Setting the Nehi down, Tommy Lee leaned over and poked with his finger at the pink ridge of fat sticking out from the space between Alvin’s tight undershirt and his pants. “Look there, you see that?”
Why, I just got to get him some new clothes,” Priscilla said apologetically, hurrying over and rubbing Alvin’s shoulders. “He’s just been growing so fast.”
“It ain’t growing,” Tommy Lee said. “It’s ballooning up. Ain’t the same thing at all.”
Priscilla kept her hands protectively on Alvin’s shoulders. “He say anything?”
Tommy Lee gulped his Nehi, then lowered the bottle and grimaced. “Who? Old Doc?” he asked in a specimen of the undertaker humor that Priscilla had gotten used to.
Priscilla turned up the corners of her mouth. “That Robins fellow. ’
“Nope,” Tommy Lee said. “Real queer-acting. Said he wanted to be with old Doc. Hope they have them a real good time.” Tommy Lee took another sip from the Nehi. “Sure hope his eyes don’t come open again. I never did think I was going to get them eyes of his shut. All morning, every time I like to turn around, they was open again, staring up. I ain’t never had one do me thataway. And the way them eyes was looking. Like he seen it coming.”
Priscilla was stroking Alvin’s stringy hair, but her hand stopped. Using her why-don t-we-all-be-sweet tone of voice, she said, “Alvin honey, ain’t there something on TV you’d like to watch?”
But Alvin was still looking at his dad.
“Ain’t no two alike,” Tommy Lee continued authoritatively. “Corpses, they got them a kind of personality. Like old Doc down yonder. You look in them eyes of his and it’s like you’re seeing something. Something that ain’t fit to be seen.”
Priscilla gave Alvin a shove now. “You go on and find you a show on TV to watch, hear?”
“Yes’m,” Alvin mumbled, reluctantly going into the living room.
It was only after she had heard the TV come on that Priscilla went over to Tommy Lee and said with a hiss, “I didn’t want you going on in front of the boy.”
Tommy Lee had emptied his Nehi now and set it on the counter, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.
“It’s just on account of them dreams, Tommy Lee,” she whispered.
Tommy Lee scowled. They had argued over it before, many times. Wasn’t it bad enough, them living right on top of the parlor? Priscilla would say. Why, Alvin couldn’t even pass by the steps leading down there, into the basement, without turning white as a sheet. Couldn’t Tommy Lee see he just wasn’t meant to be an undertaker?
But Tommy Lee was of a different mind. “I ain’t saying it don’t take some getting used to.” Which is what Tommy Lee had had in mind when, on the boy’s twelfth birthday, he took hold of Alvin’s hand and dragging him all the way down the basement steps, he had forced the boy to look at one of the corpses. It was the body of Lester Eubanks, who was just eight at the time of the hunting accident that killed him. Shrieking with terror, Alvin had broken loose from his daddy and come running like crazy up the steps, hiding in his mother’s arms.
That was the night he had started having his nightmares. Since that time Priscilla always tried to change the subject, or sent Alvin up to his room or out to the store, whenever Tommy Lee began talking about the corpses. Anything to keep him from hearing more than he had to.
“How you expect him to ever take over the home if he don’t know nothing about fixing up corpses?” Tommy Lee asked now. When he was Alvin’s age, he had already started working down in the parlor, helping his daddy with whatever he could. “Why, I wasn’t much older than he is now when my daddy showed me about the embalming.”
“But, hon,” Priscilla said, “Alvin ain’t cut out for undertaking.”
“And I reckon I know whose doing that is!”
“Now, hon, you know I ain’t never done anything to discourage him. You know that, Tommy Lee.” Priscilla was sweating from the exertion of speaking to her husband, and the sweat was pulling strands of hair into her face.
“Coddling. That’s what you done,” Tommy Lee shouted. “I told you what you should’ve done when he started having them dreams in the first place. You remember what I said? Let him sink or swim.”
Priscilla was trying to keep her own voice low. “I do, Tommy Lee. But sometimes them dreams of his are so bad, why, I just don’t have the heart to leave him be.”
All at once, Tommy Lee got a strange, even crazy look in his eyes. “You don’t think I had me some bad ones, too? I’ve had me some nightmares when I was a boy. Why, I seen them corpses sit up and grin at me. I seen them reach up and take hold of me by the neck. I seen them open them jaws so wide, so wide it was like they was going to...”
Priscilla stared at her husband, taken aback by his sudden vehemence. “Like they was going to what, Tommy Lee?”
“Never you mind. I done got over them. Reckon Alvin would, too, if you’d let him be. Ain’t nobody yet died on account of a bad dream from what I hear,” Tommy Lee said. He turned and brushed past his wife. “I reckon I better go on back down and see if them two’s done with their socializing.”
Priscilla went over to the sink and started to finish lip the dishes. Within a couple of minutes she heard her husband letting Robins out by the back door to the parlor. She craned her neck and looked out the window over the sink. A dark figure made its way across the yard.
She stared at the dark trees and the woods that came to the side of the parlor. Suddenly she shivered, remembering her husband’s words about the corpses sitting up. “Crazy thoughts,” she whispered to herself and turned the tap on. She stared down into the sink as the water swirled into the drain. Right down below her was old Doc. Right under her feet.
She was freezing cold now. Somehow she knew with absolute certainty that old Doc’s eyes had just snapped open.
When Robins left the funeral home, he walked across the Andersons’ yard toward old Doc’s place, cutting through a familiar path and coming out in the backyard. He stopped and stared up at the house. There was a full moon overhead, and all the windows showed its reflection. All but the windows at the very top. The ones in the attic.
Robins frowned. Somehow they didn’t look just dark. They looked black. Not black from shadow, but darkened by something else.
A thought hit him. He went up the back steps and quickly made his way to the third floor. He opened the door leading up to the attic and stared at the dusty steps. He clicked on the light and made his way up.
He stopped and looked around. The place was full of the thousand various things Doc could never bring himself to throw out. Old books, medical equipment, the telescope Robins had looked through as a boy, the woodworking tools. It was a treasure trove of memories. Robins made his way among them and walked toward one of the windows. It was clear. But it was one of the side windows. He turned around and looked to where the back windows would be. There was a wall nearly hidden behind boxes piled up one upon the other. He walked over to it and began taking them down. His hands were shaking and his eyes watered from the dust. It took him only a minute to clear away enough space to realize what the boxes were meant to hide.
There was another room. A room that hadn’t been there when, as a boy, he used to come up into the attic to play and explore among the ancient junk. The partitioning walls showed obvious signs of hurried workmanship and in the center was a door. Robins cleared the way to it, then pulled it open. The light from the main part of the attic exposed only bits and pieces of the narrow room. He blinked and saw the windows. He walked inside and went to them. The panes had been covered with black paint. He turned around.
There was a bed in one corner of the little room and a table in another. Robins walked to the table, reached down, and pulled something out into the light.
It was a child’s crib, folded up.
“Christ,” he whispered.
14<
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Amy stayed up in Beulah’s room until about ten o’clock that night, reading to the old woman from a magazine about the twenty-seven growths an eighty-five-year-old woman had removed from her neck. Beulah couldn’t keep her mind on the article; she kept interrupting Amy with questions about whether she had double-checked the lock on the back door and whether she was sure she had locked up after Charlie and Robins had left. Each time Amy smiled and said, “Yes’m, Beulah, you know I did.” But that didn’t seem to satisfy her. Her eyes kept ranging around the room, as if looking for some neglected opening. And every ten minutes or so, she would hunch her shoulders, shivering with a chill, despite the warmth of the room. “I feel it somewheres, Amy.”
“Feel what, Beulah?”
“Something ain’t closed up in this house. Something ain’t closed good.” Beulah paused and seemed to sniff the air. “Them windows down in the basement,” she whispered, kneading her quilt thoughtfully. “How big are them windows down yonder? They big enough for a man to crawl through? A man sucking in his gut, holding it?”
“Beulah, I done told you, ain’t nobody coming through them basement windows. Charlie and me already checked them.”
Beulah frowned, her eyes flitting around the room warily. Then, shivering once more, she shook her head. “I feel it, that cold wind coming in from somewheres.”
“Well, if you need me you just knock with your stick, hear?” Amy said. “You sleep good now.”
Beulah said nothing, just gave Amy one of her sharp nods. But, just as Amy was about to go, she called back. “Sit a spell more.”
Amy came and sat in the depression Beulah’s body made on the bed. Beulah hesitated, then glanced up at the girl. “You ever have one of them nightmares?”
Amy nodded. “Course I have, Beulah. I reckon everybody’s had nightmares.”
Beulah licked her blistered lips, her eyes fixed on the closet door. “What’s the worstest one you ever had?”
Amy looked away. “Reckon that’s easy,” the girl said. “It was right after my momma died. Right before I come to live with you.”
Beulah shut her eyes, but she was still listening.
“Well, I dreamed I was alone in that old house we used to live in. And I could hear my momma calling out from somewhere, like she was hurt. And she kept calling, ‘Amy, Amy, honey. Come and help your momma.’ And I kept looking all around for her, looking everywhere I could. And then. . .” Here Amy hesitated. A shiver passed over her.
“Go on,” Beulah insisted, opening her eyes.
“Well, I found her in the strangest place. She was way back in the pantry. But all I could see was her arm a-reaching out, like she wanted me to take it. Only”—Amy bit her lip—“only I was afraid to. But Momma kept on saying, ‘Help me, honey. I don’t want to be alone way down here.’ And that’s when I seen where her hand was coming from. It was coming from down under the house. And I said, ‘Momma, you re dead, ain’t you? We done buried you just the other day.’ But she kept saying, ‘You ain’t going to leave me by myself, honey? You ain’t going to leave your momma all alone?’ And I says, ‘Momma, I have to. I can’t come down there with you.’ And I says, ‘Maybe you can come up here with me.’ And that’s when I done took hold of her hand.” Amy stopped. There were tears in her eyes.
“What happened?” Beulah whispered.
“I couldn’t bring her up. I couldn’t move her none. And I says, ‘Momma, let go. I can’t lift you. Let go now, Momma.’ But she didn’t. She didn’t let go. And that’s when she commenced pulling me down and down. . . and. . .” Amy put her hands around her, shivering again. “It was so real.”
“Where you think them nightmares come from?”
Amy shook her head. “Don’t rightly know, Beulah. I reckon there must be something inside us. Something funny-like.”
Beulah was quiet for a moment, then said, “You come closer.” Amy moved nearer Beulah, and the old woman took her hand. “I know I ain’t been the easiest person in this world to live with. I know I get a might cranky sometimes.”
“Reckon everybody does, Beulah,” Amy said. “’Sides, you been mighty good to me. Taking me in after my momma died. Don’t know what I’d a done. All I knew to do was look after my momma. All my life, that’s what I done. Wasn’t nothing else I could do, Beulah. ‘Sides, this way least I got somebody. And you got somebody, too. And that ain’t so bad, is it, Beulah? There’s some in this world don’t have nobody. Nobody at all. It’s them I feel sorry for.”
Beulah looked at Amy. There were tears in the girl’s eyes. “You know,” Beulah said, “I ain’t never kissed you. Long as you been here. Course, I reckon maybe that ain’t much of a treat, kissing a cranky old woman.”
Amy smiled. Then she leaned over and she kissed Beulah on the cheek. Suddenly Beulah grabbed hold of her, pulling Amy to her with such strength that the girl gave out a little cry. “It’s just I ain’t never been happy,” Beulah said, hugging the girl close to her. “I don’t know why. I just ain’t never seen the happiness...Beulah held Amy to her for a full minute, then let her go.
“You watch,” Amy said, clearly surprised at Beulah’s outburst, “I bet anything we going to start to be real happy soon. Both you and me, Beulah. Why, tomorrow I can curl your hair. You like me to curl your hair,” she cajoled, still holding Beulah’s hand. “And then you’ll feel better about everything. Ain’t that right?”
“Maybe,” Beulah whispered.
Beulah watched as the girl closed the door behind her, then listened to her footsteps as she made her way down the stairs. When the noises stopped, Beulah reached over and turned out the lamp on the table next to her. She closed her eyes. “Ain’t nothing but dreams,” she whispered to herself. “Whatever comes, ain’t nothing but dreams. And tomorrow Amy’s going to curl my hair real nice.” Suddenly she remembered. She lifted up and looked at the closet. She had forgotten to ask Amy to check the little door in the closet that Robins had opened when he had returned the old suitcase to the attic. She reached over to the side of her bed, where she kept her knocking cane, but stopped.
Beulah frowned. No, she told herself, Amy probably was undressed and in bed. Maybe even asleep already. She stared at the closet door in the sliver of moonlight that the drapes let in.
Wasn’t no sense to it, she told herself. No sense at all.
Beulah set her cane back against the wall. She was going to start doing better, she told herself. Start being a little sweeter. Maybe, she thought, she’d give Amy a little something tomorrow and let her go into Lucerne and pick out a dress for herself at Becky’s.
15
Rev. Kline sat up on the edge of the bed, and reaching down, adjusted the brace on his leg, then locked it into place.
“Sadie?” he whispered, looking through the door into the dark hallway in front of his room. He waited, listening, but he was no longer sure it was his wife. Maybe it was simply one of those groaning noises that swept through the old house at night, hauntingly like human cries.
He looked over at the clock by the bed. It was after midnight. But he knew that made no difference. Long ago, his wife had lost any sense of time, together with so much else. He would wake up and find her wandering the dark hall at any hour of the night. Standing on the porch. Or out in the backyard. Sometimes she even seemed to think it was daytime.
“Sadie?” he whispered, stepping out into the hall. He cocked his ear and heard the sad, familiar singing. He listened. It was “Jesus Is All the World to Me.” Or at least it was meant to be. She was standing on tiptoe, looking up into one open cabinet above the kitchen counter, exploring it the way bored children do.
“You hungry, Sadie?” he asked. But Sadie didn’t turn around. She opened another cabinet door and looked into the grimy shelves, empty except for some old Campbell’s soup cans and the upturned bodies of dead roaches.
“I’ll fix you a sandwich, hon,” he sa
id, hobbling into the kitchen. Going to the pantry, he reached up to the top shelf, where he kept most of the food—high enough so Sadie couldn’t reach it. “I’ll fix you a peanut butter sandwich, if you’re hungry.”
“So many blessings,” Sadie said suddenly, cheerfully. “Why, I can hardly count them. So many blessings,” she repeated, still exploring the empty shelf as if it were overrun with blessings, not roaches.
Untwisting the jar of peanut butter, Rev. Kline looked up at his wife. She was putting something in her mouth, smiling as if it were a piece of candy. Humming to herself, she reached back into the filthy shelf, rubbing her fingers into the corners. Pulling her hand back out, she peeked around at him, her eyes sparkling like a mischievous child’s.
Kline watched her in the dim light, staring at her fingertips, at the crumbled pieces of a dead cockroach that adhered to them.
“My husband, the Reverend Kline,” Sadie said, her voice high and light, “he doesn’t like me to do it. He’s so mean to me sometimes. He doesn’t let me have any fun. Yum-yum.”
He looked back down and realized that it no longer even made him sick to his stomach to watch her do it.
He had gotten used to it. Like so much else.
“Come and sit down,” he told his wife, spreading peanut butter on one slice of bread, then placing it on the other side of the table. “Come and sit down, Sadie.”
She turned around, smiling sweetly now. “The birds, they like the bread so much,” she said. “It makes me happy to see them eating it.”
“I know it does.”
“I like to hear them fluttering all around me. Like angels, aren’t they? A lot like angels,” she added with determination.
“Yes, honey,” he said, wrapping the loaf of bread back up and setting it on the highest shelf.
He turned around.
Her face had changed. She was no longer smiling.
Deliver Us From Evil Page 24