Margaret Millar
How Like an Angel
This book is dedicated, with love, to
Betty Masterson Norton
What a piece of work is a man!
...in action, how like an angel! in
apprehension, how like a god!... And yet,
to me, what is this quintessence of dust?
man delights not me;
no, nor woman neither...
One
All night and most of the day they had been driving, through mountains, and desert, and now mountains again. The old car was beginning to act skittish, the driver was getting
irritable, and Quinn, to escape both, had gone to sleep in the back seat. He was awakened by the sudden shriek of brakes and Newhouser’s voice, hoarse from exhaustion and the heat and the knowledge that once more he’d made a fool of himself at the tables.
“This is it, Quinn. The end of the line.”
Quinn stirred and turned his head, expecting to find himself on one of the tree-lined streets of San Felice, with the ocean glittering in the distance like a jewel not to be touched or sold. Even before he opened his eyes he knew something was wrong. No city street was so quiet, no sea air so dry.
“Hey, Quinn. You awake?”
“Yes.”
“Well, flake off, will you? I’m in a hurry.”
Quinn looked out of the window. The scenery hadn’t changed since he’d gone to sleep. There were mountains and more mountains and still more, all covered with the same scrub oak and chaparral, manzanita and wild holly, and a few pines growing meagerly from the parched earth.
“This is nowhere,” he said. “You told me you were going to San Felice.”
“I said near San Felice.”
“How far is near?”
“Forty-five miles.”
“For the love of—”
“You must be from the East,” Newhouser said. “In California forty-five miles is near.”
“You might have told me that before I got in the car.”
“I did. You weren’t listening. You seemed pretty anxious to get out of Reno. So now you’re out. Be grateful.”
“Oh, I am,” Quinn said dryly. “You’ve satisfied my curiosity. I’ve always wondered where nowhere was.”
“Before you start beefing, listen. My turn-off to the ranch is half a mile down the road. I’m a day late getting back to work, my wife’s a hothead, I lost seven hundred in Reno and I haven’t slept for two days. Now, you want to be glad you got a ride this far or you want to put up a squawk?”
“You might have dropped me off at a truck stop where food was available.”
“You said you had no money.”
“I was figuring on a small loan, say five bucks.”
“If I had five bucks I’d still be in Reno. You know that. You got the disease same as I have.”
Quinn didn’t deny it. “O.K., forget about money. I have another idea. Maybe that wife of yours isn’t such a hothead after all. Maybe she wouldn’t object to a temporary guest—all right, all right, it was just a suggestion. Do you have a better one?”
“Naturally, or I wouldn’t have stopped here. See that dirt road down the line?”
When Quinn got out of the car he saw a narrow lane that meandered off into a grove of young eucalyptus trees. “It doesn’t look like much of a road.”
“It’s not supposed to. The people who live at the end of it don’t like to advertise the fact. Let’s just say they’re peculiar.”
“Let’s just ask how peculiar?”
“Oh, they’re harmless, don’t worry about that. And they’re always good for a handout to the poor.” Newhouser pushed his ten-gallon hat back, revealing a strip of pure white forehead that looked painted across the top of his brown leathery face. “Listen, Quinn, I hate like the devil to leave you here but I have no choice and I know you’ll make out all right. You’re young and healthy.”
“Also hungry and thirsty.”
“You can pick up something to eat and drink at the Tower and then hitch another ride right into San Felice.”
“The Tower,” Quinn repeated. “Is that what’s at the end of the quote road unquote?”
“Yes.”
“Is it a ranch?”
“They do some ranching,” Newhouser said cautiously. “It’s a—well, sort of a self-contained little community. So I’ve heard. I’ve never seen it personally.”
“Why not?”
“They don’t encourage visitors.”
“Then how come you’re so sure I’ll get a big welcome?”
“You’re a poor sinner.”
“You mean it’s a religious outfit?”
Newhouser moved his head but Quinn wasn’t sure whether he was indicating affirmation or denial. “I tell you, I never saw the place, I just heard things about it. Some rich old dame who was afraid she was going to die built a five-story tower. Maybe she thought she’d have a shorter hitch to heaven when her time came, a head start, like. Well, I’ve got to be on my way now, Quinn.”
“Wait,” Quinn said urgently. “Be reasonable. I’m on my way to San Felice to collect three hundred bucks a friend of mine owes me. I promise to give you fifty if you’ll drive me to—”
“I can’t.”
“That’s more than a buck a mile.”
“Sorry.”
Quinn stood on the side of the road and watched Newhouser’s car disappear around a curve. When the sound of its engine died out, there was absolute silence. Not a bird chirped, not a branch swished in the wind. It was an experience Quinn had never had before and he wondered for a minute if he’d suddenly gone deaf from hunger and lack of sleep and the heat of the sun.
He had never much liked the sound of his own voice but it seemed very good to him then, he wanted to hear more, to spread it out and fill the silence.
“My name is Joe Quinn. Joseph Rudyard Quinn, but I don’t tell anyone about the Rudyard. Yesterday I was in Reno. I had a job, a car, clothes, a girlfriend. Today I’m in the middle of nowhere with nothing and nobody.”
He’d been in jams before but they’d always involved people, friends to confide in, strangers to persuade. He prided himself on being a glib talker. Now it no longer mattered, there wasn’t anyone around to listen. He could talk himself to death in that wilderness without causing a leaf to stir or an insect to scurry out of range.
He took out a handkerchief and dabbed at the sweat that was trickling down behind his ears. Although he’d often visited the city of San Felice, he knew nothing about this bleak mountainous back country, seared by the sun in summer, eroded by the winter rains. It was summer now. In the river beds dust lay, and the bones of small animals which had come to find water.
The silence, more than the heat and desolation, bothered Quinn. It seemed unnatural not even to hear a bird call, and he wondered whether all the birds had died in the long drought or whether they’d moved on to be nearer a water supply, to the ranch where Newhouser worked, or perhaps to the Tower. He glanced across the road at the narrow lane that seemed to end suddenly in the grove of eucalyptus.
“Hell, a little religion’s not going to kill me,” he said, and crossed the road, squinting against the sun.
Beyond the eucalyptus trees the path started to climb, and signs of life became evident as he followed it. He passed a small herd of cows grazing, some sheep enclosed in a pen made of logs, a couple of goats tethered in the shade of a wild holly tree, an irrigation ditch with a little sluggish water at the bottom. All the animals looked well-fed and well-tended.
The ascent became steeper as he walked, and the trees denser and taller, pines and live oaks, madrones and cotoneaster. He had almost reached the top of a knoll when he came across the first building. It was so skillfully constructed that he was only fifteen or twenty yards away before he realized it was there, a long low structure made of logs and native stone. It bore no resemblance to a tower and he thought Newhouser might have made a mistake about the place, had been taken in by local rumors and exaggerations.