Lightfall

by Paul Monette

  “Don’t be silly.”

  He stood up sharp with his box in hand. As they edged toward the iron ring in the piling, he seemed to shudder with impatience. He threaded the rope through the ring and slung a lightning knot. Then he scampered up the ladder more or less one-handed. He was out of sight before the prophet had a chance to wish him luck, trotting up the pier in the pouring rain.

  Godspeed, thought Michael quaintly. As he gathered up his precious stuff, untrammeled by the rain and sweet as honey, he knew it didn’t matter what they said. They’d gone beyond the need of fate. The air itself was burning now.

  He floated up the ladder, smiling. In half an hour his master had taught him everything he knew.

  On Monday afternoon, the innocent caught it. If someone had pooled the data, it would have been patently obvious. There were babies turning over in their cradles, curling up like fallen leaves in villages near and far. They just stopped breathing. All the pediatricians, who were used to happy endings, attributed it to a rare syndrome, which meant they hadn’t a clue. Though the dead soon numbered in the hundreds, it was only one in every town. As the grief only turned each broken family inward, nobody really noticed there were others. The papers reported nothing. Sudden death was not a story like a killing.

  It wasn’t only babies. Here and there it was a spinster, slumped in her chair as she went about her Christmas cards. Different towns had different saints: kindly shopkeepers, patient teachers, good-hearted types who kept a lot of cats. They fell over dead in the middle of tea. It was as if, in every human cluster, some force chose the purest of the pure and snuffed it out. Almost, it seemed, to put it out of misery.

  But the time had come to deny these portents. In certain places, the neighbor who found the body simply shut the door. The dead were buried in cellars, or if there was land, in the back meadow. Few went to work that Monday. All day long they checked the locks and put in more, the deader the bolt the better. Then they nailed the windows shut for good, as if there wasn’t any going back, even after tomorrow. Gradually, from the dim past of sunlit schoolrooms, they remembered snatches of civil defense—filling up every vessel they could find with fresh clean water. Flashlights and battery radios were put at the ready in the deepest room. The drugstores were cleared to the bare shelves.

  And guns. Guns by the millions: stacked in the upstairs bedroom, with an unobstructed view down Main Street; guns in the glove compartment, under the pillow, by the porch swing. People had waited for something like this forever.

  And yet there was no panic. Everyone went around with the nicest smile, greeting the neighbors like family. For a little while, it seemed the world had changed its bitter ways. So much so that only a monster would have gone ahead and ended it. All the brute preparedness was secret. In sixteen hours they would shoot the kid next door if he set foot on the lawn, but today they were out to gentle whom they could. Even as they chatted, they checked the chinks in one another’s armor, trying to figure who would weaken first.

  Even the hordes from the cities, seeking higher ground, pretended it was just a walk. Inside they were hard as commandos. Once they got to a rural village, they planned to overrun the folk like so many native tribes. But time wasn’t on their side. By nightfall they had hardly reached the outskirts. They began to flag down cars and tear the drivers limb from limb. They floored the gas and shot through the suburbs, mad to find a little open space.

  By now they’d started to crave this thing. No matter what it was, they had to have it or they’d die.

  At twenty after four, when she rang the bell at Emery’s, all of Michael’s people were cavorting in the rainy meadow. The air was thick with a mist that was not quite storm and not quite fog. In the vanished town, all the sod was in place on the riddled earth. The woodland bushes were artfully set. The buttercups were planted one by one, by women who had done a lot of needlework. Now the tools were all stowed in the church, and they capered about with nothing more required of them. Their laughter floated on the chill gray air.

  Iris made a fist and knocked. Where the hell was he? The longer she stood in the cold, the more she feared she would start to laugh herself.

  “Ah,” said Emery, peering through the peephole. The door swung open. “My dear girl—such a pleasure. Always such a pleasure.”

  She walked past him and into the parlor and held her hands at the fire. She thought it was a trick at first, for the whole downstairs was empty. None of the others had shown. Her cheeks turned pink with shame to think they had called her bluff. After all, this was the meeting she’d requested. She wondered now if Roy and Maybeth even told them—though the blame was all on her, of course, for not having gone herself. Why had she wasted two good hours wandering down in the caves? Didn’t she know there was nothing there?

  But when she turned to ask the old man what he knew, he was gliding toward her smiling, bearing a package wrapped in tissue. A bright red ribbon tied it round. Beyond him, in the dining room, she saw the table heaped with a dozen more. It looked like Christmas.

  “This is for you, my dear,” he said. One hand fluttered at the bow, as if to plump it. “I wanted you to have it now, before the others come.”

  “Where are they?” she asked, taking it from him abruptly and wishing she could fling it in the fire.

  “I told them five,” he replied with an impish smile. “You don’t mind, do you? I wanted to be alone for a bit.”

  Alone with her, that is. Four-thirty was how she’d left it with Roy and Maybeth. He’d either gone round himself, leaving gold-tipped invitations, or he’d reinstructed her messenger force. She didn’t ask which. He was tapping the side of the package, to make her go ahead. She clenched her teeth and drew the end of the ribbon. The bow collapsed and came away. She tore off the paper. The box was a deep-nap velvet: inside was the string of pearls.

  “Oh,” she said clumsily, “but you mustn’t.” She hardly dared to look at them, let alone touch them. “I mean, they’re beautiful, but—”

  “They used to belong to a queen,” he whispered, mad with delight. “Nobody’s worn them for centuries. Not since the night they were torn from her neck.”

  He yanked the pearls out of the box as if he meant to take them back. She swallowed all her rage as he stepped behind and slipped them around her neck. What did a half hour matter? She dared not throw away another chance to—was it love?

  “I had to restring them myself,” he said, fumbling with the clasp. “They were all loose, like a bag of marbles.” He fairly cackled at the thought. “They say she had a million of them. Think of it: rooms and rooms of pearls.”

  “Who says?”

  “Oh,” he scoffed, “don’t listen to me. I’m an old man, all full of blarney.”

  He came around and surveyed the effect, wearing the most insipid grin. She bore it well enough, but there wasn’t any use pretending that she cared. The strain in her face, just trying to smile, set a tic going in her right eyelid. Not for a moment was he put off: he could only shake his head at the Tightness of it all. He could hardly speak. He had to retreat to compose himself in the dining room.

  The pearls fell along her throat with a dreadful chill, but she made no move to take them off. There was something else going on here. She followed close behind, as if she didn’t dare let him out of her sight. He stood, head bent, at the table. She could see that only eight or ten of the packages were finished. There were still some treasures loose on the polished oak. A silver beetle. A signet ring. An ivory cup.

  “It’s nothing, really,” said Emery gently. “All I’m doing is giving away loose change.” He spoke it close to her ear, with a slight conspiratorial air. “We’re fifteen now, you know.”

  Yes, she knew. Three others, a couple and their baby son, had pleaded at Mrs. Jeremy’s door, a little after dawn. They begged for a bit of warm clothing and a mug of milk for the child. In an hour they were dressed in hand-me-downs and huddled at the fire eating homemade doughnuts. Iris hadn’t met them yet, th
ough she felt no urge. They didn’t sound any smarter than the rest.

  “We’ll have a cup of tea, shall we?” Emery asked.

  What was it that made every word he spoke come out like the tongue of a trance? And what was that smell?

  He had already stepped to the kitchen door and swung it wide. There wasn’t a question of saying no. One took the tea like everything else. They were fed on a schedule so exact that hunger and thirst no longer panged the heart. The smell, she now felt sure, was coming from the packages. Very very faint, like roses pressed in Bibles. Not unpleasant. She supposed it was in the satin ribbon or steeped in the leaves of tissue, from being stored in a sacheted drawer.

  Tea was all right. It was only another twenty minutes, and then the others would come. For a moment she must have twirled in a circle, for she came up short when she nearly bumped the wall. She shook her head with a funny smile. Then she happened to glance in the gilt and speckled mirror above the buffet.

  Her smile was the twin of the old man’s. Dead at the edges and curled with flecks of spit.

  She swam toward the kitchen door, her terror like a blast of icy cold, shaking her awake. She batted the door back on its hinges. He stood stooped over the stove, one hand gripped on the kettle’s handle, as if to will it to boil. If he was startled, he didn’t show it.

  “No, let me,” she said firmly, sweeping across to take his place.

  “Oh, I don’t mind,” he said. “It’s almost done.” And when she took his arm and playfully pushed him away: “But you don’t know where things are.”

  “A kitchen’s a kitchen,” said Iris, smug and honey-sweet. “You go put a log on. I’ll do the woman’s work.”

  He was too polite to have the next rejoinder ready. He simply bowed and went. She shut the door behind him with a laugh, then went right to the teapot waiting on the counter by the stove. She put her face to the open top and sniffed the leaves inside. A dozen different fragrances wafted up, redolent of kingdoms from Ceylon to the Vale of Kashmir. She breathed and breathed, till finally there it was: roses.

  She reached to flick the catch at the back of her neck. When it wouldn’t come, she tugged it around to the front and concentrated. At last it slipped, and they fell in a pool in her hand. She lifted them up and sniffed them. Roses again. Then she quickly clasped them back in place, lest the old man catch her having second thoughts.

  The kettle began to whistle. She was so aware of the odor now, it began to smell like something going rotten. For a moment, she thought she’d spill the dry leaves out in the trash. She grabbed up the tin marked tea, to see if the source was tainted—or did he just sprinkle something in the pot? She couldn’t say for sure. By now it had pretty much numbed her senses, till everything smelled of it. She started to count to ten, to calm down. Just make the tea. Go on as if nothing’s wrong.

  Just don’t drink it.

  She poured the boiling water on the leaves. Then she set the teapot out on a lacquered tray, where two old Belleek cups were already side by side, along with a sugar bowl and a tiny, empty milk jug. She turned to the yellowed icebox, pulled the door open, and ducked inside. The roses were overwhelming.

  She couldn’t turn her back on it. She crouched and began to rifle through the stores. The butter keep. The vegetable drawer. Then a dozen different jars. She screwed off lids and drank in the smell of ordinary things. Mustard. Olives. Lard. It was just such sane and simple stuff that proved it was only roses in the air. Nothing to be afraid of. Life was the same as ever.

  Tears poured down her cheeks as she reached out a pot of jam. There was a cluster of blackberries etched on the label. Her mouth began to water for a field with a split rail fence around. The bushes were out at the end of August, for about a week till Labor Day. She lifted the lid with her eyes shut, smiling like a girl with an apron-load of sweet dark fruit.

  The rot of roses was so deep down, there was nothing left of flowers in it. It was dead like the dead themselves, squirming in the earth.

  “What are you doing?” Emery said as he peered around the kitchen door. There was danger in his voice.

  “Nothing,” she gasped, clamping the lid on tight and shoving it in exactly where she found it, right beside the ginger ale. “I can’t find the milk.”

  By now he was right on top of her, and he reached in over her head and pulled the carton out. “Here,” he said flatly, seeming to mock her. “Myself, I take it plain.”

  She stood up and went to the tray. She snatched the pitcher and turned with a smile, holding it out till he poured half a cupful in. “Here,” she said like an echo, “you take it.” She placed the pitcher precisely by the sugar, then felt the side of the pot to be sure it was piping hot. She stepped aside demurely so he could lift the tray with two hands. He was too much the host to refuse her.

  “You know, my dear,” he said quietly as he shuffled toward the door, the teacups rattling gently, “I don’t think you know what you want.”

  She followed the barest step behind and caught up the knife from the knife rack by the sink. It came out so clean that it made no sound. As Emery tipped the door open with his elbow, she raised it above her head and danced up close, till her breath sent a ripple through his wispy hair. The blade must have been a foot long. What was it for, she wondered. Meat?

  She drove it down with all her might and connected just at the top of his spine. She hit bone right away, and the knife point glanced to the side with a slice across his shoulder. It wasn’t enough at all. Though the blood bloomed out and drenched his shirt, for a moment yet he even held the tray as he spun and faced her. Though his eyes bugged wide with shock, his final act was to offer her a cup.

  She drove it in a second time, in the pit of his gut and aiming up, so as not to be stopped by the rib cage. Now he seemed to fling the tray away. It crashed to the floor before he did, like a mere domestic mishap. All the time he was sinking down, she held his eyes and the handle of the knife. For all the horror in his face, he didn’t seem a bit surprised. When he reached his knees she let the weapon go. He teetered forward. She slipped back neatly and gripped the counter as he pitched over onto his nose with a sickening crack.

  Then the sun came out.

  Then the doorbell rang.

  She scanned her clothes and her shaking hands—calmly, calmly. She hadn’t a speck of offal on her. She floated across and out the door to the dining room, letting it shut behind her. She smiled at herself in the mirror as she passed, freezing it in place as she made her way to the front hall. The bell rang out a second time, just when she gripped the doorknob. It almost seemed to remind her: she brought up a hand and yanked the pearls, and the whole string came away. They spattered all over the floor. With the smile still fixed, she opened the door. It was Roy.

  “Oh,” he said, perhaps a trifle sheepishly. It must have been the changing of the hour. He had betrayed her, after all.

  She had no intention of bringing it up. And anyway, she was so startled to see the sun on the sea behind him, with the clouds boiling off to the north, it was all she could do to look at him.

  “Where’s Emery?”

  “I don’t know,” she said. “Upstairs, I guess. I just walked in myself.” She took his hand and led him into the parlor, caressing his arm and sidling close, so his mind was all on her. “Why don’t you put a log on the fire?”

  He bent to do her bidding, and the doorbell rang again. She turned and trotted back to it. She pulled the door open sharply: it was Mrs. Jeremy. Dr. Upton and Polly were coming up the walk behind. Maybeth was crossing the lawn. Iris crunched a pearl underfoot as she shook Mrs. Jeremy’s hand.

  “Where’s Emery?”

  “I don’t know,” said Iris quietly. “Roy and I just got here.”

  “Well, I want my tea.”

  “Look,” said Polly, pointing at the sunset.

  The whole group on the threshold stopped to watch. It was pink and yellow and a raging red, with a good half hour to go, besides. The air was suffused wi
th a sudden mildness—almost tropical. Diamonds shivered all over the grass. It was like the end of any storm: their hearts lifted up with hope.

  Now they went gladly into the house, laughing as if it were a party. Iris stood her ground as keeper of the gate. Maybeth squeezed her hand in passing. Perhaps for a moment a shadow vague as time fell across the older woman’s eyes. She glanced up at Iris, puzzled. Then whatever it was seemed to pass, and the landlady walked inside with her head down, frowning and forlorn.

  “Hurry!” Iris shouted at the others, trailing across the meadow from the patch of houses below the hill.

  Instantly they picked up speed and rushed to close the gap, as if eager to do what she thought best. Jeff and Simon chased each other, larking it up like a summer game. Iris spotted the new couple, her with the baby in her arms, trudging grimly over the grass, jaws set. They looked as if they were going to a hanging. The Griersons, perhaps to counter them, were clearly stepping out to pay a social call. They sauntered up the lane. She carried a different parasol than she had the day before.

  Iris stood and watched them come. She had no special wish to greet them; they were just an excuse to be somewhere else but in the house. Behind her, she could hear them milling in the parlor, pointing out the window at the sun. Then Maybeth called upstairs to ask if Emery was all right.

  The Griersons passed inside with a pretty hello. Jeff and Simon bit their lower lips to keep a straight face for the formal gathering. Iris winked them in. She heard Roy thunder up the stairs, for the host had apparently fallen asleep. The new couple mumbled shyly at her, creeping in like servants. The baby began to cry.

  “He’s not there,” said Roy as he thundered down.

  Iris waited a moment more, for Felix Quinn came running up like somebody late for a train. His face was red, his clothes all yanked and muddy.

  “He must be in the kitchen,” said Mrs. Jeremy, pattering off in that direction.

  “What is it?” said Iris, full of concern, as the doctor wiped his eyes with a hanky out of Maybeth’s drawer.