by Lauren Wolk
For some reason he was afraid. Having to move the Schooner upset him, for he liked this spot by the stream and the way the fields looked in a storm. Pal, too, would miss it, her only home. But it was time to move, and move he would.
Something else was wrong. Something that awakened the remnants of his ancestors within him: those newly down from the trees, who stole the fur from bears and ate beetles, whose instincts made them bare their teeth and run, peeing down their legs, when the earth shuddered under their feet. Something that made Joe sweat heavily and lift his head suddenly off his pillow, again and again, throughout the long and empty night.
Chapter 33
“Ah,” said the man who answered Ian’s door, his face half-lathered, a razor in his hand. “Joe.”
“Morning, Mendelson,” Joe said.
“I heard you rattle by last night. About ten-thirty, wasn’t it?” The man spoke through the screen, did not open the door.
Joe nodded. “That’s right,” he said.
“You’ll be out by tonight, then?” It wasn’t a question. “That’ll be twenty-four hours. Actually, that’ll be about two weeks since I moved in. I was tempted to have that old heap of yours towed off long since, you know.”
Joe looked closely at the man in the doorway. The screen made him look all gray. “An odd thing to be tempted by.”
He turned and walked away, back through the woods to the Schooner, and began to break camp. He lashed his outdoor furniture to the top of the Schooner, coiled up his clothesline and stashed it inside, shook his awning free of leaves and acorns and furled it up tight. He unplugged his electric feed and retrieved the jacks that kept the Schooner level and bore some of its weight. Then he started the engine to make sure it would run. He always warmed the engine at least twice a week, listened for a lazy battery, checked what needed checking—but he’d been away for a month and was relieved when it started up. It had been much longer since he’d actually driven the Schooner anywhere, and the tires were mushy, but as he cast off it rolled smoothly over the bumpy ground, rocking a bit, unperturbed.
As he drove slowly along the narrow lane that led through the woods to Ian’s and on out to the road, Joe watched the tall grasses bend down before him. In his mirror, he caught a last glimpse of the place where he’d lived for more than two years now, of the fireplace he’d built, of the outhouse where Ian had found him in such an unusual state. He laughed aloud at the thought, his eyes full, and did not spare a glance at the man who stood out in front of Ian’s house, stiff-legged, like a dog.
Chapter 34
To Rachel, it would always seem odd, somehow prearranged, that she was once again lying in her hammock, her mouth full of sweets, when she heard the sound of the Schooner coming into town. She heard it come down Maple Street. She heard it approaching the bridge. But this time, when it reached the foot of her hill, it turned up toward her and came on slowly, laboring, edging up over the crest of the hill like a benign beast, and finally stopped alongside her house. Joe looked small and fragile through its vast windshield, as if he were starting his boyhood all over again.
At the first rumbles of the approaching Schooner, Pal had suddenly come bounding out of the woods, nearly singing with excitement, and Rachel had felt herself surrender to Joe’s proximity. Now that he was back in Belle Haven, now that he was within her reach, all the tempests knocking up against her ribs, twisting her gut, had calmed. Away, he had seemed so prone to villainy. Returning, he was ripe for pardon. The sight of him resolved things for her, took them clean out of her hands.
When he walked across the yard to her, she knew immediately that he was changed. But when he knelt down beside the hammock in the thick grass and laid his head on her belly, she put her hands on him and did not care.
Joe and Rachel spent the rest of that day together. They were never far apart and often found themselves wedged in the same chair, or Standing flush up against each other, or even more frequently locked in deliberate embrace. They ate from the same bowl, did not answer the phone when it rang, did not go beyond the borders of her land. They lay in bed in their hot, summer skins and talked and made love over and over again.
Joe had not yet told Rachel about his weeks away, but she already knew quite a lot about them. She knew he had done something about his father. What it was she didn’t know, but she sensed in him a serenity he hadn’t had before, certainly not in the hours before he’d gone away. She realized that he had put all of that part of his past where it could not hurt him as it had before. He seemed happy in a mild, peaceful, lasting way. He seemed sure of himself. He seemed wise.
Reluctant to tell Joe about Ross and everything that had happened since that day down in Caspar’s Hollow, Rachel had decided to wait until they’d had their fill of reunion. But Joe, too, could tell that something was different. He remembered the fear with which he’d slept the night before and saw, in Rachel’s eyes, its twin. She, who had always been so certain, so self-assured, seemed newly timid. Distracted. As if she were listening for something, even in the midst of laughter.
After supper, when they took their tea out onto the front porch, Joe went to the Schooner, returned with a box, and put it into Rachel’s lap.
“Open it,” he said, and told Rachel about the gold she found inside.
“Holly doesn’t want it, and neither do I,” he said. “Do you think Angela would use it for Rusty’s education?”
“What’s to think about? Of course she would.”
“Then how about you sneak it into her tips bucket for me. You’re always messing around back there behind the counter.”
“Why don’t you just give it to her yourself?”
“Nah,” he said, seemed about to elaborate, in the end did not.
“All right,” she said after a moment or two. “I guess you don’t really need this, now that you’ve claimed your inheritance.” She laid the heavy box on the floor.
“Oh, that,” he said, blowing on his tea. “I’ve already spent most of it.”
“Spent it?” She had always imagined that there was a great deal of money involved, and in this she was right. “For God’s sake, on what?”
“I invested it.”
“Invested it.” She nodded. “So you’ll live off the dividends?”
“No dividends.”
“What the hell did you buy, then?”
“A piece of land,” he said, grinning. “Prettiest land you ever saw.” But he did not tell her where, or why, he had bought it.
She pictured the bald, golden hills of California rolling into the tumultuous sea and could not really fault his impetuosity. But she put the image immediately out of her head. He would tell her about it when he was ready. She would listen when she had to.
“So now you’ll have to work for a living.” She snorted.
“Which I’ve been doing for two years now, going on three,” he said, reaching down to stroke Pal’s ears. “What’s wrong with that?”
“There’s not a thing wrong with that. Matter of fact, I think that’s great. Better than sitting around, living off the interest like me. Jesus, Joe, you make me feel like a wastrel.”
“Not at all,” he said mildly, sipping his tea. “I’m sure you have all sorts of plans for that money of yours. None of my business, anyway.”
“Damn straight,” she said, bracing her feet against the porch rail, tipping her chair up on its hind legs.
They sat for a while, watching the day go down into dusk. The sky became tarnished, everything colorful bled, and into the still air came the sound of cicadas, like mutant violins.
“I guess it’s time I let you know what’s been happening around here,” Rachel said with a sigh. And told Joe about Caspar’s Hollow.
She told him about the roof jutting up through the gritty soil like the bow of a sunken ship. “It was the strangest thing I’d ever seen,” she said. And she told him how she had unwisely stepped onto the insubstantial ground and nearly been buried alive. “Like Ross.”
&nb
sp; Joe didn’t move once as he listened to Rachel tell the story. He pictured her sinking into the earth, the dirt creeping along her body, up her neck, over her lips. Her eyes. He felt sick. He wanted to weep. He could hardly believe it when Rachel then began to talk about the aftermath, as if there was anything left to say except, It’s time to leave.
“A whole bunch of new people arrived a couple of days afterward,” she said, bringing her chair down on all fours. “Government people, scientists, geologists. Same as Mendelson and the rest who’ve been out here before, only now there are more of them and this time they mean business. They didn’t pay too much attention when cows went missing, but a dead man is different.” She bit her lip. “They dug for Ross’s body, but it’s long, long gone. Almost lost someone looking for him, so they quit. They left his house just the way it was when I found it. Nothing much they could do. But up here in town they’ve been going around from house to house, interviewing everybody who will talk to them. They’ve taken a health survey, put together a medical profile—”
“A medical profile?” Joe asked, his skin crawling.
“Seems there’s more cancer in Belle Haven than there should be, according to these new people. But mostly out near the tunnels.”
“And this is news to you?”
Rachel shifted in her chair. “There’s a lot of black lung around here. In the old men. That I already knew. But I didn’t know that there’s more cancer—especially breast cancer—than there ought to be, and I’m not surprised. I mean I’m not surprised that I didn’t know about it. It’s not the sort of thing people talk about. And besides, there still isn’t all that much. It’s the percentage that’s high.”
She paused. He said nothing.
“They’ve also put a monitor in everybody’s cellar,” she went on, not looking at him. “They’re saying that carbon monoxide could kill us in our sleep if we don’t turn them on. They’ve got everybody scared stiff.” She rubbed both eyes with the heels of her hands. “The government has no business here.”
From the hilltop, Joe could see that the sky above the distant fields was tinted with orange.
“There are more hot spots now, Joe,” she said, following his gaze. “All of a sudden.”
“Oh, come on, Rachel. There have been more and more hot spots for months now. But Ross dies and suddenly … there they are! Even Rachel Hearn sees them. That must mean they’re really there. Are you ready to talk about the fire now as if it really does exist? Not just ‘out there’ somewhere, but maybe everywhere by now. Do we get to do something, finally, instead of sitting around, knocking our knees, waiting for a sign from God? Which, as far as I’m concerned, you’ve had. Take your pick—rats, fires, sinking houses.” He shook his head at her. “Jesus, Rachel, you’re not stupid. You must have known this would happen sooner or later. You can’t save a town built on top of an inferno.”
She stared at him. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. This town’s not built on top of the fire. A few houses are. Which is why I—and a lot of other people—aren’t about to panic. Caspar’s Hollow is a good half mile away from here. Maybe the fire’s getting bad out there, but that’s out there. Not here.” She peered into her empty cup. “Even so,” she said, “we’ve decided to buy another fire truck for the town. And if there ever is a problem with gas coming up, those monitors will give warning in plenty of time.”
“And if another house goes down like Ross’s?”
“I can’t see that happening.”
“Oh, I see. You’re the expert now. Then tell me why Ross’s house went down. How close was he to a tunnel?”
Rachel looked away from him. “Well, there’s the strange part,” she muttered. “His house wasn’t actually close to a tunnel at all. They’re all west of his hollow. He must have been sitting above a long coal vein, a big one that went right up to the surface, which is very unlucky, of course. I’m sure the chances of the fire coming up directly underneath a house are pretty slim. It’s never come near us before.”
“Who’s us?” Joe snapped. “Obviously not Ross. Sophia? What about Sophia? Or Bill Hutter? Or the Saders?”
“You don’t know why Sophia’s house burned down, Joe, or why there was ice on Bill’s lawn, or why Becca Sader’s goddamned shower was too hot.”
“That’s right. I don’t. You don’t. Nobody does.”
“Look, I’m sorry for Sophia, and I’m sick about Ross, but the fact remains that the fire is nowhere close to most of this town. You look at the maps of the tunnels, and you’ll agree. They’re not a threat to most people.”
“Most people?” Joe pulled his chair up closer to Rachel’s so he could see her face more clearly, and she his. Pal, awakened, took up a fresh post at his side. “What about the ones who are at risk? A minority you’re prepared to sacrifice, I take it.” As she opened her mouth to speak he rose to his feet. “And what about all that coal down there?” he demanded. “You’re sitting up here on your hill, safe and sound, telling people to wait until their shoes start smoking before they run. Looking down your nose at anybody who’s got the good sense to be worried. While Angela and Rusty and all the rest of your pals down there walk around on top of a time bomb.” He glared at her. “Goddamn it, Rachel, grow up.”
She watched, speechless, as he stalked off the porch and into the Schooner, held the door for Pal and then shut it sharply behind them. He did not reappear for as long as she sat there alone in the darkness, stunned, furious, and for the first time sorry that he had come back to her changed.
Chapter 35
Rachel slept little that night. Her belly gurgled with acid, and her eyelids seemed to repel each other like mismatched magnets. Around midnight she heard Joe start up the Schooner and drive away. He drove out of town the way he had come in. She imagined that San Francisco had recalibrated Joe’s vision, had cast Belle Haven and all of its citizens—including Rachel herself—in a new, unfavorable light. She imagined that he was, at this moment, bound away, across the farmland, toward the nearest city.
The Schooner was the first thing Angela saw the next morning when she came down from her apartment above the coffee shop. She unlocked the front door and walked straight across the sidewalk to Joe’s door. She knocked, waited, knocked again.
“How do you want your eggs?” she asked when he opened the door.
“Good morning, Angela,” Joe said, knuckling his eyes. “Some law against sleeping past the crack of dawn?”
“Yep,” she said. “Never park your disreputable caravan outside my front door after a month’s absence unless you mean business. I’ve been itchin’ to talk to you, boy, and I hate to be kept waiting.”
“Don’t you want to know why my lovely caravan is parked outside your disreputable hash house?”
“All in good time,” she said, smiling. “Eggs?”
“Scrambled,” he said. “With cheese on top.”
“Ten minutes.” She turned on her heel and disappeared inside the coffee shop.
By the time Angela had fixed his breakfast—eggs with cheese, fried tomatoes, toast, coffee, and cranberry juice—Joe had showered, dressed, fed Pal, bought a paper.
“I know all about Holly,” she said, bringing him pepper. “And I know all about Mendelson moving into Ian’s place,” she said, back at the grill, busy with bacon. “But I don’t know why you’re here eating my eggs instead of up with Rachel where you belong.”
“We had a fight,” he said, drinking the cold juice. It was like liquid rubies. “I take it I’m the first to tell her how stupid she’s being about this fire business.”
“I don’t know as how I’d call her stupid.” Angela began to brew a second pot of coffee as a couple of farmers came in, corn silk on their sleeves. She took the first pot to their table, said hi, filled their mugs, put menus in their hands.
“You got to understand something about Rachel,” she told Joe. “And it’s not something I’ve ever said to her, because I think in time she’ll work everything out for her
self and rushing her won’t help. But it’s my opinion that the way Rachel is acting about this fire has a lot to do with the way her parents died. Actually, more to do with when they died. She was beginning to outgrow this long habit she had of always doing the right thing, being so reliable it about made you sick.” She glanced over at the farmers, who were waving their menus at her. “Keep your shirts on, I’ll just be a sec,” she called. “But she was on her way, starting to outgrow all that, when bang. Her parents got killed in a pretty horrible way. Right on the heels of a miserable time at school. And right before my eyes she did this incredible flipflop. Instantly. All of a sudden she’s stubborn as a mule. Pigheaded. Absolutely set on doing things her own way.” Angela waggled her head. “All in all, a pretty reasonable reaction, wouldn’t you say?”
Joe shrugged.
“Besides,” she said, poking a stray wisp of hair back into place. “She’s not the only one dragging her feet. We all are. Some people can’t see that there’s any problem at all. Some are bent on looking the other way. Some see it all right, but it’s like they’re looking through binoculars from the wrong end. Some see a problem like this and they get their backs up. Rachel’s one sort or another, I’m not sure which.”
“And what sort are you, Angela?”
“Hang on a minute.” She went back to the farmers, took their order. “I,” she said, cracking their eggs onto the grill, “am the sort who’s gotten very good at knowing when to throw in the towel. And I’m not there yet, that’s for damned sure.”
“Don’t you think you ought to get Rusty and your mother out of here?”
Angela put bread into the toaster.