Everville (26 page)

Then, resuming the melody where he'd left off, he pulled the body of a child, her pitiful corpse overlooked in the chaos, out through the broken window. The officer leveled his weapon at the thief s heart, and ordered him to put the child down, but this, like the rest of the orders, was ignored. Slinging the body around his shoulders like a shepherd carrying a lamb, the phantom made to depart. What followed was witnessed by five individuals, including the officer, all of them in highly agitated states, but none so traumatized as to be hallucinating. Their testimonies, however, were outlandish. Turning his back on the officer, the corpse-stealer started to amble off towards the embankment, and as he did so a convulsion ran through the smoke around him, and for a moment or two it seemed to the witnesses there were human forms in the billows-their faces long and wretched, their bodies sinewy but softened, as though they'd had their bones sucked out of them-fonns that were plainly in the thief's employ, because they closed around him in a moaning cloud which no one, not even the officer, was willing to breach.

Five hours later, the body of the child-a three year old called Lorena Hernandez-was discovered less than a mile from the highway, in a small copse of birch trees. She had been stripped of her blood-stained clothing and her body carefully, even lovingly, washed in rain water. Then her little corpse had been arranged on the wet ground in a fetal position: legs tucked up snug against her belly, chin against her chest. There was no sign of any sexual molestation. The eyes, however, had gone from her head.

Of the singing beauty who'd taken her, and gone to considerable trouble to lay her out this way, there was no sign. Literally none. No foot marks in the grass, no finger prints on her body, nothing. It was as though the abductor had floated as he'd gone about his grim and inexplicable ritual.

A report of these events was added to the Reef that very night, but there was nobody there to read it. Grillo was on his way to Idaho, leaving the reports to accrue behind him at an unprecedented rate. Strange, terrible stories.

In Minnesota, a man undergoing heart surgery had woken on the operating table and despite the anaesthetists' desperate attempts to return him to a comatose state, had warned his surgeons that the tail-eaters were coming, the tai I eaters were coming, and nothing could stop them. Then he'd died.

On the campus of Austin College in Texas, a woman in white, accompanied by what witnesses described as six large albino dogs, was seen disappearing into the ground as though descending a flight of stairs. There was sobbing heard from the earth, so sorrowful one of those who heard it attempted suicide an hour later.

In Atlanta, the Reverend Donald Merrill, midway through a sermon of particular ferocity, suddenly veered from his subject-There is one love, God's love-and began to speak about Imminence. His words were being broadcast across the nation live, and the cameras stayed on him as he pounded and paraded, his vocabulary becoming more obscure with every sentence. Then the subject veered again, on to the subject of human anatomy. The answer is here, he said, starting to undress in front of his astonished flock: in the breast, in the belly, in the groin. By the time he was down to his underwear and socks, the broadcast had been blacked out, but he continued to harangue his assembly anyway, instructing his appalled and fascinated congregation to go home, find a large mirror, and study themselves naked, untii-as he put it-Imminence was over, and time stood still.

There was one report among those swelling the Reef that would have been of particular interest to Tesla, had she known about it; indeed might have changed the course of events to come significantly.

It came from the Baja. Two visitors from England, parapsychologists writing a book on the mysteries of mind and matter, had gone in search of a nearly mythical spot where rumor had it great and terrible events had taken place some years before. This had of course brought them to the spot where Fletcher had first created the Nuncio, the Misi6n de Santa Catrina. There, on a headland overlooking the blue Pacific, they'd been in the midst of photographing the ruins when one of the number who still tended the little shrine that nestled in the rubble came running up to them, tears streaming down her face, and told them that a fire had walked in the misi6n the night before, a fire in the form of a man.

Fletcher, she said, Fletcher, Fletcher... But this tale, like so many others, was soon buried beneath the hundreds that were flooding in every hour from every state. Tales of the freakish and the unfathomable, of the grotesque, the filthy, and the frankly ludicrous. Unminded, unmatched, and now uncared for, the Reef grew in ignorance of itself, a body of knowledge without a head wise to its nature.

Finding the crossroads where Maeve O'Connell had buried the medallion had proved more difficult than Buddenbaum had anticipated. With Seth in tow, he'd spent two hours following Main Street north-northwest and southsoutheast from the square, assuming (mistakenly, as it turned out) that the intersection he was seeking-that crossroads where his journey would end-would be close to the center of town. He found it eventually, two-thirds of a mile from the square; a relatively insignificant spot on Everville's map. There was a modest establishment called Kitty's Diner on one corner, opposite it a small market, and on the other two a rundown garage and what had apparently been a clothing store, its naked mannequins and EVERYTHING MUST GO signs all that remained of its final days.

"What exactly are you looking for?" Seth asked him as they stood surveying the crossroads.

"Nothing now," Buddenbaum replied.

"How do you know this is the right crossroads?"

"I can feel it. It's in the ground. You look up. I look down. We're complementaries." He locked his fingers together. "Like that." He pulled, to demonstrate their adhesion.

"Can we go back to bed soon?" Seth said. "In a while. First I'd like to take a look up there." He nodded towards the windows above the empty store. "We're going to need a vantage point."

"For the parade?" Seth asked.

Buddenbaum laughed. "No. Not for the parade."

"What for ffien?"

"How do I best explain?" "Any way you like."

"There are places in the world where things are bound to happen," Buddenbaum said. "Places where powers come, where... " He fumbled for the words a moment, "Where avatars come."

"What's an avatar?"

"Well, it's a kind of face. The face of something divine."

"Like an angel?"

"More than an angel."

"More?" Seth breathed.

"More."

Seth pondered this a moment. Then he said, "These things-"

"Avatars."

"Avatars. They're coming here?"

"Some of them."

"How do you know?"

Buddenbaum stared down at the ground. "I suppose the simplest answer is that they're coming because I asked them to."

"You did?" Seth said with a little laugh. It clearly delighted him that he was chatting on a street corner with a man who made invitations to divinities. "And they just said yes?"

"It isn't the first time," Buddenbaum replied. "I've supplied many-how shall I put this?-many entertainments for them over the years."

"What kind of things?"

"All kinds. But mostly things that ordinary people would shudder at."

"they like those the best, do they?"

Buddenbaum regarded the youth with frank amazement. "You grasp things very quickly," he said. "Yes. they like those the best. The more bloodshed the better. The more tears, the more grief, the better."

"That's not so different from us, is it?" Seth said, "We like that stuff too."

"Except that this isn't make-believe," Buddenbaum said. 'This isn't fake blood and glycerine tears. they want the real ing. And it's my job to deliver it." He paused, watching the flow of traffic on street and sidewalk. "It isn't always the most pleasant of occupations," he said.

"So why do you do it?"

"I couldn't begin to answer that. Not here. Not now. But if you stay by my side, the answer will become apparent. Trust me."

"I do."

"Good. Well, shall we go?"

Seth nodded, and together they headed across the street towards the untenanted building.

Only when they were on the opposite side of the street, standing in the doorway of the clothing store, did Seth ask Buddenbaum, "Are you afraid?" "Why would I be afraid?"

Seth shrugged. "I would be. Meeting avatars."

"They're just like people, only more evolved," Buddenbaum replied. "I'm an ape to them. We're all apes to them."

"So when they watch us, it's like us going to the zoo?"

"More like a safari," Buddenbaum replied, amused by the aptness of this.

"So maybe they're the nervous ones," Seth remarked. "Coming into the wild."

Buddenbaum stared hard at the kid. "Keep that to yourself," he said forcibly.

"It was only@' Buddenbaum cut him short. "I shouldn't even have told you," he said.

"I won't say anything," Seth replied. 111 mean, who would I tell?" Buddenbaum looked unamused. "I won't say anything, to anybody," Seth said. "I swear." He drew a little closer to Buddenbaum, put his hand on Buddenbaum's arm. "I want to do whatever makes you happy with me," he said, staring into Buddenbaum's face. "You just tell me."

"Yes, I know. I'm sorry I snapped. I guess I am a little nervous." He leaned closer to the youth, his lips inches from his ears and whispered.

"I want to fuck you. Right now." And with one apparently effortless motion he forced the lock on the door and led Seth inside.

This little scene had not gone unnoticed. Since his encounter with the foul-mouthed virago, Bosley had been on the alert for any further sign of Godless behavior, and had witnessed the curious intimacy between the Lundy boy, whom he'd known was crazy for years, and the stranger in the well-cut suit. He said nothing about it to Della, Doug, or Harriet. He simply told them he was going to take a short walk and slipped out, keeping his eyes locked on the empty store as he crossed the street.

The subject of sex had never been of much interest to Bosley. Three or four months might pass without him and Leticia being moved to perform the act, and when they did it was over within a quarter of an hour. But sex kept finding him, however much he attempted to purify his little corner of the world. It came in on the radio and television, it came in magazines and newspapers, dirtying what he tried so hard to keep clean.

Why, when the Lord had raised man from dust, and given him dominion over the beasts of the field, did people have such an urge to act like beasts, to go naked like beasts, to rut and roll in dirt like beasts?

It distressed him. Angered him sometimes too, but mostly distressed him, seeing the young people of Everville, denied the guiding principles of faith, stumbling and succumbing to the basest appetites. For some reason, perhaps because of the boy's mental disturbance, he'd thought Seth Lundy a bystander to these debaucheries. Now he suspected otherwise. Now he suspected the Lundy boy was doing something worse than his peers, far worse.

He pushed open the front door and stepped into the store. It was cooler inside than out, for which he was grateful. He paused a moment a yard over the threshold, listening for the whereabouts of the boy and his companion. There were footsteps above, and murmured voices. Weaving between the debris left by the Gingerichs, he made his way to the door out the back of the store, moving lightly and quietly. The door led in to a small storage room, beyond which lay a steep, murky flight of stairs. He crossed the room and started his ascent. As he did so, he realized the voices had stopped.

e froze on the stairs, fearful his presence had been discovd. He was taking his life in his hands, spying on creatures at lived in defiance of morality. they were capable of anything, including, he didn't doubt, murder.

There was no footfall, however, and after a short pause he started up the stairs again, until he reached the door at the top. It stood an inch or two ajar. He pushed it a little wider, and listened.

Now he heard them. If dirt and depravity had a sound, then what he heard was it. Panting and slobbering and the slap of flesh on flesh. It made his skin itch to hear it, as though the air was filthy with their noise. He wanted to turn and go but he knew that was cowardice. He had to call the wrongdoers on their wrongs, the way he had the virago, or t, else wouldn't the world just become filthier and filthier, until people were buried in their own ordure?

The door creaked as he pushed it open, but the beasts were making too much din to hear it. The room was so configured he could not yet see them; he had to edge his way along a wall before he came to a corner around which to peep. Drawing breath in preparation, he did so.

they were there, coupling on the bare boards in a patch of sunli-ht, the Lundy boy naked but for his socks, his sodom t, izer with his trousers around his ankles. He had his eyes closed, as did the boy-how could he feel pleasure at this act, delving into a place of excrement?-but within two thrusts the sodomite opened his eyes and stared at Bosley. There was no shame on his face, nor in his voice. Only outrage. "How dare you?" he said. "Get out of here!"

Now Lundy opened his eyes. Unlike his violator, he had the good grace to blush, his hand going up between his legs to conceal his sex.

"I told you, get out!" the sodomite said. Bosley didn't retreat; nor did he advance. It was the boy who made the next move. Sliding forward until he'd disengaged himself he turned to his impaler and said, "Make him go."

The sodomite started to pull up his pants, and while he was doing so, and vulnerable, Bosley took the offensive.

"Animals!" he raged, coming at the sodomite with his raised arms.

"Owen!" the boy yelled, but the warning came too late.

As the violator started to straighten up, Bosley's weight struck him, carrying him backwards in a flailing stumble.

The boy was getting to his feet now-Bosley saw him from the corner of his eye-a wordless cry of rage roaring from his throat. Bosley glanced round at him, saw the feral look on his sallow face, teeth bared, eyes wild, and started to step out of his path. But as he did so he heard the sound of breaking glass, and looked back to see that the sodomite had fallen against the window. He had a moment only to register the fact, then the Lundy boy was on him, naked and wet.