Running with the Demon (31 page)

“Go back inside. Stay with your grandfather. I’ll wait out here until after the service. Maybe the demon will show himself. Maybe I’ll catch sight of him.” His green eyes fixed on her.

She nodded uncertainly. “I have to go to the bathroom first. I’ll be right back.”

She hurried off down the hall to the Christian Education wing, Reverend Emery’s deep, compelling voice trailing after her, floating over the hush of the congregation. She did not feel very good; her stomach was rolling and her head pounding. She glanced through the open doors into the cavernous gloom of the sanctuary; the feeders had disappeared. She frowned in surprise, then shook her head and went on. It didn’t matter why they were gone, she told herself, only that they were. Her footsteps echoed softly on the wooden floor as she crossed the lower foyer. She pushed through the doors leading into the reception room, feeling worn and harried. Mrs. Browning, who had been her fifth-grade teacher, was arranging cups and napkins on several long tables in preparation for the fellowship to
be held after the service. The bathrooms lay beyond. Nest slipped past Mrs. Browning without being noticed, went into the kitchen, and disappeared into the women’s bathroom.

When she came out, a man was standing there, surveying rows of cookies and cakes arranged on serving trays. He looked up expectantly as she entered.

“Ah, there you are,” he greeted, smiling. “Good morning.”

“Good morning,” she replied automatically, and then stopped in surprise. It was the maintenance man who had spoken with her the previous day when she had wandered through the park after working on the injured tree. She recognized his strange, pale eyes. He was wearing a suit now, rather than his working clothes, but she was certain it was the same man.

“Not feeling so good?” he asked.

She shook her head.

He nodded. “Well, that’s too bad. You don’t want to miss out on all these treats. Missing out on the sermon is one thing, but missing out on these cookies and brownies and cakes? No, sir!”

She started past him.

“Say, you know,” he said suddenly, stepping in front of her, blocking her way, “there’s a little something I want to share with you. A private fellowship, you might say. It’s this. I remember when sermons meant something. It’s been a while, but the old-time evangelists had a way of communicating that made you sit up and take notice. Now there’s the televangelists with their high-profile ministries, their colleges and their retreats, but they don’t talk about what matters. None of them do. Because they’re afraid. You know why? Because what matters is how the world will end.”

Nest stared at him, openmouthed.

“Sure, that’s what really matters. Because we might all be here to see it happen, you know. There’s every reason to think so. Just take a look around you. What do you see? The seeds of destruction, that’s what.” A comfortable smile creased his bland features. “But you know something? The destruction of the world isn’t going to happen in the way people think. Nope. It isn’t going to happen in a flood or a fire. It isn’t going to
happen all at once, brought about by some unexpected catastrophe. It won’t be any one thing you can point to. That’s not how it works. The Bible had it wrong. It will happen because of a lot of little things, an accumulation of seemingly insignificant events. Like dominoes tipped over, one against the other—that’s how it will happen. One thing here, another there, next thing you know it all comes tumbling down.” He paused. “Of course, someone has to topple that first domino. It all has to start with someone, doesn’t it? Tell me. Does any of this sound familiar to you?”

Nest stood speechless before him, her mind screaming at her to run, her body paralyzed.

“Sure it does,” he continued, inclining his head conspiratorially. His strange eyes narrowed, burning with a fire she could not bear to look upon. “Tell you something else. The destruction of the world depends on the willingness of the people in it to harm each other in any way necessary to achieve their own ends and to further their own causes. And we got that part down pat, don’t we? We know how to hurt each other and how to think up whatever excuses we need to justify it. We’re victims and executioners both. We’re just like those dominoes I mentioned, arranged in a line, ready to tip. All of us. Even you.”

“No,” she whispered.

His smile had turned chilly. “You think you know yourself pretty well, don’t you? But you don’t. Not yet.”

She took a step backward, trying to gauge whether or not she could reach the door before he grabbed her. As she did so, the door swung inward, and Mrs. Browning pushed through.

“Oh, hello, Nest,” she greeted. “How are you, dear?” She seemed surprised to see the man standing there, but she smiled at him cheerfully and moved to pick up another tray of brownies.

As she did so, the man said to Nest, “No, I’m afraid you don’t know yourself at all.”

He gestured swiftly toward Mrs. Browning, who gasped as if she had been struck by a fist. She dropped the tray of brownies and clutched at her chest, sinking toward the floor.
Her eyes went wide in horror, and her mouth gaped open. Nest cried out and started toward her, but the man with the strange eyes intervened, moving swiftly to block her way. Nest cringed from him, riddled with fear. He held her gaze, making sure she understood how helpless she was.

Mrs. Browning was on her knees, her head lowered, her face white, her throat working rapidly as she tried to swallow. Blood spurted from her nose and mouth. Nest’s scream froze in her throat, locked away by the man’s hard eyes.

Then Mrs. Browning slid forward onto her face and lay still, her eyes open and staring.

The man turned to Nest and cocked one eyebrow quizzically. “You see what I mean? There wasn’t a thing you could do, was there?” Then he laughed. “Maybe I won’t stay for the fellowship after all. Like I said, church isn’t what it used to be. Ministers are all just voices in the wind, and congregations are just marking time.” He walked to the back door, stopped with his hand on the knob, and glanced over his shoulder at her. “Be good.”

He opened the door and closed it softly behind him. Nest stood alone in the kitchen, looking down at Mrs. Browning, waiting for the shaking to stop.

W
hen she could make herself do so, Nest left the kitchen and walked back through the reception room. She was still shaking, the image of Mrs. Browning’s final moments burned into her mind. She found one of the ushers and told him to call for an ambulance right away. Then she continued on. She found John Ross standing in the deserted narthex outside the sanctuary. She drew him down the long corridor to where they could not be seen or heard and related what had happened. Was it the demon? He nodded solemnly, asked if she was all right, and did not look or sound nearly as surprised as she thought he should. After all, if the demon had come looking for him, and that was what had drawn all those feeders into the church, what was it doing talking to her, threatening her, and making an object lesson of poor Mrs. Browning? Why was it talking to her about people destroying themselves, parroting in part, at least, much of what she had heard from Two Bears? What in the world was going on?

“What did the demon want with me?” she blurted out.

“I don’t know,” John Ross answered, giving her a steady, reassuring look, and she knew at once that he was lying.

But Reverend Emery had finished his sermon and the congregation had risen to sing the closing hymn, so her chance to ask anything further came and went. Ross sent her back inside to be with her grandfather, telling her they would talk later. She did as she was told, dissatisfied with his evasiveness, suspicious of his motives, but thinking at the same time she must tread carefully if she was to learn the truth of things. She
slipped back down the aisle and into the pew beside her grandfather, giving him a rueful smile as the voices of the congregation rose all around her. She was starting the third verse of the hymn when it struck her that the demon might be trying to get to John Ross through her, and that was why he had cornered her in the church kitchen. That, in turn, would explain why Ross claimed he didn’t know what was going on. It made sense if he was her father, she thought. It made perfect sense.

Mrs. Browning had been taken away by the time the fellowship began, but all the talk was of her sudden, unexpected demise. Nest thought she would be able to speak further with John Ross, but she could not manage to get him alone. First there was her grandfather, greeting Ross in a solemn, subdued voice, telling him how sorry he was that he had been introduced to the church under such tragic circumstances, pleased nevertheless that Ross had come to the worship service, reminding him of the afternoon’s picnic and eliciting his promise that he would be there. Then there was Reverend Emery, greeting Ross with a sad face, a firm handshake, and a cautious inquiry into his needs while visiting in Hopewell. Then there was Robert Heppler, who latched on to Nest with such persistence that she finally told him they were breathing the same air and to back off. Robert seemed convinced she was suffering from some hidden malady, and while he was not entirely mistaken, he was annoying enough in his determination to uncover the source of her discontent that she wouldn’t have told him the truth if her life had depended on it.

When she finally managed to get free of Robert and all the parishioners who stopped to remark on how awful it was about Mrs. Browning and to inquire after Gran’s health, John Ross was gone.

She rode home with her grandfather in a dark mood, staring out the window at nothing, mulling over the events of the past few days and particularly the past few hours, struggling to untangle the web of confusion and contradiction that surrounded her. When her grandfather asked why she had run out of the sanctuary, she told him that she had felt sick and gone to the bathroom. When he asked if she was all right now, she said
she was still upset about Mrs. Browning and didn’t want to talk about it. It was close enough to the truth that he left her alone. She was getting good at making people believe things that weren’t true, but she had an unpleasant feeling that she was nowhere near as good as John Ross.

He knew something about her that he was keeping to himself, she thought darkly. He knew something important, and it had much to do with his coming to Hopewell. It was tied to the demon and tied to her mother. It was at the heart of everything that was happening, and she was determined to find out what it was.

She believed, though she refused as yet to let herself accept it fully and unconditionally, that it had to do with the fact that he was her father.

By the time her grandfather pulled the old pickup down the drive and next to the house, she had made up her mind to confront Gran. She stepped out into the heat, the midday temperature already approaching one hundred, the air thick with dampness and the pungent smell of scorched grasses and weeds, the wide-spread limbs of the big shade trees languid and motionless beneath the sun’s relentless assault. Nest walked to the porch, stooped to give Mr. Scratch an ear rub, then went inside. Gran was sitting at the kitchen table in a flowered housedress and slippers, sipping a bourbon and water and smoking a cigarette. She looked up as Nest passed by on her way to her bedroom, but didn’t say anything. Nest went into her room, slipped off the dress, slip, shoes, and stockings, and put on her running shorts, a T-shirt that said Never Grow Up, and tennis shoes and socks. She could hear her grandparents talking down the hall. Gran was asking about John Ross, and she didn’t seem happy with what she was hearing. Old Bob was telling her to keep her voice down. Nest took a moment to brush her hair while they finished the hottest portion of their conversation, then went back down the hall to the kitchen.

They stopped talking as she entered, but she pretended she didn’t notice. She walked to the refrigerator and looked inside. The smell of fried chicken still lingered in the air, so she wasn’t
surprised to find a container of it sitting on the top shelf. There was also a container of potato salad, one of raw vegetables soaking in water, and a bowl of Jell-O. When had Gran done all this? Had she done it while they were in church?

She glanced over her shoulder at the old woman. “I’m amazed,” she said, smiling. “It looks great.”

Gran nodded. “I had help from the wood fairies.” She shot Old Bob a pointed look.

Old Bob responded with a strangely sweet, lopsided grin. “You’ve never needed any help from wood fairies, Evelyn. Why, you could teach them a thing or two.”

Gran actually blushed. “Old man,” she muttered, smiling back at him. Then the smile fell away, and she reached down for her drink. “Nest, I’m sorry about Mrs. Browning. She was a good woman.”

Nest nodded. “Thanks, Gran.”

“Are you feeling all right now?”

“I’m fine.”

“Good. You both had phone calls while you were in church. Cass Minter called for you, Nest. And Mel Riorden wants you to call him right away, Robert. He said it was urgent.”

Old Bob watched wordlessly as she took a long pull on her drink. He was still wearing his suit coat, and he took time now to slip it off. He looked suddenly rumpled and tired. “All right. I’ll take care of it. Excuse me, please.”

He turned and disappeared down the hallway. Nest took a deep breath, walked over to the kitchen table, and sat down across from her grandmother. Sunlight spilled through the south window and streaked the tabletop, its brightness diffused by the limbs of the shade trees and the lace curtains so that intricate patterns formed on the laminated surface. It fell across Gran’s hands as they lay resting beside her ashtray and drink and made them look mottled and scaly. The tabletop felt warm, and Nest pressed her palms against it, edging her fingers into one of the more decorative markings of shadows and light, disrupting its symmetry.

“Gran,” she said, then waited for the old woman to look at her. “I was in the park last night.”

Gran nodded. “I know. I was up and looked in on you. You weren’t there, so I knew where you’d gone. What were you doing?”