Quarrel with the Moon (16 page)

"Well, we'll want to visit with Harry and his assistants...."

"You shouldn't try to start back this afternoon. You wouldn't make it back to the Ridge before dark. Better wait an' come back in the morning. If you'll fetch me a piece of paper, I'll draw you as good a map as I can recollect."

Cresta cleared the table and washed the dishes while Avarilla, brow knitted in concentration, drew a crude map. "You start off goin' toward the store - away from the Community Center - but you'll see a little road goin' off to the left. You turn there. It'll take you to the trail." She added, "You'd better be takin' some food an' blankets."

"I've already packed the necessaries in the backpacks."

Avarilla gathered her empty basket. "Well, I'd better get going. It's at least eight o'clock. I've got wood to chop, chickens to feed, an' a cow to milk." She lowered her voice. "An' I don't like to leave Sissy alone for too long a spell. She'll be wantin' her breakfast." She embraced them both and left.

Cresta remarked, "I hope when I grow old, I grow old with as much grace and kindness as Aunt Avvie. She makes me feel guilty for all the petty things I fuss about."

Doing as Avarilla had told them, the couple dressed in long-sleeved shirts, jeans and high boots. They strapped on the backpacks and, after locking the camper, were on their way.

***

The sun-scorched little road came to a fork. Josh and Cresta stopped, wiped their dusty faces with handkerchiefs and looked at one another. The fork hadn't appeared on Avvie's map.

"Which way to Oz?" wondered Cresta. She glanced around and suddenly began laughing. "Look, Josh, look! There's even a scarecrow. Is that prophetic or what?"

A dissolute scarecrow stood sentinel above the rows of tassel stalks. Arms stretched out, body dangling down, it was dressed in a threadbare jacket, baggy pants and a misshapen hat - all black. The head was made from a flower sack stuffed with husks. Somebody had added yarn to represent hair. The face had been painted on in bold, rough strokes, and the "artist" had given the scarecrow a disturbing expression. The eyes were wide and staring, the nostrils flared and mouth open and twisted into a silent scream.

Cresta muttered, "Someone has a wild imagination."

"Or a macabre one," added Josh. "By the way, they don't call them scarecrows around here. They're called scarebuggers."

"Scarebugger! That one certainly is. It's scarier than anything I've ever seen outside an amusement park." She looked at the paths. One went uphill and the other down. "Let's take the high road." Josh nodded, and they walked on. About ten yards further on, the trees cleared and they saw that they were approaching an old country church. "This can't be the way," exclaimed Cresta. "The path ends at the church."

"We needed to go the other way. I wonder why Aunt Avvie didn't mention the fork?"

The path looked as if it hadn't been used for a very long time. The church was set on the crest of a hillock. Its front was windowless, but there was a covered entrance and several steps leading up to it. Paint hung in scabs from the warped boards. The grass and bushes near the structure were brown and paper-dry.

"That's odd," said Cresta. "It looks abandoned. I thought mountain people were fervently religious."

"They are. I expect the preacher's a traveling man and doesn't get up here too often. Either that, or they've built a new church somewhere else. Come on, love, let's go." He wanted to leave. The church reminded him uncomfortably of his parents' home in Jericho Falls.

"Oh, Josh," pleaded Cresta, "let's look around." She walked around the side of the church and called, "Josh, here's a graveyard. Please, I'd like to see."

Josh sighed and followed her.

"Oh, Josh, it's in absolute ruins. It looks as if it's been bombed or something. Why on earth don't the townspeople take care of it?"

The burial ground contained roughly fifty graves, which were overgrown with leaves and thistle. Crosses, stones and wooden markers were staggered at odd angles. Here and there graves were covered with an iridescent moss which glistened like a dragonfly's wings. Cresta shuddered, and Josh slipped his arm around her. "I was hoping to make some rubbings of the gravestones," she said sadly. "When they're framed they make wonderful decorative pieces." Hand in hand they walked in through the rusted iron gate. Some of the graves had sunken several feet into the ground. One section of the hillside had eroded, and rotting caskets were clearly visible.

"Josh, how ghastly. Don't they care anything for their relatives?"

"Maybe they're planning on moving the graves to the new church," Josh suggested.

"Lord, I hope so! It looks so desolate. This does it. I've made up my mind to be cremated once and for all."

They took off their heavy backpacks, set them on the ground and turned to face the back of the church. This side had a stained glass window. It was not large; it looked as though it had been fashioned by local craftsmen. Still, the work was remarkable. It was a life-size depiction of a simple, childlike Christ wearing a milky-white robe, standing alone on a road, his arms outstretched in a gesture of welcome. A small, cuddly lamb lay curled at his feet. The colors were bold, startling in their intensity. They added to the pleasing, if primitive, effect.

"Josh, it's beautiful. It makes me want to cry or get religion."

Josh did not answer. He stooped and gathered up his backpack. "We'd better get going, Cresta. Harry's undoubtedly made a call to the institute by now, and he'll be expecting us. Cresta?"

Cresta started to turn, and then out of the corner of her eye she saw movement. "Josh!
Josh!
" Josh looked up. Cresta stood clenching and unclenching her fists. Despite her natural high color, her face was ashen.

"Cresta, what is it?"

"His face," she gasped. "It's alive! Jesus was looking at me."

"What in the hell are you talking about?"

"Look. Look at his face."

Josh stared at the glass face of Christ. "You're seeing things. It's nothing but a window."

"Josh, I know what I'm talking about. The face was looking at me. The eyes moved, the lips moved, the whole face shifted."

"Cresta," said Josh patiently, "the sunlight is playing tricks on you. Come on, we've got to go."

Cresta allowed herself to be led away.

"Come on, love, I'm going to sit you down in the shade, and I'll give you a nice cold drink of water." Josh led Cresta to the front of the church, made her sit down on the bottom step. He opened his canteen and handed it to her.

Cresta took a long drink, wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, and said evenly, "I don't care what you say. I saw what I saw."

"Maybe I'd better take you inside. It's probably cooler in there. You might have a touch of sunstroke." Josh tried the church door, but it was locked. He looked up and read the sign over the door. "The Holiness Church of Sweet Jesus Savior." His expression changed: filthy words and vile epithets had been scratched into the sign with sharp instruments. As he started back down the steps, his foot hit against a pie tin. The tin, burned black with age, was empty save for a few small, polished bones. "They must have a dog here, keeping guard against vandals."

Cresta eyed the bones and replied dully, "It must be an awfully neat dog."

"You're feeling better, then?"

"Yes, let's get on with it."

Further down the path, Cresta glanced over her shoulder. The church, silhouetted against the blazing sun, resembled a giant tombstone.

***

The inside of the church was as bleak and chill as winter. The Sin-Eater climbed down from the ladder which stood next to the stained-glass window and headed for the pulpit. The weight of his boots made crunching sounds upon the sheddings which were strewn about the floor like long cellophane wrappers. He moved carefully. His companions uncoiled and slithered out of his way.

A swarm of copperheads, rattlesnakes, blacksnakes and garter snakes constituted all that was left of the congregation of the Holiness Church of Sweet Jesus Savior.

Several were draped from the rafters like morbid party decorations. Others wound around moldering songbooks like satanic rosaries. Still others clustered together in unholy wreaths.

Reverend Hooper ascended the steps to the pulpit. A copperhead unwound with intricate grace and slid away, allowing him access to his Bible. He opened the brittle book to St. Matthew. A waterstain, like a dark yellow birthmark, blemished the pages. The preacher cast his watery eyes downward. He recognized the section only by the number of letters in its name in the upper right-hand corner. The reverend recited from memory, often paraphrasing the passages to suit his feelings of the moment. The shocking events of the past years had so scrambled his mind that he could no longer read.

He parted his cracked lips and spoke in a hoarse, fanatic voice. "An' I say! For where three or four of you are gathered together here in My name, then I am here in the midst of you." He scanned his congregation, and his distorted memory filled the pews with people. "Yea, Lord. There are spirits that are created for vengeance an' in their fury they lay on grievous torments. I say that they are the enemy of God an' must be scattered!"

As he preached, the reverend punctuated his words with vigorous gestures. He slapped his hands together, balled them into fists and struck his cheeks. He pulled at his shoulder-length hair and stamped down the steps of the pulpit. The serpents, long used to the preacher's histrionics, did not stir. His words became a choked babble, as he began to hop about the church on one foot. The snakes, pointing their seed-like eyes at him, darted out of his way. Some hissed and struck at the preacher's heavy boots, angry at being disturbed.

"I will rise again in glory and they will reap the punishment of their iniquity!"

Reverend Hooper had once been a tall man, broad-shouldered and roughly handsome. Now he was stooped, thin as a starved bird; all vestiges of his good looks had long since disappeared. His pallid skin looked repulsive and artificial. His hair, knotted and unwashed, grew about his head in rank profusion and intermingled with the matted hair of his beard. It was hard to tell where one left off and the other began. He had the wild eyes of a fallen saint ... vacant, opaque, the pupils cast up as if waiting to be imprinted with the image of paradise.

He wore a pair of bib overalls, foul with sweat and mottled with food stains, a white shirt now as yellow as old ivory, a string tie, and a jacket whose seams sprouted black threads.

In one sense, Reverend Hooper had descended into hell on the night of September twelve, nineteen seventy and four. In another, his ruination had begun many years earlier.

***

There had been a burial on that September day in 1974. Wilma Gillespie's favorite child, Fern, twelve years old and an epileptic, had died, when she suffered a convulsion. There had been no one to help her and she had choked on her own tongue. Following the funeral, the preacher had attended the grieving mother for the remainder of the afternoon and well into the evening. Then, exhausted, he had gone to the church to pray for the young girl, as he had promised Fern's mother and father.

The interior of the church had reeked of flowers and something else - the scent of death. Fern's distraught mother had refused to give up her child to the earth, and it wasn't until the granny women had talked to her that she agreed to let her daughter be buried. Bodies were not embalmed in the mountains. Because of the delay, the casket had to be closed and sealed. Still, the air had become permeated with the unmistakable smell of the dead.

He took a long swallow from the bottle of Reuben's strong blend which he carried with him for "medicinal purposes." Then he knelt and began to pray for Fern's immortal soul. The alcohol helped work up his fervor.

"Sa-weet Je-sus! Take this little gal unto your bosom. Amen. Praise the Lord an' Hallelujah! Take little Fern an' set her right next to You on Your golden throne." He took another sip from the bottle, which he set on the floor. Perspiration coursed down his face. The bandanna came loose and fell to the floor, which was littered with flower petals like so many split communion wafers. He reached for his bandanna, swabbed his brow and raised his mighty voice again.

"You remember, Fern, Lord? The youngest gal on the Ridge to find salvation an' give testimony. Only twelve years old, Lord, an' she knew enough to test her faith in You. An' they shall take up serpents, an' they shall speak with new tongues an' in Thy name they shall cast out devils!"

Fern had given her testimony only a few weeks before her death. Too tall for her age, elbows jutting, wrists thin and angular, frizzy red hair framing a valentine face - Fern had eased her way down the aisle toward the preacher, toward the rattlesnakes coiled around his arms. Her eyes were rolled back in her head, as if she was having one of her fits, but her expression was serene.

The choir started up the upbeat mountain version of "Gimme That Old Time Religion"; the worshippers, gathered in a crescent around the preacher, clapped and praised and pressed close together.

Fern approached Reverend Hooper and calmly placed her bare arm next to his. The rattler uncoiled and swiftly wrapped itself around her wrist. Fern was transfixed. Hallelujahs and amens burst from the congregation. The preacher's voice boomed out: "An' a little child, I say, a little child shall lead them!"

It had been a memorable testimony, and the preacher had recalled it on the night of her funeral with swelling pride. "Her soul was purified, Lord. Amen. I know. You will stretch forth Your hand and take Your anointed one. Fern Gillespie was a true believer."

An unearthly howl interrupted the preacher's prayers for Fern. He gave a violent start. The stench of corruption, hideously evocative, was overpowering.

He rose to his feet. The sound had come from outside the stained-glass window overlooking the graveyard.

A series of howls more like mocking laughs erupted outside. The preacher pressed his face against the glass. He could see nothing but the bright moonlight outside, now turned a ghastly shade of green by the glass. He looked up at the face of Christ. He would be able to see through that lightly tinted oval. He dragged the stepladder from behind the organ, set it by the window, and started to climb. Terror shook his body. Why did fear consume him? The preacher was not a coward. Indeed, little on the earth caused him trepidation. When he reached the top rung he pressed his face against the face of Christ.