by D. J. Butler
This, perversely, was reassuring. He wasn’t insane, he wasn’t imagining that there had once been a crack, and now it was gone.
There had been an opening, and Gus had bricked it shut.
He pounded on the stone. “Michael!”
No answer.
He went back to the ladder and looked up. The faces of the twins looked down.
Greta held an iron in her hand. In both hands, Dietrich held a heavy black skillet.
Hiram pressed his chi-rho amulet to his chest with his left hand and sprang up the ladder as quickly as he could with one hand. As he climbed, he shifted himself left and right.
The iron struck him on the left shoulder. Hiram grunted in pain, but he held tight to the rung, and pushed himself higher.
“Did that hurt, sieve and shears man?”
The pan struck him on his back. His feet lost his grip and he hung briefly over the shaft, scrabbling to get a grip. Then he dragged himself up and into the pantry.
The children stared at him with cold eyes.
Damn Gus Dollar.
The Cokes and candy bars stood on the counter. Hiram ignored them for the moment and rushed outside. He charged up to the boulders and scree behind the store, looking for the sheet of stone that screened the outside entrance into the caves that connected into Gus Dollar’s workroom.
And most likely into the mine as well.
He found the stone and climbed around it, grabbing his flashlight and preparing to deal with the spell he expected to find on the cave mouth—but this opening, too, was bricked up. Bricked up, and dirt and pebbles had been piled over it to conceal it.
“Michael!” He pounded on the stone.
Nothing.
He staggered back to the store and saw a second automobile parked in front, a red and white Ford Model A. On the porch stood Mary McGill. She wore a different dress under a stylish jacket, this one a beige color accented with a maroon scarf. A brown overcoat hung from her shoulders. She stared at him with a pale face and haunted eyes.
“You don’t look well, Hiram Woolley.”
“Sorry to say, Miss McGill, but you don’t, either.”
The woman clenched her jaws and nodded. That was strange.
Had she heard about Sorenson’s death? Did she blame Hiram? “I bet you’re thirsty.”
She raised her eyebrows at him. “Pardon me?”
“You stopped here because you were starting to feel warm and thirsty, and thought you might get a drink.”
“Well, I am thirsty. But I also came here to try to use the phone.”
“I just bought ten Cokes,” Hiram said. “I’ll give you one.”
“I’ll need something far stronger than that,” Mary whispered. “Someone has murdered a child up at the mine.”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Hiram fought sorrow and anger as he carried the ten Cokes in an apple crate he’d taken from behind Gus’s counter toward Mary’s car. He’d already wolfed down the Snickers bars, which took the edge off his hunger but also made him feel nauseated. Looking over his shoulder, he saw the two tow-headed twins, staring at him from the front window of the shop. They pressed their oily, soot-marked fingers to the window and smiled dreadfully.
Bewitched by Gus?
Or by the thing in the caves? Gus was evil, but Hiram’s real enemy was the fly demon, Mahoun-Samael. He’d have bet his farm that the demon was the same entity he’d seen in the peep-stone.
It was the demon that was manipulating the Kimballs.
Had it killed the Greek girl?
Fear spiked Hiram’s heart. If the fly demon had killed Callista, had it found Michael as well? Had it killed his son or dragged him into the pit? He recalled his dreams…searching for Michael, the empty roads, the voice booming out of a bottomless pit.
The fear threatened to kill him. His only sanctuary was prayer. Lord Divine, if it be thy will, bring my son to me. And please, let it be thy will. Amen.
“Sheriff’s deputies are coming up to retrieve Callista’s body and ask questions.” Mary opened the car door.
“Callista?” Hiram felt his heart stop.
“The murdered girl is named Callista Markopoulos. You shouldn’t be anywhere around here. Word has it, you’re a suspect for Sorenson’s murder.”
Hiram set the crate into the back seat. He looked; the twins were no longer in the store window. His stomach ached. “Do you want to ask whether I’m guilty?”
Mary laughed, and it was a bitter sound. “Hiram Woolley, I know you’re innocent. But it sounds like you should be taking your ring back. You might just need it.” She handed him the copper ring of escape.
He slipped it onto his finger; for him, it was a pinky ring.
“Let’s talk in my car. It’s cold out here.” Mary got behind the wheel.
Hiram sat in the passenger’s seat. He pulled his eyelids down with his fingertips. “I met the girl’s family.” He didn’t mention his run-in with Basil on the road nor how the man got his leg broken.
He’d wounded Medea’s husband, and now her daughter…was it Hiram’s fault?
Mary sat behind the wheel. “I told Ammon Kimball,” she said. “He called the police. He didn’t offer to help the family, though.”
“He won’t.” Hiram had to find Michael.
They lapsed into silence.
Finally Mary broke it. “Thank you, Mr. Woolley. Both the ring and sage leaf seemed to work. Here I am, free.”
Hiram was glad for the change of subject. “Five-Cent Jimmy showed up?”
“He did,” Mary replied, “and he worked his own special magic. When Jimmy tipped his hat on the way out the door, I’d swear Asael Fox wet his trousers.”
“Jimmy sounds like a good friend to have.” Hiram was glad Mary had escaped, but he had a hard time focusing on her freedom.
“Well,” Mary said, “if you get yourself tossed into the can, be sure to wear that ring. It may summon him. And do you know who came to the hearing, bold as daylight, and sat in the back grinning?”
Hiram tried to organize his reeling thoughts. “Ammon Kimball? Gus Dollar?”
Mary McGill snorted, blowing air. “The D and RGW Director of Carbon County Operations. The railroad man, Rettig. Filthy thug didn’t even try to hide his involvement.”
“You think…” Hiram concentrated. “You think Fox put you in jail because Rettig told him to.”
“Yes, I do. I think he’s making some kind of play for the mine, and I complicated things, so he wanted me out of the way.”
Hiram tried to follow the logic all the way through. “He could still buy the mine if the men working there were organized.”
“Yes, but it’d be worth less, because he’d be paying the men more.”
Hiram thought about the three railroad thugs and Dimitrios. Rettig wanted him out of the way, too. “I’m sorry.”
“For what? You aren’t Naaman Rettig. Oh, but I’ll make that little bastard sorry, I will. Once I’m done with the mine, I’ll start riding the D and RGW back and forth from Denver to Salt Lake, and I’ll organize every last porter, and get them to ask for better wages, and the firing of Naaman Rettig.”
Hiram managed to crack a smile. “I bet you will, too.”
“And I bet you’ll help Medea Markopoulos.”
Hiram nodded. “I will. But I need help, myself.” Hiram wanted to explain the situation calmly, but it was complicated, and suddenly he found himself babbling. “My son is missing. He was at Sorenson’s house when Sorenson got killed, and I haven’t been able to find him.”
Mary frowned, sighed, and let her sarcasm slip. “What, you didn’t try a charm?” Then she saw the expression on Hiram’s face. “Ah, I’m sorry. You did try a charm.”
“Other powers interfered,” Hiram said. “I have enemies.”
Mary glanced over and tried to find a smile. “I’m sorry for teasing. You must be worried sick. I want to vomit, myself. I feel so powerless. Tell me how I can help.”
“A ride?”
“I’ll be your chauffeur, Mr. Woolley. Let’s go find your son.”
Hiram’s heart was heavy. “This will sound odd, but…can I bring along my tool chest?”
He hid the Double-A by driving it into a depression screened by junipers and a jagged pile of red rock. Mary followed and waited on the main road as Hiram shifted his toolbox into the trunk of her car. Moving the toolbox, he thought about the lead lamen, with its reference to Jericho. Surely, Gus intended to use it to collapse the mine.
To defeat the demon.
But that didn’t mean that Gus was on Hiram’s side.
Hiram hurt, the ache of sleeplessness as well as the pains he’d acquired being bruised in the cave, waylaid by bandits, and attacked with ironmongery. At Mary’s suggestion, he hunkered down on the floor of the car’s back seat, ready to cover himself with a ratty wool driving blanket in case they passed anyone.
A wave of fatigue washed over him so hard, he almost fell asleep immediately. “Guess I better drink a Coke. Or two.”
“I thought you people weren’t supposed to drink coffee and Coca-Cola,” Mary said.
“Well,” Hiram said, “there’s more gray area than that.”
He downed one bottle of cola immediately, setting the empty bottle neatly on the back seat, then held the second to nurse it.
“What’s your son’s name?” Mary McGill asked over the front seat, once she had started the Model A.
“Michael.”
“He’s the young Indian man I saw up at the mine, right?”
“Practically a man.”
“What led you to adopt an Indian?”
Again, they were talking about nothing. It felt like a layer of icy normality lying over the top of a cold, wet abyss of horror. “His father and I were in the Great War. Yas was my best friend over there. He survived gas, and German bullets, and French girls, and army food. He was the toughest man I ever knew. He was a dreamer, he was very sensitive to things of the spirit. He talked about meaning and the gods and truth with an earnestness you never see, these days. And then he got killed by…”
By darkness itself, he didn’t say. By fools worshipping dark old gods, trying to salvage bloody national lines and pride.
“Anyway,” he continued, “his wife died in the Influenza Epidemic. It hit Indians pretty hard, I guess. But their baby son survived. It took a lot of talking to the tribal elders, but they finally let me adopt him.”
“You’re a good man, Hiram Woolley.”
“I aim to stand before the judgment bar and say I tried, with a clean conscience. I guess I can’t do much more than that.”
“Where would Michael go?”
…if he’s still alive. She didn’t say them, but Hiram felt the words hanging in the air.
He considered. He’d driven up and down Spring Canyon already. He’d tried a charm, and it seemed to have led him into a trap. Anyway, Michael hadn’t been where the Mosaical Rod had indicated. Hiram doubted Michael would stick around the mine, or Kimball Canyon at all. With Sorenson dead, there were no friendly faces there. So he’d head back to town. Maybe to Buford’s. The boarding house was so warm and comfortable that Hiram regretted he hadn’t taken at least a little nap in that large bed.
Hiram found himself drifting to sleep, Coke notwithstanding.
“Hiram?” she tried again.
“Town, I guess,” he said. “Just hopefully not one of the brothels. Ooh-la-la.”
“Town it is.”
Hiram watched the canyon walls spin slowly around the windows above him as Mary McGill turned the Model A about. He found the motion of the car hypnotic, so he grabbed another pair of Cokes.
He needed to find Michael, but there were other things he had to do, as well. If Michael wasn’t dead or held prisoner by Gus Dollar—Hiram shuddered at both possibilities—then he was probably fine. He was smarter than Hiram, and he should be able to handle himself.
“Why do you think you’re getting blamed for Bill Sorenson’s murder?” Mary asked.
“I have a revolver. It belonged to Michael’s father, Yas. Well, really, it belonged to an officer, but that fellow died and Yas used his gun to save the platoon and then everyone figured the gun should belong to Yas. He gave it to me when he died.” Hiram was babbling again; he tried to focus. “Last night, I gave Sorenson my weapon so he could protect Michael with it. And then Sorenson and his wife were both murdered.”
“With your gun.”
“I think so. Anyway, my gun was there, and some of the miners blamed me. Or my son.”
“Callista wasn’t shot. She was strangled.” Mary’s voice became subdued. “Her body was crawling with flies.”
Hiram nearly vomited.
Mary was silent—expecting a response? “I don’t have any good answers.”
“Things aren’t going to improve at the mine,” Mary said. “Dead kids have a way of making even sane people crazy.”
The mine. The Kimballs. Ammon, Samuel, Eliza. If he wasn’t at Buford’s, might Michael have gone to Eliza? Michael knew where her hotel room was. Other than Eliza and Naaman Rettig, Michael didn’t know anyone in Helper.
Eliza. The seer stone in Hiram’s pocket suddenly felt heavy, and seemed to burn him through several layers of fabric. Eliza needed to be warned. She’d need to be persuaded, too, because when he told her what he knew, she would scoff.
She might not scoff at the machinations of Naaman Rettig, though.
“We need to go see Eliza Kimball,” he said. “It’s a long shot, but Michael might have gone to her.”
“The sister. Where is she staying?”
“At the Hotel Utah. We’ll want to be careful, because Naaman Rettig is staying in the same hotel.”
“I know the place. It has a back stair. In a manner of speaking.”
Hiram was drifting into a warm sea of mindless sleep when the car jolted to a halt, shaking him awake.
“Lie down, cover up, and hold still,” Mary hissed.
He took the last sip of Coke and obeyed. He huddled under a blanket that smelled like engine oil and sweat and it cut off Hiram’s air, but he lay still as a lump of coal in the back seat and waited.
A brief silence ensued.
“Hello, Miss McGill.”
The voice belonged to G. Washington Dixon. Shanks.
“What’s the problem, officer? I was going to drive up to mine, after hearing about the Sorensons, but then had second thoughts.” Mary kept her voice even and cool.
“So you know about the murders,” Shanks continued. “But we also found a girl. Not sure who done it yet, but it looks like it might be that feller who came and saw you twice in the hoosegow. Woolley.”
“I don’t believe that,” Mary said.
“Nor do I,” Shanks exhaled loudly. “Chief Fox and the railroad do, though.”
The railroad? Rettig.
Mary tsked. “Surely, after getting chastised by the judge last night for exceeding his jurisdiction, Chief Fox doesn’t want to go arresting anyone up Spring Canyon this morning?”
“Nope,” Shanks said. “We’re just helping out the Carbon County Sheriff today.”
“Any other suspects?” Mary asked.
“Not one,” Shanks said. “The fellow’s gun is all we have, so even if he didn’t do the killing, we need to talk to him. The girl…wasn’t shot. I won’t say more. Only that you should stay away for a bit, ma’am.”
“So I should restrict my organizing activities to the other mines?”
“All these canyons are close enough, I figure you should probably stay in town for a few days. Get a hotel room, try the food at the Chop Suey. We got three movie theaters in Helper, you know, and a bowling alley.”
“You’re practically Coney Island. Well, as you can see, Sergeant Dixon, I’m headed down the canyon. As it happens, I have business in town, for today at least. I can’t guarantee I’ll stay down there. The spirit breatheth where he will, you know.”
Hiram heard a metallic thumping that sugges
ted that Shanks was pounding on the roof of the Model A. “Alright then, you drive safe.”
Hiram waited until the car was in gear and traveling down the road again before he pulled the blanket away from his face and spoke. “I think you quoted John chapter three,” he said.
“Ah, well, you wouldn’t quite recognize the words, would you? You’re stuck in your silly little King James translation, while I learned from the lovely, lilting phrases of the Douai. Deeply poetic, not afraid of the Virgin Mary like your English protestants were, and of course, rigorously checked against the Vulgate.”
“I don’t really know what you’re talking about,” Hiram admitted. “But the version I know says the wind bloweth where it listeth.”
Here they were, talking about nothing again. But it felt like a breath of fresh air in the cloud of death that enveloped them.
“What’s listeth?” she asked.
“It means wants. Old-fashioned. So I guess that means the same as your version. But I’m not sure about the wind and the spirit.”
“Well, you know,” Mary McGill said with a sigh. “Nuns.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Hiram kept low in the back seat as they drove through town and eased down an alley toward the Price River.
His thoughts danced erratically. The demon had killed twice—three victims in total. The mine still had to be opened, but the urgency of Kimball’s starving families faded by comparison with the murders. For that matter, Hiram was convinced the demon beneath the mine was the same entity as the luminous person he’d seen in the seer stone, which likely meant that the demon had been manipulating the Kimballs all along.
Rettig and his thugs complicated the situation.
Gus’s presence complicated everything even more. Did he truly want to defeat Samael? But if that was all he wanted, why not recruit Hiram as an ally, rather than manipulate and sabotage him? And Michael seemed to have disappeared near Dollar’s store.
And there remained the divination by sieve and shears, and what it had told Hiram—that he needed all three Kimballs’ hearts to soften.