The war torn hills of ea.., p.19
The War-Torn Hills of Earth | Flashback, page 19
I filled my own cup and went to the counter, took out my debit card. “Oh, I don’t know. I kind of like it. It’s got—how do you say it? Gravitas.” I looked at Cecilia. “I’ve got these, darling. Can’t have Bennet paying for his own coffee, not today; he’s the man of the moment!”
Bennet just shrugged. “It’s nothing, really. Little PR for the Department.” He lifted his chin and squared his shoulders. “People see things like the race riots in Seattle and, well, they get scared—that’s all. Just need to know there’s a firm hand at the wheel.”
Cecilia nodded slowly, tentatively. “So are you ... going to be on television? Or on the radio?”
“Oh, radio; radio. KEXM, right next door. You’ll—you’ll be able to hear the whole thing.” He hitched up his Khakis briskly. “Yeah, just something a lawman has to do ... I mean, now and again. Touch base with his public. Let ‘em know he’s on the beat.” He laughed a little. “After all, we work for you, right? I mean, it sure isn’t the reverse. I can tell you that.”
“Speaking of which,” I indicated the clock on the wall. “Isn’t it about that time?”
“Is it?” Bennet looked at the big IBM. “Well—so it is.” And to Cecilia: “Well. Reckon that’s why I don’t currently have a lady friend. Married to duty, as they say.”
“Aww. Well, break a leg,” she said.
“Yep ...” He exhaled loudly. “My lady is Sandy Chain.”
“Bennet.”
And we went—as Cecilia refused to run my card (as usual) and the radio blared (with Mollie talking about a bold new era in human achievement and the imminent return of Steve Dannon’s Daedalus Seven spacecraft) and the door chimed and the wind—which had picked up markedly, alarmingly, inexplicably—met our faces.
“Chief Townsend! Hey, wait!”
I turned to see Vicki from Blevins Pharmacy rushing up the sidewalk.
“Am I glad to see you!” She paused to catch her breath, the hair whipping and lashing her face—before extending a white bag. “Tell me you’ll deliver this to Wilber Cole—out in Mirabeau Park—like, yesterday, please? Before he eats anything?”
I took the bag and looked at her. “Now you know that when you ask like that I can’t help but to comply.” I peeked inside the sack. “I’m not even going to ask.”
“One in the morning—before breakfast, and one at night, just before dinner.” She jumped as a garbage can toppled and papers cycloned. “Before meals, okay? Don’t forget.”
“It’ll be done—I was going out there anyway. Go on, git.”
She paused, looking suddenly abashed. “Oh, Chief—”
“It’s all right,” I watched as the power lines began to waver—ominously, precariously. “Vicki, don’t make me—”
And she went; as Bennet and I crossed the street to the station and went up to its double doors—where he paused, abruptly. “Look, Archie. Maybe we should—”
“Aw, no. I won’t hear of it. Now you’ve been looking forward to this all week. So just go in there and knock ‘em dead—and I’ll see you on the other side.”
“Aw, Arch, but what if—”
“No, no. Everything out here is gonna to be fine.” I nodded once, twice. “Go on. Make us proud.”
He moved to go in but hesitated. “You don’t even have your service revolver; now when are you going to get back on the horse, anyway? I mean, I’m sorry, Arch, but someone has to say it. It’s time for you to snap out of it.”
I scanned the trees, which were leaning in the wind, and the brownstone buildings, whose screens rattled. “Just a storm. Don’t need a revolver for that.”
“Yeah, well. You’d think better if, say, the Dusty Moths—”
“Who aren’t going to be riding around in a storm; I can guarantee it. Now go on.”
And he went on, shaking his balding head, which shined like his badge, slamming the door behind him—after which I heard a rap on the glass above and looked up; saw Mollie holding a sign against one of the second-story windows, a sign which read, simply: NIGHTCAP AT MIDNIGHT JOE’S?
At which I just smiled and gave her a thumbs up.
“Yeah, well, sure, I try to stay sharp. And that means a lot of time at the range—lot of time sighting paper targets. (laughter) I mean, I’m no Jingo Williams—you ever seen him? Jingo Williams? On TV, I mean? Him and that Oriental gal? Amazing. Amazing shootist. I saw him do a trick once where he—”
I switched off the ignition and sighed, rubbed the bridge of my nose. ‘Oriental.’ I got out and shut the door.
Oreo was already there, barking and slavering, his white paws on the fence. Greeting me as he greeted everyone, with a hail of yaps and spit.
I shook him by a jowl. “Whoos a good boy? Whoos a good boy?”
“Not that dog,” snapped Wilber, drawing my attention (to the porch, yes, but also to the fact that he was wearing nothing but saggy undershorts and a wifebeater). “Not one little bit. Bugger chewed up my lawn gnome. Just chewed it to pieces. Ate its head off! I mean, look at it.”
I looked to where he’d indicated; saw a plastic lawn gnome with—sure enough—its head chewed off. “Aw, no.” I clicked my heals, saluted smartly. “Wilber. For him the war is over.”
Wilber just looked at me. “You, ah, you out here on business, Chief? Or are you just out here to be cute?”
“Actually, Wilber,” I walked toward him and handed him the bag, which crinkled. “I’m here to tell you to take your medicine. Two a day: One before breakfast—one before dinner. Call Vicki with any questions.”
He stared at the bag, irritably, contemptuously. “Will it help me sleep?”
“Call Vicki with any questions.”
“Hmpf.” And he went back inside.
“You’re welcome,” I said; even as the wind blew and the screen door banged.
And then I looked across the street. At the long, open, swaying gate and the hideous, black, gothic-style arch. At Sandy Chain Community Cemetery with its towering cyclone fences and tombstones like ruined teeth; its brown, semi-frozen lawns; its crypts and sepulchers full of nothing.
Bennet continued as I laid the roses (I’d parked next to her section with the engine running and the door hanging open): “Vacation? (laughter in the studio) No, no, not this Deputy. I mean, what would I do? Yeah, yeah; I know: Go to Bluebeard’s Cove, right? Or Devil’s Gorge. Go bet on the races at Checkered Flags. Well, that’s fine, I suppose—if you’re a civilian. If you’re not a lawman. But I am lawman, see, and—”
I stood, staring at the marker, staring at the inscription.
“—an oath of service, a promise to protect. And that promise comes before anything; even, I dare say, family—"
I watched as rain began to spot the granite; to stain the marker in ever-increasing blotches— darkening the ‘C’ in Cynthia, punctuating the still-fresh epigraph.
“—well, that’s true, I don’t. I don’t. I mean, unless you count Barney; that, he’s my dog. Norwegian Elkhound. (proud chuckling) That’s the national dog of Norway—”
I stared at the marker.
Were you really so unhappy—so lost? So alone? Was it really so hopeless—and did you hate me so much—that you would use a piece of me—a piece of my work—to at last finish what the pills and alcohol couldn’t? Had I abandoned you to that extent, my love? And did any of it—any of it—ever really happen?
I looked at the granite and the semi-frozen grass—the insufficient inscription, the red, wet roses in cellophane.
Where are you, my love, and just as importantly, where am I? Because I no longer care about what I cared about—and so fiercely! while you were here; by which I mean, what I took from you and gave to Sandy Chain, what I thought was my duty but was in fact only selfishness.
I looked up, the rain spotting my eyes, to find the clouds virtually racing.
Where are you, and just as importantly, where am I?
And then I turned toward the west, toward the sea—I’m still not sure why; and became, in that very instant, a kind of statue, a kind of oak. Then I saw the Anomaly for the very first time (that churning, boiling stormfront; that amorphous Man o’ War spreading, ink-like, across the sky), and, unable to comprehend what I was seeing, just stood there, frozen, like I’d looked on Medusa herself. Like I’d become Irit; the Lady of Gomorrah—and prideful spouse to Lot—after she’d been turned into a pillar of salt.
“Looks like a mushroom cloud–only, like, horizontal.”
I confess I jumped, and that my hand dropped to my weapon—had I carried one. “Donovan. Now how many times have I told you not to cut through the cemetery?”
“Ah, Chief, but then I’ve got to go all the way around. And there’s a mean dog on Oberlin; you know that. Besides,” He stepped up next to me and gazed at the cloud. “You don’t really mean to tell me you care about that when there’s, well, that. Am I right?”
I peered at the cloud: at its curtains of rain and lightning—like the tendrils of a jellyfish—at its billowing cumulonimbus, which flickered and flashed.
“What is that?” I mumbled. “Is that, is that lightning up there, or something?”
I guess he must have followed my gaze. “Up there? Near the top? No—no, I don’t think so. More like—more like balloon beacons, or aircraft. Their wing lights, maybe—glowing in the gloom. Those colors, though. They don’t—they don’t look right. Almost like—”
“That’s because you’ve never seen them,” I said, and toggled my radio. “No one has. K-94, this is the Chief. Do you copy?”
But there was nothing—only static. Only white noise. I listened for the truck’s radio: nothing. Just dead air. Just silence as thunder rumbled and the rain fell and the wind gusted—powerfully. Alarmingly.
“K-94, this is the Chief—do you copy?”
More static, more noise. I looked at the fast-approaching cloud.
“Donovan,” I said.
“Yeah, Chief?”
“Don’t cut through the cemetery.”
And then I hustled for the truck and quickly climbed in—jammed it into gear, activated the light bar. Then I was driving out of the cemetery at a dizzying clip; reaching for my cellphone even as it started ringing and ringing; glancing at the shotgun as it lay—bleakly, funereally, like a coffin—between the seats.
“What do you mean, gone?” The wipers went squirk, squirk, squirk. “She’s probably in the restroom, Hank.” I cradled the cellphone as I drove. “I mean, she is pregnant. Jesus. Give her a minute.”
“I’ve given her about 20 minutes—and I’m telling you, she’s not here. Now are you coming to check it out, or what?”
“Look, my phone’s been ringing since I left Mirabeau; okay? Just hold on. I’m turning onto Main now.”
I turned the corner even as a tangle of powerlines cascaded onto the street—spitting sparks, sniping like snakes. “And tell Clayton we’ve got lines down; front of the pharmacy—Oliver and Maine.” I maneuvered around the lines and accelerated. “Tell ‘em to hustle.”
And then I was pulling up to Carmichael’s and ratcheting the break; piling out of the cab even as Hank met me out front and I blew right past him—thankful the place had power, making a beeline for the restroom. Then I was rapping on its thin door even as Hank crowded me from behind and rain pounded the roof.
“Cecilia! Hey! You all right?” I rattled the door handle furiously—locked, of course. “Cecilia! Now, listen, you’re going to have to say something, darlin’, or we’re just going to have to kick this here door right in; ya understand?”
I leaned closer as something seemed to shift; to move—as clothing ruffled and rain trickled. “Cecilia?”
And then it came: Then she screamed, although it wasn’t so much a scream as a shriek, a wail—an extended howl the likes of which I’d never heard (and pray I never hear again). Then she was yowling like an animal even as I stepped back and kicked in the door; as I found her hunched over the toilet and starting to mumble–pitifully, incoherently. Defeatedly.
As I rushed in and knelt beside her, turned her to face me—not yet noticing the obvious; not yet noticing the mortal difference, the cruel jest that had been played on her. “Cecilia–what, what is it? What–”
But then I did notice it; noticed her flat stomach, her thin, gaunt face. Her haunted, terror-stricken eyes—and, also, the complete lack of blood anywhere.
“What happened here?”
“No-nothing—nothing happened. Don’t you see? He was just—he was just here, inside, kicking ... and then—then the kicking stopped.” She batted the tears from her eyes. “It just stopped; do you understand? It—”
She turned and retched into the bowl; forcibly, violently—just retched and retched, her entire body shaking.
I looked at Hank—who was already on the phone—then reached up, slowly, and flushed the toilet.
“Now, listen. There’s, ah, there’s people on the way here who are gonna help us with this—this thing, okay? So, until then, you just lean on the big white telephone here and try not to move—and I mean not a lick. All right? Ya hear?”
And then my phone rang, and, God help me, I had to take it. Then Donovan’s girlfriend was on the line demanding to know why I’d made him walk around the cemetery in the middle of a thunderstorm—and that I had better go look for him, and give him a ride, like, yesterday.
Because he hadn’t come home yet, she said, and he wasn’t answering his phone.
But that wasn’t really what alarmed me. No, what alarmed me was: I hadn’t made him cut around the cemetery. And then thunder struck somewhere close; krack-kakroom! And I got a move on.
He lay spreadeagled like a ragdoll—like he’d been making a snow-angel—his tongue fat and blue; as if he’d been eating pomegranates—his entrails unspooled. The cumbersome poncho rustled as I dialed my cellphone and waited for it to ring—and ring.
Dammit, Bennet, pick up ...
“Hello, you’ve reached the personal number of Bennet ‘Benny’ Firth—Deputy; Sandy Chain Police Department; Badge Number—well, Badge Number 2, I mean, it’s a small department—winner of the 2017—”
I hung up and looked at the body—at its bloody hands, as though Donovan had been trying to shield his face; at the grass and dirt-turning-to-mud, which—
Well, wasn’t that odd.
I knelt and examined the ground—which was soaked in blood and rain. It was almost like—yuh, there; and there. Anterior and lateral support impressions. Nude; no shoes. And toeprints: one, two ... three—just three, with no evidence of a heel, no posterior support at all. Not human, obviously. Not dog. Not bear. More like a fucking ostrich; or—
Ka-crack! Karoom!
I jumped as lightning struck a nearby tree—my heartbeat surely stopping, if only for an instant, my bladder feeling as though it might void right then and there. Then I was up; I was standing, looking at the split trunk and the tree’s glowing pulp; looking at the burning branches, which crisped and fell away.
Fire extinguisher ... Dammit, get the fire extinguisher!
And then I was hustling, running for the truck as fast as I could, pausing at Cynthia’s grave—or at least where her grave should have been—feeling dazed and disoriented; spying the patrol truck where I’d left it—at Wilber’s—sprinting for it only to skid to a stop next to the fence and lean on my knees, panting.
Only to wait there where Oreo would have normally greeted me—just as he greeted everyone—with a hail of yaps and spit—but didn’t. Holding and looking at all the blood—then following that blood directly to his doghouse ... to where the poor thing had died half in and half out of its door. Where the poor thing had retreated to lick its mortal wounds and curl up in the cold, familiar straw; to wonder if it had protected its people and its property; to bleed out and die.
There was a crashing sound and I froze—the sound of wood splintering and glass breaking. A sound which had come from behind Wilber’s house.
I listened carefully, intently—heard only the wind and the rain, the thunder of lightning, dogs barking in the distance. At last it came again, only muffled somewhat, more muted: another splintering, another breaking of glass. This time, however, it hadn’t come from outside. No, this time it had born a kind of echo, a kind of interiority—as though it had originated from an interior space. As though it had originated from inside Wilber’s house.
As for what I was thinking as I gripped the shotgun and stepped through the shattered doors, I couldn’t tell you. Maybe it was just the fact that it felt good to have it in my hands again—the shotgun, I mean, the Remington 870—“Fat Man,” as we called it, our nuclear option—the one Bennet wasn’t ever allowed to use. Or maybe it was Mollie’s newscast with its mentions of President Tucker’s refusal to concede and Steve Dannon’s Daedalus Seven returning to Earth, the connection being—I suppose—that both of them seemed about as possible as a baby suddenly vanishing or a killer ostrich wandering the peninsula.
Or maybe it was something else entirely; the fact that I’d been so focused on grieving Cynthia (and, paradoxically, perhaps, boning Mollie) that I’d lost track of who I was. It’s possible even that, as I raced through Wilber’s house armed to the teeth and—having heard something shatter in his bedroom—paused outside his door, I just felt like myself again.
All I know is that all of that went out the window the moment I stepped out and levelled the shotgun—which also happened to be the moment that anything that wasn’t, well, whatever that was (although, I confess, having seen Jurassic Park, I had a pretty good idea), simply ceased to exist. Rather, it seemed as though something else took over: something primitive, even primal, something deep within my mammalian DNA. A holdover from when we were frightened, possum-like creatures hiding in the trees, perhaps—an ancestral memory. Wilber, for his part, just slept like the dead.
The thing is that I completely froze as it turned; froze to the extent that I saw every detail of its skin even as I glimpsed Bennet aiming his pistol outside and dove for the floor. As he opened fire and the thing began bouncing off the walls and smashing bookcases, as it thrashed about like a deer I saw on the internet once (which had crashed through the window of a city bus and then proceeded to destroy everything in its path) and basically went insane—reminding me of the crazed deer and yet not, for it was—in the end—a thing utterly without comparison in this world.
