Nate’s eyes shone; he swallowed several times.
“You know me, Nate.” Quiet, excluding the others, excluding the world.
Nate nodded shakily, not protesting when Rina came up beside him and took hold of his hand.
“I can only tell you what I think. What I believe. I can speak for no one else. Do you want to know? Do you really want to know?’’
Nate sniffed, wanting to leave, wanting to listen.
Terrified.
“One minute,” Casey said. “Give me one minute.”
* * * *
Arlo stood behind the bar, juggling four empty beer bottles while Kay watched unimpressed from a stool. He hadn’t dropped a one, and he considered adding a fifth when something pounded against the back door.
Kay swiveled around quickly. “What the hell?”
The bottles fell, smashing one by one.
“Delivery?” she asked.
Arlo shook his head. No deliveries due today. It was Saturday, it was late, the back door was locked, his act interrupted just when it was getting good. And now he had to clean up the mess that crunched at his feet. The worst of it was, he wasn’t even drunk.
Something hit the door again.
“Hey,” he shouted, hands cupped around his mouth, “go around the front, it’s open!”
Kay leaned over the bar. “You got a broom, Arlo?”
The back door slammed open, rebounded off the wall, and was kicked open again. A dark figure stood on the threshold, winks of rain on its shoulders.
Kay uttered a small scream and hustled around to stand beside Arlo, -but not so close, he noticed, that she couldn’t make a break for the front door if she had to.
“We’re open, you idiot,” Arlo said angrily. “You could’ve used the front, you know. Man, that’s going to cost me a fortune, getting fixed and all. Hope you brought your wallet, I don’t take checks.”
The figure stepped inside, cloaked by the shadows that clung to the back.
Arlo heard the rain drip from the eaves, splatter on the gravel in the back driveway. He felt Kay easing away to the end of the bar. Like he needed this crap; like he really needed this crap. He rubbed a thumb along the side of his nose. “So what are you? Like, the Shadow or something?”
“No.”
Arlo frowned, ignoring Kay’s desperate gesturing for him to stop talking and get out of here. This was a guy he knew, but he couldn’t put a face to the sound of the voice. Maybe a guy who started out drunk at home and decided to finish it here, at Mackey’s. Maybe a guy who thought he was cute, being spooky, being cool, being an asshole who liked to smash in bar doors so he could brag about it to his friends.
“So shut what’s left of the door and come in, for God’s sake,” he said in disgust. “But you better have money, man, or you’re not getting a drop.”
“Yes, I am,” the figure said, and began to make his way around the tables. Into the light.
“Arlo?” Kay whispered.
Arlo barely stopped himself from bolting, grinned instead, and without looking away reached into the cooler for a fresh bottle of beer. “Well, peace, love, all that good shit, man. Looks like you survived.”
Diño Escobar stopped in the middle of the room, and traced a circle on the table beside him. “Yes. No thanks to you.”
Arlo snapped off the lid with a church key and set the bottle on the bar, hard enough to make Kay jump. “Old business? New business? Your buddy’s toast, you know. And I don’t think my karma can stand another round, okay?” With his free hand he pulled the shotgun from its clip, tipped it back against his shoulder.
All very smooth, he thought, all very calm, all very not how he felt when he saw the charring on the man’s suit, the debris from the forest floor, the raw red flesh and scratches and cuts across his dark-skinned face. The man was ugly before; he was damn sinful now.
“I think I’m going to leave,” Kay said nervously.
Escobar shook his head.
He didn’t say a word; he just shook his head.
* * * *
“They’ve always ridden, Nate,” Casey said, knowing he had to hurry, seeing the boy leaning, about ready to bolt. “Over every battlefield, every drought-dry farm, every village where people are sick and dying and have no way to cure themselves, have no one on the outside who can cure them if they knew.
“It’s not just in the last days.
“They’re always out there. Always have been.”
He sighed.
“Always.”
Nate couldn’t speak. His lips moved, his eyes pleaded, but he still couldn’t speak.
Rina spoke instead; “But this isn’t like that. This is my home. This isn’t like that. There’s nothing here that they want.”
“Nonsense,” said Mrs. Racine. “Can I get another cup of coffee, dear? This one’s gone cold.”
“You’re nuts,” Nate said to Casey. He shook his head sharply, pulling Rina after him toward the door. “You’re nuts, you know that? You’re not making any sense. It’s the end of the world, but maybe it isn’t...Jesus, Cora rang the damn bell, don’t you know that? She must have, and all that other stuff you’re talking about. .. you’re nuts. You’re talking nuts.”
“Nate!” he snapped.
The boy stopped, although Rina kept pushing at him, urging him to go on.
“Nate.”
* * * *
Tessa sat on the edge of the bed, head bowed, hands clasped between her knees. She was pretty much all cried out, pretty exhausted by the rage she had felt, first at Bobby for bashing Todd with his own guitar, then at Todd when she found out why. But Farber had been clever enough to chase her out of the room once the wound had been cleaned. Not that it was very much, just a small gash across the scalp, no more than three or four stitches she would have killed to do herself. And once all the paperwork had been done and Todd sent back to the diner, Farber had said nothing, just let her go.
“To enjoy the rain,” he had told her. “Think of it as a bonus.”
Her laugh was dutiful, her direction straight for the house, with a stop along the way at Mackey’s for a quick shot, paying no attention to whoever it was who sat in silence at the back, and not giving a damn. Sociable was the last thing she felt like right now.
Helen, however, had beaten her to it, and when she stomped into the bedroom, Helen had said, “Think about it, girl, before you say anything.”
Then Bobby had rolled over, saw her, and burst into new tears that Tessa couldn’t resist. Cursing Todd and men over and over, mumbling something about some woman who told her what men were really like, showing her what she could do, sobbing, subsiding, falling into a fitful sleep.
“Oh, brother,” she whispered, stood and stretched and walked to the window to look over the hedge at the Moonglow. Listen to the light rain. Wishing there were thunder and lightning and a powerful wind to suit her mood.
A footfall in the hallway.
“Helen?”
Bobby stirred but didn’t waken.
“Goddamnit, if that’s you, Todd ...”
A woman stepped into the room. “Sorry,” she said, lifting her dark eyebrows in a careless shrug. “It’s only me.”
“And who the hell are you?”
“It don’t matter,” Lupé said, and showed Tessa the knife.
* * * *
“Nate.”
Casey kept his voice steady, already thinking the boy was probably right, that he was indeed crazy, that his sickness and the heat and the charges he had taken upon himself without thinking had tipped him over without warning.
“So? What?”
Knowing, however, finally knowing that being insane was simply wishful thinking.
“There aren’t four out there, son.”
Nate sneered.
“There’s only one, Nate. There’s only one.”
Nate opened his mouth, then elbowed Mel away from the door and yanked it open, just as an explosion filled the night with fire and light.
Casey was off the stool before he even knew he was moving, shoving Nate, Rina, and Mel ahead of him through the door onto the sidewalk.
It wasn’t hard to find.
A fireball was in the process of implosion up on the Crest, but unlike the other night, this one didn’t die. It lashed sparks and tongues against the bottom of the clouds, and in contrast set the flatland into deeper darkness.
Casey ran while others shouted instructions for phone calls and volunteers, Mel yelling for someone to fetch Tessa, he would need her.
The fire took a voice, a low rumbling roar, and debris began to plummet out of the sky.
Part of a burning plank bounced off the sidewalk in front of the clinic, raising a cloud of sparks; smaller pieces of wood and melted plastic pattered like hail along the street, smoking, glowing black and red; a length of burning cloth held by the breeze-turned-slow wind danced above the slope as Casey approached the church, eyeing the steeple nervously for signs of sparks and flame; what was left of a wood chair bounced off a roof and fell in flames into the yard.
The voice of the fire.
Another voice behind him, and he looked over his shoulder, saw Kay racing toward him through a pocket of mist, waving her arms and screaming, shoving someone away who tried to stop her. He slowed, backpedaled, then paused in hesitation, then hurried toward her.
“Arlo!” she cried, and fell into his arms, pushed away, and said, “Arlo. That man. The man in the car. That man. Casey, that man!”
Indecision froze him until she yanked frantically on his arms, pulling him, forcing him to trot, to run, while the others raced in the opposite direction. As they passed the hardware store, Moss Tully stumbled out, hauling up his trousers, agape at the chaos, not arguing when Casey said, “The bar! Arlo!” and following behind.
The front window blew out, neon tubing and sparks spraying over the street. A second later, Arlo tripped and fell outside, shotgun in one hand, scrambled on hands and knees over the curb onto the blacktop where he rolled onto his back and aimed the weapon at the door. Kay stopped, but Casey kept running, one hand out to keep Arlo from firing, the other reaching for the closing door and snapping back when Diño Escobar stepped out.
“Holy shit!” Moss yelled, slipped on the sidewalk and fell against the wall.
“Padre,” Escobar said, teeth white in a shark’s smile.
The voice of the fire.
A horn blowing, shouts and cries, muffled explosions ranging over the Crest.
“I hit him!” Arlo shouted. “Jesus, I hit him, get away, Reverend, Jesus, get away, I can’t see him, get away!”
Pockets of smoke steamed from Escobar’s chest, a narrow strip of flesh dangled beneath his chin.
Casey didn’t bother to think or to question; he swung a fist and knocked the man into the recess, swung again and doubled Escobar over.
“Get away, damnit, Reverend, get away, let me shoot him again!”
Escobar straightened, slapped Casey’s next punch away, and lashed him across the cheek with the back of his hand. Casey’s head snapped to one side, seeing sparks that had nothing to do with the fire. Another slap, and Casey backed away, swinging and missing, tasting blood, vision threatening to blur, wondering how it was that this man, shot and practically dead, could be so damn strong.
Escobar landed an overhand left on the side of his head, and he went down to one knee.
“Reverend!” Moss yelled, just as Arlo fired over Casey’s rowed head.
Escobar took most of the blast in his chest, suit jacket fluttering and smoking, a tiny, short-lived fire near his heart, a now insolent turn as Moss came in low, aiming to tackle him and bring him down. Deliberately, swiftly, Escobar brought a fist up and turned it into a club, catching Moss squarely on the back of his neck.
Even through the voice of the fire, Casey heard the bone snap.
Arlo, still on his back and squirming away and trying to stand at the same time, fired again, hitting nothing but air and the edge of the roof. Splinters kicked into the air and were scattered by the slow wind that mixed them with more black-red fire hail from the Crest.
Escobar laughed and stepped out to the curb.
Casey, his breath in short supply, tried to stand, but the man whirled deftly and caught him in the ribs with an instep, flipping him over, landing him next to Tully, whose face was turned toward him, bleeding through the nose, his lips parted in an astonished grin. His eyes wide open, weeping rain.
Arlo fired again.
Escobar laughed again. “Aim next time, you old bastard,” he said. “I’ll wait. I’m in no hurry.”
Casey used the building to brace himself as he stood, one hand briefly brushing across Tully’s back in a silent promise and farewell. Kay was gone. Escobar was on the corner, a hand in a pocket, his battered face twisted in derision as he watched Arlo make it to his knees, and fall back again when another explosion highlighted the clouds.
This time Mackey didn’t hesitate, didn’t slip—he scrambled to his feet and ran, toward the new fire, the roaring, toward the people whose silhouettes flickered on and off at the top of the slope.
“Any time, my friend,” Escobar called after him. “Any time, I’ll be here,” and with a smile of disdain for Casey, he walked back into the bar.
Casey wanted to follow, to finish what had been started, but he also knew this was one fight he couldn’t handle alone, so he let the fire draw him while he held his side, pressing against the pain, waiting for the buzzing and the screams in his head to make way, to go away.
He got as far as the church before he saw Cora.
She sat on the flagstone, face raised to the clouds, rocking Dimitri in her arms, Sonya sitting beside her, sucking her thumb and staring and not seeing a thing.
“Cora?”
Cora rocked.
“Cora.”
He stood over her.
She looked up, lips pulled away from her teeth.
Dear God, he thought; all those tears.
“She blew it up,” Cora said, blinking slowly. “She blew the house up.” Her face began to change its shape. “She was a little kid, Reverend Chisholm, and she blew the house up.”
He knelt in front of her, tried to take Dimitri from her, but she snarled and pulled away.
“No! You can’t have him! You can’t save him, you son of a bitch.”
He saw it then, the blood in the boy’s hair, gleaming and still running, the blood on his bare back, gleaming and still running.
“The birds,” Cora sobbed, resting her cheek on Dimitri’s head. “Oh, God, he couldn’t hear the birds.”
* * * *
“Reverend Chisholm?” Sonya said, still staring, still sucking her thumb. “Reverend Chisholm, is Momma still alive? Did the bad girl hurt her?”
* * * *
A vehicle braked hard.
“Cora!” Reed called. “Cora, what—?”
Unsteadily Casey rocked to his feet while Cora rocked Dimitri. As Reed rushed past him, he turned stiffly, walked to Lambert’s pickup and almost said, “Take them inside, Micah, I they should be safe there.”
He didn’t.
He couldn’t.
The church was still locked.
“Come on, boy,” Micah said, ignoring Casey completely. “There’s folks up there need us, we gotta go. We’ll send the doc down for them.”
Casey saw someone running across the top of the slope; he couldn’t tell if they were afire or not.
He looked up at the steeple, and the belfry windows were black, edged with shimmering orange.
“Aw, hell, Dimmy,” he heard Reed say through a crack in his too-young voice.
Casey walked away.
* * * *
He walked west, and slowly.
He could smell smoke on his clothes, could smell smoke on the air, could feel pinpoints of fire where embers had landed on his shirt and neck.
He smelled blood.
He walked past Mackey’s and heard la
ughter inside, and the crash of breaking bottles.
He walked past the Moonglow, and there was no one inside, just the too-bright lights, and a crack across the window.
Two men ran past him toward the Crest, as if he weren’t there.
He heard someone call his name, but he didn’t turn until he heard it again.
Symphony - [Millennium Quartet 01] Page 30