The Ghosts of Varner Creek

  She pulled back the hammer on the shotgun, "I killed her, her and that devil's seed you put in her," she told him. "She's free of you now."

  "What?" he said. "Who? What in the Sam hell are you on about? You gone crazy or something?"

  "Shut up!" she hissed at him, raising the gun a little more, centering on his chest. "You'll wake him and make it harder for him to go peaceful like."

  He was going to ask who again, but he suddenly realized just how serious Mama was. He slowly put his hands up as if offering surrender. “Annie, now I don’t know what’s gotten into to you, but . . . “

  "I know about Sarah," she told him. "I know what you’ve been doin’ with your own daughter, you bastard. You own daughter!” she whispered forcefully. “How could you do it, Abram? How could you take advantage of her like that . . . your own child?" Mad tears came, an angry storm brewing inside of her, but still she barely spoke above a whisper. He’d ruined her plans by waking up. She had wanted to shoot me in my sleep so I'd never see it coming, then finish Pap, but now he'd ruined that, just like he ruined everything. She’d have to kill him first. "She was pregnant.” Mama told him. “Did you know that Abram? Did yah know that you had gotten your own child pregnant? Did you know it while you were still laying down with her in sin like you did?"

  I felt Pap becoming shocked and terrified. He felt his sins biting at his heels. The hand of judgment was on him and he couldn't find words. He had suffered that nightmare childhood with his uncle, only to become just like the man he’d hated so much, and now it had caught up to him in the eyes of Annie. "Annie, now listen . . ."

  "No, Abram," she said with finality. "The devil’s waited long enough," and she pulled the shotgun’s trigger . . . Click! Pap's eyes shut tight as he waited for the blast, but it didn't come. He opened his eyes again. At first he wasn’t sure what’d happened, but then he looked down at the dresser drawer where he kept the shells and realized it was still shut. Mama pulled the second hammer back and fired again, Click! And then she knew it, too. The gun wasn't loaded. She wanted to charge him, to kill him with her own two hands, but she couldn't find the strength. Something in her broke and surrendered. All she wanted was to have it all finally ended, yet somehow she'd been robbed of that. Outside Sarah's body was growing cold under the night sky. Sol was sleeping in his bed, and she had meant to kill him, too. But the gun wasn't loaded. She was going to tear the Devil's web down and clear it all away, but the gun wasn't loaded. It wasn't fair, she thought. The tears were coming now and she lowered the gun. I could feel her surrender, and the hate at this cruel joke fate had dealt her, one more final blow. She laughed an empty and hollow laugh, "Look," she told Pap, "even hell won't have you."

  Pap walked around the bed quickly and grabbed the gun. He laid it in the corner and then he looked back at Mama. Sarah's soul and I watched her, a broken human being that could take no more. I half expected Pap to hit her, or maybe even load the gun itself and shoot her with it, but the emotions coming from him were different than anger. They were of guilt and remorse. And for all the evils that Pap had, for the first time ever, I saw him cry. "Annie," he said, but couldn’t finish. He wanted to apologize, I could feel it in him, but he knew an apology was worthless now. The demon inside himself always wanted other people to suffer what he’d suffered, and now it’d won out. “I ain't no good,” he told Mama. “I know. I ain't never been any good." She didn't say anything. All I sensed from Mama was die, die, die, die. Just let him die and the devil have him. Let us all die.

  Pap backed away from Mama and sat on the bed, watching her cautiously. He was waiting for her to scream and charge him in a blind rage. She was waiting, too, but couldn't find the spark in her to do it. What did it matter, she thought? All was rotten. If he hadn't gotten up, she would have finished her plan. She would have killed me in my bed, killed Pap, then set it all ablaze and stood in the fires of this hell on earth. But that was past, now. Sarah was free, and she thought to herself she'd have to be content with that. She was ready to kill herself, but that seemed too good for her at the moment. She should have to bear this pain for awhile, she thought. It would be a righteous punishment, the least she could do for Sarah was to grieve for her a while before escaping the pain of this world. "I'm gonna go, now, Abram," she said flatly.

  Pap looked at her blankly. I could feel the loathing in him. He hated himself so much, hated his uncle who'd stolen happiness from him, hated his father who died and mother who’s sent him to live with his uncle, hated Mama for being better than him, hated Sarah for her innocence, and hated me for the same reason. But it was too late for Pap to try and find the goodness within himself. The irreparable damage had been done and all the repentance in the world couldn't change it now. He’d done too much wrong over the years, and now time was the fire in which he’d burn, because they’d all caught up to him.

  "Sarah’s outside," Mama said. "Her soul is free and you can’t never touch her no more.” As if in a trance she started walking towards the door, and then she repeated, as though as much to herself as Pap, “I'm gonna go now." Pap thought he should stop her. She’d cracked and he knew it. Maybe he should drag her kicking and screaming to Emma's and tell them all the horrible things he'd done and what had happened. But even now he was a coward. He didn't want to face the judgment of anyone else for what he'd done. And he was scared of what Annie might do. She had lost her mind, there wasn't any doubt. His sins had destroyed her.

  He followed her outside to see what she had been talking about with Sarah. When he saw her, he froze. She looked like a life-size porcelain doll of herself, pale white under the moonlight. He walked over to her and knelt down by her. No breath escaped from her, no beat of the heart, and suddenly Pap realized what Mama had done. I felt the grief spring up inside of him. He’d been a cruel man and done terrible things, but he truly grieved for Sarah at that moment. He cried for her, he cried for Mama, and he cried for himself.

  Sarah’s spirit was next to me watching as I did, and she told me, “Daddy was broke, and couldn’t fix himself.”

  I just watched everything, taking it all in and trying to make sense of it. All their emotions and the things that had happened to them all their lives seeped into me, and what I was getting from Pap felt like poison. I hated him and felt sorry for him at the same time. He had such evil in him, but now I understood that he probably hadn’t been born that way. I understood what Sarah meant; he’d been broken a long time ago. It couldn’t excuse what he’d done, but in some way I supposed it helped explain it.

  Mama undid the gate to Lillipeg’s pen. Pap could only watch her. He was holding Sarah's hand trying to imagine how Mama could kill her. "How could you?" he asked Mama. How could you, I found myself asking Pap.

  "I'm gonna go, now," Mama said again in that same odd way like talking to everyone and no one at the same time. She opened up Lilipeg's pen and backed her out. She put Lilipeg's bridle on and harnessed her up. Pap couldn't move. He just stared at Sarah’s dead face, trying to wish it unreal. Finally he raised his head as Mama finished setting the wagon.

  "Where are you goin?" he asked. She didn't answer him. "Annie?" he asked pitifully.

  "I'm gonna go, now," she said for the last time. And with that, still in her nightgown and without any shoes or any of her things, Mama climbed into the wagon and flipped the reins. Lilipeg started with a slow walk, and Mama was gradually swallowed by the night while Pap was left with Sarah.

  Still standing within Sarah’s memory, we stood there looking down at Pap as he held her dead body. Her own emotions flowed from her to me as though we were spectators to the events of our lives, and yes even her death. All I sensed from her was pity and sadness. She didn’t seem to hate Pap at all for the things he’d done.

  I looked down at Pap and tried to feel the same way, but couldn’t. I still hated him. I had never known about him using Sarah like he’d done, and it made me realize he’d been false all the times I thought he’d been sweet to her. I thought back to the
times he’d played his sick games with me, holding me over the well as though ready to drop me, or the time he beat Mama, or the hundreds of times he pushed and smacked me around. The only person he treated with kindness was Sarah, and it’d all been a lie. He’d abused us all, but hers was the worst.

  As he knelt down there with Sarah I could sense him wondering what to do. Should he run after Annie? Or maybe go and get Colby? No, he couldn't do that. All the options seemed wrong. Annie was gone and who knows where she was headed. Sarah was dead in his arms, and Sol was sleeping through it all. Hide it, I knew he was thinking. Nobody has to know what happened. If Annie really leaves and doesn't come back, who would know? He could just tell everyone she left him and had and taken Sarah with her. He'd get rid of their things and everyone would think they just left. Nobody would know, not even Sol. And that’s when he probably thought of the creek, down by the bend where we went crabbing sometimes.

  It took Pap a while to finally get up and start to his task. First, he went inside and gathered up all of Mama and Sarah’s things. He must have been quieter than he’d ever been in his life not to wake me. I still couldn’t believe I’d slept through Mama coming into our room for Sarah, and then Pap coming in and taking all of Sarah’s things.

  When Pap emerged from the house again he had all of their things, Mama’s brushes, clothes, books from Miss Thomas . . . all of Sarah’s clothes and toys, including the gifts I’d given her for her birthday, they were all wrapped up in a big blanket. All except the little castle he’d carved from cedar for her. Pap walked out into the woods and buried the big blanket as best he could, as it would only be a short-term solution until he could burn it all, but the little castle he left by Sarah. After burying the other things he came back and laid out about a four by five section of chicken wire. He dragged Sarah’s body on top of it and gave her a long last look. He wanted to wrap her up se he didn’t have to see her when he hid her away, but that would make it hard for the creek to do its work. I could feel the regret in him, but I tried not to let myself feel sorry for him. Pap folded her arms on her chest and put the little castle in her hands. Then rolled up the chicken wire with her inside and fastened it with bits of barbed wire.

  It was a long walk for Pap down to the creek with Sarah’s body wrapped in the heavy wire. Unlike Uncle Colby, who had carried Sarah’s body like a bail of hay the day we found her, Pap could only walk a little ways before needing to stop and rest. Sometimes he tried to drag her by one end, but more often than not the wire would get tangled on brush and he had to carry her. All the while her face was uncovered, and his eyes kept falling upon her mask of death. I can’t say how long it took Pap, because everything seemed to change and Sarah and I were standing by the creek again, except it was daytime and beautiful. We were back where we’d started, next to place where Pap would hide her body that night.

  “It’s a sad memory,” she tells me again.

  I looked into her eyes, thinking about how she must feel knowing now just what it was Pap had done to her, and about how Mama had killed her out of some sense of sacrifice. “Yes,” I told her, “it sure is.” We stood together as I took in all I’d learned. I thought about Mama, traveling to some unknown destination, falling apart as she went. And Pap, who’d tried to cover up his sins despite his regrets, I remembered seeing him that morning with muddy boots and wet hair. Now I knew where they came from. I guess his regrets would get him in the end, though. He’d end up dead in town a month later. “Pap shot himself,” I told Sarah. “I’d always thought he’d killed himself because everyone found out he’d killed you and Mama. Turned out he didn’t murder anyone, though I guess he might as well have.”

  Sarah squeezed my hand and said, “I saw.” matter of factly.

  “You saw?” I asked. “How could you have seen that?”

  “When I got here,” she said. “I could see everything, even things that happened a long time ago.

  “How?” I ask.

  “I don’t know. I just think about something, and I see it. I’ll show you. Do you remember how Daddy stopped hitting Mama?”

  "Yes," I said. "Sometime around 1905, like someone had just turned off a switch. I often wondered about that."

  "It was Uncle Marcus,” she tells me.

  “Uncle Marcus? But he wasn’t even there.”

  “Just think about it. Think real hard why Daddy stopped hitting Mama, and the answer will come.”

  I closed my eyes and tried thinking about it, and slowly, I could feel something change.

  Chapter 17

  When I opened my eyes again I was in a field somewhere and there was a man working near us. I recognized him immediately as Pap. He was out feeding the cattle Mr. Pyle had in one of the fields. He was by himself in that particular area of the pasture when a man came riding up towards him. The horse was a beautiful gray with white spots along its side and running along its mane. The man dismounted and Pap barely paid him any attention at first, but then he stopped what he was doing as the man approached. By the time he recognized who the man was, it was too late. He had been knocked down with a swift punch. And before Pap could get up again he was staring down the barrel of a Colt .45 pistol that was being pressed up against his nose. On the other end of that Colt was Uncle Marcus. He still had that intimidating look he was so recognizable by, but he looked not a day over thirty, "I never liked you," he told Pap. "And if I had it to do over again I wouldn't never’ve let Annie get mixed up with yah." He put his right knee on Pap's chest and knelt down close, still holding the barrel of the gun against Pap's face. "But what's done is done and you're my sister's husband, now." He pushed his thumb down and cocked the pistol. "But if I ever and I mean ever, hear about you laying one finger on her again . . . I'll blow your head clean off, and smile while I do it. I bought this gun just for you, and if I ever get another letter from Emma saying you’ve hit Annie, you’re a dead man. Nobody knows I'm here 'cept you and Emma, but if I ever have to come back you'll be the last to know, because the last thing you'll hear is what this gun sounds like when I shoot you with it. You understand?"

  Uncle Marcus had a way with words, brief but powerful. Pap looked scared shitless. Uncle Marcus had scared Pap back before he had married Mama, but seeing him like he was now with that stare of death on him and that gun in his hand terrified Pap. "Yeah,” he told Marcus, but apparently Uncle Marcus didn’t feel convinced because he pressed just a little harder, “I understand!" Pap shouted. And only then did Uncle Marcus get off of him. He uncocked his gun, stood up, and walked away without another word. He must have taken the train all the way from Galveston to Houston and then all the way down to Varner Creek just to deliver that message in person to Pap. But even though he'd made the trip, he didn't visit anyone else except Aunt Emma that same day to ask her where he could find Pap. She didn't ask him what he intended to do and didn't have any idea what was said, but she saw the result same as us, even if we didn't know the cause back then. Pap quit hitting Mama after that day.

  "That explains who flipped the switch," I said to Sarah. "He never told me he had done that, even after I went to live with him."

  "Marcus was with Pap when he died, too," she told me.

  "What?" I asked. "I never knew that." That's not what I had been told. Uncle Marcus said Pap was already dead when he found him at Miss Thomas’.

  I didn’t have to ask her to show me, because once again everything around us changed. I could see Pap leaving Mr. Pyle's farm early the day I found her in the creek. He went home and started in on his last bit of whiskey. At the same time me, Uncle Colby, and everyone else were sitting in front of the sheriff's office with Sarah's body in the wagon, Pap was walking into town to go and buy another bottle. He didn't have a horse or wagon anymore, so he was on foot and coming through a little wooded area that ran up against some cropland on the edge of town. Before he came out onto Main Street he saw us off in the distance sitting in the wagon. Then he saw Uncle Colby going towards it with Dr. Wilkins by him. Pap fro
ze and his heart jumped up through his lungs. He stood with his feet growing roots in the ground as he watched the Doctor look into the wagon and appear to pull back a bed sheet. Shit, he told himself. So that's why Colby had left early. Somehow one of them knew where she might have been. I could feel his disappointed curiosity at how she’d been found. He should have burned the body, he scolded. He had been smart enough to gather up her things that night and hide them until after Sol left for Emma and Colby's, then make a fire and burn them to ashes, and now he wished he’d done the same with Sarah's body, because there she was. He started back the way he came and was going to head back home, but then he thought better of it. The sheriff will know by now, of course, and he had horses. By the time he could walk home that old fat bastard would likely be waiting there with three or four other fellas. So instead he crept back in the wooded area and found a spot where he had a pretty good view of town without anyone seeing him. We watched him creep behind the tree line, protected by the brush. His head was spinning with the whiskey and he tried to concentrate and think straight.

  Time skipped ahead under Sarah's control as she painted the picture of that afternoon. At about the time my living self was having dinner back at Aunt Emma's, Pap was still sitting on the edge of the wood thinking about what to do. He replayed events over and over again in his mind and remorse started eating at him. All the things in his life were coming back to haunt him. He decided to just sit and gather his thoughts on what he should do now. And as the light began fading away he saw the train pulling into town. A few people got off and on, and one of them that had exited went to the back car to get a horse. It was a gray horse with white spots along its side and neck that Pap could see from where he was. He had seen that horse before. There wasn't another like it in the whole town. That was Marcus. Annie! cried his thoughts. She must have gone to Galveston and told Marcus everything. Now Marcus had come back to kill him. He waited until the horse and its rider entered the town and disappeared between some buildings. Then he decided the light was fading enough that he might risk getting a little closer. So he crept down from his hiding spot and sneaked his way towards town. It took him a few minutes to get into town under the shadow of dusk, but when he did he noticed the gray horse was tied to the hitching post near Miss Thomas' house. Then he saw Marcus come rushing out of the door and head towards the Sheriff's office on foot.