"Rosario's working," Josefa explained, "So Elma is also with her."
Alex was unable to speak. He helped Etta to the bed, where Josefa was pointing, and between the three of them they managed to get her seated upon it.
"Would you like some tea?" Josefa offered, and Alex shook his head but Etta was nodding and smiling, so Josefa headed to the bathroom where she pulled out a kettle from under the sink, filled it with water and set it to heat on the hot plate. After a little more rummaging she pulled out two cups and a saucer, and also a tea bag from somewhere. Alex looked around awkwardly, finding nowhere to sit. Eventually he settled on leaning against the door. No one said anything while Josefa prepared the little sustenance, finally bringing out a cup on a saucer for Etta, on which there was also a sort of a biscuit she had made to appear. Etta took it gratefully and sat quietly, sipping once or twice, while Josefa plopped herself down on the floor and indicated to Alex that he could do likewise. He did and sat with his back to the door, facing Josefa a few feet away.
"She's been touched by the angels," Josefa said. "She's a true saint," she added, tilting her head towards Etta, as if Alex didn't know who she might have been talking about.
"She's certainly .... old," was all he could think of to say. Josefa burst into a brief, loud laugh.
"If you believe her," she said after recovering her breath. "Did she tell you the same?" Alex shook his head 'no'. Josefa leaned over and whispered.
"She says she's a hundred and twenty three years old. Ciento veinte tres," she repeated in Spanish. Alex whistled.
"I thought she was maybe ... seventy five?" he guessed.
"I thought so too," said Josefa. "Me I'm fifty and my mama was just about seventy five when she died. I thought maybe the same. But no. She says it and she believes it. A saint. Maybe immortal." Josefa nodded and made a slight clucking sound with her tongue.
"But cursed," she added. "Bad witchcraft for sure."
"Why do you say that?" Alex asked. Etta was nodding off once again, and Josefa jumped up to grab the saucer and cup out of her hands before they both fell to the floor. Alex also got up and together they helped her lie down with her head on a pillow. Josefa pulled a blanket up over her, then looked up at Alex and said, very quietly,
"There's a devil inside her. It talks when she sleeps in the night."
Chapter Four
Josefa bustled around the small room while Alex backed up against the door again to make room for her. She darted this way and that, picking things up, moving them around, arranging the blankets on the bed, propping the pillows on the couch, cleaning up the tea stuff, disappearing into the bathroom and emerging moments later in full maid regalia, a pale yellow apron packed with tools in its pouches.
"I have to go to work now," she announced, "but my daughter will be home soon. She will look after Etta."
"I should be going," Alex stammered uncertainly as Josefa approached the door. She stopped and looked up at him curiously.
"You won't stay and listen?" she queried.
"I, I don't know," he replied.
"But you are Alex Kirkham."
"Yes," said Alex, very puzzled. Had she heard him say his name? He didn't think she had been there at that time. Then how did she know who he was?
"And that means what?"
"Stay and listen," she said, and patted him on the arm. "You will see. Rosario will be here soon. Please, sit down. Over there," she pointed at the couch which she had just straightened up. "Etta will be okay. She will sleep for an hour now."
With that, Josefa left the room, leaving Alex alone with the peacefully slumbering old woman. "They named the place right, at least for right now," he thought to himself, as he followed Josefa's instructions and placed himself on the narrow red couch. He sat there, hands folded on his lap, legs crossed, eyes inspecting what little there was to see on the walls of the room. There was one of those Jesus pictures with him holding his glowing heart and smiling beneficently directly across from him. There was a seascape of a port and a sailing ship on the wall to his right. To his left, above the bed, was a simple ivory crucifix. He thought of Josefa's words about the devil, and the old lady being a saint, and wondered how people always maneuvered everything into their own frames of reference. Had they been ancient Neanderthals there would have been different categories and words but the same essential ideas.
He kept still, expecting the woman Rosario to enter with her daughter in tow at any moment. He thought of his own daughters, briefly. He hardly knew either one. The older one, Charlotte, had taken after her mother and married a man she despised, got herself two children with him, then took herself and the little ones off to another state, communicating only with the father through the magic of direct deposit. Alex had never even met those grandchildren, and wasn't quite sure he even remembered their names correctly. They were in Maine or Nova Scotia, as far away as they could get. His younger daughter, Constance, had taken after him to some extent, in the sense of never wanting kids and staying on the move. She had run off to join the Navy, as she'd intended since childhood, changed her name to Cookie and eventually settled into a life of globe-trotting do-gooding, working for one international charity after another, dispensing medicine or food or clothing or else building shelters. She apparently believed in endless giving. It was her own personal religion. She wrote to him occasionally, listing those works and locations but saying nothing at all of herself.
He had never had the parenting gene. It hadn't helped that his ex was one of those wives and mothers who squeeze the father out of any involvement, keeping all the work and glory for themselves. Of course it always takes more than one variable to form any equation, and his side of the ledger was a blank. He hadn't made a real effort. The marriage hadn't lasted long in any case, and in all the many years since he had never repeated that choice, but managed with a string of short-lived affairs, none of which carried any risk of serious attachment. He was, after all, on the road all the time, inspecting railroad crossings up and down the state, living in motels more or less like the one he was rooted in at the moment.
"Less," he murmured, nodding to himself in agreement with the thought that he would never voluntarily stay in a dump like the Happy Slumbers Motel.
"That's what she said," came a weak voice from the bed. Alex glanced over but the old woman was still sleeping. He looked back at the door but it was still closed. Rosario had not come in yet.
"What did she say?" Alex asked out loud after a moment, but there was no reply. He sighed and wondered again what he was doing, sitting there in that room, watching over this old woman he didn't even know, waiting for the arrival of still other strangers, and all for no reason he could think of.
Chapter Five
Minutes passed but no other sound came from the sleeping woman's lips. Alex waited patiently, expectantly, for some sort of demonic utterance or at least a meaningless whisper, but there was nothing. The silence built up a sort of tension in the tiny room which existed only in his mind, and he knew it, but he felt he could almost sense the presence of another being there with them, and it wasn't the Lord. He nearly jumped out of his chair when the door banged open, and in barged a pair of jabbering females.
As thin, frail and graceful as Josefa was, her daughter Rosario was precisely the opposite, large and clunky and clumsy. Where Josefa was half-hair, Rosario had hardly any. In contrast to her mother's narrow, birdlike face, Rosario's was wide and blotchy and full of teeth. At her side was a very small girl, five years old with her grandmother's mane, as bright-eyed, pretty and cheerful as any little girl has ever been. It was Elma who ran up to Alex and grabbed hold of his large hand with her small one and piped up.
"It's the man, mama! It's the man!"
Rosario grunted as she brushed by them and made her way into the bathroom. Alex was frozen in place, caught between staring down at the little girl and up at her massive mother.
"You must be Rosario," he managed to blurt out while looking at the girl.
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"No, silly. I'm Elma!" the girl reprimanded him and giggled.
"My mom says your the old lady's husband or something," Rosario sang out in an unexpectedly soft and velvety voice. She emerged into the room carrying a glass of water, which she handed down to her daughter. Elma took the glass, letting go of Alex's hand and backing off exactly two paces, where she stopped and peered straight at him over the glass as she sipped.
"No, no," Alex protested. "I don't even know the old lady. I'm certainly not her husband."
"Or boyfriend or whatever," Rosario carried on, ignoring his comment. She strode over to the bed and to Alex's surprise, and even disapproval, began to shake her by the shoulders just as Josefa had done in the park.
"Do you think you ought to be doing that?" Alex spoke up.
"It's been an hour, right?" Rosario snapped at him without looking back. "The old lady's on a schedule, as you should know. It's time to get her back to the park."
"Schedule?" Alex found himself standing up. Elma gasped at how tall he was and had to strain her neck to see his face again.
"Three hours in the park, three times a day," Rosario explained as she roused Etta, who was now sitting up and dangling her legs off the side of the bed. Etta looked around at the three other people in the room and cast faint smiles at each one of them in turn. It seemed that she did not recognize any one of them. She looked foggy and disoriented, but in a moment, while holding on to Rosario, she stood, and the two of them began to walk together towards the door. As they passed Alex he asked,
"Doesn't she need to, you know?"
"Not once," Rosario glanced over at him. "Not in all this time. How long's it been, baby?" she asked her daughter.
"Eleven nights and twelve days," Elma recited. "Tonight it will be twelve nights too."
"Not one trip to the bathroom," Rosario clucked. "Not one bite of food, though we give her a biscuit or a cracker. She never touches them. Sips a little tea and that's it."
Rosario and Etta had reached the door and, Elma pushing it open with all her might, they walked out into the daylight. Alex followed, surprised by the light. He had forgotten it was still morning. It was not even lunchtime yet. Sitting in that little room had completely scrambled his sense of time. Etta and Rosario crossed the street, Alex now noticing that it was called Sleeping Dragon Way, in another nod to the legend. The city had certainly tried to capitalize on the legacy of epic failure around the property. "When life hands you lemons," he mentally recited the old refrain. His musings caused him to lag behind and he had to jog a bit to catch up.
"Where are you going?" he asked, though he already knew the answer.
"Got to be two benches side by side," Rosario's answer surprised him with its precision. "Then we leave her there, park her for three hours exactly. She might nod off, might stay awake. You never know. It's always something when we come get her. Today it was you."
"Me?" Alex had pulled up alongside Rosario and was matching her stride for stride. Rosario stepped awkwardly as she maneuvered her way through the path and Alex had to keep dodging to avoid being knocked over. Etta managed just fine, however, seeming to glide along gently, with Elma keeping pace from behind, furiously counting steps in a frenzied whisper.
"They say there were Indians buried down here," Rosario said.
"They say a lot of things about this place," Alex agreed.
"All bad things!" Elma piped up from below. "Like ghosts and such."
"Have you ever seen any ghosts?" Alex looked down at her and she glowed with the attention and nodded vigorously.
"She's one!" Elma wagged her finger at Etta. Alex didn't reply. They came to a single bench but kept walking past it, then another. At the third, they stopped. There were two benches, side by side, apparently meeting the criteria sufficiently, for Etta stopped, let go of Rosario, and carefully took a seat in the middle of the first one. She folded her hands on her lap and looked straight off into the green field before her. Rosario turned to Alex and said,
"Three hours. Understand?"
Alex nodded as if he knew what she was implying. Rosario made a slight clicking sound, enough to catch Elma's attention, and the pair took off, walking much faster in the direction they had just come from. In moments, Alex was alone again, except for the immobile and silent old lady on the bench. He checked his wristwatch and saw it was nearly eleven.
"Might as well think about lunch," he said to himself. He didn't know why, but he knew he'd be back before two.
Chapter Six
Alex returned to his car, climbed in and instructed it to take him to the Burger Joint nearest to the downtown police headquarters. His appointment was for noon so he figured he might as well make just one trip. While he was at it, he told the car to order him a number eight meal with a Raspberry Iced Tea, then sat back while the car took itself off and navigated the course it had settled on. The interview was just a formality in his mind. He had no hope that the cops would tell him anything useful, if indeed anything at all. Experience told him that police rarely communicated honestly with civilians.
The number eight meal was more than sufficient to build up his calorie count, and as he sat by a corner window munching it down, he was suddenly by two persons who wordlessly took the seats on either side of him. To his right was a dark, Nortena-looking woman with short black hair accented by crisp bangs cut just above her brows. Her large brown eyes were not terribly friendly and she looked as though she hadn't smiled in weeks. She introduced herself gruffly as Lieutenant Liliana Vasquez.
"My partner, Sergeant Romo," she added, indicating the wide man to his left, who sported a shaved head with a tattoo of a black rose etched into it just above his right ear. He looked more like a suspect than a detective to Alex, and spent the entire conversation with hands on the table, slowly twiddling his thick thumbs and saying nothing. Alex turned back to Lieutenant Vasquez, who was holding up a flat square something and aiming it at him.
"Retina scan," she uttered as the panel-type object clicked and she lowered it to the table top.
"Confirmed," she nodded. "Alex Kirkham. So we meet at last."
"Do you know me?" he asked her and she nodded the affirmative.
"I have an appointment with a Captain Lucius," he said and at this she shook her head in the negative.
"Canceled," she informed him. "The Captain sent us in his place, being on the task force and all."
"Task force?" Alex asked to no response.
"Of course we know you," Vasquez appeared to grimace, or so it seemed to Alex. He had the definite impression that these officers did not like him, and it seemed to be unusually personal.
"Let's review." Vasquez was now trading glances between her tablet and Alex, looking down and up again rapidly as she listed from the information she apparently saw on the thing. Alex strained a little to get a better look but was unable to position himself so.
"Quite a long record," she said, "or should I say 'trail'. More like it."
"About my brother," Alex began but Vasquez put a hand up to silence him.
"Yes, when your brother was five years old," she narrated, "he was witness to the disappearance of his uncle, your uncle too, yes? Charles Kirkham. Allegedly boarded an invisible bus in the middle of a deserted and rubble-filled lot."
"I didn't see anything," Alex put in.
"I said your brother was witness, not you," Vasquez snapped. "According to Sapphire Karadjian, in an interview conducted several years later. Your brother claimed to have no memory of the incident."
"He didn't like to talk about it," Alex said.
"Nor about the later incident, from what we know, when the late entrepreneur Daniel Fulsom allegedly orchestrated a complicated scheme to trap your brother and have him, what are the words? Oh yes, have him 'fed to the beast', a direct quote from Fulsom's mental hospital deputation."
"Guy was a nut," Alex shrugged.
"Bread crumbs," Vasquez murmured.
"Excuse me?"
"A trail o
f bread crumbs. That's how Fulsom described his plot. Quite intricate it seems. Very strange."
"I knew nothing about it," Alex said.
"Yes, we know what you knew and what you didn't know," Vasquez corrected him. "We know that you had contact with Ms. Karadjian in the days before her own disappearance. We know that you witnessed the Burning Girl first hand. Very few people did, you know. Very few. If it wasn't on film, no one would believe she even existed. Plenty of people don't as it is. What do you think?"
"About what people believe? Who knows?"
"About your friend Sapphire. About what happened to her. Do you have any theories?"
"Alien abduction?" Alex suggested and Vasquez nodded emphatically.
"A lot of people think so, yes. Or that the whole thing was a hoax, trick photography, stuff like that. So you really believe the alien abduction theory?"
"No," Alex said.
"Then why'd you say you did?"
"Just my way of saying I have no idea," Alex offered. "How should I know, anyway?"
"Well," Vasquez began. She leaned toward him and put the tablet down. She moved her face in uncomfortably close to his own.