Her Loving Husband's Curse

by Meredith Allard

  “We’re fortunate to have such friends.”

  “It’s in the prophecy,” Sarah said, “and I’ve learned not to second guess prophecies. They usually come true.”

  “And what is your prophecy for us?”

  “That we’ll live happily ever after. Whether it’s here, in Salem, or Sydney, Australia, it doesn’t matter. Whether people like vampires, don’t like vampires, think you’re a vampire, think you’re not a vampire, it doesn’t matter. As long as we’re together, everything will be fine.”

  “I think that’s the best prophecy I’ve ever heard,” James said. “Let’s make it come true.”

  * * * * *

  The lines of weary, broken-hearted people stretch down all the miles of the road as far as I can see, and I can see far now, Lizzie, I can. They are everyone. They are the elders, the wisest and the most respected, with gray in their hair and bends in their frames. They are the youngest, from newborns clutching their mother’s chests to toddlers who can barely walk on their own, to smaller children who are wailing, echoing the fear they see in their parents’ eyes. The young men ride their ponies until the ponies are confiscated and they are forced to walk alongside the rest. The young women catch the lewd glances of the blue-suited soldiers who do not hide their delight at the sight of the pretty raven-haired girls. The walkers are husbands and wives, fathers and mothers, sons and daughters, uncles and aunts, nephews and nieces, cousins, friends, neighbors, and anyone else you ever knew from the day you were born. They walk across the rough terrain of the heavy forest, wagons passing at a slow pace on either side. Some call for family members they cannot find. Most say nothing, staring at the back of the head of the person in front of them, stumbling over a rock here or a dip in the dirt there. Some watch their feet as though their numb legs have become detached from their torsos and they wonder how they move forward. Those too weak to walk are hauled in the wagons transporting food and blankets. Though it is a summer night and the sky is shimmers and the stars wink, there is a storm-like gloominess in everyone. They look on in bewilderment as though they hardly know how they got here.

  Those at the front have stopped to put up their camps for the night. Fires crackle and burn in the open air. People call for their family members again, hoping to find them now that the walking has stopped. There is a surprising stillness in the camp for the number of people here, the soldiers’s horses, the livestock. As families settle together, they whisper if they need to talk, hunching away from the soldiers who aren’t shy about butting someone in the head with a musket because they can. The blue-suited soldiers patroling the camps notice me, I am obvious with my blond hair and dead-pale skin, but I am not the only white man here who is not a soldier. There are others here too—some of whom are walking as a show of support, but there are also teachers for the children, doctors to care for the ailing, preachers to preach the Good Word, and missionaries thinking now is as fine a time as any to convert the heathens. Many of them will live with the native people in their new home.

  Here is the conversation of two soldiers:

  “I heered Gen’ral Scott don’t like the expenses of all this,” one says, a freckle-faced boy of perhaps twenty. He gestures at the supplies, the horses, the wagons.

  “He said for every thousand injuns taken,” says the other, “at least half are strong enough to march twelve to fifteen miles a day, and the exercise would be good for ‘em too.”

  The first soldier scans the clusters of people who are visibly exhausted and looking for the food and water rations they haven’t yet received. “I don’t know, Bill. None of these ones looks like they’re gonna last another day at this, let alone three months.”

  “No matter. The more that dies the less we got to worry about transporting. Who needs to move them anyhow. Leave ‘em here to rot, that’s all I got to say.”

  Their conversation sickens me to the core and I leave them, searching for some way to be useful. I bring food and water to as many as I can, what little there is. I want to shake some sense into the soldiers, or at least rattle their brains a bit. They will succeed in their quest, I think bitterly. The Cherokee will die if these meager rations are all they’re given to subsist on for such a long journey. I put the food, if you call stale cornbread or roasted green corn food, and the drops of water in the ration cans down near those who need them most. The water supply won’t be replenished until they come to a creek or a river, and there isn’t one near the campsite tonight. I remember seeing a river miles back, and I can run there and back a number of times before dawn. I say to the gray-haired man next to me, smacking his dry lips, his mouth open as though trying to suck in moisture from the air, “I will get you water.” He doesn’t acknowledge me, but I don’t mind. I understand his pain. I will find water for as many of them as I can, Lizzie. You will be proud of me.

  Chapter 19

  The next night James awoke to the sounds of pots and pans clanging and clashing in the kitchen. He dressed, opened the bedroom door, and saw Sarah stirring something in a pot on the stove. The house was dark except for ten pillar candles burning on the countertop, giving the house a romantic glow. He heard the low, mellow music from the CD player in the living room and grinned at the sight of Sarah in a flowing black dress and strappy gold heels. She nodded when she saw him.

  “Happy birthday,” she said.

  “Happy birthday?”

  “It’s April 19. You’re three hundred and fifty years old today.”

  “I don’t feel a day over thirty.”

  “You look good for your age.”

  “You’re not so bad yourself, Mrs. Wentworth.” He kissed her lips, running his fingers over the softness of the black silk dress, then glanced around the carriage house. “Where’s Grace? Where’s Theresa and Francine?”

  “They took Grace to visit their friends in Bangor. I told them they didn’t need to leave their own house to babysit our daughter and we could celebrate your birthday together, but Theresa insisted we should have the place to ourselves for a while. That’s their present for you. They said to wish you a happy birthday and they’ll see us later.”

  She dipped a spoon into the pot and brought it over to James. “I made you more blood soup,” she said. “Geoffrey isn’t here to steal it from you this time.”

  James shook his head. “I wouldn’t be so sure. After last night, I still expect him to jump out from behind a tree any minute now.”

  “But he’s not here now.”

  “Right.”

  “Which means we have the house to ourselves.”

  James grinned. “What did you have in mind?”

  “First, we’re eating dinner. You’re having blood soup and I’m having the pasta I made for myself. After that?” She smiled. “We’ll have to take it from there.”

  “I like that plan.”

  After dinner, while Sarah washed the dishes in the sink, James wandered into the living room and turned on the TV.

  “Typical man,” she said. “Can’t wait to get the television on.”

  “I’ll turn it off as soon as I have some company.” He flipped past one station, then another. When he couldn’t find a Red Sox game, he settled on the news. He saw the topic flash across the bottom of the screen and sighed. He used the remote control to lower the volume so Sarah couldn’t hear.

  To quarantine or not to quarantine—that’s the debate started in Congress today. For the safety of the American people, Congress says, they want to send vampires of American descent to internment camps similar to the ones we saw in this country when Japanese-Americans were unlawfully detained during World War II, and, to even more horrific effect, in Europe when the Jews were sent to death camps. The ACLU is fighting vigorously against the round up, stating that according to the laws of the land you cannot arrest law-abiding citizens out of whim or whimsy, and that’s all Congress has right now—unproved theories about why vampires should be separated from the rest of us.

  This is America, and we do not round up peo
ple for kicks. We have things like laws and a Constitution, and the idea of arresting people for no reason, removing them from their homes, their lives, the people they love, because yes, vampires, like you and me, have families they love, is just wrong. Think of the uproar over Guantanamo Bay when people were suspected and arrested, sometimes for cause, sometimes not, many of them left in jail indefinitely without charges brought against them. Many linger there still. Will we see an uproar of indignation when our friends and neighbors are carted away, to who knows what circumstances, simply because some people have rationalized the need to sequester them—a rationalization, by the way, not based on any research or fact?

  There are those in the Anti-Vampire faction combing horror films for proof that we should be afraid of vampire people. Hey you, they say, they’re going to turn into bats and flutter outside your window at night and drink your blood for dessert! They say we humans are made in the image of God, and the vampire isn’t human; therefore, they must be in cahoots with Satan. Only Satan’s magic can make the dead live, they say. But didn’t Jesus bring Lazarus back to life after death? Do we need to be afraid of a few vampires because they happen to be alive after they die? I don’t know about you, but I’m keeping an open mind. When Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King Junior said he hoped his children would be judged on the content of their character, not on the color of their skin, that sentiment could refer to anyone who’s seen as different. I’m not judging anyone of vampire descent until I meet them, know them, and have some sense of who they are. I’m just saying.

  I know I’m going all Pollyanna here, but I still believe this is a country of tolerance. True, that tolerance is often hard won, but ultimately rationality will win. People from all over the world have come to this country seeking freedom—every kind of freedom. Freedom of speech. Freedom of religion. Freedom from an oppressive regime. Freedom to be straight or gay or somewhere in between. And now, openly for the first time, freedom to be dead. It makes me proud to see that, at every protest against vampires there’s an equal number of people out in support, cheering for the vampires, dressed as traditional Dracula vampires, holding “Love all God’s creatures” and “I Heart Dracula” and “No Vampire Ever Hurt Me So I Won’t Hurt Them” placards. If we can accept people of all creeds and religions, then certainly we can accept people who are dead.

  Surely we’ve learned a thing or two since the 1940s when thousands of law-abiding Japanese-American citizens, many of whom were born in this country, were imprisoned in internment camps for no reason other than their ancestry. I know these days it’s popular to go along with the angry ones because they shout the loudest and make a funny show, but many of us are logical, thoughtful, and willing to give people who are different than us, however they are different from us, a chance.

  As for the claims that vampires are murderers? As far as I know, according to the laws of this country, someone is innocent until proven guilty. If you can prove that a vampire of American descent has committed a murder, then absolutely that vampire should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. Otherwise, if you have no proof and only theoretical possibilities, then you cannot arrest them or otherwise detain them. Vampires have the same rights as other Americans, and they should be treated that way.

  “At least someone is on our side.”

  James looked from the television to see Sarah, the tears in her eyes as she stared at the commercial on the screen, her arms crossed over her chest as though she needed to protect herself.

  “Did you know?” she asked. James nodded. “James…”

  She stumbled past him, pushed open the door, and ran outside. She clutched her arms closer around her chest since there was a cold breeze blowing in from the bay and her dress was flimsy. James went after her, taking her into his arms, but she pulled away.

  “You’re still hiding things from me,” she said. “You’re still tip-toeing around me like I’m a fragile egg that will shatter if I’m dropped and I’m not.”

  “I know that, Sarah.”

  “We can handle what’s happening together, but you need to be straight with me.”

  “But you look so sad sometimes, honey. All I want is to protect you from the things that make you look sad.”

  “Life is sad sometimes, but we can deal with it.”

  “You’re right. I won’t keep anything from you anymore.”

  “You keep saying that, but then you do it anyway.” She dropped her face into her hands, breathing deeply, struggling to calm herself. “Will they round up the vampires?” she asked.

  “Nothing has been decided.”

  “Do you think we need to leave?”

  James shook his head. “As far as I can tell no one’s been looking for us, and if they start they’ll have a hard time tracing us here. I don’t see any reason to go now.”

  Sarah looked out into the flat black of the water. James held her close, stroking her back, pulling her into his side.

  “Do you think we can outrun the madness this time?” she asked.

  “I do. I know my way around the whole world. In a way, I’ve been on the run since I was turned. We’ll do what I’ve always done—stay somewhere until we don’t feel safe and move on.”

  James shook his head. This is the repercussion of the curse, he thought bitterly. And here he had promised Sarah just a moment before that he would never hide anything from her again, but even as he said the words he knew they couldn’t be true. He was hiding something from her already—his fear at how this all would end.

  Chapter 20

  A week later James planned a special night for Sarah. Francine told him about nearby Acacia National Park, and though the park itself closed at 4:30 in the afternoon the restaurant served dinner and he wanted to take Sarah out to relax for a while. Theresa was only too happy to spend another night with the baby.

  “You two have fun,” she said. “We’ll be fine.”

  They borrowed Francine’s lime-green VW Bug since she was home from her classes at Bowdoin University, and they headed around the Gulf of Maine where the land was broken in jigsaw pieces by lakes and rivers, coves and ponds, peninsulas and bays, the islands floating like sponges a mile or two away. It was an hour drive to the park, but it was a beautiful night, clear under the wide moon and flashing stars, a little warmer now at the end of April. Sarah lowered the window and breathed in deeply, savoring the salty sea air. James reached for her hand and kissed her fingers.

  “I could live here forever,” Sarah said. “It’s like we stopped at the edge of the world, safe from everyone and everything.”

  “Then we should stay,” James said.

  The further they drove the more they were surrounded by coniferous and deciduous forests, the ocean whispering riddles in the shore-lined distance. He pulled onto the Park Loop Road of Acacia National Park, past the signs for the scenic vistas and the hiking trails, the art galleries and the boats to the lighthouses and whale watching. It was dark, so most everything was closed, but even in the night they saw the meadows and the marshes, the dense evergreen forest surrounding them.

  “I should take Grace here during the day,” Sarah said. “She’d like to see the puffins and the sea birds. Maybe I could take her on a picnic here.” James sighed. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I wasn’t thinking.”

  “Wasn’t thinking about what? Of course you should take her here during the day. It’s beautiful. If I’m sighing it’s because I wish I could come.”

  “There’s plenty the three of us can do together at night,” Sarah said.

  “I know.”

  They pulled into the parking log near the Jordan Pond House Restaurant. Sarah looked at the hikers and the campers walking through the parking lot, waiting near the door, chatting easily amongst friends and family as though there wasn’t a care in the world.

  “Do you think it’s safe to go in? What if someone notices you’re…”

  “Nocturnal?”

  Sarah laughed. “Yes, nocturnal. The nocturnal
type is so public now.”

  James listened to the ambient conversations outside. They were mainly families with children, some couples, and a few groups of friends. They were talking about their own lives, what happened to them on the trails that day, what they saw, where they went, what pictures they took. They were engrossed in their own stories, and he didn’t hear the word vampire from any of them.

  “I think we’re all right,” he said. “I’ll order a dinner for myself, you’ll eat a few bites of it, then we’ll get it boxed so you can have it for lunch tomorrow.” Sarah looked at the people, still undecided. “We can’t stay in the house all the time, Sarah. We’re safe here. We look like a normal married couple out for a nice dinner.”

  “We are a normal married couple out for a nice dinner.”

  “Exactly.”

  Sarah exhaled. “Let’s go in,” she said. “I’m hungry.”

  James parked the car and they walked to the restaurant, located on the grassy bank of a deep lake that zigged and zagged through the scenic valley within the tree-covered mountains. Sarah walked to the wooden tables and chairs outside where customers ate lunch in the daylight hours and admired the beauty of the valley brightly lit by the gracious moon, then bent over the wild-looking blue and yellow blooms. They walked inside and found a come-as-you-are diner where visitors could stop to eat in their t-shirts, khaki shorts, and running shoes after a long day hiking or canoeing. The room was brightened by the round lantern-style lights hanging from the ceiling.

  Sarah searched every face in the room as though she were wondering, “Is that man looking at James? Does that woman notice that I’m eating from his plate and not him? Do those children see his pale skin?”

  James fed her a bite of her salad. “We’re fine, Sarah.”

  She nodded, then dipped her fork into the three cheese ravioli in front of James. “I know,” she said. “Your meal is really good, by the way.”