Everville (8 page)

Their numbers steadily increased, and Maeve, fearful that she or Coker would have an eye pecked out while they slept, insisted they move a few yards into the cleft between the rocks, where the birds would be less likely to come.

Then, sometime towards noon, she woke with her heart hammering to the sound of growls. She got up and peered over the rock. A pack of wolves had nosed the dead on the wind, and were now either tearing at the bodies, or fighting over the tenderest scraps.

Their presence was not the only grim news. The clouds were getting heavier, threatening further snow. "We have to go," she told Coker.

He looked up at her through a haze of pain. "Go where?" he said.

"Back down the mountain," she told him, "before we freeze or starve. We don't have that much daylight left."

"What's the noise?"

"Wolves."

"Many of them?"

"Maybe fifteen. they won't come after us while they've got so much food just lying there." She went down on her haunches beside him. "I know you're hurting and I wish I could make it better. But if we can get back to the wagon I know there's clean bandages and-"

:'Yes-" he muttered, "and what then?" 'I told you: We go on down the mountain."

"And what happens after that?" he said, his voice pitifully weak. "Even if we could find the rest of your people, they'd kill us soon as look at us. they think you're a child of the Devil, and I'm-1 don't know what I am any more."

"We don't need them," she said. "We'll find our own place to live. Somewhere we can build."

"Build?"

"Not right now, but when you're well. Maybe we'll have to live in a hole for a while, steal food, do whatever we have to do, but we're not going to die."

"You're very certain."

"Yes," she said quietly. "We're going to build a shining city. You and me."

He looked at her almost pityingly. "What are you talking about?" he said.

,,I'll tell you as we go," she said to him, pulling on his arm to raise him up.

She was right about the wolves: they had more than enough food to keep them occupied. Only one of the pack, a scarred, runty animal missing an ear, came sniffing after them. Maeve had armed herself with a short sword plucked from one of the corpses, and rushed at the animal with a blood-curdling shout. It fled, its tail between its legs, and did not venture near them again.

The first flakes of snow began to fall just as they reached the forest, but once beneath the canopy of branches it was no concern to them. Getting lost, however, was. Though the gradient of the ground plainly pointed the way down, the forest covered most of the lower slope, and without Coker's preternatural sense of direction, Maeve would have most assuredly lost her way between the trees, and never have emerged again.

they spoke very little as they went, but Coker-who despite his wounds showed amazing fortitude-did broach one subject: that of Buddenbaum. was he a Blessedm'n, Coker asked? "I don't know what a Blessedm'n is."

"One who works with the spirit@'

"Like a priest?"

"And does miracles."

"Priests don't do miracles."

"What do they do then?"

"they say prayers. they break bread. they tell people what to do and what not to do."

"But no miracles?"

"No miracles."

Coker thought about that for a time. "Then I mean something different," he said.

"Are Blessedm'n good or bad?"

"Neither. They're explorers, is what they are."

That sounded like Buddenbaum, she said.

"Well whatever he is," Coker went on, "he has more power in him than most. That wound should have killed him on the spot."

She pictured Buddenbaum as he spoke, pulling the blade out of his own back.

"It was extraordinary," Coker replied. Though she had not said a word she knew without question he was speaking of the same sight.

"How did you do that?" she said.

He looked at her guiltily. "I'm sorry," he said, "that was impolite. It's just that it was so clear."

"You saw what I saw?" He nodded. "What else have you seen?"

"Not much," he said.

"What?" she insisted.

"When you talked about building," he said. "I saw a city."

She named it for him. "That's Everville. My Papa was oing to build it-" She paused a moment, then said: "What id it look like?"

"It was shining," he replied simply.

"Good," she said.

It was dark by the time they reached the wagon, but the snow that had blanketed the heights was failing only fitfully below. While Coker made a bed for himself, Maeve rooted around for what crumbs and scraps of food remained, and they ate together. Then they slept again, while the wind buffeted the wagon; fitful sleep, filled with dreams, the strangest of which Maeve woke from with such a start Coker stirred beside her.

"What is it?" he asked her.

She sat up. "I was back in Liverpool," she said. "And there were wolves in the streets, walking upright in fancy clothes."

"You heard them howling in your sleep," Coker said. The wind was still carrying the howls down the mountainside. "That's all." He raised his hand to her face and stroked it gently.

"I wasn't afraid," she said. "I was happy." She rose and lit the lamp.

"I was walking in the streets," she went on, turning the blankets aside as she spoke, "and the wolves were bowing to me when I went by." She had uncovered the teak chest, and now threw open the lid.

"What are you looking for?"

She didn't answer, but delved through the papers in the chest until she found a piece of folded paper. She closed the chest and unfolded the paper on top of it. Though the light from the lamp was paltry, the object wrapped in the paper gleamed as it was uncovered.

"What is it?" Coker wanted to know.

"Papa never told me properly," she said. "But it was-" she faltered, and lifted the paper up towards the light so she could study it better. There were eight words upon it, in perfect copper-plate.

Bury this at the crossroads, where Everville begins.

"Now we know," she said.

The snow continued to fall the following day, but lightly. they made two small bundles of supplies, wrapped up as warmly as they could, and began the last portion of their journey. The tracks left by the rest of the wagons were still visible, and they followed them for half a mile or so, their route steadily taking them further from the mountain.

"We've followed them far enough," Maeve announced after a time.

"We've got no choice," Coker replied.

"Yes we do," she said, leading him to the side of the trail, where a tree-lined slope fell away steeply into a misty gorge. "they couldn't go that way 'cause of the wagons, but we can.

"I can hear rushing down there," Coker said. "A river!" Maeve said with a grin. "It's a river!"

Without further debate they started down. It wasn't easy. Though the snow turned to a light dusting and then disappeared entirely as they descended, the rocks were slick with vivid green moss, which also grew in abundance on the trees, whether dead or alive. Twice they came to places where the slope became too steep to be negotiated, and they were obliged to retrace their steps to find an easier way, but for all their exhaustion they didn't stop to rest. they had the sound-and now the glittering sight-of the river to tempt them on; and everywhere, signs of life: ferns and berry bushes and birdsong.

At last, as they reached level ground, and began to beat a trail to the river, a breeze came up out of nowhere, and the mist that had kept them from seeing any great distance was rolled away.

they said nothing to one another, but stood a few yards from the white waters and looked in astonishment at the scene beyond. The dark evergreens now gave way to trees in all their autumnal glory, orange and red and brown, their branches busy with birds, the thicket beneath quickened by creatures pelting away at the scent of these interlopers. There would be food aplenty here: fruit and honey and fish and fowl.

And beyond the trees, where the river took its glittering there was green land. A place to begin.

On the mountain that would come to be known as Harmon's Heights, the elements were beginning the slow process of erasing the dead and their artifacts. they stripped from the bodies what little flesh the wolves and carrion birds had left. they pounded the bones till they splintered, then pounded the splinters to dust. they shredded the tents and the fine robes; they rusted the blades and the buckles. they removed from the sight of any who might chance upon the battlefield in decades to come, all but the minutest signs of what had happened there.

But there was one sign the elements could not remove; a sign that would have certainly disappeared had there not been a last living soul upon the Mountainside to preserve it.

His names were numerous, for he was the son of a great family, but to all who had loved him-and there had been many-be was called by the name of a legendary ancestor: Noah.

He had come to the mountain with such hopes in his heart he had several times wished aloud for the words to express them better. Now he half-believed he'd called disaster down, wishing for words. After all, hadn't it been words spoken by a child that had undone the ceremony and brought the truce to such a bloody end?

He had fled the signs of that battle half-insane, fled into the forest where he had sat and sobbed for the wife he'd seen perish in front of him, her heart too tender to survive the trauma of having her spirit-child unknitted. He, on the other hand, was beyond such frailties, coming as he did from a line of incorruptibles. His mind was part of a greater scheme, and though nothing would have pleased him more than to cease thinking, cease living, he could not violate his family's laws against self-slaughter. Nor would his body perish for want of sustenance. He could fatten himself on moonlight if he so chose.

So at last, when he'd wept himself out, he returned to the sight of the tragedy. The beasts had already done their disfiguring work, for which he was grateful. He could not distinguish one corpse from another; they were all simply meat for this devouring world.

He climbed the slope and slipped between the rocks, up to the place where the door that had led on to the shores of Quiddity had burned. It was gone, of course; sealed up. Nor could he expect it to be opened again any time soon-if at all-given that most all of the people who had known about the ceremony were on this side of the divide, and dead. Blessedm'n Filigree, who had opened the crack in the first place, was a notable exception (was he a conspirator in this, perhaps?), but given that his opening of the door was a crime punishable by servitude and confinement, he was likely to have fled to the Ephemeris since the tragedy and found a place to lie low until the investigations were over. But as Noah stood on the spot where the threshold between Cosm and Metacosm had been laid, he saw something flickenng close to the ground. He went down on his haunches and peered at it more closely. The door, it seemed, had not entirely closed. A narrow gap, perhaps four or five inches long, remained in place. He touched it, and it wavered, as though it might at any moment flicker out. Then, moving very cautiously, he went down on his belly and put his eye close to the gap.

He could see the beach, and the sea, but there were no ships. Apparently their captains had sensed disaster and sailed away to some harbor where they could count their profits and swear their crews to silence.

All was lost.

He got to his feet, and stared up at the snow-laden sky. What now? Should he leave the mountain, and make his way in the world of Sapas Humana? What purpose was there in that? It was a place of fictions and delusions. Better to stay here, where at least he could smell the air of Quiddity, and watch the light shifting on the shore. He would find some way to protect the flame, so that it wasn't extinguished. And then he would wait, and pray that somebody ventured along the beach one day, and saw the crack, and came to it. He'd tell them the whole sorry story; persuade them to find a Blessedm'n who'd come and open the way afresh. Then he'd return to his world. That was the theory, at least. There was a tiny chance that it could ever be more than that, he The shore had been chosen for its remoteness; he could expect many bewhcombers there. But patience was easy if it was all you had; and it was. He would wait, and while he waited, name the smm in this new heaven after the dead, so he would have someone to confide in as time went bN/

As things went, there was more to see below than above, for after a little while people began visiting the vallev that lay in the shadow of the peak. Noah knew their lives were trivial things, but he studied them nevertheless, his gaze so sharp he could pick out the color of a woman's eyes from his lookout on the mountain. There were many women in the valley in those early days, all of them robust and well-made, a few even beautiful. And seeing that this stretch of earth was as good a place a.,; any other to settle, their admirers built houses, and courted, and mwficd and raised families. And in time there grew and prospered in the valley a proud little city called Everville.

'Forgive me, Evervffle." The words were written in fading sepia ink on paper the color of unwashed bed sheets, but Erwin had read texts far less legible in the sixteen years h6'd been dealing with the will and testaments of Everville's citizens. Evelyn Morris's final instructions for instance ('Put the dogs to sleep, and bury them with me'), written in iodine on a table lamp beside her deathbed; or Dwight Hanson's codicil, scrawled in the margin of a book on duck decoys.

Erwin had read somewhere that Oregon had a larger percentage of heretical thinkers per capita than any other state. More activists, more flat sts, more survivalists; all happy to have three thousand miles between them and the seat of govennnent. Out of sight, in a state that was still comparatively empty, they went their own sweet way; and what better place to leave a statement about their individuality than their last words to the world?

But even by the high standard of eccentricity he'd encountered in his time as an attorney, the testament he was now studying was a benchmark. It was not so much a will as a confession; a confession which had gone unread in the @ or so years since it had been written in March of 1965. Its author was one Lyle McPherson, whose goods and chattels had apparently been so negligible upon his passing that nobody had cared to look for any indication as to how he had wanted them divided. Either that, or his only son, Frank, whose sudden demise had brought the confession into in's hands, had discovered it, read it, and decided that it as best kept hidden. Why he had not destroyed it completely ly the dead man knew for certain, but perhaps somewhere in his soul McPherson the Younger had been perversely proud of the claims his father made in this document, and had toyed with the possibility of one day making it public.

True or not, the contents would have certainly claimed the cover of the Evel-i,ille Tribune for a couple of weeks and perhaps brought McPherson-who had lived a blameless but dull life running the city's only Drain Rooter and Septic Service-a welcome touch of notoriety.

If that had indeed been his plan, death had foiled it. McPherson the Younger had passed from the world with only a seven-line obituary in the Tribune (five lines of which bemoaned the lack of a replacement Drain Rooter and Septic Service now that good ol' Frank was gone) to mark his exit. The life and crimes of McPherson the Elder, however, were waiting to be discovered, and now, sitting by the window in the heat of the late August sun, their discoverer pondered how best to show them to the world.

It was certainly a good time to find himself an audience. Every year, at the last weekend of August, Everville had a festival, and for three days its otherwise quiet streets became thronged, its population (which had stood at 7403 at the previous November's census) swelling to half that size again. Every hotel, inn, motel, and lodging house in that region of the Willamette Valley, from Aurora and Molina in the north to Sublimity and Aumsville in the south was occupied, and there was scarcely a store in town that didn't do more business over Festival Weekend than it did in the three months preceding it. The actual substance of the festival was of variable quality. The town band, which in fact drew players from as far afield as Wilsonville, was very capable, and Saturday's parade, featuring the band, floats, and a troupe of drum majorettes, was usually counted the highlight of the weekend. At the other end of the scale were the pig races and the frisbee-throwing contests, which were ineptly organized, and had several years ended in fistfights.

But the crowds who came to Everville in their hundreds every August didn't come for the music, or the pig racing. 'I hey came because it was a fine excuse to drink, dance, and enjoy the last of summer before the leaves started to turn. Only once in the years Erwin had been a resident of the town had it rained on Festival Weekend. This year, if the weather reports were to be trusted, the entire week ahead would be balmy, with temperatures climbing to the low eighties by Friday. Perfect Festival weather. Dorothy Bullard, who ran the offices of the Chamber of Commerce when she wasn't accepting cash for water bills, fronting the Tourist Board, or flirting with Jed Gilholly, the city's police captain, had announced in last week's Tribune that the Chamber of Commerce expected this year's Festival to be the most popular yet. If a man wanted to drop a bombshell, there could scarcely be a better time to do it.

With that in mind, Erwin went back to the pages on his lap, and studied them for the fourth time.

Forgive me, Everville, McPherson the Elder had begun.

I don't much like having to write these things that I'm going to write, but I got to put down the truth while I still can, being as I'm the only one left to tell it.

The fact is, everyone in town knew what we did that night, and they all was happy we did it. But there was only me, Verl Nordhoff, and Richie Dolan who knew the whole story, and now Verl's dead and I guess Richie got so crazy he killed himself, so that leaves me.

I ain't writing this to save my soul. I don't believe in Heaven and Hell. They're just words. I ain't going any where when I'm dead except into the dirt. I just want to say all of it straight, just once, though it don't show Everville up real pretty.

What happened was this. On the night of August 27, 1929, me and Nordhoff and Dolan hung three people from a tree on the mountain. One of them we hung was a cripple, and I feel more ashamed for that than I do about the other two. But they was all in it together, and the only reason he was crippled was he had bad blood in him...

The phone rang, and Erwin, wrapped up in his study, ju mped. He waited for his answering machine to pick up the call, but it had been on the blink for weeks, and failed to do so. He let the phone go on finging till the caller got bored, returned to the confession. Where was he? Oh yes, the t about the bad blood.

... and the way he jerked around on that rope, and hollered even though he couldn't breathe, I believe all the things folks were saying about him and his wife and that animal child of his.

We didn't find no human bones in the house, like we thought we might, but there was other weird stuff, like the pictures painted on the walls, and these carvings the cfippie had made. That's why we set fire to the house, so's nobody would have to see any of that shit. And I don't regret none of that, because the son was definitely going after innocent children, and the mother was a whore from way back. Everybody knew that. She'd had a whorehouse fight here in town, only it had been closed down in the twenties, and that's when she'd lost her mind and gone to live in the house by the creek with her crazy family.

So then when Rebecca Jenkins disappeared and her body was found in the reservoir, there wasn't nobody doubted what had happened. They'd kidnapped her on her way from school and done whatever they'd done to her then thrown her body in the creek, and it had been washed down into the reservoir. Only there was no proof. People was talking about it, and they were saying it was pitiful that the police couldn't pin it on the whore and her son and her damn husband, because everyone knew they'd been seen with kids before, kids they'd found in Portland, and brought back to the house at night, and if they got away with it again, with a kid from fight here in Everville, nobody's kids were going to be safe.

So that's when the three of us decided to do something about it. Dolan had known the Jenkins girl because she'd used to come by his store, and when he'd think about what had happened to her he'd get choked up and he'd be ready to go hang the whore right there and then. Richie had a little girl of his own, who was right about Rebeeca's age, and he kept saying if we can't keep the children safe we weren't worth a damn. So that's what we did. We went out to the creek, we burned the house, and then we took the three of them up the mountain and hanged them.

And everyone knew what we'd done. The house burned almost to the ground and nobody came to put out the fire. they just stayed out of sight till we'd done what we'd done and we'd come back down again.

But that wasn't the end of it. The following year, the police caught a man from Scotts Mills who'd killed a girl in Sublimity and he told them he'd murdered Rebecca too, and dumped her in the creek.

The day I heard that I got crazy drunk, and I stayed drunk for a week. People looked at me different after that, like I'd been a hero because of what we'd done and now I was just a killer.

Dolan took it even worse, and he started getting real angry, saying it was everybody's fault cause everybody knew, and that was true in a way. Everville was as much to blame as we were, and I hope if this ever gets read people forgive me for writing it down, but it's the truth, I swear on my mother's grave.

And then, in the same abrupt manner it had begun, McPherson's testimony ended, begging more questions than it answered and all the more intriguing for that.

Reading it over again left Erwin more excited than ever. He got up and paced around his office, chewing over the options available to him. It was his duty to bring this secret to light, that was not in doubt. But if he did so in Festival Week, when the city was polishing itself to perfection, he would gain a much larger audience while making enemies of his friends and clients.

Part of him replied: So what? Hadn't he been telling himself it was time to move on while he was still young enough to relocate? And what better calling card could he have than to be the man who had uncovered the McPherson Conspiracy? The other part of him, the part that had grown comfortable in this corner of the world, said: Have a little care for people's feelings. Let this news out in Festival Week and you'll be a pariah.

He paced, and he chewed, and finally he decided not to decide, at least not yet. First he'd check his facts to be certain the confession wasn't just McPherson's invention. Find out if a child called Rebecca Jenkins had indeed been dredged from reservoir, if there had ever been a house by the creek, and f so, what had happened to those who'd occupied it.

He made a photocopy of McPherson's confession in Bettijane's office

(he'd given her the day off so she could drive into Portland and pick up her mother), then sealed the original in an envelope and locked it up in the safe. That Two done, he folded up the copy, slipped it into his jacket pocket, and went out for lunch at Kitty's Diner. He wasn't by nature a self-analytical man, but as he wandered down Main Street he couldn't help but be struck by the paradox of his present mood. Murder, suicide, and the dispatch of innocents filled his head, but he could not remember when he'd last felt so utterly content with his lot in life.

There were those among Dr. Powell's patients that late morning who had seen looks like this on Phoebe Cobb's face before, and they knew from experience that caution was the byword. Woe betide the patient who reported to reception five minutes late, or worse still attempted to justify their tardiness with some lame excuse. Being carted into the waiting room in six pieces would not have won a sympathetic smile from Phoebe in her present mood.

There were even one or two of the doctor's regulars Mrs. Converse, here for a fresh supply of blood pressure pills, and Arnold Heacock, in need of suppositories-who were familiar enough with Phoebe to have guessed the rea son for her demeanor, and would have been correct in their assumptions.

Five and a half pounds. How was that possible? She'd not touched a candy or a doughnut in three weeks. She hadn't allowed herself even to inhale near a plate of fried chicken.

How was it possible to eat so frugally, to deny her body everything it craved, and still put on five and a half pounds? was the air in Everville fattening these days?

Audrey Laidlaw had just stalked in, holding her belly.

"I have to see Dr. Powell," she said, before she'd even reached the counter.

"Is it an emergency?" Phoebe wanted to know, floating the question so as not to betray the trap beneath.

"Yes! Absolutely!"

"Then you should have someone drive you over to Phoebe replied. "they deal with emergencies there."

"It's not that much of an emergency," the Laidlaw woman snapped.

"Then you'll have to make an appointment." Phoebe consulted her diary.

"Tomorrow at ten forty-five?"

Audrey Laidlaw narrowed her eyes. "Tomorrow?" she said. Phoebe kept smiling, which was a reliable irritant, and was pleased to see the woman grinding her teeth. Only two months before, under circumstances not unlike these, the thin and neurotic Miss Laidlaw had marched out of the waiting room muttering fat bitch just loudly enough to be heard. Phoebe had thought there and then: You wait.

"Will you just tell Dr. Powell I'm here?" Audrey said. "I'm sure he'll see me."

"He's with a patient," Phoebe said. "If you want to take a seat@'

"This is intolerable," the woman replied, but she had little choice in the matter. The round lost, she retired to a chair by the window, and fumed. Phoebe didn't stare, in case she looked triumphant, but went back to sorting the mail.

"Where have you been all my life?"

She looked up, and Joe was leaning over the counter, his words little more than a whisper. She glanced past his broad frame to see that everyone in the waiting room was looking their way, the same question in every gaze: What is a black man in paint-spattered overalls doing whispering to a married woman like Phoebe Cobb?

"What time are you finished here?" he asked her softly.

"You've got paint in your hair."

"I'll shower. What time?"

"You shouldn't be here."

He shrugged and smiled. Oh, how he smiled. "Around three," she said.

"You got a date."

With that he was gone, and she was left meeting half a dozen stares from around the room. She knew better than to look away. It would instantly be construed as guilt. Instead, she gave her audience a gracious little smile and stared back, hard, until they had all dropped their gazes. Then, and only then, did she return to the mail, though her hands were trembling so badly she was butterfingered for the next hour, and her mood so much sweetened, she even found a few minutes for Audrey Laidlaw to be given something for her dyspepsia.