A minute later two small bald-headed girls—the middle two of the reverend’s five daughters—ran past Rhonda and out the door. Elsa reappeared, dusting her hands. “You want that tea?” she asked, then disappeared in the other direction toward the kitchen.
Rhonda had never been invited past the living room. She’d bet good money the rest of the trailer looked like a hurricane hit it. Kids were kids, no matter what clade they came from. “Those girls downtown,” Rhonda called. “They were all wearing those white scarves. Two more pregnant girls I just passed were wearing them too. Seems like I’m seeing more and more of those.”
“The younger sisters like them.”
“Like them? It’s starting to look like a cult, Elsa. It started with that effigy of the doctor, and now all the girls want to be like them.” Three girls had burned an effigy of Dr. Fraelich and tossed it onto her lawn. The girls had been caught and punished, but they were still heroes to their sisters. “Next thing you know they’ll be dressed in robes, passing out tracts at the airport.”
Elsa came back carrying two tumblers full of iced tea. “A few of them got carried away. They’re not pagans, Rhonda. All my girls are good Christians.”
“Of course they are—they’re super Christians.” Rhonda drank from the glass with relish, and sat back. “Law, that’s good.” She sipped again and said, “Those teenagers, the ones that came through the Changes before puberty? I get the impression they think they’re a little more pure than everybody else—even the older sisters in their own clade.”
The reverend sat on the chair and sighed as if conceding the point. “They’re growing up in a different world than we did, Rhonda.”
“You don’t say.”
“The facts of life have changed. Those girls coming up now are sure they’re never going to be ‘defiled.’ They get to have their babies without going through any of that … business that other women have to go through.”
“They get to have their cake without having to eat it,” Rhonda said, and cackled.
The reverend allowed a wisp of a smile, and then her frown returned. “All they talk about is babies.” She pitched her voice to keep it within the thin walls of the trailer. “They don’t want to do anything but play with their dolls and talk about how wonderful it will be when they finally get their own children. And the only ones they admire more than themselves are the natural-borns.”
“I’ve noticed that, too,” Rhonda said.
“I’ve got NB girls having their periods at eight, nine years old. The oldest ones are nearly twelve. It won’t be long ’til I have babies raising babies, and the third generation will be upon us. And the white-scarf girls couldn’t be happier. You’d think angels were coming.”
“Hon, that’s a cult.”
“It’s not a cult, it’s just…” She shrugged.
“At the very least you’ve got another schism brewing.”
The reverend’s expression didn’t change, but she hadn’t missed that “another” slipped in like a knife. After the Changes, Harlan Martin had been determined to keep his church together, and he’d succeeded for a couple years. But he wasn’t about to alter his preaching to make it easier on all the people getting divorced, or moving in with people of the same clade. God doesn’t change, Harlan said, even if he changes us. Then Harlan tried to excommunicate two blank women who’d moved in together, and that was it—the fuse was lit. Rhonda admired Harlan for sticking to his scripture, but she’d already felt the political winds changing and knew he couldn’t win this fight. The blanks outnumbered the other clades in the church, and Elsa had led the charge to force him out. Her new church ordained her a week after Harlan cleaned out his office.
“They’re just children,” the reverend said. “They’re being rebellious.”
“Oh, listen to yourself. You already said they were growing up in a different world. You’re just an immigrant here, and you don’t understand the language. They think they’re the real thing. They probably don’t even think you’re a real beta.”
The reverend looked up, eyes slightly narrowed. In the limited vocabulary of beta expressions, that was outright anger.
So, Rhonda thought. The reverend had heard the girls talking about her.
“Listen to me, Elsa,” Rhonda said. “You’ve got to get hold of this before it spins out of control. Before they spin you out. You’re going to have to crack down on those teenagers. Make them throw out those scarves, for one.”
“I can’t just say, ‘No scarves.’ That would just make them more secretive, and I’d become the enemy.”
“You’re already the enemy,” Rhonda said. “You just have to make sure they know they need you.”
The reverend rubbed a finger over her smooth forehead. She went to the window and pushed aside the gauzy curtain. “Help me build the school, then.”
Ah. Every conversation with the reverend eventually came around to the beta school.
“We haven’t even broke ground on the high school yet,” Rhonda said. “The town can’t afford two new school buildings. Now if you wanted to start a private school …”
“You know the Co-op can’t do that,” the reverend said. “Most of us are on social assistance. We just don’t have the kind of resources you do.”
Rhonda almost laughed. The reverend also never failed to get a dig in about the vintage, thinking that her thinly veiled references would put Rhonda on the defensive. “I wish I could help you, Elsa.”
“What about the grants?” the reverend asked. “Do you honestly need all thirty million? Some of that money, just two or three million, could be used for a beta school—it would still be for education, after all. And say my girls don’t ever go to the high school, they go to this Co-op school instead. Then we don’t need as big a building.”
Rhonda pretended to consider it. “I hear what you’re saying. I do. And I’d like to help you, especially if it would make your people happy.” She shook her head. “But hon, that money’s been preallocated—the plans are submitted to the state. The federal and state grants are for building Switchcreek High School. Nothing else. The government don’t just let you spend it on whatever you want.”
The reverend paced the small room. Rhonda let her stew about it, think it was as unfeasible as all the other times they’d talked. Then when she didn’t say anything for a minute, Rhonda said, “Well, we could propose … No, Deke would never go for it.”
“What?”
“A branch campus.”
The reverend blinked at her. “High schools don’t have branch campuses.”
“Let’s just say it’s part of the high school that’s not connected to the main building,” Rhonda said. “We amend the plans to put a separate wing on the high school. Then after construction starts, we put the wing over here instead of over there—we don’t even have to change the blueprints.”
“You can’t do something like that and not have anybody notice, Mayor.”
“Oh, we wouldn’t hide it from anyone. We just make sure the whole council approves it.” The whole council being Mr. Sparks, the reverend, and Deke. Rhonda, as mayor, was a nonvoting member. “Then we make sure that none of our people make a fuss, or complain to the state. As long as we keep our paperwork straight and sell it to the town we’ll be all right.”
“That’s one tough sell,” the reverend said. “Mr. Sparks doesn’t want to change anything. The argos went along with the school last time because of their young ones, but those kids will graduate in a few years, and there aren’t any to replace them.”
“Not yet,” Rhonda said.
“Maybe not ever.” A few of the younger argos still hope to have their own babies some day, and so the high school plans made a concession to optimism: fifteen foot ceilings and double-wide doors.
“I’ll talk to Deke,” Rhonda said. “Maybe if we promise to throw some of the construction work his way …”
“He won’t take anything that looks like a payoff, Rhonda.”
“Any
work his company gets is money in the pockets of his workers. It’s good for his people.” She shrugged. “But it won’t feel like a payoff if I convince him that the beta school is for the good of all of us.”
“And what’s your reason, Rhonda? That high school’s been your pet project. I find it hard to believe you’d risk that.”
“Oh hon, I’m not risking the school. I’ll still get my football field. But I’m willing to cut out a few classrooms to help you build your school because I can do the math.” She smiled sweetly. “You betas are breeding twice as fast as my clade. The argos aren’t breeding at all, and the skips are dying off. In a few years the majority of voters are going to be little bald girls.” She shrugged. “I’m just preparing for the world to come.”
The reverend offered to walk Rhonda back to her car. The heat seemed worse when they stepped out of the air-conditioning.
They passed a group of natural-born girls, some of them only four or five years old, spread out on the patch of grass between two trailers playing Mother-may-I. They were being watched by some teenagers in white scarves. “Are any of these yours?” Rhonda asked.
The reverend pointed out a girl of about three or four, in matching green shorts and top. She held hands with one of the older white-scarf girls. “That’s my youngest.”
“Ah! The one that almost killed you.” The reverend had been on bed rest for the last five months of the pregnancy, her blood pressure through the roof. Two minutes after giving birth, she suffered a minor stroke. The right side of her face was briefly paralyzed, and she’d slurred her words for months. Even now her right arm was still weak, and she walked with a limp.
“A beautiful girl,” Rhonda said. “Now is that one of Jo Lynn’s daughters she’s holding hands with?”
“No, that one’s Marsha’s daughter. I’m sure Rainy and Sandra are around here somewhere.”
“I hope they’re fitting in all right. It must be hard, coming back into the fold. Especially with what those white-scarf girls think of their mother.”
“That’s all history.”
“Oh, hon, that kinda hate don’t go out of style. When those girls found out about Jo Lynn’s operations”—that was the politest word Rhonda could think of—“you’d have thought she’d been caught eating newborns for supper. And then when she tried to introduce birth control—”
“I’m not going to talk about this with you.”
“Jo committed the unforgivable sin,” Rhonda said, lowering her voice. “Maybe those white-scarves think that expelling Jo wasn’t punishment enough. People are saying, who knows what those girls are thinking?”
The reverend turned to face her. Her red face was smooth, almost unreadable. “People?” she said.
“It’s just rumors, Elsa. You know how people talk.”
“The DA said it was a suicide. They don’t believe the DA?”
“Of course they do! Some of them. Probably most of the town. Now you and me know that Roy Downer couldn’t find his butt cheeks with both hands, but the public, what they don’t know … Well, I’m just saying. If one of your girls, or God help us, Tommy Shields, had anything to do with this …”
“That’s enough,” the reverend said coldly. “Tommy loved Jo, and you know it. And these girls wouldn’t hurt a fly—it’s not in their nature.”
They’d almost reached the entrance to the farm. Everett stood next to the Caddy, talking on his cell phone, but he was looking at them. “Get the air-conditioning on,” Rhonda called. “I’m about to die of stroke.”
The reverend touched Rhonda’s arm, and Rhonda turned to face her. The reverend said, “I hope you aren’t riling people up, Mayor. It’s irresponsible and hurtful. If you go around accusing people—”
“Oh, I’m not accusing,” Rhonda said, her voice calm. “I’m advising.”
“What advice is that, exactly?”
“If your people had anything to do with Jo’s death, Elsa, then you better take care of it.” Rhonda patted her arm. “But I’m sure none of them did, did they?”
Everett drove slowly over the rutted drive. He waited while she dabbed the sweat from her forehead, but when they reached the gate he said, “So?”
“I didn’t see any laptop sitting out,” Rhonda said. “And I didn’t really have a chance to poke around.” She was sure that the reverend had grabbed Jo Lynn’s computer. Rhonda had had Everett search the church, to no avail. It was really too much to hope for that Elsa would leave the thing sitting out in plain view. “She’s got it somewhere,” Rhonda said. “Or Tommy has it. They were first into the house after the paramedics.”
“And what about our little bet?”
She allowed a little smile and put away her handkerchief. “Oh, most definitely.”
“Huh! She tell you that?”
“I gave her plenty of openings, but she wasn’t having any of it. Still, there’s no hiding it. The reverend is pregnant again.”
Everett shook his head admiringly. “You win,” he said. He accelerated away from the Co-op. “So now that I’m paying for lunch, where do you want to go?”
“Just drive out to Lambert,” Rhonda said. “And stop at the first place with a buffet.”
Chapter 8
HIS FIRST SENSATION was of his own mass, the vast bulk of his body stretched out across the dark like an unsteerable barge. It took him some time to realize that he’d been awakened by the noise of someone moving about the room.
He tried to open his eyes. The light was very bright. He squinted and began to make out shapes.
A woman stood on the other side of the room, her back to him. She seemed vaguely familiar, but then again, so did everything in the room.
“Heh,” he said. He’d been trying for “hello,” but his voice had snapped off like a rotted board. His throat ached, and he was terribly thirsty.
She glanced at him, and didn’t seem surprised that he’d spoken. She was in her midthirties, a thin, pale woman with blotched cheeks and forehead, as if she’d scrubbed her face with lye soap. She wore khaki pants, a plain collared shirt. Definitely an outsider.
“Good morning, Mr. Martin.”
Mr. Martin? For a moment he was confused—the name seemed to fit and not fit at the same time.
“I can’t believe you’re at a loss for words,” the woman said.
He tried to lift his arm and discovered it was tied down. Both arms were restrained. “Wah,” he said. He swallowed painfully and made a tipping motion with his captive hand. “Water.”
“I think we can do that.”
He blacked out before she returned.
He came awake a second time with someone bending over him. At first he thought it was Aunt Rhonda, and he grunted in surprise.
The chub girl—not Aunt Rhonda, a young girl maybe only twenty years old with bright red hair—put a hand on his forehead and said, “Shush, Paxton.” Her voice was a whisper.
That’s right. His name was Paxton. And he was—where was he?
The girl slowly moved a warm washcloth across his chest, and as she leaned over him the neck of her blouse gaped to reveal a large pair of breasts straining at a white bra, threatening avalanche.
“Doreen!”
The girl jerked away from him. “Doctor F, I was just—”
“I think he’s clean enough now,” a woman said. It was the pale woman from before.
“I’ll just dry him off and—”
“Doreen.”
The red-haired girl left the room. The doctor pulled down his smock from where it was bunched around his neck and covered him with the bedclothes. “Sorry about that,” the doctor said. “She’s not herself. It won’t happen again.”
“Okay,” he said. Wondering what exactly had happened.
“I’ve brought you some lunch,” the doctor said. She pulled a sliding table up to his bed.
“Lunch,” he said. “Right. Thanks.” He thought he sounded reasonably sane. In control.
The doctor moved aside a plastic water pitcher
and cup, then set out items she pulled from a white sack: a plastic-wrapped sandwich with the Bugler’s Grocery tag still on it, a fruit cup, and a chocolate chip cookie. Supplies for a sixth-grade field trip.
He wasn’t at all hungry. His throat still felt raw. It felt like hours had passed since he’d asked for water, but it could have been days.
Pax realized his arms were now untied. He started to push himself up, and Dr. Fraelich put a hand on his shoulder, then worked the bed’s remote until he was sitting upright. How long had he been in this bed? Someone, this woman or the chub girl, must have changed him, emptied his bedpan, wiped his ass.
“I’m sorry if I was …” Embarrassment made it hard to find the words. He shook his head. “You’re who?”
“I’m Dr. Fraelich,” she said. “You’re at my clinic, Mr. Martin.”
“Please, call me Pax.” A hazy memory came to him: Deke carrying him into a waiting room, setting him down in a plastic chair. At some point—the next hour? the next day?—he’d been put in a bed. Everything else was a blank.
He opened the metal lid of the fruit cup. His fingers felt clumsy. “I’m sorry if I caused you any trouble.”
“No trouble. The first twenty-four hours you did nothing but rant, with brief pauses to vomit,” the doctor said. “You eventually passed out, but then a couple hours later you went right back to the preaching and the yelling.”
Preaching? Pax thought. “So how long have I …?”
“You’ve been here three days.”
“Ouch,” he said. He tried to think of what day that made it. Thursday?
She put a hand on the door handle. “Any other questions?”
The Devil's Alphabet Page 11