Tucker’s Grove (3 page)

Mr. Deakin took the shovel and went to work
. Sweat streamed down
Clancy
’
s forehead, and his hands shook as he poin
ted the shotgun.

“
I
’
m done, Clancy,”
Mr. Deakin said, just loud enough for the
other man to hear him.

Clancy tilted the shotgun up and discharged the first barrel with
a sound like a cannon. Morning birds in the outlying fields burst into the air, squawkin
g. Clancy lowered the gun toward the mob again. “
Git!”

The circuit rider looked ready to bluster some more,
but the townspeople of Compromise turned to run. Not wanting to be left behind, the circuit rider turned around, his black frock coat
fla
p
ping. His
hat flew off, drifted in the air, then fell to the muck.

Clancy Tucker shivered on the seat of the wagon and pulled a blanket
around himself. He had cradled the empty shotgun for a long time as Mr. Deakin led the wagon around the town of Co
m
promise,
bumping over rough fields.

“
I would
’
ve shot him.”
Clancy
’
s teeth chattered together.
“
I r
e
ally meant it. I was going to kill them!
‘
Thou shalt not kill!
’
I
’
ve never had thoughts like that before!”

Mr. Deakin made Clancy take a nap for a few hours, but the
other man seemed just as disturbed after he awoke. “
How am I going
to live with this? I meant to
kill
another man! I had the gun in my hand. If I had tilted the barrel down just a bit I could have popped
that circuit rider
’
s head like a muskmelon.”

“
It was
only bird-shot, Clancy,”
Mr. Deakin said, but Clancy
didn
’
t hear.

As the horses followed the dirt path, Mr. Deakin reached behind
to the bed of the wagon where they kept their supplies. He ru
m
maged under the tarpaulin and pu
lled out a two-gallon jug of whi
s
key. “
Here, drink some of this. It
’
ll smooth out your nerves.”

Clancy looked at him, wide-eyed, but Mr. Deakin kept his face
free of any expression. “
I traded my little silver mirror for it last
night in the saloon. You cou
ld use some of this right now, Cla
n
cy. I
’
ve never seen anybody so bad.”

Clancy pulled out the cork and took a deep whiff of the contents, s
tartled. Stinging tears came to his eyes. “
I won
’
t, Mr. Deakin! It
says right in Leviticus,
‘
Do not drink wine nor st
rong drink.
’
 
”

Mr. Deakin pursed his
lips. “
Isn
’
t there another verse that says to give wine to those with
heavy hearts so they remember their misery no more?”

Clancy blinked, as if he had never considered the idea. “
That
’
s
in Proverbs, I think.”

“
Well, yo
u look like you could forget some of your misery.”

Clancy took out a metal cup and, with tense movements as if
someone might catch him at what he was doing, he poured
half a cupful of the brown liquid. He screwed up his face and looked
down into the cup. M
r. Deakin watched him, knowing that Clancy
’
s
lips had never been sullied by so much as a curse word, not to me
n
tion whiskey.

Reaching his point of greatest courage,
Clancy lifted the cup and gulped from it. His eyes seemed to pop even farther from his head
, and he bit back a loud cough. Before he could recover his voice to gasp, Mr. Deakin
spoke from the corner of his mouth
, hiding a smile
. “
My gosh, Clancy, just pretend
you
’
re drinking hot coffee! Sip it.”

Alarmed but determined, Clancy brought the cup bac
k
to his lips, squeezed his eyes shut, and took a smaller sip. He
didn
’
t speak again, and Mr. Deakin ignored him. Morning shadows
stretched out to the left as the wagon headed north toward Wi
s
consin.

Mr. Deakin made no comme
nt when Clancy refilled the metal
cup and settled back down to a regular routine of long, slow sips….

By noon the sky had thickened with thunderheads,
and the air held the muggy, oppressive scent of a lumbering storm.
The flies went away, but mosquitoes ca
me out. The coffins in back of the wagon stank worse than ever.

Clancy hummed “
Bringing in the Sheaves”
over and over, gro
w
ing louder with each verse. He turned to look at the coffins in the
back of the wagon and giggled. He spoke for the first time in hou
rs.
“
Can you keep a secret, Mr. Deakin?”

Mr. Deakin wasn
’
t sure he wanted to, and avoided answering.

“
I don
’
t think I know your Christian name, Mr. Deakin.”

“
How do you know I even have one?”
He had lived alone and made few friends in Illinois, working too
hard to socialize
much. The neighbors and townsfolk called him Mr. Deakin, and it had been a long time since he
’
d heard anyone refer to him as any
thing else. Clancy found that very funny.

“
Yes, I can keep a secret,”
Mr. Deakin finally said.

“
Promise?”

“
Pr
omise.”

Clancy dropped his voice to a stage whisper. “
Jerome lied!”
He
paused, as if this revelation were horrifying enough.

“
And when did he do that?”

“
When he came out of my parents
’
room and said that their
souls had flown off to Heaven
—
that wasn
’
t tru
e at all. And he knew
it!
My brother wanted to go found the new town so bad.
When he went into that room, after Ma and Dad were sick for
so long, Jerome
smothered them both with their pillows!”

Mr. Deakin kept his gaze pointed straight ahead.
“
Clancy, you
’
ve had too much of that whiskey.”

“
He did Dad first, who still had some strength to struggle. But
Ma didn
’
t fight. She just laid back and closed her eyes. She knew
we had promised to take them both to Tucker
’
s Grove, and she knew
we would keep our word. Yo
u always have to keep your word.
But when Jerome said their souls had flown off to Heaven, well,
that just wasn
’
t true
—
because by smothering them with the pillow,
he trapped their souls
inside
!”

Clancy opened his eyes. Mr. Deakin saw bloodshot lines around
the irises. He
wasn
’
t sure if he could believe any of this.

“
That
’
s why we have to keep burying the coffins
—
so the
bodies stay down!”

Clancy glanced at Mr. Deakin, expectant, but
then his expre
s
sion changed. With a comical look of astonish
ment, he cover
ed his mouth with one hand, still grimy from digging out the graves at dawn.
“
I promised Jerome I wouldn
’
t tell
anybody
, and now I broke
my promise. Something bad
’
s bound to happen for sure now!”
He
closed his eyes and began to groan in the back of his thr
oat.

In exasperation, Mr. Deakin reached over and yanked on the
floppy brim of Clancy
’
s hat, pulling it over his face. “
Clancy, you
just take another nap. Get some rest.”
He lowered his voice and
mumbled under his breath, “
And give me some peace, too.”

As
sisted by the whiskey, Clancy slept most of the afternoon, lying in an awkward position
against the backboard. Mr. Deakin urged the horses onward, trying to outrun
the storm. He hadn
’
t seen another town since Compro
mise, and the wild Illinois prairie spraw
led as far as he could see, dotted
with clumps of trees. The wagon track was only a faint impression,
showing the way. A damp breeze licked across Mr. Deakin
’
s
face.

The first droplets of water sprinkled his cheeks, and Mr. Deakin
pulled his hat down tig
ht onto his head. As the storm picked up, the
breeze and the raindrops made a rushing sound in the grasses.

Clancy grunted and woke up. He looked disoriented, saw the
darkened sky, and sat up sharply. “
What time is it? How long did I sleep?”
He whirled to
look at the coffins in the back. The patter of
raindrops sounded like drumbeats against the wood.

Knowing what Clancy was going to say, Mr. Deakin mai
n
tained
a nonchalant expression. “
Hard to tell what time it is with these
clouds and the storm. Probably l
ate afternoon
…”
He looked at
Clancy. “
Sunset maybe.”

A boom of thunder made a drawn-out,
tearing sound across the sky.

“
You
’
ve got to stop! We have to bury the
—”

“
Clancy, we
’
ll never get them dug in time, and I
’
m not going to be shoveling a grave in the m
iddle of a storm. Just cover them up with the tarp and they
’
ll be all right.”

Clancy turned to him with an expression filled with outrage and
alarm. Before he could say anything, a
thump
came from the back
of the wagon. Mr. Deakin looked around, wondering
if he had rolled
over a boulder on the path.

Then the thump came again.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw one of the coffins move aside just a little.

“
Oh, no!”
Clancy wailed. “
I told you!”

An echoing thump came from the second coffin. Another burst
of
thunder rolled across the sky, and the horses picked up their pace,
frightened by the wind and the storm.

Clancy leaned into the back of the wagon. He took a mallet from
the pack of tools and, just as the first coffin bounced again, he
whacked the edg
e of the lid, hammering down the coffin nails to keep the top
closed. The rusted and mud-specked nailheads gleamed bright with
scraped metal.

Mr. Deakin had his mouth half-open in disbelief, but he couldn
’
t think of
anything to say. He kept trying to convi
nce himself that this was
some kind of joke Clancy was playing.

Just as he turned, the first coffin lid lurched, despite Clancy
’
s
hammering. The pine boards split, and the lid bent up just enough
for a gnarled gray hand to push its way out. Wet, rotting sk
in
scraped off the edge of the wood as the claw-fingers scrabbled to find
pu
r
chase and push the lid open further. Tendons stuck out along
ye
l
lowed bones. A burst of stench wafted out, and Mr. Deakin gagged but could not tear his eyes away.