by Celia Jerome
B was easy, a sign on two posts saying Bayview, with a horse peeking around the uprights.
C was going to be for a condor that K2 drew with Letty’s help.
They wanted dressage for the D, so I showed them Ty’s website to see what it looked like: a high-stepping horse ought to be enough.
And so on.
“No, we are not drawing geldings. Think some more.”
“Flowers in a field for F? That’s a great idea, Mary Jane.”
H worked for the herding dogs. L definitely had to be for Lady Sparrow since Paloma Blanca got a page of her own. We brought up a picture of her on the computers from the website.
Native Americans, Open space, Rodeo clown—Yes, we were having two of them, friends of Ty’s.
Sheep.
I claimed the T. I sketched Ty and his Stetson in cartoon style, with running horses on the hatband ribbon. We’d never get done in time if I didn’t help, right?
X was tough, until someone yelled out, “An exit sign, so people can find their way home.”
We almost gave up on Z, but Mary Jane suggested a zebra. It was almost a horse, wasn’t it? No one liked the idea.
Letty ran over K2’s toes in her excitement. “How about a horse sleeping, with z’s coming out of its ear. Then we could write Good Night. Thank you for coming.”
Brilliant.
Except it reminded me of H’tah, and how I wasn’t looking for him.
Ty was so busy I seldom got to see him, and then it was with his friends or his business associates. There was no such thing as another private dinner for the two of us or a day at the beach. But we did get to spend the nights in each other’s arms.
There was no frantic hurry now, no stolen moments between watching for the mares and searching for the colt. We had all night, and a few more days. By now we were comfortable with each other, although still learning what we liked in lovemaking. Ty was imaginative and innovative and always caring of my pleasure. And he brought treats and chew toys for Little Red. Who could ask for more? When I slept, it was with complete satiation and contentment and exhaustion. No dreams.
Then he left. Dante was flying Ty in his private jet to New York to meet with Mr. Scowcroft’s lawyers, then to Albany to talk to the state comptroller and legislators about funds. If they had to, they’d fly on to Florida to urge Scowcroft himself into backing the plan and lowering the asking price.
My bed seemed awfully empty. So did my house. Susan spent all her free time at Rosehill, making friends with the mostly male show business people and helping Cousin Lily feed them. I didn’t know if she was spending time with Connor, but I hoped so, rather than sleeping her way through Ty’s friends and the crew.
I could understand how this was exciting for a small-town girl, having so many new men at her fingertips at once, but Connor needed her support. He’d been left as spokesman, the least talkative soul I’d ever met. I got the idea he disappeared whenever he could, because I saw him on the motorbike going through town when I went to and from the arts center. I wished Susan was with him; I prayed he wasn’t surfing by himself. He was a big part of the show, according to the program I was sending to the printer.
I was the last person to offer to help with the interviews. I’d have been stuttering and stammering, even if there was only a high school kid behind the camera.
I couldn’t help Connor, my jobs for the show were done, the class was going well, and I couldn’t sleep. So I went driving.
It was me and Little Red, cruising around the Hamptons looking for a cave or a number twenty. I thought there was a long avenue in Springs with numbered side streets, but the street names stopped at Nineteenth.
I parked as close as I could get to Cavett’s Cove in Montauk and walked along the beach by the lights from a nearby motel. When I got no vibes there, I drove back to Paumanok Harbor checking house numbers. Most people had taken down their protective Christmas lights, so it was too dark to read them. Other people never bothered to put up numbers, no matter how many times the police and firemen asked them to, for safety’s sake.
At first there was more nighttime traffic than usual through the Harbor, but as the hours went by, I began to feel alone in the dark, spooked by every odd shape on the side of the unlit roads.
H’tah might be alone in the dark, too. I locked the car doors and kept going.
I parked at a dead end that overlooked the bay and stopped to admire the stars and the moon on the water, with a few boats bobbing at anchor. Any one of them could be a drug runner. Any one of them could have a frightened horse on board.
I must have fallen asleep while worrying, because I started to dream. There was no danger in my dream, no horse either. All I saw was a willow tree. A weeping willow, like the one I had drawn for H’tah. I knew it was me.
“H’tah? Are you there?”
I got another view of the same tree, not the way I’d drawn it, with my arms—the tree branches and leaves—around a little white horse, but just the willow tree. I woke with a start, not frightened, not in a panic, but knowing H’tah was calling me. I tried to project back “I haven’t given up, baby! I’ll find you. Keep calling!”
I knew he couldn’t understand the words, and I didn’t know how to tell him I was coming. I grabbed the pad I always carried, turned on the car’s overhead light and drew the willow tree. Then I drew the horse, but at the farthest corner of my paper. I flipped the page and drew him closer. Another page, still closer to the tree. I closed my eyes and imprinted the pictures there. The next one was totally in my head, with horse and tree practically touching. “Visualize it, H’tah. See me coming for you.”
Then I started driving. Speeding, I guess. The farther the car got from the water, the fainter the picture of the willow in my head. The closer to Bayview, the more vivid the tree, with leaves and grass. But was that my memory? Or H’tah’s, a leftover remnant from his time there?
I had no way of knowing, except the tree I saw in my mind was not drawn in my style.
I knew at least twenty people were at Bayview, and I’d met most of them, so I drove up the hill to the ranch where clusters of campers and trailers were parked in the cleared area. A few lights were on, and I heard people talking softly, someone strumming a guitar. This could have been a cattle drive, except for the lack of cattle. And these were show business people, not cowboys. I spotted my cousin sitting at a picnic bench with the sound technician. Connor came toward me.
“Do you need something?”
“I thought I had a dream, maybe a vision, from the colt. I think he is still here.”
“Here in Paumanok Harbor or here at Bayview?”
“Here. I can see the vision stronger from here.”
Connor looked around. “There’s no place to hide.”
They’d bulldozed the buildings and filled in the old well before anyone was permitted to camp there. Uncle Henry declared the place a hazard, private property or not. Scowcroft’s people agreed to pay for the work, rather than face a lawsuit or a court order. The mayor agreed to get the job done with town employees in exchange for permission to use the land temporarily.
“Nothing here but weeds,” Connor told me.
And snakes. But only a few acres of the property were cleared so far.
I didn’t even have a flashlight.
“I’ll come back tomorrow.”
“We’ll be rehearsing. Setting up all the gear and testing the sound system. And three more damned interviews. I can’t help you.”
“That’s okay. You’re doing enough. Have you spoken to Doc lately?”
“Hell, no.”
I forgot. Doc liked to touch.
“Maybe my grandmother’s tea could help get you through those interviews.”
“Who are you kidding?” He adjusted his jeans as if the witch could shrivel his privates from a distance. Lord knew what he was doing with her favorite granddaughter out here. He sure looked guilty of something.
“I still think you should call Do
c. He’s great for relieving stress.”
So I called him in the morning. Then I went over to Grandma’s house after my class was done. She was out in one of the fields, supervising a crew of pickers, thank goodness.
“I have to go to Bayview,” I told Doc over a tuna fish sandwich.
“Sure. Lots to do over there.”
“No, I have to search it. There are snakes.”
“I heard they were mostly gone when the weeds were mown.”
“No one mowed where I have to go.”
He set his sandwich down and placed one of his hands over mine. “I’m sorry, Willow, I can’t go with you. I couldn’t walk over that rough ground, not with my cane.”
“I know. I just need some of your courage.” I felt better already, more sure of what I had to do.
“Why not wait for Ty to come back?”
“He’ll be too busy.”
“Then use your own courage, your own strength. You have it, Willy. More than enough.”
Courage, strength, and a hug from a shrink with a healing, heartening touch. I was ready.
CHAPTER 34
I WASN’T READY. NOT TO GO to the scene of two of the worst events in my life. By myself.
So I called my parents. My mother wanted to know about the dog handler for the sheep herding section. Was he reputable, did he treat the dogs well, should I contact the SPCA?
“You know him. You both studied at the Royce Institute.” I told her his name, and that his border collies were the happiest dogs I’ve ever seen, and they slept in his trailer with him at night. “He sends his regards, and asked if you were divorced or not.”
I’d like to know, myself, whether my parents were getting back together.
She didn’t answer. “I’ll put your father on the phone. He’s worried about you.”
What else was new?
This time my father told me to beware of sand pebbles.
“Wasn’t there a famous book by that name?”
“Just watch out for them, baby girl. I love you.”
“Me, too, Dad. Feel good.”
“I will, after your mother and those dogs leave. She’s trying to get me thrown out of the condo, I swear it.”
Maybe they’d be better off away from each other after all.
Then I thought about sand pebbles. What kind of danger could lurk in them? A piece of glass, maybe. I added that to the snowman and the banker and the cave and the number twenty. So now I was warned.
I was still not ready.
I tried to get Uncle Henry at the police station to lend me Big Eddie or any other of his weapons-carrying lieutenants. Big Eddie was temporarily hors de combat from the smells of sheep and new-mown grass from a recent visit to sniff the campers at Bayview for drugs or weapons in case the killer had come back. He was resting today, because he’d be stationed at one of the show’s entrances with Ranger to ensure no illegal substances got smuggled into the stadium. Everyone else was too busy planning traffic patterns, emergency procedures, and how to get free tickets. Uncle Henry told me to wait the three days till after the show. That’s what he was doing about Snake’s murder and the drug deal gone bad, although the Feds were snooping around. And wanting free tickets, too.
A falling out among thieves; that was the spin they were putting on Snake’s death for now while the medical examiner collected evidence at the morgue. In three days, Uncle Henry said, he’d have all the manpower we needed to walk every inch of the Bayview hills, and charge it to the department as looking for crime scene evidence. Which, of course, had been trampled on and mowed over by now.
When I said I couldn’t wait that long, the police chief asked if I saw spirits.
“No, just the colt. And the occasional troll.”
“That’s good. They used to say the cliff there was haunted. Some horse-wrangler died there, maybe forty, fifty years ago. No one ever proved if he jumped or got pushed over, but he’s still hanging around. Maybe that’s what got Snake so mean and crazy.”
Oh, boy. I couldn’t have a cop, but I’d have a ghost for company.
I tried to get K2 to come. He’d been there the first time and hadn’t seemed frightened by much. In fact, I’d bet he’d be thrilled to go on a ghost hunt. I found him at his father’s garage, eating a hot dog. He couldn’t go with me. Didn’t I remember? Letty had invited all the kids from the course out to her house for a pool party this afternoon. Wasn’t that cool?
Odd was the word I’d have chosen first. The Froelers entertaining local kids, encouraging Letty’s friendship with mechanics’ sons and fishermen’s daughters? Mr. Froeler and Lewis must be away on business. On her own, Alice Froeler would do anything to make her daughter happy.
Before I left, I told K2 why I was going to Bayview. “The colt is still there.” Then I waited.
No sneeze, no nasal drip, no need for a tissue. K2 was confirming my dream, so I had to get going.
I still wasn’t ready. I went home and changed my shorts for jeans, my sandals for thick winter knee-high boots I found in my mother’s coat closet. I also found an ankle-length yellow slicker with big pockets for water, bug repellent, a drawing pad, and marking pen. I grabbed a pair of thick gloves and one of my father’s old golf clubs.
Now I was ready for snakes or spooks, ticks and poison ivy, if I didn’t expire from heat exhaustion first. I left a message on Susan’s cell telling her where I was going, on the off chance I didn’t get back. I figured she’d send out a rescue squad sooner or later, when she was done collecting phone numbers and Facebook friends. I kissed Little Red good-bye in case I met the ghost or a snake and died of heart failure. Susan would take care of him, I hoped.
As I drove toward the ranch road, I heard heavy equipment way before I saw five wide grass mowers from the highway department clearing the front hill for additional show parking. The equipment operators would never hear my calls for help if I was in trouble. The engines were so loud, most of the men wore ear plugs. I waved and drove on.
No one was at the temporary campgrounds at the top of the hill, which was no more than I expected. Everyone was working hard to get the show set up in time on short notice. I parked and walked past the trailers and the sheep pen to the edge of the cleared area. I looked ahead of me and felt like Columbus, on my own, facing the unknown, praying the world wasn’t flat.
So far it wasn’t. The damned ranch had more hills and valleys than it had trees. My leg muscles started to ache in ten minutes from all the ups and downs. Good thing my ankle was all healed.
I passed highbush blueberries with some fruit the birds hadn’t picked clean, lots of blackberry brambles wherever the sun got through, cat briar that made me glad for the protective layers, no matter how I sweated beneath them. Wild grape vines hung off the scrub oaks and shad trees with their gnarly limbs. A scattering of pines had their trunks permanently bent away from the prevailing winds, but they made homes for the birds I could glimpse in the branches.
Every once in a while I stopped to listen for slithers or whispers in my head or a tortured soul bewailing its fate. All I heard was a squirrel scolding me and the wind picking up. I realized I wasn’t so hot anymore and looked up to see that dark clouds had filled the western sky. Now the place seemed more desolate than ever, haunted or not. I could see where someone might lose his mind. Snake sure had.
I followed deer tracks when I could, and avoided where I knew the lake to be. I didn’t care if phragmites had filled the whole thing or if it had dried up. H’tah couldn’t be there; nests of snakes could.
I went deeper into the property to where the land might never have been cleared, or not since Native Americans had camped here. I stopped again to check the line of the sun, but the clouds had obscured it. Great, I should have brought a compass. At least I had my cell phone. Which couldn’t get a signal, so far from a tower.
I took a drink from my water bottle and spoke out loud, just to hear my own voice: “Are you hiding, H’tah? You needn’t be afraid. It’s me, Willow
.” That’s when an image popped into my brain. The willow tree. He was here!
“Where, baby? Where?”
I had my drawings of the horse and the tree. I tore one in half and held them up, arm’s length apart. “Show me how to find you.”
Just the willow tree.
Could there be a weeping willow out here? I’d recognize one of them, for sure, but there were none in sight, nor had I passed any. I kept going, kept thinking of the colt, with the image of him as that proud young equine prince that defined his name. I wished I knew Ty’s chant. Hell, I wished Ty were here.
I saw the tree in my head, but I could not hear any words or feel any emotions not my own shaky ones. Maybe he was too tired or too weak to send more than the equivalent of a boat’s automatic distress call.
I listened hard enough to hear waves and seagulls over the wind sounds. At least I knew I was headed north, toward the bay. I kept on, not worried about any creatures but the one I wanted to find. I touched the bracelet on my wrist. I touched the pendant around my neck. You and I, H’tah. You and I.
That’s when I heard a new sound: like gravel being thrown at a window. Or like sand pebbles falling down the cliff side. I stopped in my tracks and spotted the remnants of an ancient split-rail fence, with only a few uprights remaining, just feet from me. Whoops.
I had reached the end of the world. And mine, if I took five more steps. As it was, the wind was scouring the tip of the cliff, sending those small stones hurtling into space onto the beach beneath. Far beneath, from the sound of it. Stones might survive the drop. I wouldn’t have.
“I have to go back, H’tah. I’m afraid the whole cliff top will crumble if I get too close to the edge. Don’t worry. I’ll come back from the beach side.” If I couldn’t get to him by land, I’d go by the sea.
Which was easier said than done. First I tripped over a small log hidden in the grass. But there were no trees this close to the edge, so exposed to the elements. I kicked the log aside, damning it for getting in my way, and saw a small round hole, about ten inches across. After what was in the old well, there was no way on earth I was going to look down that hole. It was far too small to get a horse through, anyway. I put the log back in place so Uncle Henry and the detectives could find it.