Search for the Shadowman (6 page)

“Two heads are sometimes better than one,” Mr. Hammergren said. “This head is asking what you’d do if someone disappeared.”

“I’d go looking for him.”

“Where was he going when he disappeared? See if you can retrace his route.”

Andy thought so hard he frowned. “The family was planning to move to Hermosa. The father had bought land here, and he was going to buy cattle and build a ranch house. Only he couldn’t, with the money gone.”

“It’s possible that Coley Joe was sent ahead of his family to buy livestock and the materials for building a house so that when the rest of his family arrived they’d have a roof over their heads.”

Andy gasped. “You mean he really might have come to Hermosa?”

“He might.”

Andy shook his head. “But then he would have done what his family wanted him to do. I don’t think he ever got to Hermosa.”

“In 1879 or thereabouts, you said. Hmmmm. The logical thing for Coley Joe to do would have been to head for El Paso, which was the major city nearest to
Hermosa. He could have planned to buy his stock there and hire help to move the cattle to the family’s land.

“On the other hand,” Mr. Hammergren added, “he might have kept going west after he reached El Paso, striking out on his own. To many the West Coast was a promised land.”

“I don’t think Coley Joe took the money,” Andy said. “If there’s any possible way to find out, I will.”

“Why?”

Andy was startled. “Why? Well, I like Coley Joe. I want to clear his name. It must have been awful for his family to cross him out of the family’s Bible and to pretend all these years that he didn’t exist. That’s why.”

Mr. Hammergren smiled. “I like what you’re doing, Andy. Keep me informed. And if you want to talk about your progress or ask questions, don’t hesitate to ask me.”

“Thanks,” Andy said.

“One more thing,” Mr. Hammergren told him. “If you want any lunch at all, you’d better hurry. You’ve only got fifteen minutes left.”

H
eavy clouds, dark as mud, clotted the sky by the time Andy and J.J. arrived at the cemetery.

“It’s going to rain,” J.J. said.

“Not for a while,” Andy said. He rested his bike against the wrought-iron fence, laid his helmet in the
basket, and peeled his sweaty shirt from his back. “At least when it’s cloudy it’s not so hot.”

“What’s that around your neck?” J.J. asked.

Andy touched the pounded nail. In spite of the heat, it was cold next to his skin. “A horseshoe nail,” he said, and explained to J.J. what it meant.

“Cool,” J.J. said. He led the way into the cemetery and took the path that wound through the neatly clipped, grassy area, with its flat grave markers, back over a small rise to the older part of the cemetery.

Wide, squatty tombstones crowded next to tall, imposing ones, most of them decorated with sculpted vines and crosses carved from speckled black-and-gray granite or pitted yellow sandstone. Here and there a weathered marble angel bowed his head and spread his wings.

In the center rose an ornate obelisk with a pointed top. It made Andy think of a giant’s finger reaching from the earth to forever point upward.

J.J. stopped so suddenly that Andy plowed into him. “That’s where James Jonathan the first is buried,” J.J. said. “It looks like those obelisks we saw in the book about Egypt.”

Andy had to lean back to see all the way to the top. “Was the first J.J. Egyptian?”

“Nope,” J.J. said, and grinned. “I think he just wanted his tombstone to be more important than everyone else’s.”

To his right Andy heard a
plink
, like rock hitting rock, and he jumped.

“What are you scared of?” J.J. asked. “Nobody’s here but us.”

A jackrabbit shot out from behind two stones, its long back legs thrumming against the ground as it dashed to safety. Andy watched the jackrabbit’s progress until it leaped from the rise down to the flat prairie that stretched to the horizon. The low scrub, mottled in gray green and purple, was dotted in the distance with grazing cattle—much like the Bonners’ ranch.

“Nobody but us and the jackrabbits.” Andy realized his laugh was shaky.

J.J. pulled a notebook and pencil stub from the pocket of his jeans. “I’m going to read what’s written on all the Gasper family stones,” he said. “Do you know where your Bonner family stones are?”

“I can find them,” Andy said. “Mom gave me directions.” As he turned right and moved into the thickly clustered tombstones he heard the same soft
plink
again. Was someone back in there? Someone moving among the graves?

The clouds grew darker, completely cutting off the straggly remnants of sun. A cold, crawling sensation slid up Andy’s backbone, and he shouted back to J.J., “Don’t take too long! Okay? We want to get home before it starts to rain.”

Malcolm John Bonner’s tombstone was nothing
more than a plain, rectangular block, but the dark red-and-black speckled granite stood out like a splotch of dried blood against the gray-flecked granite and yellow sandstone markers that surrounded it.

Silently, Andy approached the stone. Deeply carved were Malcolm John’s name and dates of birth and death. At first, Andy saw nothing else. Then, suddenly, down in the right-hand corner of the stone, where long fingers of grass reached up to almost hide it, he made out a small carving of a snake’s head. Its mouth was open, as though it were attacking, with its two sharp fangs thrust outward.

“Hey, J.J.!” Andy shouted. “C’mere! Quick!”

His shout seemed to vibrate in the quiet air, whamming and bouncing off the tombstones. A soft thud came from behind him, and he whirled, but no one was there.

J.J. appeared so suddenly that Andy jumped. “What’s the matter?” J.J. asked.

“Look at this,” Andy said, and pointed at the snake’s head.

J.J. bent over to examine the carving and whistled. “Wow! Did Malcolm John Bonner die of snakebite? Is that why this snake head is carved here?”

“No one said anything about snakebite.”

“Ask Miss Winnie.”

A low roll of thunder rumbled from the near distance as the sky darkened.

J.J. held out his notepad to Andy. “I couldn’t find anything interesting on the grave markers, just ‘loving husband and father’ and ‘devoted wife and mother.’ He grinned. “If one of them got shot during a poker game, the Gaspers didn’t put it on the tombstone.”

Lightning flashed across the sky, and the next smack of thunder shook the ground.

“We need to get out of here,” Andy said. “It’s getting close.”

But before Andy and J.J. could move, something round and dark leaped at them from behind the tombstones. Grunting, yelling words that Andy couldn’t understand, a short, powerful figure grabbed his wrist and J.J.’s and ran, dodging the tombstones as he pulled the boys across the low hill and down to the covered porch of a small building.

As they slammed up against the wall, a bolt of blinding lightning smashed into the ground at the rise of the old cemetery.

“There! You see! You see! Right where you were standing!” the strange figure shouted. “You boys got grass growin’ where your brains ought to be?”

Andy stared at a man who was not much taller than he was. His shoulders were broad, his arms muscular and overlong, and his body was round as a ball. The eyes that peered from within his wrinkled, weathered walnut shell of a face were a startling blue.

Thunder pounded against Andy’s ears, and lightning
splattered white fingers into the dark sky. Crossly, the man said, “Stop gawkin’ like a pair of stupid, cud-chewin’ cows and come on inside till the storm’s passed.”

Hesitantly, Andy entered as the man held the door wide open. J.J. followed.

The room was small and the furniture plain, but two of the walls were lined with bookshelves to the low ceiling, and all the shelves were crammed with books. A half-filled, sour-smelling cup of coffee rested on a wooden table.

“Sit down,” the man said, pointing to the sofa, “and tell me what y’all are doin’ in my cemetery.”

“
Your
cemetery?” Andy blurted out.

“Yes,
my
cemetery,” the man said. “I’m Elton, and I’m the caretaker here.”

Together, in a scramble of words, Andy and J.J. tried to explain to Elton about their history project.

Finally Elton shook his head. “This ain’t Boot Hill. None of them funny sayings are written on these stones.”

“But there is something weird on Malcolm John Bonner’s stone,” Andy said. “Down at the bottom is carved a small snake head.”

Elton nodded. “Know what it means?”

“No,” Andy said.

“There’s other words for snakes, you know.”

“Like what?”

“Got a dictionary? Look it up. Then ask the right person.”

Andy was bewildered. “What right person?”

“You ever hear tell of William Shakespeare?”

“Sure.” Andy did a double take. “But I can’t ask him anything. He’s dead.”

“That won’t stop him none from answering your questions. Or Malcolm John Bonner, neither, for that matter.”

Andy gulped. “You can’t talk to the dead.”

Elton leaned forward and grinned, his teeth gaping like little brown nutmeats, as he chuckled soft and low. “I can,” he said. “That’s how I know why Malcolm John Bonner ordered that snake head to be carved on his stone.”

“C’mon. You’re kidding, aren’t you?” Andy heard his voice tremble.

Elton swept an arm toward the cemetery that lay outside his door. “Kidding? Not on your life. There’s nobody around here but me and the dead. Who else have I got to talk to?”

A
t the dinner table that evening Andy said, “After school me and J.J. rode our bikes out to the cemetery, but it started to rain hard and thunder and lightning. We sat in the caretaker’s house until the storm was over.”

“Good thinking,” his dad said.

“J.J. and I.” Andy’s mother corrected him.

“Elton said he talks to the dead. Do you believe he can do that?” Andy put down his fork, waiting for an answer.

“Far as I know, he could talk to anybody,” Mr. Thomas said. “The big question is, do the dead talk back?”

“Bill!” Mrs. Thomas said. “What a thing to say!”

“Maybe they do.” Andy laughed but shivered.

“Mom, the odd thing at Malcolm John Bonner’s grave is the snake head with the big fangs carved near the bottom of the tombstone. You told me there was something strange on the stone, remember?”

“A snake,” his mother murmured. She squinted as though she were trying to see the stone again. “That’s right. I’d forgotten. It was a snake.”

“Not a whole snake. Just a snake head,” Andy said. More at ease now that his parents were involved in the story, he took a mouthful of mashed potatoes; then he continued. “Elton said there were other words for snake. He told me to use the dictionary. He said William Shakespeare is probably the best way to understand. I’ve only read
Romeo and Juliet
, and not even the whole play. Next year we read
A Midsummer Night’s Dream.
”

“Shakespeare,” his father said. “That’s interesting. What are words for snake?
Reptile
 … 
serpent
 …”

“Serpent!” Mrs. Thomas smiled. She looked pleased with herself as she said, “Perhaps Elton’s referring to
King Lear.
‘How sharper than a serpent’s tooth it is to have a thankless child.’ I still remember that quote from freshman English in college.”

“What would that have to do with Malcolm John Bonner?” Andy asked.

“I have no idea,” Mr. Thomas said.

“Maybe we should ask Miss Winnie if she knows what the snake head means,” his mother added.

“No!” Andy realized he’d answered too loudly. As his parents looked at him with surprise, he shrugged and hunkered down in his chair. “This is my school project,” he said. “I should be the one to ask Miss Winnie.”

“Of course.” His mother nodded and smiled.

Andy wasn’t about to bring up the subject with Miss Winnie. He realized his mother had already explained the identity of the thankless child. He was shocked to think of how hurt and unforgiving Malcolm John must have been to have ordered a carving of a snake head on his tombstone.

“Elton Gillie took over as caretaker from his grandfather. He probably inherited a passel of stories from the old man, too,” Andy’s father said.

“Do you think he knows why the snake head was carved into Malcolm John Bonner’s tombstone?” Mrs. Thomas asked.

“Perhaps, or he’s built some legend around it. Andy, you might find it interesting to talk to Elton again and discover what he knows.”

“I’d just as soon he didn’t.” Andy’s mother stood and picked up her plate and glass. “I didn’t like the idea of Andy and J.J.’s going to the cemetery in the first place, and I don’t like what Elton told them. Talking with the dead! That’s creepy.”

Andy tried to look upset, but secretly he agreed with his mother. He’d found the answer to his question because
his mother remembered her freshman English! There’d be no reason to see Elton again.

Mr. Thomas pushed back his chair. “I need to do some work on my computer. You won’t need it for a little while, will you, Andy?”

Andy shook his head. “It’s my night to do the dishes, and after that I’ve got to interview Grandpa and Grandma.”

As Andy put the last plate into the dishwasher, his dad came into the room. Holding out a sheet of paper, he asked, “I take it you’re known in genealogy circles as Hunter?”

Andy’s face grew warm. “You told me to use a screen name.”

“Right,” Mr. Thomas said. “Well, Hunter, you received an e-mail letter from MLB321 in Santa Fe, New Mexico. She’s got some love letters for you.”

“Da-aad! Cut it out!”

Mr. Thomas grinned. “I didn’t say they were
to
you. I said they were
for
you. They’re letters that someone named Coley Joe Bonner wrote to his fiancée—Felicity Strickland.”

Andy gasped. He snatched the sheet of paper from his dad. His heart thumped with excitement, and it was hard to keep his fingers from trembling. “She says they’re letters Coley Joe wrote from El Paso! On his way to Hermosa!” Andy looked up at his father. “MLB321 wants to know my name and address
or fax number. She’ll send me copies of the letters. Dad?”