Gideon

by Alex Gordon

  “What else did he say?” Hiram Cateman spoke so softly one could barely hear him.

  “I didn’t hear everything.” Petrie kept Blaine’s mockery to himself. That was his private shame. No one else’s business.

  “Question is, did you hear anything? Did you really see anything? Panic plays tricks, Joseph.” Cateman’s voice came stronger now. “Confounds the senses. One imagines all sorts of things—”

  “I know what I saw, Master.”

  “Yes, well.” Cateman nodded to his Mistress wife, who still stood in uncharacteristic silence. Then he pointed toward the clearing, indicating that she should leave him and join her earthly charges, which she did, eventually, with many a backward glance. “So many things that seemed real at the time,” he continued when she was out of earshot, “they turn to dust when exposed to the light of reason.” He laid a hand on Petrie’s shoulder. “Best forget what you thought you saw. What you thought you heard. In fact, best forget all that happened this day. Dwelling on the horrors in one’s past does nothing but harm, as you well know. And repeating such a tale as yours, mentioning names—”

  “Weren’t no names mentioned, Master. Well, except for Tom Blaylock. And then your good mistress wife, because of all the talk about Mistress of Gideon and all—”

  “As I said. Talk just breeds more talk. And you know the things people will say.”

  Petrie fought the urge to shake off Cateman’s hand, which squeezed harder with each passing moment. Instead, he bowed his head and nodded. “Yes, Master,” he said after Cateman released him, after his heart stopped pounding and his temper settled and he tried to erase the sensation of the man’s grip weighting him down.

  “You will do your duty, Joseph.” Cateman drew up tall and straight. “You are a Petrie of Gideon. A child of the Lady, charged with guarding the border between this world and the next. Your duty has called, and you will answer.” With that, he headed down the slope to join his wife and the others, his white hair bright against the woodland gloom.

  Petrie watched as Cateman’s earthly charges crowded around him like children welcoming their father, as they trod upon Eliza Mullin’s ashes and ground them into the dirt. When he could no longer bear it, he slipped away, off to search for a place where he could be alone, where he could pretend that the last few hours had never happened.

  Where he could begin to forget.

  AFTER NIGHTFALL, PETRIE took a lantern and snuck out to the clearing. He had planned to collect what remains he could find and give them a proper burial, but the mob had been thorough, and animals had taken care of whatever had managed to survive their assault.

  After a futile search, Petrie lowered himself to the ground and listened in the hope that Eliza Mullin would speak to him again. But he heard nothing except insects and the odd rustle of some foraging beastie, and knew himself to be alone. She had passed into the wilderness, his Mistress. Gone to wander among the demons and haunted dead until such time as she atoned for her sins and was accepted by the Lady into the peace of paradise.

  Petrie pulled his knees to his chin and rocked back and forth as his tears fell and the darkness swaddled him. He did not see the glitter at first for what it was, passing it off as a trick of lantern light or the reflecting eye of a raccoon or possum that watched him from the edge of the woods.

  Then it flickered again, hard gold against the darkness of rock and tree and bush. Petrie scrambled toward it on hands and knees, then slowed as he drew close. They set traps sometimes in the thin places, those who inhabited the wilderness, to lure the careless living into the realm of the dead. He would be imprisoned there for eternity if he succumbed, and for all his life had been one horror after another, he was not prepared to give it up just yet.

  He felt around until he found a stick that was long enough, and used it to drag the object into the lantern’s beam. A small pocket watch, he thought at first, given the round shape.

  Then the light fell across it, illuminating the etched letters EB in the center, framed by tiny flowers.

  Petrie tossed aside the stick and picked up the locket. How many times had he seen Eliza Mullin fondle it and touch the lock of black hair nestled within? He opened it now, even as heat flooded his face, as embarrassed as if he had walked in on a woman as she dressed. Found the black lock curled in place, bound by a short piece of blue ribbon.

  . . . I can give Tom Blaylock back to you, as young and handsome as he was on the day he died. Nicholas Blaine, ugly as sin even as he promised redemption. I can help you silence them all. Why had Eliza Mullin rejected his offer? What had he wanted in return?

  Forget. Master Cateman’s voice sounded like a knell in Petrie’s head. Forget the sad-eyed woman who had fed and comforted him and told him of her fears just as he told her of his own. Forget what little kindness he had known in his life.

  Forget.

  Petrie shut the locket, cleaned it with the hem of his shirt, and slipped it into his shirt pocket. He told himself he had no right to keep the thing, that it belonged to one of Eliza Mullin’s children, wherever they had scattered themselves. I should look for them. Surely one lived nearby, perhaps in Chicago. He would search for them. If they had lost their home in the fire, he would help them as he failed to help their mother. For once in his damned life, he would do the right thing. For once in his damned life, he would . . . forget.

  Petrie stood. To the east, the sky had brightened from black to deepest blue, the first faint hint of dawn, and he listened for the chorus of squawks as the Lady’s crows greeted the new day. As time passed and the sky continued to lighten, he heard cardinals, jays, and even the distant cry of a hawk. All but the crows, for all that day . . . and for all the days that followed. Like the phoenix, Gideon arose from its ashes. Those who had been widowed remarried. Hiram Cateman’s power grew, and his good wife, Barbara, took on the mantle of Mistress of Gideon, as was rightful and just.

  But still the crows failed to return. It was Mullin’s doing, everyone said, because for all Master Cateman’s talk of forgetting the sins of Eliza Mullin, folks never did. Instead, they forgot other things, like how she had helped them when they had taken ill or needed counsel, or what they had done to her body.

  Joe Petrie forgot a few things as well. He forgot all about journeying to Chicago, tracking down one of the Mullin children, and returning their mother’s locket.

  And everyone in Gideon, even Joseph Petrie, son of Eli, forgot about Nicholas Blaine.

  PART THREE

  * * *

  SEATTLE, WASHINGTON

  2015

  Demons lie.

  —ENDOR 2, 9

  The rain spattered against Lauren Reardon’s umbrella, loud enough to drown out the minister, the distant chimes of the cemetery chapel. December in Seattle. A world trapped beneath a dome of cloud, and the sure and certain feeling that you would never see the sun again.

  Lauren watched the minister bless the urn containing her father’s ashes, a plain oak cube with only a few carved leaves for decoration. The scant remnants of a life that ended much too soon.

  You never got to see the sun, Dad. Not once in the two weeks that had elapsed since John Reardon had tried to get out of bed to get ready for work, but couldn’t find the strength to stand. The fourteen days since the visit to the doctor’s office, and the CAT scan, and the verdict. The 336 hours it took for him to decline from living room chair to hospital bed to the quiet finality of the hospice room. Two weeks, and no sun that entire time.

  You could’ve given him that much. Lauren berated the god who gave cancer with one hand and took away the light with the other. One bright day. Something to give a minute’s cheer, a bit of warmth. A chance for a fifty-six-year-old man to forget, if only for a little while, as the darkness closed in.

  Lauren shifted her feet to keep the heels of her pumps from pushing into the saturated sod. Dug a tissue out of her handbag, and wiped the tears as they fell. Picked out the small plaque on the site next to her father’s, which bore
her mother’s name. Angela Reardon, who had died that past April, victim of a bad heart at the age of fifty-five. Hi, Mom. You won’t be alone anymore.

  “You okay, hon?”

  Lauren caught motion out of the corner of her eye, a flash of copper hair. “Yeah.”

  “Paul went to get the car.” Katie Westbrook peeked out from beneath her umbrella, and brushed away the drops that struck her face. “Seems strange to bury ashes. Most folks want to be scattered somewhere.”

  “They wanted to be cremated and buried together.”

  “I’m not criticizing.”

  “I know.” Lauren touched her friend’s arm. “There were one or two places where I thought they might have wanted their ashes scattered, but they didn’t ask me.”

  Katie fell silent as the minister intoned the final blessing. Then she jerked her chin in the direction of a group of older people clustered nearby. “Are those the folks who worked with your Dad?”

  Lauren nodded. “The owner gave them time off so that they could attend.” She held out her hand as the minister approached, the other mourners, and dispensed handshakes and hugs and directions to her condo. Then Katie left her to join her husband and she stood alone, John and Angela Reardon’s only child, shifting her feet every so often to keep her shoes from sinking. The minutes passed as she listened to the slam of car doors, the starting of engines, before finally making her way to her friends’ car. She slipped into the backseat, felt the warmth like a shock, and realized how cold she was.

  “Just a little while longer, hon.” Katie, watching her in the visor mirror.

  As they headed for the cemetery exit, Lauren laid back her head and studied the sky through the rain-spattered moonroof. Clouds like dirty cotton, sodden, low and gray. No sign of the sun.

  THE MOURNERS CAME, ate finger foods, reminisced. After a couple of hours, Katie steered them toward the door, a wall of polite resolve, while Lauren took refuge in the kitchen.

  “I think you should stay with us, at least through the weekend.” Katie stood in the kitchen doorway, coat in hand. “The store can do without me for a few days. We could drive down to Portland and see Nance’s new house.”

  Lauren leaned against the counter, slipped off her pumps, and pressed her aching feet against the soothing coolness of the tiled floor. “I don’t think I could take Nance right now.” She forced a wide, toothy grin. “A little too much perky.”

  “A little perky might do you some good.” Katie brushed nonexistent lint from a sleeve. “I kept an eye out for him at the gravesite. He never showed.”

  “Jared?” Lauren’s smile faded. “It’s all right. You can say his name.” She tilted her head in the direction of the living room. “He sent flowers. The pink tulips.”

  Katie sniffed. “Not really appropriate for a funeral.”

  “They were my favorite.” Lauren thought back to the previous December, when her mother and father had both seemed in the bloom of health and she had a wedding to plan. She had gotten as far as choosing the flowers. “At one time, I liked pink tulips quite a bit.” She picked up a dish towel and folded it, then shook it out and folded it again. “I didn’t expect him. Truth is, I’m relieved that he stayed away. He’d have just made us all uncomfortable. I think he realized that.”

  “I wouldn’t give him that much credit.” Katie’s lip curled. “What’s that bumper sticker of his? ‘When the going gets tough, the tough go climbing.’” She glared up at the ceiling. “I’m sorry. I just can’t forget how he fled the scene when your mom died. Couldn’t allow someone else’s tragedy to upset his beautiful life.” She groaned. “And I’m doing a lousy job of taking your mind off things, aren’t I?”

  “I’ll be all right.” Lauren set the towel aside. “I have things to do. I may call in to the office. And I need to go to the house and pick up some stuff for Dad’s lawyer.”

  “Can’t that wait?”

  “I don’t need to do it today.” A chill draft brushed Lauren’s cheek. She checked the window above the sink, found it closed, tightened the hand crank anyway. Then she retrieved her jacket from the chair on which she had hung it and dragged it on. “He wanted me to hunt down the receipts for Dad’s tools. Help with the valuation for the estate sale.”

  Katie donned her coat, then knotted her scarf with a few deft twists. “It still bothers you that your dad didn’t name you his trustee, doesn’t it?”

  “No, it—” Lauren turned her back so Katie couldn’t see her face. “We never discussed his financial affairs. There never seemed a good time.” Not even during those last days, as her father grew weaker by the hour and she realized that he had never told her where he kept his important papers or even where he banked. The few times she tried to broach the subject, he drifted off, fell asleep. Later, when she learned that he had designated his attorney to handle his estate, she wondered if he had pretended to sleep to avoid breaking the news.

  “I’d be thankful he kept you out of it if I were you. One of Paul’s aunts tagged him as executor of her will, and it took him over two years to clean up the mess she left behind.” Katie sighed. “Not saying your dad was sloppy. From what I could see, he was a model of organization.”

  “Frank Welles handled his affairs for over thirty years. It made sense to put him in charge.”

  “Less for you to worry about.”

  “Yeah.” Lauren picked up her shoes, then walked over to Katie and linked her arm through hers and led her through the dining room and living room to the front door. Past the inappropriate flowers from ex-fiancés, the cards that crowded the mantel over the gas fireplace and the coffee table and the top of the rolltop desk that her father had built for her the year before. “It’s just that it makes me wonder whether—”

  “—whether he trusted you?” Katie patted her hand. “Speaking as someone whose childhood traumas paid for my therapist’s home in Friday Harbor, let me assure you. I saw trust, and respect, and love, and believe me, I know how to tell.” She pursed her lips. “I also know when I’m being given the bum’s rush.”

  “I’m just tired.”

  “Still having trouble sleeping?”

  “A little.”

  Katie fidgeted with her gloves. “Are you dreaming? Like you did that time when you were a kid?”

  Lauren fiddled with the doorknob, and avoided Katie’s eyes. The problem with best friends was that they remembered things you wish you had never told them. “They come and go.”

  “She’s taking new patients. Dr. Friday Harbor. You’d like her better than the last one you tried.”

  “I’d like the Spanish Inquisition better than the last one I tried.” Lauren opened the front door. “I’ll think about it.” She shivered as cold air washed in, damp and stale as the gasp from an old refrigerator. The rain had stopped, at least—she put on her shoes and stepped out into the condo’s tiny excuse for a courtyard. “Tonight, I just want to sit. I’ll light the fire, put on some music. Catch my breath.”

  Katie concentrated on pulling on her gloves. “I didn’t see anyone from your mom’s family.”

  “They never cared for Dad.”

  “Christ.” Katie gave her a quick hug, graced by traces of a light, summery scent. “Couldn’t they have set that aside given the circumstances?”

  “I’ll be fine. I’ll call you later.” Lauren waited until her friend drove away. The late-afternoon sky had darkened to dusk, the streetlights shimmering through the gloom, and if someone had demanded a thousand dollars in exchange for a ray of sunlight, she would have handed them her bank card on the spot.

  She went back inside, then dimmed the lights and closed the curtains so that latecomers would think no one was home. Changed into jeans and an old sweatshirt. Turned on the gas fireplace and set the music on low. Air’s Talkie Walkie, quiet songs to soothe her battered nerves.

  She poured a glass of wine and settled in front of the fire, but after a short time restlessness overcame her and she got up and paced the room. Stopped in front of the
rolltop desk, pushed up the lid, and stared at the array of drawers and cubbyholes hidden beneath, the tiny front panels centered by knobs fashioned of brass and mother-of-pearl.

  It relaxes me. That had always been Dad’s answer when Lauren asked him why he built furniture in the evenings and on weekends after spending his workweek repairing it. As a child, she had watched for hours as he sawed and mitered and stained. Sometimes they talked about her day at school. Friend problems. What she wanted to be when she grew up. But more often Lauren listened as her father talked about wood. Oak had been his favorite, white for the public rooms, red for bedrooms, each piece with its own personality. It needed to be handled a certain way or you would wind up with firewood instead of furniture.

  Your father was an artist, one of the mourners had told Lauren. The wood spoke to him. An elderly lady, tiny figure clad in a curious wrap of black and brick red, hair the color of cloud twisted into a knot and held with an enameled clip. The wood spoke to him, and he listened. She had stroked the desk with a heavily ringed hand as a single tear tracked down a leathery cheek. They were like brothers.

  Lauren flicked open the tiny doors one by one. She had tried storing things in the myriad compartments, but afterward forgot which one held what. Finally, after a summer afternoon spent in fruitless search for stamps bought that morning, she had cleaned out every drawer, every niche and hidey-hole. The desk had sat empty since, lovely but useless, a once-in-a-lifetime gift better suited to someone else.

  I’m sorry, Dad. Lauren slid drawers off their tracks, brushed her fingers over the silken interiors, held them to her nose. Even after a year, the unfinished surfaces still exuded the scent of freshly cut wood. Memories returned with each breath . . . the old kitchen chair she sat on when she watched her father work, cracked mustard vinyl mended with duct tape . . . her mother’s singing drifting downstairs from the kitchen . . . the chilly basement, barn-red floor and whitewashed walls, warmed by laughter and life. “You made this for me and I never appreciated—” She quieted, held her breath, willed her tears not to fall.