Now, as she made her way over the pasture that connected the Smith farm to the Widow Ward’s property, it seemed like secrets lurked in the tall grass beneath her boots.
Or maybe just snakes.
She used her walking stick of blackened ash to push aside the dying daisies and black-eyed susans along with the heavy-seeded heads of grass. The air was laden with that sweet scent of slight decay that heralded winter’s arrival. Soon the slopes would drift to gray, and then to the silver-white of ice and snow, and finally to black as February carved its bleak misery into the rocks. But today, the temperatures were in the low fifties and the sky was blue with promise. If Snowball was out here, there was plenty to eat and no reason to return home yet.
She was breathing hard by the time she reached the fence line, the back of her hands pocked with the irritating red dots of thistle wounds. From here, she could see the gravel road running through the neighboring Ward farm. A light was on inside the kitchen window. Perhaps Betsy Ward was in there canning tomatoes or pickles, putting by for the winter as people did in Solom. Her barn stood brooding and empty, as Betsy had wasted no time in selling off the goats, cattle, chickens, and lone mule after her husband Arvel dropped to his death from a painful heart attack.
Plenty of people said old Arvel had been fetched over by the Horseback Preacher, and Katy wasn’t one to dismiss the legends, because she’d seen that sinister reverend enough times herself. The fact that Arvel died right after the big showdown on Lost Ridge had given peace of mind to the Solomites, because they told themselves—and each other, in the quiet hours of the night when small noises might otherwise become too big—that the Preacher would be content for years.
She had just reached the rusty barbed-wire fence with its canted locust posts when the briar thicket trembled beyond her property.
Snowball? She didn’t call out the goat’s name, because that seemed a little strange. Goats were intelligent but would never submit to a name granted by a human. And calling out “Here, goaty goaty goat” as she and Jett did at feeding time also didn’t fit. Instead, she tapped her walking stick against a fence post, knocking as if at a door.
The briars trembled and then parted with a brittle snapping. A round, ruddy face peered back at her, a straw boater topping it off and a wisp of a beard trailing beneath. The man squinted at her, lips pursed.
“Hello, Widow Smith,” the man said. He wore leather work gloves, with which he held the wiry tangle of briars apart.
“It’s Logan,” she said automatically. She suspected the locals would consider her Gordon’s wife until the end of time. And being addressed as “Widow” made her feel a hundred years old. “Katy Logan.”
“Oh, yes, I’ve heard that. You never took his name, did you?”
“Have we met?” His face was familiar, and she figured he was one of those men who sat on the wooden bench outside the General Store, watching non-existent traffic roll by as they solved the world’s problems and worked through cans of soda and snuff.
“Not up close, but I reckon we can fix that.” He stomped a path through the briars and came to the fence line, stopping far enough away that she didn’t feel threatened. He was shorter than her by a good four inches, although the missing height had found ample room in his belly. He was rather fussily dressed to be mucking around in the weeds, wearing black suspenders and a plain white shirt buttoned all the way up. He removed his gloves but didn’t put out a hand to shake.
“I’m the Rev. William Edmisten,” he said. “Pastor of the True Light Tabernacle over on Holloway Road.” He waved vaguely beyond the hills to the south. “Maybe you’ve heard of it?”
“Gordon might’ve mentioned it.” The name rang a bell, but it was no more distinct to her than the countless other churches her dead husband studied. She wasn’t sure she should mention Gordon, but she was already a legend in these parts. Gossip ran through the rural valleys the same as it did skyscrapers and shopping malls. Most of Solom was wired for cable and Internet—the place wasn’t that backward—but otherwise the choices of entertainment were limited. For the past two years, she’d been an A-list celebrity among the local ghost gossipers.
“What brings you out here on a Friday night?” he asked, a question she could’ve easily asked him.
“I’m looking for a kid goat. Mostly white, little nubs for horns, gray tail.”
His eyes grew even narrower, becoming slits against his moonfaced aspect. “A goat, huh?”
“You know how much trouble they are.”
“I do indeedy. Yes, indeed.”
They stood in silence for a couple of seconds, Katy glancing across the pasture behind her for the reassurance of her haunted house. Then, she said “So?”
He seemed surprised. “So what?”
“Have you seen him?”
“Oh, you won’t see him. No indeedy you will not.” He issued a grave shake of his head, although he seemed to be biting back a smile.
“What, is there some wild predator running loose?” Katy fought off her annoyance. The locals were usually reticent to share any sort of knowledge to outsiders like her. But this man was baiting her. “A goat rustler? A disease?”
“Oh, I think you know very well who took the goat, Mrs. Smith—er, I mean Logan.”
A cloud drifted over the edge of the sun, and even though the high, thin cirrus carried no threat of rain, it served to build a dark shadow beneath the brim of the Rev. Edmisten’s hat. But those beady eyes were as bright and twinkling as stars.
“If someone took my goat, I want it back,” Katy said. “Laws are still laws, and manners are still manners, even in Solom.”
“Not all laws are set down in the county courthouse, Mrs. Logan. And when the time is upon us, no dealings of man can long hold sway.”
“Well, we women have dealings of our own. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I want to finish my search while there’s still some daylight left.”
As she turned away, the Rev. Edmisten lifted a limp glove as if to flag her down. “The signs are everywhere. His return is nigh, ma’am. Are you ready?”
If this was a pitch to lure her into his church, it was failing miserably. “I was born ready, Mr. Edmisten,” she said, deliberately neglecting to insert his ordained title. “I’ve not sinned any more than the next person, and I’ve done my share of amends. I’m okay on that front.”
He laughed, causing his stiff shirt to jiggle against the restraint of his suspenders. “Oh, I’m not talking about the Lord, Mrs. Logan. No man knows that hour. But as for the other…you might say it’s set in stone. Yes indeedy.”
Now she understood. He was trying to spook her with the Horseback Preacher legend. Well, she’d already stared that demon down, and she had lived to tell the tale. Or rather, to avoid the tale. The Horseback Preacher was something she didn’t chat about with anyone, even Jett.
Especially Jett.
“I get it,” Katy said. “Scare the frail little widow woman and have her run for the shelter of your church. Cower in your sanctuary because you’re the only one that can protect me. The only one that can save my soul.”
The reverend waved the gloves as if swatting away flies. “I don’t want to save you. I want to help you.”
You’re just about the weirdest preacher I’ve ever met. And they say the televangelists are arrogant. “I don’t need any help, unless you want to help me search for Snowball. That’s all I care about right now.”
“Come to the True Light Tabernacle and we can pray on it. The Lord knows all things.”
“Thank you for the invitation. I know it’s your calling, but this is one soul that’s just off the market.”
She retreated so quickly she almost missed the angry flash of his eyes. “You’ll know him by his fruits, Mrs. Logan,” he called after her. “And then you’ll pray for the mercy I could have granted. Oh yes indeedy, Mrs. Logan. You and that daughter of yours, too.”
At the mention of Jett, Katy spun, but the rotund reverend was already crackling
his way back through the briars, thorns tugging at his cuffs. The last thing she saw was the top of his straw hat bobbing in the brambles, but he issued a final “Oh yes indeedy.”
Katy looked up at the sun hovering a finger’s width above the far mountains. She shivered even though its full golden glare shone upon her. She hurried down the sloping pasture, her walking stick hefted like a club, not the least concerned with slithering copperheads or rattlesnakes. She wanted to be back in her house by dusk.
Even though it wasn’t really her house. It was a Smith house, through and through, no matter how much she scrubbed, painted, and renovated.
And Gordon had taught her the Smiths didn’t like to leave any of their property behind—land, livestock, or lovers.
No indeedy they didn’t.
CHAPTER NINE
David Tester cut over Lost Ridge, taking the shortest route from his house to the church. Though it was dark, David knew the path well and carried a flashlight. An owl hooted in the unseen treetops and other nocturnal animals scurried on their way to put up winter supplies. The leaves were still crisp underfoot, though dew was starting to settle on the ground. A sodden wedge of moon tried to break through the canopy overhead.
He was on the upper edge of the Smith property, a forested hilltop that Harmon Smith had owned and which now belonged to Gordon Smith’s widow. He considered paying her a visit tomorrow, to put her mind at ease about Jett joining the church. David didn’t want to meddle in a broken household, although he’d come to know Mark Draper well over the last few months. Still, who knew? Maybe the Logan woman would want to join, too, once she understood the Primitives were old-time religion and kept things simple.
Primitive Baptists didn’t have the duty of saving souls, but the preacher had to tend his flock all the same. David knew the weight of that responsibility. His brother Ray had disowned him because of it and had taken up with the Free Willers. Maybe Ray needed the little extra comfort that came from bringing the Lord into your heart. But Ray was born to believe he already had a place waiting in heaven, whether he forgot it or not. But David couldn’t blame him for wanting peace of mind, especially with the Horseback Preacher riding into the valley at any moment.
This walk had become something of a pilgrimage for David, as if he expected to find an answer to the mysteries of the Circuit Rider, faith, and love lying along the trail. The land had a lot of history, much of it dark. Rush Branch started as a trickle between some worn granite boulders near the peak but gathered momentum from a few stray springs before churning into a frothing waterway by the church. Harmon Smith had ridden Old Saint over this very trail, had slid off the saddle for a sermon many times before mounting up and heading to neighboring counties. And this was the site of last year’s bizarre riot and forest fire, in which his Uncle Claude had been among the victims. The police still had the incident on the books as a neighborhood dispute that turned deadly, although no one was ever charged and most evidence had been destroyed in the fire.
Of course, the legends filled in all the blanks of the official investigation reports.
David played the flashlight over the trail, dodging the snakelike roots of oak and buckeye. Walking this trail had always soothed him and rejuvenated him, as if he were drawing on the spirit of those who had served before him. Walking right, that was the ticket. Following the path.
Psalms 23 was always a comfort in such times: Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of Solom, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me.
Occasionally an acorn or nut slapped through the leaves and bounced silently on the ground near him. The woods had the earthy scent of loam and the salamander smell of muddy springs. David came to a strand of hog wire and knew he had reached the corner of the Smith family pasture.
He’d read all about her in the paper after Gordon Smith had tried to kill the whole family, including his new parishioner Mark. He’d also heard plenty down at the general store, and the consensus among the church elders was that she’d brought it on herself with her big-city ways. She wasn’t local, and therefore she deserved whatever the Lord saw fit to deliver.
“Don’t be bitter, now,” David said aloud to himself. “If so ordained, Gordon Smith likely has a place in heaven the same as everybody else, no matter his sins.”
That was one of the things that bothered David about predestination. If the Lord already knew you were going to be worthy of eternal reward, why did He make you go through the whole works? Why didn’t He just beam your soul straight up to heaven from your mother’s belly? But that would make God little more than a parody of Scotty from the old “Star Trek” show.
So God had to want something more. He laid out tests for you. David wondered if even thinking about God’s plan was somehow wrong, the kind of sin that wasn’t written about in the Bible.
David climbed across the fence. His boot hung in a bottom strand of wire as he planted it on the far side, causing him to lose his balance. The flashlight fell to the ground and the beam flickered and died. David hung on top of the waist-high fence, the top wire digging into his upper leg. He righted himself and tried to free his boot. Wetness trickled down his left hand, and he felt the first burning of a cut.
Something scuffed the leaves twenty yards to his right, inside the pasture.
The moon glinted off the flashlight’s metal switch. David reached down from the top of the fence for the flashlight, but it was just beyond his fingertips. He stood up again, the wire yawing back and forth between the support posts. He yanked his stuck boot, but one of the eye hooks must have been caught on a stray sprig of rusted steel.
Crackling leaves heralded the approach of something big. There was little to fear in the mountains except rabid animals. All the large predators like mountain lions had died out along with the buffalo and elk that had fed them. Black bears might attack if threatened, but David didn’t feel very threatening with his foot stuck and his crotch riding the thin line of the fence top. He swung his free leg over and planted it on the ground, giving a painful twist to the ankle of the trapped foot.
Now his back was turned to the approaching creature. David twisted his neck and almost laughed.
“What in tarnation are you doing out here?” David said. “Trying to figure out who’s trespassing?”
The goat stood ten feet away, head lowered, the bottom half of the face lost in shadows. Its emerald eyes glittered in the muted moonlight.
“The Lord’s Prayer says forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.”
The goat lifted its nose and sniffed at the air as if it could care less about the Lord’s Prayer. The wicked curves of its horns suggested it was a billy buck. Though the horns were angled flat against the slope of the animal’s skull, they had the look of serious business. Goats butted heads as a mating ritual, or used their horns to drive away predators like foxes, bobcats, or wild dogs. But they didn’t attack people.
David put his free foot beside the stuck one and tried to jimmy the wire. He was sweating from the exertion. After a few seconds of struggling, he sat down, scooted himself close to the boot, and began unlacing it. Maybe once his foot was free, he could work the boot loose. Now he could see the cut on his hand, the blood black in the weak light. It would need a heavy bandage, maybe stitches.
Served him right, walking in the dark like that. Even though he thought of the trail as a sacred path, that didn’t mean it wasn’t treacherous. Rattlesnakes lived in the granite crevices along the ridge, and it was easy to trip over a root or stone and break a leg. Out here, he might not be found for days if he became immobilized. And it wasn’t like the Lord cast down a holy beacon to show the way.
No, this wasn’t a test. Just too much tread on a Timberland work boot.
And besides, Thou art with me, right?
As his fingers loosened the square knot, he looked back at the goat. It was three feet away now, and its strong musky scent filled his nostrils. Goats were such nasty, stubborn animals. David d
idn’t understand their growing popularity among local farmers, no matter how exotic goat cheese and goat meat sounded to people raised on beef and beans.
“Just be glad I’m not in the mood for a sacrifice,” David said. “Abraham would have you up on a rock altar right now, a blade against that stringy neck of yours.”
The goat bent its head down and stepped forward, the dark cloven hoof landing right next to David’s thigh. The animal panted, its breath rank with half-digested goldenrod and maple leaves. The elongated face swung near David’s cheek, the tangled beard whisking across his shoulder. The goat sniffed, the black nostrils flaring, the queer, oblong pupils fixed on David.
“Go away, boy. Aren’t you supposed to be in the barn or something?”
The animal sniffed the length of David’s arm.
“Get,” David said, louder now, almost angry.
And, if he dared to admit it, a little scared, Psalms 23 or not..
The goat drew back a step. Saliva sparkled on the protruding lips.
David tore at the boot laces, sweat stinging his eyes. The goat moved in again, this time going lower on his arm. The animal’s tongue darted out and licked at his hand.
The cut hand.
The rough tongue slid out again, this time lingering on the flesh below the pad of his thumb where the cut was deepest.
It was drinking his blood.
It’s sweet, David told himself. And the goat’s curious. That’s all.
Nonetheless, David jerked the two sides of his boot apart, yanked his foot free, and scrambled back over the fence.
He studied the goat, which licked at the leaves, searching for spilled drops of David’s juice. The animal glanced up and let its tongue loll, as if inviting David back over to its side of the fence.
David turned and ran, the sock on one foot flopping out beyond his toes. Branches tore at his face as he plunged through the dark woods. The church visit could wait until sunrise. And, Harmon Smith’s sacred path or not, next time David would make the trip over gravel and asphalt, in the cab of a Chevy pick-up truck the way the Good Lord intended.
The Preacher: A Supernatural Thriller (Solom Book 3) Page 5
