The Darkening Dream (7 page)

“I don’t know much about American churches,” he told her. “But if you need information on fussy Orthodox patriarchs, I’m your man. Tales of old martyrs are my grandfather’s idea of bedtime stories.”

Sarah raised the eyebrow he could see. “The man sounds more and more interesting. Nothing like thumbscrews and hot pokers to send you off to sleep.”

“Well, now—”

A boy kicked his desk. “Wop, you sitting behind the Christ-killer?”

This sort deserved to be stomped faster than an Athenian roach. Alex stood up.

“Apologize to the lady,” he said.

It happened fast. The bully shoved Alex’s shoulder with his palm.

He shoved back. Hard. Caught off guard, the boy tumbled backward into a bolted desk, couldn’t regain his balance, and crashed to the floor.

Everybody in the class erupted in laughter.

Except for the bully and Mrs. Fletcher.

Which was how Alex ended up having a private audience with Principal Burnsworth.

After what amounted only to a stern warning, Alex found Sam in the cafeteria waiting for his plate of overcooked food. In Greece, nothing was so organized or institutional. Today Alex received split pea soup, bread and butter, veal stew with vegetables, lima beans, milk, and a strange confection called a raisin layer cake.

“Sarah and I have been friends a long time,” Sam said as they each handed over a nickel. “But my sister could use a hand on the reins.”

Americans were so blunt. “If Paris had met Anne instead of Helen,” Alex said, “there’d have been no Trojan War.”

“I assume that means you think she’s pretty?”

“An understatement.”

Sam beamed and slapped Alex on the back again. He might end up with a bruise.

Sarah and the Williams girls were already seated. Anne was regaling Emily with advice about her teachers, and Emily looked bored. Sarah had brought her own lunch, a sandwich and an apricot.

“You don’t like the school food?” Alex asked.

“My mother packs mine — religious dietary laws. I can’t eat milk and meat at the same time, or pork at all.”

That made him think of the incident with the bully.

“I hope what happened this morning isn’t a regular occurrence.”

“It was just words,” she said. “I’m sorry you got in trouble.”

“Boys can be mean.” He had a knife scar on his thigh to prove that. “They’re just as bad back home and we didn’t even have—”

“Jews?” She giggled.

Sam sat next to his sisters, but he kept glancing at Alex and Sarah.

“I never knew any. My grandfather says everyone draws power from their own faith.”

“That’s very enlightened.”

“I’m not sure that’s the right word for him.” Alex smiled. “But Greeks have lots of rules, too. The faithful are advised to avoid olive oil, meat, fish, milk and dairy products every Wednesday and Friday, and to fast for forty days before Christmas, and forty-eight before Easter—”

“No special restrictions for the third Monday in October?” She looked at his plate.

“Probably some saint’s day. We haven’t followed all those since I was little.”

“I
was
kidding,” she said.

“It’s still hard for me to identify sarcasm in English,” Alex said.

“We can offer you plenty of practice,” Anne said.

Alex couldn’t help but laugh with the rest of them.

Anne banged the table with both hands to get everybody’s attention — which, of course, she already had.

“Lots of folk are going to the Willows on Thursday night. Let’s go while we can — it’s closing for the season soon, and there’s talk of instituting a curfew because of the murder.”

Whatever the Willows was, it had to be more exciting than another macabre evening with Grandfather.

Eight:

An Unusual Conversation

Salem, Massachusetts, Wednesday, October 22, 1913

A
NNE HAD BEEN RIGHT
about the funeral, Charles’ coffin was closed. He’d been Emily’s only friend in the youth group bible study, but he was finished studying now. Thinking about him gave her a peculiar sensation, not so different from riding down the big hill of the Willows water chute. It made her want to cry and at the same time pulled the corners of her mouth into a grin.

Pastor Parris’ gaunt face was crowned by a slick of brown hair combed back from his high forehead. When he grew animated — as he always did when denouncing sin — this sheet often tumbled across his face, only to be swept back, immediately and compulsively, by one hand or the other.

The pastor was always nice to her because she helped out around church. Sometimes he’d bless her with warm hands that made her skin crawl a little. But his sermons, even the hair-flipping kind, could be awfully repetitive. He seemed to take the whole hell thing very seriously. Emily had a fantasy about hell she liked. She was nude and a bunch of red-skinned demons cooked her up for dinner. It didn’t hurt. Usually they cut her open and stuffed her insides with fruit and stale bread. Sometimes they boiled her naked in a big pot. Thinking about it made the place between her legs buzz. Besides, she was going to heaven, so it really wasn’t an issue.

The boring part done, everyone milled about to offer condolences. Emily stood to the side with the twins, who were arguing. They did that a lot, particularly if no one else was around. Evidently, Emily counted as ‘no one else.’

“Sammy, if that little bit of sand you’re hinting about has even begun to put on a layer of pearl, I’ll cut off your head before you can blink.”

Now that sounded like an interesting hell-type sermon.

“I can’t help what I feel,
Annie.
” They hardly ever used their nicknames any more.

“Your feelings aren’t even real,” Anne said. “We’ve all been friends forever, and it’s going to stay that way. You know you’re competitive — it’s probably just because we met Alex.”

“I’m not competitive,” he said. “And I like Alex, and it’s great to have another man around. I might be a better shot, but I never saw a finer horse than Bucephalus — his riding ain’t bad, either.”

He smiled at her. Emily knew that smile. He was up to something.

He said, “You like horses. Maybe you two should go riding.”

Anne glared at him, but before she could say anything their parents returned.

“Mommy, I need to ask the pastor about one of our Bible assignments,” Emily said. There weren’t any, but her mother wouldn’t know that.

“I wanted to thank you for delivering such a nice service,” she said. “Charles was my friend.”

Pastor Parris looked down at her. “I have to go back to the parish and close up. Have a good evening, Emily.”

“I can help if you like.”

“That won’t be necessary. I’ll see you Sunday.”

Disappointing. If she went straight home, she’d have no excuse to avoid chores or homework. The schoolwork she’d eventually have to do, but if she dodged the chores long enough, Sam would take care of them. She drifted back to her parents.

“I volunteered to help the pastor close up.”

Technically it wasn’t a lie. And anyway, if they made the twins include her no deceit would be—

“Fine, Emily,” her mother said. “Just be home before dark.”

Emily dawdled in the old graveyard near the church, long full now. The new cemetery where Charles was buried was a few blocks away. Funny to think of a graveyard full up, packed with bones. She played at jumping from grave to grave, trying to land wherever she thought a skull might be — six feet under, of course. By the time the pastor returned to enter the small wooden building, the sun had almost set.

She crept over to the church door and peered into the sanctuary. The central room was dark, the orange glow from the sky streaming in through the high windows. The pastor must have gone into his office, so she slipped inside. She walked slowly down the middle aisle on her toes, trying not to let the old floorboards betray her. Halfway to the altar, she slid into a hardwood pew. She folded her good dress carefully and sat, studying the altar and its single plain crucifix.

Perhaps she should leave before the pastor returned. A loud flapping from the entrance sent her beneath the pew to lie on the wooden floor.

The church door swung open with a loud squeal. Heavy boots clomped on the floorboards as someone strode down the aisle toward the altar. Her vantage on the floor allowed her to see only the shoes as they passed and then stopped, perhaps fifteen feet away. She’d never seen boots like these, black, with high heels, like a woman’s, but square-toed and fuzzy, as if made of suede. Adorned with a fancy pattern. Black on black.

She heard the pastor’s door creak and his lighter footsteps.

“Evening, sir,” he said. “There are no services at this time, but may I help you?”

The boots rotated to face him, but their owner remained silent. Then Pastor Parris spoke again.

“This place is forbidden to your kind.”

The stranger made a noise she’d never heard a person make, like a tomcat guarding its food.

“The crucified god holds no power over me. I spit in his blood and grind his host under my boot.”

Despite the nasty words, the man’s voice was smooth and calm, soft, like the ringing of small, deep bells. For the first time today, Emily was scared.

Pastor Parris’ brown leather shoes took two steps closer to the boots.

“This is no papist palace. Be gone! Before I tumble you back into the pit.”

The man made the cat noise again. Emily thought it might even be a laugh. Then she heard his voice again, but it couldn’t be said to come from any particular place in the church, instead echoing all around her.
Come to me, John Parris. I have crossed the great water with a message for you. I have braved sea, sun, and rats to set you to this task
.

It was all Emily could do to remain on the floor. She had the strongest, most senseless urge to crawl into the aisle and run to the dark stranger. The pastor’s movement stopped her, his brown leather shoes advancing on the funny black boots.

Come to me,
the voice that wasn’t exactly a voice repeated.

The shoes edged even closer.

Come.

The stranger called the pastor across the small space that still separated them like a man coaxing a kitten.