The Fall of the Year

by Howard Frank Mosher

  “I suppose it seems like Times Square.”

  “Come on, Louvia. I know you miss him. Who’s left for you to fight with?”

  “Miss him? He was a fountain of overbearing authority. Look. Someone put fresh flowers on the memorial here, if you can believe it. No doubt the astrologer did that before she skipped town. In memory of the old fool she seduced.”

  On the stone bed beside the lovers lay a small bouquet of wild New England asters.

  “Father George was no fool, Louvia, and Chantal didn’t seduce him. She has a fiancé of her own. From Quebec. Besides, those flowers are fresh. Somebody put them there today.”

  “A fiancé. Worse yet. Then she was only trifling with the old man’s affections.”

  “It wasn’t that way at all.”

  “Go ahead and defend her. If there’s a fiancé in it, she used you just as badly, and you and I both know it. Don’t tell me she didn’t string you along. You should go instantly to Montreal and avenge yourself on the lover. A true man would exact bloody retribution. Maybe we can manage it from here. My Daughter and I could give you a certain elixir—”

  “Louvia, for God’s sake, if Chantal has a lover, she has a lover. That’s that.”

  “Why not win her back?”

  “You just said she used me.”

  “You don’t think she’s worth it?”

  “I know she’s worth it. But she was never mine to win back. As for Father George, I don’t even know where to bury his ashes.”

  “You can throw them in the river for all I care. But here, the old man gave me this. At the famous transfer of property ceremony. It’s for you. I meant to drop it off sooner, but I got to reading it myself. Why I can’t imagine—it’s full of the most extravagant lies.”

  Louvia reached under the bench and pulled out the big green cardboard box containing Father George’s “Short History.” There was no letter with the manuscript, and I was disappointed by that, but it appeared to be intact. I opened it up and read the first sentence. Then I read on until it was too dark to read any longer.

  Sitting alone on the stone bench by the monument—Louvia had slipped away at some point—I could hear Father George’s voice in my head, hear its slightly speculative, wry resonance. And at that moment, whatever else I still did not understand about the events of the past summer, I realized that long after the passing of the hill farms and the big woods and Kingdom Common as we had known it, these stories would remain: a golden legacy, to me and to the village, from Father George.

  9

  The Fortuneteller’s Daughter

  In the village in those years there dwelt an old, old woman, who had kept a candle burning in her window for over fifty years, to light home the husband who’d deserted her long ago as a young bride. Her husband never reappeared, but she was as much in love with him on the day she died as on her wedding day.

  —Father George, “A Short History”

  THE FOLLOWING DAY I moved out of the Big House and into a room at the Common Hotel. Though I’d begun working on my whiskey-smuggling novel again that morning, I had little idea where I would go or what I’d do next.

  That evening Louvia sent word that she wanted to see me immediately. I suspended my unpacking and cut across the green and down the dirt lane between the houses of Little Quebec, wondering what the old fortuneteller wanted now.

  The bright pastel homes of the French Canadian mill workers glowed in the twilight. Splashes of scarlet and gold had appeared overnight on the side of Little Quebec Mountain, set off handsomely by the dark green of the spruces and firs. The river between the mill and the railroad tracks was up and slightly cloudy from a recent rain. A year ago on an evening like this one, Father George and I might have gone trout fishing.

  As usual after a fall rain, some big German brown trout had run up Little Quebec Brook to feed, and Louvia was out netting them in the pool behind her herb garden. A quilt depicting a French Canadian maple sugaring scene was airing on a sagging clothesline strung between her house and a leaning hemlock tree. The fortuneteller was dressed in a wide-sleeved green blouse and a voluminous crimson skirt. A few yellow birch and maple leaves drifted down the brook. Late-blooming phlox, hot pink and deep red, and a dozen multicolored daylilies, all recently transplanted, grew near Louvia’s house.

  “My God, Louvia. You’ve poached these flowers from the Big House,” I said.

  “Nonsense. I’m perpetuating an old man’s dream,” Louvia said. “Once that so-called astrologer ensconces herself for good up there, I’ve no doubt she’ll post the property. She’ll probably charge us to walk by and admire the flowers. Look here if you want to talk about poaching.” From the tall grass beside the brook she picked up a brown trout at least twenty-five inches long, with a bright yellow belly and red spots the size of dimes. “I intend to invite this gentleman to supper tonight. As the guest of honor and main course.”

  Louvia reset her net, then filleted the big trout expertly on a homemade fish table covered with scales. “What do you want, Frank? I’m very busy, as you can plainly see.”

  “You’re the one who called me up here,” I said. “But the fact is, I’ve been meaning to drop by anyway. I want you to help me find Chantal.”

  “Aiee! The usurper. However. Now that you’re here you’d better come inside. I can’t eat this entire fish by myself.”

  On Louvia’s listing porch several dozen butternuts lay drying, still jacketed in their green husks. A cat with one emerald eye and one gold eye surveyed me from the windowsill. As we went up the steps, Louvia had to shoo away her hissing geese to keep them from pecking my shins.

  A smoky wood fire was burning in the kitchen range. Louvia opened up the damper and set a large skillet on the stove. She motioned toward a rickety kitchen chair missing part of its back. “So. How old are you, Frank? Twenty, twenty-one?”

  “You know how old I am.”

  It was true. In order to stay one-up on her neighbors, Louvia made it her business to know the exact age of everyone in the Common. Yet tonight she herself seemed much older. Her dark face was tired and sad, and I suspected that she was lonely. Ordinarily I’d have been glad to hear her stories of traveling with the gypsies, working the carnival circuit. But now that I’d confided in Louvia, I was determined to persuade her to help me find Chantal.

  From her reticule, Louvia produced her rose quartz Daughter and set it on the table in front of me, atop a stack of paperback romance novels. I looked into the stone’s milky pink interior and saw exactly what I was certain Louvia saw there: nothing. Yet something told me that the fortuneteller could help me locate Chantal if she wanted to.

  “What does your Daughter have to say tonight, Louvia?”

  “She wants to know what you’re going to do now that you’ve ruled out St. Paul’s.”

  “I don’t know that I’ve entirely ruled out St. Paul’s. But I’ve begun writing a story, if she must know. About Father George’s early days.”

  “Another storyteller! Well, well. I suppose that’s harmless enough. My Daughter wants to know when you’re going to get married.”

  “Maybe never. For the time being, I’m going to do whatever I have to do to find Chantal.”

  “Chantal again.” Louvia leered at me, her wax bridgework gleaming. “Listen, Frank. I know you miss the astrologer. I suspect that she broke your heart. Well, I’m sorry. I understand something about that from personal experience, as you’ll recall. In your case, it’s mainly yourself you have to blame, but my Daughter and I intend to help you anyway. We can shake you out of this holding pattern if you’ll stop repining for two minutes and listen to us.”

  “I am listening to you. You’re the fortuneteller.”

  “Who’s talking about fortunetelling?” Louvia said, looking right at me. “I’m offering you my services as a matchmaker. Now that you’ve given up those foolish notions about joining the priesthood, it’s time we found you a wife.”

  “Stop laughing and pay attention,” she
continued. “My Daughter recommends a girl from Sherbrooke, over the line in Quebec. Brown hair, striking brown eyes with gold flecks in them, an extraordinarily provocative combination. A real head for business besides; she keeps the books for her father’s sawmill. She’ll make you rich beyond your wildest dreams.”

  “Louvia, I don’t need to have anybody else arrange my dates for me.”

  “This isn’t a date, it’s a match. The woman my Daughter and I have in mind is a year or two older than you and deeply experienced in the ways of the world, if you take my meaning.”

  “What’s her name?” I said despite myself.

  “Marie. Marie Thibodeau. She plays in a little band with her family. She’s a lively one. You’ll fall in love with her at first sight.”

  I groaned. “I don’t think so.”

  “With a wife like her you’ll be a millionaire by forty. Also, she’s musically gifted, she writes her own songs. I’ll arrange for her to be expecting you at seven day after tomorrow evening. She’ll take you to a barn dance, then who knows what afterward. You’ll never regret it. Marie already has six thousand dollars in a savings bank. My Daughter assures me that this will be your making.”

  “I’m glad she thinks so.”

  “Don’t mock my Daughter. Do you want to end up like me? Alone and bitter? This Chantal woman has been bad for you, Frank. Look at you, a shadow of your former self. If you don’t believe me, you can ask my Daughter.”

  “I’m not going to ask a stone anything.”

  “I’ll have her materialize for a moment.”

  “That I’d like to see.”

  Louvia gestured toward a transparent blue shower curtain that hung across the doorway to her bedroom off the kitchen. It was rumored that as part of her fortunetelling, she sometimes sat behind this sheet of plastic, which she called the Eternity Curtain, and pretended to be a spirit. Through the Eternity Curtain tonight I saw a candle burning on her bedside table. Suspended in the air above it was an old-fashioned speaking trumpet.

  “Isn’t the astrologer in league with the forces of darkness to destroy this unsuspecting young man?” Louvia said to the floating trumpet.

  “Yes, mother,” replied the instrument in a faraway hollow voice. Then the candle flickered out and the trumpet vanished. It was all I could do not to laugh.

  Louvia looked into her gazing stone again, as though nothing out of the ordinary had happened. “My Daughter and I might have made a miscalculation with Marie,” she conceded. “I know a widower, a pinch-fisted old farmer, who’d love to get his hooks into that six thousand dollars. What we actually intended was for you to see a girl from Pond in the Sky. This one will knock your socks off.”

  I glanced toward the Eternity Curtain, but the bedroom beyond was dark. “I’m glad to know it. Tell your Daughter thanks, but no thanks. Ask her where Chantal is.”

  “The new girl will be waiting for you tomorrow night at six-thirty by the old Pond in the Sky roundhouse,” Louvia said. “Her name’s Gloryanne. She’s not a day over sixteen. You can take her to the drive-in in Memphremagog. For that matter, if you give her the money for the drive-in, she’ll let you take her to the local gravel pit for the evening instead. She reminds me of myself when I was her age. A real hot ticket.”

  “Just because I’ve put off my plans to enter St. Paul’s this fall doesn’t mean I want to spend the next year in jail,” I said. “Thank Gloryanne anyway for me.”

  Behind the blue shower curtain the candle flame appeared again, and the illuminated speaking trumpet gave a wild laugh. Now it appeared to be drifting around the room at about eye level.

  Louvia jerked her thumb at the laughing trumpet. “My Daughter thinks you should let Gloryanne have her way with you. Sex is a sovereign antidote for despair, you know. If nothing else, it would take your mind off the astrologer usurper.”

  “Chantal’s not a usurper and I’m not in a state of despair!”

  “She’d only drive you to an early grave, Frank. Look what she did to the old priest.”

  “I honestly think she loved Father G as much as I did. Louvia, listen to me for once. I know you’re trying to help. I don’t want you to suppose I don’t appreciate it. But these matches you want to arrange. They aren’t going to help me find Chantal.”

  From behind the curtain the spirit-trumpet blared out a great blast of derisive laughter.

  “What’s the matter?” Louvia said to me, pretending not to have heard anything.

  “That idiotic trumpet. How do you get it to do that?”

  “Do what?”

  “Who’s back there, Louvia? With the megaphone? Give me a straight answer for once.”

  “No one,” Louvia said. “No one alive at least. It’s the spirit of a dead relative. I had a little daughter once, now long lost to me. Still, it’s a comfort to know that even on the other side infants do grow up.”

  “I didn’t know you ever had any children.”

  “This is between you and me and the lamppost. The child was the result of an indiscretion. A one-night stand. I could never acknowledge her. It was probably fortunate for all involved that she died. As you can see, she visits me now and then from behind the curtain. I must say that she’s grown up to be a beautiful young woman and smart as a whip, if rather on the willful side. No doubt she gets that from me.”

  “I’d like to meet her face to face.”

  “That’s impossible. However. She’s taken an interest in your welfare. She has someone very special in mind for you, if you want the truth. She was just testing you with the others. Now we’ll get down to business.”

  I held up my hand. “No, thanks. Not unless her name’s Chantal.”

  Behind the curtain, the candle went out. “There,” Louvia said. “You’ve hurt my Daughter’s feelings. I hope you’re satisfied. We won’t see her again now for who knows how long. See how sensitive she is. And what a temper.”

  “Where’s she gone?”

  “Back across. But I can handle matters from here. The new girl is a prize, Frank. I guarantee it on my reputation as a matchmaker. She’s a teacher up at Memphremagog and shares any number of interests with you—fishing, book reading, sports of all kinds. A true companion. She’s cute as a button into the bargain. You’ll adore her.”

  “Thanks just the same. I can find my own companion to adore.”

  “She has a boat and wants to take you fishing on Lake Memphremagog.”

  “I’m a stream fisherman.”

  “Sunday afternoon at two. She’ll be at the boat ramp.”

  “So you’ve got it all arranged?”

  “I’m just trying to give you a choice, Frank. I still don’t see why you don’t whisk Gloryanne up to the gravel pit, you’d feel like a million dollars afterward. But not to worry. The new one teaches biology. She can show you a thing or two along those lines herself.”

  “For God’s sake, Louvia, I’m still considering the priesthood.”

  “Then why are you in such a white heat to find the astrologer?”

  “To apologize to her. For supposing she was after Father George’s money.”

  “Never mind all that. You never heard me apologize to anyone, did you?”

  “No one could accuse you of that.”

  “Or the old priest you claim to have thought so much of. I don’t recall that he was much given to apologies.”

  “He used to apologize to God quite frequently. For getting mad at Him.”

  “How foolish!”

  For a minute neither of us spoke. Then Louvia nodded toward the Eternity Curtain. “I might be able to coax my Daughter into making a quick reappearance. Just for a moment. If you once laid eyes on her, you’d trust her. She’s a famous beauty over there, you know.”

  Louvia thought for a moment, then sighed. “You have no idea how hard raising a deceased daughter has been. When she was a teenager, she wouldn’t listen to a thing I said. We fought like cats and dogs, and for nights on end she’d stay away. Now she appreciates my adv
ice. She’s actually thinking about getting married herself—oh, yes, Frank, they marry over there, too. I talked to her for a solid hour the other night about certain intimate matters. I can assure you, her husband will go to sleep on his wedding night a happy man. If he goes to sleep at all.”

  I laughed. “I’d like to talk with this Daughter of yours myself. Maybe she’d go out with me.”

  Once again the candle flame flared on in Louvia’s bedroom and the levitating trumpet boomed out, “Marry the schoolteacher and be done with it!”

  This time I couldn’t help it—I laughed out loud.

  “I could talk to the teacher for you, the way I talked to my Daughter,” Louvia offered. “She’s a long-legged young number. With the right instruction, she’d give you a run for your money.”

  “I want to know right now, Louvia. Who’s behind that curtain?”

  “Nobody,” Louvia said, and the candle went out.

  Louvia picked up an open copy of Gone with the Wind that was lying face down on the table and pretended to read for a while. Outside, it was completely dark.

  “How many times have you read that book?” I said. “One hundred?”

  “Probably more. I’ll tell you what, Frank. I’ll give you an address in Montreal. You can go there this weekend with fifty dollars in your pocket. I’ll even float you a loan. That will put all thoughts of the priesthood out of your head forever. You’ll thank me for the rest of your life.”

  “Louvia, I don’t intend to spend the weekend in a Montreal whorehouse. I thought you were going to introduce me to your Daughter.”

  Louvia thought for a minute, then shook her head. “That’s not a good idea. My Daughter thinks people are basically well-meaning, if you can believe a child of mine capable of such a delusion. At heart she’s hopelessly romantic. A dangerous outlook at best.”

  “I think she and I might hit it off.”

  “Don’t be absurd. You need a much more down-to-earth woman. Besides, you can’t go to bed with a specter, you know.”