Listen to the Silence

by Marcia Muller

  Ahead lay a level plain covered by torturously twisted rock formations, towering domes, and chasms that cut deep into the earth. Under the scrub vegetation and loose cinders, the ground was shiny black and rippled, as if a giant hand had spilled a noxious liquid there; the formations stretched their gnarled limbs toward the sky, as though struggling to pull free. The wind blew colder here, whistling around the distorted shapes and howling in the fissures. Green conifers, red-and-yellow deciduous trees, and the ever-present haze of rabbitbrush stood out in contrast to the relentless black like clowns at a funeral.

  I hugged myself, cupped my elbows. In spite of Hy’s being just beyond the bend, I felt hideously alone. This might have been a landscape after the end of the world as we knew it; I might have been the sole survivor.

  “McCone?”

  “Huh?” I didn’t know how long I’d been staring at the lifeless vista.

  “Where were you?”

  “Just… thinking.”

  “About?”

  “The lava beds.” I motioned. “Austin said they’re more impressive than the ones at the national monument.”

  He studied them for a moment. “Guess so.”

  Something about the tone of his voice alerted me to his unease. “You feel the way I do.”

  The sensation they called up in me was unnameable—unless I wanted to say the word evil.

  “Do you suppose this was once a town?” I asked.

  “More like your basic wide place in the road.”

  Hy had found a spare fan belt in the lockbox, so we’d gone back to the truck and turned toward the northern edge of the lava beds. Ahead was a cluster of falling-down, burned-out structures overrun by vegetation. An ancient, rusted gas pump stood in front of one, the canopy roof of the station collapsed around it. A weathered sign sagged across the facade. On the opposite side of the road loomed a volcanic dome. Corroded metal showed through the dry, dense thicket at its base—an old dumping ground.

  I said, “Let’s take a look around.”

  The brand of gas was Calco; I found that out by fingering raised lettering on the pump. I said it aloud, looked questioningly at Hy.

  “Pre–World War II brand,” he told me. “They went into avgas for the military, were bought out by Getty in the fifties.”

  “How d’you know these things?”

  He shrugged. “Just do.”

  “So nobody’s filled up here since the forties.”

  “Or earlier.”

  I pivoted, taking in the rest of the place. A blackened foundation looked as if it had once been part of a residence, and next to it stood a small sagging house without a roof or windows. From another house set at some distance behind a stand of conifers came a persistent banging as the wind blew its door open and shut.

  Hy was examining the sign across the gas station’s facade. “Must’ve been a general store,” he called. “All I can make out is the word ‘bait.’ The inside’s been gutted, and the walls’re covered with graffiti. Hey, here’s a recent one: ‘Olga gave Brandon head.’”

  “Either he was bragging or she was advertising. Wonder what this place was called?”

  He went over to the truck, took a map from a side pocket, and spread it on the hood. “No indication of a town around here, but there isn’t any reason for a new map to show it. Nobody but kids with spray paint cans has been here for decades.”

  “Maybe somebody in Sage Rock will be able to tell us. Let’s check out that house beyond the pines before we head back there.”

  The house hadn’t deteriorated as much as the others, but its walls were sprayed too. A piece of its corrugated metal roof was missing, its windows had been smashed, and a stovepipe chimney lay corroding on the ground beside it. Hy and I stepped into its gloom, and instantly I was seized by the same feeling I’d had at the lava beds. I glanced at Hy, and he nodded in confirmation.

  There were only three small rooms: living room, kitchen, and bedroom; an outhouse was half collapsed under the trees. A few furnishings remained: broken-down pieces that nobody had considered worth stealing; an old wind-up phonograph was the best of the lot.

  Hy went over and examined it. “RCA. My folks had one just like it.” He touched the record on the turntable, spun it around. “‘Theme from “Picnic.”’ That movie was a big hit in the mid-fifties.”

  “So this place was inhabited after the war.”

  “This house, anyway.”

  I went into the kitchen. Remains of plates smashed on the floor, drawers of utensils upended. Empty beer cans lined up on the drain board of the hand-pump sink. The bedroom was in similar disorder, men’s and women’s cheap clothing strewn about. Under the bed I found a cardboard suitcase, empty except for the sort of fancy comb women used to hold up their hair; it looked like ivory but was probably plastic.

  “So what happened here?” I asked Hy.

  He shook his head.

  “What happened to the owners? And when?”

  “Impossible to say.”

  The atmosphere in the house was more oppressive now: loneliness and abandonment and more. I couldn’t shake the notion that something bad had happened here—so bad that even the passage of decades couldn’t eradicate its emotional traces.

  “Let’s get out of here,” I said.

  “That little town? Sure I remember it.”

  Mr. Easley, proprietor of the Wilderness Lodge, was a grizzled old man with a beard that came to a point halfway down his chest; he reminded me of a prospector in an old black-and-white Western. He seemed pleased to have someone to talk with, and his pale gray eyes sparkled as he served Hy and me beers in his cozy little room behind the motel desk.

  “You say you were out there today?” he asked.

  “Yes,” I said, “just looking around.”

  “That land’s fenced and posted. Could’ve gotten in trouble.”

  “We were careful. It’s not the first time we’ve done a little trespassing. Right, sweetheart?”

  Hy gave me a martyred look before he replied, “Right, honey.”

  “Heard you folks’re environmentalists.”

  “Uh-huh.” I nodded.

  “Sure you’re not reporters?”

  “You must’ve been talking to Jimmy D. Bearpaw.”

  “Yeah. You were all he could talk about when I stopped by the café for lunch. He was really hoping you were the press. Likes his publicity, Jimmy D does, and he’s counting on getting plenty with this big lawsuit.”

  “Well, he’s bound to be disappointed in us. I can’t write an English sentence, and my husband here’s a pilot.”

  “Thought pilots were smart.”

  “Not all of them.”

  Hy nudged my foot and glared. Mr. Easley raised his eyes to the ceiling, as if he were suddenly afraid one of the less intelligent pilots would plunge his aircraft through the roof.

  “About the town…?” I said.

  “Jimmy D told me you two were thinking of settling down hereabouts. You’re not hoping to buy land up there?”

  “No. We heard about the lawsuit and were just curious.”

  “That’s good, because the developer’s gonna hang on till the last dog is hung. If I were you, I wouldn’t be too hasty about pulling up stakes and moving here.”

  “Why not?”

  “There’s nothing to do, ’less you count playing pool and drinking at the Buckhorn. Nearest movie theater’s in Alturas. Nearest city’s Reno, and that’s a long haul. You folks’d go crazy, after living in the Bay Area.”

  “I don’t know; it all depends on what you like to do. Exploring that ghost town, for instance.”

  “Oh, right, you were asking about it. Indian town, it was.”

  “Modoc?”

  He shook his head. “Nah, most of them only started moving here a few years ago. Those were Paiutes or Western Shoshones or some such. That road through there used to be the route to the fishing and hunting at Clear Lake. Ronny Wapepah, he had the gas station and store, sold bait, tackle
, ammo, sandwiches. But then the war came and Ronny joined up, got killed in France. Rest of the folks hung on for a while, some died off, the others left. Now you got nothing but ghosts out there.” The old man’s face grew melancholy. “Nothing but ghosts here too, but most people don’t know it yet.”

  “What d’you mean?”

  “Our old way of life is over. That development’s going to go through, lawsuit or not. And that’ll bring traffic, people. Won’t be any peace up here anymore.”

  “Maybe it’ll perk up the economy.”

  “Nah, not that kind of clientele. The resort’ll have everything they need, from film to fancy restaurants. You won’t see any of them driving to town to sample Jimmy D’s cooking. Right now we got a good seasonal economy going—fishermen and hunters; none of them care about fancy stuff. But a big development with an airstrip and all, it pollutes and messes with nature. Pretty soon the fishermen and hunters’ll go someplace else. And then Sage Rock’ll be on its way to being just a memory.”

  “What about you? What’ll you do?”

  “Live out my days right here on my Social Security. Suits me fine. But the others, the younger people, they’ll be gone.”

  I said, “Like what happened to that little town. By the way, did it have a name?”

  “That town? Well, sure it did. Named after the crater across the road from Ronny Wapepah’s gas station. Cinder Cone, it was called.”

  “Cinder Cone,” I said to Hy as I shut the door of our cabin. “I misheard Saskia, thought she was talking about me. But she was actually asking me—or whoever she thought I was—to find the place. Why?”

  “Something to do with the lawsuit against Austin, I guess.” He stretched out on the bed, yawning. “Maybe Robin knows.”

  “Right.” I went to the phone and dialed the Blackhawk house. “No answer, dammit.”

  “So why don’t you call Austin?”

  “I should, but…”

  “Having a problem accepting him as your father?”

  “He’s not a very likable man.”

  “Can’t pick your relatives.”

  “No, but it’s easier to accept their faults if they’ve been around your whole life.” I hesitated a moment longer, then dialed Austin’s number in Monterey. His taped voice told me to leave a message. “Why aren’t people around when you need them?” I complained, breaking the connection and dialing my home number to access the machine. Several recorded voices greeted me—among them John’s, Charlene’s and Uncle Jim’s. I returned the family calls in the order they’d been made. John wasn’t home, but Charlene was—and on a mission.

  “Listen,” she said, “when’re you going to stop all this crazy running around, looking for people who didn’t want you in the first place? It’s really hurting Ma; she thinks you don’t love her anymore. You should at least call her.”

  “I can’t do that.”

  “Ever?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Shar, I know you’re angry because she and Pa lied about your adoption. I’m not too happy about that, either. But they thought they were doing the right thing. They never did anything that wasn’t in our best interest.”

  “That’s not what you said when they grounded you for running around with that Hell’s Angel.”

  “I was a teenager then! Now that I’m a mother, I can put it into perspective. And that’s what you should be doing about this adoption business.”

  “This really isn’t the time to talk about it.”

  “When will be?”

  “When… I get some things settled.” I hung up quickly. Since her divorce from Ricky and her remarriage to Vic Christiansen, my sister had become wise and serene—qualities I admired but didn’t want to contend with at the moment.

  Hy sat up, looking at his watch. “It’s getting late, McCone, and I’m hungry. What d’you say we hunt up some food?”

  “Where? The only place in town is Jimmy D’s, and I’d just as soon not see him till our nine o’clock appointment. Listen to him, either.”

  “Well, on the drive up here I spotted a truck stop on One thirty-nine. It’s a ways south, but we’ve got plenty of time.”

  “Good, let’s eat there. But I need to return one more call first.” I dialed Jim and Susan’s number in the Gold Country. Jim answered and said they’d been wondering how my search for my birth parents was going. I filled him in briefly, ending with the day’s explorations and our discovery of the long-dead town.

  “Cinder Cone,” he said. “Name’s got a familiar ring.”

  “Have you ever been to Modoc County?”

  “No. But I’ve heard that name. Where? Damn my old-man’s memory!”

  “Why don’t you think about it? Ask Susan. Maybe she’ll remember.” I gave him the number of the motel.

  Jim continued to fret. “Usually my long-term memory’s good, even if I do have to write down everything I need to remember on a daily basis.”

  “Maybe you came across the name recently.”

  “No, there’s a feeling associated with it, like it’s something out of the past. Unpleasant feeling, if you want to know the truth.”

  “Unpleasant in what way?”

  “Well, you remember the night you visited us and asked about Fenella’s trip to the reservation? Both Suzy and I had the same kind of unpleasant feeling then, but we couldn’t pin it down.”

  “I noticed something made you uncomfortable. Did you figure out what?”

  “Not specifically. But after that trip things were different in the family. Fenella changed—went to college, got all caught up in her Indian heritage. Grandma Mary started to fail; she’d always been strong and active, but it was as if Fenella’s trip reminded her of things in the past that she couldn’t live with. Andy blamed Fenella for Mary’s decline and got sort of cold and distant.”

  “So the feeling you have about Cinder Cone could be related to that trip, too.”

  “Maybe. You know how you wake from a bad dream and can’t remember what it was about, but there’s an aura that lingers?”

  Altogether too well lately. “Yes.”

  “Well, that’s what hearing the name Cinder Cone did to me.”

  9:21 P.M.

  “You’re quiet tonight, McCone.”

  “What?” I glanced over at Hy from the passenger’s seat of the truck. Normally he and I would have shared driving duties, but Pete Silvado, the ranch hand who had loaned it to us, harbored a distrust of women at the wheel and had made Hy promise not to let me drive. That was fine with me; the truck handled like a tank, and this way I had more time to look at the scenery.

  Not that there was any scenery to admire at present. The sun had sunk beyond the horizon and a thick cloud cover obscured the moon and stars. The chill on the night air presaged a long, hard winter.

  “I said, you’re quiet. Guess that humongous chicken-fried steak didn’t set too well.” For the second time today I’d shamelessly indulged myself.

  “The steak was great,” I said. “You’re the one who should be in pain. Nobody in his right mind orders a Cobb salad at a truck stop called Big Bertha’s.”

  “And I’ll never order one again. So what’s bothering you?”

  “My conversation with Jim. What he said about Cinder Cone having an unpleasant association. Plus the fact that we seem to be driving around in circles. We’ve passed that bullet-riddled cattle-crossing sign twice now.”

  “And here I thought I was covering my confusion. Problem is, Jimmy D’s map looks like hieroglyphics.”

  “Let me see it.” I turned on the cab light, studied the squiggles and arrows. “I think we were supposed to turn at that other barbed-wire fence a couple of miles back. This road just loops around to the highway.”

  “I’m aware of that, but the fence you’re talking about is on the left; the one on the map’s on the right.”

  “Not if you don’t hold it upside down.”

  “… Oh.”

  “Just turn the truck around and l
et me direct you. And when you see Pete Silvado, you can tell him we’d’ve been a hell of a lot better off with me driving.”

  Jimmy D had told us that the lane to the house was marked by a For Sale sign; now that we were on the right road, we found it easily. Hy turned the truck and we followed a dirt track through a stand of pines. The headlight beams picked out tall weeds in the strip between the tire ruts; they brushed the undercarriage, caught in the wheel wells.

  “Place probably hasn’t been lived in for years,” he said.

  “And now Jimmy D thinks he’s found a pair of city slickers who’ll pay an inflated price for it.”

  The track ended in a clearing where a dilapidated swing set sat on a gopher-mounded lawn. The small prefab house was tucked under the branches of a live oak, and a metal shed stood a few yards away, ivy-covered firewood stacked against it. A white Ford pickup with a bumper sticker saying EAT AT THE CATTLEMAN’S CAFE—OR ELSE! was parked in front. Both the house and the shed were dark.

  Hy braked next to the pickup and looked at me, raising his eyebrows. “So where is he?”

  “Maybe the electricity’s turned off.” I started to get out, but Hy’s hand stayed me. “What?”

  “I don’t like this. Could be a setup.”

  “Why? As far as he knows, we’re exactly who we said we are.”

  “Maybe Jimmy’s smarter than he looks. If he’s connected you with Austin…”

  “Right. And then there’s the matter of that cut fan belt.” I studied the house in the headlight beams; its windows were covered by shades, but I saw no motion, no one watching surreptitiously from within. The shed’s door was padlocked, a heavy chain securing an oversized hasp. Something moved beyond it, and I tensed; then a doe stepped out, eyes glowing red in the light. Momentarily it froze, then whirled and ran into the pines.

  Hy shut the engine off and took the key from the ignition. Reached across me and unlocked the glove box where he’d put his .45. Sometimes the constant presence of the gun—for which he didn’t have a carry permit—irked me. But not tonight, not in this dark and deserted place.