The Curse of Crow Hollow (9 page)

-4-

Took both Mattingly's ambulances to get them kids out the church and up to the hospital in Stanley, some thirty miles
off. Both packed full, leaving the parents and those concerned to follow on their own. It was, so far as I know, the shortest Sunday service Crow Holler ever had.

The nurse behind the glass window inside the hospital's emergency room said the girls would have to be tended to alone for the time being. That left everybody with nothing to do but wait and pray. They all found an empty corner to settle themselves—Bucky and Angela, the Fosters (Landis, Kayann, and a shaken Hays), the mayor, the Reverend and Belle—away from the thirty or so others who'd found misfortune enough to be in such a place that morning. Chessie and Briar Hodge had made the trip, too, as had Medric, whose face had gone ashen by the time he arrived. He sat beside Angela, who said what was on everybody's mind when she asked the undertaker what had brought him there. Trolling for clients is what she guessed. Medric held his head in his hands and said that wasn't so, he'd come for Hays because Hays was his friend, all them kids were. I'd say that didn't sit too well with Landis and Kayann. Angela told Medric not to worry, things would be fine, then looked upset when Medric didn't say the same.

Doc Sullivan went back with the girls, leaving his wife to do what she did best—comfort. Maris was a Bickford before she became a Sullivan, and though she was the mayor's older sister by near twenty years and had spent much of her adult life outside the Holler, we still counted her as one of our own. She went from one family to the next, and by the time she reached the last, that whole area of the waiting room had gone silent from shock. You could almost hear their hearts and minds winding down to a slow hum.

Maris asked Hays if he was okay. He answered, “I didn't mean for it to happen.”

Bucky sat up in his seat and leaned forward. “What'd you say, Hays?”

Hays would've had to either lie or face the consequences if John David hadn't walked through the doors just then. He come into that waiting room like a bull, eyes afire, thumping those heavy boots he always wore with every step. Bucky turned as the Reverend moved past him quick, heard him telling John David to get away, he wasn't wanted. Briar stood at attention in case Chessie needed him. Her eyes alone were enough to stop the Reverend, along with that big body of hers that blocked the way. Which was a good thing, friend, because no way was John David Ramsay gonna turn around and leave.

He moved past Chessie and his daddy both, aiming for the three chairs against the wall where the Fosters sat. Hays saw John David coming and pulled his skinny legs up to his chest, making himself into a ball. John David roared as he reached for the boy, pulling Hays off the chair with one hand and cocking a fist with the other. Kayann screamed out
No
as Landis, Medric, and the mayor tried to wrench her boy free of John David's grasp. Bucky went to stand. Angela grabbed his arm and held him in place. Only when Chessie nodded her permission to let Briar help did the two finally separate.

“Get out,” the Reverend said. He laid hold of John David's arm and yanked his son backward, forcing their eyes to meet. “You hear me, boy?”

Chessie pushed herself between them and said, “I told John David to come, Reverend. Was
me
. I know that's you and Belle's little girl in there, but Naomi is John David's sister. He's got just as much right to be here as anybody. Now we ain't gonna have no trouble here, are we? Bucky?”

Bucky blinked at the sound of his name. He stood, sliding Angela's arm from his, and looked at the Reverend and John David both. “Chessie's right. Reverend, I know you're hurt because of your little girl. But John David's hurt just the same. You need to let him be here.”

“It's the Christian thing,” Chessie said.

I'd say Reverend David Ramsay's head near exploded then, what with the son who wanted nothing to do with him showing up and somebody like Chessie Hodge telling him what's Christian and what ain't. John David walked past his daddy with nary a glance and wrapped his arms around Belle. She held the back of her son's head and smiled through her tears. It was a tender moment in the midst of all that worry and fear, but one that ended when John David broke the embrace.

He looked at Hays. “I warned you, boy.”

The mayor still had one hand to Hays's chest, like he was ready to push the boy away should John David charge again. He kept that hand there and asked, “You warned him of what, John David?”

John David shook his head. “You didn't tell them, did you?”

“Tell us what?” Belle asked.

“Where'd Naomi tell you she was going last night?”

“Harper's Field.”

He looked at the others. “That what they told y'all too?”

Angela stood and looked at Hays. She shook a finger in his direction. “Where'd you take our little girl, Hays Foster?”

“It wasn't
me
,” Hays said. “It was Scarlett's idea.”

The mayor's hand went from open to closed on Hays's chest, pulling at the few hairs that grew beneath the boy's shirt until Hays winced. “Scarlett?” he asked.

“She's the one who said we had to go up to the mines.”

Landis let out a little gasp from his spot on the other side of Kayann. He took two giant steps, then slapped his son across the mouth. The sound came like a firecracker. Hays buckled as the mayor let him go, and fell back into his seat. He looked up, eyes wide with rage. Landis pulled his arm back again.

“You look at me like that,” he said. “Go on, boy. I dare you.
What business you got, going up to a place like that? You don't know
nothing
.”

Kayann tried, “Landis, he didn't know—”

“Shut up,” Landis told her, for maybe the first time ever. “Don't you understand what he's done?”

The mayor and the Reverend looked at each other, sharing the same horrible thought. Bucky missed it altogether. I don't think Chessie did. Angela was asking Hays what in the world would convince him that taking Cordy up to the mountain was a good idea and Kayann was telling her it was just as much Cordelia's fault as anyone's, and the whole room got so loud the nurse said she was calling for security. The only thing that kept her from doing it was Doc Sullivan coming through the automatic door that led deeper into the hospital. His church pants looked rumpled and his plain white shirt lay open at the collar, where a stethoscope hung limp. Half-moons of sweat stained the spots under his arms. He looked at them all and shook his head.

“I'm afraid I have some bad news.”

-5-

Bucky pushed past the Fosters and the mayor and asked, “What's wrong with my girl, Danny?”

“They're all settling in,” Doc said. “Resting and comfortable. So far as we can tell, there's no danger.”

“What's that mean?” Belle asked. “‘So far as we can tell'?”

The doctor measured his words. “It means no one, myself included, quite knows what's going on yet. The girls are being taken upstairs to be admitted so we can do more tests. You can all go on and see them.” He held up his hands when Angela and the mayor tried to push past. “Wait, now. I need to tell you all
something first. The last thing they need is to see the ones they love most just as scared as they are. So I'll ask you to swallow whatever it is you're feeling and act like the good people you are.”

The mayor asked, “What do you mean about bad news, Danny? What's happened to them?”

“I'll have to address that to each set of parents, Wilson.”

Briar Hodge eased Wilson aside and faced the doctor. I say faced, though Danny Sullivan had to crane his neck to even meet Briar's chest.

“Now listen here, Danny,” Briar said, and he was speaking slow to keep a lid on the fire growing up inside him. “All us here might not always get along as we should, but it comes down to it, we're fambly. You can stand there thinking you're gonna talk to one person or t'other, but I'm telling you all us is going up there right
now
. So you best just say what you got to and move out our way.”

It was, so far as I know, the most words Briar Hodge had ever strung together at one time in his life. And whether it was all those words or the wisdom in them (or that Doc Sullivan had caught a glimpse of the pearl handle tucked into the front of Briar's church jeans), the doctor decided Chessie Hodge's husband had spoken truth.

He looked at his brother-in-law first and said, “Mayor, we had to give Scarlett a sedative. She's resting, but she seems to have suffered some sort of paralysis to her vocal cords.”

“Lord help us,” the mayor whispered.

Doc shook his head and tried to smile. It came out looking tired and worried. “I believe it's temporary. We've given her a pad of paper and a pen, and she's able to communicate fine. But I need to see you before you go in. No protest either, Wilson. This is important, and it has to be kept private. I will not budge on that,” he said, looking at Briar and Chessie, “no matter who tries to bully me.”

He turned to the Ramsays next and said, “Reverend, Belle,” before his eyes flickered at the man standing next to them. “John David, good to see you here despite the circumstances. Naomi is conscious and alert, though I'm afraid she's lost some muscle function. We're not sure what caused her seizure. As it is, she's developed a tic in her arms and mouth. She can't control it, doesn't even seem aware it's there.”

Belle began to cry. The Reverend asked, “What caused this, Danny?”

“We're just not sure.”

“Danny,” Angela said, pushing her way toward the front. “What about Cordelia? What's happened?”

The doctor turned to the rest. “You all go on now, those girls are waiting. Wilson, you wait outside Scarlett's door for me. Understand? Hays, you can take your parents up to see Cordelia while I talk to Bucky and Angela. You all go on now. Let us talk.”

Bucky nodded and said, “We'll be there directly,” sending Chessie and Medric and the rest toward the nearest set of elevators. Maris showed them the way. Doc Sullivan took Angela by the arm and led her and Bucky off to the side.

“How long's it been since I last saw Cordelia in the clinic?” he asked.

“Been a year or so,” Angela said. “We brought her in with the flu. Why?”

“Everything good at home?”

“Sure, Doc,” Bucky said. Angela looked relieved he'd answered that. “What are you getting at?”

“She's awake,” the doctor said. “Whatever she's fighting, it's caused paralysis to the left side of her face. Now such things have been known to happen, and for a variety of reasons. But she has no feeling there at all, and because of that her face looks fallen a bit. You need to know that going in.”

Angela's hands went to her eyes.

“There's something else. We had to do a very preliminary exam to try and pinpoint whatever may be causing it. We found something else.”

“Found what?” Bucky asked.

Doc Sullivan took a deep breath. This time he didn't bother trying to smile. “Cordelia's pregnant.”

-6-

The elevator opened empty, and that was a good thing because Angela was crying. Bucky had never seen his wife do that. Not when Angela found she was pregnant herself. Not even back in '95 when Angela's momma caught cancer and her daddy had his stroke. She was saying, “How did this happen, Bucky?” and “Why didn't she come to me?” and “I can't let anything happen, I love her, I know I don't always show it but I do,” and Bucky could only stand there watching the floors light on the display and think all those same things.

They reached the fourth floor and never turned their heads as they traveled the hallway. Never peeked in to see Naomi enveloped by her parents and brother, her arm fluttering like a bird's broken wing. Her left eye blinked like something had gotten in it, or she knew a secret she couldn't tell. Belle kept laying a hand to her daughter's elbow, trying to still it, but that arm just kept flopping on.

Nor did Bucky and Angela see the Hodges standing outside Scarlett's door just a few feet from where Doc Sullivan had appeared to tell Wilson how they'd found all the cuts on his daughter's arms. The mayor only stared at the floor as he was told Scarlett had been maiming herself for a long while.

Bucky and Angela didn't even see the Fosters and Medric,
waiting out of respect for them to visit Cordelia first. No, friend, all the Vests could do was keep their eyes to the last door at the end of the hall, number 412. As they neared it, Angela took her husband's hand in her own.

Bucky knocked and eased the door open to find Cordelia sitting up in bed. An empty box of tissues sat on a small table hovering over her lap. Its contents lay balled and spilled into three piles that made it look like Cordy floated on a cloud. An IV had been stuck into the back of her hand. Machines beeped and flashed. Bucky saw none of that, nor did he see the way one side of his daughter's face looked like a blown tire sagging on a rim of bone. What he saw was only his sweet baby girl. His joy. Their blessing.

Cordy broke into a silent cry at the sight of them. There were so many things that must have gone through that poor girl's mind just then, all the secrets she'd hidden that now would come to light, but despite all that she could only bunch her lips as a single tear fell from the corner of her one good eye and ask, “Am I thtill pwetty?”

They rushed in, friend, Bucky and Angela both, neither caring how maimed their daughter looked nor what grew inside her young womb, wanting only to hold their child and wet her head and face with their kisses. At that bedside, Bucky discovered that a man could mourn how small he felt against all the world's dangers and still call himself a man. He wailed as he held Cordelia and did not care who heard or if he acted like the good person Danny Sullivan had asked him to be. And when all the crying was done, Bucky laid his daughter back against her pillow and wiped his eyes.