Gravity Box and Other Spaces (32 page)

Peter relaxed as she continued on about the deals she was setting up and the arrangements with the gallery. She was looking at getting him a new agent, and there was some talk of a New York show. The tone in her voice changed from worried to excited. By the time they pulled into the town of Saletcroix, enthusiasm had replaced the tension.

Looking out at the buildings lining the road, she shook her head. “Reminds me of the back lot of a post-apocalyptic movie. ‘The last survivors made their stand in Podunk Hole against the hostile hordes after civilization crumbled.'” Her mock-profound pronunciation, imitating an over-hyped movie trailer, made him laugh.

“It's not that bad,” he said.

“I'm sure it has hidden depths.”

Saletcroix, population twelve hundred, ran for about a mile along the blacktop between reduced-speed signs and
spread north and south by about four streets on each side. Most of the buildings lining the highway were businesses, behind which residential took over.

The sheriff's office and jail were in one building, a vaguely art-deco structure with implied pillars framing wide double doors over which, in neatly-carved marble sign read: SALETCROIX SHERIFF AND CONSTABULARY. Peter parked at a forty-five degree angle to the curb alongside an ancient pick-up truck, gathered up the knife, and got out. Elyssa stepped onto the street and pointed to the diner a few doors down.

“I'm going to get a cup of coffee,” she said.

“I'll join you when I'm done.”

“You better. You owe me lunch.” She smiled, kissed his cheek, and walked off. Peter watched her until she entered the diner, then went into the sheriff's building.

Peter had met the sheriff the day he bought the property. Old Mr. Higgins had insisted on introducing them. He had seen something familiar and reassuring in Edmunds that day: the man was not just local law enforcement, but a guardian. As Peter entered the office now, Sheriff Edmunds stood behind the front desk, leaning on one elbow, frowning at a thick book open alongside a computer keyboard. He looked up when Peter laid the towel on the counter. Edmunds closed the book and straightened. He was a tall man, broad-shouldered and balding, with a neatly-trimmed mustache.

“Mr. Malon,” he said. “How can I help you?”

Peter hesitated a bit surprised that the Sherriff remembered him. He didn't say anything, though, just unfolded the towel.

Edmunds stared at it. “That looks like Craig Newhouse's knife.”

“Tall, skinny guy, light brown hair, trying to grow a beard?”

“Sounds like Craig. How'd you come by it?”

“I took it from him. He and a buddy were on my property. They were chasing a girl.”

Edmunds made a sound like a low growl combined with a sigh. “Would you mind coming into my office, Mr. Malon?”

Edmunds took the towel-wrapped knife and led the way back to a glassed-in office. He asked the officer working there to look after the front desk. When he left, Edmunds closed the door and gestured Peter to a chair.

“I understand you were in Iraq, Mr. Malon.”

“That's correct.”

“Special Forces?”

“Close enough.”

“Who was the girl?”

“I don't know. She got away after I interrupted the chase. She was naked.”

“And how did you happen to be witness to this?”

Peter explained the scene. Edmunds listened, interrupting twice with clarifying questions, and then said, “Damn. Do you want to press charges?”

“No. Just do what you think will work best to keep them off my property. If the girl comes in to press charges, I'll be glad to testify on her behalf.” He waited for Edmunds to respond. When he did not, Peter asked, “Are you that familiar with everyone's weapons around here or did you already know about this?”

“Well, Craig and Danny—Danny Fesler, his buddy—were in a short while ago complaining that you'd stolen Craig's knife.”

“Were you going to follow up on that?”

“Eventually. Craig and Danny get into some kind of disagreement with someone about once a month, almost like clockwork, so I figured it wasn't quite what they described. I wondered if you'd come in to report it.”

“Do you know who the girl is? Or are you going to wait for her to come in on her own, too?”

“She's not likely to.” The way he said it made Peter think his observation was not the usual police acknowledgment that rape or potential rape victims often say nothing, but that this was something he knew more about than he intended to admit.

“No,” Peter said, standing, “I'd imagine not. Thank you, Sheriff.” He stopped at the door. “You haven't even asked me for a description of the girl. You must be very good at your job.”

“You have no idea, Mr. Malon. Will there be anything else?”

“How much blowback should I expect from these two?”

“Oh, as long as you don't talk it around what you did, probably none. I will talk to them.”

Peter headed for the diner.

The RV he had seen Craig and Danny drive away from his property that morning was parked in front of the diner. He went up to the diner's window and framed his face against the glass. The room was nearly empty. At the long countertop to the left, opposite a row of booths, he saw Elyssa, sitting on a stool, leaning over her coffee cup. Peter tapped on the glass. She looked over at him, and he gestured for her to come out. She put money on the counter and joined him on the sidewalk.

“What—?” she began.

“I want my knife back.”

Peter turned to find Craig and Danny standing in front of the dirty RV, arms folded, grinning.

“See Sheriff Edmunds,” Peter said. “He has it. He wants to talk to you anyway.”

“Oh, does he? Now why'd you have to go and do that?”

“Why did you?”

The grin faded. Craig's eyes shifted toward Elyssa and a corner of his mouth twitched. He tapped his companion on the shoulder and jerked his head. The pair moved past Peter and Elyssa, to the diner door.

“Stay off my property,” Peter said.

“Ain't all yours,” Craig said without turning. “You'll find that out.”

The door opened and closed. Peter felt a tremor run through his arms and legs. Elyssa came up beside him and touched his hand.

“I wish they hadn't seen you,” he said.

“You're sure you want to stay here? Never mind, you don't have to say it. You won't be run out.”

Peter watched her walk back to the SUV, pleased and annoyed that she knew him so well. No one else did.

They drove back in silence. When he turned onto their access road, Peter rolled slowly along, listening to the pop of small stones beneath his tires, a breeze pushing lightly through the open windows.

He stopped short of their house, just within the cover of the trees. The door to his workshop stood open. Peter cut the engine and took out his nine-millimeter from its pouch on the back of the passenger seat.

“Elyssa, get behind the wheel,” he said. “That door was closed when we left. Give me a few minutes. If you hear
shots, get out of here and get the sheriff.” He chambered a round.

She seemed about to argue, but then nodded and shifted into the driver's seat as he slipped out the door.

Peter entered the tree line and made his way silently to the back of the house. He went to the first window in the rear, which looked into the bedroom. He saw no one within and moved to the next, to the bathroom, and finally the across the yard to the workshop.

Keeping close to its corrugated wall, he worked toward the front. From the corner he could make out his vehicle, cloaked in the dappling shade from the oak canopy. Peter surveyed the border of forest, searching for any sight of lurkers. He saw only trees.

Keeping his back to the wall, he counted to ten. In a fluid motion he pivoted into the doorway, gun extended.

Several naked women were gathered around the statue of Elyssa, as if they were standing at an art show or gallery, completely unselfconscious and at ease. Including the young girl he had rescued, he counted nine of them. They varied in height and proportion, but all of them exhibited an enthralling physical beauty. He felt assaulted by an erotic response, a consuming inevitability of physical reaction. He remembered such intensity from adolescence and from the first months with Elyssa.

The young girl—
his girl
—turned then. Her companions turned with her nearly in unison. Their intensity seemed to demand a response from him which he couldn't quite manage. Instead, he turned away, squeezing his eyes shut. He stood like that, waiting for his emotions to subside. Behind him, he heard voices, muted and quick. Gradually, control returned. He chanced another look.

The intensity of the first impression was gone. They seemed less striking somehow, less—naked. Breasts,
supple torsos, everything was now smoothed and muted beneath a gauzy veil. But they had not put on any clothing. It was as if their skin had reformed, obscuring detail.

“Who—?”

He was startled by the sharp metal sound of a shotgun slide behind him. He spun around to find Elyssa just inside the doorway, the weapon leveled at the group of women, a “who the hell are you?” frown on her face.

The strange women stared at her. A few looked back at her statue. They turned to each other, and Peter heard a sibilant hum, like water over stone and rustling leaves, moiled and indecipherable.

Elyssa edged close to him. “Who are they?”

“I don't know. That one—” He pointed to the girl from earlier.

“Yeah, I recognize her. But these others?”

The tallest of them came forward, stopping a few paces away. Her face bore no wrinkles—no crow's feet, laugh lines, dimples, or brow furrows—and yet seemed suffused by age. Her eyes were deep brown and the whites were dull, like old ivory. Her skin had a semblance of well-sanded wood. She reached a hand toward Elyssa's face, paused, then pointed back at the statue.

“It's of me,” Elyssa said. “Sure—”

The woman extended her other hand, palm up, toward Peter. It took a moment for him to understand what she wanted. He raised his right hand, also palm up, and she clasped it. Her skin was very dry, very smooth. Familiar.

She bent over his hand, tracing his calluses, pressing fingertips into his palm, spreading his fingers and flexing them individually. When she released him and looked up, there was unmistakable respect in her face.

“Hello?”

The sound of the new voice seemed to run through the women like an electrical current. In an undulating wave they poured past Peter and Elyssa toward the forest, so swiftly he felt the air drag at their passing. Peter took after them, ignoring Sheriff Edmunds, who stood dumbfounded near the door.

Entering the forest, Peter glimpsed them, shadows dispersed among the trees, making no sound, as if passing through the foliage and underbrush without touching any of it. They never slowed, never seemed confused or indecisive. After half a mile they charged up an incline and dropped over the crest before Peter reached them. He stopped at the top to lean against a poplar tree to catch his breath.

All the way down into the valley, nothing moved except by breeze. When a squirrel broke from one tree to another, Peter dropped to a squat making his pistol dig into his back.

Along the opposite ridge one of them appeared, running. She was visible only a second before she vanished again, but it was enough. Peter ran to the left, around the crest trying to gain sight of her again. At the narrowest separation between one rise and the next, he ran down the slope, following.

She angled away from him, on a shallower incline and toward a cleft between two hillocks. Shifting his attention constantly between the landscape immediately before him and the girl, he slalomed past trees in as direct a line as possible to the cleft. He saw her bolt through it only seconds before he got there, but she was gone.

He stopped at the entry and searched for any sign of her passing. He found it—smashed grass, a few broken twigs, a clear impression of a foot. He followed the track, to where it ended at the base of a laurel.

He studied it. Two patches on the bark, detail confused in the shifting shafts of light falling through the crown above, caught his attention. They were dark brown and glistening. Shadows jumped back and forth until they were simply imperfections in the trunk that vaguely resembled eyes. For just a moment though, they had seen him.

That's impossible.

“Pete!”

“Mr. Malon!”

He looked back and saw Elyssa and Sheriff Edmunds.

“They're here,” Peter said. “They ran in here. I don't know how, but—”

Pressure built around his skull. He had not experienced this sensation since coming home, and it was as unwelcome as it was familiar. He was being watched—not by Elyssa or Sheriff Edmunds—by unseen eyes hidden in the trees beneath and between shadows and light.

Heartwood and bark.

This was a warning, like all those times in Iraq.