Sun was beginning to warm the air; a cloudless sky allowed light to flood the tops of hills. Still, down in the hollows where the dead bodies were it was cold and dark as dusk. We alternated between these two worlds, walking up into the light, down toward darkness, over little rises. If walking was good for clarity of mind, it was also a quicker way to the cemetery than driving from the mortuary.
“Where are we going?” Andrews asked suspiciously. He was game, but he enjoyed his whining.
“I'd like another visit with our friends in the
Adele
community,” I said. “I want to check in on Billy.”
“Who?” Andrews asked, stumbling behind us.
“The sick boy by the fire, remember?”
“Oh,” he remembered. “Right. Why?”
“I want to see what he's wearing.”
I took the silence behind me to be a form of derision.
“I have about a hundred ideas shooting around up here,” I told them without looking back, rubbing my temple, “and it would be better if I didn't struggle to verbalize them until I have something concrete to show you both; would that be all right?”
More silence trailed me.
I marched perhaps ten feet in front of the other two along a path I thought would avoid stray state troopers and further grisly discovery. The shushing of leaves urged the quiet, emphasized it, imitated the sound of rushing water.
The last ridge taken, our most populated graveyard came into view. Touched by sunlight, scrubbed by the first day of November, it seemed a village, a picturesque Disney impersonation of a cemetery.
Down the barely discernible path, toward the center of the larger crypts, I stopped short, taking it all in, waiting for my companions to catch up.
“See something?” Skid said softly, straining his eyes over the gray and brown.
“I'm looking,” I said hesitantly, “but I can't tell where the so-called
Adele
crypt is. It all looks different in sunlight.”
“Like a park,” Andrews agreed, pulling up beside me. “I think it's that way.” His hand waved indefinitely.
I turned to Skid. “You know, don't you?”
“I usually just go to Rud's cabin,” he answered uncertainly. “This place is always confusing to me.”
“Let's go on until we're attacked by a big black dog,” Andrews said dryly. “Then we'll know we're on the right track.”
“Excellent,” I agreed. “Lead the way.”
“Shut up.”
“It's got to be one of those.” I pointed to the group of eight or nine large stone crypts not a hundred yards away.
“Seems right.” Andrews held his ground.
“Come on.” I started in that direction.
Down the slope the scene was no more familiar. It seemed I hadn't been in the place for years. Bronze sun poured over everything, softening gray wreckage to blue statuary, black moss to green decoration. Even waterless brown hulls of weed waved sweetly in the clear cold water breeze.
Luck, then, was our only ally. A voice to our right turned our heads.
“Finally,” May said exasperatedly.
She was beckoning us around a low wall, her neck wrapped in June's cloth, a shawl we had not seen before over her shoulders. She turned; we followed.
Between tumbled gravestones and small marble vaults, the familiar doorway appeared. In the clear noon I found it quite attractive,
ornate deco ironwork in the upper corners, relief carvings of peaceful angels adorning the front wall.
May was already through the door.
“Hold it,” Skid said.
He took the lead, hand on his holster.
“What are you doing?” I said, laughter edging the words.
“You think the Deveroe boys might be around?” he said, peering into the darkness.
Biology chose that moment to release me from the protective cocoon of shock that had supported me for twelve hours. My knees gave way like hinges; my head narrowly avoided a jagged tombstone. I plunged into darkness.
Â
I woke up with fire in my face.
Low coals glowing red and white three feet from my face startled me, I jerked backward, felt cradling arms.
“Sh,” she said. “It's all right. You're safe.”
Truevine held my head with such tenderness I felt a pinch in the corners of my eyes.
Andrews was sitting next to us; Skid stood close at hand. Other faces, sweet, soot-covered, sad, held me in their gaze.
“He shouldn't be out,” Truevine said softly, petting my forehead. “After what happened to him.”
“I told him,” Andrews said tightly. “Try making that man do something he doesn't want to do.”
“Can't be done,” Skid confirmed.
“What are you doing here?” I gazed up at Truevine's version of the Madonna.
“Hiding from you'uns,” she said matter-of-factly.
“She come to look after Billy.”
I couldn't see who had spoken, but it was the scarecrow's voice.
“Billy.” I sat up. “How is he?”
The room was exactly as it had been before, orange and red, dark and warm, huddled, lonely, strange. Among the living faces I could clearly see the ghost of my great-grandmother, driven into the forest
by wild heartbreak, losing the man she loved, knowing he didn't love her. How had her mind turned, digging up her husband's grave to snatch the memento of his true love from lifeless fingers? What had been her plan? Or is madness primarily defined by its lack of maps? Founding an invisible homeless shelter had certainly not been her design; that was clear from the vacant look on her face. She was staring toward the arrangement of items in the corner, the geode where the little silver lily lay. I could barely see her through the smoke, but I was certain she was there, gazing into the darker shadows.
“Billy's gone,” the scarecrow choked.
Only then did I notice the bundle across the coals from me. A breathless heap, his face still exposed, Billy stared into the warmth without expression.
“I was too late,” Truevine said, without a hint of sadness. “Billy's done now. Gone home.”
I reached toward him absently, then looked up, found the scarecrow's face.
“I'm sorry for your loss.”
“He's past caring,” the man said, hollow, eyes vacant. “Excuse me. I got to step outside a moment.”
I watched him go, then scanned the room for the dog.
“Where's your pet?” I asked Truevine.
“Dog?” She smoothed her dress where I'd been lying. “He's not my pet; he belongs to himself.”
“It's not around,” I tried to confirm.
“Can't say,” she answered, sighing. She seemed sleepy or drugged.
“I passed out?” I checked with Andrews.
“Only a second ago.” He stared down. “We barely got you inside, she took your head; you woke up. It happened in nothing flat.”
Gaining focus, I gave further search for other players. Rud was not in evidence.
“Once again,” I addressed May, “you were waiting for me?”
“She thought you'd probably find her,” May answered, indicating Truevine. “Knew you were headed this way, came anyway to help Billy. She's a good girl.”
“Where did you find Ms. Deveroe,” Skid asked, his voice seeming harsh compared to everyone else's, “to get her here?”
“In the woods,” May told him serenely. “I know a thing or two.”
“Truevine,” I said, trying to get her to look at me, “you saved my life last night.”
“That I did,” she answered. “I'll expect something back.”
“I know.”
Hard laws of retribution and fairness were etched into us both by the mountain, the air, our parents, our different churchesâhers was a green cathedral, mine came with a card catalog, but they were our religious homes nonetheless. It was clear to both of us that I owed her a debt, one I would pay without question. No matter that her service to me had been mostly in her mind, partly in a certain esoteric knowledge of plants.
“I've been studying on Harding Pinhurst,” she went on, “and I believe I know what happened now. Last Thursday night.”
“Ma'am,” Skid said, still hard, “I'd like to hear about that.”
“All right.” She shifted in her seat. The color of the coals flushed her face rich with warmth; her eyes were far away, at peace.
She was not wearing the black cloak we'd seen the night before. A plain dark dress, heavy gray sweater, a man's black construction boots, and thick gray socks were her costume. She'd changed clothes.
“You've been home,” I said simply.
“Followed the boys,” she assented. “Give them a piece of my mind about shooting into the old mansion. They're a cussed bunch sometimes, and that kitchen's a mess.”
“They were happy to see you.”
“Not when I told them they'd shot you dead.”
“Are they home now?” Skid interrupted.
“No,” Andrews, Truevine, and I answered as one.
“You went by there this morning before you came to my office,” Skid accused me.
“They weren't there,” I dismissed him, and turned back to the girl. “But I saw your charm on the porch.”
“It was a good'un.” Her face tensed a little. “That was the problem.
I thought I would bring Able back from the dead, but he wasn't dead after all. So it just messed things up.”
I didn't know if her brothers had confessed to hanging her boyfriend or not. Best leave that a family matter, but I thought perhaps her charm had worked better than she realized. I turned my full attention to the subject.
“It brought Able to you in some other way,” I coaxed her.
“In the Newcomb mansion.” She nodded. “Last night. That's when I knew what happened. Able's not dead, and thank God for it. But I don't know if this is worse.”
“What's worse?” Skid stepped in closer.
“Able was trying to protect me,” she said, her voice losing its gentle lilt. “He didn't mean it. I believe he pushed Harding down that hill.” She looked Skidmore in the eye at last. “That's not murder. You see that. He was saving my life.”
“You think Harding was trying to kill you?” Skid's voice finally softened.
“He wanted to, yes.”
“Why?” Skid knelt down next to her.
“Well, because I'm the one told Able what Harding was doing with them bodies.”
Â
Truevine Deveroe, in her daily exploration of her mountain, learned new things every day. She had barely gone to school, but the university of geography had tutored her mightily. She knew every inch of the terrain within ten miles of her house, in any direction. She knew plants that had no names, lizards that were unique to our county, mosses that grew under granite. Her mother had fostered this education, passing on information from women whose knowledge could trace roots to the beginning of European culture. For millennia these women and thousands like them had guarded nature, protecting its secrets from men, keeping facts about their earth from being forgotten. It was a kind of knowledge I had thought vanished from the earth. Listening to Truevine talk about what her mother had taught her, I thought there might be a drop
of true folklore left to be squeezed from Appalachia yet. A great vindication of my academic study washed over me. Such was not Truevine's point, of course. She simply wanted to assure us all that finding dead bodiesâanimal, plant, humanâwas as natural to her as coming across a fallen tree. But she'd been greatly disturbed by sheer numbers in the section of her domain close to the mortuary. For several years she simply avoided the area. A casual word slipped here and there in conversation meant only for his ears had alerted Able's suspicions. He'd finally investigated. They'd fought about the subject more than once, the last time on the night in question.
“Able was going to file charges.” She squinted. “Harding was a no-account, but he's kin. I asked Able not to do it. Lordy, we fought. He's a strong-willed man.”
“The point is,” Skidmore said impatiently, “that you think Harding somehow knew you were the one who told Able.”
“He knew.” She gave s single nod.
“How did he find you over there by Dr. Devilin's house last Thursday?”
“I told him to meet me and Able at the new church hall that night,” she said, unable to fathom that we hadn't known that fact. “That's why we was waiting outside.”