The Peculiars

by Maureen Doyle McQuerry

  Now Lena watched Jimson’s eyes dilate in the firelight. “Darwin never says that. God may have created the laws that put natural selection in place. Any man of science knows that.”

  “Are we having philosophy with our supper this evening?” Mr. Beasley looked from Lena’s pinched face to Jimson’s and then let his eyes settle on Mrs. Fetiscue’s rosy cheeks.

  “The soup is ready, Mr. Beasley. I can see that you have your hands full managing these young people . . . Mrs. Fortinbras, Merilee!” Mrs. Fetiscue wiped her hands on her skirt and began ladling out hot mugs of soup.

  Lena found a rock to sit on just outside the circle of the fire. Night was creeping in. Mrs. Fetiscue’s words had reopened a wound she was trying her best to ignore. For the first time in many weeks she longed for her home in the City, longed to see her mother’s face frowning over a missed stitch or hear her voice reading from the newspaper. She even missed Nana Crane’s lectures. Merilee was laughing, telling a story about growing up in Scree. Mrs. Fortinbras and Mrs. Fetiscue thought she was a miner’s daughter. Because they couldn’t see the scars from her wings, they never suspected she was different.

  Jimson crunched through the snow to where Lena sat. “She’s rude and ignorant, and I’ve brought you some bread.”

  “Thanks.” Lena dipped the thick slice in her soup to soften it.

  “I heard you stand up to her. You were right. No one really knows who they are. Why, I bet even the two missionaries wouldn’t be feeling so high and mighty if we hadn’t rescued them.”

  Lena took a bite of the sopping bread and felt the juice trickle down her chin. She was too tired to even wipe it away. “I just said those things without thinking. I don’t even know if I believe them. Remember the book from Cloister? Do you still have it?”

  Jimson nodded and drained the last of the soup from his mug. “What’s that got to do with anything?”

  “I’m not sure, but maybe everything.”

  MR. BEASLEY HAD THEM UP BEFORE DAWN AGAIN. THE TEMPERATURE had dropped overnight, but no more snow had fallen. Lena walked alongside Merilee. Snug last night in the snow cave, she had told Merilee about her conversation with Mrs. Fetiscue. Surprisingly, Merilee hadn’t been angry. “I’ve heard it all before. You’ve spent most of your life living as something else. I’ve always known I was half Peculiar. People like them—I just feel sorry for them.”

  “How can you even know there is a God?”

  Merilee had just shaken her head, laughing until her long hair covered her face. “Oh, Lena, that’s something you just know. Not something you have to prove.”

  And with that unsatisfactory answer still ringing in her ears, Lena had fallen asleep.

  This morning, Merilee was the only cheerful one of the bunch. Mrs. Fetiscue and Mrs. Fortinbras were so sore from riding the horse that they could barely walk, but they were on Medrat’s back again at Mr. Beasley’s insistence. He was convinced that the bounty hunters would be returning, and he hurried them all along in an unusually brusque manner. Even Mrs. Mumbles was loath to walk and rode imperiously on Mr. Beasley’s shoulders. Jimson in the rear was brooding over his own thoughts, which Lena suspected had something to do with being out of communication with Pansy. Merilee’s chatter at least kept her distracted from her aching feet and the cold that none of them could escape.

  As the morning wore on, the low, flat sky felt burdensome—a weight Lena longed to discard. Mr. Beasley was consulting the map and his compass more frequently, and at times they were forced to double back on their tracks to find a turning they had missed. The hem of Lena’s skirt was stiff with snow, and she longed for the freedom that men had wearing pants. Overhead the ravens watched their progress and chattered about it among themselves.

  Then the skies opened, dumping a fresh fall of snow. Mr. Beasley stopped in his tracks, one hand gathering up Medrat’s reins. “I thought we’d have been there by now, but the mine appears to be well concealed. I plan to aim for downhill of where I think it’s located. If we go too high, we may miss it completely. If we find a stream, we’ll know we’re close.”

  “How will we find anything in this snow?” Mrs. Fortinbras’s voice was querulous.

  “Consider it a blessing, dear lady. No one will be able to find us. Follow me; we’re headed downhill from here.”

  Lena could see little but Merilee’s narrow back in front of her. She was plodding through white into white. Somewhere behind her, she knew Jimson faithfully brought up the rear, but he may as well have been in a separate universe. They were all locked in the world of their own footsteps.

  Then a strange noise intruded into that world, a whirring noise that grew louder, closer. For a minute Lena imagined the Aeolus had been resurrected. She looked up, but the snow stung her eyes.

  “Get down!” Jimson pushed hard on her shoulders.

  Lena crouched into a ball, Jimson by her side, one arm across her back. “I can’t see what it is.”

  “Hopefully they won’t be able to see us, either.”

  The others crouched down as well while Mr. Beasley guided Medrat under a nearby tree’s branches to hide. The noise vibrated through Lena’s body. She peered up into the falling snow. “I can see something, but it’s just a big dark shape—a huge dark shape.”

  Something long and dark as a ship’s hull glided over them. Lena looked up like a swimmer from under the water.

  “Jeez! It’s a dirigible!” Jimson almost stood, but Lena tugged sharply on his topcoat.

  They stayed hunched in the wet snow until the monstrosity passed over them.

  “Only the army has those. I’ve always wanted to see one!” Jimson obviously felt none of the terror that shook Lena.

  “It’s quite possible that the dirigible was sent on our behalf,” declared Mr. Beasley. “We need to find shelter in case it returns.” He sounded only slightly less excited than Jimson. “A marvel of engineering, but dangerous for us. Ladies—” He extended a hand to Mrs. Fetiscue, who had dropped from Medrat when the dirigible approached.

  “I am not getting back on that animal, even if you have to leave me to freeze to death here. My backside can’t take it another minute.”

  “If you understood our predicament—”

  Then Merilee’s voice came through the snow from several yards beyond. “There’s water here. It’s frozen, but I think I’ve found the stream!”

  Several yards above them an outcropping of basalt rock was layered with branches of pine trees. Jimson bounded uphill.

  “Wait!” As the words left Mr. Beasley’s lips, a dark shape pounced, knocking Jimson flat. The two figures tumbled head-over-heels in the wet snow.

  And then a voice: “Don’t move.”

  It came from above them, from the branches of one of the spruce trees.

  Looking up through the falling snow, Lena glimpsed a wizened face staring down, and saw a bow and arrow pointed at Merilee, who was standing right at the base of the tree.

  Jimson struggled, but the small man sat on his chest, pinning his arms into the snow. From inside the rock two more people emerged: a man, slight of build with a thin gray beard, and a woman, old and wrinkled as a walnut. They pointed rifles at the travelers.

  The woman stepped forward. She was dressed in furs, her hair covered by a hood. She kept her eyes focused on Mr. Beasley. But it was her hands clutching the rifle, one finger on the trigger, that caught Lena’s eye: long, spidery hands, each finger with an extra joint.

  A small noise escaped Lena’s mouth. The thin man veered his gun toward Lena.

  “What’s your business?” The woman’s voice was deep and harsh.

  Mr. Beasley and Lena spoke at the same time. “I—we—”

  “I’ve come because my father left me a deed to the Mattacascar family mine,” Lena managed. “These are my friends.”

  The old woman crept forward lightly on the snow. Her feet, long and slender, kept her well supported. She peered closely at Lena’s face. “And your father is?”

 
; “Saul. Saul Mattacascar.”

  Mr. Beasley held out the map. The man snatched it from his hand. Mrs. Mumbles leapt to the ground. Lena could hear Jimson’s ragged breathing as he lay captive in the snow.

  “A Scree-cat as a companion. And one with an injured leg.” The woman raised an eyebrow. She picked up Lena’s gloved hand in her own gnarled one.

  Lena stared into the old woman’s face. It was not familiar. The eyes were a faded brown. Nothing but the hands and feet were familiar. Snow stuck to the fur of her hood, to her thick lashes. “Where is my father?”

  Instead of answering, the woman gripped Lena’s arm and turned to the rest of the group. “Bring them in. Don’t keep them standing here in the snow.”

  Jimson hung back, scowling, brushing the snow from his arms and legs until he was encouraged at rifle point to move. Mrs. Fortinbras asked in a loud voice, “But what kind of people are they, pointing weapons at us?” She grew silent when one of their captors took Medrat from Mr. Beasley, tied the horse to a tree, and nudged Mrs. Fortinbras and her sister forward. Mr. Beasley and Merilee quietly followed Lena into the mouth of the mine. Mrs. Mumbles padded at her side.

  The passage sloped downward. Lena could feel hard stone beneath her feet. Lanterns along the narrow passage threw just enough light to keep her from stumbling on the uneven floor and to illumine rivulets of water that glistened on the walls. They were being led into the bowels of the earth. The old woman’s firm grip on her arm and the slap of footsteps behind were the only things that kept Lena from panic. Just when she thought she could bear it no more, the passage opened into a wide, high-ceilinged chamber, all flickering light and shadows. Hundreds of lanterns hung like stars in the dark; Lena felt as if she had walked into the night sky.

  Slowly she became aware of other people in the chamber. At first they were merely moving shadows, but as her eyes adjusted in the glimmering light, she could pick them out—men, women, and children, thin and ragged, all watching her. She looked over her shoulder and found the reassurance she hoped for: Mr. Beasley and Merilee and, behind them, Jimson, still scowling, with Mrs. Fortinbras and Mrs. Fetiscue, both of whom for once had nothing to say.

  “Welcome to my home. This is where we have been living for some time, since your government declared our land terra nullius. The mine supports seventy-three of us Peculiar people. Thirty of us live inside.”

  “Ah!” Mrs. Fortinbras swayed as if she might swoon, and Jimson grabbed her arm.

  The old woman laughed. “Ah, yes. We are all Peculiar, but I think you will find us hospitable as well, as long as you obey our rules. First you must get warm and eat. We’ll go into the eating room.”

  Mr. Beasley stepped up to Lena’s side. He looked, Lena thought, absolutely delighted, not terrified as she felt.

  “This is marvelous,” he said to the old woman. “You live in a working mine!”

  “We do not live well, but we manage to survive.”

  They were led into a smaller room in which there were three long tables. The lanterns’ light reflected from the nearby walls, walls with a strange purplish cast. The slab tables and benches almost filled the space.

  “Sit,” the old woman said. “We’ll bring food and we’ll talk, and then we will decide what’s to become of you.”

  For the first time in two days, Lena began to feel warm. A cooking fire blazed in the back of the small chamber, the smoke disappearing up a fissure in the rock. A young boy ladled out bowls of a thick stew. A dish of water was placed on the floor for Mrs. Mumbles. Jimson slipped a chunk of meat to her under the table.

  “Roots and rabbit. The best we have. And strong mead. It keeps the cold at bay.”

  They were given cups of a dark liquid that burned Lena’s throat as she swallowed. Mrs. Fortinbras pressed her lips firmly together. “We do not partake in spirits.”

  The old woman shrugged, turning her attention to Lena. “Why have you come here?”

  “But I showed you the map,” Lena began. “My father—”

  “So, you have a map,” the woman interrupted. “And you have the hands and feet of a goblin.”

  Lena blanched.

  “Does it trouble you for me to say it out loud? And that other girl”—her eyes glinted toward Merilee—“has the long bones of an Annuncius.”

  “I knew it!” Mrs. Fetiscue mumbled through a mouth full of stew.

  “I am asking what your intentions are. You’ll have to forgive me if I’m suspicious, but I’ve found that most visitors do not have our best intentions at heart.”

  “I’ve come to find my father.” Lena spoke quickly before Mr. Beasley or Jimson could say anything.

  “And why do you want to find him?” The old woman leaned forward across the narrow table. Lena could see hairs bristling on her chin and along her upper lip. Her breath smelled strange, both sweet and musty.

  How could Lena answer this question when she didn’t know herself? She stared at the old woman’s spidery hands, thick with veins. Her words echoed deep in the empty space Lena carried inside herself. You have the hands and feet of a goblin. There was no escaping it now. She was the same as the wizened woman across from her.

  The table was silent, waiting for her answer.

  “I need to find him because he left when I was five. I need to know why he left me.” Embarrassingly, her eyes flooded with tears. “I want to know if I’m like him.”

  The old woman was silent, considering. She ran a long finger down the ridge of her nose.

  “Tell me how you got the map.”

  So Lena took out the letter and handed it to the old woman. She explained her mother’s reluctance to let her leave, and she told her about Nana Crane’s predictions that Lena was as wild as her father.

  “And the rest of them?” The old woman nodded toward the others at the table.

  Lena caught Jimson’s eye, and it gave her courage. “Mr. Beasley has been helping Peculiars escape or change, so they wouldn’t be captured. Jimson is his assistant. He works in Mr. Beasley’s library.” She looked questioningly at Merilee, unwilling to give away the secrets of her friend.

  “You’re right. I’m half Annuncius,” Merilee said. “Mr. Beasley removed my wings.”

  Mrs. Fortinbras let out a small shriek. Lena was sure she heard the man with the bow hiss and others watching from the entry grumble low in their throats.

  “He removed them at my request. My sister died in the mines here.”

  “And these fine ladies?” The old woman rose and walked toward Mrs. Fortinbras and Mrs. Fetiscue. “What about them?”

  “We are missionaries. We’ve come to help the heathens of Scree. Peculiars are none of our business.” Mrs. Fetiscue’s chin trembled as she spoke.

  “None of your business, you say?” The old woman made her way around the table to Lena’s side. Again she raised Lena’s hand in her own and looked at it.

  “Your father, Saul, is dead.” Her faded eyes grew dark and glittered.

  Lena felt the room recede. She struggled to release her hand, but the old woman gripped it firmly with her own sharp fingers. All this way, all for nothing. The empty space inside her expanded until she was hollow.

  The woman was speaking. Her words circled like birds. How many times she repeated them, Lena never knew, but eventually they landed, whispered in her ear.

  “I am your grandmother, Saul’s mother. I am Lavina Mattacascar.”

  But Lena only stared. The emptiness consumed her.

  Lena and her grandmother sat long by the fire. Merilee had fallen asleep at the table, her cheek pressed to the wood plank like a small child, and Mrs. Fortinbras and Mrs. Fetiscue had been led to an alcove where they could rest. But Jimson and Mr. Beasley, with Mrs. Mumbles twitching her tail, remained alert nearby. My guardians, Lena thought.

  “He died this past summer, here in Scree. But I know he thought of you and your mother every day.”

  Lena had found a voice again, but it was flat and empty, not her own voice at all. “H
ow do you know?”

  “Because he told me so. He wasn’t a monster, no matter what other people want you to believe. He was a man who made his own bad choices and reaped what he sowed. He was my son, and I loved him.”

  “How did he die?”

  “He was shot in a brawl, which he started.” Her voice was neutral, contained. “I’m sorry you didn’t get to see him again.”

  Lena shook her head. “I was so little, I don’t know if I ever knew him. I only remember bits and pieces.” Pausing, she phrased her next words carefully. “I need to know if I’m like him. What it means to be a goblin.” She looked down at her hands.

  “He was brilliant and charming, but also selfish and rash. You were the one choice he made that wasn’t completely selfish. He courted trouble all his life.”

  “I heard he killed a man.” Lena’s voice was almost a whisper.

  Her grandmother nodded. “He liked nothing better than a good fight. But this time he picked the wrong man. He killed a federal marshal, a man named William Saltre. But the truth is if he hadn’t killed Saltre, the marshal would have killed him. After that, his life was never the same. He was always on the run.”

  William Saltre. Lena’s head reeled. Her marshal’s father? Margaret Flynn had said her father killed a man in Scree. She never mentioned it was Thomas’s father. Is that the only reason the marshal had sought her out? Her grandmother was watching her intently. “But my father couldn’t help himself; he was a goblin.”

  “Is that what you think? That being a goblin predisposes you to selfishness and trouble?” Lavina snorted. “Being alive does that. We’re all selfish, Peculiar or not. But Saul made the kind of choices that changed him into a bitter, angry person. It wasn’t because he was a goblin.” With one pointy finger, she tilted Lena’s chin up so that their eyes were level. “It’s not your family who defines you; they’re an influence, all right, but they don’t have the final say. We answer for that ourselves.”

  Lena should have felt relief, yet she felt nothing but a great sadness and weariness. The marshal had used her all along. Jimson was watching her too closely. The room was too small; the purpled stone was pressing in on her. She wanted to be out, above the ground with the cold stinging her cheeks.