Those Who Went Remain There Still (3 page)

My mood was light and the day was fine when I returned to
my own cottage and I found the mail had been delivered. I looked
n the box from habit more than expectation. But on that day, I had a letter.

The postmark nearly stopped my heart.

I jerked the envelope up to my face and examined it closely, distracting myself—delaying myself from opening it. I investigated it like a policeman. Did I know this handwriting? What kind of paper was it? Who could have written it?

There was no name on the left, but in the middle my name was composed in precise, tight letters—so it wasn’t written by any near relation of mine. Bless them, even the ones who can read a little can scarcely print at all.

John Coy

Cassadega Way

Lily Dale, NY

And it had come from Lexington.
Not Leitchfield
, I told myself, but it was a small and false comfort. Lexington was the next nearest town of any size, and if any official business needed attending, it would surely take place there.

I was still standing beside the box, outside my door.

I let myself in and set my cane on a side table. I clutched the letter and still, I refused to open it. I turned it over and over between my fingers, hunting for clues that might tell me the contents would not break my heart, or horrify me, or terrify me, or—worst of all—summon me home.

In the corner beside the fireplace, I had placed a large rocker chair. I dropped myself down into it and ran my fingers over the letter. Of course it would summon me home. No lesser mission would require such correspondence. No other task would require any communication, not after so many years.

And how many years? I considered the question and had to think. I had to calculate it, how many years had I been gone before I came to help make Lily Dale? Only a few, I believed. For the sake of settling my own nerves and letting the query drop, I concluded that it must have been five or more, and twenty-five years in total was a solid amount. The realization hit me hard. It pressed against my chest so heavily that I closed my eyes. I let the envelope fall into my lap, where it rested on top of my legs.

***

It had been a quarter of a century since I’d left Leitchfield,
Kentucky.

***

By the time I received that letter, I had lived longer outside of the valley than I’d lived within it, though that margin was slim.

When I’d escaped, yes—that’s what it was.

It
was
an escape, and for years I thought of myself as a refugee. When I escaped I was a young man but a grown man, and a suspect man because I hadn’t yet married. It didn’t matter what they thought of me; at least, it didn’t matter once I became tall enough and tough enough to deter the criticisms and assaults of my brothers.

They hated me because I liked to read, and they could not even sign their own names, except for an x-shaped mark. They worried for the family’s status when I didn’t want any of the scraggly, illiterate women they pushed upon me. They attacked me for wanting more, and they burned the books I scraped to steal or buy.

What an accusation it is, too, that a boy could “live above his raisin’,” as if anyone should aspire to less.

They meant it as an insult but I refused to hear it that way. I heard their threats as a horse hears the lash of a crop. Let them swing,
and let them shout. I don’t know if they meant to push me as hard or as far as they did, but their efforts did more to send me away than any mere encouragement might have.

***

I went to Boonesborough, and I stole what I needed or I begged for it. And I got lucky, after a few months. There was a teacher who traveled from town to town, showing children how to count or spell. He said that if I’d carry his things and work for him, he’d feed me and put me up. And he did, as far as Louisville. I left him there because I couldn’t stand him, the filthy drunk, and by then I could read and write well enough to find a better position with a shipping company.

At that firm, I watched the figures and marked down shipments in the great leather ledger we restocked with sheets of paper as big as pillowcases. I wasn’t very good at the numbers, but I was better than the man who owned the operation and besides, if I’d been any more professional they would’ve had to pay me more.

***

Sometimes I wrote out letters for other people, letters that would be carried on the riverboats that steamed back and forth along the Ohio. I made extra change that way, listening to men and women who’d never learned or never took to learning.

I thought, “This is what it must be like to be a priest.”

They told you everything, those people did. Who was alive, who was dying, and who got married because they had to. I heard it all, and I took my task seriously. They trusted me to transcribe and forget. I did my best to fulfill that obligation with integrity.

And then, one day, I took a letter that would change my life.

There was a woman, small and plain, quiet and intelligent looking.

When she spoke, her voice was lower than I’d expected. She explained that she needed to send a message down to Atlanta, to her parents there. She warned me that it might take a long time to write, because she had much to say—but she’d brought her own paper and she was prepared to pay whatever fees I required.

And the story she told…the tale she laid out for her family back in Georgia…

It was a tale of two sisters, and of hope beyond the grave. It was her testimonial of faith, and it was her declaration of independence. She spoke up and I wrote down. I tried not to interrupt her with
questions but it was difficult. This woman, her name was Patricia, she had a wonderful way of telling stories. I remember that we sat together near the river, in the shadow of the bridge behind us. I remember how the sun was working its way through my shirt and underneath the rim of my hat, and I was growing so warm that I feared I might faint.

But she kept talking, and I kept writing.

I won’t say that Patricia converted me. She transformed me. She opened my eyes to things I’d never before imagined. Listening to that tiny, lovely woman speak I could almost believe that everything in my life—every miserable moment when I was brought up slowly, and in darkness—it all was leading to a reasonable, joyful meeting with this petite saint with her ash-gold hair and her lavender dress.

In her final paragraph she declared that she was going north, and that she would not be returning south of the Ohio River, not at any point and not for any reason.

I finally interrupted her then. I was unable to prevent myself. I told her, “You are the bravest woman I’ve ever met.” And she smiled, and she invited me to come with her.

“We’ve begun to fashion our own communities,” she said. “There’s talk of a town—can you believe that? A whole town made of devout, brilliant people who commune with the spirits. There are more like me. And we’ll need more men like you, educated men with eager spirits and curious minds, not to mention strong backs for building. Have you ever done any carpentry?”

“Sure,” I said, because it was just one of those things you learned in the hills. Even if you didn’t do it well, you could saw a board in two or nail two boards into one.

“If you’re serious, you can follow me up. I’m traveling with two other girls, and we could use a man alongside us. Sometimes it’s hard for women to go alone. Sometimes people want to stop us, or change our minds and send us home to our fathers or husbands.”

I glanced down at her hand and saw no ring. If she noticed that I’d looked, she didn’t say anything.

“It’s wrong, for the world to work like that, but I know the way things are,” she said. “I believe—I really do believe—that if everyone knew what was waiting for us on the other side…if everyone understood how this life, it’s only the beginning, then things would change. I think men and women might treat each other differently, or better. And this wonderful new church could be the key. So many of the mediums who speak so clearly to the other side—so many of them are women.”

“Are you a medium?” I asked, because it interested me greatly.

“No,” she said. “But my sister has a great gift. I’ve seen what she can do, and I have something stronger than faith. I have certainty in a soul that lasts longer than our short span of mortal years. I have pure and perfect knowledge that life continues. It surpasses the grave. It lingers, and we linger. The dead who left before us linger, and if we are prepared to listen, they are prepared to speak. So will you, John? Will you come up with us?”

“Yes,” I told her, breathless with excitement at the prospect. “Yes, I will come with you. Let me come with you. Let me help.”

***

The letter was still on my lap, the one I’d received from Kentucky. I didn’t want to touch it. I didn’t want to open it. I didn’t want to know what it said inside, but that eager and curious nature of mine wouldn’t let me tear it to shreds, either, although I considered it.

I held it up between two thumbs and two fingers, and I flexed my wrists as if to rip the thing into pieces.

And there was a knock on my door.

Shirley announced herself and came inside. Older than me by ten years and beginning to shrink, I think. Shirley was Patricia’s sister. She was one of the women I’d escorted up the river, and then up the continent those decades ago.

“I hope I’m not interrupting,” she said, and her face froze with concern. “Is something wrong?”

“No,” I said too quickly.

“Liar,” she said right back.

“You’re right, I’m lying. But it’s not a deliberate deception I’m only…” I held the letter out to her and begged with my eyes. “Afraid.”

“What’s this, then?” she asked, and she took the envelope and held it to the light. Her eyes were beginning to fail her more each year, and they’d never been too strong in the first place.

“It arrived today.”

“From Kentucky?” She squinted at the postmark.

“From Kentucky.”

“And you haven’t opened it.”

“No. I told you. I’m afraid. I don’t want to know what’s inside,” I half-lied again.

“If that were true, you would have torn it up already.”

“But it might be important,” I said weakly. “It must be important, if they sent it from Lexington. Someone went all the way to the city to have this sent, and I’ll tell you the truth, I’m not certain
how they found me. It makes me nervous that they know where
o look.”

“This ‘they’ you keep suggesting—do you mean your family?”

I nodded, slow with a valiant effort not to appear shameful. “My family. Or what’s left of it.”

Then her expression clouded. Her eyes flickered in a way I’d come to recognize. I straightened in my chair and resisted the impulse to reach again for the envelope.

“Someone’s died,” she said.

“I’ve assumed, but I can’t imagine who it might be—that anyone would contact me about it.”

“Not a parent.”

“My parents have been dead since—”

“It wasn’t a question,” she chided me. “It’s not a parent. It’s an older man, a very old man. No one you ever loved. And…” She
curled her fingers around the edge of the envelope. I wanted to tell her not to crease it, but I knew better so I didn’t speak except to prompt her.

“And?”

She crushed her eyes closed and held the paper up against her breast. For a moment she looked stricken. When she spoke again, there was fear in her voice. “And perhaps you ought to tear it up, after all.”

“I’m sorry?”

Shirley returned the envelope to me. I held it up, trying to see through the outer layer to get a better hint of what waited within.

“I don’t like this,” she said. “It’s a summons from a dead man, and he’s a hateful old thing. I can’t see him and I can’t reach him, not yet. He hasn’t been gone long enough to interrogate. But the spirits are sending me warnings, serious warnings. Oh John, whatever he wants, don’t give it to him!”

I was stunned by her spontaneous conviction. “What are you hearing, Shirley? What are you seeing?”

“Darkness. A world wet and black, without any light. And it is…and there is…madness.” She cocked her head and said, not to me but to someone I couldn’t see, “All right, I’ll tell him. They say you shouldn’t go. You’re being invited home, but you shouldn’t go. But they think you
will
go, anyway.”

I held the envelope and slipped my fingernail under its seal. If I didn’t open it soon, I wouldn’t be able to do it at all. “As usual, they’re probably right.”

“John,” she said, but she didn’t say anything else.

The paper tore and the letter within crinkled as I pulled it out.

My eyes sped across the sheet and snagged on the important phrases. I said them aloud as I read them. “Williams and Katz,
Attorneys at Law…last will and testament…property west of Leitchfield…conflict resolution…” My voice trailed off and Shirley was not very patient.

“What does it mean?” she demanded sweetly.

“Heaster Wharton Junior. He’s finally dead. And you’re right. I have to go home, just this one more time.”

Shirley was listening to someone, and it wasn’t me. “Yes,” she said after a few seconds. “This
will
be the last time.”

I felt cold, even though the day was warm and I was dressed almost too heavily for it. “But I have to go. It’s hard to explain.”

“I know,” she said, and she put her hand on my arm. “But it won’t be easy, and I’m afraid for you. The spirits don’t like this, but they want me to tell you—they’ll help you, if they can.”

IV

The Mother: Reflections from the Road, Daniel Boone, 1775

We came to think of the flying, flapping thing as a “she.”

There was something about the way she moved, like she was heavy and expecting. For a long time, we didn’t ever see her too close, at least no one who survived had seen her up near. But even at a distance there was something womanly about the sway of her body, moving like a pendulum between her wings.

A mother bear, a mother lion. A mother wolf. She was angry and dangerous like they are, and like nothing else on earth.

I mean, God Himself knows you can make a male thing mad.
You can wind him up and he’ll see red, and he’ll come for you, and he’ll mean to tear you apart when he catches you. But that’s nothing like the wrath of a mother when you stand between her and the thing she nurses.