Black Noon (18 page)

This time Lorna was not at the window as Keyes and Deliverance walked across the yard toward the shed.

She did not see their elbows touch, nor the smile on their faces, nor hear what was being said.

Lorna was in bed, more comatose than conscious.

She did not see the two of them once again pause at the open door, this time linger a little longer, as Keyes's hand started to move up toward Deliverance's face but stopped in midair as he turned and walked away.

When he entered the room Keyes went directly to the bedside, looked at the untouched tray of food on the bed stand, then at Lorna, whose eyes were closed.

“Lorna . . . Lorna . . . it's . . .”

“I know who it is,” she muttered without opening her eyes.

“You haven't eaten . . .”

“I'll eat . . . later.”

“I'll bring something up and we'll have supper together.”

“NO! You go eat with your friends.”

He did.

Of course Caleb asked about Lorna's condition, and Keyes did not want to appear too negative but it was difficult for him to appear in the least bit positive, so he was as equivocal as possible.

“She's resting now.”

“Has she eaten any of what I brought up to her?”

“Not yet, Bethia, but she's promised to later.”

Bethia nodded and went on serving at the table.

“There's nothing that stimulates a person's appetite,” Caleb said, “quite like a hard day's work.”

The others at the table did their best not to react to the irony of Caleb's comment since he had seldom, if ever, moved from his shaded seat during the entire day.

Joseph started to say something but thought it better not to.

“Would you please pass the butter, Jon?” Deliverance reached out as Keyes complied and their fingers just happened to converge and stay suspended for a beat more than necessary to make the exchange.

This did not go unnoticed by Bethia, who smiled faintly as she repaired toward the kitchen.

Not much later Keyes rose from the table.

“Well, I'd better go upstairs and see about Lorna.”

“And I'd better go out and see about my candles.”

“Well, get a good night's sleep both of you,” Caleb lit his pipe, “we've got another hard day's work ahead of us tomorrow.”

The tray was still on the bedside table and still untouched as Keyes knew it would be. And when he tried to talk to her, she was just as unresponsive as before, with a voice that hardly seemed to be her own.

“Lorna . . .”

“Yes, my husband . . . did you enjoy supper with your . . . friends?”

“I'd enjoy it a lot more with you.”

“Is that so?”

“Yes, Lorna, that's so. I wish you'd believe that.”

“I wish I . . . could.”

Keyes realized that it was hopeless to try and reason with Lorna in her state of mind. He would have to wait . . . but for how long?

Hours? Days? Weeks?

Or...

Was it not a matter of time?

Was it this place?

San Melas?

Or was it forever?

Had the Lorna he knew and married been lost in some other realm?

What force was tugging at her, wracking her mind and body?

 

 

Deliverance was in the shed, but not working on her candles. On the table directly in front of her were two wax figures, one plainly enough, that of Jonathon Keyes, the other, hardly recognizable except for the hair, Lorna.

As Deliverance kneaded that figure it became even less identifiable.

The nocturnal silence within the shed was rifted only by the pervasive purr of the cat.

Keyes sat on the straight-back chair near the bed with the Bible in his hand, his head lowered, eyes closed, and lips in near silent supplication for the recovery of his wife.

“‘And the prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up.'”

He rose, the Bible still in hand, walked across the room, placed the Bible on the dresser, and removed his shirt. He sponged, then dried himself before almost automatically looking in the mirror.

He instantly wished he hadn't, but it was too late.

He stood benumbed by the reflection within:

As the mirror cracked.

Keyes stood in front of the mirror, sweating, trembling.

Did
the mirror crack, or, was that, too, a reflection of his imagination? He reached out, touched, then passed his fingers across the slivered surface.

The mirror had cracked.

Keyes turned away even though now the mirror reflected only his own image.

He found it hard to breath. He drew each breath with effort. He walked unsteadily to the bed. In truth he didn't know why.

Did he want to tell her what he had seen in the mirror?

The answer was no.

If he did, what could he expect from her? Particularly in her current condition. She had illusions or delusions of her own.

Still, he whispered, then called out her name.

“Lorna . . . Lorna . . .”

As he expected . . . no response.

He might as well have been in the room alone . . . except for the images in the mirror.

He walked to the window and looked out.

Darkness, except for the moonlight that filtered through branches of the trees and spread their shaky shadows on the ground.

He looked toward the outline of the shed.

It was only an outline. No candlelight from within.

But there was a gust of refreshing night air through the bedroom's open window.

If nothing more, he needed the vivifying outdoor air. He needed to get out of this room.

He did.

Keyes, still shirtless, sat on the stump of the tree, his head bent into the palms of both hands in a vain effort to separate reality from illusion.

Who was the man in the mirror? Why was the man trying to catch him? What was he trying to say, or do? Was he a ghost . . . like Moon, come back from the grave to haunt him? But why?

And Deliverance.

Beautiful, beguiling, bewitching Deliverance.

A composition of empyrean elegance and earthy enticement.

A vision out of every man's dream.

“Jon.”

Keyes looked up.

Deliverance stood before him, looking much as she did in the mirror. Adorned in a diaphanous white gown. Hair cascading onto her shoulders and breast. But this was no mirror image.

She was real.

“Jon, what are you doing out here?”

“I'll ask you the same question. There is no light in your workroom.”

“No, there isn't.”

Keyes didn't wait for a further answer.

“Deliverance . . . I have to tell you something. I have to tell someone . . .”

But suddenly the sky crackled and was lit up by a crooked bolt of lightning, then darkness again, and a spatter of rain . . . more lightning, then thunder and a heavier shower burst.

“Summer storm,” she said. “Let's get inside.”

Deliverance lit two large candles that were on the workbench and glanced at the two wax images now covered with damp cloths, then she turned to Keyes who stood shirtless, his body glistening from the rain.

“Jon, you're drenched.”

“So are you,” he smiled.

“Yes, but you're half-naked. There's a towel right over here.”

She reached on the table, picked up a towel.

He started to take it from her but instead, Deliverance began pressing it gently on his arms, chest, neck, and face.

He stood stiff at the touch of the towel and the occasional touch of her fingers against his body.

“That's fine, Deliverance. Thank you.”

“Jon, sitting out there you seemed . . . pensive . . . actually, melancholy . . . and there was something you were going to tell me.”

“Now I don't know whether I should.”

“Please do, Jon. Maybe, just maybe I can even help you a little, though not like you helped me. I want to try.”

“The mirror in the bedroom.”

“What about it?”

“Sometimes . . . when I look into it I see . . .”

“Yourself.”

“No. A man, burned, blistered, bleeding . . . and he's chasing me . . . why, I don't know . . . whether it's to harm or to warn me. I don't know . . . but I don't want him to catch me . . . and then there's Moon . . . standing between me and . . . you, Deliverance . . . he's alive and I shoot at him again and again while I hold you in my arms . . .”

“But that's just a dream, Jon, a bad dream,” she paused and smiled, “except for the part where you hold me in your arms . . . but a dream, nevertheless.”

“Deliverance, you dream while asleep in bed . . . not looking in the mirror.”

“There are different kinds of dreams. Good and bad. Asleep and even awake . . . day dreams . . . shadows of the soul, they've been called . . . tricks of the mind . . . puzzles within puzzles.... There is no earthly answer, any more than there is an answer to the riddle of the Sphinx. No earthly answer, Jon. Your sermons, which have helped so many are all based on a book called the Bible. If there is an answer, perhaps it lies hidden somewhere in there. I want to show you something.”

She walked to a corner of the room and pulled back a curtain revealing a cot against the wall.

Keyes did not quite contain his surprise.

Deliverance smiled.

“I use it to sleep on when I sometimes spend the night here. That's why it was dark inside tonight.”

She reached down and picked up an object near the pillow.

“Come over here, Jon. Sit down next to me.”