“Are you all right?” Ginger said. “Are you crying?”
“No, I’m not,” Deut said. “I’m okay.”
THEY ENTERED THE large, arched opening to the cottage chamber. In their headlamps stood one of the weirdest sights Ginger had ever seen: a two-story wood-frame farmhouse, with a gabled roof and wrap-around porch, the kind you’d see in a Kansas wheat field. Only, they weren’t in Kansas but in a ginormous cavern inside a mountain.
“There aren’t any windows!”
“Who needs windows when it never gets light out?”
There weren’t any shingles or rain gutters either because it never rained. And no paint, lawn, or driveway.
“It’s got plenty of insulation,” Deut went on. “Hosea says if we wear sweaters, then all of our body heat will be enough to keep it warm. He says the cookstove might drive us outdoors.”
“Out into a sea of darkness.”
“I know. It’ll take some getting used to. It’ll be like living inside a refrigerator with the light turned off and the door shut for seven years.”
“About that,” Ginger said, trying to sound matter-of-fact. “Your brother says the Tribulation has already begun. What does he mean by that?”
“Exactly what he said.”
“He believes we’re in the Apocalypse?”
“We all do.”
“Um, and you’re okay with that?”
Deut laughed. “Like I get a vote?”
Their headlamps picked out a trail of small stones on the limestone floor. It led off into the darkness on their right.
“That goes to the woodpile,” Deut said. “We have about a hundred cords split and stacked so far.”
“How do you know it’s begun? The Tribulation.”
“Because of the signs. The handprint in the snow. The angel’s trumpet.”
Ginger had still been in Wallis when Father God knocked Poppy off his snowmachine, and she had been at the Bunyans’ house with Proverbs when Poppy showed them the heavenly trumpet, and by the time she had returned and heard about it, some angel had come to reclaim it or something. But not before everyone but her had seen it. She was the only one not to have seen any of the signs.
Not that Ginger Lawther was a skeptic. She believed she was living in the Final Days. She even believed that the Apocalypse might occur during her lifetime. But despite everything she believed, it was another matter altogether to believe that the end times had already begun.
“But wouldn’t, like, the whole world know it if the Apocalypse had begun?”
“I’m sure the outside world is finding out even now.”
“Good,” Ginger said. Here was something they could test. “Do you have a radio? We could listen to the news.”
There was a radio, two radios, in fact. They were of the variety of civil disaster radios that could automatically receive tornado and hurricane alerts and be charged with a hand crank or solar panel. But Deut didn’t know where Poppy kept them, and she didn’t really want to ask.
Inside the cottage, the walls were framed but not yet covered. Only half of the second story floor had been laid. Hand tools and saw horses lay about where they’d last been used.
“We’ll have more room than we ever did,” Deut said. “Not as much as you’re used to maybe, but . . .” She had intended to say, but you’ll get used to it. However, if Ginger wasn’t interested in marrying Proverbs, there was no way Poppy would allow her to stay with them on her own. He’d toss her out the gate and lock it behind her, even if it meant death by starvation or by wild beasts. They didn’t have enough stores to feed the whole hungry world. That was why you prepared yourself for the worst. That was why the whole family worked at it so hard. They could have simply prayed for Father God’s protection, but prayer without action only got you so far.
They walked through the future kitchen. “The plan is to take apart the range in the big house and move it here piece by piece.”
Maybe Ginger would fall in love with Hosea, or even with Corny, and then she could stay. Maybe that was Father God’s plan. Deut prayed that it was so. She couldn’t bear the thought of losing her first friend in the whole world.
Behind the back porch was another trail of stones leading further into the dark chamber.
“Where does that one go?” Ginger said.
“To Sue’s house, or future house.”
“Sue gets her own house?”
“It’ll be her and Adam’s house once they get married, but till then it’ll be Sue’s.”
“What about you? Are they going to build you a house too?”
Deut laughed. “When the time comes, I’m sure they will. Adam says a village could fit into this one cavern.”
“You have anyone in mind yet?”
“In mind for what?”
“For when the time comes.”
Deut blushed so fiercely that she lit up the entire cavern in pink. Or at least that was how it felt.
Ginger said, “I’ll take that for a yes.”
WS7 1.0
DEUT AND GINGER were gone about two hours on their tour, and when they returned, the entire household was turned upside down.
Sarai had gone to bed with a headache (something only she had the power to get away with) and left twelve-year-old Frankie and Myrrh in charge of the kitchen.
The tweens had managed to serve lunch but neglected to clean up afterward. And instead of prepping for dinner, they spent their energies baking a cake.
The middle boys fled the house after lunch, along with the dog, and no one remembered to feed the common room stove.
Mama P, who had not been moved for hours, lay soaked in her own urine, while Nummy sat on her and worried her breasts raw.
Revie and See-Saw were closeted in the girl’s room, and baby Elzie tottered about the cooling house in a soiled diaper.
To make matters worse, Poppy came in from the prayer cabin to witness all of this before Deut had a chance to set things right.
“I said you could visit the keep, not spend the whole afternoon there,” he said.
“Yes, lord,” Deut replied, “but I didn’t know Sarai was going to —”
Poppy cut her off. “I’m talking to you, not your sister.”
“Yes, lord. Sorry, lord.”
Poppy cast a sour glance at Ginger. “I hear you turned down the chance to go on a picnic.”
“Yes,” Ginger said. “I wasn’t up for it.”
“I wasn’t up for it — what?” Poppy said.
So here it was, the final showdown. Ginger had spent the last few days since her humiliation over Bible verses dreading this inevitable moment. Now it was happening. Now she had to decide what kind of woman she was, one who stood her ground or one who knuckled under.
On the one hand, addressing the old goat as lord was a small thing; it meant little in the big picture; it was a minor annoyance.
On the other hand, where did this temporary guardian of hers get off demanding more from her than her own, faith-filled father? And for that matter, who had put her in charge of reforming this bizarre family? Who had made her the Prophecy girls’ champion? No one, that was who.
Poppy was not a tall man, and his bushy beard made him look a bit gnomish. Ginger stood nose to nose with him, but he seemed so much more powerful, substantial, commanding. So she stood a little taller and met his rheumy old gaze, and said, “I wasn’t up for it, Mr. Prophecy.”
A tiny gasp escaped from Deut, but Poppy didn’t seem upset. If anything, he seemed relieved.
“Maybe you’d feel more comfortable staying with the Bunyans,” he said, “until you return home.”
“Actually, Mr. Prophecy, I’d rather stay here, if you don’t mind. I like it here. I like being your guest. But there are things that a host just can’t expect their guests to go along with, and this is one of them for me. So, I understand if you decide to send me away, but until then I’m eager to stay. Maybe we can come up with some kind of compromise we can both live with. How about Pastor
Prophecy? Reverend Prophecy? Or just plain sir? I could call you sir. I wasn’t up for it, sir. How’s that?”
Poppy wondered what seven years locked up in a cave with such a hellion would do to his nerves. He shook his head and said, “I’ll pray on it.” Maybe she was sent to test his patience. If it weren’t for Proverbs, she’d be on the next plane out.
WS8 1.0
OVER THE LAST twenty years, anytime Poppy bothered to tune into the mainstream news, which wasn’t often, there were reports of disasters, droughts, floods, jihad, massacres, terrorism, plague, and so on and so forth all over the globe. Was it possible, against such a pervasive and unrelenting backdrop of doom, that the Apocalypse had begun but that no one had noticed?
According to Revelation, when the Fifth Angel unlocked the bottomless pit, clouds of black smoke would spew forth, so thick that they would block out the sun. And from the smoke would spring a swarm of stinging locusts that would attack not green things, as ordinary swarms of locusts did, but people who were not marked with God’s seal on their foreheads. Surely, if some part of the planet was buried under bilious black smoke, if killer locusts were loosed upon the population, news would leak out, no matter how strenuously the media and government tried to bury it.
On Firstday morning, Poppy awoke with a desire to catch up on current events. Ordinarily, he’d wait until Twosday and log in on his Samsung at Mail Day. But if he went to the Sulzers’ this week, Ed would no doubt badger him for his art supplies. And then he’d want to know why his precious souvenir goldpans were dumped in the woods next to the parking lot. There would be a confrontation, a scene, hard feelings, needless hassle. Better to let Ed stew about it until even he saw the writing on the wall.
So when Poppy turned the key of the new Arctic Cat, he had a different destination in mind. There was a McHardy snowbird named Yurek Rutz who kept a nice, out-of-the-way cabin on the outskirts of town. He arrived each year in Sixthmonth to spend the summer fly-fishing and drinking whiskey under the Midnight Sun. He usually left in Ninthmonth for points south, well before the first snow.
Yurek Rutz was not saved, and since he was not likely to ever return to McHardy in this life, it was only a matter of time before his cabin would be considered abandoned and all of his goods forfeit. It would be prudent then, and not at all larcenous, for Poppy to get a jump on future scavengers and claim first pickings. In the meantime, he could take advantage of the cabin’s excellent cell reception.
As expected, the snow on the trail leading to Rutz’s cabin was undisturbed. A lone raven witnessed Poppy removing the bear shutters from its windows. Rutz kept a good supply of seasoned wood about the place, and Poppy quickly built a hot fire in the old Jøtul stove. While he waited for the place to warm up, he gathered what supplies and equipment he deemed useful and loaded them into his sled.
Yurek Rutz had a lot of nice stuff, including a new Yamaha 1200-watt portable generator and a set of deep-cycle storage batteries. They would come in handy.
Then Poppy pulled Rutz’s ratty old armchair in front of the stove and sat down to browse on his Samsung Galaxy.
The headlines were unremarkable. Obama is in Connecticut speaking to survivors of yet another school shooting. The Syrian vice president deplores the continuing civil unrest in his country. House Speaker John Boehner tearfully agrees to tax millionaires. Venezuela’s Chavez has cancer. Italy’s Berlusconi is engaged to a teen-ager. Duchess Kate Middleton is recovering from morning sickness.
In other words, remain calm, nothing is happening here, and if something was happening, we wouldn’t tell you anyway. The only story Poppy could find that had anything to do with reality, albeit a twisted version of it, was about the handwringing over the so-called Maya Apocalypse. According to pagan superstition, the ancient Mexican civilization was supposed to have predicted that the world would end that Fifthday, only four days away.
That gave Poppy pause. He’d heard about the Maya calendar, of course, but had always dismissed its doomsday prediction as demonic fear mongering. Now, however, he saw that the timing could be no accident. It made sense that Satan would want to distract the unsaved populations from preparing for the real Apocalypse with a phony one. Clever.
As Poppy browsed and pondered, he became gradually aware of a sound outside the window. He ignored it at first. It was the call of some forest creature. A lynx or a bird of some sort. Not loud. Not far away. He looked out the window but couldn’t spot its source in the woods surrounding the cabin. It sounded forlorn and frightened, like a baby animal bleating for its parent. A bunny trapped in a snare, maybe. A baby fox separated from its litter mates.
At some point, the sound ceased, and Poppy didn’t notice its absence until it started up again. This time it was more clearly a human voice, the voice of a child, in fact. Help me pleeease. The hair stood up on the nape of Poppy’s neck.
He jumped to his feet. Could it be one of his own? He was miles from home. Could one of his kids have followed him? Impossible. He pulled on his hat and gloves and dashed out the door. On the porch he stopped to get a bearing, but the cry had ceased again.
Poppy cupped his hands and shouted into the woods, “Where are you?”
Nothing.
He tried again. “Where are you?”
Poppeeeeee, came the voice. Poppy’s heart lurched. It was one of his, and he even knew which one — Uzziel — his irascible eight year old, his pride, his favorite.
Poppy leaped off the porch and waded through waist-high snow to the forest edge. “I’m coming, child,” he shouted. “Where are you?”
No reply.
“Tell me where you are, boy. Poppy’s coming.” He was out of breath by the time he reached the trees, but once under the forest canopy, the snow cover wasn’t as deep.
I’m coldeeeee.
It came from behind a large spruce tree, and Poppy charged ahead. But when he reached the tree, there was no one there.
“Uzzie, where are you?” He cocked his head, focusing on every sound. “Poppy’s here. Where are you?”
Help meeeeee.
There, that way. Poppy corrected his course and slogged deeper into the woods. He spotted snowshoe rabbit tracks and fox tracks, but nothing human. He called again and again, but nothing more came from his son. Had the boy succumbed to the cold? Had he been dragged off by a wild beast? Poppy looked for blood on the snow. He dashed this way and that until he was out of breath. But the only tracks he found were his own. He searched until he had to stop. He was spent. He was getting old after all and was no longer the superman of his youth. If only Adam were here, or Proverbs, or, for that matter, Uzzie’s worthless dog.
Sobered by the cold, Poppy made his way back to the Rutz cabin. The fire had died down, but before he could reload the stove, he noticed glass shards on the table and floor. One of the windows had been shattered during his absence as though someone had thrown a brick through it.
He searched the floor and found no brick or rock, but he did find his phone, or pieces of it. He had left his phone on the table when he went out. Now the display was smashed and the case broken open and tossed aside. The electronic innards were missing. He searched all about the cabin but failed to locate them.
Poppy turned up some duct tape and a piece of cardboard that he used to patch the broken windowpane. Lying in the snow just outside the window was a single black feather. Ordinarily, he wouldn’t have noticed it, but there was nothing ordinary about any of this, so he went outside to investigate. But by the time he waded around the side of the cabin, the feather was gone. Poppy’s whole soul shuddered.
“Keep the phone, Satan,” he said. “I don’t need it no more. You are proof enough.”
WS9 1.0
WHEN POPPY ARRIVED home, he summoned everyone together for an emergency meeting. The middle girls were dispatched to fetch their brothers from the slide and keep. Poppy counted heads as they arrived. Uzzie was one of the last to show up, and Poppy whispered a prayer of thanksgiving when he saw him. For once he
was even happy to see the dog.
When the family, Adam’s betrothed, and their obstinate guest were all assembled, Poppy quickly told them about his frightening encounter. “I was beguiled by a demon,” he concluded and drew from his pocket pieces of his phone. The children all leaned forward to see. “It has begun. Demons are loose on the land. Let us pray.”
Worship Time had come early, and the family never prayed so fervently as they did that afternoon.
When they said their last amen, Adam asked, “What now, lord?”
“We double our efforts. Move the rest of the supplies. Finish the cottage so we can move in. And in the meantime . . .” He paused, deep in thought.
“Lord?”
“In the meantime,” he repeated, “we secure what we have. Bring me a jug of oil.”
Ithy, closest to the kitchen, ran to fetch it.
“As the eldest-born,” Poppy told Adam, “you stay here to hold down the house. Sing hymns, pray, make such a righteous racket no devil or demon would dare to creep in. You, you, and you,” he said, pointing at girls and boys alike, “and you, you and you.” Elder, middle, and little. “We’re going up to purify the keep.”
Ithy returned with a gallon bottle of Wesson Oil and handed it to his father. Poppy swished the cooking oil around in the plastic jug for a moment before returning it to the boy. “Don’t we have any olive oil?”
Without a word, Sarai took the jug from Ithy and went to the kitchen.
THE SPIRITUAL WARRIORS gathered inside the gate and passed around hardhats.
“For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them,” Poppy recited, quoting Matthew. “How many of us are gathered in His name here?”
“Seven,” Uzzie answered. Poppy, Hosea, Deut, Corny, See-Saw, Nummy, and himself.
“Seven,” Poppy affirmed. “Does anyone know what that means?”
Uzzie replied, “That Elder Brother Jesus is here with us?”
“That’s right. Elder Brother Jesus is here with us, so don’t nobody be afraid. Say praise Him.”
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