Dark Arts (4 page)

Maxwell liked thinking he was a creature
made for the city, but when he returned to the Webb Farm it really
was home. The woods made him feel like he was surrounded by life.
The smell of the damp soil, the underbrush, and thick trees were a
warm embrace he’d learned to miss.

They took the last turn onto a well-tarred
dirt road and he slowed down. There were a few twists that could
make trouble for them. She moved with him as they made the turns
and then they came to the top of a hill. Miranda gave his waist a
squeeze and he throttled up in response, sending them down the hill
at an alarming speed. She laughed against his good ear as they went
down, the slightly smaller hill ahead rising up, blocking the
sun.

They made it up the other side, mostly on
the speed they’d accumulated on the way down, and then they could
see the farm. Cars lined the road leading to the large grassy green
opening and there were at least two dozen tents on the empty field
around the main farmhouse. The main house was a large, expanded
building with nine bedrooms and at least five other rooms people
could sleep in. If that was so full that people needed tents, then
there was more to the Gathering than he expected, much more.

A few people picking things from the trunks
of their cars turned to see him and Miranda ride by, and they
greeted them with smiles. An old Wrought iron gate, large enough
for two lanes, marked the boundary of fenced in land. He rode
towards the barn, where there were at least a dozen people he
didn’t recognize moving in and out of the building.

That barn hadn’t been used for livestock for
decades, but they did keep feed and a workshop there. When Bernie
and he were teens their dads spent a weekend building them a modest
stage with enough space for a band of five or six at the back. It
was years before Max saw the wisdom in that. They knew there would
be partying as the two boys approached twenty, and giving them a
good place to do it close to home kept them within reach, and it
worked. The other barn was further down the road that was for
livestock and farm business. Past that, down a well-travelled
gravel road there were cabins and the lake, a major source of
income for the Webb farm. The cabins were normally booked for most
of the year, even through winter. Scott couldn’t help but prattle
on about how the band had been given the big cabin for the week, a
four bedroom rental that dwarfed the rest of the quaint one and two
room log structures.

“Stop here,” Miranda said into his ear.

He could see what she may have objected to,
a pair of women who were all smiles, breaking from the group headed
into the barn with trays and pitchers. One was short, a plump older
woman, and the other was taller and thin. They both had the same
dark hair as Miranda except for an invasion of a little grey. The
shorter one with the bigger smile caught them with her Polaroid
camera, practically tittering at the act. She pulled the instant
photo off the front of the camera and waved it in the air.

Miranda gave him a final squeeze. “See you
later,” she whispered before dismounting and pulling the straps off
her shoulders so he could get his guitar.

He accepted the guitar and said; “Take it
easy,” immediately wishing he’d chosen any other words. The private
space that separated them from the rest of the world was gone. As
he watched her walk towards the two older women who were only a few
feet away, admiring her shape through tight fitting jeans, he
realized he wanted it back more than anything.

“You don’t have to gloat every time you’re
right,” Miranda said as she walked past the pair of women. The
taller one rolled her eyes and followed her, speaking in
Italian.

Maxwell knew he had been caught admiring
Miranda’s retreat towards the main house, as evidenced by the
shorter woman grinning at him through momentarily narrowed eyes. He
smiled back at her a little and tended to his bike, doing some fine
adjustments before he let it down on it’s kickstand so it wouldn’t
topple over onto the gravel. She approached, admiring the image
forming in her photograph. “I knew you two would match,” she said.
“Look at that.”

He glanced at the photo and returned his
attention to setting his kickstand down on more stable gravel.
“Think she just hit me up for a ride, if I’m honest,” he said.

“Look,” she said, putting the photo in front
of him.

The pair of them matched, both in dark
leather and denim, and it didn’t look like Miranda was simply
wrapped around him, it looked like they were riding his shining
motorcycle together, sharing one space. Their expressions were
passive, relaxed as they stared back at him through the photo.

“Yours,” she said, putting it into his
pocket. She had an Italian accent that was unmistakable, and a
manner that made it impossible to refuse her insistence. “You don’t
recognize me, but then, we only met once when you were thirteen or
fourteen.”

Maxwell took another look and recalled
immediately. She’d visited the house within weeks of his father’s
death. “You were here to talk to Allen.” He said, remembering the
late night, when Bernie and he came in from the barn to find her
and his father at the kitchen table, talking soberly. They thought
little of it at the time, but he didn’t see Miranda after that.

“I took Miranda in after her mother passed,”
she said. “We returned to the old country, that’s Italy, we’re
Sicilian. After a few years there we moved to Spain to meet her
father, then New York. Two years there was enough, too fast, too
busy, and Miranda had enough time to know our people there, so it
was time to come here, at her mother’s house in Chelmsford. Back
just in time for the Gathering.”

Maxwell looked to the barn, where people
from the tents were beginning to congregate for lunch. Many of them
were dressed in the loose dresses and bellbottoms of the sixties,
and they were all ages. He faintly recognized a few from the year
his father and he made the journey to Canada from England. As he
returned his attention to Miranda’s Aunt, he thought he saw his
father out of the corner of his eye, standing in one of those half
button-up collared T-Shirts he wore all the time and his dark
framed glasses, puffing his pipe by the main barn door. He looked
back immediately and saw nothing but bare barn door. He shook his
head. “I’m sorry, I can’t remember your name.”

“Gladys,” she told him. “And my sister there
is called Susan. I understand, it was a long time ago, and you
weren’t interested in some woman visiting. You’ll have to get used
to me now though,” she said with a wink.

It had been a long time since Maxwell felt
he was in a situation where he felt he had little to no idea as to
what’s going on. When he caught sight of Bernie’s father, who was
only a slightly thicker, greyer version of his tall son, he was
relieved. Allen waved him towards the large gazebo off to one side
of the barn, and Max got off his bike. “Looks like someone wants an
update on his son,” he said.

“And a few other things,” Gladys said,
falling in step beside him. “Miranda missed you, you know. She
never forgot you, sent letters to Bernie a few times. I was always
surprised that she never sent one to you.”

“Bernie never said he got letters from her,”
Max said, allowing the stout woman to loop her arm through his.

“She was a shy girl until a few years ago. I
suppose I can’t call our Miranda a girl anymore,” she chuckled to
herself. “New York will show anyone their shouting voice, except
for our Miranda. She found her singing voice there, but I think she
wants to see what is here for her, for now. New York can be tiring
for people who are bred for the country.”

“I’ve never seen traffic like I’ve seen in
New York,” Max said. “Wish I’d known she was there, I’d have
dropped in.”

“You would have been able to see one of her
shows,” Gladys said.

“Think she’d sing after things are set in
the barn? I hear there’s some band playing, locals I think.”

“Your band,” Gladys said, poking him.
“You’re funny, I didn’t expect funny. If you don’t play that disco
music, then she would, I’m sure. She should, I’ll tell her
later.”

“Good bands don’t play disco,” Max said.

They arrived at the Gazebo and Max’s stomach
rumbled at a tray of sandwiches in the middle of the table. He
shook Allen’s hand; it felt calloused from fingertip to wrist.
“Your son’s coming in a couple hours. He had to mind Zack and
Darren into the wee hours last night.”

“And you didn’t?” Allen asked, amused.

“I’ve got a remarkable constitution,” Max
replied. “Mind if I?” he asked, pointing at the neat stacks of
sandwiches on the table. For the first time he noticed a wrinkled
old man sitting at the back of the gazebo in shadow. He smiled and
coughed once when he looked up at Max. The ancient’s blue eyes
looked as young as a child’s.

“Go ahead. How was the last leg of the
tour?”

“Sold the rest of our records,” Max said
before chomping into what turned out to be a cucumber and
mozzarella sandwich. He hazarded picking another quarter sandwich
from the other end of the tray up and finished chewing. “Zack’s
an-“ he consciously changed his mind about how he was about to
finish his sentence. “He’s been difficult. Wants to be the next big
disco star or something, Darren’s leaving, the Grand will be the
last gig he plays rhythm guitar for us. His girlfriend is
expecting, waited five months to tell him, so she’s popping in a
couple of weeks.” Max decided to stop there; he could feel the
frustration that his long ride to Sudbury and the subsequent ride
with Miranda had relieved coming back.

The ancient fellow in the corner found that
particularly funny, laughing so hard that his cane rolled off his
knee and clattered to the floor. Max didn’t hesitate for an
instant, but retrieved it and offered his hand. “I’m called
Maxwell, Max to friends.”

“Samuel Hamilton, you met me a long time
ago, when you and your father came for your first Gathering here.
You call me Sam, and it’s not his child,” he said, his voice thin
and wheezy. “Don’t tell him that though, or she’ll end up alone,
and she’s a good girl, except for the one time. Darren’s chosen a
woman who does not do well alone, he should stay close, and they’ll
be happy, especially if you don’t tell him her secret.”

Max was frozen in place for a moment, then
straightened and took a bite of his sandwich. He chewed slowly.
This was one of those meetings. He’d overheard dozens of them, been
shooed out of the room and told to go play, as many times when he
was younger. This was the kind of talk that dealt with portents and
old magic, the kind of thing his father wasted his life on. This
time he was the subject of the meeting, they were waiting for him,
and he would not get away without ruffling more feathers than he
could afford to.

From the groups of people outside and how
many he recognized, he came to one conclusion. This was a gathering
of people who believed in witchy ways. There was a High Summer
Festival every August on the Webb farm, and there were people who
stood in circles, praising whatever pagan deities they chose to
around midnight at every one. None of them had the attendance he
was seeing, and few of them had a name – The Gathering. The last
one he remembered attending that seemed half as large happened the
year his father brought him to Canada.

There was some special significance to the
year, or the month, or the day, that he missed because he didn’t
believe, and he tried to ignore all things occult. The true
consequences of that special time was this – a rare call to the
Webb farm for the week, he would be neck-deep in spiritualism, and
this gazebo meeting in the growing humidity of the late morning was
where it would start for him. He inwardly admonished himself for
not paying more attention; he could have avoided it all together.
But then, he might not have run into Miranda.

Something so good happened to his father
during their visit during the last large festival that he decided
to move in to the farmhouse and become a Canadian citizen, dragging
Max through the whole process. He objected as a child of seven
would back then, but since then he’d learned to love his father’s
decision. He’d never had friends like he did in Canada, or felt as
free as he did in its wilderness.

So, the act of walking out of that gazebo,
of quietly avoiding all things mystic could come with serious
repercussions. He would be alone, everyone else there was most
likely a believer, and Miranda was among them. He would at least
have to listen to what they had to say. They were staring at him,
the quarter sandwich he’d taken – this one was salami and some
yellow cheese – had been chewed to unrecognizable pulp as he put
off what was about to happen next. He swallowed. “I’ll be sure to
keep Darla’s details under my hat when I see Rick,” Max said
quietly.

“Her name’s Pamela,” the old man
croaked.

“Bloody hell,” Max said. “You got that from
Allen.”

“You slept with her sister, Franca when you
were in Barrie, kept it from everyone. She’s doing well, by the
way, got into University of Toronto,” Samuel said, shrugging.
“She’s not pregnant, even though the thing broke.”

“The condom,” Allen said, catching a
wide-eyed look from Miranda’s aunt.

Her gaze switched to him as Maxwell sat down
in an old wooden chair. “So I’m believing for a second while I
figure out how you know that, my good ear is wide open to whatever
you’re sellin’,” Max said.

“What happened there?” Allen asked.

“That piece sacrificed itself so the rest of
me could go on,” Max said, fixing Allen with a withering look. “On
with the show, what’s the spooky thing you’ve brought me here to
talk about?”

“You’re on the verge of making a mistake,
Max,” Samuel said. “In a few days-“ he was interrupted by a
rattling cough.