The Good House Part 24

"I'm sure. He had on his collar." That was a lie, but a forgivable one, Angela thought. "Sweetie, I'm so, so sorry. We both are."

Utter, stark silence again.

Angela stopped at a picnic table and sat against the rough, damp tabletop, feeling the rainwater seep into the seat of her jogging pants. From where she sat, the expanse of the rain-spattered lake stretched out on one side while the oldest and most regal homes in town sat tranquilly on the other. This was a peaceful place, she realized. That was why she had come, because she would need to h.o.a.rd all the peace she could find.

"What happened?" Naomi said finally.

Angela paused, wondering if Naomi really wanted to know her dog had been found in pieces. She chose mercy. "We're not sure," she said. "A snakebite, maybe."

Naomi sobbed, a squeal. Naomi finally believed her, and Angela was sorry both for the lies and the truth. She cursed herself for not knowing better in the beginning. She never should have brought Naomi to Sacajawea.

"I was so scared something would happen to him in those woods. Wasn't I, Angela? That first day, when he was gone, I was so scared he was in the woods all by himself. Before I left, I knew something had happened to him. Iknew it. I-" Her next sob stole her speech.

Angela let her friend cry. She'd needed that at one time, when she called her friends to cry, until she was sick of hearing her own misery. She waited, gazing at a brown duck paddling between stalks of gra.s.s in the water with her line of four ducklings, a sight that nearly mesmerized her. "Here's what you should do, Naomi," Angela said after a time, and Naomi quieted, eager to be told. "Don't stay at that hotel. There's no reason for you to be there. But don't come here."

"What about..."

"I've already taken care of Onyx for you. He's buried in the woods." That lie elicited another sob, but this time Angela didn't wait for the spell to pa.s.s. "I'll have Suzanne book you a room at the nicest spa she can find up there. Go somewhere pretty, like a hot springs. Pamper yourself. The works. Blow your diet. Eat ice cream. Do you hear me?"

Naomi made a vaguely affirmative sound.

"I think that's the best thing for you now. You're hurting. Take care of yourself for a few days, then go back to work. It's my treat."

"I can't let you do that, Angela," Naomi said. Her voice was tear-racked.

"You don't have a choice. I am doing it. I want to."

"Only if you come with me," Naomi said.

"I can't, sweetie."

"Why not? You took the week off." She was nearly whimpering.

"I'm stuck here for a while. Something's going on."

"Something like what?"

Angela paused. There was no way to explain it, but she decided to try.

"Like when Corey shot himself. And when my neighbor walked into a truck. And when you went sleepwalking into the cellar. And when Onyx died. That kind of something."

"Angela, you're scaring me. Justleave that place."

"I can't. Whatever's happening here started with my family."

"So?"

"It's mine," Angela said, because she could think of no other way to put it. "I own it."

"You're talking crazy."

"I know," she said, smiling to herself. "Don't worry. I'm sleeping in a hotel, and I won't stay in town long. Will you go to a spa?"

"I'll think about it," Naomi whispered.

"Just do it. Please." She paused. "Naomi...have you been sick at all?"

"What do you mean?"

"Have you had a stomachache since you left here? Anything strange?"

"I just got a headache, but my stomach's all right. Why?"

Angela had called Liza's house that morning and posed a single question to her exhausted father, who was the only one in the house who could compose himself enough to come to the line. After apologizing for the intrusion, Angela asked him a single question:Did Art say he wasn't feeling well before yesterday? As a matter of fact, Mr. Kerr told her, Liza had said Art had a bellyache the night before Glenn died.

Angela had felt better while she was running, but now the foreboding that had begun in earnest last night was gathering strength. Didn't she feel a slight heat in her arms, the tingling again? She was almost sure of it, and her heart quickened. "There's something going around town. That's another reason you need to stay up there. I want to make sure you're okay, because I love you, Naomi. And I'm so sorry about Onyx."

She heard Naomi's sniffling nostrils as she cried to herself. "If I promise to go to a spa, do you promise to leave that house as soon as you can? Before something else happens?"

"I promise," Angela said, although she doubted it was a promise she could keep.

Les Mysteres.

"People ask, 'Why has this Evil come?'

Why does the rain come?

It has its time."

-MARIE TOUSSAINT.

Le Livre des Mysteres.

1929.

Twenty.

FROM THE NOTES OF.

MARIETOUSSAINT.

IWAS THE FIFTH OF FIVE CHILDREN,the youngest; and, some would say, the most spoiled. My siblings Charles, Gil, Henrietta, and Nadine preferred each other's company, as I was born much later, so I spent my time either playing alone or atGrandmere's knee. She liked to tell me she had been waiting for me, asking, "Why did it take you so long to get here,cher?"She chided me as if I'd had a choice in the matter. "I got here fast as I could, Grandmere,"I told her, laughing as her dry fingertips tickled my soft belly.

Grandmerewas a manbo,her talents widely sought after. Throughout my childhood, Madame Fleurette, as she called herself, was visited by all the walks of life inhabiting New Orleans; colored and white, rich and poor, unschooled and well-schooled. A white man with a handlebar moustache came to her once because he wanted to go to the state senate, and he sent our family boxes of sweets and cookies for six Christmases after he won that gilded seat. He later became a United States Congressman, but by then his Christmas packages had stopped arriving. Grandmeresaid he should have been thanking Ogou la Flambo and Shang, because you would never want to go to battle without them at your side. People always forget those who have helped them. I learned this young, but knowing this did not save me from my fate, from my own forgetting.

From the start, I lovedvodouand the lwasmore than my brothers and sisters, and more, it seemed, than my own mother, who was a manboin her youth, favored with visits from spirits in her dreams. I knew we owed our home, our clothes, and our luck to the lwas,and to the blessings of Jesus Christ, whose crucifix hung above my bed at night. Grandmeretrained me from the time I was young. I was only seven years old when my sweet Papa Legba came to me the first time, when Grandmeremade her ritual call, "Papa Legba! Ouvri barye,"so he would open the doorway to the lwas, and suddenly I felt as if I was floating into the sky. I remembered none of what happened next, but I was told Papa Legba bent my spine as if it belonged to a twisted old man, and I hobbled about, speaking with Papa Lebga's tongue, a tongue of an elder. I was a marvel, because it is rare for a lwato mount a child; the danger to young ones is too great because they are not yet strong enough to carry such a burden. Yet, I was that strong as a child. As a child, I am convinced, I was the strongest I have ever been. Papa Legba has always favored me, and my love for him was sown early in my years.

One day, when she feared she was near death,Grandmerebade me to wear her ring. I was but twelve, so the ring was too large for my ring finger, but she fitted it to my thumb. "So I will always be able to find you," she said. I did not know the meaning of her words at the time, but I was happy to take possession of such a lovely ring, especially since she had not offered it to my brothers or sisters. I studied the ring's ritual artwork, and I did not recognize the veveas those I had seen her draw on the ground, cornmeal slipping delicately between her fingers as she called thelwas.I asked Grandmereto explain the ring's drawings to me, and she said they were from an ancestor's dream, that the ring had been mined in West Africa. The drawings were clues to a secret language known only to our bloodline, telling our story, preserving our power. "Through this ring," Grandmeretold me, "I will tell you the language of the lwas,so you may speak to them as an equal."

Such talk was not unusual for mygrandmere,who had often been accused of pomposity, even heresy, thinking so much of herself. I had a.s.sumed her critics were only jealous, since no other manboin New Orleans, in Louisiana, or perhaps in the whole of the South, could claim her power. Hundreds of people came from miles about for her rain ceremonies, and her successes with healing rituals were legend. Grandmereoften made the claim that she was kin to the great priestess Marie Laveau, a lie-but there was enough truth ground up in her lies to serve the lwasand the people well. Even people who did not like her arrogance came to her when they needed help.

Grandmeretaught me young that I was not bound by the rules that governed others. Our wealth and standing gave us privileges, she said. As a consequence, when I was in town, I dared to go places designated only for whites, much to my parents' mortification. Grandmeregave me courage. In Africa, she told me, our direct ancestors could take wing and fly. It was our birthright, she said, to create miracles. With my ring, she said, I would grow up to make a great miracle take place, something no other manboor bkcould claim. I would become the head family spirit.

I have waited all of my life for the miracleGrandmerepromised. There are times I have come close to destroying these papers because I became convinced she lied to me, another of her elaborate stories meant to serve as a metaphor, not literal truth. There are times I have wanted to destroy these papers whether her words were lies or not, so great is the power of what lies within these pages. Twice, I have thrown the ring she gave me away, and twice I have retrieved it; once, I had to search an open field for a month before I found it glimmering in the sun. It is a terrible dilemma: I blame the ring, and I blame the word, and yet only the ring and the word can restore what has been ruined. I loathe the ring and the word, and still I must cherish them.

There has been a curse upon me. Perhaps "bad eyes," the plague of too much jealousy, led to my change of luck afterGrandmeredied. I was blind to the curse until it was too late.

I did not speak for a full year afterGrandmeredied when I was eighteen, so much did my heart ache. I expected her to come to me right away, in dreams and visions, but she did not. In her homeland of Haiti, the not-speaking disease, pa-pale,is said to usually come after childbirth, but in my case it was after a death. I hardly washed or ate. My family could do nothing with me.

It was Philippe Toussaint, the Creole young man who served as my father's attorney, who drew me from my prison of mourning, with his gentle smile, wit, and constant attentions. For two years, he courted me, and I would not have him. I did not want to be a wife right away, as so many others of my s.e.x did. I went to the Mary McLeod Hospital and Training School for Nurses, to learn nursing to complement myvodoupractice, and when I returned, Philippe was still waiting for me. Again, as I said, I was spoiled. Why should I settle for one thing or the other-my education or my suitor-when I could have both?

At last, we wed. He built me a lovely house very near my parents. We had a daughter, Dominique. I was no longer angry at life for the loss ofGrandmere,nor for the absence of her spirit.

Then, as if to prove its mean core, life became a horror.

That night is too painful to me to describe in full, but suffice it to say that one can hardly comprehend that human beings would be capable of such monstrosity. It began when Philippe grew interested in politics, encouraging other colored people to register to vote despite the stranglehold of Jim Crow. With my blessings, he could have ama.s.sed more power than any colored man in the history of the state, and there were many others who knew it. We were naive not to expect reprisals.

I had no warnings, no dreams. I had prayed for Philippe's safety, but it was not enough.

They came for him with their rifles at night, when we were sleeping. They pulled him from my bed, from my desperate embrace. My baby was too young to comprehend the violence, but Philippe was killed before our eyes."Remember the sight of this, n.i.g.g.e.r,"one of his torturers spat at me, as if I could forget a sight that could not have been more abhorrent if it had been a rendering from h.e.l.l itself.

Those men were all soon dead for their crime-thelwashelped me punish them-but that was small comfort to me. Papa Legba tried to console me by offering himself as my spirit-husband, a ceremony consecrated by a pretsavannfrom Haiti, a bush priest, with the signatures of witnesses dutifully collected on our marriage papers, and I swore to Papa Legba that no man of flesh should ever touch me on Sat.u.r.day, my spirit-husband's sacred day. But even as the new bride of so powerful and generous a lwaas dear Papa Legba, I could not shake myself from my mourning.

My heart died with Philippe. I barely had heart enough left for the child of mine, who now knew only one parent, but I did not give the baby to my sisters, as they begged me to. If only I had! Instead, I took my precious Dominique away from New Orleans, away from the South, as far from the place of her father's murder as I could go.

It was then thatGrandmerebegan to find my dreams and visions, offering me the miracle she had promised me as a girl.

It was then that my journey to d.a.m.nation began.

Twenty-One.

THURSDAY.

UNDER A RAINY SKYthe color of dirty snow, the creature that had once been Tariq Hill drove a 1968 bay-window Volkswagen microbus northbound on Interstate Five in southern Was.h.i.+ngton, nearly an hour past Portland. Onyx was curled on the pa.s.senger-side floorboard, either sleeping or pretending to. Onyx hadn't always been this quiet, but he'd wised up since Tariq caught him with a quick kick in the ribs two hours back. The dog had nearly ruined his telephone chat with that prissy Myles Fisher, with all the racket he'd been making. Tariq had wanted to kick Onyx two or three more times, but he'd stopped himself, counting to ten. He was getting better at that. Anger management.

Tariq opened the glove compartment and pulled out a handful of sunfaded ca.s.sette cases, spreading them across the pa.s.senger seat. Teddy Pendergra.s.s, Marvin Gaye, Al Green. Coincidentally, all his favorites. When he popped a ca.s.sette in the player, "I'm So Tired of Being Alone" mewled from the van's old speakers, distorting Al's voice with a hiss on the high notes. Still, the sound of the music was celestial. He remembered that much about who he had been. Music, so far, was his favorite souvenir of himself.

Tariq drove at seventy miles per hour, the precise speed limit, neither more nor less. He was in a hurry, but he would not be pulled over for speeding. He had no faith that he would be cordial if someone in a police uniform tried to delay him. He had never liked police uniforms much, the fault of a few bad apples. He remembered that too.

That b.i.t.c.h Marie was a bad apple. She had spoiled everything close to her, everyone she touched. Marie had been lost from her precious granddaughter for a time, but she would never be lost from thebaka who deviled her.

It was too bad he had won his knowledge so late, Tariq thought, or he'd have known from the start that Angie's line was spoiled, that she would be impossible, and that the boy would be as greedy as his great-grandmother. Tariq knew the entire shameful story, because thebaka With No Name had whispered it while it awakened within him, gleefully telling him about the downfall of the silly flesh creatures who tried to be G.o.ds.

Eshu had been too good to Marie and her forebears, thebaka said, favoring them blatantly with his attentions. That was Eshu's way, blinded by his love for his children. Over the ages, when Marie's line had called him from Yorubaland, or Cuba, or Haiti, or the Americas, praying for Eshu-Elegba, Eleggua, or Papa Legba-by any of the names by which he was known to them-Eshu came speedily. He had been generous, his eternal flaw. Foolishness!

One's children, thebaka said, can only be motivated by fear.

Yet, Eshu had bid his fellow spirits Yemoja and Oy to hold famines, earthquakes, and hurricanes at bay to save Marie's line a dozen times over. Most of her line had been spared slavery across the sea, but for those he had lost, Eshu had given voice to their prayers in the bellies of the great s.h.i.+ps, and they had stayed strong. He had rescued Marie'sgrandmere Fleurette from a shack in the swamp, brought children to Fleurette's barren womb, married her daughter Sonia well to thatpa.s.se blanc she loved so much, showered them in property and riches. And they had grown so vain!

When Marie's husband was killed, Eshu had hastened her grieving pleas to Ogun and Oy to wreak the penalties against those who had taken the unlucky man's life. Those murderers awakened with boils across their bodies, fire in their genitals, dying at the rate of one a year, and always at the anniversary of Marie's husband's death. Then, Eshu led Marie to the sacred grounds in the far west to begin her life afresh, far from the place her beloved died. He had given her free run of the land to use as she pleased.

And how had Eshu been repaid? Eshu, the great Trickster G.o.d, had himself been tricked.

"But you've learned better now, haven't you, Marie?" Tariq said. "You were only a silly flesh witch playing games. You were a child, Marie. You're still a child."

Eshu had led her to the land willingly, to the Crossroads Forest, but when Marie found it, she had become insufferable. She could have offered libations and sacrifices and collected sacred soil in a pouch to wear around her neck, across her breast. That soil would have suited her well enough, and thebaka there might have slept forever, undisturbed. She could have gone anywhere with the soil and ensured health and happiness for her children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren.

Instead, That b.i.t.c.h had been proud enough to steal the land.

Even that, though, was not the worst offense; the land had been stolen by others, and it recognized no owner. The land belonged to spirit, not to flesh. The red men had understood this about the land, and Marie should have known, too.

But even Eshu could not forgive the way she befouled the land.

Oh forgive me, Papa Legba, but I did not know,she claimed in so many prayers to him afterward, when she pretended to be shocked at the potency of her wishes. She, who had been tutored by Fleurette, a priestess who would have been burned as a witch in earlier times because she was so brazen with her gifts, governing crops, rain, and births. She, who had been taught the history of the line from which she was descended. She, whose dreams had revealed forgotten prayers, prayers from long before the Journey of her people across the sea. She, who wore the ring mined from gold blessed by the most powerful circle of priests in her people's original land. It was all the more impudent for her to claim she did not know her power!

And Marie was a clever one. She had kept her progeny in ignorance, stripping them of her knowledge, as if Eshu might be placated with so small a penance, and as if thebaka could so easily be banished from their trail. But it was too late for penance. And thebaka could not be so easily deceived. Thebaka had taken Marie's daughter easily. Marie's efforts were feeble. Thebaka would not be banished.

Especially now that it had taken the boy.

Tariq had once loved the boy, as a flesh creature. But silly was silly, whether or not the boy was his son. The boy had been too easy to fool. All flesh was easy to fool. So, thebaka would take the last of Marie's line, to make Marie an example. Thebaka had nearly fulfilled its lesson. Eshu, in his anger, would not intervene.

Angela Marie-daughter to Dominique, grandchild to Marie, great-great-grandchild to Fleurette-was the last of the line. Angie was the last.

Tariq could feel her nearby. He could see her face in the evergreens his bus drove past on the freeway, painted in the gaps between the trees. Her chiseled brown face was all around him now, bringing its own memories. But thebaka had warned Tariq: There would be trickery. There would be messengers. All of it was evidence of That b.i.t.c.h's pride, her effort to preserve her progeny. Marie and her line had held Tariq in sway for two years, through pure strength, or else he would have completed his calling much sooner. He couldn't discount her power, the power of her line.

But Marie's line was not the stronger of them. Tariq would teach her that, at last.

As a revelation came to him, Tariq opened his van's glove compartment and smiled at what he found: The gun lay there waiting atop the old registration papers, maps, and receipts that had migrated their way into the s.p.a.ce over the years. Its b.u.t.t was still wrapped in old tape, but its black barrel s.h.i.+ned as it never had. The gun had been taken when the boy died, impounded.

Tariq had lost this gun before. Thebaka, once again, had given it back.

There would be ironic beauty in taking Angie with this gun, Tariq realized. She had always been afraid of it; knowing, yet never understanding what she knew.

The sight of the gun brought back another ghost of memory: In his pure flesh life, Tariq and his brother Harry had heard gunshots through the wall of the bedroom they shared as children, the first time Tariq had heard the terrifying sound so close. Tariq couldn't remember the woman's name, but he remembered the thrill and shock of knowing their neighbor had committed a murder. She'd been a nice woman, that was the thing. A waving and smiling kind of woman whose home was one of the few places he, Harry, and their sisters were allowed to trick-or-treat. When he'd asked his father to make sense of how such a nice woman could turn around one day and shoot her husband to death, his father had told him,Sometimes you get mad. When you're mad enough, you can do anything. That was a lesson Leland Hill had taught his children many times before.

And Angie had seen it when he first brought home this gun. She'd seen how the bruises at his father's hand had left him eager to settle arguments with his fists, or with a weapon. He had never touched her that way, but he had wanted to. He may not have aimed that gun at her breast in life, but she knew he had many times in his imagination. She'd seen it in him, just like Brother Paul.