Revelator: A Novel

by Daryl Gregory

  “Maybe. Or maybe they’re running for their lives.”

  “But sooner or later…”

  “Sooner or later, they’ll be looking for Sunny. You’ll have to keep her hid.”

  “I know my job.”

  She went up on tiptoes and gently kissed his damaged cheek. “I know you do.”

  * * *

  —

  the lanterns and the fireplace had been left burning, but Motty’s house had been abandoned. Stella went into the kitchen, peeled off the stiff, bloody shirt. The wound was a weepy mess but surprisingly small, the width of a nickel. The inside of the hole looked like raspberry jam. Maybe there was a bullet under there, maybe not. A problem for later.

  She sat at the kitchen table with Motty’s box of cast-off rags in front of her. This house had seen a constant need for bandages. She splashed moonshine across the wound, grimaced, then took a gulp for herself. She wrapped her arm, then held the end of the bandage in her teeth while she pinned it.

  After, she gingerly pulled on one of Motty’s old shirts. The cabin breathed as it always had in the winter, cold air outside, warm air within, the walls creaking like wooden lungs. The floors were seasoned with the sweat of generations of Birch women. How ridiculous that they thought these four rooms could someday be known as a new Jerusalem.

  She didn’t know how long she had to wait. She mixed coffee with her whiskey to keep awake.

  * * *

  —

  the headlights swept across the window sometime around three in the morning. The driver didn’t shut off the engine, but Stella recognized that Chevrolet rumble. She walked out to the porch.

  A figure stepped out from behind the wheel.

  Stella said, “You got my message.”

  “My father passed it along,” Alfonse Bowlin said. “My mother, well, she wasn’t happy about me having any more dealings with you.”

  “Understandable.”

  He walked up to her and she put a hand on the back of his neck. Touched her forehead to his. “I appreciate this. I can’t even tell you.”

  “It ain’t nothing, Stella.”

  He unloaded three big duffel bags from his trunk. He uncinched one and took out a cardboard box stamped hercules powder company.

  “This is the good stuff, fifty-percent mix,” Alfonse said, showing her one of the sticks. “The strongest they come.”

  “And this’ll do it?”

  “You said you needed to drop some rock. This’ll seal the deal.”

  “Okay, show me.”

  “Show you?”

  “Show me how to do it. How to put it all together. You know I ain’t afraid of a little fire.” Stella was an engineer at heart—she’d laid out and welded every pot and pipe in the Acorn Farm—and while she was respectful around explosives, they didn’t cause her to quake in her boots. Queen Bess, under high heat and creaking at the seams under the pressure of alcohol fumes, was a bomb-in-waiting, and she’d never lost sleep over it.

  He laughed. “How about you let me take the lead in this, just this once.”

  “I don’t want any of this to come back on you. I’m in serious trouble. There are…bodies.”

  “Plural?”

  “Four.”

  “Well, fuck.” He looked to the side. Nodded, taking it in. Then: “Is one of them that saltine cracker?”

  “Brother Paul.”

  “That’s him.”

  “As a matter of fact…”

  “Then it would be my pleasure. Where’s this cave of yours?”

  “You’re not going to like it.”

  * * *

  —

  “A church?” Alfonse shook his head. “No, this ain’t right.”

  “It’s not a real church,” Stella said. “It’s a fake. A front. If anybody asks, you said it was where some moonshiners were storing hooch.”

  “You don’t say,” Alfonse said. “Your uncle Hendrick, Brother Paul, and these other fellas, they were moonshiners who…what?”

  “Got into a gunfight. Over money, probably. You know how criminals are.”

  “A greedy, violent lot.”

  Alfonse laid the tools and material on the chapel floor. A spool of green safety fuse, a pair of crimping pliers, heavy-gauge snips. A box of metal blasting caps. And the main prize: thirty full sticks of dynamite in three cardboard boxes. All of it purchased from his cousins working at the bauxite mine in Chattanooga.

  Assembling each stick was painstaking work. Alfonse had to crimp a length of safety fuse into the blasting cap, then slide the cap into the body of the dynamite stick. Crimp the cap too close to its internal charge, he said, and you’d lose a hand, or worse, set off the whole damn chain of explosives. Stella tried to help by handing him tools, but with her lame arm she wasn’t much help. In an hour he wired all thirty sticks. Each one trailed six feet of fuse.

  “Now let’s find the right places to set them.”

  “I’ll have to do that.”

  “Stella, no. Place them wrong, and the tunnel won’t collapse. Wire them wrong, and, well, you could blow yourself up. Plus…”

  “What?”

  “You’re not looking good, Stella.”

  “I’m fine,” she lied. Her arm ached. Sweat painted her neck, and she was on the verge of throwing up. She was also dying for a cigarette, but lighting up didn’t seem wise.

  “Think you could show me where the spot is?” he asked.

  She thought, The Ghostdaddy’s dead. If she never took him past the table room, he wouldn’t see something that would give him nightmares.

  “I can do it,” she said. “Let’s head down.”

  Alfonse ended up doing all the work, while she held the flashlight. His eyes kept asking questions, but she declined to answer. She tried not to think about the vault above her head. It was a tomb now. Let some far-future Howard Carter find it.

  An hour later, Alfonse crimped the last strand of safety fuse onto the main cord. They stood in the small passage, surrounded by stone, and she thought, I should send him out of here, then set it off right here.

  She’d known for a long time that she wasn’t fit for human company. That much had been clear even before she found out she wasn’t one of them. She’d murdered four people, one of them an innocent boy stupid enough to love her. If she stayed on this path she was on, she might have to kill more. Maybe that’s what Lena understood, at the end. Ray Wallace couldn’t abide what she was, and she couldn’t stand what she was becoming.

  Stella could end it now with one spark of the blasting cap. It wouldn’t be a bad way to go. Instant death and burial, and her bones laid deep underground, secret as a meteorite.

  Except: Sunny. Stella couldn’t leave her alone in the world.

  They backed out of the cave, letting the cord spool out behind them.

  “One more thing,” Stella said. Two of the generator’s gas cans were still full. Alfonse splashed gas down the main aisle and across the platform.

  Stella portioned out the gallon of hooch across the corpses. Thinking, Drink up, boys. You’ll be thirsty in hell.

  Out in the chapel yard she shook a cigarette from the pack of Lucky Strikes Merle had given her and lit up. She passed one to Alfonse. Together they enjoyed them for a moment, and then Alfonse stooped and handed her the end of the safety fuse.

  She touched the tip to the fuse. Watched it burn, spitting and twisting, until it disappeared through the chapel door.

  Waited a while longer.

  She looked at Alfonse and said, “Is it…?”

  A womp and the ground shook. A second later came another muffled explosion, and another, and suddenly a chain of them like rolling thunder. The chapel door banged open, and the cigarette jumped from her fingers. A black cloud billowed from the doorway, scattering moonlight. Not smoke; dus
t. The mountain emptying its lungs.

  Stella picked up her Lucky Strike. Still burning.

  “Huh,” she said aloud. She’d expected more. Then fire filled the doorway and she said, “There you go.”

  She wished they could stay to watch it burn.

  * * *

  —

  it was near dawn when they reached the top of Rich Mountain Gap. She and Alfonse got out of the Chevy and watched the sun come up over Thunderhead. Blue fog wreathed the mountains. The sunlight crept over the floor of the valley, and the autumn trees seemed to burst into flame along its path.

  The smoke from the chapel fire was all but invisible, a thin twist of black smoke rising through the fog. The rangers were no doubt already there.

  “Sure is pretty,” Alfonse said. He lit a cigarette, passed it to her.

  No wonder the Ghostdaddy had chosen this valley. No wonder the government wanted it. The cove was the prettiest place on Earth.

  She was exhausted, and would have liked to watch for an hour. But no, she had one more thing to take care of, and a long drive ahead.

  “You don’t have to do this,” Stella said for the third time.

  Alfonse lit his own cigarette. “Get in.”

  27

  1938

  Stella stood in front of the house, her feet planted in the red dirt, her face turned toward the road. The afternoon sun threw hard shadows across the yard. The carpetbag sat at her feet.

  “You’ll be back,” Motty said.

  The old woman was hanging back on the other side of the screen door, holding the baby. No outsider would mistakenly see it, not until some plausible gestational period had elapsed. Then Motty would claim the baby was a girl cousin from North Carolina, knowing everyone would assume it was the child of Stella and Lunk. One lie could cover the other.

  It was tradition. Everyone in the cove knew the Birch women were suspect: born out of wedlock, giving birth out of wedlock, a chain of fatherless daughters.

  “Lena swore she’d never come back, too,” Motty said.

  Without turning around, Stella said, “I ain’t Lena.”

  Stella had threatened a god. Promised to kill its next child. In the moment, she meant it—and meant it still. But years from now, when the time came, would she still have the strength? Abraham was willing to sacrifice his child. God turned his son over to the mob. But she was no god, and no Bible hero.

  She was a monster. Plain and simple. The only question was how long could she live with that knowledge.

  A shiny sedan pulled into the yard. Stella picked up the carpetbag. It felt like a hundred pounds of river rock. There was nothing in it but a few changes of clothes—no books, no framed pictures. The only picture she’d ever owned she tore to pieces. Why march off to a new life holding on to a lie?

  Motty said, “It’s your right to name her.”

  “Call it what you like.”

  “I was thinking of naming her after you.”

  “Suit yourself.”

  Merle stepped out of the car, long-legged, broad-shouldered. Stella walked toward her and Merle brought her in close. A strong arm circled her shoulders.

  “You okay?”

  Stella pressed her forehead into Merle’s shoulder. “Get me out of here.”

  Pee Wee opened the rear door and smoothly took the bag from her. “That’s all you got, kiddo?”

  Stella looked back toward the house. Motty stood behind the screen door, holding that bundle in one arm.

  Stella slid into the back seat. Cigarette smoke on leather made her think of her pa, those long hours in the truck on their way here from Chicago. Maybe one day she’d forgive him for breaking his word to Lena and taking her back to the cove. Maybe one day she’d forgive him for failing to protect her. But she was grateful for one thing he’d done for her. He’d taught her how to leave.

  28

  1948

  The electric percolator was such a tidy, efficient device. Stella liked everything about it: the little glass dome that showed the coffee bubbling, the cheerful red power light, the stainless-steel innards and the painted ceramic skin. It felt like the future.

  She and Alfonse sat at the table, pouring cups for each other. They were both exhausted by a long night and a day of driving, but this, this imitation moment of domesticity, was sweet. Alfonse’s Colt pistol lay on the table between them.

  They were on their third cup when the front door opened in the distant living room. Veronica and Rickie were arguing in low, urgent voices. It was Aunt Ruth who entered the kitchen. She didn’t see the strangers at first, and in that unguarded moment her face was a portrait of a lost woman: pale, hollow-eyed. Undone.

  Then Ruth saw her husband’s murderer sitting at her table, across from a Black man. To her credit she didn’t scream, or cry. Her face hardened.

  Stella put down her cup. “Howdy, Ruth.”

  The argument in the next room ceased. Stella waited.

  Veronica crept in, her eyes wide. She looked about as wrecked as her mother. Rickie loomed behind her. His arm was in a sling. He saw Alfonse and went purple.

  Alfonse stood up. “Ma’am.”

  Rickie bulled forward. “What the hell is a—?” He got as far as saying a word Alfonse didn’t approve of. Alfonse punched him in the nose. A quick jab.

  Rickie cried out, covered his nose with his free hand.

  “Navy,” Alfonse said under his breath.

  Veronica burst into tears. “Stella! What are you doing here? What happened to Daddy?”

  “Why don’t y’all have a seat,” Stella said.

  Ruth trembled with bottled rage. “Get out of my house.”

  “I’m going to need something first.”

  “Rickie, throw these people out.”

  But Rickie was in no shape to throw anything. Veronica gripped his arm, trying to soothe him. He’d had a tough week. Shot full of splinters, hit by a shovel, knocked out by a mountain man.

  “And call the police,” Ruth added. “We know about the fire. You started it, didn’t you? You murdered him.”

  Stella uncurled her fingers. Ruth stared at her open palms. Stella didn’t know how much the men had seen in the chapel, or how much they’d passed on.

  “Mother,” Veronica said. “Please.” Vee shut her eyes. Opened them. Between those two moments came a calculation.

  “All right,” Veronica said. “Tell us what you want.”

  “The Revelations. The original, handwritten ones, from Russell Birch on down.”

  “What?” Ruth was outraged.

  “They’re mine by right,” Stella said.

  “That’s ridiculous,” Ruth said. “They’re not leaving this house. They’re sacred.”

  Stella scraped back her chair and stood. “Take me to the safe, Vee.”

  Alfonse picked up his Colt.

  Ruth’s thin lips twisted into something like glee. “Only Hendrick knows that combination. Hendrick and myself. And I’ll never let you lay your filthy hands on them.”

  Veronica turned and walked out of the room. Stella followed and Ruth shouted, “Veronica Louise Birch! Get back here!”

  Rickie started to trail them and Alfonse said, “Ah ah ah. Let’s just wait here.”

  Stella said to Alfonse, “This won’t take long.”

  Hendrick’s office was at the end of the hall. Stella had walked through the house when they’d arrived an hour ago and found it empty. Empty of people, anyway. Every room was overcrowded with furniture: end tables and armchairs, lamps and armoires. Hendrick’s desk was a mighty rolltop that filled the room like an overturned lifeboat. The safe sat just behind it, beside Hendrick’s green suitcase.

  Veronica walked to the safe, knelt before it, and carefully dialed the combination. Stella suspected she was puttin’ on. Vee had to have opened this
safe a hundred times.

  The stack of manuscripts inside was surprisingly small. “Put them in the case,” Stella said.

  Veronica started moving them to the suitcase, going slow and careful. Some had cardboard covers, like accounting ledgers; others were loose pages wrapped in string. She asked, “Is Sunny all right?”

  “She will be.”

  “Thank goodness.”

  “Don’t pretend like you care about her.”

  “You’re wrong. I do care. If there’s a Revelator to serve the God in the Mountain, the work goes on, one body, ever—”

  “Your god’s dead.”

  Veronica’s face went still.

  “You heard me.”

  Stella could sympathize. The Ghostdaddy’s death was still a mystery to her. All those cryptic Revelations, the generations of women giving themselves to it, the endless promises of some immortal body resilient to the poisons of this world…and for what?

  Veronica shook her head as if she was coming awake. “I don’t believe you. You can’t kill God.”

  “You ought to ask Jesus about that.”

  “He rose again.”

  “Which you know because of scripture,” Stella said. “Because the Bible told you so.” Stella slammed the lid shut. Turned out, one suitcase could contain an entire religion. She carried it to the doorway. Stopped. “One more thing.”

  Veronica sighed elaborately.

  “I don’t know how many copies Hendrick printed. I don’t know where they’re stored. But I advise you to burn them all. If I ever see a single copy out in the world, or find out you’re trying to publish them? I will come back here and kill you all. You, your mother, Rickie. Everyone.”

  “You wouldn’t.” Her voice was a whisper.

  “Tell me, Veronica. Tell me what I would or wouldn’t do to protect my family.”

  “But, but, we’re your—”

  “No. You aren’t. You never were.”

  * * *