November Mourns (12 page)

“That’s all?”

“Sometimes more,” Dudlow said, on the defensive and gesturing vaguely with his hands. “We want to make our brethren feel embraced, but I’m not a naive man. I take my responsibilities in safeguarding my congregation very seriously.”

With blackness creeping up to ply the back of his skull, Shad forced himself to see it.

Mags.

There she was. Seventeen years old, lovely and grinning, holding a Bible and some photocopied literature, maybe with donation envelopes or a mason jar for collections. Stepping up onto a shaky porch and knocking as the paint chips flaked around her shoulders, waiting patiently while some bitter, lonely wife-beating prick roused himself from a drunken stupor in front of the TV set. The game was over and he’d lost another twenty bucks on a bad defensive line. A bellyful of bile and three aching teeth. Got up with his belt unbuckled, only one sock on, kicked empty beer cans aside, and came to the door with the sunlight slashing his brain into juicy, throbbing slices. Just as Mags’s shadow lengthened to cover his stubbled face, the beautiful smile something he’d rarely seen before—hadn’t seen in years—while her gentle, buoyant voice asked for charity and offered an inviting hand. Talking about kindness, crafts shows, and church bake sales while his T-shirt, gummy with liquor and drool, slowly dried and stuck to his graying chest. His tattoos stretched and dull, the flesh pink as a sow’s ass. Suddenly feeling fat and old and weak, unbearably needy, glaring at her legs in the golden afternoon. Watching the swell of her young breasts, the blond down and freckles at the base of her throat. Asking her inside with the promise of a few dollar bills on his dresser. Want some lemonade?

Shad looked into Dudlow’s face and the preacher said, “Merciful Jesus.” He took a step back, tottered in a chuckhole and nearly fell over. “Lord a’mighty.”

“What?”

“Your eyes. So full of fury.”

“You expect something else from a man who’s just lost kin?”

“You’re primed and set to go off, Shad Jenkins. I can see it.” Wrapping the edges of his scarf in his fists, beginning to slip away. Scampering happily because murder was sort of pervy. “Who are you planning to kill? Who are you taking with you to hell?”

“I just want to find out what happened to my sister.”

Dudlow paced backwards another few feet, as if he might turn and bolt on a dead run for his microbus. “She went to sleep. It happens. Not often, praise Jesus, but it does. That’s the way of God.”

“That’s not good enough for me.”

It made Dudlow look around for help, even glancing at Lament, hoping the dog would understand and agree. He let out a sorrowful breath but his eyes were gleaming. “The more’s the pity.”

“Maybe so. We all have our course.”

“Come see me, if you need to talk. Before you . . . well, if you’d like to chat.”

“Sure.”

Preacher Dudlow trundled off so quickly that the orange flaps over his ears popped up as he made his way down the incline back to his vehicle. Pa’s pickup still hadn’t returned.

Lament shook himself, cocked his head. Shad went and plucked dying wildflowers from the thickets, putting half on Mama’s grave, the rest on Megan’s.

The hollow was getting on his nerves. He still had a few questions he wanted to ask. As soon as he had some answers, he’d drive up Gospel Trail, see if he could find whatever it was that had been thinking on him so decidedly.

Maybe Dudlow was right. Shad might have to kill some folks before this was all over, and take them along to oblivion.

Chapter Eight

THE BLOOD DREAMS RETURNED, SANGUINE
and burning.

He used to have them a lot in the joint. He’d wake up and find himself standing naked at the bars, the entire cellblock awake but quiet, everybody staring into the dimness. Even the Aryans and the homeboys didn’t say a word. Jeffie O’Rourke would have his face buried in his pillow, shrunken back into the corner of his bunk and pretending to be asleep.

Shad never found out what he said or did while sleepwalking. No one would ever tell him, and they’d give him a wide berth for a while. The Muslims kept trying to convert him even though he was white, saying that Mohammed and Allah had plans for him.

So, it was happening again.

He blinked and realized he was in Mrs. Rhyerson’s backyard, looking up at the brightening sky. Maybe 5:00
A
.
M
. from the purple hue of dawn, with the sound of the Freightliners barreling down the highway humming through the thickets.

He waited to see if he was out here for a reason. He was freezing, wearing only sweatpants and a T-shirt. The wind filled the trees overhead, and the ash and the oaks shrugged, leaves wafting against his knees. It kept him turning, facing one way, then another, the breeze shaking the brush. His hands were open at his sides, slightly raised, palms out. Knees bent, ready to run or jump. It was the most prepared you could be when you didn’t know from which direction they’d be coming.

If someone wanted him, he was here. He was still being looked over, contemplated, deliberated on. He could feel a certain anxiety in the night but couldn’t be sure if it was his own.

Shad had an urge to talk but checked himself. The more of your voice you gave away, the more power you consigned to your foe. Imagine the seventy-year-old woman clambering out of bed, stomping down the stairway, swinging through the kitchen and slamming open the screen door, holding an iron skillet.

Like he didn’t have enough on his mind.

His feet were numb and his skin crawled with gooseflesh. He backed up, step by step, wondering if it would compel the hills to make a move.

Perhaps it had. Shad wanted to go back inside but suddenly grew immensely tired. A peculiar weakness trailed through his limbs. He stooped and sat under a spruce, and when he felt strong enough, he stood and started back to the house. He was almost at the door before he realized he’d left his body behind.

He headed back to the tree and his mother and the devil were waiting for him, both out of breath.

“Shad?”

Mama began calling to him again, like he wasn’t there, or she wasn’t. What would happen if he didn’t answer? Did he have a choice? Would she finally leave?

Beside her stood Ashtoreth, evolved from the ancient Phoenician mother goddess of fertility Astarte, who in his male incarnation is a teacher of sciences and keeper of past and future secrets. A grand duke of hell that commands forty legions, one of the supreme demons.

Ashtoreth smiled affectionately through terrible scars covering his face. It took Shad a second to remember where he’d seen the devil before.

Tattooed at the base of Glide Luvell’s back.

“Well now,” Shad said.

Mama groped blindly for him. The red devil moved from her and crouched before Shad’s body, which was still beneath the tree, breathing into his face and whispering something in his ear. Ashtoreth stared up almost contritely as Shad approached, quickly finished whatever he’d been saying, and stood.

The devil, dressed in the warden’s finest suit, stepped forward and straightened the knot of his silk tie. Shad thought he should grab for his mother and get it over with now. Wake up, turn aside, and get the blood out of his belly.

Ashtoreth’s voice was his father’s voice. “She wants to give you a warning.”

“She always does.”

“You need to listen.”

“No, I’m not so sure that I do.”

But this was another of his faults. Holding out hope that the ghost of the mother he’d never met might actually be searching him, loving him in her own grotesque way. You never got free of your mama.

She drifted out there in the brush, tangling in the camphor laurel, the maple, and catclaw briars. Slowly she became aware of him standing there and looked over, held one hand out to the devil, the other toward Shad. He rubbed the creases in his forehead and sighed. She stared beyond him, and said, “Son?”

“I’m here, Mama.”

“Son?”

“I’m right next to you. I’m always next to you.”

“Shad?”

“Yes.”

“Oh, hello.”

“Hello, Mama.”

Ashtoreth said, “Come closer. She wants you to come closer.”

“Quiet, you.”

Glide Luvell’s devil revealed disappointment in his expression. “Believe me, you want to hear what I have to say.”

“That right?”

The bizarre knowledge flooded him again, everything sharp and sensible as if he’d read it off a page many times before.

Instigator of demonic possession, most notably in the case of the Loudun nuns of France in the sixteenth century, who accused Father Urbain Grandier of unholy and perverse acts. After severe torture, Grandier scrawled a confession with his broken hands and was burned at the stake for consorting with Satan.

So
, Shad thought,
this is the guidance I get.

Ma smiled sadly, as if she too wanted this all to end as quickly as possible. Clutching for him so he’d wake up, get on with his life, and let her go back to the grave. She appeared even less interested in him this time than a few nights ago.

“Shad? You listen, son. You listen to me.”

“Shh, Mama, I want to talk to your companion now.”

“Son? I need to tell you . . . stay off the road.” Confusion twisted and contorted her features as she moved off in the wrong direction trying to find him.

He figured what the hell, grabbed Ashtoreth by the warden’s tie, and yanked him forward. “You got something that might actually help me or not?”

“Yes. I’m only here to deliver you a friend.”

That stopped him. “What friend?”

“One you’ve been missing.”

The devil faded from sight and soon Jeffie O’Rourke stepped up and stood there just a few feet away, dressed in Armani. His eyes had some new hipness to them that he hadn’t possessed in the can, and his grin was knowing and a touch badass. Murdering your lover had a way of giving you a new confidence.

“Where’d you get to?” Shad asked.

“Been out and about,” Jeffie said, taking a step closer. The three-thousand-dollar silk suit gave a gentle swish. Shad could see there was dried blood or paint on Jeffie’s hands, the bitten-down fingernails caked with it. “Spending a lot of time sitting around on beaches, doing seascapes.”

“Like the warden.”

“Yes, just like him. He always said they were calming, but I don’t find that to be the case.”

“You should probably quit then.”

“I’ll give it a while longer though. Maybe it just takes time.”

“Maybe so.”

Jeffie gave a kind of frowning grin, like he was glad to be there and had arrived just in time. “Jenkins, I know this town is about as backass backwater backwards as can be, but are you telling me that you actually walk around this place like that? No shoes, no coat? You’re young but you’re not quite Huck Finn.”

That slow crawling heat at the back of Shad’s skull made itself aware to him again. It was always there, as much a part of him as the beating of his heart, but forgotten until the strain became too great. It grew more intense but wasn’t yet too painful. He looked down and didn’t see his body under the spruce anymore, and couldn’t be certain if he was awake or asleep.

“Stay out of the woods,” Jeffie said. “There are snakes in the dark.”

“Jesus, you people and all these warnings about the fucking woods.” He was starting to feel himself come undone a little. “Are you talking about the snake handlers up there? The community of the hill families? Did one of them kill Megan? Did her heart stop because of rattler venom?”

“How should I know? I’ve never been around here before.”

“Why did you show up then?”

“You wanted me to.”

Slouching a bit, Jeffie had a swagger now, something else he’d picked up off the warden. He let out a deliberate smirk and started chuckling, standing as if he were twelve feet tall, all this power in his face. Shad felt his shoulders go rigid as Jeffie reached out and touched him on the side of the neck. Flecks of red drifted against his skin. You could find some kind of goddamn symbolism wherever you looked.