Dark Corner (26 page)

"My great-grandfather was a member of the inner circle
of slaves who worked in the Mason household," Franklin
said. "His name was Samuel Bennett. Sam was a `house nigger,' reviled by the slaves who worked in the fields, for they
assumed that his lot was better than theirs, his burden easier
to bear. In truth, Mason treated the house slaves worse than
he treated anyone else, and subjected them to brutalities that
I cannot even tell you. When the insurrection hit, Sam was
the one who wound the noose around Mason's neck"

"Jesus," Nia said.

"Sam told the story to his son, who in turn told his son,
and so it was passed down, eventually falling to me," Franklin
said. "I've verified virtually every detail of which my ances tor spoke. For instance, the mausoleum that Mason had constructed stands in Hillside Cemetery, just off Main Street. I
have not, however, ventured inside to find the subterranean
hideaway. Edward Mason's corpse, ravaged as it was, was interred in his tomb, and his family lies with him.

"In addition, many of the survivors of the slaves who
worked on the Mason plantation presently live in Dark Corner.
Our chief, Van Jackson, is the descendent of a slave who escaped with my great-grandfather. Nia, your late father, Thomas
James, was another descendant"

"I remember Daddy telling me," Nia said, wonder in her
eyes.

Franklin nodded. "David, you too have an ancestor who
played a role as well: William Hunter."

"I remember hearing stories about him, as a kid," David
said. "He was some kind of freedom fighter, right?"

"Yes," Franklin said. "William Hunter was a free man who
roamed throughout the South. He frequently assisted slaves
in fleeing North on the Underground Railroad. Although he
was free himself, he helped to plan the insurrection at the
Mason plantation. According to Sam, my great-grandfather,
William Hunter was the bravest-and most cunning-man
he had ever seen. Sam believed that Hunter had witnessed
something, as a younger man, that gave him the fortitude of
ten men. But Hunter was secretive about his past"

"I don't know much about him, either," David said. "I
never learned much about my father's side of my family.
Mostly everything you've said is new to me ""

"Doubtless, the ghost stories would be, as well," Franklin
said.

David's heart skipped a beat. Nia shifted in her chair.
Ruby watched her husband thoughtfully.

"Ah, your reactions tell me that you're more than passingly
aware of the ghost stories connected to Jubilee," Franklin
said. "Since the slave revolt, people have reported stories of
hauntings at the estate. Some claim to see apparitions of slaves huddled under the trees that surround the house. Others
said they have seen the ghost of Edward Mason himself,
floating through the rooms in a dark suit, his face blue and
eyes bulging, presumably from his death due to hanging."

David reached under the table and found Nia's hand. She
squeezed his, gratefully.

"The house has been vacant for most of the hundred
forty-odd years that Edward Mason has been dead. On rare
occasion, someone will move in and attempt to refurbish the
estate. I recall an ambitious couple who wanted to restore
the mansion's period detail and turn it into a tourist attraction. They lived there for only a month and left in haste, the
restoration project abandoned.

"Jubilee has been perhaps the one constant in Dark
Corner. Throughout world wars, Jim Crow, the booms and
busts of the economy, the Civil Rights Movement, and so on,
up to the present day, the mansion has stood, inviolate, an unchanging landmark. Townsfolk despise what the house represents, and they fear the ghost stories, but in spite of that,
we've let it stand-a bit like a scar that serves as a reminder of a fight that we've won. You can only understand
how far you've come when you understand that from
which you came."

"Someone's living in Jubilee now," David said, thinking
of the tall man dressed in black whom he had seen a few
days ago. "I visited the house"

Franklin put his coffee mug on the table. "May I ask
why?"

"I need to tell you about this." David looked around the
table at his friends. They watched him expectantly. "I saw a
ghost a few days ago. It was my grandfather."

"Lord, have mercy," Ruby said.

"There's much more," David said.

He told them everything.

"It requires a leap of imagination to believe that your father's death was a hoax," Franklin said. He stared thoughtfully into his mug. "Possible, I suppose"

"It would be terrible, if it's true," Ruby said. "All the pain
he's caused so many folks, especially you" She touched
David's arm.

"Well, it's only a theory," David said. "I don't have any
solid proof. But I do have some evidence of the other stuff I
mentioned."

He unzipped the backpack that had been lying beside him
on the deck. He pulled out the old Bible and handed it to
Franklin.

"Ali, yes, this is an artifact." Franklin carefully opened
the Bible.

"The illustrations were done by my great-grandfather,
James Hunter," David said. "He was an artist, but you probably already knew that"

"But I never realized he did work like this." Franklin
pushed up his glasses on his nose, leaned closer to the book.
"My God"

"What is it?" Nia said.

Franklin put the Bible in the center of the table. It was
open to one of the drawings David had seen before: a pack
of dogs guarding the mouth of a cave, and a group of men
nearby, crouched amidst some trees.

Franklin's eyes were bright. "The young man who cuts
my grass, Junior. He was recently asked to do some work at
a cave in this very town, by the man who moved into Jubilee.
Digging. Junior and his cousin did the work late at night,
about a week ago. They saw the stout, bald-headed man who'd
requested their assistance, and a tall man dressed in black."

"The guy who wears black is the same man I saw when I
visited the Mason place!" David said. "There was something
strange about him, too. He seemed a lot older than he looked."

Franklin nodded. "After Junior and his cousin finished
the work of breaking a passage into the cave, they were dis missed. However, being curious, they peeked inside. Junior
claims that he saw a heap of skeletons, with rags clinging to
their bones. And the man in black saw Junior and his cousin
and ... well, used a supernatural force to throw them
against the wall."

"Okay," Nia said. "Now you're creeping me out"

"Me, too," Ruby said.

David, too, felt a cool dampness at the nape of his neck.

"That is what Junior told me," Franklin said. "He's a simple man, without guile. I wasn't completely convinced of his
story, of course, but David, you've confirmed the existence
of the mysterious character in black. Also, these depictions
of the cave are highly suggestive. It must be the same one.
Only fools believe in coincidence."

"But those drawings must've been done decades ago,"
David said.

"Indeed" Franklin paged to another illustration. This one
showed men inside a cavern, facing a legion of savages.

"What does it all mean?" Nia said. "Can you figure it out,
Franklin?"

Franklin contemplated the Bible, silent.

Around the table, David, Nia, and Ruby anxiously awaited
his response.

Franklin's head snapped up. He pointed at David.

"You are being summoned to perform a task, David. A
task that deals with this." He tapped his finger against the
sketch. "This is your family history here, lucidly portrayed"

"How do you know it's my family's history? What if it's
just a bunch of drawings of some fable, some tall tale-"

"No, no, no!" Franklin hammered his fist against the table.
"This is history here, I can feel it in my old bones. Your
great-grandfather was almost certainly telling a visual story
of an episode from Hunter family lore."

"But what am I supposed to do?" David said. "That's
what I can't figure out"

"Whatever is required of you, which will become clear in time, as Pearl advised," Franklin said. He looked at each of
them, somber. "Let's not lie to ourselves. We are facing something unearthly."

"Stop it, Franklin," Ruby said. "You don't know that yet"

"I know what I feel, and I have an inkling of what David
is feeling. He is seeing ghosts; psychics are relaying messages to him. I doubt that he is being prompted to perform a
task as mundane as replacing the plumbing in the Hunter
residence. His mission is obviously as strange as the signs
that he has received thus far. It only makes sense"

David had a chunk of red velvet cake remaining on his plate,
and the coffee was still warm, but his appetite was gone.
Franklin, as he had hoped-and feared-had confirmed, in
no uncertain terms, that a grave responsibility awaited him.
And he had made their next step clear, too.

Nevertheless, David asked, "What should we do?"

"I believe you know the answer to your question," Franklin
said. "My friends, we are going to embark on a field trip tomorrow. To the cave"

Shenice Stevens loved the night.

As a child, she'd loved to sit on the porch with her mother
and gaze at the stars that were scattered like diamonds across
the sky. "The stars are God's eyes, sugar," her mother would
say. "He's always watching you to make sure you're safe"

When she grew older, her love of nightfall and silvery
moons stayed with her. She especially loved night in Mississippi. There, the darkness seemed purer, deeper. Without
the harsh lights of a big city-like Memphis, where she attended college-washing out the gloom, she could soak up
the blackness as though it were water and she were a sponge,
letting it fill her up with tranquillity.

Probably the only thing more comforting than the night
was her boyfriend, Trey. His presence soothed her, no matter
the time of day.

They were at a park, sitting on the cool hood of Trey's car.
They sipped a chilled, peach-flavored wine from plastic
glasses, the half-full bottle propped between them.

She was a junior at the University of Memphis, and had
come home to Mason's Corner for the summer; Trey, a grad
student at the same school, drove from the city every weekend to visit her. They spent many nights like this, sitting outdoors talking, sometimes sipping a sweet wine, and listening
to soulful music. They had been dating for almost a year and
Shenice was sure that they would marry after she graduated.
Trey was the kind of man who was all about business and
knew what he wanted out of life. She was a free spirit, a
good balance for him. They complemented each other.

On the car stereo, a sensual Maxwell ballad came on,
"Lifetime"

"Oh, I love this song," Shenice said. She leaned into Trey.
He drew her closer, kissed her cheek.

"That brother Maxwell can sing," Trey said. "He can represent for brothers like me, 'cause you know I can't sing a lick."

"Why don't you try?" she said. "Sing a verse for me,
sweetie."

"Girl, please."

"It's only the two of us out here. Sing for me, please?"
She batted her eyelashes, which always made him melt like
chocolate in her hands.

He opened his mouth and was about to sing a note. Then
he paused.

"Look over there" He pointed.

Swaying to the music, she turned.

A large dog stood in the corner of the parking lot, revealed in the dim, yellow-orange light cast by a nearby street
lamp. The oddly quiet canine watched them with glimmering eyes.

"I think it's a pit bull." Trey's voice held a trace of anxiety.

"Yeah, it does look like a pit," she said. "Why is it staring
at us like that?"

Pit bulls terrified her-those dogs were murder machines.
When she was in high school, her neighbor had owned a pit
bull, and once, the dog had gotten loose and locked its teeth
onto the leg of the postman, Mr. Jones. They had to literally
crack the dog's skull in order to get it to release its grip on
the poor guy. Mr. Jones required fifty stitches and had walked
with a limp ever since.

The flesh of her neck tightened as if squeezed with pincers.

"Look over there," Trey said. "There's another one. Looks
like a rottweiler."

On the other side of the parking lot, another massive
hound had stepped out of the shadows and into the light.
This one watched them in eerie silence, too.

"That looks like my cousin's dog," she said. "He has a
rottie, named Kilo. He's sweet"

"He doesn't look so sweet to me. Where did these mutts
come from? They don't have collars, see?"

She saw. She didn't like it at all. Her cousin's dog would
never be running loose and collarless. She didn't know who
these hounds belonged to.

She screwed the cap on the wine bottle. "We better get in
the car, Trey."

"I was about to say that. Move slowly. We don't want to
agitate them"

They cautiously slid off the hood of the car.