Dark Channel

by Ray Garton

  “So what do you have in mind?” Marvin asked. “Are you planning on asking the Thornes about Hester’s … I don’t know what to call it … her powers?”

  “Not right away. I’d just like to talk with them about her, watch their reactions, see how they behave.”

  “What do you think made Hester that way?”

  Lizzie was quiet awhile, thinking, then she shrugged. “Who knows.”

  The sky was smeared with purple and orange from the setting sun by the time Marvin stopped the car just short of pulling into the Thornes’ long driveway.

  He turned to Lizzie and asked, “Now, you’re sure these people will be glad to see you.”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “What?”

  “I said they knew me, I didn’t say they’d be glad to see me.”

  Marvin closed his eyes, put his elbows on the steering wheel and his face in his hands. It was going to continue like this, he just knew it, with Lizzie testing his patience and Jordan’s, and Jordan finally making him take her all the way back to Irving.

  She did know a great deal about Hester Thorne and she was very interesting, but she was a big mistake.

  “Do you know,” Marvin said deliberately, “what these people do to visitors they’re not glad to see? They feed them to the dog, is what they do.”

  “They have a dog?”

  “No, no. They have a genetic experiment gone awry, is what they have. A pit bull that looks like something out of a Japanese monster movie. It tried to eat my car this morning.”

  She smiled. “I’m not too worried. Let’s go.”

  “Well, you’re the only one in here who’s not too worried.” He put the car into gear and turned onto the dusty road. “What do you plan on saying to these folks? Providing you get to speak before that mutant with a collar rips your throat out.” He got no response. When he glanced at her, Lizzie was wearing a relaxed expression and her eyes were closed. “Hello? Hey. Hey!”

  Her eyes opened slowly. “Does my praying bother you?” she asked with a slight smile.

  Marvin felt as if he were about to blush, like a little boy who’d just stepped in on his mother undressing. “Uh … oh. I see. I’m, uh, sorry.”

  “You ought to try it sometime,” she said as they continued down the bumpy road. “It’s very comforting and anyone who tells you it doesn’t work hasn’t done it enough.”

  “What did you ask for … if, uh, you don’t mind my asking.”

  “No, I don’t mind. I asked for help.”

  “Ah. I see. Well … I’m not sure I believe in god, myself.”

  “Oh, really?” She thought about that a moment, then turned to him and smiled. “You know, a planeful of atheists are likely to start praying if the plane’s going down.”

  He laughed and said, “You think so?”

  “Don’t you think so?”

  Marvin didn’t say so, but no, he didn’t think so. He knew some atheists and they were not the type to start praying when in danger—or in any situation. They more likely would try to find ways to get out of danger. But he didn’t want to get into that discussion with Lizzie.

  He parked in the same place he’d parked earlier that day. In fact, his clipboard was still lying on the ground untouched. When they got out of the car, it was only with great effort that he managed to make his legs work. His eyes were not still for a second as he watched for any sign of the dog, knowing he wouldn’t hear it when it came.

  Lizzie, on the other hand, walked with confidence, head held high as she went up the front steps to the porch, tan clutch purse tucked under her left arm. She gave four sharp knocks then took a step back.

  Marvin stood behind her, watching nervously for the pit bull as he reached inside his coat to turn on the recorder.

  There was movement inside, but no answer.

  Lizzie stepped forward and knocked again, then waited.

  When there was still no answer, Marvin moved up to her side and said quietly, “Look, there’s really no point in this. It’s not necessary. Why don’t we just—”

  A bare yellow light bulb above the door came on and the door opened a crack. Marvin saw the same woman peering out that he’d seen that morning.

  “You again,” she hissed. “You oughtn’ta come back here. My husband’s goin’ out the back door and you know what that means, don’tcha? He’s gonna be comin’ ’round here with—”

  “Mrs. Thorne?” Lizzie said, smiling. “I’m Lizzie Dayton. Remember me?”

  The woman squinted at her, looked her up and down, then said. “Oohh, yeah. I ’member you.” She opened the door a little more, her face softening with a cautious smile. “How you been?”

  “I’ve been just fine, Mrs. Thorne. And how about you and your husband?”

  “Oh, we been—” She stopped and her smile fell away as she glanced past them and scanned the front yard quickly. Then: “What’re you doin’ with him?”

  “This man is a friend of mine. He means no harm and he’s not trying to trick you into anything. He just needs very much to talk with you, and I thought that, since I haven’t seen you in so long, I’d come along and catch up on things.”

  “Oh. Well, um …” She reached up and tugged on her lower lip, frowning. “Corben’s not gonna like it, but …” She seemed torn, even a little afraid, and was about to speak again when—

  —Marvin heard familiar footsteps on the gravel and spun to see a dark figure standing in the twilight. And hunkering beside it was the dog.

  “Oh, god,” Marvin breathed.

  “Corben!” Mrs. Thorne called, opening the door and stepping out. She was tiny with a slight hunch to her back and her brown-streaked silver hair was so thin that her pink scalp was visible in patches. “It’s Lizzie. ’Member Lizzie Dayton? She’s come to—”

  “I don’t care ’bout her,” the man said in his deep, quiet voice. “All I know is that this fella don’t know when he ain’t wanted. Do ya, mister?”

  Marvin’s mouth worked but nothing came out at first, until: “I—I was juh-just wondering if m-maybe I could speak with—”

  Before Marvin could finish, Mr. Thorne made that sound again and the rock-solid dog shot forward and around the corner of the front porch toward the steps and—

  —Marvin stumbled backward, mumbling, “Oh my god oh my god” and he swung his arm up, pushing Lizzie away from the steps and toward the door where—

  —Mrs. Thorne backed into the house and closed the door on them and—

  —Marvin slammed his back against the door as the dog’s deep growl became louder and its paws made chittering sounds coming up the porch steps and—

  —Lizzie stepped forward, almost casually, until she was standing at the top of the steps and Marvin shouted, “No, no get away from—” but he didn’t finish because—

  —the dog stopped just two steps down from her.

  Lizzie stood motionless, her head bowed to stare down at the dog. She didn’t move a muscle.

  Neither did the dog. It froze on the steps, staring up at her, its lip quivering ever so slightly, its growl continuing like the idle of a distant engine.

  Mr. Thorne came away from the corner of the house and stood at the bottom of the steps. “What the hell’s a-matter with you, dammit! Hee-yup! C’mon, dog, hee-yup!”

  But the dog did not move. It didn’t even react to the man’s voice. It simply stared at Lizzie, its growl slowly diminishing until it was making no sound at all, its head lowering gradually but its eyes staying on Lizzie, until—

  —the pit bull made a soft whimpering sound and turned its eyes away, looking shamed as it turned and started back down the steps. Marvin noticed something astonishing: the dog’s tail was tucked between its hind legs.

  Mr. Thorne stared up at Lizzie, his jaw slack. The dog returned to his side.

  �
��You really should put that dog on a leash, Mr. Thorne,” Lizzie said. “He might hurt somebody.”

  He stared at her a moment longer, then kicked the pit bull and shouted, “Git outta here! Go on! Damned coward, git!”

  The dog kicked up gravel as it ran yelping around the corner of the house. Mr. Thorne followed, grumbling to himself.

  “How the hell did you do that?” Marvin hissed when Lizzie turned.

  She smiled. “I told you I asked for help, didn’t I?”

  Coffee brewed as Marvin, Lizzie and Mrs. Thorne sat at a table in the bright, spotless kitchen. Mr. Thorne said nothing to them and stayed in another part of the house.

  The house was old-fashioned with lots of old wooden furniture and handmade afghans on the two sofas and the chairs in the large living room and several braided rugs positioned here and there on the hardwood floor. There were no family pictures on the walls, tables or fireplace mantel. In fact, there were no photographs at all in the house. Instead, the walls were decorated with paintings and drawings of Christ, some framed, some not, and crosses of wood and plastic, some with small figures of Christ hanging on them. There were needlepoint samplers that quoted scripture. One in particular had caught Marvin’s attention in the hall between the living room and kitchen. It read:

  SATAN HIMSELF

  MASQUERADES AS

  AN ANGEL OF LIGHT.

  II CORINTHIANS 11:14

  “You know, I suspect you and Hester didn’t get on so well,” Mrs. Thorne said to Lizzie, smiling crookedly as her fingers fidgeted with one another.

  “No, I’m afraid we didn’t.”

  “Didn’t think so. Hester didn’t get on well with certain people.”

  “How did she get on with you?” Lizzie asked.

  Mrs. Thorne pulled her thin, papery lips between her teeth and bowed her head as she shook it slightly. “We tried, but… well, she just never seemed to take to us either.” She lifted her head. “I don’t understand. If you ain’t gonna write a book or a article, how come you’re askin’ all this stuff?”

  Lizzie said, “Some people went up to Grover where Hester’s group is and they never came back. Mr. Ackroyd is trying to help find them. We thought you might be able to tell us something that would be helpful.”

  She turned to Marvin and studied him for a while. “You think maybe Hester’s done something bad?”

  “I-I don’t know, Mrs. Thorne, I just thought maybe you’d—”

  “If you don’t know, then you don’t know anything about the Alliance.”

  “Why do you say that?” Lizzie asked.

  “You were born in the faith, Lizzie. Your mama took you to church every week. You’ve accepted Christ and you know the bible. Ain’t nothin’ good about what Hester’s doin’ now and you know it. She’s still my daughter and I love her with all my heart and always will, but … I’ll never know how she came to believe what she believes now. She didn’t get it from this house.”

  Marvin asked, “Does she know how you feel about her beliefs.”

  “Oh, I suspect she does. But Hester’s had nothin’ to do with us for … oh, a lotta years. I just about lost track, I think. Breaks my heart, too. Her daddy lost patience with her a long time ago and don’t even want to hear her name, but I know it hurts him, too. Deep inside.” She scowled. “Letting that … that thing she calls Orrin talk through her.”

  “What do you think Orrin is, Mrs. Thorne?”

  She stared at her hands a moment and watched her restless fingers, then said, “I don’t know,” as she pushed her chair away from the table abruptly, stood and went to the coffee maker. “Who wants Java?”

  They both said they’d like some and told her how they took it. As she poured their coffee, Lizzie said, “Surely you have some opinion about Orrin. It seems everyone else in the free world does. Not all of them are good, I’m sure you know.” She waited for a response, but none came; Mrs. Thorne simply busied herself at the counter. “When did you first find out about Orrin?”

  The old woman dropped a spoon and it clattered into the sink as she leaned against the counter, shoulders rising and falling with slow breaths.

  “Mrs. Thorne? Are you all right?”

  “Oh, sure, Lizzie, I’m fine.” She brought their coffee and returned to her seat, but she looked preoccupied and shaken, as if she were thinking thoughts she did not want to think.

  “So,” Lizzie said. “What do you think of Orrin?”

  Mrs. Thorne’s eyes met neither Lizzie nor Marvin’s. She stared at her coffee, looking uncomfortable. Her eyebrows rose, then fell, rose, then fell, and her lips squirmed, quivered, opened, closed. The tears came slowly and she blinked rapidly to hold them back. When they finally trickled down her pale, wrinkled cheeks, Lizzie reached over and put her hand on Mrs. Thorne’s.

  “I try to come up with somethin’ else,” Mrs. Thorne whispered, voice trembling. “I try and try, but … I always come to the same conclusion. When I read her books and listen to her tapes … when I hear about her on the radio and read about her in the newspapers … I always come to the same conclusion. There’s … some … demon in my little girl. Some horrible monster come to twist her soul into a weapon against god. Heaven knows we did our best to teach her right when she was growing up, but still, there were times … like once when we was arguing about church. When she was a little girl, Hester seemed to like church fine and went every week. Then, when she got older, she didn’t like it so much, wanted to stay home or go over to a friend’s house to watch the tee-vee. Then she just stopped. Refused to go. I talked to her about it one day and she threw a tizzy. Started breakin’ things in her room, callin’ me names—awful names, the most horrible names, words I didn’t know she knew—and for a second there, just for a little second, so quick I wasn’t even sure for a while if I heard it, she spoke in this … voice. T’wasn’t Hester’s voice. And I knew—I still know today—that she couldn’t’ve possibly changed her voice that much. It was a man. A deep, cold man’s voice.”

  “What did it say, Mrs. Thorne?” Lizzie asked urgently.

  “Oh, I won’t repeat such things, I won’t pass such words over my lips. It was just a second of profanity … all aimed at me. Couldn’t’ve shocked me or scared me more if she’d punched me in the mouth. Couldn’t’ve hurt me more, either.”

  “Did it ever happen again?”

  “Twice. Both the same. During arguments. Plus she … changed as she got older. Became angrier, meaner. Couldn’t have any pets. She did horrible things to ’em. Don’t know why, but she did. We were never sure, but we suspected her of hurtin’ some of the cattle, too. She just got worse until she finally graduated from high school. And then one day she just … left. It seemed so sudden, like. Just left. Never hear from her. Never see her. You don’t know how much I’d love to see her again, in spite of all this Orrin stuff. I think I’d burst with joy to see my baby. He’d never admit it, but I suspect Corben would, too. He’s gotta tough skin, but … but …”

  Until that moment, her tears were accompanied only by the slightest quiver in her voice, but she suddenly quaked with sobs that came out as mere whimpers from behind her tightly closed lips. Her body grew limp and she leaned forward, elbows on the table, hands covering her face. Lizzie stood and went to her side, putting an arm around her hitching shoulders. “How could it happen?” Mrs. Thorne asked, her voice a harsh, ragged whisper. “What’d we do wrong, huh Lizzie?” she sobbed. “Whatta you suppose brought this on? D’you suppose it happened when she was born? I never told nobody ’bout her birth.”

  “What about her birth, Mrs. Thorne?” Lizzie asked.

  “Hester was born dead. She was stillborn.”

  Marvin and Lizzie exchanged a glance.

  “She was born right here in this house. We had a midwife. She cried out when she realized the baby wasn’t breathin’ and then started snifflin’ like a little
girl. Corben saw what was wrong and started prayin’ right beside me, prayin’ like I never heard him pray before. Then pretty soon we heard the cry. A loud wail. We knew our baby was alive. The midwife just stared at it, pale as a ghost. And then … then … later …” She turned her teary eyes upward to Lizzie. “Why? Was it a punishment for Corben and me? Did god allow the devil to enter our baby when she was born?”

  Lizzie pulled her chair to Mrs. Thorne’s side and sat down, taking her hand. “You can’t blame yourself for this, Mrs. Thorne. It has nothing to do with you. God wouldn’t want you to hurt yourself like that. Keep in mind that we’re not sure what’s happened to Hester. We’ll never know how many proddings the lord’s given her, how many times he’s tapped on her shoulder. We all have a choice as to whom we serve, Mrs. Thorne. Hester’s made hers. All we can do is pray she’ll change her mind.”

  Marvin could tell by the look on Lizzie’s face that she didn’t think that would ever happen.

  4.

  They’d driven in silence for a while after leaving the Thornes, but once they’d started talking, they hadn’t stopped, and were still at it even now as Marvin drove through the night.

  “Well, maybe the Universal Enlightened Alliance is right,” Marvin was saying, playing the devil’s advocate … quite literally, in this case. “Maybe they’re harmless and their teachings have a lot of truth to them. Maybe Satan has nothing to do with them at all. And even if he does, Lucifer, if I’m not mistaken, means ‘bringer of light.’”

  “You’re right, Lucifer does mean ‘bringer of light.’ But the Enola Gay was a bringer of light, too, and I don’t think you’ll find any Japanese people to agree that it was harmless.”