She hobbled across the damp leaves of the forest clearing until she reached the others. The congregation. Only they didn’t know it yet. They knew only that they had to come, had to join in, had to open their hearts. Mama Bet was the only one who knew that the Second Son was back, and now there would be hell to pay. But she had never whispered a word of the truth, except to Archer. Darned if she couldn’t keep a secret as good as God could.
“I reckon we ought to pray,” she said. She held out her wrinkled hand to Stepford, who folded his pocketknife and put away his carving. He wiped the wood chips from his hand and clasped it to Mama Bet’s. Noreen took her other hand, smiling. She was a pretty girl, not as moon-faced as the rest of the Abshers. Maybe she had Potter blood in her. Zeb Potter had been known to cat around a little, back before his health started failing. Maybe Nell had succumbed to old Zebulon’s sinful charms.
There I go again, God. Thinking ill of others, as if I got no sins of my own to worry about. Strike me down if it be Thy will. Just please don’t plant another seed in me. I don’t think I could take another go-round as bad as the last one.
Well, that, plus she had no more love to spare for another child. Archer Dell McFall took up every square inch of her heart. Archer had given her more joy than she ever thought heaven could hold. Archer was the most beautiful creature under Creation. Darned if God couldn’t produce a fine offspring when He set His mind to it.
The others gathered in a circle and held hands, though Sonny gave another of his little grunts of annoyance. Mama Bet shot him a wicked look. He blinked and went cow-eyed. The gathered bowed their heads.
“Dear God, give us the strength to do Your will, and to accept our part in Your work,” she said, her voice taking on a tremulous quality. “We know we have sinned and come short of the glory, but we know You love us anyway. Lead our eyes from evil visions and lead our ears from the call of false prophets. Allow us to make whatever sacrifices You require, that we may not stray from the one true path. Keep us and protect us unto the fourth generation. Amen.”
And may Archer do this thing right, she silently added, as the others echoed “Amen.”
“Are we done now?” Sonny said, pulling out another cigarette.
“We might not ever be done,” Mama Bet said.
“When the Lord Jesus gives you a mission, you follow it to the end,” Haywood said.
Poor Haywood. Swallowing that New Testament tomfoolery hook, line, and sinker. Well, Archer will shine the light on him soon enough.
Stepford spat onto the trunk of a poplar. “Come on, Sonny. I’m thirsty,” he said. He turned and started down the path that led to the rutted dirt road. They had parked their cars at the foot of the trail.
“Wait a second,” Sonny yelled. He turned to Mama Bet. “Do we got to go to the red church tomorrow night?”
“I said so, didn’t I?”
He frowned at the forest floor. “It’s getting so a body ain’t got time to pitch a good drunk, what with all this bowing and scraping and worshiping.”
“Well, Mr. Absher, you’re welcome to go straight on down to hell if you want, but this ain’t about you, is it?”
He looked at the small overgrown grave.
“The stone’s been rolled away,” Mama Bet said. “We all got sacrifices to make.”
Sonny’s thin lips curled. “Well, we may have to follow the call, but we sure don’t have to like it none.”
He turned and hurried after Stepford, his boots kicking up a wash of leaves. Haywood came to Mama Bet’s side and took her arm. “Come on, Mama Bet,” he said. “Let’s get you home so you can rest up.”
She smiled at him, at Noreen, even at Nell. The congregation. Well, part of it, anyway. That Noreen was so pretty, there in her Easter dress the color of robin’s eggs. Almost a shame that beauty such as that would have to fall by the wayside.
Because all a pretty face does is hide the ugly underneath, don’t it?
“Yeah, I guess we all better rest up,” she said. “There will come great trials.”
The sky seemed to darken a little at her words, or maybe God took up into the trees and reached His fingers out to throw a shadow in her eyes. He liked to keep things confusing, all right. She sometimes wondered if He loved her, if He really loved any of them. Or was He just pretending so He could get the things He wanted, like love?
Haywood led her down the mountain path to her home, to the birthplace of the Second Son.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Linda watched the sun crawl down toward the ridge of Buckhorn Mountain. Just a few more hours. She was wondering how she could slip away without the boys noticing. She almost wished David had stayed. He swallowed lies more easily than the boys did.
She turned from the door and went back to the kitchen. Timmy would be hungry when he got in from his chores. She could see him through the window above the sink, chopping at the brown garden soil with his hoe. The cabbage and peas and potatoes were in the ground, and soon it would be time to plant corn and cucumbers. She didn’t know how she was going to manage the farm alone. Even though the fields were leased out for growing hay, the garden took a lot of backbreaking time and sacrifice.
Sacrifice.
Archer always said that sacrifice was the currency of God.
Linda bit her lip. Tears stung her eyes, and she didn’t know whether they were brought by regret or joy. The fold would prosper in the next life and unto the fourth generation, but letting go of the things in this life was hard. There were joys to be had here: her children and sometimes even David, a walk in the wet grass of a morning, standing in the barn during a rainstorm with the music of the drops on the tin roof.
No, that was mortal thinking, covetous and vain and destructive. But she was a mortal. Still. A mother of two wonderful boys. Until Archer demanded it, she wouldn’t forsake them.
Linda stopped at the refrigerator. One of Ronnie’s poems from school was hanging from a banana magnet. His teacher had circled a large red A on the corner of the page. “The Tree,” it was called.
The tree has arms
that hug,
not as warm as Mother’s.
Sometimes when I walk by,
the tree waves
and I run away.
The tree barks at me.
Ronnie was doing okay. He had slept most of the time since coming back from the hospital. His face was pale and his nose was lost in gauze and padding. Once he had vomited blood and stained the carpet in the boys’ room. The place smelled like carpet-cleaning spray, but luckily it was warm enough that she could leave the windows open.
Linda pulled some hamburger from the refrigerator. They had killed their final cow the previous fall. Linda wondered if the dead cow counted as a sacrifice. Maybe for the God of cows. Let Archer worry about that kind of stuff.
Tim came in the back door.
“Go wash your hands, honey,” she said over the rush of water as she rinsed some potatoes.
“They’re sore.” Not too much whine in his voice.
“I know. You’ll get used to it.”
Tim came to the sink and saw the hamburger. “It looks like that guy’s face.”
“Hush, honey.”
“I dreamed about him last night.”
“Was it scary?” She searched his face, looking for weakness. All she saw were David’s eyes, the stubborn gift of genetics. She moved over and let Timmy wash his hands.
The sink turned brown-red from the dirt. “No. In my dream, the graveyard was sort of dark, but not a bad dark. A fun dark, like a carnival or something. And the dead man was all ripped up and stuff, but he was walking around the tombstones.”
“You’re a brave boy. That sure would have scared me.” Was Archer coming to the boys? Or had it just been the usual trick of dreams?
Tim turned off the taps and wiped his hands on the dishcloth that hung from a cabinet knob. “There was another person, a boy, up at the church. Except the church wasn’t a church, it was lit up like a spookhouse
. This boy was up in the place with the bell, just laughing and laughing and laughing and ringing the bell. And the dead man danced around the tombstones, pieces of him falling off the whole time.”
Archer. It had to be Archer. The truth has many faces, he always said. “Well, you’ve been through a lot. It’s no wonder you had such a weird dream,” Linda said, pressing out two patties and placing them in a black iron skillet on the stove. The heat made the meat sizzle, the white noise of energy transformation.
“That dream was nowhere near as scary as talking to the sheriff. Or seeing Ronnie in the hospital.”
The sheriff. No wonder Tim had thought the man was going to arrest him. The sheriff had stood like an army man in the hospital lobby, asking Tim questions in his deep, patient voice. He was a threat. But he was of the old blood, and had his own debt to pay. Archer could handle him.
The burgers popped as she flipped them, sending tiny sparks of pain up her bare arms as hot grease spattered on her skin. The bell rang on the microwave. “Dinner’s ready,” she said.
While Tim ate at the kitchen table, Linda took some apple juice to Ronnie. She turned on the light, and he moaned. “It’s okay, honey,” she said. “I brought you something to drink.”
He was feverish and pale against the pillow. His nose was still plumped by packing, and a stray bloody thread of gauze dangled from one nostril.
“N—not thirsty,” Ronnie said.
She sat beside him on the lower bunk. As the oldest, he usually slept in the upper bunk, but she didn’t want to risk his falling during the night. Archer would want him mended, healed, whole. Not like this.
Why did you have to go and break your nose? He looked so small, with his hair brushed back and the Star Wars sheets pulled up to his chin. Theo, his stuffed bear, had fallen to the side, the stiff arms providing no comfort.
For a split second, she blamed Archer for the injury. Of course, she knew that Archer had taken Boonie Houck, had made the drunkard pay for his sins at the same time Archer rejuvenated himself for holy work. Boonie’s worthless life had culminated with a great act of giving. Serving as a sacrifice was Boonie’s highest possible purpose in this world. He should have been whimpering in gratitude as Archer took his wicked eyes and tongue and other sinful parts.
Ronnie’s accident was only a down payment, she knew. Many innocents would fall so that none of the guilty escaped. That was the Word, that was the Way. She had accepted the testament long ago.
Archer warned that some choices would be difficult. But he reminded the fold that earthly love was only another vanity, another sin. All love must be directed to the Temple of the Two Suns. And none of that love could be wasted on the First Son, Jesus.
Jesus, the plague maker. The damning one. The liar. A mask of light and peace covering a devil’s scarred and pocked face. Linda shivered, recalling how deeply the Baptists had brainwashed her. And to think that she’d been making the boys go to their church.
A Jesus trick, Archer had explained. Using David to trap her. To “save” her.
She shuddered and put the apple juice to Ronnie’s lips. He strained his head forward and took a swallow, then collapsed back against the pillow. “How are you feeling, sugar?”
“Hurts,” he whispered.
“I know, baby. It’ll be okay soon.”
“I just want to sleep.”
“Sure.” She kissed him on the forehead, careful to avoid the purpled flesh around his eyes. “Sweet dreams.”
Timmy was finished eating by the time she got back to the kitchen. She sent him to wash his face and brush his teeth, and then to bed. She turned on the radio, the local station. A Beatles song was playing, “Strawberry Fields Forever.” Sinful. But she was strong. She could withstand this test of faith.
Yes, Archer, I am strong. I am worthy. The music can’t touch me, because I know it for what it is.
She listened as the song segued into its second fadeout, the backward tape effects filled with secret messages. The taunts and seductive whispers of Jesus. Something about burying Paul, the cursed apostle. Dozens of people across the county, maybe hundreds, were being exposed to this depraved Christ-worship. She said a quick prayer to Archer for their souls.
Another song came on. The Culture Club, a band she used to like. Back before she met Archer. “Karma chameleon,” Boy George sang. Karma chameleon. More sacrilege, more perverted celebrations of the spirit, another false Way.
The boys would be asleep now. She turned off the radio and silently crept out the door. The sky was charcoal gray in the west, where the waxing moon hung bloated and obscene. But the ground, the earth, the mountains were black as absolution. As near Archer’s promised peace as one could hope, at least in this mortal world.
Crickets. The chuckle of the creek. The wind soughing through the trees, hiding the noises of nocturnal creatures.
She didn’t need light in order to see.
She needed only faith.
And darkness.
Archer’s darkness summoned her, a beacon so righteously black that it was blinding.
She crossed the damp meadow and slipped into the forest.
Zeb Potter cradled the shotgun across one flannel-wrapped arm. He shined the flashlight into the belly of the barn. The cows were banging against the walls of their stall, uneasy lowing coming from their throats. The air was thick with the smell of fresh manure.
Something’s scared ‘em bad.
Zeb had been getting ready for bed, had taken out his chewing tobacco and his teeth and was deciding whether or not he could go one more night in the same pair of long johns when the bawling of a calf filled the night. A calf could wail its lungs out if it wanted, but hardly ever cut loose without a good reason.
Most people thought cows were dumb as dirt, but they had peculiarities that none of those genius “agronomists” from NC State would ever be able to explain. A healthy cow, you hit it in that place just between and a little above the eyes with a sledgehammer, and it dropped dead on the spot, ready to turn to steak and hamburger. But a sick cow, you had to hit it five or six times before it went down. And why was that? The sick cow was living to get healthy, but the healthy cow was about as well off as it could hope to be. So the healthy cow didn’t have as much to look forward to. Cows knew a thing or two about life.
So they always kicked up a fuss when they smelled something bad. Though all the big predators had died out, once in a while a pack of wild dogs came over the hills from Tennessee-ways, where people let such things go on. But on this side of the state line, people took care of their problems. They didn’t wait for problems to do their damage and move on.
After the first commotion, Zeb had cussed once and slipped into his boots without bothering to find his socks. He’d stopped by the door and put on his hat and collected his twenty-gauge and his spotlight. If Betty were still alive, she would be waiting by the door in her nightgown, telling him to be careful. And he would have patted the shotgun and said, “This is all the care I need.” But Betty had gone to be with the Lord, and the farm was big and lonely and the house made noises at night. And the damned hound had probably skulked away into the woods at the slightest scent of trouble.
The shotgun was heavy, and Zeb’s muscles ached from tension. He flicked the light over the barn, its yellow beam bouncing around among locust posts and old wire and rotted feed sacks. Hay dust choked the air, and the crumbs from last fall’s tobacco snowed between the cracks in the loft floor above. Something was moving around up there.
That ain’t no damned wild Tennessee dogs.
Zeb clenched his bare gums together and moved as smoothly as his old bones would let him over to the loft stairs. A chicken was disturbed from its nest under the steps and almost got its knobby head blown off when it erupted into Zeb’s face. Zeb picked up the flashlight he had dropped. The cows were noisier now, their milling more frantic.
Zeb put a trembling foot on the stairs. “Who’s up yonder?” he hollered, hoping he sounded angry ins
tead of scared. Nothing but moos answered him.
He’d heard what had happened to Boonie, and there was no way in hell that it was going to happen to him. The sheriff had even been out, asking if Zeb had seen or heard anything unusual. But the only thing Zeb had heard was those damned bells in the middle of the night, what was probably some of them high school kids finding a way to bug as many people as possible.
He thought now about going up to the house and ringing the sheriff’s department. Littlefield told him to call if anything “unusual” happened. Littlefield sure liked that word. But Zeb had known Littlefield when the boy was knee-high to a scarecrow, and he didn’t want the sheriff to think that he couldn’t take care of his own problems. That was why Tennessee and the rest of the damned country was in such a mess. Everybody closed their eyes when the bad stuff came along.
John Wayne never even blinked.
Zeb played the spotlight into the darkness at the top of the stairs. He put a boot on the second tread, and before he could decide whether he was really going to or not, he had taken another step, then another, and he was halfway up before he even started thinking again. He laid the barrel of the shotgun over his left wrist so he could shine the light while still keeping his right hand at the trigger. If he fired the gun in that position, with it held beside his hip, the recoil would probably break his trigger finger. That was one worry that John Wayne never had.
“Might have been somebody with a knife or an ax,” the sheriff had said. “Either that, or a wild animal.”
Sure, it could be somebody with a blade. City folks had moved into Whispering Pines, up from Florida or down from New York, come to escape those streets that were full of maniacs with drugged-out eyes and hands that would rather slap you than lift in greeting. But guess what? The city folks had brought the bad things with them. A killer’s instinct was as easily packed away in a U-Haul as a fitness machine or a golf cart was.
He’d told the sheriff in no uncertain terms that there wasn’t an animal around here big enough to mutilate a man like that. Maybe off in Africa or something, but things were tamed over here. So when Littlefield said Perry Hoyle had mentioned a mountain lion, Zeb laughed out loud. The idea of a touched-in-the-head killer running around was way easier to swallow than believing a mountain lion was on the loose.
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