrs. Bennett scream. She re-opened the door to witness a scene of wild confusion. Mrs. Bennett had dropped her baby and was picking up up, apparently examining it for injuries. It was crying. Mrs. Wamsley pointed fearfully to the sky.
“It had a body like a man, yet it was a bird, oh a terrible bird! I think it was the devil himself!”
Both fled back into the house. The baby had been wrapped heavily and apparently suffered no injuries, but the two adults were hysterical. They slowly gasped out the story. A huge, bird-like creature, with glowing red eyes, had suddenly dropped like a heavy wet sack upon the sand of the yard. It made a flapping, gurgling sound, as it righted itself and stood up.
The red eyes had almost hypnotized them, holding their gaze for a few seconds before it suddenly shot up into the air “like a rocket”.
Mrs. Thomas thought that she, herself, had caught a glimpse of the red eyes as she opened the door, but she could remember no huge bird. They had been the same red eyes of her vision.
When the excitement had died down and her neighbors had finally departed, she retired to her kitchen, carrying there the ancient bible. Again she opened it and looked upon the terrifying creatures doomed to suffer in agony and perpetual darkness and ugliness because they were out of God’s Light.
Was the great bird one of them, or had it been a sign sent upon her, reminding her she had forgotten to pray?
“Oh Lord,” she prayed, “forgive this poor trespasser who would let the ways of the world intrude upon her worship. Withdraw this terrible visitation and withdraw Your anger. Let not the innocent be punished for the ways of the transgressor. And Oh Lord, even though it be blasphemy, set Thy Light also on those creatures, who expelled from heaven, dwell incessantly in the shadows of the precious Light, away from Thy sweet face; and who, if but for a day, could dwell again in that Light, would perhaps repent, and descend upon the world with warnings, even though Elijah and the prophets failed. For even though the fires torment them, and the terrible worms bite at them, it surely must be their hope that You, in Thy infinite wisdom, have not completely withdrawn from them.”
Mrs. Thomas sobbed at this thought, and then a feeling of peace came over her. She knew it was time she should go to bed.
“And if it please you, dear Jesus,” she added, “let no more prophecies come tonight.”
She turned out the light and lay there, still experiencing the tranquil calm. She thought about the baby and how beautiful she was. She would rock her to sleep later, and tell her stories of past days in the valley. She hoped Mrs. Bennett would bring her back for visits, despite the harrowing circumstances of that evening.
It was a cold, calm night. The rain had stopped, and only intermittent clouds, sweeping rapidly across the sky, obscured, then revealed the moon. She could see one bright star. It was now past midnight. Only a occasional car interrupted the peace of the lonely T.N.T. area, and she began to hear the far-away sounds of the city.
The sounds were diffuse and indistinct, though she could distinguish the occasional auto horn. Later, when all was quiet in her neighborhood, the city noises could be identified by the steady rumbling she always heard—the sound of trailer trucks as they shook the eye bar-suspended structure, as the heavy traffic progressed, bumper-to-bumper, across the Silver Bridge.
I
always dread the drive to New Martinsville, which I make about once each month in connection with my educational sales work. From Clarksburg its route of access is a tortuous, twisting, narrow stream of macadam, pock-marked with “pot holes”, and marked here and there with warning signs, one-lane bridges and precipitous mountain views, where one slight misjudgment in steering might well throw one over a towering embankment, with no guard rails present to slow or stay the crashing descent.
On the evening of Nov. 19, 1966, as I negotiated the treacherous road at a careful speed, I wondered why the State Road Commission allowed it to remain so primitive. But the old farm houses, perched nervously on the banks above it, and unpainted for years, with occasional half-naked children standing on their porches despite the cold weather; the rusting automobiles in their yards, often with wheels and other parts removed, indicated that here was a people without any political personality or power.
The utter drabness depressed me. The old mine tipples, most of them abandoned, with timbers rotting and crumbling, contributed to my low mood. A small railroad station, no longer operative, and with yellowing timetables and notices on its doors, added to the evidence of general decay. Not only, it seemed, had the area declined economically, but psychologically and spiritually as well.
The driving rain, along with the descending early darkness of winter, further impeded my progress. Mud, hurled from the tires of a creeping coal truck impossible to pass on the crooked road, fouled my windshield and headlights. I thought of the many remarks I hadheard about the people of the area, where it was said that intermarriage between kin was widely practiced, and that, as a result, deformities of children were commonplace. Social workers had attempted to help, but residents preferred to exist at near starvation rather than to reveal their secrets. Rumors had it that in many a locked room along the road, a “dummy” as these defective progeny were called locally, was imprisoned, to live out its days guiltily hidden from society.
I was glad to reach Wallace, the westernmost village in Harrison county; for here not only would the road improve, but the general tone of the countryside as well. Although the outward signs of degeneration would end with my crossing the boundary of Wetzel county, generally known as more progressive, a rural atmosphere still prevailed. All business places were closed except one small service station where an unkempt, deaf old man finally understood my questions, and directed me on the road that would lead to the home of Newell Partridge, whose German Shepherd dog, “Bandit” may have been snatched out of this world by Mothman.
The side road was paved, and not much worse than the main highways I had negotiated; but the rain had increased and driving was even more difficult. I hoped the old man had been correct with his directions.
I wished I had not gotten mixed up in the matter at all. A friend from the local television station had called me and given me the lead. Newell Partridge had telephoned the station two nights previous and asked them about the news item they had telecast about the Point Pleasant happenings.
“He began by asking me in particular about the report of a dog being found dead in that area,” the news director told me. “Then this fellow said his dog disappeared on the same night—a large German Shepherd animal. He was pretty well shook up about the loss of his dog, and I think he half suspects that ‘Mothman’ got his dog.”
I then telephoned Partridge, who at first was reluctant to talk. After I explained that I considered myself a reliable reporter, and was after only the facts, he assented to invite me to his house for an interview.
As the pavement ended, and a graveled road continued, gutted by mud puddles, I seriously considered turning back, for I felt I might be on the wrong road. I noted with disquiet that my gas was low, for I understood the witness lived a short distance off the main road and had neglected filling up before leaving Clarksburg.
Seeing a light to my right through the downpouring rain, I stopped the car and ran over to the building. It was a new house in its final stages of construction, yet apparently already occupied. There was no front entrance completed, but I banged on a window and somebody opened it and poked his head out. The resident assured me I was on the right track and that indeed there actually was a Newell Partridge, who lived “quite a spell” down the road.
His “quite a spell” developed as no great distance, yet it included a frightening mountain, with narrow muddy roads. The downpour worsened and I envisioned becoming stuck or running into the ditch. Since turning off the main highway I had encountered no traffic, and I probably would be stranded all night, before help could be obtained.
The depressing and disquieting condition of the road, along with the utter weirdness of the case I was investigating, made me jumpy. I tramped my brake pedal and almost skidded into the ditch to avoid an animal, limping and waddling in a kind of sidewise motion on the road ahead of me. Inching ahead, I followed it, obviously a fowl of some sort. It was too large to be a chicken; evidently it was a goose or turkey. Instead of getting off the road it continued to limp ahead of the car. Now and then it would falter, and flap desperately, before arising to continue its tortured journey. Finally the animal, apparently incapable of further movement, came to a dead stop in front of me. I stopped the car and investigated. It was a large turkey gobbler, with a broken leg and bleeding from the head. Its feathers appeared waterlogged, mixed with mud and filth of the road. I decided to put it into the station wagon with the hope of drying it out and splinting its leg at the Partridge residence; but as I picked up the dripping, almost disgusting black mass, I could tell, in the mud-stained light from my headlights, that the bird had expired. I held it for a moment, and then threw the pitiful thing over an embankment.
