The Off Season

by The Off Season (epub)

  They paused at the top of the hill. Obed sat flipping his tail, winded, pretending not to snort oxygen.

  For as far as Joel-Andrew could see, enormous houses stood on large lots. Moonlight lay saffron across roofs large as playing fields, although the roofs were not flat. They rose in moonlight beside high turrets, and above widow’s walks. Joel-Andrew could imagine angels striding along the roofs in gigantic and godlike postures. Here and there, elaborate wrought iron railings, gewgaws, and wrought iron spires poked at the moon; while light through stained glass windows cast shades of red and yellow, purple and green across shrubbery and lawns. Joel-Andrew, accustomed to Victorian row houses of San Francisco, saw what a Victorian house could become when not squashed by neighbors.

  “Meet some Victorians. That’s the Tobias house.” Kune pointed. “Haunted by Amy Tobias, who is mad. She shrieks from the left hand tower on Monday evenings.” He stared at the left hand tower. “If I married the bull-pizzle who built that house, I’d have gone mad, too.” He pointed another direction. “That’s the Naavik house. Sven Naavik sobs in the basement. Except when he’s crashed on laudanum.” Kune pointed. “That’s the Annie Wier house. Not all of these were built by men. Annie’s a madam who ran a joint downtown. Now she does a number that is pale and wan—soft music among the shrubbery—delicate laughter—echoes of player pianos—stuff like that.” Kune’s voice tried to be funny, but carried too much sadness.

  “I swear by Obed’s white whisker I haven’t the foggiest notion what all this means.”

  “It may mean suffering is eternal,” Kune said. He slumped, pointing. “In that house a consumptive has choked for a hundred years. Next door a child falls into a blazing fireplace every Christmas Eve—in that house a guy collects feet; horses’ hooves, dog paws—deer—raccoon . . .” He looked at Obed. “Don’t go anywhere near that place. Pickled feet from mice, Indians, ducks, cougars, bears.”

  Joel-Andrew, accustomed to seeing only normal perversion, was appalled. He bent to stroke Obed’s chin. Obed purred in patterns Joel-Andrew had never heard. Obed practiced rudimentary Chinese.

  “That spire,” said Kune, and pointed, “is the Lutheran church. That one over there is Baptist. That one is Methodist, and the one on the right is Presbyterian.”

  “And Episcopal?” Joel-Andrew asked.

  “On a high hill beside the Catholics, toward the back of town. Also over there are Moravians, Mennonites, and a bunch of others.’’ Kune pointed, and small surprise entered his voice. “And that’s the old Presbyterian parsonage. It rarely locates in this section of town.”

  It was the same house Joel-Andrew had entered five hours before. It held the same stern lines, the same tower from which so many sermons must have poured. Its octagonal bell tower stood silent. Moonlight illuminated surrounding houses, but no moonlight touched The Parsonage. No smoke came from its chimneys. The Parsonage stood darkly, as if brooding on human depravity.

  A thin scream sounded in the distance.

  “It’s 6:13,” Kune said. “That was one of the Crocker twins jumping off the bluff. Prudence and Simplicity Crocker. Both fell in love with the same man. He was killed at Verdun. They take turns.”

  “I am not sure,” Joel-Andrew said, looking seriously at The Parsonage, “that I’m going to cut it around here.”

  “It’s no different from Seattle,” Kune told him. “Seattle is just as Victorian as here. It is fascinated by sex and drugs and romance and money. It’s only a question of style.”

  “Does it make you sad?” Joel-Andrew’s gray-green eyes were moist. The awfulness of Point Vestal history seemed shrieking.

  The Parsonage, which only hours before was such a welcoming place, now struck Joel-Andrew as the only sane place. The firm lines, the severity of the all-seeing tower, caused him to yearn for the warmth of that intelligent-seeming drawing room.

  “I met two fine people earlier, but were they real?” Joel-Andrew asked. “Named Bev and Samuel. He’s a Methodist. Can’t be helped, I suppose.”

  “They are alive right now in Point Vestal, if that’s what you mean,” Kune said. “Yes, they’re real. He’s a preacher. Except for that, you can’t fault him. No imagination, of course.”

  “I have discovered,” Joel-Andrew said, “that imagination gets you excommunicated.” Joel-Andrew pushed away memories. Excommunication was lonely, but it led him to addresses where he was needed.

  Kune paused. “I try to live without any more imagination,” he said.

  “You can tell me.” Joel-Andrew could not bear seeing someone in distress.

  “Bev is the smart one.” Kune spoke as if he had not heard.“If this business with August Starling gets out of hand we can count on Bev.” Rustling sounds came from nearby shrubbery. Obed’s white tail flashed beside a rhododendron. Obed tried to bust a field mouse.

  “Because,” Kune said, “the whole history of Point Vestal swings on August Starling. He was the biggest drug pusher, the biggest bond slave runner, the biggest whoremaster in Point Vestal history.”

  Joel-Andrew was appalled. August Starling had seemed a little weird, but Joel-Andrew put that down to Victorianism and lack of religious training. August Starling seemed so young, so romantic, so innocent. Then Joel-Andrew remembered how August Starling lied with complete sincerity.

  “Maybe the history is wrong,” Joel-Andrew said. “He was young, was he not?”

  “He was a baby killer,” Kune said. “Also a deacon.”

  “I’ll deal with him,” Joel-Andrew said, and the serenity of the Lord dwelt in him. “Prepare for miracles.”

  Kune stood erect as if stabbed. His eyes opened wider than nineteen yards of Benzedrine. Grief flowed over his face. His eyes stared, stared; then he slumped. “Please,” he whispered, “if we are to be friends, never use that word again. You can speak of angels and demons and any other kind of critter. You can do what you wish with August Starling, but don’t use that word miracle again.”

  “There will come winds of Heaven.” Joel-Andrew found himself speaking with fervency that came only from the Lord. “There will come a mighty storm, and the trees will bend and the trees will break. The sea will run in the streets of the town, and across these fabled houses will flash the fires of the Holy Ghost; the fires of angels. This I prophesy.”

  “It storms up a racket around here most winters,” Kune said, relieved to be back on conversational ground. “If anybody ever writes a history of this town, weather will play a big part. You can count on it.”

  Chapter 8

  “I’ve never heard of a house that moved,” Joel-Andrew said. “Plus, it’s such a nice house.” The two men stood beside The Parsonage as moonlight illuminated uptown streets.

  “It is nice,” Kune told him, “which makes it altogether different from the Starling House. A big part of town history is really a tale of two houses. This is the history:”

  The Parsonage, Kune explained, was built in 1871, largely with money contributed by Janie, the owner of Janie’s Tavern. Cussing was not allowed in her tavern. She was lightning and thunder when it came to overt whoring.

  In 1871 the Presbyterians’ barn-sized church ran in a high and almighty manner. Deacons stood at the helm of everything happening downtown. When threatened with loss of the best hell-and-brimstone preacher on the coast (because the preacher tired of living in the fifteen-square-foot sacristy with his wife and toddlers), Janie was elected a deacon. It was a Presbyterian first.

  Janie—a red-haired Scot of medium height and more than medium temper—hired a builder, approved his plans, and built The Parsonage in three days. She enjoyed more help than was needed. It was a tour de force. She pressured every joint in town to cut off booze until The Parsonage stood complete. In Point Vestal history, the event is still remembered as “the dry spell”; it certainly impressed the Baptists.

  Peace descended. The Parsonage sat beside the church through the nineteenth century, and through the first half of the twentieth. One hellfire-and-brimstone preac
her followed another. The Parsonage felt happy, even content. Sermons issued from the all-seeing tower with regularity unknown since the days of Cotton Mather. Then the Presbyterians fell onto one of the seven deadly sins: the Presbyterians were racked with Pride.

  In the 1950s Point Vestal went through a spasm of modernization. People felt compelled to pour concrete. There was talk of building an airport, of expanding the boat basin, of building a new City Hall. The bookstore sold collections of strange poetry. People bought three-toned automobiles fitted with air horns and spotlights; and the Presbyterians lusted for a place to park their three-toned cars.

  They decided to put a parking lot beside the church and build a new parsonage. Their heritage was one of thrift. The Parsonage was a perfectly good house. In its way, it was even sanctified.

  So the Presbyterians sold it to a Mormon.

  The Mormon moved it to a nearby lot while The Parsonage reeled in a state of shock.

  Awful theological confrontations went on in the mind of The Parsonage. Rain clouded the face of windows and ran from the eaves like tears. Wind moaned around the turret, and passersby heard congregated ministerial voices. Bells in the octagonal tower plinked like broken harp strings. Paint flaked from walls as shudders of grief racked The Parsonage. For eighty years it had issued declarations of Calvinist flame; now the poor thing looked at a Mormon.

  Give The Parsonage credit. It analyzed differences and came to grudging admiration. The Mormon was monogamous. The Mormon was patriarchal. The Mormon’s whiskers became heated when he argued for thrift and hearth and home. The Mormon was penurious, bigoted, and sometimes spoke well of Moses. The Parsonage, reconsidering, began to feel right at home. Things were turning out very well for The Parsonage.

  Then something awful happened. To the horror of the whole town, the Mormon sold The Parsonage to a Quaker. That is when The Parsonage began its odyssey.

  “I’m not a theologian,” Kune murmured, “but The Parsonage is stern. Quakers are just blunt.”

  The two men and the cat stood looking at The Parsonage, at enormous houses on the hill, and at distant towers of the Starling House. A heavy scent of burning flesh lingered for a moment beneath glow of moon and scatter of stars. On wrought iron stakes of an elaborate fence, a ghostly gentleman hung impaled. A church bell clanked above Wednesday evening prayer meeting. A mutilated Indian led a limping horse, the two staggering toward downtown. A woman in a white Victorian gown emerged from mist as she reached the top of the 307 steps. Her dark eyes filled with fear. Her fingers fumbled at her purse. She breathed heavily, but marched past the men and the cat. The woman did not flicker, but she trembled. Joel-Andrew watched her, felt enormous pain, and remembered his excommunication. Frightened women always made him remember his excommunication.

  “San Francisco,” he told Kune. “I went in 1966 at the behest of the Lord.”

  “I’ve got to check out August Starling,” Kune told him, but he mused. “San Francisco: That big suburb to the south.” He walked slowly. “It is unbelievable the way Seattle has expanded.”

  “Before San Francisco I had a small congregation in Providence, Rhode Island.” To Joel-Andrew, the memories of quiet days of study, of visiting infirm members of his church, of playing with children of the congregation were the warmest he owned. He had hoped for a wife, but the Lord willed him to be a prophet. Joel-Andrew could never remember having ever misunderstood about love. His father was a quiet minister; his mother cared only to teach, whether children or other small animals.

  Rhode Island seemed long ago and far away. Joel-Andrew often wondered why the Lord picked someone so unsuitable.

  “The Starling House can put on quite a show,” Kune said. “In its way, it is as moody as The Parsonage.” Kune stepped steadily, like one accustomed to walking all night. His yellow eyes were as remarkable in moonlight as were the golden eyes of Obed. He moved as routinely as measles.

  “And because the Starling House is moody,” Kune said, “you can never be exactly sure which year you’ll hit when you go through the servants’ entrance. The servants’ entrance is a way of entering the past. If we go in the front door, it will be today, 1973.” Unaccountably, Kune giggled. “This is not common knowledge. Even old folks in this town don’t know about the servants’ entrance.” He paused. “How could they? All of them are decent. I may be the only one who has used the servants’ entrance in the last five decades.”

  “You are a wonderful expert,” Joel-Andrew assured him. “Perhaps no one living knows more about Point Vestal than you.”

  “No one living,” Kune said, “except a young woman named Collette who runs the antique store. A few of the dead ones are simply gee-whiz-experts. There’s an old Indian named Maggie who hangs out at Janie’s Tavern . . .” He paused, his thoughts interrupted. A ’66 Plymouth bearing high schoolers roared past. Beer cans popped like losing punches on a punchboard. A police car running on a single pinball light pursued the Plymouth. The police car was a ’39 LaSalle, dark and flickering.

  “Homecoming week,” Kune explained.

  “Tell me about August Starling.” Joel-Andrew hoped the local football team would win. He was beginning to feel community spirit. He hoped the Plymouth would not get in a wreck, that people would not be killed . . . then told himself he did not know. Being killed in Point Vestal was not the same as being killed elsewhere. Then he told himself nope, naw, uh­ uh. A bad trip was a bad trip.

  “l saw August Starling once,” Kune said. “I walked into 1888, back when the house was just built.”

  “And Starling was going crazy,” Joel-Andrew said. “Going crazy with guilt because of his sins.”

  “Nope,” Kune told him. “He was going crazy because the house was being painted, and there was a lot of lead in the paint. It kind of snoozled his brain.” Kune pointed to a massive house looming in the moonlit sky. Turrets and towers brooded in the night. Balustrades and porches and balconies stood deserted. The house seemed like a tomb.

  Chapter 9

  Kune and Joel-Andrew stood before the Starling House as it rose four stories into the night.

  “We’ll go inside in a few minutes,” Kune said, “but before we do, I’ll tell about August Starling. Can you pretend the year is 1888?”

  “You got it,” Joel-Andrew said.

  “I am very good at making pictures with words,” Kune murmured. “The year I’m going to show is 1888. We are presently standing uptown in 1973, but I am going to tell about 1888, and about downtown where the action started. It would have looked something like this.”

  Kune began by saying that gray skies drizzled mist on the muddy street, and buildings that were new in 1888 rose three and four stories. The buildings carried elaborate gewgaws splendid in pastel enamels. New brick on The Fisherman’s Café shone beside stained glass windows, while carriages and lumber carts churned the muddy road surface bound together by wood chips, crushed rock, oyster shells, clam shells, twigs; and layered with horse poop.

  Before Janie’s Tavern stood two tough cops in boiler hats and cheap wool suits, while in the tavern a youthful August Starling sipped whiskey and blew kisses toward the street where an occasional madam passed with her bodyguards. An elaborately carved and beautifully painted wooden sign advertised the joint as a “discreet hostelry for gentlemen.” A tidily rolled drunk lay wrapped around a hitching post.

  One cop wore a bruise on his chin, a scar over one eye, and an Irish brogue. “We’ll be carrying that one home,” he said, and nodded over his shoulder toward August Starling. “I can’t get over how he still looks like a youngster.”

  “He’s a deacon,” the second cop said. “You can get a deacon boiled out past ‘halla-loo-yah’ and he’ll still walk.” The second cop was skinny and morose. He slouched and chewed tobacco. He proved an accurate spitter.

  “Steam,” the first cop said. “Look at that precious darlin’.”

  In the harbor a two-stacker made anchor. It boiled coal smoke into the mist. Fresh paint on the
iron hull shone red and black and white. Lumber barges were towed toward the ship by a steam tug, and beyond the ship six old clipper ships hung at anchor like wounded greyhounds. Clipper masts disappeared in low mist. Riding sails sagged yellow, stained like old parchment. Small waves breathed on the beach beside The Fisherman’s Café.

  “I worked in the engine room of a steamer once.” The morose cop wrinkled his nose. “If you’d ever worked in the engine room, you’d be thinking it ain’t so darlin’.”

  The drunk wrapped around the hitching post gave a small groan. He moved crabwise across a patch of mud and climbed onto the wooden sidewalk. Although a small man, his faulty movements still held hints of agility, echoes of squirrel-like scrambles along masts and yards. His hands were scarred and capable from fisting sails. He was too little to be a Swede, too blond to be anything else.

  “Me lad,” the Irish cop said, “you’d best get your bung back to your ship. There’s a man in there”—and the cop motioned over his shoulder toward Janie’s Tavern—“who eats sweet boys.”

  “Shanghai,” the skinny cop said, “or cutting limestone in a pit alongside Chinamen. No floozies, no rum, for never—if Starling takes you on.”

  The Swede got to his knees, blue eyes staring. He struggled to stand, tipped over, began crawling down the sidewalk.

  “He’s got an hour of daylight,” the skinny cop said. “If he crawls fast, he’ll make it.”

  Across the street and half a block away, a four-story building seemed built to hold fancy decorations. A huge sign read ‘De Fuca Trading Company and Chandlery—A. Starling, Esq. Prop.’ On the wooden sidewalk stood wares: coils of manila, casks of salt pork, brass fixtures for ships and houses; one elaborate, gorgeous, waterproof ebony coffin. The coffin was big enough to hold a husband and wife, or a mother and child; the kind of Victorian chamber much favored when a family owned more than one corpse.