Mistress of the Undead

Mistress of the Undead
Lazar Levi
1940
For thirty minutes she lived. Thirty minutes she suffered while the plane wreckage and dismembered human bodies burned around her. And one year later she told her story!
"DEATH!"
Tim Blake whispered the single word as he gazed in horror at the cuckoo clock on the mantel shelf. Fear contorted his rugged brown face when he turned to John Turner.
"God, man, did you hear that?" he asked.
John Turner had heard nothing except striking of the clock, but he felt strangely queer. An eerie silence followed as vibrations of the cuckoo's mournful croaks died away slowly.
"What was it?" He managed to get words out of a dry throat.
"Hit struck seven," Tim replied, in nervous agitation, "and it's only six o'clock. Death's acomin' to this here very house, and it's only a hour away." He was trembling and beads of perspiration popped out on his weather-beaten face.
From the next room there came a pitiful moan, hollow and weird. John Turner thought it whining of the cold January wind?a wind that had caused him to stop and warm at Tim Blake's shack on the edge of the marsh before plodding on to the lodge, where he and three other duck hunters were quartered for a week's shoot.
"Hit's the ole woman!" Tim Blake barely whispered the words. They seemed to lodge, chokingly, in his throat.
"Is she ill?" Turner asked.
"Sick for nigh onto a month," Tim whispered. "An' she ain't got but a hour to live by the clock." The old man's face twitched, revealing the inward agony tearing at his gaunt body. He wrung his hands pathetically.
"You don't believe that clock striking the wrong hour means anything, do you?" Turner asked the backwoodsman.
"Hit ain't never done it but onct afore in all the fifty years me and Nancy has been married," Tim Blake moaned. "Hit was the night the Little City airyplane crashed and kilt all them people right out thar in the swamp."
Warning of foreboding danger seemed to Turner to permeate the Blake shack now, as Tim paced the floor. Turner stood up uneasily, ready to make his escape from the room, which had become strangely cold and bleak despite the red hot stove glowing in the semi-darkness.
"Yuh can do it!" Tim swung around and shouted at him. Turner stepped back as the old man took long strides in his direction. Blake caught the lapels of Turner's coat and shook him violently. "Fetch a doctor from Lake Worth for Nancy," he shouted, excitedly. "If yuh hurry, yuh can git 'im back here 'fore the hour is up, and it won't be too late. Fer God's sake, hurry!"
John Turner wanted to refuse. It was a long way to Lake Worth by foot. He had no way to ride. He wore rubber boots and was not accustomed to walking. Most likely he couldn't get the doctor back in time.
"Yuh can't go back on me and Nancy," the old man pleaded, as Turner hesitated. Tears were streaming down Tim Blake's face. "Death'll be here in a hour. The clock's done said so. Hit done it a year ago, come this very night, and thet thar airy- plane crashed right on the hour, with nary a soul left alive to tell 'bout it."
"Sure, I'll go," Turner heard himself say, his own voice sounding queer to him.
John Turner and Tim Blake had been good friends ever since Turner started coming to the marsh duck hunting, but there was no reason why he should go stumbling through the bitter cold to get a doctor for Nancy Blake when it was impossible to get the physician back within an hour. He had not wanted to make this promise, but the words slipped off his tongue against his will.
Tim Blake shoved him toward the door and out into the open. It was dark, with low clouds hanging ominously overhead. The wind, cutting like sharp blades of ice, licked at Turner's hands and face as they reached the gate.
"Hurry, man," Tim pleaded. "Hit's ten miles 'round the marsh, but yuh can make it."
"I'll cut across the swamp and save time," Turner assured him as he started walking away.
TIM caught him by the arm and jerked him around. His voice was pleading and queer, as he begged.
"You can't make it that way, son. There ain't nary a man bin through thar since them airyplane passengers was kilt in the swamp."
"I'm not afraid," Turner laughed, scornfully, but his voice was shrill and uncontrollable.
"'Tain't that," Tim moaned. "Hit's the ghosts! They won't let a body past. Fer God's sake, go 'round so's yuh'll be sartin to git thar 'fore too late."
"All right," Turner answered, impatiently.
He set out for the rutty road around the edge of the marsh. He lowered his head against the raging wind, and rammed his hands deep in his pockets