South Of Hell

Again, they were quiet for a long time.

“Something else is wrong,” Amy said. “With you and Mr. Kincaid.”

The closeness kept Joe from turning to see Amy’s face. “Why do you say that?” Joe asked.

“I can… sometimes I…” Amy let out a long breath. “Never mind.”

“Go ahead and finish what you were saying.”

Amy’s head dipped. “I know things sometimes,” she said softly. “Like I can hear people talking… but only to themselves. It feels weird, like…” Her head came up. “I was outside once when there was lightning. I could feel this tingling in my body when the lightning hit close. Do you know that feeling?”

“Yes, I do.”

“That’s how it feels when I can hear people talking to themselves. Like there is this lightning thing between us or something.”

Joe was silent.

“You and Mr. Kincaid,” Amy said. “You love each other.”

Joe hesitated. “Yes, we do.”

“And you feel like you and him… are… like you’re in the same room, but like it’s dark, and you can’t find him?”

Joe cleared her throat. “Yes.”

“He’s there, Miss Joe.”

Joe’s eyes welled.

“People lose each other in the dark sometimes. That’s what happened to me and Momma. Mr. Kincaid… he’s right there by your side. You can’t see him right now. But you have to just kind of believe. He’s there. You’ll find each other again.”

Joe couldn’t move. The night wind was cold on her face. But then, beneath the blanket, she felt the warmth of Amy’s hand covering her own.

Chapter Thirty-one

It was still dark when Louis slid from under the sheets. He dressed quickly, looked back at Joe curled deep in the blankets, and crept from the bedroom. The cartons from last night’s Chinese dinner still sat on the table. After glancing at Amy, fast asleep on the pullout sofa, Louis grabbed a leftover egg roll and slipped silently from the hotel room, locking the door behind him.

The campus was asleep as well, the wind kicking up the gutter litter of paper cups and cans from the night’s revelry. A misty rain followed him as he drove deep into the countryside.

He ate the cold egg roll and chased it down with Dunkin’ Donuts coffee as he drove. Just east of Hell, Louis flicked on the high beams, looking for the cutoff road to Talladay Trail. He spotted it at the last second and swung the Bronco hard onto the gravel road.

The sky was turning a muddy gray as he parked and picked his way through the high, wet grass to Lethe Creek. The creek was running fast and deep, swollen by the recent rains, and for a second, he thought about going back to the hotel and slipping in next to Joe’s warm body.

Instead, he turned up the collar of his jacket, found the same narrow part of the creek he had braved before, and waded across, grabbing on to low-hanging willow branches to stay upright.

With sodden shoes, he continued up the small incline to the cemetery. In the mist, the headstones seemed small, insubstantial things, like they were slowly being absorbed into the earth. Louis stood, looking down at Amos Brandt’s grave.

What am I doing here?

Looking for answers.

You don’t even know the questions, Louis.

He knew that a troubled sixteen-year-old girl had somehow come to believe she was a murdered black woman from long ago. And he knew he had to find an explanation for her memories. Yesterday, after the session at Dr. Sher’s home, he had asked Amy if she could remember ever visiting a cemetery. Amy said she had a fuzzy memory of old gravestones in trees. Had Jean brought her here once? Or had Geneva just told her about a family plot far beyond the cornfields?

Had she seen the name Isabel here?

A sound behind him made him spin around. He half expected to see the strange old man with his dog. But there was no one.

You got kin here?

The old man had asked him that. Why had it stuck in his mind?

Don’t you want to know where you come from?

Lily had asked him that.

And what had he answered? What would be the point?

It was a harsh thing to say to a child, let alone his own. He had realized it as soon as he said it. What made it worse, it was not something he even truly believed. He used to believe it, back when having no ties to anyone took the shape of freedom rather than loneliness.

What would be the point? He still wasn’t sure. Maybe just to feel connected to something tangible and unbroken? His mother was dead, and he had no idea where his half-brother and sister were, or if they were even alive. He had no one he could claim as his blood — except Lily.

The sun had broken through the clouds. The letters on Amos Brandt’s headstone took shape. Louis stared at them for a moment, then turned away.

He walked slowly through the clearing, examining every headstone he saw. Just the same names he had seen before.

There was one last piece of half-buried granite. He knelt in the damp grass, digging it out. His fingers stiff with cold, he scraped the dirt and moss out of the faded carved letters. It said: MURIEL BRANDT.

He hadn’t seen this one on his first visit. He stood up, wiping his muddy hands on his jeans. In the quickening light, he could see there were no other headstones he hadn’t examined.

No one named Isabel was buried here.

After one last look around the cemetery, he left.

Louis hung up the pay phone with a sigh. He had called Joe to tell her where he had gone. She hadn’t chastised him, but he could almost imagine what she was thinking: What are you doing chasing down ghosts in graveyards? She had, however, felt compelled to tell him they had only two days before they were scheduled to appear again in custody court.

He didn’t need to be reminded. The thought of turning Amy over to Owen Brandt made his stomach turn.

“You want a fresh cup?”

Louis looked up at the kid holding the coffee pot and nodded, going back to his stool. The kid refilled Louis’s mug and retreated to the far end of the counter to read his book.

Louis ate the last of his omelet, observing the kid. He was black and slender, with the red-rimmed eyes and chin stubble of a hard studier. It struck Louis that the kid had the same lone-wolf look he himself had at that age, when he had sat in this very seat at the Fleetwood Diner, lost in his prelaw books. Louis wondered what the kid was reading.

At that moment, the kid closed his book, giving Louis a look at the cover: Pathologic Basis of Disease. Louis smiled slightly. Premed.

“Excuse me,” Louis called out.

“You want more coffee?”

“No, just some help,” Louis said.

The kid came toward him, pushing his glasses up his nose. “With what?”

“Is there a historical society or something in Ann Arbor?”