not mine; mine were not the ghosts of the past, but a shadow of the future.
“You’ll have to come over to Bruton and see our new museum when it’s
done,” the Lady said to Mom. “We’ve raised money to start buildin’ onto the
recreation center. Should be finished in a couple of months. Gonna have a nice
exhibition room.”
“I’ve heard about it,” Mom said. “Good luck.”
“Thank you. Well, I’ll let you know when the openin’ ceremony’s gonna be.
Remember what I’ve told you, Mr. Mackenson.” She offered her violet-gloved
hand, and my father took it. He might be fearful of the Lady, but he was first
and foremost a gentleman. “You know where I live.”
The Lady rejoined her husband and Mr. Damaronde, then they walked out
into the warm, still night. We went out soon after them, and we saw them drive
away in not the rhinestone Pontiac but a plain blue Chevrolet. The last of the
attendees were talking on the sidewalk, and they took the time to tell me
again how much they’d enjoyed my reading. “Keep up the good work!” Mr. Dollar
said, and then I heard him brag to another man, “You know, I cut his hair.
Yessir, I’ve been cuttin’ that boy’s hair for years!”
We drove home. I kept my plaque on my lap, clenched with both hands.
“Mom?” I asked. “What kind of museum’s gonna be in Bruton? They gonna have
dinosaur bones and stuff?”
“Nope,” my father told me. “It’s gonna be a civil rights exhibit. I guess
they’ll have letters and papers and pictures, that kind of thing.”
“Slave artifacts is what I hear,” Mom said. “Like leg chains and brandin’
irons, would be my guess. Lizbeth Sears told me she heard the Lady sold that
big Pontiac and donated the money toward the buildin’ costs.”
“I’ll bet whoever burned that cross in her front yard isn’t exactly
whistlin’ ‘Dixie’ about this,” Dad observed. “The Klan’ll have somethin’ to
say, that’s for sure.”
“I think it’s a good thing,” Mom said. “I think they need to know where
they’ve been to know where they’re goin’.”
“Yeah, I know where the Klan wishes they’d go, too.” Dad slowed down and
turned the pickup truck onto Hilltop Street. I caught a glimpse of the Thaxter
mansion through the trees, its windows streaming with light. “She had a hard
grip,” Dad said, almost to himself. “The Lady, I mean.” We knew who he was
talking about. “Had a hard grip. And it was like she was lookin’ right into
me, and I couldn’t stop her from seein’ things that—” He seemed to realize we
were still there, and he abruptly canceled that line of thought.
“I’ll go with you,” Mom offered, “if you want to go see her. I’ll stay
right by your side the whole time. She wants to help you. I wish you’d let
her.”
He was silent. We were nearing the house. “I’ll think about it,” he said,
which was his way of saying he didn’t want to hear any more talk about the
Lady.
Dad might know where the Lady lived, and he might need her help to
exorcise the spirit that called to him from the bottom of Saxon’s Lake, but he
wasn’t ready yet. Whether he was ever going to be ready or not, I didn’t know.
It was up to him to take the first step, and nobody could make him do it. I
had to concern myself with other problems for now: the dream of the four black
girls, the Demon’s crush on me, how I was going to survive Leatherlungs, and
what I was going to write about next.
And the green feather. Always the green feather, its unanswered questions
taunting me from one of the seven mystic drawers.
That night, Dad hung the plaque on a wall in my room for me, right over
the magic box. It looked nice, up there between the pictures of a large fellow
with bolts in his neck and a dark-caped individual with prominent teeth.
I had been charged with power and tasted life tonight. I had taken my own
first step, however awkward, to wherever I was going. This feeling of sheer
exhilaration might fade, might wane under the weight of days and dimmish in
the river of time; but on this night, this wonderful never-to-be-again night,
it was alive.
3
Dinner with Vernon
TO SAY THE DEMON PESTERED ME IN THE FOLLOWING DAYS ABOUT coming to her
birthday party is like saying a cat has a fondness for the company of mice.
Between the Demon’s insistent whispering and Leatherlungs’ window-shaking
bellows, I was a bundle of nerves by Wednesday, and I still couldn’t divide
fractions.
On Wednesday night, just after supper, I was drying the dishes for Mom
when I heard Dad say from the chair where he was reading the paper, “Car’s
stoppin’ out front. We expectin’ anybody?”
“Not that I know of,” Mom answered.
The chair creaked as he stood up. He was going out to the porch. Before
he went out the door, he gave a low whistle of appreciation. “Hey, you oughta
come take a look at this!” he said, and then he went outside. We couldn’t
resist this invitation, of course. And there parked in front of our house was
a long, sleek car with a paint job that gleamed like black satin. It had wire
wheels and a shiny chrome grille and a windshield that seemed a mile wide. It
was the longest and most beautiful car I’d ever seen, and it made our pickup
truck look like a crusty old scab. The driver’s door opened and a man in a
dark suit got out. He came around the car and stepped onto our lawn, and he
said, “Good evening” in an accent that didn’t sound like he was from around
here. He came on up the walk, into the porch light’s circle, and we all saw he
had white hair and a white mustache and his shoes were as shiny and black as
the car’s skin.
“Can I help you?” Dad asked.
“Mr. Thomas Mackenson?”
“Tom. That’s me.”
“Very good, sir.” He stopped at the foot of the steps. “Mrs. Mackenson.”
He nodded at my mother, then he looked at me. “Master Cory?”
“Uh… I’m Cory, yes sir,” I said.
“Ah. Excellent.” He smiled, and he reached into the inside pocket of his
coat and his hand came out holding an envelope. “If you please?” He offered
the envelope to me.
I looked at Dad. He motioned for me to take it. I did, and the
white-haired man waited with his hands clasped behind his back as I opened it.
The envelope was sealed with a circle of red wax that had the letter T
embossed in it. I slid from the envelope a small white card on which there
were several lines of typed words.
“What’s it say?” Mom leaned over my shoulder.
I read it aloud. “‘Mr. Vernon Thaxter requests the pleasure of your
company at dinner, on Saturday, September 19, 1964, at seven o’clock P.M.
Dress optional.’”
“Casual wear recommended,” the white-haired man clarified.
“Oh my,” Mom said; her worry-bead words. Her brows came together.
“Uh… can I ask just who you are?” Dad inquired, taking the white card
from me and scanning it.
“My name is Cyril Pritchard, Mr. Mackenson. I am in the employ of the
Thaxter household. My wife and I have looked after Mr. Moorwood and young
master Vernon for almost eight years.”
“Oh. Are you… like… the butler or somethin’?”
“My wife and I serve as we’re required, sir.”
Dad grunted and frowned, his own mental worry-beads at work. “How come
this was sent from Vernon and not from his father?”
“Because, sir, it’s Vernon who wishes to have dinner with your son.”
“And why is that? I don’t recall Vernon ever meetin’ my boy.”
“Young master Vernon attended the Arts Council awards ceremony. He was
very impressed with your son’s command of the language. You know, he had
aspirations of being a writer himself at one time.”
“He wrote a book, didn’t he?” Mom asked.
“Indeed he did. The Moon My Mistress was its title. Published in 1958 by
Sonneilton Press in New York City.”
“I took it out from the library,” Mom admitted. “I have to say I wouldn’t
have bought it, not with that bloody meat cleaver on the front. You know, I
always thought that was odd, because the book was more about life in that
little town than the butcher who… well, you know.”
“Yes, I do know,” Mr. Pritchard said.
What I didn’t know until later was that the butcher in Vernon’s book had
cut out a different intestine from a number of ladies every time the moon was
full. Everybody in the fictional town raved over the butcher’s
steak-and-kidney pies, spicy Cajun sausages, and lady-finger meat-spread
sandwiches.
“It wasn’t bad, though, for a first novel,” Mom said. “Why didn’t he
write another one?”
“The book unfortunately didn’t sell, for whatever reason. Young master
Vernon was… shall we say… disenchanted.” His gaze returned to me. “What shall
I tell young master Vernon in regards to the dinner invitation?”
“Hold your horses.” Dad spoke up. “I hate to state the obvious, but
Vernon’s not… well, he’s not in any mental shape to entertain guests up at
that house, is he?”
Here Mr. Pritchard’s stare went icy. “Young master Vernon is perfectly
capable of entertaining a dinner guest, Mr. Mackenson. In response to your
implied concern, your son would be safe with him.”
“I didn’t mean any offense. It’s just that when somebody walks around
naked all the time, you’ve got to believe he’s not rowin’ with both oars. I
can’t figure why Moorwood lets him go around like that.”
“Young master Vernon has his own life. Mr. Thaxter has decided to let him
do as he pleases.”
“That’s clear to see,” Dad said. “You know, I haven’t seen hide nor hair
of Moorwood in… oh, I guess over three years. He was always a hermit, but
doesn’t he ever come up for air anymore?”
“Mr. Thaxter’s business is taken care of. His rents are collected and his
properties maintained. That was always his principal pleasure in life, and so
it remains. Now: what may I tell young master Vernon, please?”
Vernon Thaxter had had a book published. A mystery, by the sound of it. A
real book, by a real New York City publisher. I might never get the chance to
talk to a real writer again, I thought. I didn’t care if he was crazy, or
walked around in his birthday suit. He had knowledge of a world far beyond
Zephyr, and though this knowledge may have scorched him, I was interested in
finding out his own experiences with the magic box. “I’d like to go,” I said.
“That’s a yes, I presume?” Mr. Pritchard asked my parents.
“I don’t know, Tom,” my mother said. “One of us ought to go, too. Just in
case.”
“I understand your hesitation, Mrs. Mackenson. I can only tell you that
my wife and I know young master Vernon to be a gentle, intelligent, and
sensitive man. He doesn’t have any friends, not really. His father is and has
always been very distant to him.” Again, the ice crept back into Mr.
Pritchard’s eyes. “Mr. Thaxter is a single-minded man. He never wanted young
master Vernon to be a writer. In fact, up until quite recently he refused to
allow the library to stock copies of The Moon My Mistress.”
“What changed his mind?” Mom asked.
“Time and circumstances,” Mr. Pritchard replied. “It became clear to Mr.
Thaxter that young master Vernon did not have the aptitude for the business
world. As I’ve said, young master Vernon is a sensitive man.” The ice left
him; he blinked, and even offered a shade of a smile. “Pardon me. I didn’t
mean to ramble on about concerns with which I’m sure you don’t wish to be
bothered. But young master Vernon is eager for an answer. May I tell him yes?”
“If one of us can go, too,” Dad told him. “I’ve always wanted to see the
inside of that house.” He looked at Mom. “Is that all right with you?”
She thought about it for a minute. I watched for signs of a decision: the
chewing of her lower lip usually brought forth a no, whereas a sigh and slight
twitch of the right corner of her mouth was a yes being born. The sigh came
out, then the twitch. “Yes,” she said.
“Very good.” Mr. Pritchard’s smile was genuine. He seemed relieved that a
positive decision had been reached. “I’ve been instructed to tell you that
I’ll pick you up here on Saturday evening at six-thirty. Is that suitable,
sir?”
The question was directed to me. I said it would be fine.
“Until then.” He gave us all a stiff-backed bow and walked to the
black-satin-skinned car. The noise the engine made starting up was like hushed
music. Then Mr. Pritchard drove away, and turned at the next intersection onto
the upward curve of Temple Street.
“I hope everything’ll be all right,” Mom said as soon as we were back in
the house. “I have to say, Vernon’s book gave me the willies.”
Dad sat down in his chair again and picked up the sports page where he’d
left off. All the headlines were about Alabama and Auburn football games, the
religions of autumn. “Always wanted to see where ol’ Moorwood lives. I guess
this is as good an opportunity as I’ll get. Anyhow, Cory’ll have a chance to
talk to Vernon about writin’.”
“Lord, I hope you don’t ever write anythin’ as gruesome as that book
was,” Mom said to me. “It’s strange, too, because all that gruesome stuff just
seemed sewn in where it didn’t have to be. It would’ve been a good book about
a small town if all that murder hadn’t been in there.”
“Murders happen,” Dad said. “As we all know.”
“Yes, but shouldn’t a book about life be good enough? And that bloody
meat cleaver on the cover… well, I wouldn’t have read it to begin with if
Vernon’s name hadn’t been on it.”
“All life isn’t hearts and flowers.” Dad put down his paper. “I wish it
was, God knows I do. But life is just as much pain and mess as it is joy and
order. Probably a lot more mess than order, too. I guess when you make
yourself realize that, you”—he smiled faintly, with his sad eyes, and looked
at me—“start growin’ up.” He began reading an article about the Auburn
football team, then he put it aside again as another thought struck him. “I’ll
tell you what’s strange, Rebecca. Have you seen Moorwood Thaxter in the last
two or three years? Have you seen him just once? At the bank, or the
barbershop, or anywhere around town?”
“No, I haven’t. I probably wouldn’t even know what he looks like,
anyway.”
“Slim old fella. Always wears a black suit and a black bow tie. I
