Baz raised both eyebrows. “Shit,” he said, for all of them. “What’s happening?”
“Hell if I know,” Sol replied, knew he sounded surly and he wished that it was different, that he could offer Baz some explanation. “What do you see?”
Baz cocked his head, shrugged. “I’m not seeing anything. Cloud? Ashes? You?”
Sol shrugged back. Same-same, for all it mattered.
“Do we have a plan?” Lutie asked after a minute of silence, and Sol had no plan. She said ‘we’ but Sol knew she meant ‘you’. She was, what? Twenty today. Too young for this. You were laying spirits when you were twenty. You were doing a lot of things by the time you were twenty.
Behind the glow and nearing crackle of fire, the wind picked up again, came round as though it had merely been on an errand elsewhere. On it came the scent of blood, metal, carrion. Sweet smell, cloying, choking. Death.
That last smell landed like a punch and just as Sol thought that, the wind came on fast, roaring like a freight train, and Lutie staggered back, blown hard as though she’d been shoved. Baz grabbed at her, keeping her upright. Lutie’s sudden shout was one of surprise, not pain. Then whatever it was coalesced, turned, came for him.
Sol landed on his back and he hit his head on something hard and edged, a field stone, maybe. He lay still for moment, hating the sensation of falling. No, not falling. Landing. No further thoughts on that, then he was lifted by his shirt front and hit so hard on the face that blood burst in his mouth like the liquid center of gift-wrapped chocolate, burst and sprayed and, Goddammit, Sarrazin, open your eyes.
Sol got his hands up, met rotting cloth and bone, unyielding for all it was falling apart, and pushed hard. A ghost, not a manifestation that resembled the living, but a spirit sustained by its hate, pared down to bone and sinew and malice. They rolled down an incline, embraced, then came apart and Sol scrambled to his feet. Their struggle had led them right down to the tracks. He couldn’t see Lutie or Baz through the ash haze. Only this: big damn ghost, rails and ties dim shadows beneath the ash.
The ghost wasn’t a gauzy apparition, either, it was a brick shithouse. Some ghosts were barely there, couldn’t really harm anything in a physical sense. Not this one. This one was different, more vital and dangerous than even the fortuneteller’s ghost. Sure, its hate made it strong, but it was more than that. Something to do with le diable, no doubt. But Sol had no time to think about it, because in its skeletal hand was a dark club. A police baton, and Sol knew this was Lewis’s ghost, a man who had killed with a bat, had made sport of clubbing hobos brainless.
Sol ducked low to avoid the ghost’s sudden lunge. It was big, closer to seven feet than six, a monster, and as Sol twisted out of its way, it adjusted its swing, made contact with his shoulder and Sol yelled, partly in pain, mostly in surprise. Merde, it’s fast, he thought, tracking the club in the thing’s hand, and saw the movement, felt the movement, as it swung again.
He rolled out of the way, rolled towards it, inside its reach and into its feet, or where its feet should be, planning to knock it to the ground, but Lewis sure as hell knew what to do with a body at its feet.
Instead of toppling, the ghost slammed a boot into Sol’s curling body, connected with hip and Sol was moving too fast to really register it on a conscious level. The ghost swung again, missed, and Sol shot to his feet, hands scrabbling in the gravel to find upright, panting, hip now a block of radiating pain.
The thing was relentless, not allowing Sol the opportunity to do anything, to establish his connection with the ground, to find where its bindings were, to sever things between the ghost and whatever was holding it here. Sol backed up against the rails, four sets running along out of sight.
Risk. Opportunity. Despite everything, he grinned, spat blood to the side. A situation he could rise to, could cope with, and alone with being in a moving ambulance rig, this was the one place where he knew exactly what to do. He’d been here on the tracks before, the devil had tried this trick last night. Sol wasn’t stupid; he knew to use iron for protection, and he had time enough, he hoped. He peered around, trying to see beyond the ghost, but that wasn’t possible. In fact, it wasn’t advisable.
The ghost came on again, bat swinging. Laughing, power beyond imagining. Sol backed up, feet finding purchase on the icy wooden ties between the tracks. Then over the tracks, iron between him and the ghost. He didn’t say anything, just dropped to a crouch and his hip registered that fact. Unbelievable, astonishing pain on top of ghostcold so shattering he couldn’t feel his fingers. Speed was essential, everything was pointless without it. Not the best circumstances to find an opening, send this méchant thing on its way.
It was no regular ghost, beyond being merely old and tough. Old and tough, Sol had dealt with. No, more than that, it was present in a way most ghosts weren’t, was allied. No other word for it. This one was bound to chaos, to evil, just in a different league altogether. Sol wiped his bloody mouth on the back of his hand, put it on the ground again, prepared.
“You think that’s gonna help you, cher?”
He hadn’t heard the devil coming this time, and he wasn’t drunk, but it was here anyway, picking its time and its place. It was dark with ash, cloying, choking. There: the devil skitched and scratched, and was barely visible across the tracks, hovering behind the skeletal spirit of Lewis, one claw around the ghost’s arm like it was holding the ghost back.
Sol didn’t say anything to it: what was there to say?
Fingers against ground, intent absolutely clear: You are going away from here, you. The ghost was laughing and the devil inched closer, but would not cross the iron rails.
The ghost wasn’t coming either, had pulled up short on the other side of the tracks. Fine, Sol didn’t need for it to come to him, he could swing the road to it. Intent, pure, form the line, open the path—but worse than not coming forward, the ghost wasn’t sticking around. As Sol watched, as he sought out the tentative connective knot, the thing dissipated, faded into the ash, whirled skywards, leaving only the devil.
“You’re not gonna get rid of my pet like that, Beausoleil Sarrazin, it ain’t that easy. Your papa sure thought so, and lookit where that got him. But my ghost needs some fun, always on the hunt for that. Wonder where he’ll find it?” It chuckled and it coughed and Sol’s surprise fell into leaden fear. “It’s on you, this next one, Sarrazin.”
The ground shook and the train’s lights were suddenly everywhere, and even though Sol had left himself enough room, didn’t think he was in danger, he was closer to the rails than he’d thought. No time for forming any thoughts, let alone a connection, an opening, shit, he didn’t even know where the devil was anymore.
The train rushed past and Sol swore, daylight upon him now, no ash, no cloud, no darkness. Daylight and steel and the sweeping train wind buffeting him back on his ass, no hand on the ground, no connection, just a Nebraska winter’s day, too close to a train, not close enough to a devil or a ghost. Not close enough to those he loved, those he cared about. A train between him and Lutie and Baz. Between him and a devil.
He had to wait for the cars to pass, of course, and the waiting wasn’t easy, but by the time the last had rumbled by, he was on his feet, anxious. Last car, line of cottonwoods near the frozen river to the south, and there were Baz and Lutie waiting for him on the other side, the Wagoneer behind them, a little distance from Lutie’s parked car. A moment, and Sol saw it on both their faces: fear, followed by relief.
They were both alive, though, and the devil wasn’t anywhere to be seen, nor the ghost, and Sol knew that his own almost incomprehensible relief would look like anger, but he had no control over that, none at all.
FOURTEEN
IRON RAILS, IRON BARS
Sol wasn’t happy to see them, not at all. He was livid and Lutie recognized it immediately. She could see his scowl from across the tracks as he placed one unsteady foot in front of the other like walking was a new activity. As he neared, Baz stepped out in
front. “Don’t get mad. It’s her birthday.” Pre-emptive words, an answer to the scowl, an excuse, a get-out-of-jail-free card. What did her birthday matter in this? Not at all and Lutie knew it.
Baz’s words brought a quick smile to Sol’s face, but his teeth were bloody, the cut above his eye bleeding again. The smile was no better than the scowl. “Her birthday,” Sol repeated softly, almost to himself. “That’s great.”
The bright sun disguised nothing about going a round with a giant ghost. Baz lifted one hand to his brother, who flinched, but Baz wasn’t taking that, was shaking his head as he tried again. “Where’d it get you?” He gestured vaguely, voice low but no-nonsense, as though sympathy would be turned away and he was probably right.
“What did you see?” More than simple deflection, that question: it was an easy way to separate the normal from the supernatural, asking Baz what was visible and what was not.
“You, too damn close to the track. You were fighting something, getting thrown around some,” Baz said, but Lutie talked over him.
“The ghost, burned to the bone. Big bastard, too.” She hesitated, unexpectedly wanting to protect Baz, as though not naming the obvious would do it. She took a breath. Shielding Baz wasn’t an option. “And the devil. They’re connected, for sure.”
Sol’s eyes were still bright with anger, but he seemed unable rather than unwilling to agree with her. Baz asked him if he was okay, no longer no-nonsense. Sol licked his blood-flecked lips, about to say that he was fine, Lutie could tell, but instead he looked at Baz, and the anger shifted and fled, leaving something much more difficult.
His chin dropped and he stood very still, his bare hands tucked under either elbow, all his weight on his right leg, the other bent, toe barely touching the ground. Beside him, Baz reached out to take Sol’s arm, and Sol’s hand twitched in return: Give me a minute.
The Wagoneer was unlocked, thank God. Lutie left them alone and pulled down the tailgate. It gave an arthritic whine, and she crawled into the back where the massive medical kit was held fast behind the bench seats. She dragged it across a threadbare and dog-haired carpet through a maze of man-debris: shovel, toolbox, cordless drill, sleeping bag, baseball mitt, box of ropes, carton of spare car parts. Sol limped over and sat heavily on the tailgate; Baz tried to unzip his brother’s parka and was quietly berated in French. Finally, Sol pushed his help away.
Baz held up both hands, giving up, allowing Sol to do it himself. Questioningly, Lutie gestured to the kit. Sol nodded to her. She opened it up, found where he’d put the packs of gauze and handed him one.
He touched the back of his head, wincing, as he tore open one of the packs with his teeth, pressed the square of gauze to his bloody mouth. “There’s some water bottles rolling under the back seat. Can you find one for me, birthday girl?”
Sol sounded calmer than either of them, gave them curt instructions for cleaning the cuts he couldn’t reach or see and pulling them closed with tape and cotton and butterfly bandages. Although Sol told them repeatedly that he was okay, he still needed Baz’s help to get his left arm out of his parka. With the chinook, it wasn’t too cold, and as soon as Sol got his arm free of the sleeve, he stretched it out, flexed his hand, rotated his wrist, then his elbow, face screwing up as he tried to roll his shoulder.
“That’s enough, Superman,” Baz protested, evidently fed up with Sol’s self-diagnostics. Pearl-button snaps were easy enough to undo, and they discovered that the earlier bandages along Sol’s left ribcage were soaked through with new blood. Lutie changed the bandage, but Sol seemed more concerned with his shoulder, a huge club-shaped bruise coming up like a Polaroid picture, black and red and purple.
Lutie had found a bottle of frozen water in the back seat. Sol scowled as she held it out, probably thirsty. Lutie wrapped the bottle in a stray t-shirt, told him to hold it against his shoulder, watched him as he scowled harder.
“There’s Tylenol 3s in there,” and he gestured to the medicine box with a finger. He swallowed the tablets dry, made a face as he did so.
After a minute, Sol slid from the tailgate to take most of his weight on his right foot. His breath escaped between clenched teeth and he closed his eyes for a moment, mouth fixed on the thin edge of profanity. With his right hand, he undid the top button of his fly, inched down his jeans and his boxers, revealing a spectacular bruise on his hipbone. He took one long shuddering breath as he pressed fingers to either side, assessing for internal damage, Lutie assumed. He transferred the wrapped bottle of ice to his other hand, held it against his hip with a hiss.
“I’m driving,” Baz said. Then he gestured beyond the tailgate, into the territory of rope and car parts. “Lay down in the back. Keep that ice on the bruises.”
Sol gave him a look, and Lutie just about burst out laughing. He wasn’t going to say what was on his mind, probably deemed it pointless, and instead shook his head, tossed the water bottle in the back and eased up his jeans. With difficulty, he put on his parka, not allowing Baz’s help with it. He pushed off from the Wagoneer, stood in the clear prairie light, face turned away from them, staring out at the horizon.
Lutie closed the tailgate, taking his hint. He shouldn’t be driving, but he was stubborn, and it was hard to argue with a brick wall.
Sol came around slowly, stiffly, and opened the driver’s door before turning to Lutie and gruffly informing her that they’d meet back at the motel. Baz moved then: he got between Sol and the driver’s seat, slender body inserting himself right in the middle, and Lutie recognized that screwing up courage sometimes meant allowing yourself anger.
Baz held out his hand. “The keys.” Long moment, eyes locked. “Don’t be an asshole.” Sol seemed close to pushing Baz out the way when Baz lowered his voice, pitched same as the wind. “You never let anyone help. You’re so damn selfish.”
Wow, way to kick someone when they’re down, Lutie thought, and then, amazed, watched as Sol withdrew his hand from his parka’s pocket, handed over his keys. Without a word, he walked slowly around the truck, one hand touching the vehicle at all times like it was home base and he’d be tagged out if he let go.
Baz stared at Lutie, shock on his face. He didn’t seem to call Sol on his behavior often; it was probably the first time Sol had backed down.
Once behind the wheel of her car, Lutie led them out of the field and they hadn’t gone a half-mile down the road towards Brule when she noticed lights flashing across the long stretch of prairie. Police, nestled right in around the silos by the track. She slowed the car and pulled to the side of the road, Baz following in the Wagoneer. As the truck eased up beside her, Sol rolled down his window.
“Well?” she asked.
Sol had one hand out the window, eyes intent on the far silos, on the emergency vehicles. Two ambulances, a fire truck. Three police cars. Baz said something beside him from the driver’s seat and Sol said something back, Lutie couldn’t tell what had been exchanged, but then Baz’s voice rose.
“No!” Baz exploded and the Wagoneer inched forward a little.
“Hey!” Lutie called back, and Sol turned in his seat. His eyes were unreadable, dark, tired and in pain and he looked like he didn’t want to deal with any of it, but that he was going to anyway. “I’ll go find out what’s going on, I’ll meet you back at the motel,” she said, heart thudding. She didn’t know how any of this worked, how to talk to cops. She couldn’t let her brothers know that. “The way you look, any cop sees you, Sol, they’re going to haul you into the station.”
Sol’s smile disappeared. She had a point and he knew it. He tried a different tack. “We can read about it in the papers, or make a phone call from the motel. You don’t have to go there.”
“I have to go there,” she replied, and rolled up her window, leaving Sol speechless. Baz gunned the engine and pulled ahead of her, heading back to Ogallala before Sol could jump out to argue.
Two cops leaning against a cruiser gave her a good look as she pulled into the parking lot beside th
e Coffee Caboose Museum, and one came off the car just like a dog would that had caught a nose-full of rabbit. She didn’t cut the engine, tried to look like a lost tourist, which wasn’t too difficult. Except tourists didn’t really come along here.
“Not a good day for a coffee, miss,” the cop said, a highway patrolman by the patch on his uniform. Lutie glanced behind him, but whatever was happening, or had happened, was blocked by the caboose itself.
A smile might work wonders. She’d put on makeup today. It was her birthday. All good reasons to think she’d be cut some slack. “I was just here not an hour ago. Bart said to come back, that he’d have a pot on.”
The cop exchanged a look with his buddy. Too much information? Lutie’s smile faltered a little.
“Bart’s not going to be making coffee today.” He paused, bent down to give her a good look, one gloved hand on her door. Then he asked her to get out of her car.
Once back at the Prairie Paradise Motel, they tried to avoid each other in the room, which was impossible. Baz bit his tongue half a dozen times, watching Sol wrap a bag of ice from the motel’s machine, alternating shoulder and hip, not staying still, edged. He downed some more painkillers from his box, but didn’t say a word or give any other indication about how he was feeling.
After an hour or so, Baz sat outside with Sol as his brother killed cigarettes one after the other. Baz told him that they’d been to the Coffee Caboose Museum before the ash storm, told him what he and Lutie had learned about the railroad bull. Sol asked few questions, remote, which told Baz that his brother already knew all about Lewis and how he’d died. Back to his usual self, back to square one.
The sun was lowering beyond the roof line of the tatty motel before Lutie’s car pulled in, Sol leaning against the cinderblock wall, Baz laying flat out on the Wagoneer’s hood, hands in pockets, staring at the sky. He sat up, recognizing the thin hum of the foreign motor, running on cheap gas, gerbils, a twisted rubber band. She sat in her car for a minute before turning off the engine, sun coming at such an angle that Baz couldn’t see her face. Sol didn’t move, wasn’t even looking in her direction. Finally, when Baz thought he could stand it no longer, Lutie got out. Baz could see right away that she’d been crying and he didn’t know if she’d want him to point that out, so he didn’t.
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