August Moon (21 page)

One monumental tug on the nail, and there was suddenly give in my wrists. I pulled them apart at an angle and was able to free them of the duct tape. Sweat coursed down my face as I tried to draw oxygen out of the heated air. I felt like a roasting pig on preheat. I turned to the Jesus statue and used my tender and bleeding hands to wiggle the railroad-sized nail out of his feet. When it was free, I plunged its sharp point into the duct binding my ankles. From the corner of my eyes, I saw the couch go up in flames that were now licking hungrily at the walls. In the center of the main room, the rags burned ineffectually, their gasoline power long gone, but the linoleum at the edges of the walls was curling and blistering like an open sore.

I pulled my legs apart, but the duct tape was still too tight to rip. I plunged the nail twice more into the empty spot between my ankles, trying not to notice how difficult it was to breathe. Across from me, Lydia whimpered, her first sound.

“Mira?”

“Weston? Are you awake?” He moaned and sat up drunkenly. I ripped viciously at the duct tape, and suddenly, I was free.

I rushed over to Weston and set him free, too. He was still groggy, and I slapped him across the face hard enough to leave a mark.
“Get out now, Weston! Get Lydia and go!”

He stood up shakily. “What about you?”

The flames were kissing the door frame, little pecks at first, but it only took seconds for the fire to become a towering demon, its tongue darting out lasciviously into the room and along the ceiling. I coughed out orders. “I can walk out of here. Go now! There isn’t time to get her bindings off.”

He scooped up Lydia, and for a terrible moment, I thought he was going to pass out. He rallied himself, wrapped his cape around Lydia and himself, and then charged through the flames and up the stairs.

I crouched low, but the smoke was everywhere. Using my teeth on his duct tape, I had Pastor Meale free in less than six seconds. “Get up! I know you can hear me. If you don’t get up now, you’ll die.”

The pastor’s voice, deep and sad, rumbled out of his body. “‘But God is the judge: he putteth down one, and setteth up another.”

There simply wasn’t time. I reached over and grabbed the nativity scene baby Jesus that had rolled out with the manger, and I conked Robert over the head with it. It was a good, solid noggin-bonker, and it laid him out cold. “The Lord helps those who help themselves,” I whispered hoarsely.

I was able to drag Robert all of three feet before my ankle gave out. Fortunately, Weston had returned down the fiery stairs, a wet blanket over his head and another in his hands. He shoveled Robert Meale onto his shoulders, and together we scuttled clumsily up the stairs, the flames caressing our legs, begging us to stay.

Free of the house, I was confused by the complete and utter darkness of the outdoors. “Where’s the moon?” I croaked through a smoke-seared throat.

Thunder answered my question, followed by raindrops as big and heavy as grapes. Fresh water poured down on my shoulders, as sweet as balm, cooling my raw wrists and hot skin. I guess the August Moon Festival had worked its magic.

Ironically, the torrent of rain kept Sissy Meales’ house on Hancock Lake from burning to the ground. The gory church-room, the den, and the stairs were the only areas to suffer real damage. Weston Lippmann was as good as his word and had a radio in his car. He had an ambulance, a fire truck, three state troopers, and two unmarked cars at Hancock Lake within twenty-two minutes of sending out the word.

Lydia was traumatized, but she would heal. Robert Meale came to shortly after the ambulance arrived and was pronounced physically healthy except for a concussion. His immortal soul was a different matter.

After Weston gave instructions on where to find Sissy and Mrs. Meale, he and I were driven off in the ambulance. On the ride he told me Sissy’s real name was Constance Penwick, long-suffering younger sister of Naomi Meale, nee Penwick. Likely, Sissy was the reason the Meales chose to move to Battle Lake. In the course of his investigation, Weston had found no other connections tying them to this area.

I took wicked pleasure at the thought of Mrs. Meale, lying in wait in the woods, a smirk on her twisted, puffy face as she heard the police sirens blaring toward the Bible camp. She would think they were coming looking for her to tell her her husband had gone up in smoke; they would really be coming to handcuff her and toss her to the mercy of very human judges. All her self-flagellation was for naught.

The ambulance brought Weston and me to the Douglas County Hospital in Alexandria, where the same nurse who had originally treated my sprained ankle—telling me sternly not to put any pressure on it—was still on duty. When she saw the grass and dirt stains on the bottom of my straggling bandage, surface burns on both feet, charred hair, eyebrows, and eyelashes, and wrists rubbed raw, she looked at me like I didn’t even deserve ankles. This time, I took the crutches.

I took a week
off to recover, leaving Mrs. Berns and Sarah Ruth in charge of the library. Sid and Nancy took turns running baked goods out to me and tending to my lawn, garden, and animals. It had been raining steadily and pleasantly since the rock-and-roll thunderstorm the night of the fire, and all of Otter Tail County grew furiously, brazenly lush and as humid as a greenhouse.

I healed along with the parched ground. The burns and abrasions mended quickly, but it took all of the week before my ankle went from pumpkin-sized to merely swollen. I had to chop off a couple inches of hair, my lungs weren’t yet at full capacity, and it’d be a few months before I’d have eyebrows again, but I was alive. When I returned to work, I had a new writing assignment for the paper: cover the affirmation celebration Pastor Winter wanted to hold the coming weekend. I researched the topic, mostly by pumping Mrs. Berns for information. She and I were alone as Sarah Ruth had failed to turn up for work.

“Tell me again why Pastor Winter was out at the Bible camp the night Lydia disappeared.”

Mrs. Berns leaned her face into the palm of her hand, her elbows on the front desk across from me. Her eyes were sparkly, like they always are when she’s got a good story. “He knew they were up to no good. He was looking for Lydia, just like you.”

“Why’d he suspect the Meales?”

“He’d been at that Wisconsin seminary with Robert when he and Naomi lost their baby. Said it was a real scandal. Well, not so much said it, but I could tell that’s what he meant. Said it was a tragedy, broke Naomi in half. She just stopped walking, eating, started talking in tongues. The Meales disappeared after that. When they showed up in Battle Lake last fall, Pastor Winter ogled them.”

“What?”

Mrs. Berns rolled her eyes. “It’s called the Internet. You want information, you ogle it. Welcome to the twentieth century.”

I rubbed my ankle, feeling no need to correct her about what century it was or the difference between ogling and googling. “And what’d he find out? When he ogled them, that is?”

“Same thing you found. They went to Georgia, started a church, but Mrs. Meale just got crazier and crazier and talked him into starting that whacky Christ’s Church of the Apocryphal Revelation. Then, a couple teenagers get shot in the back, the Meales skip town, and next thing you know, they’re in Battle Lake. When Lucy turned up shot the same way, Winter knew there was a connection, but didn’t know what. He was trying to find that out when you saw him at the Bible camp the night of the Festival.”

I stretched, enjoying a comfortable silence with Mrs. Berns as we both chewed our thoughts. I realized I still had an unanswered question. “So, how’d the Meales know the teenagers in Georgia?”

“Robert Meale didn’t. Naomi Meale confessed to meeting them both at a girl’s after-school center she volunteered at. Said when she saw them, she knew she had to save ’em.”

I shivered. “With help like that, you almost don’t want to leave the house.”

Mrs. Berns nodded agreeably. “Pastor Winter feels terrible he wasn’t able to prevent Lucy’s death.”

Pastor Winter hadn’t been able to save Lucy or find Lydia, but he had done what he could to heal the town. He started by initiating a calling chain in his congregation, arranging for members to be with Lydia and her family at all times. They would be up to their ears in hotdish, ham, buttered dinner rolls, and jello salad until Lydia was comfortable and the family felt safe once more. Lucy Lebowski’s family would never feel safe again, but I knew Pastor Winter would make sure they felt the support and comfort of their community for as long as they lived here.

Once he was satisfied he was doing everything in his power to heal the town, he turned to his religion. Calling together some of his most active congregants in an emergency meeting, he put forth the need for some large-scale event to restore faith in the church. He wanted to call it the “Apologies, Not Apostasies” Festival and hold it as soon as possible. He envisioned closing down Lake Street, bringing in a Christian band, and having arts and crafts booths, bake sales, and profuse literature highlighting the “upbeat” parts of the Bible along with walking, talking pastors from other communities called in to heal the town through Jesus’ words.

Sid and Nancy talked him down from the lofty pulpit, gently arguing that people may have had enough evangelizing for a while and that an encore to the August Moon Festival, which had been sadly interrupted, would be the way to go. After all, they pointed out, Pastor Winter had often told them that our goodness is seen in our actions, not our words.

They agreed on a town-wide potluck with arts and crafts, bake sales, and Not with My Horse playing in the afternoon. All proceeds from the bake sales would be divided evenly between Lucy’s and Lydia’s families. Kennie agreed to close off Lake Street from one p.m. to six p.m. this Saturday, and I agreed to write an article promoting the event for the
Battle Lake Recall
.

After I zipped off the Community Festival article, I edited the
Recall
police log. Although this was an activity I always enjoyed, I took particular pleasure in the third item.

WEDNESDAY, August 18

10:01 p.m. Denny Warner called in, reporting that neighbor has fire in fire ring. Dispatcher said that was legal. Mr. Warner said fire is too big. Dispatcher advised as long as it’s in ring, it’s legal. Mr. Warner said neighbors are making too much noise. Officer en route.

FRIDAY, August 20

9:43 a.m. Nelson family reports their grandmother, Louise Nelson, is locked in their car outside the nursing home and refuses to go back in. Officer en route.

SUNDAY, August 22

11:11 p.m. 17-year-old male minor pulled over for suspicious driving in 1993 Dodge Caravan, license plate GH 857. Alicia Meale, 19-year-old female, found, apparently hiding, under blanket in rear of vehicle. Reported bruises on her neck. She declined to press assault charges.

Ah, hickeys. The calling card of young lust wielded by sons of farmers all over the Midwest since time immemorial. And what did Alicia expect, making out with a high school kid in his parents’ minivan? He probably begged her to wear his letter jacket and she was so excited that she wrote his name in hearts and wondered what it’d be like to marry him. Or maybe I was confusing my brief, sad adolescence with her protracted one.

I had no doubt that life had just bumped Alicia out of the self-involvement she had been enjoying for so long. She was now on her own, with her three nearest relatives in jail for serious crimes: her mother, for three counts of murder and multiple counts of kidnapping, attempted murder, and the murder of the two teenage girls in Georgia; her aunt for one count of kidnapping and multiple accounts of assault and battery; and her father for accessory to murder. Robert said that he hadn’t known what had been going on, or even that his wife could walk, but he was going to have to prove that in court.

Now, Alicia needed to figure out what she was doing with her future and how she was going to define herself, free of her parents’ rules. It’s hard to be a rebel when you’re the only one who cares what you do. I hoped she ended up making some good choices for herself; my money was on cosmetology school. Hey, I was willing to cut her some slack, now that I knew she had only been Second Alicia her whole life.

I had one more job to complete. Despite Weston’s advice, I knew I had to tell Tina what I had seen in the woods at the August Moon Festival. It might ruin our friendship, but that was a price I was willing to pay if it would help her escape an abusive marriage. I hobbled over to her shop on my lunch break, describing the scene in the woods at the Festival as clinically as possible, omitting the whiteness of Tom’s rear as he pumped in the moonlight, but making clear that I had witnessed him and Annika being unquestionably intimate.

“That’s not possible.” Tina’s eyes grew shiny with tears.

I wanted to be anywhere else in the world. “I’m sorry.”

“Are you sure they weren’t just talking?”

“They were on the ground, naked.”

Tina shook her head repeatedly, like a dog with water in its ears, and then broke down sobbing. Part of me had figured she’d be relieved to get out of a relationship with that clod, but that just goes to show how much I know about relationships. It took me a half an hour to calm her down. Finally, she asked me to leave and went into the back room like a broken woman.

Back at the library, I felt like a heel, but knew I had done what I had to. I had just settled into my seat, grateful to put my battered ankle on the front counter, when the front door slammed open. In charged Kennie, murder in her eyes. Her hair was plastered to her head from the rain that had been drizzling pleasantly on and off all morning. Her clothes clung to her like honey on a spoon, only one of those really big spoons you use to scoop out mashed potatoes.

“Nice weather,” I said, to no one in particular.

Mrs. Berns had sidled up next to me for a front row seat when she first caught sight of Kennie. “It is if you’re a seed,” she said agreeably.

“Mira James!”

“Hi, Kennie.”

“Gary Wohnt is gone!”

I sat back. “Where’d he go?”

“A four-week leave of absence.” She slapped a typed letter on the counter. “Four weeks!”

“He didn’t say where to?”

“No. He just wrapped up his end of this murder and kidnapping business and hit the road.”

“What’re you going to do?”

She peeled a straggle of soggy platinum hair off her forehead and tossed it back. “Find a replacement, I suppose.”

“Who’ll work at the job for just four weeks?” I grabbed Mrs. Berns hand as she began to raise it.

“I don’t know. This is just terrible for the town.”

More likely, it was terrible for Kennie. She clearly still carried a torch for Gary, even though he had cheated on her with God. Come to think of it, Gary’s absence might be bad for me, too. As much as our personalities clashed, he had always come through for me. This might be a mystery I’d need to look into more. “You’ll fix this, Kennie. You always do.”

Kennie humphed and strode back out. I suppose she could simply promote one of the three deputies until Gary returned. But where had he gone? Suddenly, I had a tickly feeling along my hairline as I realized I knew exactly why Sarah Ruth was not at work today. I should be getting official word in the next day or two.