Four and Twenty Blackbirds

"But you know where to find me now." I sounded like I was pleading, and maybe I was. "I'm sorry I didn't call or anything, but I'll give you my room number and I won't change locations without letting you guys know. I promise." I meant it, too.



"You should call Lu."



"If I do, she'll just yell at me. She's probably not finished from yesterday."



"She's worried. And she hasn't been feeling well. Let her yell. It'll do her good."



"I'll think about it. What do you mean, not feeling well? She was fine last night."



"She's a tough old birdie, she is. She's all right. Don't worry about her."



"You take care of her, then."



"I always do, don't I?"



"Yeah."



"Call her," he said, patting my cheek. "I'm going to head on. My cell phone's in the car. On the way home I'll let her know you're alive, but you call her too. Let her hear your voice." He slung an arm around my shoulder, squeezing me with a half hug. "Be careful."



"I always am."



"You and I both know that's not the case."



"Yeah."



He turned to leave, pausing at the door. "Good-bye. I mean it, be careful."



"Maybe I will, and maybe I won't. But I sure won't do anything you wouldn't do."



"Dear God," he swore. "Don't put it that way, or we're both screwed."



I was about to hug him and send him on his way when I got an idea. "Hey, Dave?"



"Huh?"



"What do you know about the Seminoles?"



"The football team or the Indians? I know they're both from Florida, that's about it. Why?"



"The Indians. And, uh, no reason."



Dave thought a moment, ignoring my lie and leaving his hand on the door. "If you really want to know, there's a store downtown called the Crescent Moon. I went to school with the guy who owns it—we ended up at UT together for a while. He's not Native American himself, but he dabbles in the culture. He could help you out, maybe. His name's Brian Cole."



Of course. Leave it to Dave, the Answer Man. I should have known he'd have the right connections. "Brian Cole at the Crescent Moon?"



"Yeah, it's one of those incense-smelling New Age shops. Tell him I sent ya. I'd try to think up some directions, but since you've become such a master of the phone book, I'll trust you to figure it out on your own."



"Yeah, I will."



Only after he was gone did I begin to feel tired. It had been a big day, and it was getting late—at least late enough that an independent retail shop would not be open. I retreated to my room and turned on the TV, trying to find a local channel that wasn't covering the manhunt at Eliza's. They'd catch him, I knew they would; but I didn't really want to watch it.



I gave up and turned it off, then hit the lights as well, still not knowing what I intended to do in the morning.



My dreams took a strange turn that night.



I often dreamed of the ghosts, and of the sticky swampland that had haunted my childhood. Frequently enough I heard Mae's quiet crying or her sisters' warning pleas, but that night the voice was different.



It was not vague, or tearful. It was not begging, or demanding. It was simply calling.



Come home.



In my sleep-choked state, I tried to interrogate the speaker with half-formed questions. "Who are . . . ?" "Where is . . . ?" "Why do . . . ?" I tried to remember the name on the stone. "John Gray?"



Come home.



As in my youth, I saw the book again, sitting on the table beside the vials of powders and syrups. I approached it slowly, like struggling through tangible fog. I needed to see what was inside. I needed to look in the back. I put out my hands and touched the dry leather of the binding. It crackled beneath my touch, as though it were alive or on fire. A fine yellow powder that was not dust covered my fingertips. But the hands were not mine—they were not my fingertips. They were different, bigger or smaller or older or younger, different. I couldn't see them. I couldn't feel them. I began to panic.



"I can't feel my hands," I blurted out, fumbling with the book.



You don't need them here.



"I don't . . . I do need them. Everywhere." The book came open to a crinkly page covered with formulas and drawings. I think the sketches were plants, or trees, or roots; I saw words I didn't recognize: Korombay, diggi, sibitah kaaji . . . but the numbers ran together and I couldn't sort them out from one another. "What is this?"



You should know.



"But I don't." I lifted the pages and pushed them over to the left, ten or twenty at a time in order to reach the back cover. "What is this? What is this?"



The speaker was chanting, softly but with increasing volume.



Asi goun goun ma . . .



Asi goun goun ma . . .



Asi goun goun ma . . .



One more page. I held it between my thumb and index finger. "What is this?" I turned it.



Violently, a giant black bird flapped out, up towards the ceiling, then back down to peck at my head. I shrieked and dove away, shielding my face with one arm and trying to close the book with the other. I slammed the covers together but the bird did not stop its assault. I waved my arms, trying to push it away and meeting the feathery pressure of strong black wings beating the air around me.



You can't put him back now. He knows you're here.



"What is this?" No. Not the right question. "Who? Who is this?"



Laughter. You said a name. John Gray. How much do you know, after all?



I sat up, sweaty and cold. Calmed to find myself in my hotel room, I reclined against the pillows and panted until I'd caught my breath. I opened my eyes again expecting nothing but the ceiling fan.



Willa was standing above me, a knife in her hands aimed down at my chest. Not this time, you don't! she growled, plunging the blade down through my ribs.



I gasped.



It was then that I truly awakened, wet with fear, clutching the blankets around my neck. I hunkered into a crouch, leaning my back against the headboard and rocking myself back and forth like a child.



7



The Right Tree



I



When day broke, when light crawled under the heavy hotel curtains and spilled onto the floor, I was finally able to sleep a few hours more. Otherwise, I spent the night angry and afraid, curled in a rag-doll bundle with the covers up under my ears. Who did these ghosts think they were, harassing me like this?



I got up feeling drained and unhappy, and a shower did little to take the edge off of my misery. By way of distraction, I took the phone book out of the nightstand and looked up the Crescent Moon. The day clerk at the front desk supplied me with fuzzy directions that got me downtown all right, but then lost me. I had to stop at a gas station and get more directions, and thereby learned that the day clerk had been off by miles. Lovely. Once I did get to the correct block, parking was tricky; but the Death Nugget is small and I can parallel park in two flawless moves, so the situation remained manageable despite my grumpy frame of mind.



The Crescent Moon was just as Dave implied—thick with incense smoke and light with imported fabrics. Candles of every color were grouped in clumps according to their scents: musky and exotic, floral, perfumey, and simply decorative. Along the back wall were rows of specialty books on everything from feng shui to natural childbirth. Silver wind chimes tuned to friendly minor keys tinkled when the door fell shut behind me.



"Peace be with you, little sister," greeted the man behind the counter. He was maybe fifty, with a Walt Whitman beard and a straw hat that had feathers in it. "Can I help you with something?"



A large brown dog ambled slowly out from behind the counter. It stretched with a mighty grunt and came to sniff my legs. "That's Bo. He'll just smell you and leave you alone unless you start petting him—and then he's yours for life. He's real friendly."



"He sure is," I said, scritching the dog's scruffy head and ears. He thumped his tail against the counter and leaned into my thigh.



"Some folks don't like dogs, but I don't understand it."



"Bo seems real nice," I said, and I meant it. I'm more of a cat woman, personally, but I'll not begrudge anyone a fondness for a good old mutt.



"Are you Brian Cole?" I asked.



"Oh yes, yes, I am," he nodded, unsurprised that I knew his name. "What can I do for you?"



"I'm Dave Copeland's niece, Eden. Dave said you might be able to help me out."



"Dave? Well, I'll be . . . how's that old son of a gun doing? Good, I hope?"



"Same as always. Indecent, dishonest, and up to no good."



Brian laughed. "That's him, all right. I'm glad to know he's well. And what can I do for you today, little lady?"



Where to start? And how to phrase it? "See, I was going through some old family things and I kept coming across these vague references to places in Florida—maybe places having something to do with the Seminole Indians, or a guy named John Gray."



Brian's eyes went wide. "Whoa, there—John Gray? You want to know about him?"



"Um, I guess so."



"That's a tall order of trouble right there, sister. You're not thinking of getting involved with a group like his, are you?"



I waved my hands in a hearty disavowal. "Man, I don't know the first thing about him. There's just a rumor that some cousins of mine were wrapped up with him, and I wanted to know what he's about—that's all."



"Whoa," he said again, this time as an exclamation and not a suggestion. "Whoa. Not anyone on Dave's side, I hope?"



I shook my head. "This is on my mom's side, a couple of generations back. So he wasn't a real nice guy, huh?" I said suggestively, trying to prompt him to say something more helpful than "whoa."