Summer of Night (27 page)

Mr. Ashley-Montague crossed his arms and watched the screen where Tom was clobbering Jerry. Or maybe it was Jerry clobbering Tom… Dale could never keep the cat's and mouse's names straight. Finally the seated man said, "And what, precisely, is the nature of your report?"

Duane seemed to take a breath. "The Porsha bell," he said at last. Or Dale thought he heard him say. At that second an explosion of noise from the Tom and Jerry cartoon almost drowned out the words.

Mr. Ashley-Montague shot up out of the chair, grabbed Duane's upper arms, released them, and stepped back as if embarrassed. "There's no such thing," Dale heard the man say under the machine-gun sounds from the speaker.

Duane said something that was lost as a giant firecracker under the cat exploded. Even Mr. Ashley-Montague had to lean forward to hear Duane.

"… there was a bell," the millionaire was saying when Dale could hear again,"but it was removed years ago. Decades ago. Before the First World War, I believe. It was a fraud, of course. My grandfather was… taken, I believe the word is. Conned. Defrauded."

"Well, that's the kind of stuff I need to end my report," said Duane. "Otherwise, I'd have to hand in an essay saying the present whereabouts of the bell is a mystery."

Mr. Ashley-Montague walked back and forth beside the projector. The cartoon was over and his assistant was rushing to cue up the short subject-a 20th Century newsreel about the spread of Gommunism, narrated by Walter Cronkite. Dale glanced up to see the dark-haired reporter sitting at a desk. The short subject was in black and white… Dale had seen it at school last year in a special presentation. Suddenly a map of Europe and Asia began to turn black as the Communist threat spread. Arrows plunged into Eastern Europe, China, and other places Dale couldn't quite name.

"There's no mystery," snapped Mr. Ashley-Montague. "I remember now. Grandfather's bell was taken down and stored sometime after the turn of the century. It couldn't even be rung, I believe, due to cracks in it. It was taken out of storage, melted down, and the metal used for military purposes early in the Great War." He stopped, turned his back, and sat down again as if the conversation were at an end.

"That'd be great if I could quote that from the book and maybe photograph a couple of the old pictures for my report,” said Duane.

The millionaire sighed as. if in response to the spreading ocean of Communist domination on the screen. Walter Cron-kite's voice boomed as loud as the Tom and Jerry cartoon. "Young man, there is no book. What Doctor Priestmann willed to me amounted to a mass of unrelated, uncollated, and unmarked materials. Several cartonsful, if I remember correctly. I assure you I did not keep them."

"Could you tell me where you donated them…" began Duane.

"I did not donate them!" said Mr. Ashley-Montague, his voice rising almost to a shout. "I burned them. I supported the good professor's researches, but I had no use for them. I assure you, there is no mystery volume which will conclude your report. Quote me, young man. The bell was a mistake… one of many white elephants grandfather brought back from his honeymoon tour of Europe… it was removed from Old Central sometime around the turn of the century, stored in a warehouse… somewhere in Chicago, I believe… and melted down for bullets or somesuch in 1917 when we entered the war. Now, that is all."

The 20th Century piece had ended, the assistant was hurriedly putting on the large first reel of Hercules, and several heads turned to look up at the bandstand as Mr. Ashley-Montague's voice boomed through the relative silence.

"If I could just…" began Duane.

"There is no 'just," ' hissed the millionaire. "There is no more conversation, young man. There is no bell. Now that is all." He gestured toward the bandstand steps with what Dale thought was a rather feminine swish of his wrist. Another gesture brought the assistant over-the movie now starting with a shouted leader countdown from the crowd-and Duane was staring at a six-foot-tall man with his sleeves rolled up. The assistant could have been a butler, a bodyguard, or a flunky from one of Mr. A.-M."s movie theaters for all Dale knew.

Duane seemed to shrug and turn away, ambling down the stairs at a much slower speed than Dale would have used if an adult had shouted at him. Realizing that he was inconspicuous in the back corner of the bandstand while hidden by darkness, Dale nonetheless vaulted the railing and landed in the grass four feet below, almost stumbling onto Uncle Henry and Aunt Lena as he landed.

He ran to catch up to Duane, but the heavier boy had left the park and was strolling down Broad Avenue, his hands in his pockets, whistling a tune and evidently heading for the ruins of the old Ashley place two blocks south. Dale was no longer afraid of the night-that nonsense was past-but he didn't really want to go walking in that darkness under the old elms down there. Besides, the music and dubbed dialogue was swelling behind him and he wanted to watch Hercules.

Dale turned back to the park, figuring that if he didn't talk to Duane later that night then… well…he'd talk to him sometime in the next few days. There was no hurry. It was summer.

Duane walked west on Broad Avenue, too agitated to pay attention to the Hercules movie. Leaf-shadow lay heavy on the street. Streetlights along lanes running to the south were obscured by branches and leaves. To the north there was a single row of small homes, their undecorated lawns sprawling into one another and devolving into weeds where the train tracks curved a bit south and then swept off into the cornfields where the road ended. Only the old Ashley-Montague place, what people still called the Ashley Mansion, lay down that final dark lane.

Duane stared at the curved driveway, now turned into a tunnel by overhanging branches and untended shrubbery. Little remained of the place except the charred remnants of two columns and three chimneys, a few blackened timbers tumbled into the rat-infested cellar. Duane knew that Dale and the other kids often made a game of riding down that lane, sweeping past the front porch, leaning far out to touch the columns or porch steps without dismounting or slowing. But it was very dark-not even fireflies illuminated the bram-bled depths of the circular drive. The noise and light and crowds of the Free Show were two blocks behind and made more distant by intervening trees.

Duane was not afraid of the dark. Not really. But he had no interest in walking down that lane tonight. Whistling, he turned south along a gravel path to intersect the new streets where Chuck Sperling lived.

Behind him, in the darkness where the driveway was most overgrown, something stirred, moved branches, and scuttled around the periphery of a fountain long forgotten amidst the weed and ruin.

FIFTEEN

Sunday, the twelfth of June, was warm and hazy with cloud cover that turned the sky into an inverted gray bowl. It was eighty degrees by eight a.m, into the nineties by noon. The Old Man was up early and out in the fields, so Duane put off reading The New York Times until after some work was done.

He was walking the rows of beans back behind the barn, pulling the stalks of pioneer corn invading there, when he saw the car turn into the long drive. At first he thought it was Uncle Art, but then he realized that it was a smaller white car. Then he saw the red bubble on top.

Duane came out of the fields, mopping his face with the tail of his open shirt. It wasn't Barney's constable car; the green letters on the driver's side door read creve coeur county sheriff. A man with a lean, tanned face with eyes hidden by reflecting aviator's sunglasses said, "Mr. McBride here, son?"

Duane nodded, walked to the edge of the beanfield, put two fingers in his mouth, and whistled loudly. He could see the distant silhouette of his father pause, look up, and begin walking in. Duane half expected Wittgenstein to come hobbling from the barn.

The sheriff was out of his car now: a big man, Duane noticed, at least six foot four. Perhaps more. He'd put on his broad-brimmed county mountie hat now and the full effect of the man's height, lantern jaw, sunglasses, gun belt, and leather boots made Duane think of a recruiting poster. The effect was only slightly marred by the half-moons of perspiration soaked through the khaki shirt under the arms.

"Something wrong?” asked Duane, wondering if Mr. Ashley-Montague had somehow sicced this cop on him. The millionaire had been visibly upset the night before, and hadn't been at the Free Show when Duane returned to get a ride home with Uncle Henry and Aunt Lena.

The sheriff nodded. "Afraid there is, son."

Duane stood there, sweat dripping from his own chin, until the Old Man strode down the last thirty feet of row.

"Mr. McBride?" said the sheriff.

The Old Man nodded and made a swipe at his sweaty face with a kerchief, leaving a muddy streak in gray stubble. "That's right. Now if this is about that goddamn telephone thing, I told Ma Bell…"

"No, sir. There's been an accident."

The Old Man froze as if he'd been slapped. Duane watched his father's face, seeing the second of hesitation and then the impact of certainty there. Only one person alive would carry the Old Man's name on an In Case of Emergency card in his billfold.

"Art," said the Old Man. It was not a question. "Is he dead?"

"Yessir." The sheriff adjusted his sunglasses at almost the same instant that Duane touched his middle finger to the bridge of his own glasses.

"How?" The Old Man's eyes seemed to be focused on something in the fields behind the sheriff. Or on nothing.

"Car accident. "Bout an hour ago."

"Where?" The Old Man was nodding slightly, as if receiving expected news. Duane was familiar with the nod from when they listened to news on the radio or when the Old Man was talking about corruption in politics.

"Jubilee College Road," said the sheriff, his voice firm but not as flat as the Old Man's. "Stone Creek Bridge. About two miles from…"

"I know where the bridge is," the Old Man interrupted. "Art and I used to swim there." His eyes gained some focus and he turned toward Duane as if he were going to say something, do something. Instead, he turned back to the sheriff. "Where is he?"

"They were removing the body when I left," said the sheriff. "I'll take you there if you like."

The. Old Man nodded and got into the passenger seat of the sheriff's car. Duane rushed to jump in the back.

This isn't real, he thought as they roared past Uncle Henry's and Aunt Lena's, hit the first hill doing at least seventy, and roared up past the cemetery. Duane's head almost banged the ceiling as they dove down into the woods again. He's going to kill us too. The speeding sheriff's car threw dust and gravel thirty feet into the woods. All along the roadside as they climbed toward the Black Tree, trees, weeds, shrubs, and branches were gray-white, as if they were covered with powdered chalk. Duane knew that it was just dust from previous vehicles, but the gray foliage and the gray sky made him think of Hades, of the shades of the dead waiting there in gray nothingness, of the scene Uncle Art had read to him when he was very little about Odysseus descending into Hades and braving those gray mists to meet the shade of his dead mother and former allies.

The sheriff didn't slow for the stop sign at the intersection of County Six and Jubilee College Road, but turned in a controlled broadslide onto the harder-packed gravel. Duane realized that the light above them was flashing, although tb"t was no siren sound. He wondered what the rush was. Ahead of him, the Old Man's back was perfectly straight. Lead forward, moving only to the turns of the car.

They roared the two miles east. Duane looked across fields to his left to see where the long stretch of woods began where Gypsy Lane lay hidden. Then there were cornfields on either side except for the patches of timber at the bottom of the hills.

Duane counted dips, knowing that the fourth small valley held Stone Creek.

They dipped the fourth time, braked hard, and the sheriff pulled to the left side of the road, parking faced toward oncoming traffic. There was no traffic. The bottomland and sparsely wooded hillside was silent with a Sunday-morning hush.

Duane noticed the other vehicles parked along the shoulder near the concrete bridge: a tow truck, J. P. Congden's ugly black Chevy, a dark station wagon he didn't recognize, another wrecker from Ernie's Texaco station on the east end of Elm Haven. No ambulance." No sign of Uncle Art's car! Maybe it was a mistake.

Duane noticed the damage to the bridge railing first. The old concrete had been set forty or fifty years earlier with balustrade-like gaps beneath the three-foot-high shelf. Now a four-foot chunk of that concrete had been broken off on the east end. Duane could see rusted iron reinforcement bars trailing from the concrete like some weird sculptured hand pointing down the embankment.

Duane stood next to the Old Man and looked over the railing. Ernie from Ernie's Texaco was down there, along with three or four other men including the rat-faced justice of the peace. So was Uncle Art's Cadillac.

Duane saw at once what had happened. Art had been forced far enough right while barreling across the single-lane bridge that the concrete railing had struck the left front of the big car, smashing the engine back through the driver's side and sending the Caddy spinning out over Stone Creek like a twisted toy. Then two tons of automobile had hit the trees on the other side, shearing off the saplings and a ten-inch oak, before being bashed around by the larger elm on the hillside.

Duane could see the deep gash there, the three-foot scar in the bark, still bleeding sap. He wondered idly if the elm would live.

After having the right rear door and quarter panel caved in by the second impact, the Caddy had rolled uphill thirty or forty feet, taking out shrubs and small trees and bounding over a boulder-the windshield had popped out at this point and lay shattered just beyond the rock-before gravity and/or collision with another large tree had sent the wreck rolling back down the hillside into the creek.

It lay there now, upside down. The left front wheel was missing, but the other three seemed strangely exposed, almost indecent. Duane noticed that there was plenty of tread left; Uncle Art worried about worn tires. The exposed undercarriage looked clean and new except where part of the transaxle had been torn away.

One door of the Caddy was open and bent almost in half. The passenger compartment was not submerged, although it lay in a foot or so of water. Bits and pieces of metal, chrome, and glass glinted across the hillside despite the lack of bright sunlight. Duane saw other things: an argyle sock lying on the grass, a pack of cigarettes near the boulder, road maps fluttering in the bushes.

"They took the body away, Bob," called Ernie, barely glancing up from where he was attaching a cable to the front axle. "Donnie and Mr. Mercer rode in with the… oh, hello there, Mr. McBride." Ernie looked back at his work.

The Old Man licked his lips and spoke to the sheriff without turning his head. "Was he dead when you got here?"

Duane saw the woods and ridgeline reflected in the sheriff's glasses. "Yessir. He was dead when Mr. Carter drove by and saw something down the hill 'bout half an hour before I got here. Mr. Mercer… he's the county coroner, you know… he said that Mr. McBr-ah, your brother… died instantly upon impact."

J. P. Congden came puffing up the slope, stood wheezing whiskey fumes on them, and hitched up his baggy overalls. "Real sorry about your…"

The Old Man ignored the justice of the peace and started down the steep slope, sliding where the hillside was muddy, hanging on to branches to get to the bottom. Duane followed.

The sheriff picked his way down cautiously, careful not to get burrs or mud on his pressed brown slacks.

The Old Man crouched at the edge of the stream, staring into the wrecked Caddy. The roof had been caved in and water rose to the upsidedown dashboard. Duane saw that the ray-gun automatic-dimming device had been torn free. The passenger's side was relatively unbattered, even the collapsed roof had spared it, but the seat-bench on the driver's had been driven back through the backseat cushions. There was no steering wheel, but the shaft still hung there, dripping into the water two feet below. In front, where the driver would have been, a mass of twisted engine metal and torn firewall filled the space like the corpse of a murdered robot.

The sheriff hitched up his pants and crouched, keeping his shined boots out of the mud and murky water. He cleared his throat. "After he lost control, your brother hit the guardrail on the bridge and… ah… as you can see, the impact must have killed him right off."

The Old Man gave the same nod as before. He was squatting with his feet and ankles in the stream and his wrists on his knees. He looked down at his own fingers and stared at them as if they were alien things. "Where is he?"

"Mr. Mercer took him into Taylor Funeral Home," said the sheriff. "He has… uh… a few things to finish up, then you can make arrangements with Mr. Taylor."

The Old Man shook his head gently. "Art never wanted a funeral. And definitely not at Taylor's."

The sheriff adjusted his glasses. "Mr. McBride, was your brother a drinking man?"

The Old Man turned and looked at the sheriff for the first time. "Not on Sunday morning he wasn't." His voice held the perfectly flat, calm tone that Duane knew threatened fury.

"Yessir," said the sheriff. They all had to back out of the way as Ernie began cranking up the cable with the winch on the wrecker. The front of the Caddy rose, dripped water from the windows, and began turning slowly toward the embankment. "Well, maybe he had a heart attack or a bee got into the car. Lotta people lose control because of insects in the car with 'em. You'd be surprised how many people…"

"How fast was he going?" asked Duane. He was amazed to hear his own voice.

The Old Man and the sheriff both turned to stare at him. Duane noted how pale and fat he looked in the sheriff's glasses.

"We figure about seventy-five or eighty," said the sheriff! "I've only looked at the skid marks, not paced 'em off. But he was moving."

"My brother didn't like to speed," said the Old Man, his face close to the sheriff's." "He had a real thing about obeying the law. I always told him it was foolish."

The sheriff stood face to face with the Old Man for a moment and then glanced up at the broken bridge. "Yeah, well, he was speeding this morning. That's why we have to do some tests to see if he was drinking."

"Look out!" shouted Ernie, and the three of them backed away as the Caddy rose vertically from the water. Duane saw a crawdad tumble out with the dirty water and soaked maps. He remembered hunting for crawdads here with Dale and Mike and the town kids a couple of summers ago.

"Could someone have forced him off the road?" asked Duane.

The sheriff stared at him for a long moment. "No sign of that, son. And no one reported the accident."

The Old Man snorted.

Duane walked closer to the Caddy, now twisting so that they could see the driver's side. He pointed to a red gash just visible on the mangled driver's side door. "Couldn't this paint be left by the vehicle that forced Uncle Art's car into the bridge railing?"

The sheriff stepped closer, bringing his sunglasses right up to the dripping wreck. "Looks old to me, son. But we'll look into it." He stepped back, set his hands on his gun belt, and chuckled. "Not many vehicles could force a Caddy this size off the road if it didn't want to go."

"Something the size of the Rendering Truck could," said Duane. He looked up the bank and saw J. P. Congden staring down at him.

“ Y'all need to get out of there while we crank this goddamn thing up!" shouted Ernie.

"Come on," said the Old Man. These were the first words he'd spoken to Duane since the sheriff had come. The two started up the steep bank, feet sliding. Then the Old Man did something he had not done for five years. He took Duane's hand in his own.

The farm seemed different when they returned. The overcast was breaking up a bit and a rich light fell across the fields. The house and barn seemed freshly painted, the old pickup in the drive magically renewed. Duane stood by the kitchen door and thought while the Old Man listened to a few last words from the sheriff. When the car left it brought Duane up out of a numb reverie.