A Stranger Here Below

by Charles Fergus

  “D’you see it?”

  Gideon almost jumped out of his skin. A figure rose from behind shrubbery a few feet away.

  “Low in the east, in the neck of Cetus.” A shadowy arm pointed.

  He looked in that direction. Above the horizon he saw a pale glowing smudge.

  “Edmond Halley did not discover it, but he calculated its interval. The comet visits us every seventy-five years, give or take a few years. The last time it appeared was in 1758. The Seven Years War was raging in Europe; here in the New World, men were butchering one another during the French and Indian War.”

  “Halley’s Comet,” Gideon said wonderingly. “I read in the paper that it was coming.”

  The dark figure motioned to him. “Come on around, and you will find a comfortable bench.”

  Gideon made his way around the hedge.

  The man standing before him was bundled in clothing, his head topped with what appeared to be a floppy Scotch bonnet. “You are the sheriff, Gideon Stoltz, if I do not mistake.” The man stuck out his hand.

  Gideon gripped it. The smaller hand shook Gideon’s hand up, then down, then released it as the figure turned abruptly back toward the comet. The man said over his shoulder, “Horatio Foote.”

  “Headmaster Foote,” Gideon said. “I’ve heard good things about your school. I’m pleased to finally meet you.”

  “Well met, indeed, beneath the hairy star.” Foote gave out a high-pitched grating laugh. “In 1456, or so it is said, Pope Callixtus excommunicated the comet because he thought it was an agent of the Devil.”

  “What are comets made of?” Gideon asked.

  “Ice? Rock? Certainly gaseous matter forms the tail. Kant argued that comets are composed of particles of ‘the lightest material there is.’”

  The headmaster sat down on the bench and motioned for Gideon to sit beside him. He drew out of his coat a telescope, expanded it, and handed it to Gideon.

  Through the glass, Gideon viewed the comet as an elongated smear of light trailing a luminous, curving tail. “It’s beautiful,” he said.

  “I spotted it last night. It will brighten as it approaches perihelion.” The headmaster put out his hand for the glass. “Comets excite alarm among the ignorant, who call them ‘malicious meteorites’ and suppose that they foretell wars, famines, plagues, and such.” Foote raised the telescope to his eye. “Tell me, what brings you up Academy Hill?”

  “I wanted to look out over the town. To think about certain things.”

  “Such as murder.” Foote clucked his tongue. “And suicide. No doubt it’s this damned comet working its mischief.”

  “Mr. Foote, you attended Judge Biddle’s funeral. I’m told you were his friend.”

  “Yes. We had drifted apart somewhat of late, not because of any disagreement, mind you—just two old men whose lives and interests were on separate paths.” He lowered the telescope. “May I ask if Hiram left a letter explaining why he took his life?”

  “He left a will,” Gideon said. “Nothing else.”

  “So I heard. Hiram was a private man. He had known great tragedy, and all his life I believe he struggled with anger and regret. He may have thought he had overcome his past. I’ve often wondered whether that is truly possible.”

  “Mr. Foote, how long have you lived in Adamant?”

  “I came here in aught one. Started my school in a one-room cabin—it’s long gone, as I sold the lot and the one next to it to some people, who then put up the hotel. With the money they paid me, plus subscriptions from a number of citizens, I built the structure behind us.

  “There are two other teachers besides myself,” Foote continued. “Our students learn Greek, Latin, literature, history, mathematics, and the sciences. I teach them to be skeptical, also. You are seated next to a Connecticut Yankee, a man who is exceedingly skeptical.”

  “And exceedingly curious?” Gideon said.

  Again the high-pitched laugh. “What would life be, without a keen curiosity regarding one’s surroundings? The natural world is a continual delight to me. I’m somewhat less curious about the mind of man, as it has disappointed me many times in the past.”

  “I too am interested in the natural world,” Gideon said, “and also in the mind of man. Why it makes him do so many strange and unwise things—things that may hurt him or other people, things that disrupt order and peace.”

  “You are a philosopher, sir.”

  “No, just a sheriff. The son of a Pennsylvania Dutch farmer.” He paused. “Mr. Foote, did you attend the trial of the Reverend Thomas McEwan in November of 1805?”

  “Thirty years ago. A mere thirty orbits around the sun of our small and rather insignificant planet,” he said. “Yes, I was there. They held the trial in the old courthouse—a primitive space cobbled together out of a log structure and a frame addition, with a cranky old stove that finally burned the place down. I sat in the gallery both days. I listened to the witnesses giving testimony—Sheriff Bathgate, as I recall; Flora Hendry, an attractive young woman; Sam Lingle, a teamster, who saw the preacher burying the body of the ironmaster’s brother at night; and, of course, the reverend Mr. McEwan himself.”

  “After the judge died, I found four journals in his study,” Gideon said, “his diaries for the years 1802 through 1805. In them, the judge made many entries about nature, the weather, people he met. He described meeting Rachel McEwan and courting her. And he wrote a detailed account of her father’s trial. The last entry was for November 11, 1805, the day the preacher confessed in court to murdering Nat Thompson, and Judge Biddle sentenced him to hang. There were no entries after that. It seemed as if the judge’s examination of life ended on that day.”

  “Oh, I’m sure Hiram continued to examine life,” Foote said, “though he may not have judged it worth recording.”

  “I know things were done differently back then,” Gideon said. “Colerain County was even more remote and isolated than it is today. But I have a hard time imagining holding a trial so soon after such a crime took place.”

  “Yet it was common to do so, not only here but in other places as well.”

  “I wondered why the judge didn’t recuse himself. After all, he would have to try the man who was supposed to become his father-in-law.”

  “Hiram always had, shall we say, an abundance of confidence in his own impartiality and judgment. And at that time, I suppose it might have been difficult or at least inconvenient to bring in a judge from elsewhere.”

  “It seems to me that Judge Biddle rushed to judgment in the case,” Gideon said. “As if he lost control of the whole process. I think he let the Reverend McEwan convince him of his guilt.”

  “Wasn’t the man guilty? As I recall it, the evidence was overwhelming. And, of course, he confessed to his crime. What an amazing set of circumstances and events! A fight, witnessed by passersby, that resulted in a man’s death. The preacher striking down his victim, Nat Thompson, then burying the corpse in the middle of the night—also witnessed, by the teamster, Lingle. The Reverend McEwan sleepwalking, having no recollection of finding or burying the corpse—or so he said. Yet the situation resolved itself. It became completely understandable in the end.”

  Gideon looked at the comet. It seemed to have grown brighter, or perhaps the air had become clearer as the temperature fell. “I wonder about the preacher walking in his sleep. How can a man get out of a warm bed, wander around in the dark, find a body lying somewhere in the woods, carry it back, dig a hole in the ground, put the body in the hole, cover it with dirt, smooth out the spot and conceal it with branches and dead grass, go back to bed—and not remember any of those things?”

  “At first,” Foote said, “I believed that McEwan knew full well what he had done. He had struck Nat Thompson a terrific blow to the head. Maybe Nat was killed outright, or maybe he scrambled to his feet and staggered off, only to die later. Either way, the preacher hid the body and then buried it under the cover of darkness. He did all those things consciously and will
fully. He then made up the story about falling and hitting his head, which caused a loss of memory and led to his supposed sleepwalking—in other words, he lied to make his actions seem less culpable. After all, he was a minister. What a thing for a man of God to have done!

  “But if it was play acting,” the headmaster continued, “then it was a most convincing performance. On the second day of the trial, I had no sense whatsoever that the broken, remorseful man standing there making his confession was being anything but truthful—completely and brutally truthful about his own flawed character and what he had done.”

  “The judge wrote that when they dug up Nat’s corpse, there was more than one wound to his head,” Gideon said. “The nose was flattened. ‘Crushed,’ is how the judge described it in his diary. Also, the bone of the skull had been exposed by what must have been a different blow. But before the trial, he also wrote that the preacher’s daughter Rachel told him that her father had struck Nat ‘a blow.’ She didn’t say that the reverend hit Nat twice. Anyway, it seems to me that striking a man hard enough to cause either of those two injuries would have dropped him like a stone. He would not have remained standing to receive a second blow.”

  Foote thought for a moment before replying. “I don’t recall the testimony that clearly; it’s been thirty years, after all. But I guess Hiram assumed that one of the injuries happened when Nat fell, perhaps hitting his head on a rock.”

  “That could explain the two wounds,” Gideon said with a nod. He went on: “Mr. Foote, as a learned man, can you tell me whether people really walk in their sleep?”

  “Indeed they do. The condition is called somnambulism, or noctambulism. It is well documented. Men—usually they are men, though there are female somnambulists as well—ride horses, climb up and down ladders, sing songs, write letters, do all manner of complex tasks. Their eyes remain open; they are able to see, and navigate their surroundings, and even respond to questions. Yet mentally, they are asleep.

  “The Reverend McEwan had just been in a fight,” Foote continued. “He was worried that he had badly hurt his adversary. He had suffered a serious blow to his own head. He had a history of getting up and doing things while asleep. If all of those suppositions are true, then I believe it’s entirely possible that the preacher found and buried Nat Thompson while somnambulating—and did not realize he’d done it.”

  Gideon shivered and wrapped his arms around himself. The Milky Way stretched overhead, two broad bands of glittering stars arrayed against the inky sky. The comet lay below the galaxy, nearer to the horizon, where it seemed to pulsate against the blackness.

  “From Julius Caesar,” the headmaster murmured, “the great Shakespearean drama of betrayal and deceit: ‘When beggars die, there are no comets seen; the heavens themselves blaze forth the deaths of princes.’”

  Beggars. Gideon considered for a moment, then said, “Mr. Foote, what would you say if I told you that Nat Thompson may still be alive?”

  Through grace I am determined

  To conquer, though I die

  Twenty-Four

  The room occupied one end of the Academy’s third and uppermost story. As the headmaster lit a lamp, he cautioned Gideon not to step on the box turtle asleep on the floor nor sit on the green snake coiled up on the cushioned seat of a chair. The lamp’s strengthening glow revealed book-lined shelves, wooden leaf presses, gauze collecting nets, fishing poles, walking sticks, a battered flintlock blunderbuss leaning in a corner. From branchlet perches on the wall, owls with cruel curved beaks and hawks with speckled breasts stared down, their glass eyes reflecting the light.

  “Will you join me in a drop of the creature?” Foote said.

  The headmaster set out two chairs in front of the fireplace. Pouring from a thick columnar vessel, he filled a pair of tumblers and handed one to Gideon. Seating himself in one of the chairs, Foote raised his glass. “A product of the agricultural surplus of our fair community. I use it medicinally and for preserving specimens. I assure you that this batch has never pickled a foetus nor preserved a toad.”

  Gideon inspected the contents of his glass, took a cautious sip. The whiskey was strong but it went down smoothly. He was now able to get a close look at the headmaster. The man’s narrow-bridged nose mimicked a beak. His blue eyes appeared shrewd and quick. From a head of unruly white hair, snowy sideburns extended down to cover a pointed chin. For some reason, Gideon felt he could trust this man he’d just met.

  “Now tell me about this resurrection of a murdered man,” Foote said.

  Where to begin? “Just over two weeks ago, an old tramp came to Judge Biddle’s door.” Gideon explained how, according to the judge’s housekeeper, Judge Biddle behaved oddly after meeting the tramp; how the beggar had also appeared at the ironmaster’s house, where he walked in the front door, asked for “Ad” in a familiar manner, and where suspicious behavior ensued.

  Foote listened intently, now and then sipping his drink.

  “The day after he was visited by the old tramp,” Gideon said, “the judge and I went hunting. He didn’t say anything about the stranger who had shown up at his house. But I got the feeling that he wasn’t himself. He was quieter than usual. Somber. I remember thinking he seemed hopeless, and sad. After the hunt, he gave me the birds he’d shot. And he called me by my forename. He had never done those things before. That evening, he killed himself.”

  The headmaster rose from his chair. He set his glass down on an ornate wooden display case whose glass-fronted compartments contained mollusk shells, crystals, fossils, Indian spear points, the empty-eyed skulls of birds and mammals. Foote muttered “Solvitur ambulando.” He strode the length of the room, his hands clasped behind his back, canted forward so that Gideon feared he might topple. Before the headmaster collided with the far wall, he turned abruptly on his heel and retraced his steps. The area he trod was paler and more deeply polished than the surrounding floorboards. After a half-dozen transits, Foote returned to his chair, which he repositioned to face Gideon’s.

  “I suppose that it could be Nat Thompson,” Foote said. “If so, most astonishing. And troubling.”

  Gideon sipped his whiskey. “What I don’t understand is what really happened thirty years ago. Because a dead body definitely was dug up in the preacher’s yard.” He paused. “I wonder if any of the witnesses who testified at the trial are still alive.”

  “Flora Hendry, I mentioned her when we were outside—the poor girl died, I believe it was from scrofula, probably twenty years ago.” The headmaster brushed a bony index finger back and forth across his nose. “Sam Lingle—he was no spring chicken. I haven’t seen him for years; I doubt he survives. I might add that, as a teamster, he worked for the ironmaster and would have been prepared to say exactly what his employer told him to. The sheriff, Ben Bathgate, is long dead. I helped perform an autopsy on his body; his stomach was a fibrous mass, the liver much distended. After leaving office, he pretty much devoted himself to drinking.” As if reminded of his own libation, Foote lifted his glass and took a generous swallow. “Have you heard about Bathgate? He was not an honorable public servant. Quite open to a bribe. In the end, that led to his being turned out of office.”

  Gideon drank from his own glass. The whiskey had begun to make him feel light-headed. “If the preacher was made to appear a murderer, if he was somehow made to believe he was a murderer, then I think Adonijah Thompson did it.”

  Foote lifted a snowy eyebrow. “Indeed, he has several possible motives. Animus toward Rachel McEwan for rejecting his proposal of marriage. And toward her father, for favoring Hiram Biddle as a suitor, not to mention handling the ironmaster’s brother roughly.”

  “My father-in-law told me that Mr. Thompson had hated Judge Biddle for years. For winning Rachel’s hand, but also because the judge ruled against Thompson in a case concerning a valuable piece of land.”

  “The Wheeler farm.” Foote nodded. “If the old beggar really is Nat Thompson, that could certainly explain why Hiram …”
He shook his head. “My poor friend. To learn that your life could have been far happier and more fulfilling. That through your own inability to see the truth, you destroyed a great love and hanged an innocent man.”

  “If the old tramp is Nat Thompson, I wonder why he went to the judge’s house,” Gideon said. “Did he want to mock him? Did he even know who lived there? Judge Biddle wasn’t in that house back in 1805; it hadn’t been built then. Or did he go to Judge Biddle out of grief and shame, determined to reveal the truth of what happened so long ago?”

  “Do you think he knew about the trial and hanging?”

  Gideon considered what he had learned of Nat Thompson, both from the thirty-year-old entries in the judge’s journal and from the way the tramp had behaved, two weeks ago, at the judge’s house and at the ironmaster’s mansion: Nat’s and his brother’s closeness; Nat’s argumentative, combative nature in the past; his slothfulness, his boasting, his saucy, entitled manner. A possibility began to take shape in Gideon’s mind. He took another sip of whiskey, cradled the glass in his lap.

  “Mr. Foote, consider this theory, this explanation of what Nat Thompson may have done over the last sixteen or so days. He comes back to Colerain County after being away somewhere for thirty years. First, he goes to Panther to see the ironmaster. But he doesn’t sneak back; he walks right in through the front door and demands to see his brother. That suggests he wasn’t part of any plan to trick the preacher and the judge back in 1805. Let’s say he’s down on his luck, wants to get his share of the profits from the ironworks. Adonijah Thompson is shocked to see his brother, and he’s frightened, because the ironmaster knows what could happen if people find out that he caused a man to be unjustly hanged thirty years ago. I don’t know what charge could be brought against him, but probably it would send him to prison for the rest of his life.