Hellfire

by Jeff Provine

  Mr. Johnson had worked alongside Nate’s father shoveling coal until one died and the other moved up the ladder to a desk at the railroad. The Johnsons had always looked out for the Kemps, sending hams on Christmas and getting Nate his first job on the rails. Part of Nate had always hated the Johnsons for their luck, but that part was missing this morning.

  Voices trickled out from the kitchen. Nate unwrapped himself from borrowed quilts and pulled on his trousers. He and Blake had changed clothes at his own house after what would come to be known as Hellfire Night.

  It seemed so strange to climb the familiar steps over the butcher’s shop. He had gone up and down them since before he could walk and only crawled with his pudgy hands. They had always been the threshold for his life. Outside, he was constantly on guard, working to be the biggest man he could be whether through fighting or earning wages. Inside, he was his mother’s son, no matter how he rebelled. Now he had a peace that transcended both sides of him.

  The apartment had been empty. The locks were broken, though nothing was stolen inside. Nate imagined the rail agents had stormed the house after they had stolen the airship and gone on the run.

  “Where are they?” Nate had asked.

  “They...,” Blake began, but he sighed. “They told me, but I...”

  Nate patted him on the shoulder. “It’s been a long night. Think on it a minute.”

  They ate bread and cheese and drank bottles of cider. Nothing had ever tasted so good.

  “Johnsons!” Blake said suddenly.

  Nate looked at him.

  “That’s where they went,” the sheriff explained. “The Johnsons’ place on…”

  “Moore Street,” Nate finished for him. He stood and stretched. The baggy underclothes he’d been wearing were just about to fall off. “First, I’m going to put on something decent.”

  Blake gave up his dirty clothes, too, already worn through two days of smoke and struggle. He had borrowed a suit that belonged to Nate’s father. It was a tight fit with short legs, but it would do him until he could get back to Bastrop. Nate was glad the old clothes had found a use.

  He walked Blake over to the Johnsons’ house two blocks over on Moore Street. Once the sheriff saw the place, Blake tipped his hat. “I reckon this is time for your family.”

  “You’re leaving?”

  “I’ve got some unfinished business I need to take care of,” Blake said. “I’ll be back, if you’ll have me.”

  “The door’ll always be open.”

  Blake hummed and walked out to the street.

  Nate knocked at the Johnsons’ door and pulled the rope to ring their bell. No one answered.

  “Ma!” Nate called up. “Ann! It’s me, Nathan!”

  He heard a window shuffle open, and a set of red curls stuck out. Nate couldn’t make out the face in the shadows with the street lamps out, but he could tell from his heart. “Ann!”

  “Is it you?” Ann called back.

  “Who else would it be?”

  Ann disappeared inside. Footsteps and locks clicked from the other side of the door. It burst open, and his mother leaped out to grab him. She buried her face in his chest and blubbered a whole mess of things.

  Nate hugged her tightly. “I’m back.”

  She pulled him inside. Ann appeared over her shoulder and leaped onto Nate with her own arms wide. Both women were weeping and singing between sobs. Nate was silent, but warm tears rolled down his cheeks.

  When they had calmed down, Mrs. Johnson had gotten them some tea. Mr. Johnson stood near the door with his old hunting rifle, watching the dark streets. The city was quiet now, but Nate could only imagine what they had heard.

  “What did you see?” Nate had asked.

  Ann had piped up. He listened to her meandering rendition of seeing rail agents storm their house from the street corner, hiding with the Johnsons, and overhearing. Somewhere near the flash of light, he fell asleep. He had awoken briefly when Blake arrived back at the door, but he only stayed awake long enough to lie down. Mrs. Johnson somehow found enough pillows for them all.

  Nate stumbled into the kitchen. His mother and Mrs. Johnson were fluttering about the stove, constantly in each other’s way and tapping one another on the shoulder as they danced through breakfast making. The table was crowded with Ann, Mr. Johnson, Sheriff Blake, and a dark-headed little boy munching on a huge slice of toast covered in jam. Nate eyed the boy for a long moment as Mr. Johnson spoke so excitedly that his hands waved.

  “He’s the one who served us dinner in the capitol prison,” Blake said from the side of his mouth.

  Ann nearly spilled her tea. “Prison!”

  “Later, dear, later,” Mrs. Kemp said. She pushed Nate to the table and slipped a plate full of bacon into his hands.

  “I was just telling everyone what I’d seen around the city,” Mr. Johnson said, his gray hair flopping around his head. “I went out after dawn, you see.”

  “Go on,” Nate said just before chomping on bacon.

  “People are just milling around. Nobody’s rushing anywhere, not that there’s anywhere to rush to with the whole city pretty much shut up. Except on the city mall! There are tents going up all over. I’ve never seen such a thing.”

  “Revival!” Nate’s mother sang. “We have to go there! It’s the Sabbath after all!”

  Nate gasped. “I’ve got to check on Ozzie!”

  He had been with her that night, holding her up as she caught her breath after keeping the hellions at bay. After the light, the chaos was over, and people picked up the pieces. Militia medics set up surgery tables with long lines. They’d rushed Tom Husk onto one, just as he woke up enough to say they shouldn’t bother. Ozzie had stayed with him, while Nate and Blake helped move other wounded people as they cried out. They’d lost them in the crowd. Nate supposed she’d gone home, too.

  “Who’s Ozzie?” Ann asked, rubbing her mouth with a sleeve.

  “She’s the young lady who saved the city,” Blake said over the lip of his cup of coffee. “At least, saved it long enough for your brother here to save it.”

  “What does that mean?” Ann demanded.

  Nate winked. He leaned back toward the stove. “I should tell you, Ma. You’re right about Newton’s Catalyst. It is of the devil.” His was a long story, and everyone listened with gaping mouths.

  The Johnsons lent them their buggy and said the walk would do them good as they went down to the tents on the city mall. Nate was glad to be in a vehicle that didn’t have an engine on it for once. He tapped the reins on the horse’s back to trot faster.

  “Easy there, boy,” Blake called from beside him. “There’s no need to hurry!”

  Nate grinned. “Fine, fine. We have time.”

  They rode quietly through the empty streets. People were on the sidewalks, mostly sitting on stoops and whispering to one another. No one seemed willing to speak outright. Only the splashing puddles made noise with reminders of the night before.

  The Jacey mansion was one in the big row of houses along the riverfront north of town. A wide boulevard was lined with huge magnolia trees where the wealthy could ride up and down with the glimmering Burr Bridge towering to the east. It was a far cry from the narrow streets with rusted street signs Nate had grown up in, and the police frowned when he and his pals ambled up to this part of town for a drunken walk.

  Now the gardens were all flooded out. The trees were stripped of their early summer flowers, which lay scattered on the mud that bled over the sidewalks. The boulevard was deserted except for an overturned carriage.

  The Jacey’s house was large and white with front columns stretching through the roof of a wide veranda. The windows of their ground floor were all open, and rugs hung over the sills. Water stains lined the sides of the house, along with all kinds of debris from broken branches to wadded papers. Not even the mighty Jaceys had escaped the flood.

  Tom Husk was sitting in a low chair under the shade of the veranda.

  “Tom!” B
lake called from the buggy.

  The lanky newspaperman sat up and waved, knocking a stack of papers off his lap. He was wrapped in blankets with pillows under his head. He had slept on the porch and still wasn’t up. There was a bottle of whiskey next to a cup of water on the thin table beside him. The stump of what was left of his leg was bound in thick rolls of bandages.

  Nate pulled the horse to a stop and set the buggy’s brake. Blake hopped out, and Nate followed after him.

  “Good morning!” Blake called.

  “Morning,” Husk replied. He waved a hand at a couple of rocking chairs nearby. “Have a seat.”

  “Good to see you,” Nate told him as he took a chair. “The Jaceys doing you right?”

  “They put me up just fine in a spare room… they have one or two of those,” Husk said. “The old man is up in his room, mumbling to himself. Miss Ozzie’s with him. The rest of womenfolk went downtown with the servants and a wagon load of blankets and preserves. Funny what little things like catastrophes and miracles will do to people.”

  Nate snorted a chuckle.

  “I’d’ve gone along, too, I think,” Husk said, but he paused to pat his leg high on the thigh. “If I were able.”

  “You going to be all right?” Blake asked.

  Husk nodded. “I lost it, but I suppose there was no way it would’ve healed right. I’ll be investing in a set of crutches pretty soon, and I’ve already got an eye out for a wheeled chair around the office.”

  He pointed at the papers in his lap, many of them already covered with scrawled-out lines. A cup full of pencils rested below his chair. “But it’s just as well if I never run again. I’ve got work to do.”

  Blake picked up a sheet. “What’s this?”

  “The truth,” Husk replied. “I’ve been writing news reports for years, but I never thought I’d have a story like this. People need to hear it, and they need to hear the whole thing.”

  “I imagine it’ll sell quite a few copies after today,” Blake told him.

  Husk laughed and shrugged. “I’ve already got it mapped out. The serial should get picked up by the big papers back East. Everybody’s going to want to hear about what happened last night. I’ll need to get back to my office once the trains to Bastrop are running again. I imagine you’re eager to get back, too, and sort out the facts from the rumors.”

  Blake nodded. “Yep. Though it won’t be for too long.”

  Nate and Husk both looked at him.

  “I’ve been sheriff a long time,” Blake told them. “It’s a good job where I’ve done some good, but there’s more I need to do. Carmichael can take over for me easy enough.”

  Husk’s jaw dropped. “You can’t just up and leave! What about the town?”

  “Bastrop can take care of itself,” the sheriff said, shaking his head. “Last night I looked into the fires of Hell, and it shook me up so much that I don’t think I could stay in one place anymore. There’s too much evil out in the world to try to watch one small town. I’ve got to go.”

  “Are you sure, sheriff?” Husk asked. “If it’s nerves, you could check in at Oak Grove for a while, get them settled.”

  Blake was still shaking his head. “It’s not about settling; it’s about fighting. Seeing all that wriggles in the fire took a lot of out me, just about everything, to the point I was going to give up. But, when I saw that light, something came back. I had to act, and I fought. I fought things worse than all the crimes mankind’s ever done to itself. That’s what I’ve got to do.”

  “What do you mean?” Nate asked.

  “Not all the hellions were wiped out last night,” Blake said, his voice cold. “Some of them took flight. That big one, and I thought I saw some others. Who better than a lawman to hunt for them?

  “Then there’re the rest of the hunchbacks attached to rail agents from Maine to California. If I had to guess, they’re going to be disappearing once word gets around about what they really are. I aim to get them before they have a chance to go too far.”

  Nate crossed his arms. “What about that boy of yours?”

  Husk flipped his head around so fast Nate thought he’d snap it. “Boy of yours?”

  “He brought that boy home to the Johnsons’ place,” Nate explained. “The one who opened the locks in Burr’s prison.”

  “Johnsons?” Husk asked. He scribbled on paper.

  “Family friends.” Nate looked back at Blake, who scratched his head. “What of him? You can’t just take him home to drop him back off in the streets.”

  “Wouldn’t dream of it. I can’t take him with me, either.”

  Husk cleared his throat. “Well, now, let’s see. With my condition, I’m going to need a page, now aren’t I?”

  Blake looked at him with wide eyes. “Are you sure?”

  “The kid broke me out of jail.” Husk made a dramatic shrug. “I’d say I owe him at least a job, maybe even an apprenticeship.” Husk reached out his hand.

  Blake shook it.

  Nate stood and patted them both on the shoulder. He was proud to know them. “Let me know how I can help you.”

  “You take care of your family for now,” Blake told him. “It seems to be growing. Maybe see that it gets a little bigger, too. You should talk to that nurse friend of yours.”

  Nate’s face grew hot. He opened his mouth, but he didn’t have any words to put in it.

  Husk rescued him. “She’s upstairs, kid.”

  Nate let out a long sigh and shook his head. “What would she want with a fireman?” He groaned. “I’m not even that anymore, after the train wreck.”

  When he looked up again, Husk and Blake were staring at him.

  “You think she cares about that?” Husk asked.

  Before Nate could answer, the threshold at the front door squeaked. Ozzie was there. She looked up at him with wide eyes. Her dress was printed calico.

  “Oh, I thought I heard voices.” She winked. “I didn’t know it was you.”

  Nate winked back.

  Blake cleared his throat. “I say there, Miss Jacey. I could do with a drink if you happen to have one.”

  “I’ve got some coffee,” she said. “And a cup for yourself, Mr. Husk?”

  “Absolutely,” he called.

  “I’ll help you with it!” Nate told her. He followed her inside.

  The Jaceys’ anteroom was as big as Nate’s home. Twin staircases led down from the upper floors. The gold carpets bore dark, wet stains, and nails were poking up from warped wood. He marveled only a moment before following Ozzie through the huge dining room and out to the kitchen house across a short boardwalk.

  It was warm in there, and the air smelled of spices. Ozzie turned over two mugs and filled them from the brass kettle hanging next to the low-burning fire.

  Nate took a breath. “I came to check on you.”

  The smile Ozzie held widened. “I’m fine.” Then it faded as she looked back over her shoulder. “I’m not so sure about my family.”

  Nate stitched up his eyebrows. “Anyone hurt?”

  “No, no,” Ozzie said, turning back. She sighed. “They had all come home because of me. Nobody wanted to face the other snobs with their sister being held up as a traitor to the state. They saw the light when it struck the levee, which gave them plenty of time to run upstairs before the water came through. We came through, overall.”

  She leaned on the countertop. “Here, anyway. The factories took the brunt of the flood, and the glove works is all gone. Nobody was there with the holiday, thankfully, and I doubt we’ll lose our shirts, but it’s quite a blow. My mother and sisters and I don’t even know how much. They all went downtown to help with relief.”

  “My ma and sister’s there, too.”

  She nodded. “My father hasn’t been the same since word came about the factory. I stayed behind with him. He could certainly use something to believe in.”

  “We all can.”

  Ozzie smiled again. Her smile widened until she couldn’t keep her mouth
closed. She leaped forward and scooped Nate into a hug. He held her in return.

  Something seemed to whisper on the breeze. The hair on the back of Nate’s neck stood, and he froze. He knew the voice.

  “What is it?” Ozzie asked.

  Nate put himself between her and the fire. He grabbed an iron poker from the side of the hearth and jabbed the logs burned down to cinders. Sparks flew up and hissed. Nothing spoke out of it.

  He turned back to Ozzie. “You’re not using Newton’s Catalyst in here, are you?”

  Ozzie shook her head with her eyebrows upturned. “No, never. It makes the food taste terrible!”

  “Then...” Nate clamped his mouth shut and slowly turned his head with his ear raised. He heard the foul whispering again.

  “Burn it,” it said. “Insurance…”

  It came from the main house. Nate dashed out the door, keeping his grip firm on the iron poker. He heard Ozzie call after him, but he didn’t stop to answer.

  He raced up the stairs. The swollen boards creaked under his weight on the first steps, and then it was just the pounding of his boots against the plush carpet. He rounded oak-paneled walls to a heavy door.

  The voice came through it. “More if the girl dies inside…”

  Nate kicked the door open.

  It was a gentleman’s study. A huge desk with its top rolled up sat with its drawers all open, spilling papers out onto the floor. Its chair was overturned, and H. Robert Jacey was on the floor on his knees. His collar was undone, his tie loose across his neck, and his shirttail half out. Pale eyes stared blankly from his blood-drained face.

  In front of him was a little spittoon with a flickering red fire. He fed it pages torn from a huge ledger lying on the floor. Beside the ledger, a little envelope marked “Newton” lay torn open.

  “Trespasser!” the fire hissed. “Destroy him!”

  Jacey looked up at him with dead eyes.

  “No!” Nate shouted with righteous anger. He kicked the spittoon over. The fire spilled onto the floor.

  “Nathan!” Ozzie screamed from behind him.