The Uninvited by William W. Johnstone Page A

AM station that was on the air from five in the morning till ten at night, and an AM/FM combo in Bonne Terre. The station in Barnwell played country music. They ran the gamut, from genuine artists to local amateurs.
    The combo in Bonne Terre was split in its format: the AM band playing rock and roll mixed with soul, the FM playing a mixture of everything.
    On this night, while the radio stations in the two-Parish area rested their tubes and transistors, Sheriff Ransonet and the men who had accompanied him to the Cole house raced back to Bonne Terre. Vic, Rollie, and Slick had bagged the remains of the couple before the ambulances arrived. The drivers knew only that the people were dead. Sheriff Grant and Sheriff Ransonet spent many minutes on the phone, trying to work out a plan of action against an unknown enemy. The citizens of Baronne and Lapeer Parishes slept through this first night of horror.
    Most of them.
    Some of them would go to sleep forever.
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    â€œSarah!” the father called from the upstairs bedroom. “For the love of God and dear ole Dad’s eardrums, please turn down that radio.”
    The volume was cut by at least two db’s, which to the teenager’s ears was tantamount to near silence; but the father heard no lessening of the clashing and banging and screeching which battered its way to the master bedroom of the two-story home.
    Bob Campbell turned to his wife. “I’m telling you, honey, that kid’s gonna be deaf by the time she’s eighteen. Stone, stark deaf.”
    His wife, Tanya, smiled at him. “Yes, dear.” She heard the same complaint every morning, Monday through Sunday. She didn’t think the modern music was all that bad. But, she mused, it wasn’t all that good either. No variety to it.
    â€œI seem to recall,” she said, smiling, “us dancing to Little Richard.”
    â€œWe didn’t! I don’t remember that.”
    â€œYou don’t want to remember that,” she laughed.
    â€œWell,” he admitted grudgingly, “I guess we did, at that.”
    â€œSix points for me!” Tanya clapped her hands.
    â€œYou’ll never make the PAT,” Bob called from the bathroom.
    â€œBob,” she warned, trying not to grin, “that better mean Point After Touchdown.”
    Pussy After Tasting, Bob grinned, remembering the old locker room joke. “Of course, dear, what else?” He sobered. “Is Sarah staying home tonight and eating with us and our company?”
    â€œNo. She has a date.”
    â€œWith whom?”
    â€œDean.”
    â€œThat cretin!”
    â€œHe’s really a very nice boy, Bob.”
    I’ll take your word for that, babe. I’ve never heard him utter a sound except for an occasional yawp, which I assume is some strange new language of the young. How do kids nowadays converse? Do they just sit and look at each other, grunting over the throbbings of what is laughingly called music?”
    Tanya laughed silently. How to tell him that most of the boys in Bonne Terre were scared to death of Bob Campbell. The Big BC: a college football star in the late fifties; a combat Marine during the early days of Vietnam—technically an advisor to the mountain people of that region; a decorated war hero; then a pro football linebacker for nine years.
    She thought fondly of her husband of twenty-one years. He was now forty-two, she was forty. They had married while in college; she had gotten her degree while he went off to fight a war. Then came the glory days of pro ball. He was thirty-five when he walked off the field for good. And he did not look back.
    Bob had wanted a return to the simple life, and, as was his way, he got it. He bought land in Louisiana and raised wheat, soybeans, rice, and three kids. Bob, Jr. was at LSU—a music major; Roy was in the Marine Corps; Sarah was the last chick in the nest. Bob did not play the game of Keeping Up With The Jones. Had not