Authors: Thomas Cater
Elinore believed Samuel’s words because he spoke
Gospel
truth
, which is all he ever spoke, nothing but the Gospel truth.
Specters
were lurking in the
shadows of finance and trade.
Amy Taylor’s influence changed Elinore for the better.
She plucked the teeth out of that threatening and dangerous world that had
imprisoned her. Amy brought it all back into perspective. Amy helped Elinore
tackle problems of love and anger, god and the universe, heaven and hell. She
believed someday she might
see again
. For the most part her adolescent
musings were a
painful experience
. Another element was a disturbing, s
uperstitiou
s
note. She appeared to be exercising
wit and intelligence
, but her
content was subjective. It was as if she were revealing the working of a
cleve
r,
excitable mind in a state of eager anticipation.
It must have come as a shock when the
stirring
of
passio
n came. He told her it was the
devil creating mischief
. She
preferred to keep it
secret
.
She wrote frequently of
secret longing
she
wished to share. It was
growing inside her,
getting bigger every day. Samuel
was not able to satisfy those deep and tender yearnings.
It was not an easy script to decipher. Between the
lines and during breaks, I digressed. I tried to imagine what it was like
living in a house in the middle of a forest surrounded by a grasping grotesque
wall with very few intimate friends.
I returned to the notebooks and began picking through
them. On the open page of a comparatively recent book, I saw words that seemed
to be upside down. I could not decipher the meaning. Something about it made me
feel uneasy.
I thumbed through other pages looking for more of the
same. Everything else was yellow and faded. It all seemed so difficult to understand,
and yet it was compelling. Sometimes the words looked more Cyrillic than
English. They stayed in my head like other mesmerizing words I’d discovered:
“Tza ba di jia.”
I decided to concentrate more intently on the
notebook. It could just possibly have been the last one written. The dates were
not legible and words were often imposed one upon the other. The writing had a desperate
quality about it. I couldn’t help wonder if Elinore had the integrity and will
to continue making notes, even after she lost her mind
.
I could imagine the inner struggle it must have taken
her to put the words on paper. The words would vanish from the page to be renewed
somewhere in the middle or the next page. They struggled for some kind of
coherence, but the words were on occasion not related one to the other.
There were screams and sighs within those pages and dark
dry stains where I suspected tears
had fallen and etched their own
message. In the middle of one page in great gasping, groping letters, I saw the
words “
I could love a baby girl!
” It was undoubtedly part of an
exhortation, a plea for help 70 years ago. I was alone, hearing it, seeing it
perhaps for the first time. It was a
cry
that had gone unheeded. I tried
to make sense of it. A baby, whose baby? The gravedigger said she had given
birth to a child, even though she never married, and it vanished from her arms.
Could it have been illegitimate?
I returned to the notebooks: but not to simply read. I
imagined many strange things occurring through the night and into the early
morning. I knew that half of everything I imagined would lead nowhere, but would
mean something later. I closed the notebook, stretched out on the bed and tried
to sleep. Later, I would pick up where I left off and re-discover something new,
but only for a moment. I was exhausted, brain tired and bone weary. I needed
sleep. Nothing I did was making the least bit of sense. “Tza ba di jia.”
Chapter Fifteen
Falling
into a deep sleep did not happen: The pages in Elinore’s notebooks began revising
and re-printing themselves. New words were taking form right before my closed
eyes. It was as if by some overwhelming desire, the words were forming in my
mind.
I saw her, walking through the garden holding hands with
a young man, staring at flowers through a piece of colored glass. Rays of
sunlight formed images unlike any I had ever seen. We looked directly through
the sun. She took her glasses off and invited me to gaze into her eyes. They
were like diamonds with facets, and she could see things sparkling brightly.
Elinore appeared in the dust-laden photos. She never
spoke with anything but her eyes. They seemed to ask, but not demand; their
wisdom made me see.
*
I was frying an egg and boiling water for coffee when
someone rapped at the van door. I shouted for them to enter and removed a
second cup from the shelf. I was not fond of instant coffee. I drank it for the
caffeine and to remind myself of how much I hated it. A guest always provided a
good opportunity to get rid of the stuff that was beginning to ‘set up’ in the
jar as toxic waste.
Walter Kepler hauled himself up and into the van,
rocking it back and forth with each heavy step. His feet were dragging and his
mouth was in a frown. I do not know why some men appear perpetually troubled,
but just looking at him seemed to cast a shadow over the sun.
We exchanged greetings and I offered a cup of scalded coffee.
I asked him about his research at the library and he sadly shook his head. The
book, he said, was there somewhere, but he
could
not find
it. It was about castles and
walls in Central and South America, Europe and Asia. There was also a story in
the book about the construction of the Brooklyn Bridge. Airtight timber
caissons filled with concrete were buried in the riverbed. The author talked to
workers who said the bridge would never collapse because ‘mortar containing the
blood and bones of men will last forever.’
A fitting tribute, I thought, and wondered if their
skeletal hands were reaching out to grasp living things. The story sounded
similar to others. Many men had fallen into concrete footers and died. Some
were mob figures, such as Jimmy Hoffa. After drowning in several yards of
concrete, they were impossible to retrieve. Who could possibly create a more
fitting tombstone?
I wanted to tell Kepler about the skeletal hands in
the wall, but I didn’t want to start a witch
hunt that might result in my
incarceration in the local funny farm. I told him it was all very interesting
but unless we could corroborate with hard evidence
,
the story was
just a story.
“Is there more?” I asked.
He nodded and pulled out a sheet of paper he had covered
with notes. “The author also mentions the name of a man who was in charge of
building Adolph Hitler’s secret bunker in Berlin,” he said. “There are pictures
of the bunker and from what I could see the work is similar to the stonework at
the Ryder House. I think they were built by the same man.”
I felt as if I’d been dealt a low blow. The thought
was also irritating. I hated to concede that I knew so little about something as
basic as a wall that I was not able to distinguish one man’s work from another.
I asked Walter if it was possible that two schools of masonry could have given
birth at the same time on both sides of the ocean. He seemed amused by my
suggestion and shook his head.
“A stone cutter’s work is his own,” he said. “To you,
it’s just a wall, but to other masons, it’s a statement. There are similarities
too walls, but no two masons work is identical. It may seem a simple thing to
lay one stone upon another, but believe me; a mason knows one man’s work from
another. The differences are not as obvious as paintings. No one would ever
confuse Michelangelo with DaVinci, but when I say to you that the man who built
the wall around the Ryder mansion and the state hospital is the same man who
built Hitler’s bunker, you can believe me.”
The possibility I thought was bordering on lunacy, but
at the same time he mentioned the hospital, it occurred to me they should have
records on contracted work. I wanted to let the new information settle while I
pursued the hospital gambit. I invited Kepler to join me, but he declined,
which in a sense I was glad to hear. I was already beginning to feel his
life-negating effect on me.
I ushered him out the door and poured his untouched
coffee down the drain. I listened for the sound that would reveal the condition
of the RV’s holding tanks. I tried again to make a palatable and potable cup of
coffee, pouring hot water over the dark brown granules and watching them turn
into a black and bilious broth.
If I was prepared to accept everything I’d heard as
gospel truth, then there was surely some universal wickedness afoot. My next
stop, I decided, would have to be the hospital.
Chapter Sixteen
Virgil was waiting in his office. He had already invested
time and effort to make sure the transaction was swift and painless. The local bank
had managed to clear the letter of credit from my DC bank and Virgil notified
the county clerk’s office and told them we were on our way. The clerk advised
me to re-survey the property and have another deed recorded. The fees and delinquent
taxes were paid from my small and modest trust fund. I asked Virgil to review the
paper work in his spare time. I had more compelling tasks to perform. He
silently consented.
We returned to his office and I told him about my
plans to visit the state hospital and Kepler’s visit to my van. He showed very little
enthusiasm. The thrill of the chase, or sale I suspect, begins to wear off after
the commission is paid.
Things weren’t proceeding well at the Ryder house. After
getting ‘tuned up’, or mauled in the attic and watching Virgil vomit snakes, I suspected
things were not going to end well there either. I also knew that if I were ever
going to get something out of my investment, I would need to put some delinquent
spirits to rest. The house, for want of a better word, was haunted, but it was
like no conventional haunt I had ever margined, which is usually the way it
works.
*
I enjoyed the drive to the hospital and seeing it for
the first time. It was more formidable than the house. There were mammoth
buildings incarcerated around grounds that made correctional centers look like
summer camps. The wall was nearly 15 feet high, higher than functionally
necessary and impossible for anyone to scale.
It looked as if a truck could have driven through it,
but like the wall surrounding the Ryder house, there was not a stone, brick or
block out of place. I walked along the outside examining the work, the mortar,
and the overall configuration of the structure. It pleased the eye the same way
the Ryder’s wall tended to fit dimensionally into the world better than nature
itself. If ever a god had chosen to work as a man, he would be a stonemason, not
a carpenter. God was like a bubble in a level; composed of nothing, yet he
keeps everything on a perfect keel.
The stone and the texture of the mortar were similar,
smooth as glass and hard. If I had to swear an oath, I could believe the same
man had built both walls; they were identical.
I entered the main gate and found my way to the
administration building. It was cavernous and nearly empty. A patient, or an
employee, slowly pushed a broom down the empty corridor. From behind a closed
door, I heard the staccato dance of a lone typewriter. I entered, found one
secretary adrift in a pool of empty desks and dust-covered covered office
equipment, and delivered my most ingratiating smile.
“I’d like to see the head man,” I said, “no pun
intended, if it’s possible.”
Her smile was carnivorous. It chewed its way into my
heart.
“I’m sorry, he’s not in,” she said.
“When will he return,” I asked. She tossed her head
and dark curls danced on her shoulders.
“He likes to keep everyone in suspense,” she said. “He
has a private practice in New York and he’s only the administrator here about
two weeks a month.”
I decided to find out if it was possible to see old
hospital records without paying tribute to administrative officials.
“I’m curious about the wall,” I said, none too
convincingly.
She raised an eyebrow, but smiled, which gave me hope.
“I’m a student of masonry,” I added.
She smiled and shook her head in disbelief. Her tongue
touched the middle of her lip and quickened its shine.
“All right,” I said, “I lied. I’ll tell you the truth:
I want to know who built the wall around the hospital. I bought a house in
Elanville with a similar wall and I’m running out of options.”
“You bought the Ryder mansion?” she asked.
I smiled and nodded, and asked her how she knew.
“Samuel Ryder was a board member here years ago,” she
said, flashing a knowing smile toward the opposite wall. “That’s his picture,”
she indicated.
Our eye met, not for the first time, but in a jarring
collision. I had seen that threatening physiognomy before. He was staring at
me, straight through me, actually, warning me off and away. There was nothing
kind in his expression. He looked like the type of man who specialized in
destroying things that displeased him.