So I fully believed that I had the answers to at least a couple of my questions. I knew what the Terrible Deed was and I knew who killed Gramma G, and why. But it’s a strange thing, I’ve learned, that answers often just generate more questions. And one of those questions, I thought, looking at Asael curled in Thea’s arms, is whether, when you get the answers you seek, you can be at all sure that you wouldn’t have been better off without them.
Nonetheless, I couldn’t let it go.
“But you were never arrested? Never tried? No charges were made against Les? Why not? And why does everyone talk about it as though it was some big mystery? Some itinerant in off the highway, they say! Why make up a story?”
“Not hard to understand,” Isak said. “Not that part, leastways! Folks jus’ reasoned that Les Crampton was for sure a bad bastard! He good as confessed, in the pub, to getting’ up the Reverend’s girl an’ his mates were happy to dob him in, once he was gone. An’ everyone knowin’ how he treated his own woman, no one doubted he done the same to Gracie. A mongrel dog, gone bad in the head, folks said! Now if ol’ Isak’s gone an’ done what needed doin’, there’s for sure no one in Sugar Town gonna speak against him!”
“So,” Amalthea stuttered, like me, more appalled with every revelation, “no one ever . . . talked to you about it? Questioned you?”
“Masher Morrow did, once. I tol’ him the story. Tol’ him all what Les said in the pub, ‘bout enjoyin’ the Reverend’s girl on Harvest Festival night. An’ like I said, his mates backed me up on that. I tol’ Masher all about catchin’ the little rat-bastard at Gracie’s an’ all what I done to him. Ol’ Masher, he listened to it all then he says, ‘Nuh! I reckon he’s jus’ run off, Isak. He’s a ‘Missin’ Person’! End of story!’ ”
Isak was back beside Queenie then, holding his hands out to her as though to warm them at a fire.
“For a long time, it seemed like it was the end of it, too. Folks turned into clams,” he said. “Protectin’ me, ye see! ‘Cause nothin’ could be done for the Reverend’s daughter. Or for Gracie. Or for Bessie, who was well shot of him, as far as the town was concerned. So best thing was to make like nothin’ ever happened! Me, I regretted goin’ after ‘im. Not killin’ ‘im, but goin’ after ‘im. I shoulda stayed wi’ Gracie. I’da given anything to change that! But ye can’t go back, can ye! Nex’ thing, I got into the drink. Started stayin’ out, under the stars. Ye don’ forget, o’ course. But if ye work at it, ye can stop rememberin’.”
I could hardly get my head around the repercussions of what he was saying! And Amalthea, I could tell – still on the couch, still rubbing Asael’s back – was having the same struggle. I couldn’t imagine what turmoil Asael must be in, having just discovered that his sister was his mother! Rosemary nosed Garlic’s cheek as though planting a kiss and the old buck struggled, with a groan, to his feet, trembling like a newborn. Together, they made their way to Amalthea and Asael where they leaned in silent support.
“So what you’re saying is,” Amalthea asked, “that, basically, everyone in town knows that Bridie and Asael are . . . ?”
Isak shook his head and looked pointedly at Asael. “Don’t reckon he does! Even yet! Look at him.”
We did. Asa’ was only beginning to come out of his foetal crouch.
“Don’t reckon the girl does, neither, by all accounts. By all accounts, she lost her marbles, that night, when she got done over. Or when the sprog was born. Or when her ma died or when the Reverend up an’ left. Somewhere in there. An’ she never got ‘em back. That’s what folks say, leastways.”
A bit of a light seemed to come on in Isak’s eyes then and he became newly animated, walking about the room.
“Anyway, after findin’ Queenie out in the paddock – or maybe it was her found me, I dunno – I had this memory, see? First, I seen Gracie – all whole an’ beautiful, like she was! An’ then I ‘membered Les, beggin’ me for his worthless life. He says to me, ‘We on’y meant to scare her.’ See? ‘We meant to scare her! We thought she’d keep runnin!’ That’s what he says. We! I’d forgot that, but that’s what he said all right.”
He looked grimly over his shoulder at us.
“I gotta piss,” he said, and walked out of the room.
* * *
The keening subsides to a manageable level and finally ends. The air is clean again. Asael lifts his hands from his ears, to sample the sound levels, and he sees his sister, Ruthie, watching him with an unusual level of tenderness. He smiles.
“Did you hear?” Asael demands. “Did you hear it?”
Ruthie begins to cry. She comes to him and adds her arms to those of Amalthea Byerson, wrapping him tightly. Asael feels very very warm and protected, snuggling there between them.
“Don’t be frightened, Ruthie,” he says. “She’s only sad. Sad can be fixed.”
* * *
I don’t know how much later it became clear to us that Asael hadn’t taken in any of Isak’s story. Something about a sound from Queenie – which complicated matters enormously for me because it meant that I would have to make an actual decision on how, when and even whether to tell him.
The only explanation I could give him for my tears was, “It’s been a big day, Asa’. I must be overtired! We’ll go home soon, okay?”
As though that was any kind of a solution.
* * *
When Isak came back into the room it was clear that he’d been through Amalthea’s dirty clothes basket and liberated a new outfit for himself. He’d found a pair of her jeans which, rolled at the ankles and bunched at the waist with the cord from his hospital gown, made him look like a half-empty sack. He’d also found a pink t-shirt emblazoned with the words, WOMEN MAKE MEN.
“Hey girlie!” he said to Amalthea. “You pick up my rifle the other night? From out in the cane?”
“Uh-huh,” she affirmed. “That and your clothes. We left everything at the hospital.”
“Shit! Never get it back from them bastards. You gotta gun?”
“No-o-o!” she said hesitantly. “Why? Do you need one?”
“Yeah!” His tone suggested that she might be an idiot for having to ask. “I’m a bit past beatin’ folks to death, case ye hadn’ noticed!”
“Oh! Ahh!” she said, as we all turned to watch him. “You’re planning on killing someone?”
“Oh yeah! Sooner or later. You got any eggs in the house?”
She rose quickly, moving toward the kitchen, trying to sound nonchalant.
“Anyone in particular in mind? To kill?” she asked.
“Well not yet, no. Gotta find out who else was with Les first.” He flicked a gesture toward the lounge where Asael and I sat. “You know! At the rapin’!”
The stunned silence that greeted him, exasperated him quickly. “I tol’ you! Me ‘n’ Queenie . . . we remembered what that little pony’s pecker said when I got ‘im cornered. He said, ‘We’! ‘We didn’ mean to hurt her.’ See? Meanin’ there’uz more ‘n’ one of ‘em! An’ that means, ind’rec’ly, there was more of ’em in on what got done to Gracie. Ye follow?”
We both looked at him blankly and he rolled his eyes.
“Bloody hell!” he declared, amazed at our stupidity. “It’s like talkin’ to me foot! It ain’ over! That’s what I’m sayin’! Soon’s I finda ones ‘at got away, I’ll be finishin’ the job! See?”
“But how . . . !” Amalthea stuttered from the doorway. He looked at her curiously, as if she was about to ask how he’d like his eggs. “How are you going to find them?” she finished lamely. “After all these years?”
“Dunno yet,” he said. “Can ye scramble them eggs? I really am tonguing for some scrambled egg!”
She began getting out bowls and pans and I could hear her, shakily, breaking eggs into a bowl. Isak came back into the living room to sit opposite Asael and me.
“Whadda yez reckon about this fer an idea?” he said to us. “I go over to the hospital and shoot fuckin’ Dabney in the kne
ecaps. Then ask ‘im respeckfully to tell me why he let Gracie die. Who was he coverin’ for? ‘At might be a place to start, eh?”
And then, restless with ideas, he went to take over from Amalthea.
“Let me do that. Gracie always loved my scrambled eggs. What about you lot? You havin’ any?”
“Uh. . . I think I’ll take a shower,” Amalthea muttered. “I’ll have a shower and think about it. Okay?”
He waved her away brusquely. “Yair, you get on wi’ your day, kiddo. Don’t mind me. Be outta your hair d’rec’ly.”
* * *
In the bathroom, she strips off quickly and steps under the warm spray. Before the water fully wets her, though, it occurs to her what a strange series of predicaments she’s found herself in. Inside her house, at this very moment, there are three people who she barely knows. One is a self-confessed murderer with a blatant plan to kill again! Another is a fragile boy who’s in contact with spirits that even she can’t detect and who’s been prowling through her stuff! (In fact, judging by Isak’s mode of dress this morning, they’ve both been prowling through her stuff!) And the third is a confused teenager who’s just discovered that her sister has been raped and her brother is in fact her cousin.
And then, of course, there’s The Thing (or Queenie, depending on who you listen to) which is an issue in itself – an object of unknown origins which, (who could deny it?) has an altogether independent power of its own! Garlic, after all, was surely dead and is now certainly alive! Amalthea, half showered, steps dripping from under the spray, pads across the room and locks the bathroom door.
Chapter 13 – Waiting for Understanding
Sunday, June 4, 1994
Jacob,
Eight and a half months, since it happened! Thirty-four weeks. Two hundred and thirty-eight days. Nearly six months since we left Sugar Town. Two weeks to go ‘til the birth. An hour until we leave for our last doctor’s visit. Three minutes to boil an egg. One minute for noodles. Seconds until I go entirely insane. I’m sorry, Jacob. I know you want us to somehow place this obscenity behind us . . . and I’ve really tried. I’ve tried to find a positive spin – we’re none of us permanently injured, a new life is being made, we’ll be together again soon, etcetera, etc. It hasn’t worked for me! So now I fill my head with numbers and calculations and trivia because they take up a bit of the space that otherwise would simply boil over with rage. I so envy the great, seemingly unshakable faith that you have in the love of God and I wish, I wish, I wish I had just a portion of it! But I haven’t. Not any more. If I ever did! Not when such terrors must be visited on children! For what?
But I know that’s just me. And it’s not about me in the long run, is it?
As far as Bridie goes. . . she’s definitely your daughter – eerily, unshakably fine, as she has been all along, since the night it happened – since you first spoke to her about it. You’d be very proud of her. We can only imagine how dreadfully uncomfortable and confusing and upsetting it must be for her, living away from home like this and going through all this change in her body. But, unlike me, she seems to grow stronger, day by day. She doesn’t complain, she doesn’t object – doesn’t even question. Sometimes it seems as though she doesn’t even remember! I say you’d be proud of her but, for me, in some ways, she’s almost terrifying. I don’t know, you see, if it’s courage or if something inside her has been so terribly crushed and broken that she simply can’t respond anymore! I need so badly to know what’s going on in her mind. I asked her at lunch yesterday what she was thinking and she answered, “Ecclesiastes, 44, 1.” That’s all she said! I had to go look it up. “Let us now praise famous men and our fathers that begat us.”
So you see? She also seems to have a mania for numbers, but it’s all scriptural references. You’ll be happy to know, though, that when she talks, she talks about you and she mentions you in every prayer. She loves and trusts you so much. As do I, of course. If I didn’t, I wouldn’t have agreed to this charade which, I confess, I still don’t fully understand. I’d be there, pulling down the houses and tearing up the streets to find the animal that did this obscene thing. God help me, I would kill him myself if I could find him.
Jacob, I am desperate to know from you what’s happened with the police investigation. Have any clues at all turned up? Surely there was something left at the scene – some evidence? Or around the church where he must have been lurking? What about the missing sandals? Did you find the box they came in, to show Sergeant Morrow? I’m sure it’s still in her cupboard. Write it down for me, Jacob – all of it – every word – everything that’s been done and said and tried, so that I can know for myself that no stone has been left unturned.
Someone, after all, knows who did it. Someone at least suspects. All they have to give is a clue, a hint, a suspicion – something that’ll set the police on the right track. Please, please, please, renew your appeal to the congregation, Jacob. Don’t let it die. Plead with them. For me. For Bridie. For themselves. Whoever he is, he is a thorn in the flesh of Sugar Town and the town cannot be allowed any peace until he’s rooted out!
I know you’re going to be disappointed with this letter, Jacob, and that you’ve begged me not to keep going over and over this. You’ve seen in my previous letters how I’ve tried. But I can’t help it. Maybe it’s not being there – not being able to walk the streets and look our neighbours in the eye and demand that they tell me the name. Maybe it’s the nearness of the birth. I feel so useless – so helpless. So frightened. What if the baby’s a monster? What if we can’t love it? What if Bridie can’t manage the next couple of weeks, let alone what she’ll go through in all the coming months and years? She’s so uncannily calm and serene right now! It’s not natural!
(Ten minutes later.) There, you see? I’ve tramped about the house a bit to try to calm myself. Eighteen steps from this desk to the front door. Exactly half that to the kitchen sink. Ten from the toilet to the edge of the bed where Bridie and Ruthie are napping. I expect the numbers are what I’ll most remember about this place.
I’ll have to get them up in few minutes. The doctor just wants to talk more to Bridie about what’s going to happen. He’s really been very good and sensitive in dealing with her, but I think even he is worried about her state of mind.
I know I’ve said it before but I have to say again how grateful I am that Bessie’s been able to help you. We owe her a great debt of gratitude. I don’t know if she’s mentioned it, but we’ve exchanged a few letters of our own these past months. I have no doubt that she’s guessed the truth – that it’s not me who’s pregnant – that we haven’t taken Bridie away just for psychiatric help. I honestly don’t expect anyone will be fooled into believing this baby is yours and mine – not when the assault is common knowledge. Still, I suppose, in a strange way, the silence is a way of protecting us as well – an assurance that whatever story we choose to tell for Bridie’s sake is exactly the story they’ll support – if not out of respect for your position, then for Bridie’s sake and for the new child’s sake.
I wonder . . . has Les had anything to say to you about Bessie being out of the house, helping you? It’s common knowledge in the town (at least among the women folk) that that man has a foul temper and is blue jealous of Bessie’s time and attention. I strongly suspect he’s hit her, Jacob! On more than one occasion! What kind of a man does that? In fact, if Bessie hadn’t vouched for him going home early from the Harvest Festival, he’d be exactly the sort I’d be casting suspicions on for what happened to us. But Bessie says he was home, dead drunk and asleep, and her word, of course, is golden.
Okay. I hear our girls stirring. Fifteen minutes to get them dressed and sorted. Twenty to the doctor’s surgery, if the lights are with us. Twenty-five if they’re against us. Once again, I’m sorry for the tone of this letter. You must think I’ve suddenly lost my mind! But really, I will be fine. I actually think that putting all this down on paper at last has helped a little! N
ot with understanding – just with coping. Just a little! Please remember, Jacob! Keep asking! Keep demanding! And write it all down!
Love for now,
Rita (and Bridie and Ruthie) (and ? )
(We have one or two names in mind! Nothing certain yet! Something strong, though! We’ll get your approval before registering anything!)
* * *
Bridie sits at her father’s desk in his study, in the very chair he occupied while writing his sermons. The desk, the chair, the room – she has kept them as he left them, untouched except by the weight of memory. Before her lies a lost letter – one that Bessie had taken away with her when she went, all those years ago.
* * *
“Why?” she’d asked Bessie when the papers were handed over. “Why take old papers?”
“For shame,” Bessie had said, struggling to hold Bridie’s gaze. “All for shame! Shame for the words in there that say how near to breakin’ Rita was, even then. Shame for the kind things she said about me that weren’t true. Shame for Rita’s need to have it all written down! ‘Cause I knew that, one day she’d look back at what she wrote an’ . . . she’d know . . . what a bad thing I did.”
“Bad thing? But you looked after us! When we were in need, you . . . !”
“Tsst!” Bessie had hissed through her teeth, waving a hand in negation. “You take this stuff home. Sit yourself down in a quiet corner an’ read it. You’ll know what I’m talking about.”
Bridie had been nonplussed. Did she really need to know about the weights Bessie had on her conscience?
“Okay,” she’d said softly. “I’ll read it.”
“And,” Bessie had added, “if there’s anything . . . anything I can do . . . to make it up . . . I want to do that. You only got to ask me. Eh? You were always a good girl, you were. Quiet an’ respectful. I’m not expecting your forgiveness. But maybe . . . it’s not too late for understanding. Okay?”
Kevin had halted Bridie outside the back door of the bakery for a final word, gripping her arms. To her surprise, his dark little eyes, usually so filled with merriment, were brimming with concern.
“Bridie, listen! I don’t know what’s in these papers. But I can tell you,without even knowing what they are, that some of the things you’ve forgotten most probably deserved to be forgotten! Maybe you should just throw this stuff away!”
Sugar Town Page 34