Tucker’s Grove (19 page)

The man looked directly back at him as the car crawled past. Time froze, and Ray felt a shadow wrap around his
heart and squeeze it with icy fingers. Ray
’
s eyes bulged, and he felt the ice thicken in his chest. An unreasonable, gibbering terror mounted his shoulders, making him shudder. His lungs didn
’
t want to breathe anymore. Black spots swam before his eyes.

The
spectral man reached down to lift something out of the cart, a sharp farming tool.

“
Ray!”
Betty screamed, he realized, for the second time. “
It
’
s Scotty!”
The car swerved back and forth as Betty tried to reach to the back seat. Suddenly, Ray heard the lit
tle-animal sounds of a baby choking. Scotty was already turning blue in the face, and his tiny arms and legs writhed.

Ignoring the roaring pain in his joints, Ray broke his fascin
a
tion with the spectral man and snatched the baby into the front seat, flippi
ng him over his knees, and pounded him roughly on the back. Scotty finally coughed and spit up again, crying and breathing great gasps of air.

Ray pulled a hamburger-stand napkin from the glove co
m
partment and wiped off the baby
’
s mouth. Scotty had apparen
tly spit up and started to choke, unable to turn over in his basket.

Betty
’
s eyes were glassy and terrified. “
He has a fever, Ray. We
’
ve got to
watch
him! It only takes a second, and if
—”

“
He
’
ll live,”
Ray said, and was surprised at the accusatory tone in
his voice. Betty shut up immediately and struggled to keep her tears back. Ray hated it when she cried.

“
Did you see that man?”
he asked.

“
What man?”

Ray turned to look back, but they had left
the stranger and his oxcart in the distance.

The ancient atte
ndant turned the crank on the rust-red Conoco pump, ratcheting the numbers back to zero before he started pumping gas into the Buick. He massaged the bugs from the windshield, checked the oil, and performed the typical amenities. The gas station sat at th
e
intersection of two infrequently tra
v
elled roads, but “
G. DuBay, prop.”
seemed to be doing an ad
e
quate business with his two gas pumps.

The old man
’
s house was attached to the station building; several automobile skeletons in various stages of decay litte
red his back yard. Ray expected to see a mongrel dog pressing its snout up against the weathered slat fence around the yard.

“
Was just ready to close up for the night.”
The old man wiped his hand on his stained gray coveralls. His voice carried the ra
g
ged ends of a French accent. “
You jes
’
caught me before I started cleaning up.”

Ray sat motionless against the passenger door, not wanting to climb out of the car. He kept looking behind him into the tw
i
light, where the road was swallowed up in the darkeni
ng cor
n
fields. The gaunt man with the oxcart was back there someplace. As he thought of the apparition, Ray felt fear swell in him again.

Betty stepped out of the car, stretching her legs. “
Are you Mr. DuBay?”
She nodded toward the sign in the gas-station
window. A red Coca-Cola machine hummed next to a rocking chair in front of the station
’
s door. A stack of old newspapers sat on top of a case of empty bottles, as if the man read the papers in wha
t
ever order he happened to pick them up.

“
Yes, ma
’
am, I am G
illie DuBay.”
He grinned at her with a mouthful of perfect teeth, odd in itself for a man his age. He held out his hand, but noticed the black stains from engine oil, ker
o
sene, and gas on the skin, so he tipped a non-existent hat instead.

“
Is there anyplac
e to spend the night near here?”
Ray spoke up, sounding gruff. He didn
’
t want to be out on the road in the dark. The spectral man could be waiting for them around any curve, from any side road, beckoning Ray to climb into his cart.

Ray recognized the para
noid tinge to his thoughts and became even more frightened, wondering if the leukemia and the unr
e
lenting fact of his own death might have squeezed his mind into a dark corner where healthy men could never go.

DuBay pointed down the road. “
Tucker
’
s Grove i
s not too far, a couple of miles. Jes
’
this side of town you
’
ll find one of those motor-hotels, and you can get a room there, sure enough. They might even have a television for you to look at. Red Skelton should be on tonight…
or is it Tuesday?”

“
Thank you,
Mr. DuBay.”
Betty paid him for the gasoline and looked sidelong at Ray, as if to be sure that he wanted to stop for the night rather than continuing for another hour or so.

“
DuBay
—”
Ray sat up and turned to look the old man square in the eye. “
About two m
iles up the road we passed a burned-out cornfield…”
He paused, afraid he would sound ridiculous. Ray had been dealing with the constant fear of his own mortality, but this fear of the shadowy man was something he couldn
’
t put a finger on
—
and that made it
m
uch worse.

“
Ah, Sanderson
’
s place,”
DuBay interrupted. “
He is a ho
t
head
—
heard how Eisenhower was going to remove price su
p
ports due to the farm surplus, so he went out and burned his crop to the ground.”
The old man slapped his knee, as if he thought it wa
s funny.

“
I saw a man with an oxcart parked in the lane by that field,”
Ray continued. “
He was all dressed in black, and wore a wide-brimmed hat. He didn
’
t seem to have any eyes
—
but he looked like Death himself. I never felt so horrified in my life. Do
you
know who I
’
m talking about? Does this man live around here?”

DuBay looked at Ray, studying him, then he let out a disb
e
lieving laugh. “
I think you are pulling my leg, mister.”

Ray began to lose his temper. “
Dammit, I asked you a que
s
tion!”

DuBay frowned g
ravely. “
My
Meme
, my Granny, used to tell me stories. I can
’
t imagine how you might know them, or know me enough to think I
’
d be familiar with it.”
He put a grimy finger to his lips. The black semicircles under his fingernails looked like perplexed scowls.

“
She talked about a spectre called the
Ankou
.”
His slightly accented voice drew out the last syllable, slurring it. “
He is the ghost of the last man to die ea
ch year. The Ankou stalks the night, with his scythe in one hand and his demonic oxen pulling a creaky cart by his side. He looks for victims, poor souls to throw into his cart, until the next year brings another
Ankou
to take his place. Now, I do not mean
to scare you, because it means not a thing, but my
Meme
said any person who catches a glimpse of the
Ankou
is doomed to die within a month.”

For just a moment, Ray
’
s blood stopped cold in his veins, then he snorted at the old man. “
Tell me something I
don
’
t
know.”

DuBay raised his eyebrows, then looked searchingly at Betty. She remained silent for a moment, then drew strength from her own ability to answer. “
My husband has leukemia, Mr. DuBay. He
does
have less than a month to live. According to one doctor
, anyway. We
’
re going to Chicago for a new treatment.”

The old man appraised Ray with such intensity that it made him uncomfortable, but the scrutiny didn
’
t make Ray feel p
a
thetic, as many other people did when they wept their crocodile tears for the poor,
terminally ill man (“
only thank God it didn
’
t happen to Me!”
). DuBay came over to the passenger side of the car. “
Maybe you
did
see the
Ankou
, then. It
’
s possible, you know.”
He leaned down to look Ray in the eye and spoke with touching sincerity. “
You
’
ll
get used to the dying, mister. I have been doing it for the past forty years.”

“
I don
’
t have quite that much time to adjust.”
Ray caught himself on the point of rebuking DuBay for having had so many years to see all the places, do all the things
—
. He cut
himself off before the words rolled out of their own accord. That particular sermon had been building up in him for days, and he was afraid he
’
d unleash it on Betty, condemning her for having a life ahead, that she
’
d be able to remarry some
other
bank vice
president, someone else who could watch Scotty grow up, who could go with her to see all the new movies, who could hold her hand in the darkness while the Big Screen romance took place in front of them….

“
Don
’
t be too sure I
’
ve seen all that much in my li
fe,”
DuBay said, as if he understood the anger bubbling beneath Ray
’
s s
i
lence. “
But I have learned to be satisfied with what I
have
done and seen. It takes a special kind of trick to look at your own yard every sunset, year in and year out. I cannot rememb
er the last time I left Rutherford County. Some people want to go ever
y
where and see everything
—
but I could stare at that field for the rest of my life and still not see it all.”

“
Don
’
t stare too hard, Mr. DuBay
—
you just might catch a glimpse of the
Ankou
yourself. Then we
’
ll see just how prepared for Death you really are.”

“
Ray!”
Betty scolded.

DuBay took no offense, though. He rapped his knuckles on the baby-blue paint of the Buick
’
s hood. “
Good luck to you.”
He smiled with his perfect teeth and pulled
at his imaginary cap again. “
About that treatment in Chicago, I mean.”
He said not
h
ing more about the
Ankou
. Ray wanted to be safe behind a locked door for the night.

Ray pulled himself out of the steaming bathwater, trying to make the heat work a moment
longer on his body
’
s pain. His skin was crab-red as he grabbed a scratchy motel towel that smelled of bleach.

While in the tub, he had spent most of his time thinking about death and about Death personified, whether it be the Grim Reaper or DuBay
’
s
Ankou
.
Betty said she hadn
’
t seen anyone, but maybe nearness to death allowed Ray to see things other people could not. Maybe the vision he had seen was the
real Ankou
, the
real
precursor of his own death.