by Deb Davies
“Charles.” Ed’s voice broke like a teenager’s.
“Yeah. Right here. Oscar OK?”
“Oscar’s OK, but there’s bad news. Jeez, I don’t know how to tell you.”
Now what, Charles thought. “Did my cabin burn down?”
“Uh. No.”
“Power out?”
“No.”
“Deeter’s burn down? Your chickens die?”
“No, no. Wait a minute, Charles. Someone’s been in your cabin, and they messed up the place.”
“There’s not that much to mess up,” Charles said.
“That leather thing you showed me? That ‘keep to the right’ thing your dad had?”
Charles was silent.
“Someone burned it,” Ed said.
“It was in a glass case. Framed.”
“Someone built a fire on your fold-up bed. Blankets, your books. That book you wrote about feathers.”
His collection of Jean-Henri Fabre, then, with descriptions of those wonderful, lumbering dung beetles. Mantises that colored plates showed green as green spring leaves. The books that, more than any other, had led him to be a naturalist, led him to be an observer and to wander creeks and woods, wanting, even as a child, to step as lightly as Fabre had stepped. Fabre had used dead insects when he found them but never killed what he studied. Because of those books, Charles aspired to let small, woodsy creatures influence him more than he influenced them.
“Your computer, too. Boy Howdy, what a mess. I could see the smoke from my place.”
Karma, Charles thought. But he doubted his ex-girlfriend whose computer he’d drowned had tracked him down after years had passed.
“The books under the bed?”
“They’re OK. Seems like the mattress didn’t burn good. Just a big black hole in it like God Almighty stubbed out one big cigar. Didn’t get the fire department. Burn permits are on, and your place sure smelled like burning garbage. I came down in time to see someone just getting into a car. Black T-shirt, black jeans, black baseball cap. Ha!”
“Ha?”
“That bird of yours sure didn’t like him! That’s what had him leaving so quick. Didn’t get the license. Black car, though. Some kind of Honda?”
“Tell me about Oscar.”
“Oh, yeah. That bird comes diving down, wing healed, pecking—hell, Oscar’s got a mouth like channel locks, pecking’s not the right word—swooping, slashing, stabbing with that beak of his, making a hell of a racket, and this guy’s startled and fumbling with the keys, and then three more ravens come out of the trees like Spitfires—oh, man, I cracked up. But I’m sorry about your bed.”
“Uh.” Good thing he never bought an early edition Audubon. And maybe a good thing he hadn’t been closer to his grandfather, because as it was, the loss of the “Maintiens le Droit” leatherwork hurt his heart. He took off his glasses and set them on the kitchen table, pinching the bridge of his nose between the fingers of his left hand.
“So, Oscar’s the boss raven, huh,” said Ed.
“Ravens recognize faces. They’ll stick together, mob people.”
“Me?”
“Not you, Ed. Ravens have been hanging out with people, especially hunters, and some predator animals to eat their scraps for thousands of years. The Inuit believe they’ll even lead predators to potential prey. Usually people and ravens have a working relationship. But bad people, ravens will go after. Say one raven says, ‘Enemy of ravens!’ Other ravens want their DNA to go on, so they pile on whoever is hurting the first raven.”
“Awesome,” Ed said.
“Listen, I gotta get off the phone. I owe you one, buddy.”
“Naw, you don’t. Seeing the raven attack was worth it. You still seeing the blond lady?”
“Maybe,” he said. “I’ll talk to you when I get there. Put some eggs out for Oscar and his friends if you think of it.”
He ended the call and sat down, thinking that Claire was close to right. He had just joined the list of people whose lives had been damaged.
Claire.
Oscar, who counted as a person.
Elaine Santana.
Zoe Weathers, through targeting Whitsuntide Whirlwind.
Jen. And even if Jen’s injury was a mistake, it had deflated Laurel as though her lungs had blown out.
Patsy, her life taken.
And now everyone who had been at Patsy’s wake.
Arnie came downstairs, retrieved Claire, and seated her in the recliner. “Jen is asleep,” he told Charles. “You look flummoxed. Was the call bad news?”
“Not as bad as it could have been.” Charles shrugged.
“Talk to me about what happened here,” Arnie said. “I’d like to not sound ignorant when I write up this report.”
Charles didn’t respond. He was trying to remember if he had backed up his work on his external hard drive.
“Come on, Professor. Get your head out of the clouds.”
“That’s an asinine thing to say,” Charles at last responded, his tone acidic. “Do you know what happens if you go around with your head in the clouds?”
“You trip?” Arnie hazarded.
“You’re electrocuted,” Charles said.
Arnie sat down on the steps that led out to the patio. Charles leaned against the trunk of a tree.
“You have something to say?” Arnie asked Charles.
Charles said, “What made people sick? I’d bet every cent I have that they ate vomiter mushrooms, and I’ll bet the mushrooms were in the cream of chicken soup. Some people eat them and get sick; other people don’t react. Anyone who has spent any time picking mushrooms knows the rule is: If you don’t know it, don’t pick it. If someone else picks it, don’t eat it. What I don’t understand is how Barbara Marsh, who’s had a place here for years, could have made such an egregious mistake.”
“They’ll be all right?” Arnie said.
“No one’s been known yet to die from eating them. But as you can see, they make some people hellaciously miserable and don’t bother others at all.”
“They’ll all be all right?” Arnie said. “Laurel will be all right?”
Charles gave Arnie a thoughtful look. “They’ll all be fine. Squirrels and deer eat vomiter mushrooms all the time. If your wake participants had eaten death angel, they’d already be dead.”
Arnie rubbed his eyes, thinking. “Could someone have added vomitous mushrooms to the soup? Sounded to me like everyone but the priest was in the kitchen.”
“That would have worked. Everyone but the priest and Jen were in the kitchen, I think. And you’re going to want to talk about green-spored parasol mushrooms if you want to sound scientific.”
“Aren’t there some Latin words I can use?” Arnie asked.
“There are. But do you really want to keep saying Chlorophyllum molybdites?”
“Right. Green-spored vomiters. I think, with this many people, the state police will at least check this.”
“It’s not always easy to confirm what happened,” Charles said. “Irritants break down when exposed to gastric juices. Some break down with time, some with heat, some even with alcohol. Get a sample from the piano leg,” he added.
“How long before they’re better?”
“Maybe a few hours. With older people, like the priest, sometimes longer. He wasn’t what I expected at all.”
“He’s a disgusting old reprobate.” Arnie added, “You’re not what I thought you were either. Any more bright ideas?”
“Did anyone check Patsy’s body for honey?”
“What? Like smell her hair for honey butter?”
“Just curious. People have used honey for a lot of things. Cosmetics. Embalming.”
“She was cremated,” Arnie said. “I think it’s too late to sniff her.”
“I’m wondering if she might have been snuffed,” Charles said.
“We’ll check out her room,” Arnie said. “Give me a hand here.”
“Am I doing dishes again?”
“That will be a pleasant change,” Charles said.
As Charles predicted, all of the poisoned participants recovered completely. Jen began to venture outside the house, with Laurel’s blessing and Bertram Allarbee’s company.
The pans and plates and other paraphernalia were labeled as evidence, sealed in plastic containers, and stored in the basement of the sheriff’s department. Arnie let Claire clean and keep the piano leg.
Barbara Marsh explained that she had not made the soup.
“I run a farm,” she said. “I don’t know who made it. It was in the freezer at church, and I left money for it. Bill and I had some before we came!”
The Unitarian Universalist Church helped return Claire’s house to order, and in this case, to breathable air.
When Arnie checked Ann’s house, over Ann’s objections, he found—in a shared downstairs bathroom, way at the back of a cluttered drawer—a small jar proclaiming to be beeswax. “Good for the hands, good for the scalp,” the label on the glass jar read. “Almond Milk and Beeswax Paste.” Someone should have sniffed her hair, Arnie thought. Would a commercial product using something bees make have made Patsy more attractive to bees? He pictured a few bees innocently exploring Patsy’s delicious-to-bees smelling skin and hair, and Patsy tossing the kitten carrier aside and flailing in panic.
THEY HAD MOVED into the days when sun sluices through the trees and bathes the world in slanted light. The morning was cool and smelled like fall and adventure. Dannie threw back the quilt and prodded Elaine.
“Cold,” Elaine said. “You left the window open.”
“I got used to the polar elements while fetching your ice.”
“My butt cheek looks much better now. But cold.” Elaine struggled for the quilt.
“I’ll check out your butt cheek later,” Dannie said. “Come on, get up! You promised me last night you’d see if Bertram will take the shift.”
“I just said that to get you to stop bothering me,” Elaine told her.
“I want to see a movie! I want popcorn with extra butter. I want a root beer, dammit. If we never relax together, we’ll never get old together, and we’ll never join OLAA!”
“What the fuck is OLAA?” Elaine said. She dug around under the quilt and found and put on a cotton shirt.
“You remember. Old Lesbians Against Ageism. My mom sent me one of their shirts. Seriously, Elaine, my pet, my cranky darling, you know Bertram will work tonight. And Arnie wouldn’t leave that house if you dragged him behind a tank.”
“I dunno,” Elaine said. “I’m worried about Jen. If she’d gotten sick that night, and then fallen…”
“Don’t be morbid. She’s crutching around, designing things. Oh, hey! I’ve got a great idea. We should take Jen!”
“You think she’d get a doctor’s OK?”
“She can’t stay under her mom’s wing forever. Let’s get her out of there. Make her laugh.”
“Technically speaking, we’d be seeing if Margaret Cho would make her laugh. And Jen’s not gay.”
Dannie shot Elaine a vamping look. “But how does one—know?”
“One usually knows by Jen’s age,” Elaine said. “Sometimes, one knows by seventh grade.”
“You were precocious. Think Fun Home. Everyone has a choice. If nothing else, we’d boost the attendance for Arnie’s film club. How many people from Grayling are going to attend stuff like Moonlight? Moonlight doesn’t have Jackie Chan or The Rock.”
“More people than will come to see I’m the One That I Want.” Elaine sounded derisive.
“Huh. Maybe Arnie should invite the ladies from Best to Be.”
“That’s not a bad idea,” Elaine said. “Maybe hard to do tonight, but—what’s next month’s film?”
“Get Out,” Dannie said.
“Tell you what,” Elaine said. “We’ll try this little by little. You ask Jen, and I’ll ask Tansy Campbell.”
“That’s ridiculous,” Dannie said. “But deal. You’re on.”
Jen and Tansy were both willing to have their horizons expanded. Tansy gave a wide grin, so wide it showed she had a dimple.
“Sure,” Tansy said. “I can get the night off. I do watch Amazon and Netflix. People think I’ve been lobotomized because I like older people.”
Jen had Laurel put some highlights in her hair and asked Bertram to stuff the Bentley with pillows so she could support her foot and leg. They learned on the drive to the theater that Bertram had already seen I’m the One That I Want.
“My mom’s gay,” he said. “She and Dad split years ago.”
Elaine texted Arnie, “If you knew Bertram’s mom is gay, you should have told me.”
“I couldn’t,” Arnie texted back. “You had no need to know.”
“But Bertram’s so quiet, I’ve been treating him like a dildo. Bad choice of words. But you know what I mean.”
Arnie’s text came back. “Your problem. You fix it.”
“Maybe Arnie’s right,” Elaine said. “Maybe finding out what kind of movies people watch would give us insight.”
“Maybe,” Dannie said darkly. “But I am never watching Noah.”
IF OSCAR HADN’T hung around, Charles asked himself, would his cabin have gone up in flames?
He’d never get permission to rebuild anywhere on his property that ran along the stream. The Wild and Scenic Rivers Acts would have left him living in a tent or in the apple tree with Oscar.
Had he put Ed’s life at risk?
What if he had talked Claire into going back to the cottage? Would someone have tossed a Molotov cocktail into bed with them?
Someone wanted Claire out of her house. That much seemed clear. Widow. Woman. Witch. Cunt. Get Out. This house was like the center of a shock wave. The damage rippled outward, hurting more people at greater distances.
They had searched the house top to bottom. Taken feathers out of pillows, then restuffed them. Looked under mattresses. Peered in toilet tanks.
He tried to think of even a small place they should still be looking.
A dark place, he thought, rubbing a hand through his hair so it stood on end. Not a place like the beach in Run Away Home, known for seashells and golden sand.
A place where people were not expected to go.
A shrew’s house, a mouse’s house, a place where bats flew.
He thought of the bit of bone Pearl had brought him, the bone Zoe had helped him identify. Small, fragile, and shaped like half a pistachio. He thought about the basement. Who knew what it had seen? Bathtub gin? Sugar water and baker’s yeast?
But the fact was, he and Arnie had already done a quick perusal, sneezing in unison as they did. There was nothing to see but dirt floors and dry mouse turds. No wardrobes, no broken toys, no sleds that said Rosebud. The floor had some uneven levels, but that wasn’t unusual in houses this old. He knew people who’d dug trenches in cellars just so they could bury trash without hauling it up the stairs. He knew one family who’d dug up the old basement, reinforced a wall, and propped up their house, leaving it yawning cavernously over unsupported space.
He thought about the cabinet again, the pivot peg that would open the earthy-smelling world he could explore.
He liked bats. Caves didn’t faze him.
Doves nested in open areas that fronted spectacular caves.
He should wait for Arnie before he went exploring, but Arnie was engrossed in a different project.
Charles knew he wasn’t an action hero.
But someone had tried to burn his house and hurt—with the single exception of his sister—all of the people he loved.
ARNIE STOOD OUTSIDE the patio doors. The new cedar chairs were inviting, but he didn’t plan to sleep. It was a cool night. Supposed to go down to the forties. He’d added logs, ready to light, in the fire pit Jen had designed and Zoe had paid for.
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Zoe had explained that she and Sanjay could use it from time to time. She’d asked Sanjay to move in with her and had bought him two cases of Mawby Blanc de Noir as a welcoming present. The first bottle, Arnie suspected, was already chilling, because Zoe and Sanjay would want to uncork it while there was a little daylight. They’d have the first glass by Whit’s stall, probably sharing some with him. Horses that had won races could develop a taste for champagne.
Jen would soon come home with friends, after seeing the movie, and enjoy her own bit of triumph at the design feat everyone would enjoy.
The kit Zoe sent had been easy to assemble, the concrete veneer of the wall set with polished river stones. He hadn’t seen Charles recently, but remembered him saying he might go out to look for hollow trees that held nests of flying squirrels. The Adirondack chairs Tansy purchased sat a little low. Claire might want to set them on a platform, to make it easier to see the fire while sitting in the chairs, but for now, people could perch on the wall’s generous corners. Maybe, in time, people would celebrate here, see the flames reflect from the patio window and entertain thoughts of new beginnings. Weird phrase, that one. Though beginnings, he guessed, could get old.
Arnie waved to Bertram Allarbee, who had moved a chair to sit outside of the kitchen door. The man just sat, stolid as a stalagmite. Solid as a brick outhouse, boys used to say when he was a kid. She’s built like a brick outhouse.
“Hey, Bertram,” he called.
Bertram Allarbee didn’t respond.
Arnie looked at Bertram again. There was no reason for the tension creeping up his own back. No reason his ears should feel as though he’d just come out of the water, the eardrums aching as though someone had shoved Q-tips into them.
Shit, he thought. He hadn’t heard a thing while he was moving logs around. And he hadn’t noticed when the last of the crickets stopped chirping. Except for the river, the night was silent. He drew his Glock as he lurched for cover, cursing.
A shot near the heart took him down in an explosion of pain. The shot that creased his forehead knocked him back and threw him into blackness even the river’s murmur couldn’t penetrate.
