"I'm going to get some air."
"Not with the baby you're not."
There was a litany of suspicions in these few words.
"I'm not going far-2'
"You're not going a-a-a-anywhere!" Howie shouted. "Now put Amy back on the bed and sit down!"
Before this escalated any further, Grillo stood up, "We all need some food in our stomachs," he said. "Why don't we go get some pizza?"
"You go," Jo-Beth said. "I'll be fine here."
"Better still," Tesla said to Grillo, "you and Howie go. Let me and Jo-Beth sit and talk for a few minutes."
There was some debate about this, but not much. Both men seemed relieved to have a chance to escape the confines of the motel for a few minutes, and from Tesla's point of view it offered an opportunity to speak to Jo-Beth alone.
"You don't seem very afraid that Tommy-Ray's coming to find you," she said to Jo-Beth when the men had left.
The girl looked across at the baby on the bed. "No," she said, her voice as pale as her face. "Why should I be?"
"Well... because of what might have happened to him since you saw him last," Tesla replied, trying to put her point as delicately as possible.
"He's not the brother you had in Palomo Grove."
"I know that," Jo-Beth said with a tinge of contempt in her voice. "He's killed some people. And he's not sorry. But... he's never hurt me. He wouldn't ever do that."
"He might not know his own mind," Tesla replied. "He might hurt you, or the baby, without being able to help himself."
Jo-Beth simply shook her head. "He loves me," she said.
"That was a long time ago. People change. And Tommy-Ray's changed more than most."
"I know," Jo-Beth replied. Tesia didn't reply. She just waited in silence, hoping that Jo-Beth would talk about the Death-Boy a little. After a few moments, she did just that.
"He s been all over," she said, "seeing the world... now he's getting tired-"
"He told you that?"
She nodded. "He wants to be quiet for a little while.... He says he's seen some things that he needs to think over-"
"Did he say what?"
"Just things," she said. "He's been traveling around, working for a friend of his."
Tesla hazarded a guess. "Kissoon?" she said.
Jo-Beth actually smiled. "Yeah. How'd you know?"
"It's not important."
Jo-Beth raked her fingers through her long-unwashed hair, and said again, "He loves me."
"So does Howie," Tesla pointed out.
"Howie belongs to Fletcher," Jo-Beth said.
"Nobody belongs to anybody," Tesla replied.
Jo-Beth looked at her, saying nothing. But the look of utter abjection in her eyes was chilling.
Would nothing be saved? Tesla thought. There was Grillo, playing his endgame, thinking of the Nuncio as some last reprieve (but not truly believing it); D'Amour climbing the mountain to spend his last hours where the crosses stood; and this poor girl, who had been so blithe and so effortlessly beautiful, ready to be taken by the Death-Boy because love had failed to save her.
The world was turning off its lights, one by one.... A gust of wind shook the windowpane. Jo-Beth, who had turned from Tesla to tend to the baby, looked round. "What is it?" Tesia said softly.
There was another gust now, this time at the door, as though the wind was systematically looking for some way in.
"It's him, isn't it?" Tesla said. The girl's eyes were glued to the door. "Jo-Beth, you have to help me here@' Tesla crossed to the door as she spoke, and gingerly turned the key in the lock. It was a pitiful defense, she knew (this was a force that brought down houses), but it might earn them a second or two's grace, and that might be the difference between saving a life or losing it. "Tommy-Ray's not going to solve anything," Tesla said. "You understand me? He's not."
Jo-Beth was bending to pick up little Amy. "He's all we've got," she said.
JOL, EVEP.VILLE 471
The wind was rattling both the window and the door now. Tesla could smell it as it gusted through the keyhole and the cracks. Death was here, no doubt of that.
Amy had begun to sob quietly in her mother's arms. Tesla glanced down at the child's tiny, knotted face, and thought of what such innocence might rouse in the DeathBoy. He'd probably be proud of infanticide.
The floor was shaking so hard the key was rattled from its slot. And somewhere in the gusts there were voices, or the fragments of same, some speaking in Spanish, some, Tesia' thought, in Russian, one of them nearly hysterical, one of them sobbing. She caught only a smattering of their words, but the gist of it was plain enough. Come outside, they were saying. He's waiting for you...
"Doesn't sound all that inviting," Tesia whispered to JoBeth.
The girl said nothing. She just stared at the door, gently rocking the troubled baby, while the voices of dead pined and moaned and muttered on. Tesla let them speak for themselves. to judge by the look on Jo-Beth's face they were doing a far better job of dissuading her from stepping over the threshold than Tesla could have done.
"Where's Tommy-Ray?" Jo-Beth said at last.
"Maybe he didn't come," Tesla replied. "Do you... maybe want to slip out the bathroom window?"
Jo-Beth listened for a few second longer. Then she nodded. "Good," Tesla said. "Make it fast. I'll keep them busy."
She watched Jo-Beth retreat to the bathroom, then she turned and went to the door. The ghosts on the other side seemed to sense her approach, because their voices dropped to a murmur.
"Where's Tommy-Ray?" Tesia said.
There was no coherent response, just more distressing din, and a further rattling of the door. Tesia glanced over her shoulder. Jo-Beth and Amy were out of sight, which was something. At least now if the ghosts tried to break in "Open... " they were murmuring, "open... open,"and while they murmured they escalated their assault on the door. The wood around the hinges began to splinter, and around the lock too. "It's okay," Tesia said, fearful that their frustration would make them more dangerous than ever. "I'll unlock the door. Just give me a moment."
She stopped and picked up the key, slid it into the lock, and turned it. Hearing this, the ghosts were quieted, the gusts hushed. Tesia took a deep breath and opened the door. The cloud of phantoms retreated from her in a dusty wave. She looked for Tommy-Ray. There was no sign of him. Closing the door after her, she walked out into the middle of the lot. She'd written an execution scene in one of her failed opuses-a terrible screenplay called As I Live and Breathe. This walk put her in mind of it. All that was missing was the warden and the priest, She started to turn, looking for the Death-Boy, and her eyes came to rest on an area of stunted trees and ambitious weed on the far side of the lot. There were lanterns hanging in the branches, she saw, giving off a sickly phosphorescence. And somebody standing in their midst, more than half hidden. Before she could start towards the place a voice behind her said, "What the hell's going' on out here?"
She looked back to see the motel manager appearing from his office. He was sixty or more, with a bald pate, a gravy-stained shirt, and a can of beer in his hand. By his staggering step it was plain he was the worse for its influence.
"Go back inside," Tesla told him.
But the man had seen the lights in the thicket now, and he strode on past Tesia towards them. "You put them up?" he demanded.
"No," Tesia said, following after him. "Somebody very-"
"That's my property. You can't just go hanging'-" He stopped in mid-stride, as he came close enough to see exactly what these lanterns were. The can of beer dropped from his hand. "My God... " he said.
The branches of the trees and bushes had been hung with horrific trophies, Tesla saw. Heads and arms, pieces of a torso, and much else that was not even recognizable. All of them shone, even the scraps, charged up with a luminescence she assumed was the Death-Boy's gift.