Dust (7 page)

The lights dimmed all the way this time, and the room grew dark as night. A long, low noise reverberated through the walls. A familiar sound. After a few moments of slow struggle, Robert recognized it as the whistle of a distant train. It was the eerie cadence of time going by, of journeying to another country, of things passing on. It made him feel tired, as though he was about to slip into a dream.

Then the mirror flashed. The people of Horshoe caught their breath.

"I see rain," a man exclaimed a few seats away. "Glorious rain."

"And flowers," a woman said, breathlessly.

"Dolls!" a girl peeped. "A closet full of dolls!"

Robert didn't see anything. The others gaped at the mirror, faces slack-jawed or agog with wonder.
They
were seeing something, but there was nothing for him. Just a dull gray. The mirror wasn't even reflecting light.

"Matthew," he heard his mother saying quietly. "Oh, Matthew. My dear Matthew."

Robert swallowed, an acidic taste in his mouth. His mom's faint voice was terrible and sad. Hearing his brother's name made Robert's guts flutter.

Abram stood, hands behind his back, watching the crowd. He looked happy, apparently content that everything was working properly. Robert still saw nothing—no flowers, no rain, no Matthew. The mirror must be broken, he thought.

Just then the gray behind the glass began rolling like storm-laden clouds. Winged shapes circled inside shadows. He couldn't look away; the mirror was the only thing that existed.

A figure appeared and moved close to the mirror's edge, walking with a lopsided, limp. Robert dug his fingers into his legs as the form got closer. Go away! he thought. Go away! He heard grunting and a low rumbling, like ice cracking on a lake. He could make out the shape of a man, near enough that Robert heard his dragging footsteps. Finally he emerged from the fog. He was wearing an army uniform.

Robert's heart thumped hard in his chest. It was his Uncle Edmund, who had died so long ago, whose picture Robert had committed to memory.

This was Edmund during the war, alive and breathing but badly injured. He had been hit by shrapnel; his uniform was tattered and bloody. He reached out, fumbled momentarily, and found the frame of the mirror, and it creaked as he leaned on it. Behind Edmund was the battle-field: explosions blossomed brightly, sparks of gunfire dotted the land, smoke blended into storm clouds, wounded men screamed in pain.

Edmund looked back at the battlefield, then out again through the mirror. His face showed the confusion of a man who had staggered into unfamiliar territory. He squinted, scanned the crowd. He can see us! Robert thought.

Edmund found Robert, caught his eye for a moment, then swallowed hard, leaning forward so it seemed he might come right through the mirror. He waved weakly, his hand rising slightly above his hip. His mouth moved but produced no sound. Robert thought he was trying to tell him something.

I'm listening, Robert thought, I'm listening.

A shell shattered the ridge behind Edmund, sending a blast of heat over Robert. Edmund struggled to stay upright, gesturing desperately with one hand. His voice was muffled when he yelled, and it sounded as though he was saying
"Ay-vil! Ay-vil!"
He pointed at Abram, who had been standing a few feet from the mirror.
"Ayvil! Ayvil!"
Then Robert heard him more clearly:
"Evil!"

Abram must have heard too, because his smile faded. He charged at the mirror.

No!
Robert wanted to yell, but he couldn't force the word out of his mouth. Abram plunged his hand through the filmy barrier of the mirror and pierced Edmund's chest. It exploded with crimson light. Edmund screamed, his head thrown back, his hands thrust out in front, one flailing right through the mirror. Then he disappeared.

The mirror went black, and the audience woke with a shudder, as if startled by a loud noise. They glared at the stage like children whose toys had been taken away from them.

"The Mirror of All Things has finished its display," Abram spoke, bowing. The lights brightened. Abram ran his hands across the glass, glanced at Robert, then back at the mirror.

In that moment Robert felt wrath, shot like a bolt toward him.

The mirror now reflected two hundred and fifty-nine bewildered faces, people who looked as though they had just woken up in a strange place. Abram adjusted a lever behind the mirror, then laid it flat. Robert couldn't see the surface any more, but it caught the chandelier's lights and cast them onto the ceiling, studding it with stars.

Abram turned to the townspeople. His smile was gone, and he seemed more like a man about to deliver a eulogy than perform a magic trick.

"I'm not finished yet. I have another surprise about something dear to your heart. The very future of this community." He put his hands together as if he were about to pray. "Forgive me for becoming serious during this entertainment, but my topic is very important. I have but one message: Together we can end this drought."

The words were like stones cast into a pool; astonishment rippled through the crowd and over Robert.

"What does he mean?" his father asked.

"Allow me to explain," Abram said. "Many of you know me from church, and others have met me at my farm, but no one knows that I am, first and foremost, a meteorologist." He gestured toward the ceiling. "Meteorology, for those unfamiliar with the term, is the study of the atmosphere, of weather patterns, so that we can accurately predict the weather. It is a science in its infancy. I am a scholar who has learned how to influence the weather. What makes snow, hail, wind?" He paused.

Robert heard the wind whistling outside. He recognized that Abram was like the reverend, building words into a sermon.

"Long have I sought to understand these things. I have developed hypotheses that I have kept from my colleagues. Secrets. Horshoe is the perfect place to test my theories. With your help, we can make it rain as often and as hard as you wish. It is, of course, too late for this year's crop, but next year at this time we will be sitting with bins so full of wheat, and fields so stacked with hay, that the whole world will look on in amazement."

He looked from face to face; his eyes pierced Robert, then passed by. In that moment he felt Abram's intensity, his belief in his own words. Potential, that's what Robert saw in those eyes. Promise.

"I know. I know. Fool's gold, you're thinking! You'd be daft not to." Abram's eyes narrowed. "But you are also thinking: What if he
can
make it rain? What if next year we could grow the crops we deserve?

"I will bring rain!" He pounded his fist into his palm, startling Robert. "I guarantee it. But only with your help. You've already witnessed the impossible reflected in a mirror. Soon the impossible will be real. Your fields will be green. I will show you how."

As the lights dimmed, Abram reached into one of the clay jars that had been sitting on the stage and cast a handful of red dust over the mirror. From a second jar Abram withdrew a palmful of blue dust. He tossed it into the floating red cloud. A cinnamon smell filled Robert's nostrils. He breathed it in, salivating. The dust thickened into a fog-like smoke that split into three different trails. They glowed green, yellow, and violet, then changed colors and curled into a cylinder, which rotated, reminding Robert of a dazzling kaleidoscope. Again, the lonely wail of a distant train. He blinked and began to feel tired.

The cylinder was now brownish red. It grew to about twelve feet in height, a tower of earth-red bricks. Robert couldn't figure out where it had come from. It looked solid enough. How could Abram make it appear from a handful of dust?

"This is Raithgan, the rainmill," Abram said. Four white vanes appeared near the top of the tower and spun counter-clockwise. Abram pointed, and the spinning stopped. "Here"-he gestured at three spokes sticking out of the vanes—"are the containment filters that will hold a special liquid I call
vive,
short for vivification.
Vive
causes an atmospheric reaction that leads to the formation of heavy cumulous clouds, followed by rain, to put it simply."

It didn't sound all that simple to Robert. It was something only scientists would understand.

Tiny rain clouds formed over the tower, striking it with lightning bolts. Robert's arm hair stood straight up. It was
real
miniature lightning. It had to be. Like the kind he'd seen in
Frankenstein,
a talkie Uncle Alden had taken him to.

"The process seeds the clouds, making them water-bearing. The rainmill will continue to manufacture rain clouds, until the motors are shut off. It will be a perpetual rainmaking machine." He gestured again and the image froze. He turned back to the people.

"Impossible, right? I've shown you pretty pictures, tossed out some big words. You need something concrete. Something that isn't mist in the air." He passed his hand through the image of the rainmill. "You will have it.

"I have had numerous meetings with Mr. Samuelson, the manager of Horshoe Savings and Loan." Abram nodded at the banker and his wife, sitting in the front row. Cigar smoke plumed out of Samuelson's mouth. "I have shown him blueprints and projected crop yields. As you know, bankers are hardheaded when it comes to money, but we have hammered out an agreement. I'd like to ask him to come up and announce the terms of that deal."

Samuelson rose and lumbered toward the stage, his cigar flaring red. People in the front row pulled back their feet to avoid injury.
Pompous,
Robert thought. That was a word that summed up everything about Samuelson.
Pompous, swaggering pooh-bah.

The banker climbed the stairs at the middle of the stage, strode over to Abram, and turned to the audience. He wore a dress coat with tails; a large red sash held back his protruding stomach. Samuelson removed the cigar, tapped the ashes.

"I have examined Mr. Harsich's proposal with great care." His voice was deep and rough, vocal cords scarred by smoke. "I believe the rainmill is authentic. Its construction will create untold economic growth in our community. As long as a work crew is formed to aid Mr. Harsich, I will personally put every interest and loan payment due from those workers on hold until this date next year."

"My God," Robert's dad mumbled. "He can't be serious."

Heads turned, people muttered questions. Robert saw that Abram's and Samuelson's faces were split by wide, childlike smiles; the banker winked at Abram. The crowd's disbelieving noises grew to a senseless cacophony, so loud that Robert was tempted to cover his ears.

A man raised his arm and waved it. The din receded into a hissing of whispers and then silence.

"Yes," Abram said gently. "You have a question?"

"How do we know this thing will actually work?" the man asked.

The crowd drew a collective breath in shock. Robert squirmed off his seat and stood, leaning against the wall. The speaker was Uncle Alden. His voice sounded distant and slightly garbled.

"I've read about other rainmakers who used airplanes and such to seed clouds. Far as I know, they never had any success."

"What's your name, sir?" Abram asked.

"Alden Bailey."

"Well, Mr. Bailey, you asked a good question. Thank you for that. I'm glad you asked it. But it's a question that will be answered only in time. I'm afraid everyone will need a little patience, too. When Monday's edition of
The Horshoe Times
comes to your door there will be a special article outlining our plans and the conditions of Mr. Samuelson's deal. I believe all this business can be dealt with satisfactorily on Monday. In the meantime, enjoy your lemonade and treats."

He clapped his hands, the image of the rainmill collapsed into the mirror, and the lights flickered on. All that remained on the stage were two men and a mirror.

"We should talk to him," Robert's father said. "Find out more about this deal."

Robert's mother nervously wrung her dress, stared at the mirror, and whispered, "I saw Matthew."

A mass of murmuring bodies shuffled into the bright light of a burning sun. They shaded their eyes, squinted at each other. Robert felt they were walking out of some imaginary place into the real world. Or perhaps it was the opposite, and they had just stumbled onto a strange planet devastated by a war with the sun. It burned your skin, the fields, everything under its gaze. Maybe the real world, cool and inviting, was back inside the theatre?

No one wanted to leave the front steps: they leaned against the railing, plugged up the passage. Some even turned around as if to go back inside. Robert was jostled by elbows and purses. The stink of underarm sweat wafted in the air. He wished he were taller, then maybe he wouldn't smell it.

Uncle Alden squeezed in beside Robert and his parents. "What a snake-oil trick," he hissed quietly, "all smoke and mirrors."

Robert's dad remained silent, pulling Robert by the hand, guiding him through the crowd. Then his grip loosened and Robert looked up. His parents were gone, swallowed by the mass of people.

Robert stepped over feet, around legs, and got too close to the war widows. One reached out to pull him to her bosom or do something equally frightening, so he ducked and launched himself into the forest of arms and legs. He figured he'd be able to spot his parents from the other side of the street.

Escape was only inches away. He watched his step, avoided several more elbows, and finally bumped into a heavyset man in a suit.

"It's all for nothing," he heard the man announce hoarsely, "all of it."

Robert knew the voice. He looked up to see Reverend Gibbs, hunched over holding his side. People avoided him as though he were a big stone in the middle of a field

"It's futile," he said.

"What?" Robert asked him. "What did you say?"

The reverend raised his head revealing wild, red-rimmed eyes. Robert had once seen a stray dog crazy with rabies, and its eyes had looked like that. Gibbs blinked, and his pupils remained dilated.