Godmother Night

by Rachel Pollack

  Later, while digging in her bag for a half roll of peppermint Life Savers, Jaqe came across the three I Ching coins she had found in the street. Medallions, Mark’s friend had called them. She held them up to examine them in the weak reading light. She’d never noticed the markings on the backs of the turtles. They looked like the continents, as if the turtle wore the Earth itself as a shell. She turned the coins over to look at the pairs of toads, the way they stared so intently at each other. She thought of the toad dance, the first time she’d seen Laurie, the way they’d danced together. She thought of Mother Night.

  Jaqe found a notebook in her bag and set it on her lap. With both hands she made a shell around the coins to bounce them around each other. She worried for a moment that Laurie might get angry, but then she made up her mind not to think about it. When she dropped them on the book all three came up toads. Nine. Yang. She opened the book and drew a line with an X in the middle. Five more times Jaqe tossed the coins, and five times they came out the same. Jaqe stopped writing after the third line. She’d planned to look it up when she got home, but there was no need. Six yang lines meant action. And because they were nines they would change into yin. Peace. Action brings peace. What? she wondered. What the hell should she do? She looked out the window. No motorcycles.

  At the bus station Laurie sat while the other passengers hurried off. Jaqe looked at her. Laurie was bent forward with her head down and her elbows on her knees. “Can we get off?” Jaqe asked. “I’d like to go home.”

  “Sorry,” Laurie said, and jumped up, almost banging her head against the rack.

  The station blared at Jaqe with all the noise of loudspeakers, crowds, video games, and fast-food stalls. At the same time a buzz sounded in Jaqe’s ears, getting louder and higher pitched as she moved toward the exit. Outside, Jaqe looked around for Dr. Root, or the woman in the purple wig who had tried to sell her a ticket, but they were both gone. Maybe the cops had chased them away. She stepped into the street and the buzzing jumped another level. It drowned out the cars, the buses, the sirens, the people shouting at each other up and down the block. Laurie asked, “Should we take a cab?” but Jaqe wasn’t listening. She stared across the street at a teenage boy and girl who sat together in front of a closed jewelry store, their backs against the metal grate, their knees drawn up tight as if they hoped they could make themselves small so the police wouldn’t notice them. A couple of nylon backpacks lay between them. The boy held tight to a rolled-up piece of foam about an inch thick. Scattered crumbs lay about their feet, like the end of a trail from a home where they could never return.

  The girl’s shoulders looked squeezed together, her whole body compressed as she bent forward to get something from her backpack. A half-empty bag of junk food, Jaqe saw. The way they bent forward, with the car lights flickering over their faces, they looked to Jaqe like birds, like children of the sky whom some enchantment had imprisoned in the bodies of human beings.

  Something tugged at Jaqe’s arm; she jerked it away. Beside her, Laurie sighed. “Come on,” she said. “Let’s go.” When Jaqe didn’t answer or move, Laurie said, “What do you want, anyway?”

  Jaqe turned her head now. “Justice,” she said. “I want justice.”

  Eight

  Greenthumb and Redshoes

  Jaqe met Mother Night in a cemetery. Mark had suggested it to her. “If you need to find a violinist,” he pointed out, “you go to a concert hall. If you’re looking for a professor you try the universities.”

  She’d gone to Mark one evening after the store had closed, after Laurie had gone home expecting Jaqe would be there waiting for her. Mark was sitting by the counter, alone, with a review magazine and a red pen to mark the mistakes he always discovered in the reviews. “I need to find someone,” Jaqe said, and then, after a deep breath, she told him about Mother Night.

  For a while Mark sat back in his desk chair, rubbing his cheek with a fingertip, as if nothing was more important than checking his beard stubble. Jaqe thought for sure he would tell her she needed serious counseling, or else detoxing in a spiritual recovery program. But all he said finally was, “Why do you want her? It sounds to me like you’d want to keep away from her.”

  “I can’t tell you that,” Jaqe said. “I just need her help for something.”

  “You want to put out a contract on someone?”

  “No!”

  “Just asking,” Mark said mildly. He added, “Is Laurie okay? She hasn’t looked right lately.”

  “Laurie’s fine.”

  “She moves like someone’s jerking her muscles.”

  “I said she’s okay!”

  Mark nodded. “Yeah, she says that too. So I guess if you both say it, it must be true.”

  “Look,” Jaqe said. “I’m doing this for Laurie as much as for me. No, that’s not true. I’m doing it for myself. I just have to pray it will help her. Or at least not hurt her.”

  Mark shrugged. “Not much you can do except hope. Praying is good. Praying is always good. So. You want to find this Mother Night. Too bad you can’t kill a dragon.”

  “What?”

  “Recommended by all the authorities. You kill a dragon, taste the blood, and you understand the language of the birds. And then the birds tell you where to find Mother Night.”

  “Why would the birds know?”

  Mark laughed. “Good point. The authorities never seem to consider that question. Of course, dragons were really fluid earth energy, and killing them meant pinning the energy down in one place so people could plant crops and build cities. What would a modern dragon be? Maybe a nuclear power plant.” He stopped as Jaqe headed for the door. “Hey,” he said, “come back.”

  “I’m serious about this,” Jaqe said. “It may sound weird to you, or dumb, but I don’t care.”

  “I know,” Mark told her. “I’m sorry. Please sit down again. I’ll make some tea.” He went into his storeroom office at the back of the shop. A couple of minutes later he returned with a tray containing two brown mugs and a white book. There were no words on the cover, only a drawing of a toad sitting on the back of a turtle. “What you need,” Mark said, “is to go to the Land of the Dead.”

  Two nights later, Jaqe stood in a small cemetery by a small country road. “You don’t want one of those big city places,” Mark had told her. “For one thing, they’ve got cops around in case of vandals or weirdos. For another, they’ve crowded things up so much Mother Night would never notice you.” He added, “Or hear you. The dead make a lot of noise. I found this out once when I spent a few nights in a cemetery. Some of them get lost and upset, and some like to sing—for some reason, the dead all sing off-key, I don’t know why—and some just like to complain.” So he had loaned her his car and given her directions to a “nice rustic little place” where most of the graves went back two centuries and the residents had given up making trouble.

  The cemetery sat behind the only church in a tiny village near the state border. The church itself didn’t look very old, with its single white steeple and plain cross. The cemetery, however, must have gone back to colonial times, for many of the gravestones had sunk so far into the ground it was impossible to read who was buried there. The cemetery was smaller than the church, and much smaller than the lawn in front or the parking lot alongside. As far as Jaqe could tell, anyone who died in the neighborhood these days took up residence somewhere else, probably someplace more modern, with room for elaborate stone tributes.

  At first Jaqe parked in the church lot, but then she thought how a cop might spot the car and come looking for her. So she drove back to the village green and left the car in front of an antique shop, under the protection of an overhanging oak. When she walked back she noticed an odd rock across the road from the church at the edge of a wood. A huge boulder about five feet high and six or seven feet long, it perched on five small rocks, like footstools. From a certain angle Jaqe could see a profiled face in the boulder, a round indentation for an eye, a jutting block for a nos
e and a crack in the rock for a prim mouth. The stone swept back from the “forehead” so that the whole thing looked like the elongated head of a snake, or maybe a turtle. When Jaqe looked underneath, among the footstools, she noticed something white, and when she bent down she saw they were bones, small and polished, like the remains of a doll. Somewhere behind her, Jaqe heard a noise and she hurried across the road and behind the church.

  For over two hours Jaqe sat at the edge of the graveyard, with her back to one of the larger stones, a memorial to a certain Jack Hunt, who had died more than a hundred years ago. It was chilly in the cemetery, and Jaqe had to pull her knees up against her chest to keep from shivering. This is nuts, she thought. Mark and his stupid ideas. The next thing, she thought, he would tell her to sacrifice a chicken. She laughed. Maybe she should cut her finger and scatter some blood over the tombstones.

  Jaqe had been sitting there for two hours and seventeen minutes—she had just checked her watch—when she heard footsteps. Like some small dog she scurried behind the tombstone, trying to compress her body and still look out at the graveyard. An old man came from the parking lot into the cemetery. Over his shoulder he carried a bag, which he set down with a thump. Next to it he placed a plastic bag, like the kind used in supermarkets. He sat for a moment, head bowed, looking very tired. With a sigh, he emptied the bag. A bunch of clothes fell out, along with some dirt, a few rocks, and some string. Working efficiently, the man molded the dirt into the rough form of a body. He placed the stones for eyes and a nose, and used the string to form a mouth. He looked critically at this sculpture a moment, then made a few small changes, lengthening a dirt leg, rolling a stone a little higher up the head. He then took the clothes and laid them out along the body. When he finished he reached into the shopping bag for what looked like a bottle of beer. With the experienced skill of a waiter, he took an old-fashioned bottle opener (a church key, Jaqe realized) from his pocket and flipped off the cap. Shaking the bottle, he poured the liquid all over the clothes and the effigy.

  For several seconds, nothing happened, while the man tapped his foot and Jaqe held her breath. Then the clothes began to flutter, as if a wind had risen. At that moment, a speck of dust flew into Jaqe’s eyes. She squeezed them shut, and when she opened them again the clothes were occupied. A young man with long matted hair was sitting up, rubbing his eyes, stretching. He grinned up at the old man, who looked down at him with disgust. The young man said, “I guess I did it again, huh?”

  The other gave him a hand and pulled him to his feet. “One of these days,” he said, “I’m just not going to bother.”

  “Yeah, sure,” the young man said, and laughed.

  The older man made a face. “You stink.”

  “Well, what do you expect?” said the other, and the two of them walked off toward the parking lot. Only after they’d gone did Jaqe notice that the sculptured pile of dirt had vanished.

  She was about to get up when she heard someone else coming. A woman came around the church, young, about Jaqe’s age, with straight blond hair. She wore a long loose dress that fluttered softly against her body. An animal loped alongside her—a dog, Jaqe thought, but then she saw it was a fox. The woman said, “Is this the place?”

  “Yes,” the fox said. “Now you must do what you promised.” It spoke in a high sharp voice, with some kind of accent that Jaqe found hard to follow.

  “I can’t do that,” the woman said. “You’ve done so much for me.”

  “And you must do this for me,” the fox insisted. The woman began to cry. “Have I ever asked you for anything?” The woman shook her head. “And have I ever told you to do anything that turned out badly?” Again she shook her head. “Then do what I tell you.”

  The woman reached into her handbag and took out a gun. Before Jaqe could do anything, the woman shot the fox. Jaqe gasped, but the woman didn’t seem to hear her. When the fox had stopped twitching, the woman, weeping now, bent down and took out a small axe from her bag. In five quick chops she cut off the fox’s head and then its feet. Blood spattered her face and her lovely dress. Sickened, Jaqe looked away. A cry of surprise made her turn back again. The mutilated corpse of the fox had vanished. In its place, a young man sat kneeling on the ground. He started to get up, fell on all fours again, then finally made it to his feet. The woman stood before him, staring at his handsome face, his silk T-shirt, his black linen trousers. In a soft tenor voice, with only a trace of the fox’s accent, he said, “The man who tried to kill you and fell over the cliff was my older brother. He changed me when a fortune-teller told him I would take over the family business.” He held out his hands and the woman took them. Together they walked out from the graveyard.

  Almost the moment the two vanished around the corner of the church, Jaqe heard footsteps from the other side. This time a middle-aged woman came into view. She was crying as she carried the body of a girl about ten years old. She laid the body down on the grass, in the same place where the man had shaped the dirt and the woman had shot the fox. This woman, too, carried a bag, a child’s knapsack shaped like a teddy bear. The woman reached inside and took out a quart-sized metal can. When she opened it Jaqe smelled gasoline. The woman poured the whole bottle over the dead child.

  Instead of lighting a match, however, she sat back on the grass and spoke to the corpse. “Who are you?” she said.

  The mouth didn’t move, but a whisper came from the body. “I am the child of Mother Night.”

  “Where do you come from?”

  “I come from the dark in the back of the sky.”

  “And where are you going?”

  “Away from there and back to here. Far away and forever home.”

  In one movement, the woman lit a match and threw it on the dead child. “No!” Jaqe screamed, but she was too late. The gasoline flared up, a flash of light that blinded Jaqe as she jumped to her feet. When Jaqe could see again, the little girl was standing next to the woman, who bent down and hugged her. The smell of gasoline had vanished, replaced by a faint sweetness, like some delicate perfume made for a child’s birthday. The girl picked up the knapsack and the two started to walk away.

  “Hey!” Jaqe called to them. “Just a moment. I want to talk to you.” They stopped to turn and look at her for a moment, but then kept on walking. A hand on Jaqe’s shoulder stopped her from following them. She turned, and there stood three of Mother Night’s helpers. They all wore their leather outfits. Heavy makeup masked their faces: violet eyeshadow and dark blue mascara, red lipstick and slashes of red across the cheekbones like scars. The moonlight shone in their red hair. Behind them, by the corner of the churchyard, stood their motorcycles. The one who’d grabbed Jaqe’s shoulder said, “Mother wants to see you.”

  “I’m right here,” Jaqe said.

  The woman grinned. “Yeah, well, Mother’s across the road. Over by the turtle.” The big stone, Jaqe thought. So it was a turtle and not a snake. The three women turned and walked toward their motorcycles. Her hands on the handlebars, one of them turned to look at Jaqe. “Hey, kid,” she said.

  “Don’t call me that,” Jaqe said. “I’m as old as you are.” The three laughed, and Jaqe blushed.

  “Fine,” the woman said. “All I want to know is, are we going to have some fun?”

  “I didn’t come here for you to have fun,” Jaqe said. Before they could say anything else she turned and headed out of the cemetery. As she rounded the church corner she heard the roar of motorcycles.

  Mother Night was standing with her back to Jaqe, with one hand on the stone, and her head tilted up, as if to talk to the petrified face. Jaqe thought how it always surprised her to see how short Mother Night was. Mother, as the redhead had called her, wore a striped tunic, belted at the waist with a braided rope belt. The tunic flared out over a long skirt whose flowing rivers of color sparkled in the dim light. On her head she wore a hard skullcap, set with feathers, clustered jewels, and strips of lace. When she turned around, she was wearing a necklace of char
ms, ribbons, and, in between, a series of small polished bones. Jaqe glanced under the rock. The bones that had lain there had vanished. Mother Night smiled at her. “Hello, Jaqe,” she said.

  “Hello,” Jaqe said. “Thank you for coming.” Mother Night nodded. Jaqe said, “That was quite a show you put on.” Mother Night smiled, a delighted grin, like a child. Jaqe said, “Did you set it all up just for me?”

  “You went to such trouble to find me, it seemed only fair to give you something a little special. But it wasn’t just for you, you know. The work needed to get done.”

  “I didn’t know you did that kind of work.”

  Mother Night fluttered a hand. “Oh, I do many things.” For a while they just stood there, Mother Night lounging against the boulder, Jaqe with her shoulders up and her fists clenched. With a quick smile, Mother Night said, “What do you want, Jaqe?”

  Again silence, this time for nearly half a minute. Just as Mother Night turned away again, Jaqe said, “I want justice.”

  Mother Night turned to stand directly before Jaqe. A gust of wind blew a strip of lace from her hat across her eyes. She didn’t move it. She said, “Are you sure?”

  “Someone did something to me. And to Laurie. I want him punished.”

  Mother Night nodded. “I understand,” she said. A moment later she added, “Do you?”

  “I don’t know. But I don’t think it really matters. I know I want justice.”

  Softly, Mother Night clapped her hands. “Fine,” she said. “We will see what we can do.”

  In the road, just behind Jaqe and to the side, the five women appeared, all of them this time, and without their motorcycles. “Well, what do you know,” one of the women said. “It looks like we’re going to have some fun after all.”

  Bill Cohen carefully rolled up the sleeves of his blue shirt to just above the elbow. He looked at himself in the bedroom mirror, turning first to the left and then to the right. He pouted a moment, then pulled his belt a notch tighter over his jeans. In the bed, Janet groaned and stretched out her arms. Something about the gesture enraged Bill, but he shrugged the feeling away and went back to the mirror. Leaning closer, he rubbed his prickly beard shadow. Bill always shaved in the evening; smooth for Janet, rough for the women in the beauty parlor. When he glanced back at the bed, Janet was sitting up, with Bill’s two pillows behind her own. Like a fucking queen, he thought.