“I need to get that nightgown off.” Kate gave Caleb a grave look. “This will be…bad.”
He swallowed. He could barely bring himself to look at the woman, at her charred and bubbled flesh.
“I’m not good with things like this,” he admitted.
“Nobody is, Caleb.”
He realized something else. He’d waited too long; now they were stranded, waiting for the woman to die. With only one horse, they couldn’t use the buckboard to take Dory to Mystic. And Pim would never leave her.
“I’ll need clean cloths, a bottle of alcohol, scissors,” Kate commanded. “Boil the scissors, and don’t touch them afterward, just lay them in a cloth. Then go look after the children. Pim can help me here. You’ll want to keep them away from the house for a while.”
Caleb didn’t feel insulted, only grateful. He retrieved the things she’d asked for, brought them to the room, and traded places with Pim. By the kitchen garden, the girls were playing with their dolls, making beds for them out of leaves and sticks, while Theo toddled around.
“Come on, children, let’s go for a walk to the river.”
He lodged Theo on his hip and took Elle by the hand. She, in turn, took her sister’s, as they had learned to do, making a chain. They were halfway to the river when a scream severed the air. The sound shot through Caleb like a bullet.
—
Lucius, it’s started. I need you now.
Greer had been driving since before dawn. “Just get this boat ready,” he’d told Lore. He swung past Rosenberg in the dark, jogged northwest, and hit Highway 10 as the sun was rising behind him.
He would reach Kerrville by four o’clock, five at the latest. What would the darkness bring?
Amy, I am coming.
* * *
50
Michael came to consciousness in darkness. Lying on his bunk, he fingered the wound on his head. His hair was rigid with dried blood; he was lucky they hadn’t broken his skull. But he supposed an armed criminal in the president’s house warranted at least one good blow to the melon. Not an ideal way to get a night’s rest, though, on the whole, not entirely unwelcome.
He slept some more; when he awoke, soft daylight was coming through the window. A clunk of tumblers, and a pair of DS officers appeared. One was holding a tray. While the other stood guard, the first placed the tray on the floor.
“Much obliged, guys.”
The two walked off. Probably they’d been instructed not to talk to him. Michael lifted the tray and put it on the bunk. A bowl of boiled oats, scrambled eggs, a peach—a better meal than he’d had in days. They’d given him only a spoon—no fork, of course—so he ate the eggs with that, followed by the porridge. He saved the peach for last. Juice exploded over his chin. Fresh fruit! He’d forgotten what it was like.
More time passed. At last he heard footsteps and voices in the hall. Peter, most likely, with someone else in tow. Apgar? Sooner or later, the conversation was going to have to widen.
But it wasn’t Peter.
Sara stood in the doorway. She’d changed less than he would have thought. Older, of course, but she’d aged gracefully, the way some women could, the ones who didn’t fight it, who accepted the passage of time.
“I don’t believe my eyes.”
“Hello, Sara.”
Michael sat up on his bunk as his sister stepped inside. She was carrying a small leather bag. A guard moved in behind her, holding a baton.
“Goddamnit, Michael.” She was standing apart from him.
“I know.” An absurd remark: What did it mean? I know I hurt you? I know how this must look? I know I’m the worst brother in the world?
“I am so…angry at you.”
“You have a right.”
An eyebrow lifted. “That’s all you have to say?”
“How about, I’m sorry.”
“Are you kidding me? You’re sorry?”
“You look well, Sara. I’ve missed you.”
“Don’t even try. And you look like hell.”
“Oh, this is one of my better days.”
“Michael, what are you doing here? I thought I’d never see you again.”
He searched her face. Did she know? “What did Peter tell you?”
“Just that you’d been arrested and you had a gash in your head.” She lifted the bag a little. “I’m here to sew you up.”
“So he didn’t say anything else.”
She made a face of disbelief. “Like what, Michael? That they’ll probably hang you? He didn’t have to.”
“Don’t worry. Nobody’s getting hanged.”
“Twenty-one years, Michael.” Her right hand, the one not holding the bag, was clenched into a fist, as if she might strike him. “Twenty-one years without a message, a letter, nothing. Help me understand this.”
“I can’t explain right now. But you have to know there was a reason.”
“Do you know what I had to do? Do you? Ten years ago, I said, That’s it, he’s never coming back. He might as well be dead. I buried you, Michael. I put you in the ground and forgot about you.”
“I did some awful things, Sara.”
At last the tears came. “I took care of you. I raised you. Did you ever think of that?”
He rose from the bunk. Sara let the bag drop to the floor, raised her fists, and began to pummel his chest. She was crying in earnest now.
“You asshole,” she said.
He pulled her into a tight embrace. She struggled in his arms, then let him hold her. The guard was watching them warily; Michael shot him a look: Back off.
“How could you do this to me?” she sobbed.
“I never wanted to hurt you, Sara.”
“You left me, just like they did. You’re no better than they were.”
“I know.”
“Damn you, Michael, damn you.”
He held her that way for a long time.
—
“That’s quite a story.”
It was late morning; Peter had cleared the office. He and Apgar were seated at the conference table, waiting for Chase. A short retirement for the man, thought Peter.
“I know it is,” Peter answered.
“Do you believe him?”
“Do you?”
“You’re the one who knows the man.”
“That was twenty years ago.”
Chase appeared in the door. “Peter, what’s going on? Where is everybody? This place is a tomb.” He was dressed in the jeans, work shirt, and heavy boots of the cattleman he had announced his intention to become.
“Have a seat, Ford,” Peter said.
“Will this take long? Olivia’s waiting for me. We’re meeting some people at the bank.”
Peter wondered how many of these conversations he was going to have to have. It was like leading people to the edge of a cliff, showing them the view, and then shoving them off.
“I’m afraid so,” he said.
—
Alicia saw the first mounds just outside of Fredericksburg—three domes of earth, each the length of a man, bulging from the ground in the shade of a pecan tree. Riding on, she came to the outermost farmstead. She dismounted in the packed-dirt yard. No sounds of life reached her from the house. She stepped inside. Furniture overturned, objects strewn about, a rifle on the floor, beds unmade. The inhabitants had been infected as they’d slept; now they slept in the earth, beneath the pecan tree.
She watered Soldier at the trough and continued on her way. The rocky hills rose and fell. Soon she saw more houses—some nestled discreetly in the folds of the land, others exposed on the flats, surrounded by hard-won fields of newly tilled soil. There was no need to look more closely; the stillness told Alicia all she needed to know. The sky seemed to hang above her with an infinite weariness. She had expected it to happen like this, at the outer edges first. The first ones taken up, then more and more, an army swelling its ranks, metastasizing as it moved toward the city.
The town itself was abandoned. Al
icia rode the length of the dusty main street, past the small stores and houses, some new, others reclaimed from the past. Just a few days ago, people had gone about their daily lives here: raised families, conducted business and trade, talked of small things, gotten drunk, cheated at cards, argued, fought with their fists, made love, stood on the porches to greet their fellow citizens as they passed. Had they known what was happening? Did the fact creep upon them slowly—first one person missing, a curiosity barely remarked on, then another and another, until the meaning dawned—or had the virals swooped down in a rush, a single night of horror? At the southern edge of town, Alicia came to a field. She began to count. Twenty mounds. Fifty. Seventy-five.
At one hundred, she gave up counting.
* * *
51
The day moved on. Still Dory did not die.
From the room where the woman lay, Caleb heard only small sounds—moans, murmurs, a chair shifting on the floor. Kate or Pim might appear briefly, to fetch some small implement or boil more cloths. Caleb sat in the yard with the children, though he had no energy to amuse them. His mind drifted to undone chores, but then another voice would speak to him, saying it was for naught; they would soon be leaving this place, all his proud hopes dashed.
Kate came out and sat beside him on the stoop. The children had gone down for a nap in the house.
“So?” he asked.
Kate squinted into the afternoon light. A strand of hair, golden blond, was plastered to her forehead; she tucked it away. “She’s still breathing, anyway.”
“How long will this take?”
“She should be dead already.” Kate looked at him. “If she’s still alive in the morning, you should take Pim and the kids and get out of here.”
“If anybody’s staying, it’s me. Just tell me what to do.”
“Caleb, I can handle it.”
“I know you can, but I’m the one who got us into this mess.”
“What were you going to do? A horse gets sick, some people go missing, a house burns down. Who’s to say any of it’s related?”
“I’m still not leaving you here.”
“And, believe me, I appreciate the gesture. I never was much of a country gal, and this place gives me the creeps. But it’s my job, Caleb. Let me do it, and we’ll get along fine.”
For a while they sat without talking. Then Caleb said, “I could use your help with something.”
Jeb’s body had swollen and stiffened in the heat. They lashed his hind legs together, set Handsome into his plow harness, and began the slow process of dragging the body to the far edge of the field. When Caleb felt they were far enough away from the house, they led Handsome back to the shelter and brought out one of the jugs of fuel. Caleb dragged some deadfall from the woods and placed it over the corpse, building a pyre; he splashed kerosene over it, recapped the can, and stepped back.
Kate asked, “Why did you call him Jeb?”
Caleb shrugged. “Just the name he came with.”
Nothing remained to be said. Caleb struck a match and tossed it forward. With a whoosh, flames enveloped the pile. There was no wind to speak of; the thick smoke rose straight skyward, full of popping sparks. For a while it smelled like mesquite; then it became something else.
“That’s that, I guess,” he said.
They walked back toward the house. As they approached, Pim appeared in the doorway. Her eyes were very wide.
Something is happening, she signed.
—
The room was cool and dark. Only Dory’s face was showing; the rest was covered by boiled clothes.
“Mrs. Tatum,” Kate said, “can you hear me? Do you know where you are?”
Staring at the ceiling, the woman seemed completely unaware of them. A remarkable change had occurred. Remarkable, but also disturbing. The harsh appearance of the burns on her face had softened. Their color was now pinkish, almost dewy; in other patches, her skin was white as talc. Dory shifted slightly in her bed, exposing her left hand and forearm from under the cloths. Before, it had been a gruesome claw of cooked flesh. In its stead was a recognizable human hand—blisters gone, charred bits flaked off to reveal skin of rosy newness beneath.
Kate looked up at Pim. How long has she been awake?
She wasn’t. That just happened.
“Mrs. Tatum,” Kate said, more commandingly, “I’m a doctor. You’ve been in a fire. You’re at the Jaxons’ farm; Caleb and Pim are with me. Do you remember what happened?”
Her gaze, wandering the room in a desultory fashion, located Kate’s face.
“Fire?” she murmured.
“That’s right, there was a fire at your house.”
“Ask her if she knows what started it,” Caleb said.
“Fire,” Dory repeated. “Fire.”
“Yes, what do you remember about the fire?”
Pim stepped forward and knelt by the bed. She gently lifted Dory’s exposed hand, placed the tip of her index finger in the woman’s palm, and began to form letters.
“Pim,” Dory said.
But that was all; the light in her eyes faded. She closed them again.
“Caleb, I’m going to examine her,” Kate said. Then, to Pim: Stay and help.
Caleb waited in the kitchen. The children, mercifully, were still asleep. A few minutes passed, and the women appeared.
Kate gestured to the back door. Let’s talk outside.
The light had shifted toward evening. “What’s happening to her?” Caleb asked, signing simultaneously.
“She’s getting better, that’s what.”
“How is that possible?”
“If I knew, I’d bottle it. The burns are still bad—she’s not out of the woods yet. But I’ve never seen anybody heal so fast. I thought the shock alone would kill her.”
“What about her waking up like that?”
“It’s a good sign, her recognizing Pim. I don’t think she understood much else, though. She may never.”
“You mean she’ll stay like this?”
“I’ve seen it happen.” Kate addressed her sister directly: You should stay with her. If she wakes up again, try to get her talking.
What about?
Easy stuff. Keep her mind off the fire for now.
Pim returned to the house.
“This changes things,” Caleb said.
“I agree. We may be able to move her sooner than I thought. Do you think you can find a vehicle in Mystic?”
He recalled the pickup he’d seen in Elacqua’s yard.
Kate seemed surprised. “Brian Elacqua?”
“That’s him.”
“That drunken old cuss. I’d wondered what had become of him.”
“That was pretty much my experience of the man.”
“Still, I’m sure he’d help us.”
Caleb nodded. “I’ll ride in in the morning.”
—
Sara was waiting on the porch with their bags when Hollis appeared, sitting atop a sorry-looking mare. With him was a man Sara didn’t know, riding a second horse, a black gelding with a back as bowed as a hammock and ancient, runny eyes.
“What’s this I see?” Sara said. “Oh, two of the worst horses I ever laid eyes on.”
The two men dismounted. Hollis’s companion was a squat-looking man wearing overalls but no shirt. His hair was long and white; there was something cunning in his face. Hollis and the man exchanged a few words, shook hands, and the man walked off.
“Who’s your friend?” Sara asked.
Hollis was tying the horses to the porch rail. “Just somebody I knew in the old days.”
“Husband, I thought we talked about a truck.”
“Yeah, about that. Turns out a truck costs actual money. Also, there’s no gas to be had. On the upside, Dominic threw in the tack for free, so we are not, technically, one hundred percent penniless at the moment.”
“Dominic. Your shirtless friend.”
“He kind of owed me a favor.”
“Sho
uld I ask?”
“Probably best if you don’t.”
They returned to the house, lightened their gear, loaded the remains into saddlebags, and secured them to the horses. Hollis took the mare, Sara the gelding. She was getting the best of the deal, though not by much. Years had passed since she’d even been on a horse, but the feeling was automatic, touching a deep chord of physical memory. Bending forward in the saddle, Sara gave three firm pats to the side of the horse’s neck. “You’re not such a bad old guy, are you? Maybe I’m being too hard on you.”
Hollis looked up. “I’m sorry, were you addressing me?”
“Now, now,” Sara said.
They made their way to the gate and descended the hill. Scattered workers were toiling in the fields beneath a late afternoon sun. Here and there a pennant still hung limply from its pole, marking the location of a hardbox; the watchtowers with their warning horns and sharpshooter platforms jutted from the valley floor, unmanned for years.
At the outer edge of the Orange Zone, the road forked: west toward the river townships, east toward Comfort and the Oil Road. Hollis drew up and took his canteen from his belt. He drank and passed it to Sara. “How’s the old boy doing?”
“A perfect gentleman.” She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and gestured eastward with the canteen. “Looks like somebody’s in a hurry.”
Hollis saw it too: the boiling dust plume of a vehicle, driving fast toward the city.
“Maybe we could see if he’d trade for the horses,” Hollis said, not seriously.
Sara examined him for a moment, flicking her eyes up and down. “I have to say, you look rather dashing up there. Takes me back a bit.”
Hollis was leaning forward, bracing his weight with both hands on the pommel. “I used to like to watch you ride, you know. If I was on the day shift on the Watch, I’d sometimes wait on the Wall until you came back with the herd.”
The City of Mirrors: A Novel (Book Three of The Passage Trilogy) Page 40
