And the Hills Opened Up (14 page)

Ingrid smiled and reached for his belt, unbuckling it.  She pulled down his trousers and he wavered on his feet again, stepping out of the pants one leg at a time.

“You ladies don’t fuss around, do you?”

“We don’t get paid for fussing, generally.”

She ran her hands up his right leg, then the left.  She ran her hands over the bulge in his drawers and slipped them beneath his shirt.  She took that off, too, lifting the fabric over his head and pulling it off his hands.  She kissed his chest, making him shiver as she took his right nipple in her mouth and bit down, softly.

“Mercy.”

His hands cupped her ass and squeezed.  Ingrid felt the silken fabric of her slip rub against her skin and the warmth in his clutching fingertips.  She remembered Minnesota in May, the last of the snow finally melting and the budding trees and the chilled but warming days, the farmers planting in the fields, shouting their oxen on.  The dogs running unchecked across the farm, eager to scent it all, and the cats yowling in heat.  The roughness of the straw on her bare back, the feel of Erik Blomvik on her body and between her legs and the knots in the wood above and the loft, creaking, while her mother was out there somewhere, working at something.  She recalled how everything seemed to have excitement about it, even the long visits to their neighbors, how the future was somehow both likely and unlikely at the same time.

Elwood lifted her slip off as she pulled down his drawers.  They moved to the bed at the same moment and Ingrid lay beneath him, kissing at every inch she could reach.  His body had such warmth to it, and felt so good.

Afterward, they lay naked beneath the covers, watching the crack of light that shone beneath the door.  Ingrid had burrowed her blond head into the crook of Elwood’s arm, draping one arm and one leg across him, enjoying the hot pulse coming from her loins. 

“Hard to believe I went so long without it.”

Elwood shifted beneath her, turning his head.

“Without it?”

“Without enjoying it, I mean.”

Elwood exhaled and she could hear the wind leave his lungs.  She could hear his heartbeat as well, and the gurgling down in his stomach.

“Must be hard, lying with men you don’t feel for.  You must have to make yourself go blank, like when you need to shoot somebody.”

“It is.  And toads like Revis Cooke don’t make it any easier, believe me.  Even the lightest touch from him is like ice.” 

Ingrid squeezed Elwood harder, warding off the memories.  He kissed her forehead and touched her hair.  “You’re done with all that.  No matter what happens from here on out, you’re done with that.”

Ingrid nuzzled deeper into Elwood’s chest, trying the idea out in her mind.  She was done.  Done with all that.

“Goddamn.”

Elwood bolted up in bed, causing her head to slide off his chest and drop to the mattress.

“Fire.”

Ingrid sat up beside him, letting the sheet drop from her breasts.

“What?”

“Fire, sweetheart.  What we need is fire.”

26

Safely tucked away in his house, Revis Cooke listened to the screams, shots, and hollering that rose throughout Red Earth, sounding as if they were rising up from some ancient, black-hearted place.  As the town shrieked and shot itself into drunken fragments, Revis looked at the dead National man on the floor and felt assured that whatever was going on tonight was far larger than the death of one man, an unimportant man who would not be greatly missed, and it set his feverish mind at ease.

For the past few hours, he’d been counting and recounting the payroll for the Dennison Mining Company and wondering how far he could get, and for how long he could live, on $2,810.  About seven years salary for an average working man, wasn’t it?  He wouldn’t live like a king, or even a politician, but a savvy individual with few expenses could get along well enough on such a sum, at least until such time they relocated to a new environment, such as New York City, that more favorably suited their disposition. 

“What do you think, Mr. Wells?  Should I abscond from this ghastly place and start anew?” 

Flies buzzed about the dead man’s face, intrigued.  How they’d gotten into the house was a mystery to Cooke, who kept the windows shut and locked no matter the weather outside.  He bore no great love for insects, birds, bats, or rodents.  Their place was out of doors, his was in.

Cooke rose from his chair and circled round his desk.  “Did you ever think of a comparable plan, Mr. Wells?  The temptation must have been great, I am certain.  Thundering about in that stagecoach of yours, loaded down with lockboxes.  All that money riding with you, quite close yet quite out of reach.  Out of your reach, I should say.  You were allowed to carry it, yes, but you were paid the same meager wages any delivery boy is paid, and if you would have taken a single dollar for yourself they would have strung you from the highest tree.”

Cooke laughed and bent over the corpse. 

“You must have dreamt about that money as you drifted in and out of sleep, Mr. Wells.  Perched on top of your jouncing coach, yearning for hot food and hoping to make the next town in good time—that money must have haunted you as much as any beautiful, untouchable woman.”

The lake of blood had congealed around the dead man, creating a sticky surface similar to the covering of skin on a pail of milk.  When the flies landed on it, their weight was so insignificant that they were able to walk across it, like Jesus striding across the Sea of Galilee.  Unable to restrain his curiosity, Cooke poked his finger through the blood skin and took a sounding.  “One-eighths of an inch, I’d say,” he said, holding his blood stained finger toward the lantern light.  “By morning, the whole lake will be dried through.”

Cooke examined the dead man’s face.  His skin had taken on a decidedly purplish hue, as if he’d been strangled to death and not bludgeoned with a fire iron.  Yet, perhaps Wells had been strangled, in a way.  His chest and ribs had taken a fierce beating—one of those ribs, which had snapped with such a pleasing crack, could have pierced his lungs, causing him to suffocate from the inside out. 

“Was that it?  Was that what killed you, sir?”

Cooke placed his knees onto the floor and crawled forward, so that his face hovered inches above the dead man’s.  He could feel the chill of death rising off the skin.  Transfixed, he lowered his head and kissed the dead man’s purple lips with his own, parting them with his tongue and breathing hot air into the lifeless mouth.

When he drew back, Cooke’s entire body was vibrating, as if strung through with electric current.  The flies buzzed about his face, now drawn to him as well.  The wind had dropped outside.  The town was quiet.

“Your taste, Mr. Wells.  It—”

Someone pounded loudly at the door.  Cooke exhaled, his gaze still fixed upon the dead man.

The visitor pounded again. 

“Just a moment.” 

Cooke reluctantly rose from the floor and brushed off his knees and shirt, his heart thumping in his chest.  An image of a dark river filled his mind, its coal-black waters flowing rapidly along its curving, serpentine banks—

The visitor pounded a third time, louder still.

“Yes, yes,” Cooke shouted, striding to the door and opening the viewing slot.  “What is it?”

He expected Ingrid Blomvik on his front step, back again to mew for attention.  Or perhaps Sheriff Atkins, hat in hand with some fresh tale of mining camp stupidity ready for the telling.

Instead, the figure on his step was a stranger, one as tall as Cooke himself.  The stranger’s face was a pale outline in the dark (how had it gotten so dark?  Even in the middle of the night, the Copper Hotel and the Runoff Saloon habitually left a few lamps burning).   The stranger’s eyes, sunk back, were two black slits, his mouth was a tight line above his pointed chin.  Black patches, scab-like, spotted his cheeks and forehead.

Revis Cooke frowned, a new current of thrill arcing through his shoulders and into his gut. 

“Cooke,” the stranger said in a low, rasping voice. 

“Yes, what is it?  What do you want?”

The stranger closed his eyes and a slight, curling smile rose on his lips.  The accountant flinched and stepped back from the viewing slot.  The smell of burnt meat had seeped in through the door, fouling the air. 

“Go home,” Cooke shouted through the slot.  “Go home, drunkard, and sleep off whatever rot you’ve been swilling!” 

The accountant slammed the viewing slot shut and stepped back, his chest heaving.  Somehow the stranger had managed to unnerve him.  What had happened to the ruckus outside, the hooting and hollering?  It wasn’t that late—only one in the morning.  Usually the stoutest drunks lasted well past two, especially on a Saturday night.

Cooke looked at Hollis Wells lying on the floor.  The dead man suddenly appeared so obvious, so nakedly exposed.  What had he been thinking, allowing the National man’s body to remain in the middle of the room like this?  They would catch him, he would be found out.  He’d killed a man in rage and would now be punished for his brute indulgences.

“This is what you wanted, isn’t it, Mr. Wells?  Did you somehow call out to this prying stranger and bring him to my door?”

A fresh pounding on the door, each blow reverberating through the house. 

“That door is made of iron,” Cooke called out.  “Pound all you like, but I’m not opening it.”

A rain of blows pummeled the door.  A buckled dent appeared in the door’s surface as it strained inward against its hinges.  The accountant picked the fire iron off the floor—it was still covered in the National man’s blood and felt solid in his hand.

“I am warning you, sir—”

One mighty, concussive blow and the door tore from its frame, whistling through the air and sailing inches above Cooke’s head.  He froze in mid-sentence, stunned silent as the door struck the rear of the house and clanged to the floor.  A gust of cold, smoky air blew into the building and ruffled the stacked bills on his desk.

The stranger stepped inside through the open doorway, his scabbed face blank as he studied the body of Hollis Wells.

Cooke licked his lips and squeezed the fire iron’s handle. 

“This building is the property of the Dennison Mining Company.  Not only are you attacking me, sir, you are attacking its interests.”

The stranger smiled insolently and stepped forward on his long, bony legs.  He spread his arms apart and raised his palms. 

“Revis Cooke, you are but a drop in the ocean.” 

The accountant stiffened, feeling the white heat of his earlier rage returning.  Cooke charged across the room, swinging the iron with every sinew in his body, certain of victory.  Then he was lying on the floor beside Hollis Wells, gazing upward as something warm pooled beneath him.

27

They did not tell the boy about the Charred Man.  Billy, only seven-years-old, frightened easily, and nothing good would come from adding another boogey man to the forest of nightmares that rose up each night beneath his bed.  The encampment of Red Earth was already filled with enough terror for one night—terror you could feel in the air and hear in the occasional distant scream. 

Milo Atkins did not explain the blood.  He simply stripped down to his underwear and threw his stained, pulp-flecked clothes into the fire and stood there, watching them catch fire and burn through. 

Violet came up beside him and set a kettle of water over the fire. 

“Should heat shortly.” 

Atkins looked over his shoulder.  Billy was sitting at the kitchen table, playing with his straw dolls.

“Are you hungry, Milo?  There’s soup left.”

An image of Big Reggie wedged in the Copper Hotel’s doorway came unwelcomed to Atkins’ mind.

“No.  I’m not hungry.”

Violet touched the small of his back and it was all he could do not to flinch.

“That bad?”

“Yes.  It was.”

Billy murmured something at the table and made crashing noises with his mouth.  Atkins picked up his holster from where he’d dropped it on the floor and brought it over to the table, sitting down across from his son.  He drew out the pistol and spun the chamber open.  It was empty.

“That’s right,” he said aloud.  “I fired them all before I tucked tail and ran.”

Billy looked up from his dolls.

“You ran, Papa?”

“Yes, sir.  I did.  Like a scared rabbit.”

Billy smiled and made his dolls bounce along the table, their dry straw legs crunching on the wood. 

“Rabbit, rabbit, rabbit.  Hoppity, hoppity, hop.”

Violet dropped a cloth pouch on the table. 

“Your father did exactly what he should have, Billy.  He fled from a bad thing and returned for his dinner.  To his family.”

Atkins untied the ribbon from the pouch and dumped its contents onto the table.  Two dozen bullets rolled across the table, bumping into each other like metal logs floating down a river.  He picked one up and held it to the light.

“Might as well be air.”

Violet crossed her arms.

“They’re not air, Milo.  They’re bullets.”

“Can I hold one?”

Atkins looked at his son. 

“Please, Papa?”

Atkins handed the bullet to the little boy.  Billy held it up to his eye, so close it brushed his long eyelashes. 

“I can see me in it.”

“Your reflection, that’s called.”

“My reflection.  I can see my reflection.”

Violet tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear and went back to the fire.  She tested the water with her finger and stirred it about.

“Say, Milo.  Finish with that gun and get over here.”

Atkins held out his hand.  Billy pouted and cupped the bullet. 

“No.  I want it.”

“What for?”

“I like it.”

“Don’t work without a gun.”

“I don’t care.  It’s pretty.”

Atkins picked up a different bullet and loaded it into his pistol’s chamber.  Some of the blood had dried on the back of his hands.

“Sure, son.  You can have your pretty bullet.”

Billy smiled and held the bullet out to his father.  “Here.  I want you to have it for your gun.”

“Thank you, sir.  I appreciate that.” 

Atkins plucked the bullet from his son’s warm palm and thumbed it into the second empty chamber.  Then he filled the other four, too, and slapped the chamber shut.  Billy laughed and made his dolls dance some more on the table, giving them all a show.  Atkins slid the pistol back into its holster and brought the belt with him to the fire, where Violet was dipping a rag in the kettle water.

“That’s your side of the family he takes after,” Violet said, smiling as she wrung out the steaming rag and rubbed it with soap.  “No one on my side is as odd as that.”

Atkins set his belt on the floor and dragged a chair away from the wall to sit before the fire.  He sat sideways, so he could watch the cabin door.  The door had no lock on it, had never needed a lock, and he supposed there was no point locking it now.  He’d seen the Charred Man pick up two large grown men at the same time and hurl them twenty feet like they’d been filled with nothing but cotton.  No way to block something as strong and determined as that, even if they heaped everything they owned against the door, bed and all. 

“What about your ma?  She thinks she talks with Jesus in her dreams.”

Violet touched the wet cloth to his face.  The heat felt good as she scrubbed, her thumbnail scraping through the fabric.

“How do you know Ma doesn’t talk to Jesus?”

Atkins closed his eyes.

“Guess I don’t.”

“That’s right.  You don’t.”

She wrung out the rag in the pot and moved on to his hands.  Atkins cracked open one eye—he could not remember the last time his wife had tended to him like this.  Her rough hands had gone soft and kind as they worked his skin over, rubbing out the blood. 

“I love you, Vi.”

“I know.  You said so earlier.”

Atkins rubbed his hands together, smelling the soap in the air.  “I just wanted to say it again, is all.”

“Yes, well.  Thank you, Mr. Atkins.  I love you, too.”

Billy made kissy noises at the table, mashing the faces of his dolls together.  Atkins turned to get a better look at his son, who was sitting with his back turned to them.

“I suppose that even goes for you, boy.  Though it wouldn’t hurt anything if you put those dolls away and went to bed.”

Violet smiled and handed Atkins the wet rag.  “Why don’t you scrub the rest of yourself, Milo, and I’ll dig out a pair of clean trousers.  You need something to buckle that gun belt around, don’t you?”

Atkins ran the rag across his chest and under both arms, enjoying the heat.

“I don’t know, Vi.  I thought I might go about town naked.”

His wife snorted and went into their bedroom.  “No thank you, sir,” she called back.  “There’s already been enough fearsome happenings in camp for one night.”

Atkins lowered his gaze to the gun belt on the floor and the puddle of pink-tinted water around his feet.  As usual, his wife was right.

With nothing else to be done, they went to bed.  They had a proper bed, with a cot in the corner of the bedroom for Billy.  They had a proper bedroom, too, separate from the rest of the cabin.  Violet had demanded the room, arguing that sleeping shouldn’t be done in the same place where you spent all your days awake.  She liked things separate like that, each part of their lives in its own box.  She thought if you were going to live in the wilderness, with no city finery or enjoyments, you might as well do it right. 

Before they’d snuffed the lantern, Atkins had removed his pistol from its holster and set it on the table beside their bed, where he could reach it if he needed to.  He’d also boarded up the bedroom’s sole window along with the two others in the main room, fitting the boards together so tightly he’d be surprised if a crack of light shone through in the morning.  He knew the boards wouldn’t do much, but he hated the idea of the Charred Man lingering out there, peeping before he came inside.

Billy and Violet fell asleep quickly, their breathing steady and reassuring in the dark.  Atkins lay curled around his wife and allowed the day’s events to play across his mind.  Johnny Miller shooting that coach guard over spilt beer.  The ride out to the Dennison Mine with Leg Jameson and his crew.  Hank Chambers covered in gore, his eyes wild and serious, ready to torch the whole mine.  And that first glimpse of the Charred
Man, a murky outline at the far back of the entrance—like a man, but not.  How they could all tell, even at a hundred yards, that he was an unnatural thing, something right out of a child’s nightmares. 

They should have believed Chambers right off.  They should have let him put fire to those fuses as soon as they’d seen that blood on his clothes and the fear in his eyes.  Instead, they’d held him up with their foolish chatter, still worried about the mine and the goddamn copper. 

Atkins sighed and turned onto his back.  His mother said the past was like the stars in the sky—you couldn’t change either, no matter how much you worried them in your mind.  Nothing to be done now until morning, when they’d have to see to the dead and living and make preparations for leaving town.  Atkins started going over the long list of things that would need doing, the supplies they would need and what they could leave behind.  He started drifting above himself, rising above the bed and the dark room, and a fine silt of sleep came over him without his notice. 

Next he knew, Milo Atkins was sitting up in bed, wide awake and listening.  Somebody had come into the cabin—he could feel him in the other room, waiting. 

“No,” Atkins whispered.  “Lord, no.”

He reached for the pistol on the bedside table but it was gone. The room smelled like smoke.

“No, no, no.”

He put a hand out and touched his wife’s shoulder—she was still warm and breathing.  Thankfulness flooded his heart and he swung out of bed, his strength returned.  He pulled on his pants by feel, then a shirt.  He padded barefoot to his son’s cot and stood over him, listening to his whistling breath.

“You’re a good boy, Billy.”

The rhythm of his son’s breathing paused, started again.  Atkins went out of the bedroom and closed the door behind
him.

They had a visitor at the kitchen table.

Their visitor had set a lantern in the middle of the table, providing the cabin’s only light.  Atkins swallowed the fear that threatened to overwhelm him and sat across from the Charred Man, his legs tingling with an urge to run as fast and as far as they could.  He set his hands on the table and felt the wood grain beneath his palms.  The Charred Man was wearing a different suit than before, a finer getup that fit him better.  His pale skin was clearer, too, with only one middling black patch on his right cheek.  He smelled like a smokehouse. 

“Thought you might show,” Atkins said, his mouth dry.  “Hoped you’d pass us by, but I suppose not.”

The Charred Man tugged at the emerald cufflinks on his jacket and grinned, the corners of his lips receding with unnatural stiffness.

“No, Milo.  No one gets passed by.”

Atkins nodded, suddenly feeling very tired and very heavy, as if his body had been stuffed with clay.

“Is that Revis Cooke’s suit?”

The Charred Man’s tight grin faded.  He leaned forward in his chair and set his hands upon his bony knees.

“Milo Atkins, you shall bear witness to what has happened here.” 

“I will?”

The Charred Man appraised Atkins with dark and uncanny eyes.  Their visitor was old, Atkins realized.  Very old.

“What about my family?”

The Charred Man reached into his coat pocket.  He drew out a pearl-handled straight razor and set it on the table.

“A prophet travels faster alone.”

Atkins looked around the cabin.  It was like he’d never seen it before, any of it.  Not the fire or the rocking chair or the straw dolls scattered on the floor.  He picked up the straight razor with a hand that did not feel like his own.  He unfolded it and studied the keen, square-headed blade.  He recalled the screams from inside the Copper Hotel, the sound of bones cracking and flesh tearing.  The sense, deep in his gut, that something was feeding inside the hotel—not on flesh and blood, but on the agony itself. 

Atkins licked his dry lips.  His bones felt hollow and cold.  He rose from his chair and went into the bedroom where his wife and son lay sleeping.  He floated above himself, drifting through the roof of his home and into the night sky, rising so high it was as if he were looking down on their cabin from the heavens, with a field of endless dark all around him.