I went to the bedroom and rifled through the bedside stand. What I wanted was buried in the third drawer. I took it to the dining room, spread it on the table, and opened my drink and carry-out. No go. The sight of greasy rice and overcooked beef made my stomach withdraw like a sand crab. I reached for a slice of pita.
I located my street on the now familiar foot, and traced a route out of Centre-ville and across the river onto the south shore. Finding the neighborhood I wanted, I folded the map with the cities of St. Lambert and Longueuil showing. I tried another bite of souvlaki as I studied the landmarks, but my stomach hadn’t altered its negativism. It would accept no input.
Birdie had oozed to within three inches of me. “Knock yourself out,” I said, sliding the aluminum container in his direction. He looked astounded, hesitated, then moved toward it. The purring had already begun.
In the hall closet I found a flashlight, a pair of garden gloves, and a can of insect repellent. I threw them into a backpack along with the map, a tablet and a clipboard. I changed into a T-shirt, jeans, and sneakers, and braided my hair back tightly. As an afterthought, I grabbed a long-sleeved denim shirt and stuffed it into the pack. I got the pad from beside the phone and scribbled: “Gone to check out the third X—St. Lambert.” I looked at my watch: 7:45 P.M. I added the date and time, and laid the tablet on the dining room table. Probably unnecessary, but in case I got into trouble I had at least left a trail.
Slinging the pack over my shoulder, I punched in the code for the security system, but in my building excitement I got the numbers wrong and had to start over. After messing up a second time, I stopped, closed my eyes, and recited every word of “I Wonder What the King Is Doing Tonight.” Clear the mind with an exercise in trivia. It was a trick I’d learned in grad school, and, as usual, it worked. The time-out in Camelot helped me reestablish control. I entered the code without a slip, and left the apartment.
Emerging from the garage, I circled the block, took Ste. Catherine east to De la Montagne, and wound my way south to the Victoria Bridge, one of three linking the island of Montreal with the south shore of the St. Lawrence River. The clouds that had tiptoed across the afternoon sky were now gathering for serious action. They filled the horizon, dark and ominous, turning the river a hostile, inky gray.
I could see Île Notre-Dame and Île Ste. Hélène upriver, with the Jacques-Cartier Bridge arching above them. The little islands lay somber in the deepening gloom. They must have throbbed with activity during Expo ’67, but were idle now, hushed, dormant, like the site of an ancient civilization.
Downriver lay Île des Soeurs. Nuns’ Island. Once the property of the church, it was now a Yuppie ghetto, a small acropolis of condos, golf courses, tennis courts, and swimming pools, the Champlain Bridge its lifeline to the city. The lights of its high-rise towers flickered, as if in competition with the distant lightning.
Reaching the south shore, I exited onto Sir Wilfred Laurier Boulevard. In the time it took to cross the river, the evening sky had turned an eerie green. I pulled over to study the map. Using the small emerald shapes that represented a park and the St. Lambert golf course, I fixed my location, then replaced the map on the seat beside me. As I shifted into gear, a snap of lightning electrified the night. The wind had picked up, and the first fat drops began to splatter on the windshield.
I crept along through the spooky, prestorm darkness, slowing at each intersection to crane forward and squint at the street signs. I followed the route I’d plotted in my head, turning left here, right there, then two more lefts …
After ten more minutes I pulled over and put the car in park. My heart sounded like a Ping-Pong ball in play. I rubbed my damp palms on my jeans and looked around.
The sky had deepened and the darkness was almost total. I’d come through residential neighborhoods of small bungalows and tree-lined streets, but now found myself on the edge of an abandoned industrial park, marked as a small gray crescent on the map. I was definitely alone.
A row of deserted warehouses lined the right side of the street, their lifeless shapes illuminated by a single functioning streetlamp. The building closest to the lamppost stood out in eerie clarity, like a stage prop under studio lights, while its neighbors receded into ever-deepening murkiness, the farthest disappearing into pitch blackness. Some of the buildings bore realtors’ signs offering them for sale or rent. Others had none, as if their owners had given up. Windows were broken, and the parking lots were cracked and strewn with debris. The scene was an old black-and-white of London during the Blitz.
The view to the left was no less desolate. Nothing. Total darkness. This emptiness corresponded to the unmarked green space on the map where St. Jacques had place his third X. I’d hoped to find a cemetery or a small park.
Damn.
I put my hands on the wheel and stared into the blackness.
Now what?
I really hadn’t thought this through.
Lightning flashed, and for a moment the street was aglow. Something flew out of the night and slapped against the windshield. I jumped and gave a yelp. The creature hung there a moment, beating a spastic tattoo against the glass, then flew off into the dark, an erratic rider on the mounting wind.
Cool it, Brennan. Deep breath. My anxiety level was in the ionosphere.
I reached for the backpack, put on the denim shirt, shoved the gloves into my back pocket and the flashlight into my waistband, leaving the notepad and pen.
You won’t be taking any notes, I told myself.
The night smelled of rain on warm cement. The wind was chasing debris along the street, swirling leaves and paper upward into small cyclones, dropping them into piles, then stirring them up anew. It caught my hair and grabbed at my clothes, snapping my shirttails like laundry on a line. I tucked in the shirt and took the flashlight in my hand. The hand trembled.
Sweeping the beam in front of me, I crossed the street, then stepped up the curb onto a narrow patch of grass. I’d been right. A rusted iron fence, about six feet high, ran along the edge of the property. On the far side of the fence, trees and bushes formed a thick tangle, a wildwood forest that stopped abruptly, held in check by the iron barrier. I aimed the light straight ahead, trying to peer through the trees, but I couldn’t tell how far they extended or what lay beyond them.
As I followed the fence line, overhanging branches dipped and rose in the wind, shadows dancing across the small, yellow circle of my flashlight. Raindrops slapped the leaves above my head, and a few penetrated to strike my face. The downpour was not far off. Either the dropping temperature or the hostile setting was making me shiver. More like both. I cursed myself for bringing the bug spray instead of a jacket.
Three quarters of the way up the block I stepped down hard at a drop in elevation. I swept the light along what seemed to be a driveway or service road leading forward to a break in the trees. At the fence, a set of gates was held shut by a length of chain and a combination padlock.
The entrance didn’t look recently used. Weeds grew in the gravel roadbed, and the border of litter that ran the length of the fence was uninterrupted at the gate. I aimed the light through the opening, but it penetrated the darkness only a little. It was like using a Bic to light the Astrodome.
I inched along for another fifty yards or so until I reached the end of the block. It took a decade. At the corner I looked around. The street I’d been following ended at a T-intersection. I peered into the gloom on the far side of the intersecting, equally dark and deserted street.
I could make out a sea of asphalt running the length of the block and surrounded by a chain-link fence. I guessed it had been a parking area for a factory or warehouse. The crumbling compound was lit by a single bulb suspended from a makeshift arch on a telephone pole. The bulb was hooded by a metal shade, and threw light for approximately twenty feet. Debris skittered across the empty pavement, and here and there I could see the silhouette of a small shack or storage shed.
I listened for a moment.
A cacophony. Wind. Raindrops. Distant thunder. My pounding heart. The light from across the way compromised the blackness just enough to reveal my unsteady hands.
Okay, Brennan, I chided myself, cut the crap. No pain, no gain.
“Hmm. Good one,” I said aloud. My voice sounded strange, muffled, as if the night were swallowing my words before they could reach my ears.
I turned back to the fence. At the end of the block it rounded the corner and took a hard left, paralleling the street I’d just reached. I turned with it. Within ten feet the iron uprights ended at a stone wall. I stepped back and played the light over it. The wall was grayish, about eight feet high, topped by a border of stones jutting six inches laterally from the face. As best I could see in the darkness, it ran the length of the street, with an opening near midblock. It looked to be the front of the property.
I followed the wall, noting the soggy paper, broken glass, and aluminum containers that had collected at its base. I stepped on a variety of objects I didn’t care to identify.
Within fifty yards the wall gave way, once again, to rusted iron grillwork. More gates, secured like the set at the side entrance. When I held the flashlight close to inspect the chain and padlock, the metal links gleamed. This chain looked new.
I tucked the flashlight into my waistband, and yanked the chain sharply. It held. I tried again, with the same result. I stepped back, retrieved the light, and began passing the beam slowly up and down the bars.
Just then something grabbed my leg. As I clawed at my ankle, I dropped the flashlight. In my mind I could see red eyes and yellow teeth. In my hand I felt a plastic sack.
“Shit,” I said, my mouth dry, my hands shakier than before as I disentangled myself from the bag. “Assaulted and battered by a Pharmaprix sack.”
I released the bag and it went whipping off in the wind. I could hear it rustling as I groped for my flashlight. It had gone out when it hit the ground. I found it but it was reluctant to serve. At first nothing. I pounded it against the palm of my hand, and the bulb flicked on, then died. Another tap and the beam stayed on, but the light looked shaky and uncertain. I had little confidence in its long-term commitment.
I hovered a moment in the dark, considering my next move. Did I really want to go further with this? What in God’s name did I hope to accomplish? Home to a hot bath and bed seemed the better plan.
I closed my eyes and concentrated on sound, straining to filter any signs of human presence from the bustle of the elements. Later, in the many times I would replay that scene in my mind, I would ask myself if there wasn’t something I missed. The crunch of tires on gravel. The creak of a hinge. The hum of a car engine. Perhaps I was sloppy, perhaps the building storm was a co-conspirator, but I noticed nothing.
I took a deep breath, squared my shoulders, and peered into the darkness beyond the wall. Once in Egypt I had been in a tomb in the Valley of the Kings when the lights failed. I remember standing in that small space, engulfed not just in darkness, but in a total absence of light. I had felt as if the world had been snuffed out. As I tried to tease something from the void beyond the fence, that feeling returned. What held darker secrets? The pharaoh’s tomb or the blackness inside that wall?
The X marks something. It’s in there. Go.
I retraced my steps to the corner and down the fence to the side gate. How could I disengage the lock? I was playing the light over the metal bars, searching for an answer, when lightning lit the scene like a camera flash. I smelled ozone in the air and felt a tingling in my scalp and hands. In the brief burst of light I spied a sign to the right of the gates.
By the flashlight beam it looked to be a small metal plaque bolted to the bars. Though rusted and obscured, the message was clear. Entrée interdite. Entrance forbidden. Keep out. I held the light close and tried to make out the smaller print below. Something de Montreal. It looked like Archduke. Archduke de Montreal? I didn’t think there was one.
I peered at a tiny circle below the writing. Gently, I dislodged some rust with my thumbnail. An emblem began to appear, resembling a crest or coat of arms that looked vaguely familiar. Then it hit me. Archdiocese. Archdiocese of Montreal. Of course. This was church property, probably an abandoned convent or monastery. Quebec was peppered with them.
Okay, Brennan, you’re Catholic. Protected on church property. Full-court press. Where were these clichés coming from? Pumping out with the rushes of adrenaline that alternated with the trembling apprehension.
I stuck the flashlight into my jeans, took the chain in my right hand, and grasped a rusty metal upright with my left. I was about to yank, but there was no resistance. Link by link the chain slithered through the bars, looping over my wrist like a snake coiling onto a branch. I let go of the gate and reeled in the chain with both hands. It didn’t come loose completely, but stopped when the padlock wedged between the bars. I looked at it in disbelief. It was hooked through the last link, but the prongs had been left unclasped.
I unhooked the lock, pulled the rest of the chain through the bars, and stared at them both. The wind had stopped during my labors, leaving an unsettling hush. The quiet pounded on my ears.
I looped the chain over the right gate, and pulled the left one toward me. The hinges seemed to scream in the void left by the wind. No other sound breached the silence. No frogs. No crickets. No distant train whistles. It was as if the universe were holding its breath, awaiting the storm’s next move.
The gate moved grudgingly and I passed through, easing it closed behind me. I followed a roadbed, my shoes making soft crunching sounds on the gravel. I kept the light roving from the road to the thicket of trees on each side. After ten yards I stopped and directed the beam upward. The branches, ominously still, were interlaced in an arch above my head.
Here’s the church. Here’s the steeple. Great. My mind had switched to children’s rhymes. I was shivering from tension and wound up with enough energy to repaint the Pentagon. You’re losing it, Brennan, I warned myself. Think about Claudel. No. Think about Gagnon and Trottier and Adkins.
I turned to my right and swept the beam as far as it would reach, allowing it to linger briefly on each of the trees bordering the road. They marched along in endless rank. When I did the same on my left, I thought I saw a narrow break about ten yards up.
I kept the beam focused on that spot and crept forward. What looked like a gap wasn’t. The trees didn’t break rank, yet the place looked different somehow, disturbed. Then it struck me. It wasn’t the trees, it was the underbrush. The ground cover was sparse and patchy, and the vines and creepers looked stunted compared with those nearby. Like a clearing partly overgrown again.
They’re younger, I thought. More recent. I shone the light in all directions. The undersized vegetation seemed to flow in a narrow strip, like a stream meandering through the trees. Or a path. I gripped the flashlight tighter and followed the diversion. As I took my first step, the storm broke.
The steady drizzle gave way to a sudden torrent, and the trees burst into motion, leaping and diving like a thousand kites. Lightning flashed and thunder responded, over and over, like demon creatures seeking each other. Snap. Where are you? Boom. Over here. The wind returned with full fury, driving the water sideways.
Water soaked my clothes and plastered my hair to my head. It streamed down my face, blurred my vision, and stung the abrasion on my cheek. Blinking, I tucked some loose hair behind my ears and ran a hand over my eyes. I pulled out a shirttail and held it over the flashlight to try to keep the water from getting inside the casing.
Hunching my shoulders, I edged up the path, oblivious of everything beyond the ten-foot diameter of my pale yellow beacon. I swung the beam back and forth across the path, allowing it to probe the woods on either side, like a dog on a leash, sniffing and poking its way along.
In about fifty feet I spotted it. Looking back, I realize that an instant synapse occurred, that in a nanosecond my brain linked the visual input of the moment to a past experience recen
tly stored. At some level of awareness I knew what I was seeing before my conscious mind developed the picture.
As I closed in and the beam teased its find from the covering darkness, recognition broke the surface. I could taste my stomach contents in my throat.
In the wobbling shaft of light I saw a brown plastic garbage bag poking through the dirt and leaves, its open end twisted and tied back unto itself. The knot rose from the earth like a sea lion surfacing for air.
I watched rain pound down on the bag and the surrounding soil. The water nibbled at the edges of the shallow burial, turning the dirt to mud and slowly but persistently uncovering the hole. I could feel a weakness at the back of my knees as more of the bag was exposed.
A flash of lightning snapped me out of my reverie. I jumped more than stepped toward the bag, and bent down to examine it. Tucking the flashlight back into my jeans, I grabbed the knotted end of the bag and pulled. It was still buried too deep to budge. I tried to undo the knot, but my wet fingers got a poor grip on wet plastic. It wouldn’t give. I placed my nose close to the sealed opening and inhaled. Mud and plastic. No other smell.
I made a small perforation in the bag with my thumbnail and sniffed again. Though faint, the odor was identifiable. The sweet, fetid smell of rotted flesh and damp bone. Before I could decide on flight or fury, a twig snapped and I sensed movement behind me. As I tried to leap sideways, lightning flashed inside my head, sending me plunging back into that pharaoh’s tomb.
I HADN’T BEEN THIS HUNGOVER IN A VERY LONG TIME. AS USUAL, I was too sick to remember much. When I moved, harpoons of pain shot into my brain and forced me to be still. I knew if I opened my eyes I’d vomit. My stomach also recoiled at the thought of motion, yet I had to get up. Above all, I was cold. My body was gripped by a chill that had taken over its core. I began to shake uncontrollably, and thought I needed another blanket.
I sat up with my eyes still tightly shut. The pain in my head was so fierce I retched up a small quantity of bile. I lowered my head to my knees and waited for the nausea to pass. Still unable to open my eyes, I spit the bile into my left hand, and felt for my comforter with my right.