The church sat close to a bend in the mud road. Water washed off its roof in torrents, and the black windows made the building appear to be a dead hulk.
Rain pounded like rubber mallets on the roof and hood of my truck, a deafening din. I pulled up close to the front door of New Hope.
“Why are the windows blacked out?” Orvid asked over the noise.
“People are curious about what goes on inside,” I told him, shifting into park, “and Preacher Levi does not care for the idle eye. He would prefer to have a visitor brave the confines of the building.”
“Where said visitor might fall under Preacher Levi's hypnotic sway,” Orvid added, a slight grin touching his lips.
“Exactly,” I confirmed. “But also, the members of this church need concentration. It would not do well for anyone to be holding a rattlesnake in one hand and suddenly be distracted from the trance state by leering neighbors, or a nice view. That's just an invitation to a poisonous bite.”
“Yes,” Orvid said more seriously, “concentration on the task at hand. I understand that.”
Once again I had the impression that Orvid was employing a bit of judicious understatement. The concept of
concentration
was more than a casual element of his regimen. It was an imperative.
The moonless sky dipped low to the earth, helped to hide the
trailer behind the church. I tried to peer through the darkness, past the distraction of the windshield wipers, but everything was black beyond the back of the church.
“It doesn't look like anyone's broken into the church,” Orvid ventured, staring at the front door. “Is there a back way in?”
“No.”
We both sat, trying to decide how to proceed.
“I have an umbrella under my seat,” I said absently.
“I don't think it would help both of us at the same time. If you hold it, it'll be too high for me, and if I hold it, you'd have to walk on all fours.”
“You can have it. I'm already as wet as I can get.”
“No.” He took hold of the door handle. “I like to have both hands free.”
He shoved the door open and got out of the truck.
Not one to be outdone in the category of manly deportment, I too eschewed the umbrella. I turned off the headlights and shut down the truck.
The air around us plummeted into darkness. It took a moment for my eyes to adjust. I could barely make out Orvid's back as he moved toward the church.
He checked the front door.
“Locked,” he reported.
I started around the church.
“The preacher's trailer is back here,” I told Orvid.
He followed.
Night air was polished, wet obsidian, a slick black jewel set in the emptiness above the earth. Rain battered it constantly, a vain attempt to split the diamond. But the darkness would not be broken.
The soaked grass seemed to grasp at my ankles, hands of the buried souls beneath the earth around the church, hoping for help out of their drenched resting place.
The hushing static of the rain and the wet rustle of the last leaves on the trees all around us filled my ears, made sound a part of the absence of light.
The smell of sodden earth, decayed leaves, mildew and rust, filled the air around me.
All senses were stopped.
By the time I saw the trailer, I felt I had walked a mile in the rain.
“There.” I pointed.
But Orvid was ahead of me. He'd seen something.
He turned and held his finger to his lips. I fell silent.
Although the curtains of the trailer were pulled tight, it was obvious a light was on inside. And as I took a step or two closer, I could tell that the curtains closest to the door were parted just enough for a single eyeball to be seen peering at us from inside.
“He's seen us,” Orvid whispered. “No good trying to pretend he hasn't. Go to the door.”
I nodded.
“Preacher Levi?” I called, loud enough to startle both Orvid and the man at the window.
The curtains shut immediately.
“It's Dr. Devilin,” I went on. “Sorry to disturb you so late, but I have some rather urgent business.”
There was no reply, but I could hear the preacher moving around inside the trailer, even through the masking noise of the sheets of rain.
Orvid slowly positioned himself by the door to one side of the hinges, so that if the door opened, he would be hidden behind it.
I took my cue and moved toward the other side of the door, clearly visible to Levi when he opened up.
After a moment the door cracked and his muffled voice shot through.
“Who is it?”
“It's Fever Devilin,” I said.
I waved.
“Oh.” He sniffed. “You.”
“Look, I would never bother you if it weren't important, but there's a man wanted for murder running around loose up here, and I have reason to believe he might try to break into your church. He did just that in Clarksville not too along ago.”
“Break into the church?” he grunted. “Why'd he want to do that?”
“He's something of a preacher himself,” I explained. “He had a congregation in Tennessee, until he murdered his wife.”
“Murdered?” Preacher Levi opened the door wide. “Is that true?”
Orvid was nearly pinned to the side of the trailer behind the door.
“You know me,” I said deliberately. “You know the kind of person I am. I don't lie. And maybe you remember that the county sheriff is a friend of mine. And Hek Cotage too.”
“Hek's a good'n,” Levi muttered, something almost like a smile beginning at one corner of his mouth.
“He is that.” I grinned back.
“Don't know about that wife of his,” Levi grumbled, any hint of a smile gone.
“The point is,” I said hurriedly, “that there's a man possibly headed this way who just may try to break into your church.”
“Uh,” Levi began, “yeah. About that. Maybe you'd better come on in.”
“Into your trailer?”
He'd never invited me into his home before.
“Yeah.” He bumped Orvid with the door several times. “And tell your little friend he can come in too.”
Orvid appeared, somewhat chagrined.
“So much for stealth,” Orvid said to no one in particular.
“Let's have us some coffee,” Levi said, disappearing into the recesses of the trailer.
Orvid looked at me, I politely indicated that he might go in ahead of me.
He did; I followed.
The trailer was Spartan. It was only one open room. A sink and a gas stove were in one corner, a wooden kitchen table close to them, four solid chairs. At the far end of the rectangular space there was a cot and an oil lamp. Above the cot was a large wooden cross with a serpent coiling up it. At the foot of the cot there was a wooden trunk, lid open. Nothing else adorned the walls or floor. There was no other furniture. The front of the trailer had two windows, one on
either side of the door, and a third window over the sink looked out the back, into the woods.
On the kitchen table there were two candles in nice crystal candlestick holders, Levi's ever-present Bible, and, to my astonishment, a silver and glass Bodum French-press coffeemaker, nearly empty.
Beside it sat an ancient stone mortar-and-pestle set that had obviously been used to grind whole coffee beans by hand.
“I'll make fresh,” Levi told us, his back to the door.
He grabbed the French press, pulled out the plunger, opened the window above his sink, and tossed out the old coffee and grounds. He washed out the press for what seemed like five minutes, not speaking, not turning to look at us.
Orvid and I stood silent, watching him, wondering what we were doing. I knew better than to speak before Levi was ready. I'd made the mistake of prompting him in one of our early meetings years before, and he'd stopped talking altogether. Patience was a necessary ally in the house of Levi. Luckily, Orvid followed my lead and contented himself with taking in every detail of the interior of the trailer.
Finally Levi turned.
“There.” He shook the press. “Sit you down.”
He nodded toward his kitchen table.
“We're kind of wet,” I ventured.
“I don't care about that,” Levi responded in a monotone.
I shot a quick glance to Orvid and we took seats.
Levi spent another ten agonizing minutes grinding more coffee beans while the gas eye under his old tin kettle did its best to boil water and I did my best to keep quiet. Orvid seemed perfectly at peace. All the while the rain made a constant drumming rhythm on the roof of the trailer.
At long last Levi stood and poured the contents of the mortar into the bottom of the French press. He reached for the kettle, poured in the steaming water, and rested the plunger of the press at the top of the glass cylinder.
“Let it sit,” he said with a nod.
He replaced the kettle on the stove, sat down, folded his hands as if he might pray, and looked down at the open Bible on the tabletop.
“Now,” he began, his voice taking on the diction and demeanor of his sermons. “The man you seek has been by this way.”
Orvid almost fell out of his seat, and I made some sort of surprised noise that didn't sound human.
“He said he was a wandering preacher,” Levi continued, apparently oblivious to our response. “Used to happen a lot in the old days. My daddy and granddaddy was preachers in this same church, New Hope, and when I was a sprite, they'd come by this way all the time. Great men of God, burned by hot sun; shivered to the bone by hellish ice on the mountaintops. They would tell of a wide world, a terrifying place filled with devilment and decay. And one by one that world gobbled up those men, and they were gone. I missed them, near as much as I missed my kin when they passed. But this man tonight, I could see the vapor in his eyes. He was not a creature of this earth. I made myself invisible to him, and the demon passed though this place without doing harm.”
Orvid looked over at me, helpless.
I did my best to nod reassuringly, then turned my full attention to Preacher Levi.
“A man visited you tonight.” I chose my words and tone of voice carefully.
“Did.” Levi didn't look up.
“He was dressed in black,” I continued, almost in monotone, “white hair, grizzled, early sixties.”
“That's him.”
“What did he want,” I said quietly, “do you mind my asking?”
“Said he wanted shelter from the storm,” Levi answered grimly. “But you could see he was a creature untouched by wind nor rain. His eyes was blank. No soul in him. A wandering sheaf.”
“You were lucky to get rid of it.” I leaned in a little closer.
“I was that,” he agreed, a little more heartily than he had been speaking.
“How did you do it?”
“I vanished,” Levi repeated simply. “I was gone from this place. And the demon passed through without doing harm.”
“Where did you go when you vanished?” I was careful not to sound overly interested.
“Beulah Land,” he said, as if it should have been obvious. “Where all my words come from. All my silence goes.”
“Yes,” I said, quickly agreeing. “And when you came back, when you appeared again, the other preacher was gone.”
“Was.”
“Do you know how long it all took?” I ventured.
“A thousand years are but the blinking of His eye,” Levi muttered.
“I understand.” I looked at the French press. “That's a very nice coffeemaker.”
Orvid's head twitched. He could not believe I was changing the subject.
“Makes good coffee,” Levi agreed.
“Where did you get it?”
“It was a gift,” he said uncomfortably.
“I understand,” I assured him. “Is the coffee ready?”
Levi looked up, gave the press a perfunctory examination, and pushed the plunger down without another word.
He stood, fetched three spotless white coffee mugs. He poured Orvid's first, turned the mug around three times, and slid it across the wooden tabletop toward Orvid, handle directly toward him. I got the same treatment. Then Levi poured his own cup last.