October Skies (24 page)

 

‘Are you certain that is what the Indian said?’ Preston asked again quietly, light from the oil lamp suspended from the crossbeam making his gaunt face look like a skull draped with fine silk.

Keats shook his head. ‘Nope. But it’s the best I could make out.’

Midday was gone and the low, sleepy sun already yearning again for the horizon by the time a meeting of the quorum was convened in the church. Ben was surprised to find himself and Keats asked to attend - although not surprised that Broken Wing, whom Keats insisted come along too, was stopped at the entrance and sent away.

‘Dark skin’s a mark of evil,’ Mr Hollander had grunted, standing like a sentry beside the flap.

‘The evil spirit took them? That’s what the Indian said?’

Keats shrugged. ‘Hell, he could have said that . . . other hand, maybe the words could’ve meant somethin’ else. The Indian was speakin’ all kinds of crazy.’

‘What other things did he say, Mr Keats?’ the minister pressed him.

Keats shook his head. ‘Said somethin’ about an evil spirit reaching out from the trees. Wasn’t makin’ any goddamn sense to me.’

‘The Indian was in a state of shock,’ said Ben. ‘His mind and his eyes were playing tricks on him. The wounds across his front could have been from some wild animal. Ragged cuts like . . . like a claw, not clean like a blade. Perhaps the bear?’

Keats shook his head. ‘Ain’t no bear.’

They sat in silence for a few moments. Outside the temple they could hear the muted sound of wood being chopped and cooking fires being prepared. The routine of survival went on, despite the traumatic event earlier in the day.

Preston winced painfully as he shifted his position, holding a protective hand over the linen binding around his torso.

‘And where is Mr Hearst?’ asked Jed Stolheim, running a tired hand through his thinning auburn hair. ‘He’s not been seen since this morning.’

‘I don’t know, Jed,’ replied Preston. ‘It’s been long enough that I’m fearful for Saul.’

‘It’s them Indians out there did it,’ someone muttered from the back.

‘I’m not even sure they are Indians,’ replied Vander. ‘Me and Mr Zimmerman saw ’em up close in the woods. Dark as the Devil himself, they were.’

Keats snorted. ‘If they ain’t Indians, what the hell are they?’

‘Demons, Keats . . . Satan’s imps sent to torment us.’

There was a sharp intake of breath amongst the quorum.

‘That’s enough, Eric,’ snapped Preston. ‘We have God on our side, so we have nothing to be afraid of.’

Ben heard a tremulous note of uncertainty in the elder’s voice. Or perhaps it was his weakness, or the pain, that robbed his voice of authority. Preston turned to Ben.

‘How is Emily Dreyton?’

‘She’s in deep shock. Her mind has gone for now.’

‘Has she spoken of what she saw?’ asked Vander.

‘She has said nothing. Nor do I imagine she will for some time,’ replied Ben. ‘So terrified was she at what she saw . . . her mind is gone, and it may never return.’

‘Poor girl,’ muttered Preston. ‘Poor Dorothy, poor Samuel,’ he added with genuine remorse etched across his face.

‘Who’s with her now?’ asked Vander.

‘Mrs Zimmerman.’

There was a murmur of approval amongst them. The woman had lost a daughter, Emily had lost her mother. Mrs Zimmerman was the best person to sit with her.

‘They may still be alive,’ said Ben. ‘All we have is Emily and some blood - most of it I’ll wager came from the Indian boy. They could still be out there.’

Preston nodded thoughtfully. ‘Yes, you’re right, Lambert. We should send out a search party to—’

‘We ain’t headin’ out tonight, Lambert,’ Keats cut in, ‘and that’s final. I ain’t riskin’ the lives of anyone else lookin’ for dead people. First light tomorrow we will look.’

Ben turned round to him swiftly. ‘What? We can’t leave them out there overnight!’

‘I ain’t leadin’ out a party in the dark!’

‘They’ll die of the cold!’

‘Reckon them to be dead anyways,’ muttered Keats. ‘We go at night, we’ll miss the tracks and we’ll not find them.’ He looked around at the others. ‘Sky’s clear tonight. Don’t expect no snow, so we go at first light. That way we can follow the blood up to where whatever happened . . . happened.’

Preston nodded. ‘That seems sensible, Mr Keats.’

Ben shook his head, knowing the guide was probably right that poor Sam and his mother were gone and there was nothing they could do about it but try and find their bodies. The small, unlikely hope that Sam might be lying somewhere wounded and pleading for help was nothing more than a wish that he knew was going to torment him through the night.

‘And I shall come with you, Mr Keats.’

Vander turned to him. ‘Are you well enough, William?’

‘I’ll be fine, Eric.’ Preston offered Ben a courteous nod. ‘Mr Lambert has strapped me up well.’

‘First light, then,’ said Keats. ‘Reckon we want to have at least two dozen men with guns readied to fire. Might want to be ready if we bump into ’em Paiute. They’re out there nearby for sure.’

There were murmurs of agreement amongst the gathered men.

‘What are we going to tell the others?’ asked Mr Larkin. ‘About what did this to the Dreytons?’

‘Reckon we’ll tell ’em it’s a bear for now,’ growled Keats, ‘till we know better.’

Preston cocked his head. ‘You may tell your party what you wish.’

‘So what’re you goin’ to tell yours?’

‘It was the work of those demons out there!’ snapped Vander.

‘You forget,’ replied Ben quietly, ‘that one of those demons died bringing Emily back to us.’

‘The Devil likes to play games with the innocent, Mr Lambert. ’ Preston spoke softly. ‘There’s sport in that for him. For now, until we know a little more, we shall tell our people to pray for Dorothy and Samuel. We shall assemble a party in the morning.’

Preston stood up, his head dipped beneath the low ceiling. ‘This meeting is done now.’ He uttered a short prayer, then dismissed them. The men filed out into the weakening sunlight. Vanilla rays lanced through the tree tops, bathing their small world in cream where they landed, and leaving violet shadows where they didn’t.

Preston touched Ben lightly on the arm as he followed in Keats’s wake.

‘Mr Lambert.’

‘Yes?’

‘Might I have another dose of your medicine tonight, for the pain?’

Ben studied his pale features. ‘Is it that bad?’

Preston nodded. ‘It gives me a merciful release from it.’

He thought about it for a moment. ‘A small dose then.’

‘Whatever you think is correct.’ Preston smiled.

‘I’ll return with the bottle after I have checked in on Emily,’ he said and then turned to catch up with Keats.

 

Preston watched them go, then stepped back inside the church, shuddering at the transition from bitter cold to the pleasant warmth left behind by the accumulated bodies.

‘I’m worried about Saul,’ said Vander from the gloom inside.

Preston’s eyes slowly adjusted and found him sitting on the cot. He sighed sadly.

‘William, you know it was necessary. She would have spread doubt amongst the others about you.’

Preston slumped down wearily beside Vander. ‘I know. They need me now, more than ever. But I wish in my heart it had been anyone other than Dorothy who was troubled with doubt. She was so devoted.’

Vander nodded.

‘And now we have to wonder what has happened to Saul,’ said Preston. ‘Perhaps it might have been the bear, perhaps the Indians.’

‘And Emily? What did she see?’

Preston nodded regretfully. ‘What might she say?’ He turned to Vander. ‘I love her too, like all my children.’

‘God needs you strong, William.’

‘I know.’

 

Ben ducked down and entered the shelter. Its frame was sturdier than the one he shared with Keats and Broken Wing. The Mormon men had constructed, for Dorothy and her children, a firm lumber frame from their wagon, large enough for three or four people to sit together in, but only tall enough to kneel in.

By the light of a single candle he could see Emily huddled away from the entrance, wrapped in several blankets, her knees pulled up to her chest, and staring blankly into space. Lying beside her was Mrs Zimmerman, sadly stroking the girl’s forehead and singing a lullaby. She stopped to look up at him.

‘Mrs Zimmerman,’ Ben said politely, nodding. ‘How is she?’

‘She’s gone far away from here.’

He knelt down next to the girl. ‘God only knows what she witnessed.’

Ben looked closely at her face, moving his hand to and fro in front of her dilated pupils, with no reaction.

‘She’s not spoken?’

‘Not a word. Not a single word,’ she replied, studying Emily’s pale face. ‘Truth be, Mr Lambert, I have never seen fear so bad as that in my life.’

He shuffled closer to her, unwinding his poncho and draping it over Emily’s blanket-covered body.

‘I’ve seen shock like this before: industrial accidents brought into the London hospital where I was studying. Shock . . . the mind closes down to shut out the pain, and yet can still function amazingly well. I once witnessed a man walking in carrying his own arm under the other. Machinery had wrenched it out at the shoulder.’

Mrs Zimmerman made a face.

‘The point is, the mind is very resilient. Emily’s has shut down for now . . . from what she’s witnessed. I can only presume it was something quite horrific. And now, her mind is in a dormant state, hiding . . . hibernating somewhere safe.’

‘But she’ll come back to us eventually, won’t she?’

Ben nodded. ‘Eventually.’

‘What happened, Mr Lambert? Do you know?’

‘Eric Vander thinks it was the Indians did this. Keats says it might have been a bear.’

Mrs Zimmerman nodded tiredly.

‘Tomorrow morning there’ll be a search party and we’ll find out all that we need to know,’ he said.

Ben knew it would be a hard find, chancing across their bodies. Hard, in as much as he would see Sam in a horrible way. If it had been a bear, their bodies would be horrendously disfigured. It was not a final image he wanted to have in his mind of the lad.

I’m so sorry, Emily. So sorry.

He stroked her pale cheeks, remembering a cheerful face around the campfire, delighted with the loan of a doll.

‘I’ll look in on her again soon,’ Ben said to Mrs Zimmerman. ‘Will you be with her tonight?’

Mrs Zimmerman nodded. ‘All night.’

Ben smiled. ‘Good.’

 

The phone rang only a couple of times before a deep voice answered it. ‘Dr Thomas Griffith.’

‘Tom, it’s Julian Cooke.’

A moment’s hesitation passed. ‘Julian . . .’ Then, ‘Julian! How the hell are you?’

‘I’m well, Tom, very well.’

Julian had worked with him a few years ago on their series Uncommon People. Dr Griffith was a forensic psychologist who freelanced for the Met, on occasion for the Crown Prosecution Service and, more often these days, he also found himself contributing the foreword to books on hard-case East End gangsters and the criminally insane. His last collaboration had been with a crime novelist, co-writing a book on Harold Shipman.

The book was doing very well. Julian had noticed it piled high on the centre tables of Waterstones and Borders, and spotted Thomas on daytime TV shamelessly plugging it. Thomas was made for TV; a gregarious character, a large and generously covered frame and an enormously deep voice finely tuned to deliver a Welsh accent.

It was all going very well for Thomas, right now.

‘What are you up to these days, Julian?’ his baritone voice boomed down the line.

Julian sucked on his teeth. He knew the call was going to involve eating a small helping of humble pie.

‘Not as much as I’d like. Business is still coming in, but you know what it’s like; a lot less money sloshing around the TV business these days.’

‘Indeed.’

‘I saw your book. Doing very well, I see.’

‘Yes, isn’t it? I’m quite taken aback. There’ll be more, I hope.’

Julian smiled. ‘Oh, I’m sure there will be. Publishers love to keep backing a winner.’ Actually he was pleased for the lucky bastard. Good fortune couldn’t have fallen into the lap of a nicer bloke.

‘Tom, look, apart from wanting to hear the melted-chocolate tones of your voice again, there’s another reason I rang.’

Griffith chuckled. ‘Go on.’

‘It’s something I sort of stumbled upon by accident over in America. Before I go into too much detail, this is between us and no one else, do you understand?’

‘Of course.’

‘I’m not going to need to send you a confidentiality agreement, am I?’ Julian asked cautiously. He trusted the man more than most. Thomas’s word had been good in the past when they’d worked together. But it would be reassuring to hear him make a verbal promise.