Kingman looked a bit shocked by that, but responded readily enough. “You want to know if I’m scared of getting shot? Of course I am. Anybody would be. But mostly I’m worried about my deputies. Those of you who’ve been generous enough to volunteer. I don’t want it on my conscience that I walked you into an ambush.”
Gronk’s dad, Mr. Small, stood up. He looked nervous, but determined to have his say. “I’ll admit it, when this first started I didn’t take Webster Bragg seriously. Yeah, he blew away an ATM, and yeah, he spouted a lot of wacky, hateful theories about the end of the world and the New World Order and white supremacy and like that. Forgive me, Naomi, but I still didn’t take him seriously when we suspected that one of his boys set fire to the Superette.” Mr. Small paused to gather his thoughts. “To be honest I figured they were drunk, simple as that. But I underestimated the man. He’s determined to make himself king or dictator or whatever, and despite all that racist, paranoid talk, he’s intelligent and therefore all the more dangerous. So I’m with Reggie. We need to do something, but we can’t go off half-cocked. We need a plan.” He started to sit down, then popped back up. “Anybody has any good ideas in that regard, I’m listening.”
An older woman heaved herself to her feet, way in the back. “What about your special radio, Mr. Kingman? Can we request backup? State troopers, National Guard?”
Kingman couldn’t bring himself to look directly at her. “Not at this time, Mildred. We’re snowbound. On our own. We’ll just have to figure it out ourselves. Right now I’m thinking the best way might be to go out there by myself. See if I can persuade Mr. Bragg to return the medicine as a gesture of goodwill.”
Mom, alarmed, leapt to her feet. “Reggie? I don’t want you going in there alone. Not for my sake. Please?”
He nodded but held to his decision. “Alone is best, given the situation. I’m the one who attended the police academy. I’m the one who has been trained to respond in situations like this. I’m the one who volunteered for this job.”
Nobody said it, but everybody was thinking, And you’re the one who’s the best pistol shot in the state, or used to be.
“And what happens when he says no?” Mom demanded.
“Truth?” His hands slipped to his holster. “I don’t intend to take no for an answer, once I manage to get inside. I’ll leave with your medicine, Emma, or I won’t leave at all.”
Looking back, we should have foreseen why Webster Bragg did what he did. Why he stole the medicine and encouraged me to tell everybody about it. Not because he wanted my mother to beg, although he might have enjoyed that. Not because he wanted King Man and his volunteer deputies marching out to his compound. No, he was way smarter than that. He assumed that someone would call a meeting to complain about his behavior. And then he’d have all his opponents trapped in an old wooden building. That was his plan all along.
Should have foreseen it, but we didn’t. So it came as a big surprise when Bragg’s amplified voice started booming from the street.
“CITIZENS OF HARMONY, STAY WHERE YOU ARE. DO NOT RESIST. LAY DOWN YOUR WEAPONS AND SURRENDER.”
My first thought was, if electricity isn’t working, how can he amplify his voice? The answer was simple, as I saw when sneaking a peek out the window. Bragg was some distance away, more or less protected by a lump of ice that had once been a school bus, but he had in his hands an old-fashioned megaphone, like cheerleaders use at football games. Nothing electric about it, just a big cone-shaped thing that must have been three feet long.
“YOU ARE SURROUNDED. OBEY ME IF YOU WANT TO LIVE!”
He wasn’t kidding about the surrounded part. He sons were spread out, crouching behind tree trunks. Like their father, they were in full winter camo and heavily armed. They looked oddly bulky until I realized they were wearing battle armor. Armored vests and body shields. Ready for war.
Then Becca grabbed me and dragged me away from the windows.
“Everybody get down. Hug the floor,” King Man ordered.
We got down on the floor. I heard someone crying. All I knew for sure, it wasn’t me.
“THERE WILL BE NO NEGOTIATION. THE FREE STATE OF LIBERTY HAS TAKEN CONTROL OF THIS TERRITORY. ALL THOSE WHO LIVE WITHIN THESE BORDERS MUST OBEY THE PRIME LEADER. THOSE WHO RESIDE OUTSIDE THESE BORDERS ARE DEEMED TO BE ENEMIES OF LIBERTY AND WILL BE TREATED ACCORDINGLY.”
I was hugging the floor, Becca on one side of me, Mom on the other. Becca’s voice was even huskier than usual. “This is my fault,” she said. “I rang the bell.”
“No, sweetie.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry. This is his doing.”
“I should have listened to you.”
“It’s not your fault, pumpkin.”
I had my cheek to the floor but my eyes were wide open. Focused on the windows because I expected them to dissolve in a hail of bullets. But instead of bullets I saw reflections of light. Flickering light.
Flames.
“FIREBOMBS HAVE BEEN IGNITED AND ARE READY TO LAUNCH. YOU HAVE ONLY ONE CHOICE IF YOU WANT TO LIVE. REGGIE KINGMAN MUST BE SURRENDERED UNARMED OR THE HALL WILL BE BURNED TO THE GROUND WITH ALL OF YOU IN IT!”
Mom had a tight grip on me and Becca. She whispered, “When I say run, we’re going to run to the back of the hall. We’ll find a way out.”
That’s when I noticed that Reggie Kingman was clinging to the podium. Like he’d fall down if he let go. I could see the fear in his eyes, and that scared me almost as much as the threat of fire. His mouth was working, trying to speak, and finally he managed to say, in a shaky voice, “Everyone stay calm, please. I’ll do my duty.”
Nobody said a word. Nobody said Don’t do it, don’t give yourself up, because we all knew the consequences, and we were all as terrified as our volunteer police officer.
A lot of folks couldn’t bear to watch. They kept their eyes shut or stared at the floor. Some prayed, some cursed. And some of us couldn’t look away from Reggie Kingman as his trembling hands fumbled at his holster.
Hands shaking so bad he couldn’t unbuckle the thing.
Finally he sat down on a chair to steady himself, took a deep breath, and managed to unfasten his belt and slowly ease it to the floor.
“YOU HAVE ONE MINUTE. GIVE ME KINGMAN OR BURN.”
Kingman’s eyes widened at that, and he saw me watching him. Or I’m pretty sure he did, because he nodded in my direction and mouthed the word sorry before he hauled himself to his feet. Then he seemed to find his courage. He adjusted his policeman’s hat and managed to walk from the podium to the front door without trembling or hesitation, at least not very much.
Before leaving he turned to us and said, “Thank you all. It has been an honor.”
Then he opened the door and stepped outside.
I wrenched free of Mom and ran to the window just in time to hear the snapping boom of a rifle shot and see King Man fall to the ground like a puppet with his strings cut.
Despite the threat of being firebombed, everybody crowded to the windows and the open doorway to see what was going on. There we were, more than a hundred men, women, and children, staring down Webster Bragg and his little army.
For a moment, the space of a few heartbeats, nothing happened. And then so many things happened all at once that it took me a while to sort it out later.
First thing, Reggie Kingman was lying on the steps of the town hall, hand clutching his side. His dark blue policeman’s hat had fallen off and I could see the bald spot on the back of his head. Never noticed that before. His face was gray, his eyes unfocused.
Then Bragg came out from behind his hiding place. The megaphone had been replaced by an AR-15, and he advanced toward the steps where Kingman had fallen, as if intending to finish him off.
We remained frozen where we were, not daring to move. Bragg’s boys, silent as ever, had their rifles aimed at us. The ones holding firebombs looked eager for a reason to throw. It all seemed to be happening in between ticks of a giant clock, as
if we were trapped in the gears, unable to change or stop what was about to happen.
Then someone started yelling from way down the street. A figure was running excitedly toward the town hall, into the sights of the guns. Holding one cupped hand out in front of him, the other waving high in the air as he shouted, “It’s back! It’s back! It’s holding!”
Mr. Mangano, our science teacher. He’d left his house without his parka or hat or mittens, and was so focused on whatever it was he had in his hand that he didn’t notice what was going on. Bragg moving in for the kill, weird eyes gleaming with the promise of more bloodshed.
When he finally realized what was happening, Mr. Mangano stopped in his tracks. Horrified, he looked from King Man to Bragg and said, “No, no. Don’t do it. Everything has changed.”
He opened his hands, revealing the compass. “See? When the lights first went out the needle just wandered. No charge at all. Then about a week ago it started swinging wildly, as if looking for a place to settle. I didn’t want to raise any false hopes, or frighten anyone with the prospect it might get even worse, which was a distinct possibility, so I didn’t say anything.” He looked around, from the gunmen to those of us trapped in the town hall, and begged us to understand. “Maybe I should have. Because in the last few hours, those wild swings started to settle down. And here—look!—it’s holding! The compass points north!”
I’d like to say we all understood what it meant, that an old Boy Scout compass was working. That magnetism was functioning once again, and whatever that implied about electrical current. But the only one who got it, other than Mr. Mangano, was my sister, Rebecca. Little Becca, smarter than your average chipmunk, who called out, “Mom? Charlie? Look! It’s working!”
Her hands were cupped around the mini flashlight she wore on a lanyard around her neck.
The flashlight was glowing.
Webster Bragg lowered his AR-15 and backed up a step. He was a hater, but he was a smart guy, too, and I think he had some idea of what was about to happen, and what it might mean for men like him. Men who depended on chaos and fear.
We all heard it at the same time. The rrr-rrr-rrr of an internal combustion engine trying to start. And then another and another. All around Harmony, automatic generators cranked over as batteries came to life and current began to flow. Spark plugs sparked. Pistons fired. And one by one, our homes began to fill with incandescent light.
* * *
Nobody is sure what happened to Webster Bragg that afternoon. One moment he was about to take charge, the next he and his boys slipped away. Headed back to the compound, probably. Maybe to see if their trucks and Hummers would start. They’d need those vehicles to load up their weapons and their gold, and whatever else they’d been hoarding.
Why did Bragg and his family do what they did? Why did they look at the mean side of things instead of the good? Why did they hate so much? Maybe because the world had changed, and then changed again, and it upset their compasses. But that’s only my theory, and what do I know?
One thing I did figure out. Who was behind the pair of high headlights approaching Harmony from the south. It was several hours later, in the evening, and Mrs. Adler and Mom were tending to Reggie Kingman. Applying pressure to slow the loss of blood, keeping him warm with blankets heated on the woodstove, and praying he would survive the night.
The high headlights slowly bobbed as they got closer and closer to town. They belonged to a Tucker Terra Sno-Cat, the one with all-rubber treads, adjustable plow, and a heated cabin. My aunt Beth had commandeered it from the National Guard armory and headed north to check on her sister and family.
She wasn’t able to visit longer than it took to load Reggie Kingman into the cab, with Mrs. Adler riding along as a nurse. From there it was decided they’d go straight to the Air National Guard base hospital in Portsmouth, fast as that Sno-Cat would go.
Not very fast, so we were worried about that.
Before she left, Aunt Beth—Staff Sergeant Bethany C. Delaney, Air National Guard, 157 Refueling Wing—told us that the president of the United States would address the nation the next morning, as the sun rose over Washington, D.C. “Gonna take ’em a while to get the cable and satellite networks back up and running, so they’ll be doing it the old-fashioned way, by radio. Sunrise in D.C. is about twenty minutes after sunrise here, this time of year. So be ready to tune in.”
“What frequency?” Mr. Mangano wanted to know.
“All of ’em,” said Beth. “As I understand it they’ll be saturating the airways, AM, FM, and shortwave.”
Mom embraced her. “I was so worried, little sister! Worried you might have been flying. Worried you might have crashed.”
“Luck of the draw,” Beth said. “I happened to be off duty. Everybody airborne, they went down, near as we can figure. Lots of friends, lots of colleagues. Nobody is sure what happened. All we know is that it appears to be over. There will be planes back in the air by this time tomorrow, count on it! Meantime, don’t forget to tune in. Shortly after dawn. Any frequency.”
We didn’t forget.
Most of us were there before the sun came up, waiting as Mr. Mangano rigged King Man’s old crystal radio to the public address system in the old town hall. It only seemed fitting. We had no idea if Mr. Kingman would survive—he had looked so drained of life as they loaded him into the Sno-Cat, and it was such a long journey—but the idea of a radio-wave beacon of hope, that image would live as long as we did.
Mom came along with me and Becca, not because she really felt like it—she was still a little shaky, maybe because almost getting killed messes with your blood sugar—but because she thought we’d want to remember being together on that particular morning.
We still had the problem of what to do about her pills, which would be running out in less than two weeks. But with power back and vehicles running, I was confident we could find a way. Once the roads were clear we could drive wherever necessary. Or borrow a snowmobile. And Aunt Beth could help, if it came to that.
Meantime, Mom decided I was old enough to drink real coffee, and that was cool. She handed me a cup from the big urn in the town hall, heavy with milk and sugar, and said, “As I recall, you prefer café au lait. This won’t be as good as Mrs. Boncoeur’s, but it will have to do.”
Very cool.
* * *
Not everybody joined us that morning. Some had radios at home, or were so upset by what had happened on the town hall steps that they didn’t want to leave their homes, or the comforting warmth that was finally being provided by generators and heating systems. Some may have been ashamed because in their hearts they had agreed with Webster Bragg and his ideas about how we needed to fear everybody who wasn’t us.
But the former town moderator, the old dude with the shakes, Mr. Hubert Brown? He was there, sitting up straight with his ancient hands folded in his lap, looking delighted to be alive. Many of those who had stood with King Man came not only to hear the radio broadcast, but also to inquire about the status of our volunteer police officer.
Like I said, we didn’t know what happened after the Sno-Cat left because cell phone service had not yet been restored, and landlines were down, and would be for a long time.
Gronk’s father said if anybody could survive a wound like that it would be Reggie Kingman, but he didn’t sound like he really believed it.
“Bravest thing I ever saw,” he said, shaking his head in admiration. “The man was scared to death but willing to take a bullet for us. Don’t know what it says in the dictionary, but that’s my definition of courage.”
Gronk slipped into the seat between me and Becca, grinning like it was his birthday and he knew what presents were coming.
“Sorry about your skis,” I said. “I’ll pay you back, promise.”
“Don’t worry about the skis, knuckle brain. What about the jerky, what happened to that?”
“I ate it, every stinky bite.”
“Liar, liar, pants on fire.”
&n
bsp; “Gary!” Becca hissed in disapproval. “Don’t talk about fire, okay? Please? Not today.”
“What, just because King Man saved us from being crispy critters?”
“Yes, as a matter of fact. Don’t be a dolt.”
Gronk turned to me. “Dolt? What’s a dolt? Oh wait, I’ll bet that’s a crossword word.”
“Hush! It’s starting.”
At first there was only static. And then, as daylight brightened the windowpanes of the old town hall, the radio crackled to life, and a familiar voice came over the speakers.
You probably know that speech by heart, the one that begins: “My fellow Americans, my fellow citizens, my fellow human beings. We have survived a great darkness, and in the light of dawn we gather not to mourn our dead, but to celebrate the living. We have survived. Whatever is broken, we will fix it together. Whatever has burned, we will build it again. Let us join hands and face the new day. Together we stand, united in purpose, one people made of many …”
The speech was repeated every hour for the first couple of days, and school kids will likely have to memorize it for years to come, and do projects on it and stuff. They’ll learn to recite the words, but unless you heard it live for the first time, as it was being spoken, you can’t really understand what a relief it was to be assured that our country was still there, still standing, and that life would go on.
Nobody knows how many people died when the lights went out. Millions, probably. But more of us survived. They said it would take years to rebuild the power grid and get back to normal, and they’re still working on it. Until then, we’ll get by with the generosity of our neighbors, and with the help of those who have the courage to rise in defiance of tyranny and ignorance. From the stories people have told and are still telling, Reggie Kingman was far from alone. All across the nation and all around the world, good people helped us find our way.
They shone a light, and the light is love. Remember that and you’ll be okay.
The Big Dark Page 11