Chapter 3 | le poisson

Local whitefish poached in its own juices, served with pommes vapeur, braised fennel, and beurre blanc.

I would not see much of Alys Lawless again until the spring of 1842. I was twelve, and my pa figured the time had come to begin my studies in earnest. Of course, those lessons mostly revolved around what he thought goodly for me to know; roping, riding, caring for the few skeletal cattle that remained to us. It’s a marvel to me still that any animals survived those years.

Between 1838 and 1848, hardly a drop of rain fell across Kings County, but I’m getting ahead of myself. What had seemed a tinderbox awaiting the match the summer I first met Alys had become much more worrisome four years later. It was partly on account of the drought that so many of the old families in the county decided to move on to where rumor had it the rivers still flowed up to their banks, snow came when it was timely, and grain didn’t turn to dust under the red eye of the sun. Those what remained were either too old to break trail, too sick to follow those who did, or were tied to the land in other ways.

My pa was one of the latter and, by extension, so was I. That tin star on his chest meant something I was only beginning to comprehend. I saw it in the way he’d look away to the west, then force himself back to the task at hand. Obligation, honor, mule-headedness, whatever you want to call it, it tied him to that dying land sure as he was rooted in the ground.

My lessons kept me busy from afore sunup to past sundown. It was just me, my pa, and my ma at our place, my older brother Alex havin’ been thrown from a horse and killed a few years previous. I failed to grasp the reason my pa was so keen for me to learn everything I could at first, but it began to dawn on me that he intentionally kept me so busy that I never saw the inside of the town schoolhouse, nor had time for any of my friends. That included Alys Lawless. I vividly remember the one and only time her name came up in conversation in our home shortly after the strange events at the funeral.

“Pa, what was that black stuff what came out of Old Man Schein’s mouth?”

My father frowned. “Sin,” he said. “The corruption of the soul made manifest. Some folk believe if you die unshriven, someone else can take on your sins. Even a base sinner like Schein can stroll right on through those pearly gates if—”

“Abelard Caine, don’t you finish that sentence!” My ma stormed in, her washing dripping on the floor. “I’ll not hear that blasphemy spoken aloud in my house, I tell you!”

My pa was as fearless a man as you’d ever hope to see, but even he didn’t cross my ma. Edie Rasmussen Caine was more force of nature than mortal woman, at least in those days. Her blue eyes blazed like lake ice in the February sun, and for a moment I thought she would strike me simply for asking the question. She did not, however.

“Atticus,” she said — she always called me by my full name, never Kit. “That woman and her daughter are abominations. Sin eaters stand apart from God’s justice, gnashing their teeth in the outer dark.” She glanced toward the open door, as though afraid someone might overhear, but only an old red chicken stood pecking the dust in the yard. Still, she lowered her voice. “They consort with foul spirits, and dance and copulate in the black of night. They sup with the Devil.” She held me at arm’s length, blue-eyed stare to blue-eyed stare. “Now, I want you to promise me you’ll not go in search of that monster or her devil daughter.”

I said nothing at first. It seemed a great deal to give up suddenly, no matter that Alys and I had never had so much as a proper conversation.

“Atticus! You promise me right this moment!” She did shake me then. And who among men would gainsay their ma when pressed? Not I. I bowed my head and made the appropriate noises, but in my heart of hearts, I remembered those green eyes, and I harbored a secret hope that Alys would find me. That opportunity was to come sooner than I expected.

It was March, and it was already hot. My pa had decided that now was the time to repair the fence that ran along the road. For reasoning, he claimed that spring was the coolest time for such labor, but given that our cows were listless to the point of being catatonic, I was unsure whether a fence was needed at all. My pa wasn’t about to be gainsaid, however. So, I found myself at seven-thirty one March morning pounding fence posts into the arid soil.

It was hard, thankless work. Years of scorching sun and little rain had turned once fertile soil into something akin to stone. A twelve-year-old boy stands little chance against that, even with a heavy maul and his youthful energy.

“Go. Into. The. Damned. Ground!” I shouted, punctuating each word by striking the head of the fence post with my post maul.

A giggle from the road made me pause mid-stroke. There was a hard knot in my stomach as I turned to find Alys and her ma watching. Alys’s grin was huge, and even Rhian had a small smile on her face.

“That post givin’ you trouble?” Rhian asked.

I blushed. “Sorry about the language, ma’am.”

“I’m sure we’ve both heard worse from men older and wiser than yourself, young Kit,” she said.

I stood there awkwardly as they walked past. Alys’s smile and bright green eyes burned themselves into my mind. After they were out of sight, I returned my attention to the stubborn post. After only a few judicious blows, the sound of running footsteps on the road caused me to raise my head.

There stood Alys, chest heaving from running. She darted up to me and placed a kiss as light as could be on my cheek, and then she was gone, running back to her ma. I stood there with the maul raised over my head, grinning like a fool. That grin lasted until I got home that evening.

I could tell something was wrong as I walked toward the house. All the curtains were open, and it looked like every lantern and candle we owned were ablaze. Three horses were tied up to the hitching post, and a strange wagon sat in the yard. My stomach clenched as I walked toward the door, and the sound of my mother’s wailing pierced the spring night air.

Things got no better as I entered. My pa lay across the dining table, eyes closed, and hands crossed over his chest, pale as a whitefish. My ma lay across his stomach, face buried in him. I stumbled as the reality of the situation struck home, and strong arms caught me.

“Son, I’m sorry you had to find out this way.” I looked up into a face I did not know. He was tall, taller than my pa, with curly dark hair and dark, hot eyes in a lean, olive-skinned face.

“Kit, come here,” another voice said. This one I recognized: Preacher Perkins. The stranger released me, and I walked to Preacher Perkins, who put his calloused hands on my shoulders. “Your pa, well, he’s passed on, son.”

“What happened?” I asked quietly.

“Poachers,” the stranger said with what I had to assume was meant as a kindly smile.

“Pastor Goodman here was with him at the end,” Preacher Perkins added.

Goodman nodded. “Your pa had a stout heart, boy. It’s only because of him that I’m standing here today. I brought his body back to you and your ma.”

Numbness was settling over me, like the soft spring rains I could just barely recall from my childhood. This man had been there. He’d seen my pa alive, seen him fall. With a small cry, I ran to my mother, but there was no succor to be found there. She kept her face buried in my father’s pale flesh.

Thunder rumbled off in the distance, and a dry, hot wind howled through the house. Going to the window, I saw roiling black clouds above us, but nary a drop of rain. Lightning lit the dark, lacing across the sky like cobwebs of white fire. The crack of thunder came again almost instantly. Another bolt, another ear-splitting crack of thunder. An orange glow grew in the west toward the mountains, and I could not tear my gaze away. A hand descended on my shoulder.

“Come and say your farewells—” Preacher Perkins began, but then he stopped, slack-jawed and staring same as me. The hellish glow grew brighter, flames whipped into a frenzy by the scouring wind. “God have mercy,” he breathed. “The world’s burning.”