The Copper Head snake that had originally lashed out at Willie had discovered a weakness in its habitat. It slithered out of its container and coiled up under the edge of the carpet, away from the booming bass of the band, before slinking up to the pulpit sight unseen once the music stopped. Rev. King motioned to one of his deacons. Mr. Mathews, a lanky man left the church without a word only to return a moment later with Eddie and his parents in tow.
The trio was escorted to the front of the church. As they passed the wall of serpents, every snake began stirring in its cage. Some bared their fangs; others smacked relentlessly against the Plexiglas, apparently undeterred by its imperviousness. The incessant thump!-thump!-thump! reverberated through the small building and punctuated Eddie’s steps. Still no one noticed the errant copperhead gliding along the carpet not far from the feet of the perisher’s feet. Deacon Matthews presented Eddie to Rev. King, who placed both hands atop the lad’s head and began to pray. His parents were ushered quickly into a nearby pew as Willie locked eyes with his schoolmates, whose gazes seemed even wider than his own.
There was an old man sitting in the very first pew to whom parishioners affectionately referred as Daddy Hamilton. He rose from his seat with a grimace, shifted his always-present wooden cane, and hobbled toward the altar where he retrieved a marbled wooden tube not much larger than a coffee canister. He carried the thing past the reverend, past Eddie who appeared to be trembling at the head of the pulpit. The tube’s lid erupted with a pop at Daddy Hamilton’s weathered hand and a thin line of white cascaded between Rev. King, Eddie, and the rest of the congregation. Willie knew what the glittering crystals were: salt. The wooden cylinder had its place on the pulpit beside an old Bible opened to the Book of Mathew, beside a snarl of freshly cut pine boughs snipped from the trees that loomed over the church. Daddy Hamilton returned it to its rightful place as he doddered toward one end of the salt barrier and unsheathed a most unlikely sight—a thin, long sterling blade—from the hollow of his cane. The knobbed end came unhooked like a carabiner and snapped easily back into place. Willie couldn’t believe his eyes. He’d seen the cane dozens of times, even held it for Daddy Hamilton before when he needed to steady himself to take his seat in the front pew. But he had no idea it held a weapon.
In a booming baritone that matched neither Daddy Hamilton’s age nor his stature, he declared, “The Bible tells us to be strong in the Lord and his mighty Power. We are to put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the Devil’s schemes.” Daddy Hamilton drew the long blade along the floor beside the salt demarcation as he went from one side of the church to the other. Once he finally took his seat, the very effort of traversing the length of the building appeared to have drained him.
Willie was fascinated. He turned to his mother and asked, “What did Daddy Hamilton just do?”
“He built a wall of faith to protect us from the Devil,” she whispered.
“But, where is he?” Willie countered, peering around the room timidly.
Willie’s mother nodded in the direction of Eddie and the reverend. “In that boy.”
He immediately turned his attention back to Eddie, who was now laid out on the floor, trembling and moaning. He could see beads of perspiration on the preacher’s brow as his lips moved in prayer, although he wasn’t speaking loudly enough for the congregation to overhear—at least not until he bellowed, “Lord, we beseech you to free this evil from your child! Satan, in the name of God and our Lord Jesus Christ, leave this child! He is a child of God and you are not fit to stand in his shadow. He is protected by God’s armor. There is no choice but to leave this holy place; this is sanctified ground. Even the Lord’s serpents will not bite the anointed believers of faith and signs, for they even know of the folly of refusing the will of God.”
Rev. King sucked in a deep breath before turning to the crowd and imploring, “Pray, everyone, pray for this boy. Pray for his soul to be cleansed. Pray!”
Fearing what might happen should he not do as he was told, Willie bowed his head and recited the only prayer he could remember: The Lord’s Prayer. A stolen glance toward the altar found Eddie curled on his side, shaking as though he were atop a tractor motor. Suddenly he stiffened, one leg kicking out involuntarily. Eddie’s foot due to the muscle spasm crossing the line of salt on the church floor. Reverend King loomed over him, hands raised, continuing to pray as Eddie rolled onto his back and snapped his head sideways just enough to lock eyes with Willie. His mouth rounded into a howl and Rev. King stepped back, looking as though he may collapse.
A parishioner yelled, “Praise God!” and the band kicked up the strains of a joyful version of “I Saw the Light.” Willie, meanwhile, felt like he might be sick. His stomach churned and threatened to expel its latest meal. The copperhead that had been slithering along the outskirts of the pews happened to be next to Willie and none too pleased about the sudden explosion of sound rumbling through the air. Without warning the serpent’s fangs sank into Willie’s ankle as the snake wrapped itself around his stained Converse.
Willie awoke in his own bed with nary a recollection of what had happened at the service. He remembered feeling faint with an inkling that he may lose his lunch all over his shoes. But he couldn’t remember anything after that, and no one would mention a word about the rest of the evening. Willie was too nervous to ask. All he knew was that he never saw Eddie again. Sometimes he wondered where his young classmate had ended up, but the town was so tight-lipped about that Wednesday’s service that Willie eventually resigned himself to it having been a dream, a subconscious rendering of his deeply instilled fear of the Lord.
August 23, 2005 New Orleans, Louisiana
Rebecca could barely see through the torrential rain and screaming wind. She attempted to call for help, but a gust only carried her wail away. Her husband Brian was off with the rest of his firehouse, dealing with damage from the storm. She was worried about him; the storm had proven to be much more threatening than expected. She had taken shelter at a local community center. Her daughters Jennifer and Mary hadn’t been able to accompany her, but somehow Rebecca knew they were safe. She didn’t feel as though she could say the same for herself, however; a blast of wind had torn the community center’s front door clean off, leaving her exposed to the elements in the concrete entrance to the building. She clutched the rusted wrought iron gate and wished for her husband. The nearby river had run over, leaving the water to continue rising in the never-ending rain. It was up to her knees and the sandbags flanking either side of the absent doorway did little to stop its rush.
At that moment Rebecca heard a different sound, one that seemed to float above the din of the storm. It brought with it a searing flash of light and crack of thunder so loud it shook the bowels of the building. The lightning illuminated a wall of water rushing toward Rebecca that had to be no fewer than twenty feet high. It struck her with such force, she crumpled into the mud that framed the old community center.
When she came to, the slick ground had been replaced with the fluffy ivory sheets that lined her bed. The rain had melted into sweat on her brown skin, and the wave that rocked her became Brian’s hand on her arm, gently shaking her awake. She tugged the vintage cotton quilt, lovingly stitched by her grandmother, tighter around her shoulders to ward off a sudden chill and reached for a nearby pillow to hug to her chest.
Brian tucked a stray chestnut strand behind her ear, asking, “That dream again, wasn’t it?”
Rebecca nodded and tucked her chin into the pillow. “But it was different this time. It actually felt real.”
He planted a kiss on her temple and pulled the blanket up to her neck. “I wish I could tell you everything is going to be OK,” he admitted. “But I’m not sure how.”
The two of them had been together for years before settling down. The men in Rebecca’s family had pulled Brian aside when it was clear they were getting serious and invited him to have a drink in their family cabin in the Bayou, where they lai
d out the expectations that come with marrying a Creole woman. He was nervous that Rebecca’s elders would take issue with his background. As one of her cousins quipped, “Brian’s so white, he could change oil in a pickup at midnight by the glow of his skin.” To his relief, his heritage was a non-issue as far as her family was concerned. Her father once advised him, “It ain’t the bottle, boy, it’s the whiskey inside that counts. Just don’t get to no point where someone feels he’s gotta break open the bottle to see just what’s inside.”
He eventually coaxed Rebecca out of bed with a gentle reminder that Jennifer and Mary needed to get ready for the day. Jennifer was three years old and happy to bounce off to the babysitter, but Mary was only 14 months and needed more coaxing. The girls’ caretaker, Sally, arrived shortly after Rebecca began putting herself together for work at the nearby physician’s office. Brian would soon be headed back to work at the New Orleans Fire Department. Sally decided to take the girls for a short jaunt in the park, so they wouldn’t be underfoot while Rebecca and Brian were trying to get out of the house.
As Rebecca contemplated slipping into her scrubs, she was reminded of her family’s legacy of helping to heal others. Her great-great-great-grandmother Anne-Suzette Chevalier who had been born to an enslaved woman and her French master in Saint Dominic, now Haiti, and was spirited away during the Haitian Revolution. Some historians called the successful coup the greatest slave revolt since Spartacus.
As a refugee child, Anne-Suzette was taken to a Louisiana plantation and eventually learned healing and folk magic from her elders and fellow Haitian refugees.
She had been considered a free woman of color growing up in New Orleans. Yet even as a successful businesswoman by her own merits, some suspected her folk magic past was in fact the source of her good fortune, much like her more famous contemporary, Marie Laveau. Anne-Suzette affinity for the otherworldly had been passed down through generations, strange dreams and all. Rebecca had been unlucky enough to inherit the trait. She was uncertain how far back such visions went, but she did know that her mother and grandmother had each seen their own deaths.
Her mother knew she would die in an accident, which was precisely what happened: a drunk driver jumped a curb and pinned her to the side of a building, where she passed before medical help could arrive. Rebecca was only a young girl of 18 then and had wanted to curse the man who had killed her. The driver later pled guilty in court and apologized tearfully to her and her family. Rebecca could tell that he was truly sorry, and she no longer wished him harm. She became the family matriarch thereafter and made it her duty to look after her family and make a good life for them and herself.
The dreams did not come right away. In fact, it was just about a year ago that they began plaguing her. She knew her daughters were too young to be made aware of their potential burden and the education of the family ways and knowledge. So rather than warn them of its nearly certain passing, she took to scrawling her dreams and the family history in stacks of journals. She packaged them up as she filled one book after another and mailed them off to a relative out of town for safekeeping. In the meantime, she started transcribing her great-great-great-grandmother’s teachings in fresh new notebooks with Brian’s help. He even added personal touches to these works in the form of illustrations. He also penned personal notes in the margins to his daughters as lessons for the future. He hoped Rebecca’s dreams were just that: imaginary. But Rebecca seemed concerned, and he knew better than to question her intuition.
Rebecca caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror as she tied up her hair and considered how much she resembled her mother. The same toffee skin and dark, brooding brown eyes. She missed her mother fiercely, always had, but somehow felt like her mother was there with her as the girls grew older. She grabbed her purse off the stair rail and headed out to her car for the quick drive to the office. Once she arrived, she went straight into the break room to grab a quick cup of coffee. The newscaster on the TV behind her caught her attention as she rifled through the sugar holder for actual sugar.
“Tropical storm Katrina made landfall in Cuba and the Bahamas last night, causing extensive damage and power outages. Now over the Gulf of Mexico, the warm water is expected to add more power to the storm. Computer projections indicate possible landfall between the Florida panhandle and almost anywhere west along the Gulf Coast.”
Rebecca stood frozen in front of the TV, staring at a map of the Gulf of Mexico coastline rife with computer-generated yellow lines fanning out along the coast. One of the lines ended in New Orleans. She fished her phone out of her pocket and called home.
“Sally,” she said as soon as the line picked up, “would you be able to take the children on a trip?”
“Well, I guess. Where to and when?”
“Asheville North Carolina. Tomorrow.”
Sally’s curiosity was nearly palpable. “North Carolina?” she replied. “Why?”
“Just know that it’s important.”
“But how can I get there, ma’am? I don’t even have a car.”
“We’ll take all of you to the train station,” Rebecca suggested. “You can take the Crescent to Spartanburg. One of Brian’s brothers will meet you at the station and drive you the rest of the way to Asheville. Can you do that?
“Yes, ma’am,” Sally replied. She turned to the girls and said, “Well, kids, looks like we’re going to Asheville.”
CHAPTER 6
FRIENDS ON BOTH SIDES
“There is a story of a peasant woman in a French church who was found kneeling before a marble group, and was warned by a priest that she was worshipping the wrong figure—namely, Beelzebub. ‘Never mind,’ she replied, ‘it is well enough to have friends on both sides.”
Demonology and Devil-lore, by Moncure Daniel Conway, 1879 Virginia
Present day, Asheville, NC
Mackey loved to hunt. In fact, he had convinced himself he was a master hunter. After all, he could move silently and render himself almost invisible to his prey. He practiced stalking even when he was not hunting. And his marksmanship reputation was well known, mostly due to self-boasting. He had observed his prey going north and made a broad circle to assume a position where he could best intercept it. His target came into view nearly instantly. He drew his gun and fired a shot that traveled across Haywood Street and shattered the storefront glass window just in front of Oliver Griffin. About a perfect shot, if not a hair short.
Ollie froze in place before ducking behind a parked car. He had two men with him, one of whom pulled his own hand gun and began to shoot in no particular direction. None of the rounds came anywhere near Mackey. Instead, he waited for Ollie to emerge from his hiding place. The snitch had gone to the police and managed to get Mackey arrested along with several others who were involved in various illegal activities in Asheville last month.
One of Ollie’s companions finally recognized Mackey and appeared to tell Ollie so. Mackey pointed his weapon in Ollie and company’s general direction and fired off the remaining five shots without bothering to aim. Then he ran. Sprinting around the corner, he stopped at an alcove at the rear of a nearby building. He was met by a pile of blankets and coats, the sure sign of a homeless person’s resting place. Mackey tore off his jacket and tossed it into the mishmash before kicking one of the loose blankets over it. Picking up a brown plastic grocery bag blowing across the ground at his feet he stuffed his revolver inside after removing the empty 6 brass shell cases. Seeing a flower box next to one of the back doors that lead to the alleyway from the attached buildings. Mackie quickly dug into the mulch until he had an opening in the combination of dirt, sticks and bark, big enough for the bagged revolver to be placed into. Pushing the mulch over the weapon Mackie was stuck with a thorn that went underneath the nail of his trigger finger on the right hand. Cursing and quickly glancing behind him he thought he saw movement near the entrance to the alleyway and decided it would be best to leave as quickly as possible. Placing the spent six shells in his pocket
thinking he would latter drop these in the river to destroy some of the evidence he thought could link him to the shooting. Just another one of the reasons he was a professional, he was careful, he smiled and thought to himself. Putting on a pair of sun glasses he rushed away as the scream of police cars came hunting. He couldn’t even be bothered to try to cover his tracks better than that.
Inside the Haywood Street Book Store.
14-year-old Jennifer was confused. They had been going to story time at the book store when one of the windows near where they stood shattered. Something then knocked her to the floor of the store. Her left leg hurt, and she couldn’t move it; it burned like it was on fire. She lifted her head to try to look around and spotted her sister Mary and cousin Justin also splayed out on the linoleum. Their Uncle Joe, with whom the trio lived, bent down checking each of them, gasping a frantic “No, no, no” as he went.
A different figure appeared in front of the kids. “What happened?” Jennifer called out woozily.
The man came over and knelt beside her. “Looks like someone was shooting outside and a couple bullets came into the store.”
“Are you a doctor?”
“No, baby girl, but I used to take care of my friends in the desert a long time ago when they would get hurt like you are now.”
“Are Mary and Justin OK?”
“Don’t worry about them right now,” he assured her. “Your dad is taking care of them.”
She blinked. “Daddy’s dead,” she said. “That’s my Uncle Joe.”
The man paused briefly and looked the child in the eyes at that revelation than moved over to check on Mary and Justin, to whom he began immediately administering CPR.
The kids’ uncle whipped around in a panic. “Where the hell are the EMTs?!” he shouted.
Cop and Call A Novel: When you call for help don't be surprised at who responds (Asheville’s Cop Series Book 2) Page 4
