A Land More Kind Than Home Page 10

  “Good God,” he said. “Who hasn’t heard of that son of a bitch?” Nicks said Chambliss always told folks that he was a mechanic, but all Nicks had ever known him for was being arrested on little charges like petty theft and possession of marijuana and controlled substances. “I’d had my eye on him for a long time,” he said, “but he had to go and blow himself up for us to have something that would stick.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked.

  “He cooked meth,” Nicks said. “And he moved like a squatter back and forth between shacks and abandoned trailers and we couldn’t ever catch him. And then one morning we had an old house explode about ten minutes outside Toccoa. It was Chambliss, what was left of him anyway.”

  “Was he hurt bad?” I asked.

  “You ain’t never looked at him up close, have you?” he asked me.

  “No, Sheriff,” I said. “I haven’t.” The truth was that at that time I hadn’t laid my eyes on him yet. I couldn’t have picked him out of a crowd of two men.

  “Well, that explosion took off something like forty percent of his skin. It almost killed him. They had to graft big old pieces from his legs and his back. He must’ve worn a gas mask or something over his face while he cooked it, because you can’t quite tell it just by looking at him. But his chest and the right side of his body are just awful-looking. If you saw him without clothes on, you’d swear he was a danged mutant.” He sighed like he was about to tell me something he either shouldn’t or didn’t want to. “You want to hear the messed-up part?” he asked.

  “I sure do,” I said.

  “He had him a sixteen-year-old girl in that house when it exploded, a runaway from Mississippi. She died a week later from her burns. Her folks drove up here from Jackson and took her home. It was just a sad story all the way around.”

  “What happened to Chambliss?” I asked.

  “We tried to get him on second-degree murder, but you know how it is, Sheriff. His court-appointed suit got it argued down to involuntary manslaughter, and the newspaper made that poor girl sound like a conspirator. They only gave him three years. I think he might’ve served two.”

  “That don’t seem right,” I said.

  “It wasn’t right,” he said. “But like I told you, you know how it is.” It was quiet for a second, and I thought he’d finished telling me all he knew about Chambliss. Then he cleared his throat. “You want to know something else? After he got sent to the Allendale Pen down in Alto, he was explaining away those burns by telling folks that God had done it to him. He told them that the hand of God Almighty had come down and set his body afire to purify him from the sins of the world.”

  “But what about the meth explosion?” I asked. “What did he have to say about that?”

  “He said that was how God chose to do it.”

  “And what about that girl?”

  “He didn’t ever mention her, not after he got to the pen anyway. It was just like she’d never existed,” he said. “But let me tell you this, and you ain’t going to believe it when I tell you, but the warden told me he couldn’t hardly keep that man from setting himself on fire once he got inside the pen. Warden said Chambliss started up some kind of cult called the Signs Following. He said they’d hold services right there on the spot, wherever they felt moved: the chapel, in their cells, out in the yard. He said they’d speak in tongues, heal each other, talk about the Devil like he lived next door. But the thing was, once they got going, they’d pull out anything flammable they could get ahold of and light it on fire and run their hands over it, hold it right up to their faces: shaving cream, cologne, cleaning spray. He said if you confiscated lighters and matchbooks to try and keep them from setting that stuff on fire, then they’d up and drink it. But not a single one of them psychos was burned or ever got sick. He said Chambliss got him a little following together and there was nothing outside of solitary confinement that could keep those folks away from him.

  “He couldn’t get nothing out of Chambliss that would explain why they were carrying on like that, but one of his followers told him that it was in the Bible, that Jesus told the disciples that after he was gone they’d be able to do all kinds of dangerous things without getting hurt, he said it would be a sign of their righteousness. I didn’t believe him until I got home and opened up my own Bible and did a little searching, and there it was, right there in Mark. Just like they said it would be.” I heard his desk chair squeak, and I imagined Sheriff Nicks leaning all the way back, his boots up on the desk, crossed at the ankle, his hat resting in his lap.

  When he mentioned the book of Mark, my mind suddenly recalled the new sign out by the front of Chambliss’s church. I recalled the exact verses on it: Mark 16:17–18. I hung up with Nicks, and when I got home that night I took Sheila’s Bible out of her nightstand and flipped through the pages until I found the verses and whispered as I read them out loud: “And these signs will follow those who believe: In my name they will cast out demons, they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up snakes with their hands; and when they drink deadly poison, it will not hurt them; they will place their hands on the sick, and they will get well.”

  Things became clearer to me once I read that. A bad burn from a meth house explosion in north Georgia becomes a sign of holiness and power in western North Carolina. It was all in who told the story, even if that story involved a dead young girl from Mississippi. I suddenly understood the kind of mind that could convince Gillum to set his barn on fire, and I suddenly understood why a group of folks would hide behind newspaper-covered windows while they worshipped, and I finally realized what was in those little crates they carried in and out of that church on Wednesday nights and Sunday mornings. But other than suspicion, what did I have? What could I do? Arrest a man for exercising his religious freedom? None of it was a reason to knock on church doors, interrupt meetings and services. But now, this time, it wasn’t a sixteen-year-old runaway but a thirteen-year-old mute boy who was dead, a boy who couldn’t have told Chambliss “yes” or “no” or “stop” even if he’d wanted to. This time, I knew it was different.

  NOTHING I SAW AT ADELAIDE LYLE’S SURPRISED ME WHEN I STOPPED at the top of her yard and turned off my engine and then my lights. I reached into the dash and found my badge and pinned it to my shirt, and then I opened the door and stepped out and looked into the yard where the front porch light lit up the whole scene. It was just what I thought I’d find.

  A couple of beat-up and bloodied men still wearing their church clothes, Adelaide Lyle and two other old women out there seeing to their wounds. Out by the road Ben Hall had his head down on the hood of what must’ve been his daddy’s old truck, and there was Jimmy Hall himself, who’d somehow become an old man since the last time I’d seen him, sitting on the porch steps and smoking a cigarette like nothing had happened. Above him, at the window by the front door that looked out into the yard, stood Ben Hall’s youngest son, his mother, Julie, right beside him. When she saw me, she turned and walked away.

  Like I said, none of what I saw that night surprised me, but what did concern me was what I didn’t see. I didn’t see Carson Chambliss, and I knew there had to be a reason why.

  Jess Hall

  SEVEN

  MISS LYLE HAD MET ME AND MR. STUCKEY AT HER DOOR, and then she took my hand and led me through the living room, where Mama was lying on the sofa with her eyes closed. Miss Lyle told me to sit as quiet as I could right there at the dining room table and wait for my daddy. It felt like an oven inside her house with no breeze coming in, even though she went around opening all the windows after I’d gotten in there and sat down. After she’d done that she went back into the living room and sat down in a chair beside the sofa. It was dark in her house, and there wasn’t hardly any lights on except for a lamp in the front room and the bulb hanging over the table where I was sitting and waiting. Mr. Stuckey stayed out on the porch after I came inside, and a few minutes later I heard a car come driving down the road and stop, and then I heard a door ope
n and shut and the car drove off. I knew that whoever was driving that car had come by to pick him up.

  I leaned back in my seat and looked into the living room, where I saw a little bit of light coming from under the door to the kitchen. There were people in there, but I hadn’t seen them yet. I could hear the voices of a couple of old women whispering. I could smell the coffee they’d started brewing in there too, and I figured they didn’t even know I was here, and even if they did they had probably forgotten all about me with Mama lying on the sofa over there in the front room crying like she was and Miss Lyle sitting next to her in that chair whispering, “Now, now,” and rubbing Mama’s back.

  Outside, another car was coming slow down the road in front of the house, and I heard the tires crunch on the gravel when it pulled into Miss Lyle’s driveway. I heard the car doors open and slam, and then I heard footsteps in the gravel. I prayed it was Daddy coming to get me, and I sat there and listened hard. Whoever was out there shuffled their feet slowly through the gravel like they’d never make it inside. I couldn’t hear them in the driveway anymore, and I knew they must’ve been coming up the porch steps one step at a time.

  The door creaked open in the front room and a man’s voice said, “Addie.” It was quiet for just a second after that, and then Mama started crying again even louder than she was before. I knew that whatever made her cry had just been brought into the house because I heard somebody walking across the wood floor in the front room like they were struggling to do it, and I turned around in my chair and looked toward the front room and waited to see what it was. Two old men from the church shuffled into the dining room, and they stopped walking and looked at me where I sat at the table. They were carrying Stump. He had his head leaned forward and his eyes closed like he was asleep, but I knew he wasn’t sleeping, and I knew without knowing for sure that I’d seen these same two men carrying him out of the church as me and Mr. Stuckey drove off in Daddy’s truck. I wanted to say something to them, but my jaws were shaking and I couldn’t get my mouth to open. I could feel tears running down my cheeks.

  “Alton,” one of the old men said. He held Stump under his arms and looked at the other man.

  “What happened?” I finally asked, but I was crying so hard they probably didn’t even understand what I’d said. I couldn’t hardly see them with all the tears in my eyes. “What happened to him?” I asked, but it came out worse than it had before.

  “Alton,” the man said again. The one named Alton held Stump’s legs and just stared at me. When he heard his name, he looked at the man calling him. They shuffled across the floor to the bedroom on the other side of the table. It was so quiet that I could barely hear Mama crying in the next room, and I knew she had her face buried in one of the sofa cushions. I knew those old men had laid Stump down on the bed because I heard the springs creak. I could hear them in there whispering too, and then I heard the door shut. A second later I felt somebody’s hand on my shoulder.

  “Son,” a voice said. I looked up and saw the old man named Alton standing over me. His eyes were bright blue and sad-looking, and his face was tan and wrinkled. “I’m sorry, son,” he said. He squeezed my shoulder just hard enough for me to barely feel it.

  “Alton,” the other man said. Alton gave my shoulder another squeeze.

  The two old men walked through the front room and opened and closed the kitchen door without making a sound. After a minute I could hear them whispering to the old women who were already in there. I heard the pot tap against their cups when they poured the coffee, and then I heard somebody put the pot back on the stove. I leaned back in my chair as far as I could, and I looked around the corner into the front room. All I could see was Mama’s feet, but I could tell that she’d turned over on her side with her back to Miss Lyle. Miss Lyle still sat in that chair by Mama.

  I crossed my arms and put them on the table and laid my head down on them. I breathed hard and tried to stop myself from crying, and I knew my breath was probably fogging up the wooden tabletop and I knew it was making my face get wet and hot, but after a bit I knew it was wet from my own tears.

  WHEN I LOOKED UP, MISS LYLE STOOD RIGHT BY THE TABLE AND I wondered how long she’d been there.

  “Jess,” she said, “can I get you something to drink, maybe some milk or a little something to eat?”

  My mouth was dry as a cotton ball and I was thirsty, but I shook my head no anyway because I just wanted to sit there and wait for Daddy without having to talk to nobody. Miss Lyle stood there looking at me like she was waiting for me to say something else.

  “I don’t want anything,” I said, and then I put my head back down on the table. I knew she was still standing there looking at me.

  “You let me know if you need something,” she said. I looked up, and she was still there. She put her hand on my head and then used her fingers to brush my hair. “Your daddy’s going to be here real soon, but don’t be afraid to tell me if you need anything.”

  She turned and walked through the front room, and I watched her open the door to the kitchen. She held the door open for a second, and I could see a little table in there and some of them old people sitting down with their coffee cups. Alton and the other old man who’d carried Stump into the house leaned against the counter with their arms crossed. They all looked at Miss Lyle when she came in. She let the door close behind her and I couldn’t see nothing after that.

  I pushed my chair away from the table as quiet as I could, and then I got down real slow and walked over to the doorway and took a look into the front room. Mama still laid on the sofa with her back to me and I could hear her breathing, but I could tell she wasn’t asleep. A voice came from inside the kitchen that was louder than all the others, and I could tell it was Miss Lyle. She sounded like she was angry.

  “I don’t care why he was in there,” she said. “He shouldn’t have been. Not tonight and not this morning either. No way.”

  “But, Adelaide,” one of those old women said, “I know what I saw this morning, and I know what I heard. It was a miracle.”

  “We all heard that boy speak,” the man named Alton said. “Every one of us heard it.”

  “Well, that don’t matter now, does it?” Miss Lyle said. “It don’t matter one bit what y’all heard in there this morning. All that matters is what happened tonight, and I can tell you that you’d better be ready to talk about it once the sheriff gets here.” It got quiet after that, and I pictured Miss Lyle with her hands on her hips staring at those old women and those two old men until they looked away from her. I could hear somebody running the water in the kitchen sink, and then it sounded like somebody’s footsteps were coming across the floor toward the living room.

  I turned and crept back into the dining room and walked to the other side of the table and stopped at the bedroom door where those men had laid Stump on the bed. Nobody had opened the kitchen door yet, and from that far away I could just barely hear them talking in there, and I could hear the curtains stirring in the dining room from the little bit of breeze that came in the open windows now. I put my hand on the knob, and I turned it real slow and hoped the door wouldn’t make any noise, and then I walked into the bedroom and closed the door behind me just as quiet as I’d opened it.

  It was dark and hot in there with the windows closed and the curtains pulled shut. When my eyes adjusted to all that dark, I found where just a little bit of moonlight was trying to get through the windows over the bed, and in that light I could make out where Stump laid in the middle of the bed with his arms by his sides. His face was turned away from me like he was asleep or just lying there and staring at the wall. I couldn’t see him as good as I wanted to, so I walked closer to the bed until I stood right beside him. The bedspread was a white quilt, and with him laying on it his face looked pale blue in the light coming through the curtains. Some buttons were tore off his shirt and it was pulled open and I could see his chest. I just stood there and stared at him, and then I crawled up onto the bed so I could loo
k at his face. There was a speck of dried blood on his lip like he might’ve bit it by accident, and his eyes were closed like he hadn’t woke up yet, and I thought about waking up in the night and looking over at him and watching his mouth puff out air while he slept. At night the house used to be so quiet that I could hear him breathing soft beside me. Sometimes I’d lay there and listen to him for what seemed like forever, and before I knew it I’d be asleep again. But I didn’t want him to be asleep like this on Miss Lyle’s bed with the moonlight outside shining on the curtains of this hot room and Mama crying on the sofa with Daddy on his way. I wanted to tell him, “Wake up, Stump,” but I didn’t say nothing because I was afraid to see that he wouldn’t hear me.

  I got up on my knees on the bed beside him, and I pulled back the curtains behind the bed and pushed the window open to let some air in. I looked outside. The moon shone bright, and I saw our truck and the other cars parked in the driveway in front of the house. I left the curtains pulled open, and then I looked down at Stump where the moonlight spread across his face. I lay down beside him and stared up at the ceiling while the breeze moved through the curtains over the bed. I thought about how it felt just like sleeping in our bed at home, and for a minute I imagined that Mama hadn’t come into our bedroom to wake us up yet.

  I closed my eyes and thought about me and Stump lying out in the ferns down by the creek where the sun that came through the trees was still bright on his face. There was an old green frog croaking somewhere along the creek, and his voice sounded like a loose banjo string, and I knew if I didn’t keep an eye on Stump he’d take to looking around for that frog until I’d have to get up and go hunting after him. I tried my best to keep my eyes open, but sometimes the water gurgling in the creek can sound like people talking, and I listened to them talk until I drifted off to sleep in all that warm sun, and when I woke up I saw that Stump had fallen asleep too, and it could be late now with the light out of the trees and the air turned nice and cool. I looked at his face until he blinked his eyes and looked up to where the sunlight faded in the treetops and smiled.