Beau stopped. “
“Yeah. We got two days to get our shit together.”
“Why so soon?”
Finch looked annoyed. “It isn’t
-24-
“I once beat a man until he cried like a baby just for looking at my sister the wrong way,” Jeremiah Krall said. “What makes you think I won’t chop your goddamn head off for deliverin’ her to me dead?”
Papa shook his head. “Because it ain’t my doin’, that’s why. I can understand what you must be feelin’ right now: hurt, anger, sadness, but you’re quarrel ain’t with me. Outsiders done this, and if what Momma said before she died has any truth to it, then it won’t be long before they send folks to try to get us. I figure you might appreciate bein’ here to see their murderin’ faces when they do.”
They were standing at the back of the battered truck they had bought from Lawrence Hall, the old mechanic back in Elkwood. Stricken by fear at the sight of Papa-In-Gray limping into his garage, he’d sold the vehicle for a song and eschewed the paperwork in an effort to be clear of him quicker. But from the start, the truck hadn’t run right. It didn’t much favor steep inclines and spluttered a lot, but it was better than nothing, and they’d only needed it to get them as far as Radner County, and Krall’s place. Once they got settled, assuming Krall allowed them to stay, they could seek out a replacement and dispose of Hall’s junker.
In the bed of the truck was an enormous dirty white tarp they had once used to drag bodies from one shed to another and to cover logs in winter. It was raised up enough to obscure the small window at the back of the truck’s cab, but Papa sensed the three boys watching.
“What happened to her?” Krall asked. There had been no discernible change in his tone since he’d first stepped foot into the cabin. Even the news of his sister’s death hadn’t appeared to rattle him, but Papa guessed he should be glad of that. Another man might have used his grief as an excuse to kill the messenger.
“Heart, I reckon. She’s had problems for a while.”
“You
“We didn’t have no time to get her seen to, and there weren’t much sense in it. She was gone, and we needed to be quick about leavin’.”
The tarp moved. Papa saw it and was not surprised, but he saw Krall frown and look around, as if expecting to find the wind had risen suddenly. It hadn’t, and he drew his gaze back to the truck.
The tarp moved again, rising in the middle as if the body underneath was struggling to get up.
“Now what the hell is this?” Krall said, and despite his apparent fearlessness, moved back a step. “You sure she’s dead?”
Papa nodded a single time. “I’m sure.”
This time something seemed to punch at the tarp from underneath. Rainwater that had puddled in the folds ran down the material.
“If’n you let varmints get at her, ’ol man, you ain’t drawin’ another breath,” Krall told Papa. Now that the initial surprise had abated, the man’s gruff tone had returned, though it was laced with a note of confusion.
Without a word, but not without effort, Papa grabbed the edge of the truck bed and hauled himself up. Krall watched impassively as the old man began to untie the cords that were restraining the now pulsating corpse. Rain made the sound of fingernails drumming against the material as Papa hunkered down with a wince—his leg had been bothering him since the night Luke had clipped him with the fender of the truck, and it was not showing any signs of getting better—and grabbed the upper hem of the tarp. He paused, both for effect, and to look up at the boys. Aaron, Isaac and Joshua had their faces pressed against the cab window, their features misted by their breath against the glass. He offered them a faint smile. All the way here Aaron had chatted excitedly to his silent brothers about the unveiling Papa had promised them once they reached Krall’s cabin, and now Papa was keeping that promise.
The old man glanced over his shoulder at Krall, who stood in the rain looking as fierce as always, but now he looked curious too.
“I’m sorry for your loss,” Papa told him. “And mine too. But it’s times like these we got to think about rebirth, about the good that can come from tragedy. Momma-In-Bed asked me to make her a promise and to let you know it was her wish.”
He began to unroll the tarp. Maggots spilled out onto the truck bed. Noxious fumes rose from the corpulent remains, but they did not bother Papa. To him it was a sweet perfume and one he would miss once they put his wife in the ground. He took a moment to whisper a short prayer over the body, then rose and tugged the covering away from her. Underneath, she was naked, the enormous mounds of skin a bluish gray.
“Goddamn maggots,” Krall said in disgust and waved a hand. “It’s them that’s makin’ her move.”
Papa looked at him serenely. “No,” he said. “It isn’t.” With a nod he indicated the thick black stitching that ran from the base of Momma’s throat to her groin. Some of the stitches had ripped. Krall stepped up onto the bed to get a better look, though there was scarcely room, and the truck was in danger of flipping over backward under his weight. He stooped forward a little and shook his head, then looked coldly at Papa.
“You said you didn’t bring her to a doctor.”
“Correct.”
“So who cut her opened?”
“We did. At her request.”
“The hell for?” Krall was outraged.
Suddenly Momma’s midsection lurched upward, pushed from within, sending maggots tumbling, and he took another involuntary step back. The truck rocked on its wheels.
Papa reached into his coat and produced from within a pocketknife, the edge well maintained and razor- sharp. “Momma died from fear, Jeremiah,” he said. “She knew our world was comin’ to an end, and couldn’t bear the thought of us bein’ claimed. They already poisoned our baby girl, and then Luke. She loved that boy and wanted to take him back. To give him another chance.” He smiled. “So that’s what we done.”
He bent low, stuck the blade between two of the stitches, and began to saw at them. The pressure from within the corpse subsided. It took only a moment for the thread to snap, the flesh to gape, and when it did Krall joined him in looking down.
“Jesus Christ Almighty,” Krall whispered in horror.
“Rebirth,” Papa said simply, as both men stared down at the fingers slowly wriggling out from inside Momma-In-Bed’s corpse.
-25-
“What are you doing up?” Kara asked. “It’s late.”
Claire shrugged, and fingered the cell phone on the kitchen table, setting it spinning. She watched the slow revolutions until it came to a stop, then did it again. “Couldn’t sleep.”
“Well, you should try. I have some pills.”
“I don’t need pills. I’m sick of pills.”
Kara, dressed in a pair of red silk pajamas, came around the table and sat down opposite her sister. Claire’s eye was swollen from crying, the lid puffy, and there were dark bags beneath both sockets. Her hair, always so lustrous, was lank and tousled. Kara didn’t imagine she herself looked any better. She had slept a little, but not much. Worry for her sister, and the memory of her conversation with Finch had kept her awake.
She looked around the kitchen, quiet but for the sound of Claire playing with the phone. It seemed odd seeing the room like this. Ordinarily such a hodge-podge of activity, for both girls and their mother loved—or had
