The Darkest Thread

by Jen Blood

  A figure in black chases us, gaining on me fast. At ten years old, raised in the church, I am certain that it is the devil himself. He wears a hooded cloak; I imagine him taking flight at my heels, reaching for me with gnarled fingers. I run faster, my breath high in my chest, trees speeding past. The air gets thicker and harder to breathe the closer we get to the fire, but I don’t stop.

  The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.

  I can hear him behind me, three or four steps back at most, his breath coming hard and his hands getting closer.

  I skid into the clearing certain that I’m safe now—I’ve reached the church. The church is always safe.

  But today, nothing is safe. Flames climb the blackened walls of the chapel, firemen circling with hoses to keep the surrounding forest from burning. My father has arrived ahead of me—I find him kneeling in front of a pile of rubble just feet from the flames. His shoulders shake as he cries.

  He maketh me to lie down in green pastures. He leadeth me beside the still waters.

  I go to him because I know no one else will, and wrap my arms around his neck. When I scan the tree line, the man I felt behind me just moments before is gone. Now, there is no one but the firemen, the local constable, and my mother with her doctor’s bag and no survivors to heal.

  I pray in my father’s ear, whispering words of comfort the way he always has for me. There is a smell that sticks in my throat and turns my stomach, but only when my mother comes for me, trying to pull me away, do I realize what that smell is.

  He restoreth my soul. He leadeth me on a path of righteousness for His name’s sake.

  A coal black, claw-like hand reaches from beneath the pile of burned debris where my father weeps. A few feet beyond, I see a flash of soot-stained white feathers, china-blue eyes, and a painted smile that seems suddenly cruel. I stay there, fixated on the doll, until my mother takes me in her arms and forces me away.

  She sets me on the wet grass and places a mask over my face so that I can breathe. The oxygen tastes like cold water after a long drought. I sit still while the rain washes over me and my father cries and the church burns to the ground.

  I’m just beginning to calm down when I feel a presence like warm breath at the back of my neck, and I turn once more toward the trees.

  The cloaked man stands at the edge of the woods, his hood down around his shoulders. Rain plasters dark hair against his head. Water drips down high cheekbones and a thin, sharp nose.

  Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil.

  The words of my favorite Psalm stutter in my head—Thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me.

  The man in black turns his head, his dark eyes fixing on mine.

  My cup runneth over.

  He puts a finger to his thin lips and whispers to me through the chaos.

  “Sshhh.”

  More than twenty years will pass before I pray again.

  * * *

  Chapter 1

  I returned to my hometown of Littlehope, Maine, on a wet afternoon when the town was locked in fog. A cold rain filled the potholes and pooled on the shoulder of coastal Route 1, ensuring that I hydroplaned most of the drive up from Boston. I hadn’t set foot in Littlehope since my high school graduation, when I left the town behind in a beaten-to-hell Honda Civic with the vow that I would never return.

  That was fifteen years ago.

  Littlehope is a fishing village at the end of a peninsula on Penobscot Bay, about two hours from Portland. It’s known for Bennett’s Lobster Shanty, the Ladies Auxiliary Quilting League, and a small but determined band of drug runners who rule the harbor. Littlehope also happens to be ten miles as the crow flies from the island where thirty-four members of the Payson Church of Tomorrow burned to death and where, a decade later, my father hanged himself in their honor.

  They say you can’t go home again. In my case, it seems more apt to ask why the hell you’d ever want to.

  I walked through the front door of the Downeast Daily Tribune just after eleven o’clock that Wednesday morning. The Trib has delivered the news to three counties in the Midcoast for over fifty years, from an ugly concrete block of a building on Littlehope’s main drag. Across the road, you’ll find the Episcopal Church, the local medical clinic, and the only bar in town. My mother used to joke that the layout was intentional—locals could get plastered and beat the crap out of each other Saturday night, stumble next door to get patched up, and stop in to see the neighborhood preacher for redemption on Sunday morning.

  The first job I ever had was as Girl Friday at the Trib, fetching coffee and making copies for the local newshounds, occasionally typing up copy when no one else was around or they were too lazy to do it themselves. Walking through the familiar halls that morning, I soaked in the smells of fresh ink and old newspapers, amazed at the things people are usually amazed at when they come home after a lifetime away: how small the building was, how outdated the décor, how it paled in comparison to my golden memories.

  My comrade-in-arms, Einstein—part terrier, part Muppet, and so-named not for any propensity toward genius but rather for his unruly white curls—padded along beside me, ears and tail up, his nails clicking on the faded gray linoleum floor. Plaques and photos decorated the concrete walls, some dating back to my teenage days with the paper. I passed two closed doors before I reached the newsroom—the last door on the right, with yellowed Peanuts comics taped to the window and the sound of a BBC newscast coming from within. Einstein’s tail started wagging, his body shimmying with the motion, the second he caught scent of the company we were about to keep.

  “Settle, buddy,” I said, my hand on the doorknob—though in fairness the words were probably more for me than him. The dog glanced up at me and whined.

  I opened the door and had only a second to get my bearings before I was spotted; it’s hard to be stealthy when a bullet of fur precedes you into the room. Daniel Diggins—aka Diggs to almost everyone on the planet—greeted my mutt with more enthusiasm than I knew I would get, crouching low to fondle dogged ears and dodge a few canine kisses while I took stock of the old homestead.

  The computers had been updated since I’d been there last, but were still out of date. The desks were the same, though: six hulking metal things with jagged edges and scratched surfaces, buried under the detritus of the newspaper biz—piles of paperwork, oversized computer monitors, and half-eaten bags of junk food. A couple of overweight, graying reporter-types were on cell phones on one side of the room, while Diggs and another man stood at a desk that had once been mine. Behind them, a wall-mounted TV was tuned to MSNBC.

  Before Diggs straightened to say hello, the other half of the duo locked eyes with me. Though we’d never met face to face, it was clear from the man’s pointed glare who he was—and that, unlike me, he had not been looking forward to this meeting.

  “Are you planning on saying hello to me at all, or is this visit gonna be all about the dog?” I asked Diggs, if only to break the sudden tension in the room.

  “It’s always all about the dog,” Diggs said. “You should know that by now.” He stood and enveloped me in a warm hug. I held on tight, lost in a smell of wool and comfort that would forever be associated with the best parts of my youth.

  “How’re you doing, kiddo?” he asked. The words were quiet, warm in my ear—a question between just the two of us before I got started. I stepped out of his embrace with what I hoped was a businesslike nod.

  “Good. I’m good.”

  “Good,” he said. “And the drive was…?”

  “The drive was fine, Diggs.”

  He smiled—a slow grin that’s been charming women around the globe for as long as I can remember. Though I hadn’t visited Littlehope in over a decade, Diggs and I never lost touch. Our latest visit had been a few months before, but he looked no different than he always does: curly hair stylishly unkempt, his five o’clock shadow edging closer to a beard than I’d seen it in some time. He was toyin
g with me now. Diggs likes that kind of thing.

  When it became clear that I wasn’t playing along, he nodded toward the other man at the desk.

  “Noel,” Diggs said. “This is Erin Solomon. Erin, Noel Hammond.”

  Hammond extended his hand to me like someone had a gun at his back, and we shook.

  “Nice to finally meet you, Noel. Thanks for coming.”

  “Diggs didn’t give me much choice.”

  So, Diggs had come through again—this time by delivering a much-needed source at my feet. “Yeah, well, he knew he’d have to put up with my bitching otherwise. It won’t take long.”

  “This is about your book, then?” he asked.

  I glanced at Diggs, making no effort to conceal my displeasure. “You heard about that?”

  “The whole town’s heard about that,” Hammond said. “It was the lead story in the paper about a month back. The book deal, you inheriting Payson Isle… Everybody knows about it.”

  I raised an eyebrow at Diggs, who raised his hands in surrender. “It wasn’t my call, Solomon—there was no way I could keep it quiet. I figured you’d rather I do the write-up than somebody else.”

  He was right about that, at least. Still, I wasn’t thrilled to think the entire Trib readership was in on my business. I suppressed a sigh and told myself to get over it. I was sure it wouldn’t be the last surprise I had in this investigation.

  “So, where do you want to do this?” Hammond prompted me.

  He was a lesson in how deceptive a phone voice can be. In the one telephone interview he’d granted me in the past three months, Hammond had been articulate and reserved during a conversation that had been anything but pleasant. Though I’d known he was a retired cop, I had still pictured an aging professor-type—someone the local fishermen would hate, and the women in the tiny library on the corner would fantasize about. I was wrong.

  Though he had to be at least sixty-five, Noel Hammond was built more like a linebacker than a man bound for the geriatric set. Over six feet tall and easily two-hundred pounds, he looked like he could bench press a buffalo without breaking a sweat. His hands were callused, his grip stronger than I’d expected.

  “Do you guys mind coming back to the dock to check things out with me?” I asked. “We can talk there.”

  “Actually, there’s been a little change of plan,” Diggs said. “I got a boat for you like you asked, but we took her out to the island and set the mooring already. Noel said we can take you out there together—make sure you get set up all right.”

  This had clearly been Diggs’ idea, since Hammond looked like he’d rather hog-tie a rattlesnake than spend the afternoon hauling my ass around the harbor.

  “That would be great,” I said.

  “Great,” Hammond repeated, with a notable lack of enthusiasm. He was out the door before I could respond.

  Five minutes later, Diggs and I were headed out when a grizzled fisherman in coveralls and an orange hunting cap stopped us in the hallway. I fought the urge to run in the other direction the moment I realized who it was.

  “You got that paperwork I asked you for, Diggs?” he asked. He didn’t give me so much as a sidelong glance.

  “I was just on my way out, Joe—can I drop it off later?”

  The man shook his head; he didn’t look pleased. Joe Ashmont was the fire chief in Littlehope—or at least he had been, up until the Payson fire. A week after the church burned to the ground, Ashmont turned in his resignation. Though the reasons for that were never quite clear, he always seemed to hold my family personally responsible.

  “I’ve gotta get that boat fixed or I’m screwed—the season’s about to start, I can’t have her leaking oil all over the bay. You said you’d help me,” Ashmont pressed.

  Diggs glanced at me in apology. “Yeah, all right. Just hang on a second and I’ll grab it. You wanna wait in the office, Sol?”

  I started to nod, but Ashmont interrupted. “She can wait here with me. I don’t bite.”

  Ashmont was probably in his sixties, though he didn’t look a day under seventy-five. Still, he was lean and mean and, despite his claim to the contrary, I suspected that biting was the very least I had to worry about from him. Since he’d had a front-row seat at the Payson fire, however, I knew I’d need to break the ice sooner or later if I wanted any information from him. I sent Diggs on his way.

  Einstein growled low in his throat, and stood with his body blocking my legs—just in case I did something crazy and took a step toward the psychopath in the hallway. He didn’t need to worry, though. I planned on staying put.

  “It’s good I run into you,” Ashmont said the moment Diggs was out of sight. The way he said it gave me the uneasy feeling our meeting didn’t have anything to do with luck.

  “Oh?”

  “Payson Isle belongs to you now, don’t it? Word is Old Mal left it to you.”

  ‘Old Mal’ was Malcolm Payson—brother of Isaac Payson, the preacher who had led the Payson Church until their untimely demise. Ashmont took a step toward me. I smelled whiskey and stale cigarettes on his breath.

  “I guess it does.”

  “ ‘I guess it does,’” he repeated, his voice up a tone to mimic me. “It does or it don’t, right? I got fishing rights off that back cove—been pulling traps there for the past twenty years. Your old man didn’t bother me, said I was welcome to it. Once he strung himself up, nobody said a word about it since.”

  My chest tightened at his words. “I’ll look into it,” I said.

  A slow smile touched his lips. “You do that,” he said. “You got your daddy’s red hair, but you look just like your mum—you know that?” His eyes slid up and down my body, lingering on my chest. “You’re littler than her—not much to you, is there?” I’m lucky to hit five-five in heels, and at the moment I felt about three feet shorter. “You got that fire in your eyes, though. A lot of secrets locked up tight in that busy head.”

  He took another step toward me, then leaned in more quickly than I would have thought possible. Einstein leapt for him, but he cuffed the dog in the side of the head with a swift, meaty-looking fist. Stein yelped and a split second later Ashmont’s hand was wrapped around my upper arm, his mouth at my ear.

  “Somebody might crack that pretty skull and let all those secrets spill out, you don’t watch yourself. Go home, Miss Solomon. You got no business here.”

  Einstein was headed in for another go and Diggs was rounding the corner when Ashmont released me, turning on his heel.

  “Mind that dog,” he said, calling back over his shoulder as he reached the door. “A dog like that bites me, nobody’d say boo if I shot him where he stood.”

  I stared after him, too stunned to respond. As soon as Ashmont was gone, I knelt to check on Einstein.

  “What the hell was that?” Diggs asked as he hurried to my side. The dog was fine, just a little shaken up; I hadn’t fared so well.

  “Did you see that? He hit my damn dog. Who does that? The son of a bitch actually hit my dog.”

  “What’d you say to him?”

  Like it was my fault. I turned on him. Diggs held up his hands before I could light into him.

  “Not that that justifies anything,” he added quickly. “It’s just—you know Ashmont.”

  That was true—I did know Ashmont. And it wasn’t like I was actually surprised at his behavior, given the number of drunken brawls he’d started and hateful epithets he’d spewed in my family’s direction when I was a teen. That didn’t make it any more acceptable, however. I took a manila envelope from Diggs’ hands.

  “This is his?”

  Diggs nodded. He didn’t say anything when I tore the envelope open, and he did a fine job of keeping his amusement to himself while I skimmed the pile of paperwork inside.

  “His boat broke down,” he said. “There are a couple of places that offer financial assistance to lobstermen, but he was having a hard time with the paperwork. I told him I’d give him a hand.”

  Sin
ce I couldn’t think of a fitting insult for this fairly innocuous revelation, I settled for a pointed glare as I returned the documents to the envelope and handed them back to Diggs.

  “Newspaper man by day, guardian angel by night. What would Littlehope do without you?”

  “I’m sure they’d muddle through.”

  A horn honked in the parking lot.

  “That’ll be Noel,” Diggs said. “Not here half an hour and you’ve already got two men who’d just as soon watch you drown than toss you a line. Could be a new record.”

  “Give me time—I’m sure I can do better.”

  From the look on Diggs’ face, that was exactly what he was afraid of.

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