Steven knew he should not be out at night alone. He had been told repeatedly to stay inside with the doors locked after dark. But when the moonlight beckoned outside his bedroom window, it was more than he could resist.
He made his way down the hill behind the house and into the corn field. The moon went behind a cloud and the long rows of corn were darkened. The nights were beginning to cool; a small breeze moved the leaves of the drying corn. He stopped to listen to the rustling of leaves–to inhale the dry, dusty stalks. Despite the night’s chill the dirt was warm under his bare feet. He pulled the drying silk from an ear of corn.
Suddenly there was a larger rustling of corn a few feet from Steven. Something big was moving through the field. It couldn’t be a person–people tended to stay in rows. This thing was bending the tassels of corn as it moved cross-ways through the patch. Steven became alarmed. It wasn’t more than thirty feet away now.
“Who’s there?” he said.
No answer, but the thing stopped.
Who’s there, I said!” Continue reading “The Teufel”