November Mourns (21 page)

Rebi eventually let the two snakes she’d been carrying go free, and the girls began to walk faster. Rain cascaded off the slash pine, and oak branches snapped in the winds. The temperature dropped quickly until they could see their breath. Rebi began to laugh quietly.

He heard the other snake handlers up ahead on the trail, the children still giggling and chattering excitedly, parents giving sharp commands to watch for stickers. Jerilyn pressed a hand to Shad’s elbow, helping to guide him over the rough path.

When they broke from beneath the heavy brush, the trail sloped to a hamlet he hadn’t been expecting.

The community proved to be much larger than Shad had imagined. He’d been thinking it might be like the shantytown quarter in Poverhoe City, but it was much more formalized than that. Lottie Sublett had been right. Houses and cabins sat close together, porches bunched up to form plank walkways.

There was some money here in the settlement. But the men had done the work themselves and they hadn’t had the skills or craftsmanship to do an impeccable job. His father would’ve been appalled. Foundations had shifted and the walls inclined at bad angles. Rain would cause doors and window frames to stick or jam shut. They had sunk their own wells and septic tanks and the area had unnatural grades to it.

Now folks returned to their homes carrying their containers of snakes, the kids asking questions about church services, men talking about their hunger.

In the center of the small colony stood a two-story farmhouse with a wide veranda. It was much larger and better constructed than the surrounding buildings, erected on rocky, thorn-choked land that could never be properly farmed. It showed that these people either believed in miracles or had an insane amount of faith in themselves.

Unlike the other homes, which looked to have been built within the last couple of years, the farmhouse had been around for decades.

“That’s our place,” Jerilyn said. “It doubles as a communal center for the congregation.”

“A church?”

“We don’t really have a proper chapel,” Rebi told him, and when she spoke she turned and moved against him. He had a hard time listening even with her talking in his ear. “Just a big room in back of the house with seats.”

“Is your father the preacher?”

“I reckon you could say that, though anybody can give witness if they like. The rest of the congregation, well, they’re more than just neighbors. A lot of them are cousins, family now through marriage. More every year.”

“Was your whole village out there this afternoon?”

Jerilyn let out a smile at that, and said, “Mama and a couple of the other women stayed out of the roundup so they could prepare supper.”

One question led to another. He was starting to grow annoyed by the inquiring tone of his own voice, but pressed on. “Is this considered a holiday for you? A holy day?”

“Every month or so we do the snake hunt. No particular day, really, just whenever Daddy and the rest of them get in the mood for the celebration.”

“And what do you do with them all? The snakes.”

Rebi slid up into his face again. The girl had no idea what personal space might mean. Ferociously sexy as she was, it still got on your nerves. “Daddy does some preaching and everybody bears witness and they handle the rattlers during services. Afterward, we set ’em free, then round ’em up again.” She drew her hair aside and cocked her head so he could see. There were puncture scars along the edge of her throat.

“Jesus Christ,” he said. “Why the hell are they on your neck?”

“’Cause I like to dance with snakes in my hair and draped over my shoulders, that’s why.”

Glowering, Jerilyn pulled her sister roughly away. “It’s not like we let the snakes bite us on purpose. We’re not fools, and we don’t believe that God will protect us from the poison because our souls are pure. It’s just another way to pay tribute to the Lord. We’ve all built up a resistance over the years, so it’s not as dire as you might think. Like I said before, townsfolk would think that witchy.”

Rebi’s blouse had been soaked through and when she moved beside him she gave it an extra nudge so he could feel the weight of her chest pressing in close and pay attention. He did. Her hair flowed across the left side of his face and Jerilyn’s flailed against the right.

Still, you had to pretend that you weren’t aware when your life took on the pattern of a tale you’d heard before. How many guys in prison had talked about fucking two sisters back to back, back to forward, right to left, and the catfights that came afterward? The crews on C-Block would be drunk on pruno listening to how the cops would come in and bust up a brawl between two razor-wielding ladies. A rookie getting slashed in the face and screaming while he bled all over the place. The nightsticks and cuffs coming out, paramedics in the hallway, and the guy stoned and just lying there on the bed watching it all. The C-Block crews would laugh their asses off, and they never got tired of sister stories.

Rebi gripped his arm and pulled Shad up the veranda stairs. “We’re late getting back. It sounds like they’re about to start.”

“It’ll be all right,” Jerilyn said. “They’ll be glad to see we’ve brought a new friend.”

They marched to the front door and Shad stopped in his tracks and stared into the foyer ahead. Prison was closing in on him again. Both Gabriel girls tugged at him harder, but he didn’t budge.

Megan’s hand beckoned him from the hall and he finally stepped forward.

It wasn’t dark inside the home at all. He even had to shield his eyes, moving from the gloom of the storm to an abruptly illuminated room. He was suddenly surrounded by clamor: voices, a clatter of silverware, and the rattling of windows as the rain throbbed against the glass.

Rebi brought him a towel, and said, “Come sit.”

“The whole settlement sits down and takes meals together?”

“On certain days. The babies and real young’uns are put down for naps after a roundup.”

“You sure no one will be upset?”

“You got no sense about you at all.”

“There’s plenty who’d say you were right.”

“You’re thinking it’s a big fuss, Shad Jenkins,” Jerilyn said. “It’s not. You got no call to be distressed. Nobody’s going to hurt you.”

“Sorry, it’s been a long time since I’ve sat down and had dinner with any family.”

“Even your own?”

“I don’t have much of one anymore.”

With a casual grace, she led him down the corridor into the depths of the house. They moved side by side as if they were a long-enduring couple who’d been together so many years that they balanced each other out. It somehow felt more natural now that it ever had with Elfie. It was such a disturbing thought that it put a hitch in his stride.

Jerilyn reacted with subtle adjustments, slowing to match his pace. He dried himself but couldn’t shake the chill. Falling behind him, Rebi slid herself against his back and urged him along.

Okay,
he thought,
so where does the game go from here?

When do I get to wrangle the rattlers and prove myself a servant of the lord?

Folks were already seated for dinner and the first plates were being served when Shad stepped into the room. He sat between the sisters and his introduction into the fold hardly made a ripple. He counted twenty-five people and none of the children were in sight. A few of them reached over and shook his hand, clapped him on the back. A couple knew his name already and said they’d met his father years ago.

A woman flitted over, hugged him, and made a comment he didn’t catch. He heard various names spoken at him, but few he could remember. Taskers. Johansens. Burnburries. It was the first time he’d had a meal with another person since the prison cafeteria.

Up on the wall they’d nailed Hellfire Christ, and he didn’t want your sympathy. He didn’t even want your love. He just scowled at you from his agony and wrath and let you know he was up there for the sole purpose of making you come face-to-face with your own crimes and weaknesses. Hellfire Christ was damn near smiling. He wanted to see you go down.

Shad was a tad surprised. He’d thought only the Catholics went in for crucifixes. If these folks were going to have one, then he expected snakes to be wreathed around the gaunt figure. Snapping at the Messiah’s feet, twined at the bottom of the cross.

But there weren’t any other idols or paintings of serpents anywhere in view. Did snake handlers believe that Saint Patrick was a good man for casting the vipers out of Ireland or did they consider his actions disgraceful?

The shit you had to think about.

Shad ate beside the snake handlers, giving short precise answers whenever he was asked a question. The old-timer with the sunburned crown looked over and said it again. “Hey there, how you today?”

“Fine, thanks.”

“Good taters!”

“Yes.”

It felt exactly like it did in the can. Your first view of the new world’s hierarchy happened in the cafeteria. You learned how the place was organized, who ran the show. Where you were allowed to sit, how the power structure worked. You started with the guy at the head of the table. All the others would fall into line eventually.

There he was. Leader of the nameless church, master of vipers, King of the Goblins, Jerilyn and Rebi’s father, Lucas Gabriel.

A bull of a man dressed all in white except for the carefully knotted narrow black bow tie that had been fashionable before Atlanta burned. The tie told Shad something about Gabriel but he didn’t know what. He was bald, his skull knobby and creased, with a fringe of kinky brown hair above each ear. His shirtsleeves were rolled up to reveal powerful forearms covered with purplish snakebite scars. He showed them off the way cons advertised their jailhouse tats. It proved you didn’t care about the surface of your flesh. Only what was in your blood really mattered.

There was an element about Lucas Gabriel that reminded Shad of Pa. Maybe the tightly compressed potential of force waiting for the chance to escape.

The patriarch. Shad knew the man had a hell of a story, and he wished he’d asked Dave Fox or somebody else what it was.

Gabriel watched Shad with washed-out eyes the color of gravel. There was no suspicion in them. Only an impish sparkle of authority that let you know he was in charge and never to cross him. It was the same gleam the warden’s gaze had held until Jeffie O’Rourke rammed a paintbrush through his eye.

“He came here on his own, Daddy,” Jerilyn said. “This is Mr. Shad Jenkins.”

“There’s always room at our table for one more,” Gabriel told her. “If someone wants to share our bread with us.” His voice had a laugh to it, but the laugh didn’t come out.

No direct acknowledgment or real welcome from the man, which put another spin on the situation.

“He ain’t never handled snakes before,” Rebi put in. Almost mocking but having fun with it, pushing a little. Shad figured these people did a lot of that, honing their social skills against one another like sharpening knives.

“Folks from the hollow, or most towns anywhere, don’t truck much with snakes except to kill ’em.” Gabriel’s smile showed off his small, even, white teeth. “Must’ve been quite a sight for him to come upon, seeing as how we were rounding up so many for services.”

“Yes, it was.”

Shad figured the hard sell was about to start, and they were going to talk about the burgeoning ranks of God’s saved people now. He began to draw his thoughts together and gather his words, but then Gabriel asked somebody to pass him the potatoes. The whole group fell to talking among themselves again even louder than before. Most of them were garrulous, chuckling noisily, leaning toward him to welcome him into their long-winded jokes and conversations. No one addressed him specifically.

He checked around to see who might be keeping to themselves.

Those were the ones you had to watch for. The hitters. The muscle.

They weren’t hard to spot. Two toughs, brothers by the look of it, with feral eyes and fixed dull faces covered with patchy beards. Shirts buttoned up to the collars, thick hair parted at the side and combed over into ridiculous juvenile waves and curls. Perhaps they were Gabriel blood, but Shad didn’t see any of the same poise in them. They sat obediently like dogs.

It took a while but eventually he heard their names. Hart and Howell Wegg.

They ate silently and with good manners, wiping their mouths a lot. They kept their elbows off the table, cut the ribs off the bone, and sliced their meat into small pieces. Whenever someone spoke to them they smiled dutifully but hardly said a word. They appeared so docile that Shad could feel himself gearing up for impending grief. He hoped he was being paranoid but really didn’t think it would be that easy.

The meal seemed to be a carefully rehearsed performance put on for his benefit, and he paid no serious attention to it. He tuned out most of it and found that even Jerilyn wasn’t saying anything of importance though she kept whispering to him. He could feel how keyed up they all were, holding back but edgy and raring. Was it due to his entrance or because this was one of their holy days? He sat and waited and knew it wouldn’t be too much longer.

It took another twenty minutes. As the ladies began to clear the table, he started to stand and Rebi shoved him back down. She told him, “It’s not anything sexist, it’s just our turn to clean up. You sit and relax, talk to Daddy for a bit.”