Four and Twenty Blackbirds

by Cherie Priest

Page 25

 

  But if I were in Rachel's shoes I wouldn't want to spend eternity next to the man who'd cheated on me twice—once with a woman and once by taking his own life and leaving me. Malachi would have been young then, but not so young that he wouldn't have had a good idea what was going on. I didn't know exactly how old he was, but I was guessing he was maybe twelve or thirteen in 1979. I was also guessing that it was around that time (or shortly thereafter) that he came to live with Eliza. No wonder he was such a nut job.

  I sighed. Should I have brought flowers?

  No. What would be the point? I doubted Arthur had ever set eyes on me, and I doubted even more that he would have cared that I'd come by. He was obsessed with my mother, not with me. I was little more than an inconvenience. Our problem. That uncomplimentary phrase still itched in the back of my head, hard as I tried to exorcise it. The argument could easily be made that ultimately I had cost him the relationship he had with her.

  I'd been about two years old when he died. Had he ever tried to see me?

  Not likely. If he had, Lulu or my grandmother would have guessed who he was—taking Lu at her word and assuming they didn't already know. So why was I wasting my time hanging out at a stranger's grave? I shifted my light around and watched my feet part the grass as I navigated a trail between the stones. About halfway back to the road I sorted out a separate set of footsteps crunching through the grass, moving a split second slower than mine and taking a longer stride.

  I turned off my flashlight and stood still. Another voice called out.

  "Hello?"

  Hot damn, Eliza had been right.

  I didn't answer, but I hopped off the main path and set my back against one of the pillarlike monuments.

  "Hello? Is someone there?" He was not shouting, not even raising his voice above a hard whisper. I did not have to see him to know I should hide from him. I doubted he was armed, but there was no sense in taking chances.

  "I . . . I saw a car up by the road. Is there someone here?"

  Malachi had not been to see Eliza yet, otherwise he might have guessed whose car it was. My breath came a little faster, and my heart beat a little harder. Should I head for the car? Call out? I wasn't too far from the house at all; if I yelled, the cops down the hill would likely hear me.

  He stood as still as I had, nearly on the same spot where I'd been a moment before. I could have reached out and pulled his hair. He was nervous, but he was wanted by police in several states so I decided not to judge him a coward for his shaking. His shoulders were square and high, his neck craned forward, and his hands were held out and empty—not even a flashlight.

  Speaking of flashlights, my own was heavy enough to brain him with if it came down to it. I fondled the metal-and-glass instrument with both hands, but did not leap out to ambush him . . . yet. I wanted to know what he was up to.

  Reassured by the silence, Malachi's shoulders drooped back into the sloped posture I remembered, and his hands went into his pockets. No, he was no threat. I relaxed too, and followed him with my eyes, then with careful feet. I made my steps match his, staying a few stones back. I was not afraid of losing him. I knew where he was going. We both stopped near his father's grave. Our father's grave.

  Even in my head, I didn't like the sound of that. His father, then. My sperm donor.

  He sat cross-legged in front of the stone, holding his chin in his hands. I was glad he had no light—he might have noticed the freshly bent grass where I'd trampled the same spot.

  Malachi ran his fingers through his hair, pushing it out of his face, and returned his chin to his palms. I half expected him to start talking, either to himself, his dad, or to God, but he did not indulge. Instead he sat there with his head cocked as if he was paying very close attention to something I couldn't hear.

  Now I was annoyed with us both—me for following him and not leaving sooner, and him for sitting there like an idiot.

  Suddenly his head jerked up. "Where?" he asked, his voice louder than before. He swiveled his storklike head, nose in the air. "Where?" he asked again. "I know, but . . . I can do it. But. But. Okay. Not now. " Then he bolted back towards the fence, hopping over it with a spindly-legged leap and disappearing down the hill.

  My eyes were wide. He had successfully creeped me out.

  I shook my head and flipped my light back on, making to leave as well. The bulb flickered and sputtered, then fizzed. I knocked it against a tombstone, but this only offended it more, and it died altogether. Oh well. There was light enough to see by the moon, at least to get myself back to the car. Despite my confidence in the lunar illumination, I got myself turned around and ended up farther down the hill, away from the gate but still within sight of my vehicle. I grumbled at myself, slung one leg over the fence and brought the other down behind it, dropping my shin down on something very hard that was hidden in the grass just outside the ironwork barrier.

  Cursing all the way, I sat on the ground and lifted my jeans enough to see that I wasn't bleeding so badly that I should worry. I rolled my pants leg back down and felt around in the grass until I located the source of my pain.

  The weeds were high outside the family plot. In the dark, there was no way I could have seen and avoided the little stone. This was another marker, a grave set beyond the elitist dead of the Dufresne clan. I held the grass away and ran my fingers over the worn carving. With a bit of patience, I made out the inscription.

  UNKNOWN SEMINOLE MAN

  WHO CAME TO THE HOUSE ON

  OCT 22, 1906

  AND ASKED FOR JOHN GRAY

  GOD HELP HIM

  WE COULD NOT

  Bizarre. Just bizarre.

  I got to my feet and dusted myself off, then limped to my car.

  Down at Tatie's, much havoc had broken loose. The unmarked cars had emerged from their hiding places, interior blue lights raging. I drove by without stopping to see if they'd caught Malachi. If they hadn't yet, I was pretty sure they would get him before long. I squeezed forth a few drops of pity for the lad and went back out to the main road.

  He was my brother, after all.

  Eliza had told me everything she was going to for now—not that I could expect to get any more out of her while her nephew was busy getting rearrested under her roof. For lack of any better ideas, I returned to the hotel to pack up my things.

  Dave was waiting for me in the lobby.

  "Lu's worried sick about you. She called me in Atlanta and told me to come and get you. " His hands were folded in his lap, an overnight bag beside him, bulging with his camera equipment. A Styrofoam cup of brew, still mostly full, steamed on the coffee table before him. He hadn't been waiting long.

  "How'd you find me?"

  "Called around. It's not like you were using an alias or anything, and you've got that Visa card on my account. "

  "Oh yeah. I forgot about that. "

  I sat down next to him on the white plush couch. "Next time I should come incognito, eh?"

  "Wouldn't have done you any good to hide. I can't come home without you. Lu'd kill me first. I wasn't too worried for you until I started watching TV a few minutes ago. Check that out. " He pointed at the screen that the night clerk was listlessly paying half attention to.

  I looked in order to humor him. I could have guessed what it was without seeing the rolling captions.

  A police helicopter was combing the ground with a spotlight, circling and scanning the area around Eliza's homestead. If they were still looking that hard, he must not be in custody. "They haven't caught him yet?"

  "No. But they know he's there. They'll get him. "

  "Yeah. " I should have hit him on the head when I had the chance. Lounging there next to Dave, I suddenly couldn't remember why I hadn't done so.

  My uncle didn't take his eyes away from the television, so I didn't either. "Did you find your way out there? Well, I guess you must h
ave—since you recognized the place on TV. "

  "Yeah. I found it. "

  "How? Lu didn't point you there, did she?"

  I shook my head. "Good God, no. I did it the old-fashioned way, with a phone book. "

  "Learn anything good?"

  "Sort of. I found my father. "

  "Really?"

  "I mean, he's dead and everything, but I found him. "

  "Oh. " I thought he sounded relieved, maybe a bit.

  I went ahead and filled him in on the evening's events, leaving out the parts about Malachi being my brother and seeing him in the graveyard. Dave grunted agreeably at the narrative, finishing his coffee while I talked. I concluded with, "And then I saw you sitting here," bringing him as far up to date as I had any plans to.

  He twisted his arm around in his bag's strap, then stood with it. "Does this mean you're ready to come home?"

  I hesitated, but couldn't think of a reason to say no. Even so, I wasn't ready to run off to my room, pack up, and leap into my car. My hesitation was not lost on Dave.

  "It isn't safe here in town, not with that boy still running loose. "

  I wanted to point out that Malachi was in his mid-thirties by now, but it seemed superfluous. I wanted to insist that I stay where I was for a while yet, that I hadn't found out everything I needed to know, but nothing sounded practical or convincing.

  Dave shifted his weight beneath the heavy bag, waiting for my response. He looked old and tired, his eyes sagging from concern or lack of sleep and the first starts of gray decorating his temples. He wasn't my hippie fudge buddy anymore, but he was still Dave, and he deserved more from me than ambivalence.

  "I think I'm going to stay here, at least for another couple of days. They'll have Malachi before morning, and I'd like to talk to Tatie some more if I could. She got drunk and passed out before I managed to ask her everything I wanted. And maybe I'll go back to the cemetery in daylight or . . . " I glanced down at his camera bag. "I might take some pictures, or something," I finished weakly.

  "That's your call. But just so you know, Lu's gonna hurt me when she hears it. "