Dr. Mirakle eyed the house, then looked out toward the cornfield where the scraggly stalks and scarecrow stood. “Billy,” he said quietly. “Does anyone ever call you William?”
“No sir.”
“How old are you?”
“Seventeen. I’ll be eighteen in November:”
“Ah, yes. Eighteen usually follows seventeen. Then you’re twenty, and thirty; and pretty soon you’re fifty-eight.” He folded his jacket carefully and laid it on the porch floor, then took off his hat. Sweat gleamed on his balding pate, and two horns of gray hair stood up from each side of his head.
“Billy,” Mirakle said, “have you ever been to a carnival?”
“No sir.”
“Never?” Mirakle asked incredulously. “Why, when I was your age I could smell candied apples and popcorn in the air two days before the carnival got to town! And you’ve never been? Why, you’ve missed out on one of the best things life has to offer fantasy.”
Ramona came out with the man’s glass of water. He drank half of it at a gulp. She said, “Now just what can we do for you?”
“Fine house you’ve got here,” Mirakle said. He finished the water at his leisure, pretending not to notice the woman’s hard stare. Then he said quietly, “I’ve searched for this house since the first of June. I had no idea if it was real or not. But here it is, and here are both of you. I’ve covered most of the northern half of Alabama looking for you.”
“Why?” Ramona asked.
“In my line of work,” the man said, “I travel a great deal. I meet a lot of people, and I hear a great many stories. Most of them untruths, or at best half-truths, like the tale of the giant ghost boy who walks the forest near Moundville. Or the rebel who still haunts his ruined plantation and fires at hunters who stray too neat. Or the black dog that runs the road between Collinsville and Sand Rock. Maybe there was a grain of truth there once, but who knows? A gnarled oak on a moonlit night could become a giant boy. A plantation house creaks and groans with age, and someone hears a ghost walking. A wild dog runs from a car’s headlights. Who knows?” He shrugged and ran a hand through his unruly hair to smooth it. “But…when one hears a tale about living people; well, that makes a difference. An old man in Montgomery told me that what I did was pretty fair, but had I ever heard of the Indian woman in north Alabama who could lay the dead to rest!”
Ramona’s spine stiffened.
“I disregarded that story at first. But my profession draws the type of person who might be interested in the spirit world, and in four months on the road I might hit a hundred small towns. Soon I heard the story again, and this time I heard a name as well: Creekmore. In the next town, I began asking some questions. It wasn’t until much later that I heard about the boy. But by then I had to know if you were real or simply a half-truth. I began searching, and asking questions along the way.” He smiled again, lines crinkling around his eyes. “It wasn’t until several days ago that I heard of Hawthorne, from a man who lives in Chapin. It seems there was an accident involving a pickup truck and a large oak tree…”
“Yes,” the woman said.
“Ah. Then I believe my search is over.” He turned his gaze toward Billy. “Are the stories about you true, young man? Can you see and talk to the dead?”
The way that question came out caught Billy off-guard. He glanced at his mother; she nodded, and he said, “Yes sir, I can.”
“Then is it also true that you exorcised a demon from a house where a murder took place? That you have a power over Death itself? That you called up Satan in a deserted sawmill?”
“No. All those are made-up stories.”
“That’s usually the way tales are spread. A grain of truth is taken and a luster is spun around it, like an oyster with a pearl. But there is the grain of truth in those stories, isn’t there?”
“Sort of, I guess.”
“People talk to hear their damned lips flap!” Ramona told him. “I know full well what’s said about us. Now I’d like to hear why you searched us out so long and hard.”
“No need to get upset,” Mirakle said. “Folks are afraid of you, but they respect you, too. As I said, I’m a performer. I have my own show, and I travel with carnivals…”
“What kind of show?”
“I’m pleased you ask. It’s a show that goes back to the rich vaudeville heritage of England. As a matter of fact, I learned it from an aged magician who’d performed the very same show in his heyday, in London before the Second World War.”
“Mister,” Ramona said, “your tongue takes more turns than a snake on wet grass.”
Mirakle smiled. “What I perform, Mrs. Creekmore, is a ghost show.”
An alarm bell went off in Ramona’s head. She said, “Good day, Mr. Doctor Mirakle. I don’t think we’re interested in—”
But Billy asked, “What’s a ghost show?” and the sound of curiosity in his voice made his mother uneasy. She thought of ghost-chasing charlatans, false seers, seances in dark rooms where painted skeletons danced on wires and “dire warnings” were spoken through voice-distorting trumpets: all the nasty tricks her grandmother had seen and told her to be wary of.
“Well, I’ll just tell you. What I’d like to do, though, is sit down underneath that oak tree there and rest my legs, if that’s okay.” Billy followed him, and Ramona came down off the porch as Mirakle eased himself to the ground at the tree’s base. He looked up at Billy, his gray eyes sparkling with crafty good humor. “The ghost show,” he said reverently. “Billy, imagine a theater in one of the great cities of the world—New York, London, Paris perhaps. Onstage is a man—perhaps me, or even you—in a black tuxedo. He asks for volunteers from the audience. They tie him securely into a chair. Then a black cloth is draped around his body, and the cloth tied to the chair’s legs. He is carried into a large black cabinet. The cabinet’s doors are padlocked, and the volunteers go to their seats as the houselights dim. The lights go out. The audience waits, as a minute passes. Then another. They shift nervously in their seats.” Mirakle’s gaze danced from Billy to Ramona and back to the boy again.
“And then…a muted noise of wind. The audience feels it across their faces; it seems to come from all directions, yet from no direction in particular. There is the scent of flowers on the edge of decay and then…the distant, echoing sound of a funeral bell, tolling to twelve midnight. Above the audience there is a scattering of bright lights that slowly take on the shape of human faces, hovering in midair: the spirit guides have arrived. Music sounds; the blare of trumpets and rattle of drums. Then…boom!” He clapped his hands together for emphasis, startling both of his listeners. “A burst of red flame and smoke at center stage! BOOM! Another, stage right, and BOOM! on the left as well! The air is filled with smoke and the odor of brimstone, and the audience knows they are on a perilous voyage, into the very domain of Death itself! A wailing dark shape darts across the stage, leaps high, and soars to the ceiling; strange blue and purple lights dance in the air; moans and clanking noises fill the theater. A chorus of skeletons take center stage, link arms and kick their bony legs, accompanied by the dissonant music of a spectral orchestra. Sheeted spirits fly through the air, calling out the names of some members of the audience, and predicting events that only the all-seeing dead could know! And when the audience is driven to a peak of excitement and wonder, Old Scratch himself appears in a grand burst of red sparks! He clutches his pitchfork and prowls the stage, casting fireballs from the palms of his hands. He glares at the audience, and he says in a terrible, growling voice: ‘Tell your friends to see Dr. Mirakle’s Ghost Show…or I’ll be seeing you!’ And Satan vanishes in a grand display of pyrotechnic artistry that leaves the eyes dazzled. The lights abruptly come up; the volunteers return, unlocking the black cabinet. The form within is still securely covered with the shroud, and underneath that he is still tied exactly as before! He rises, to the applause of a stunned and pleased audience.”
Mirakle paused for a few seconds, as if regaining his breath
. He smiled at Billy. “And that, young man, is a ghost show. Mystery. Magic. Delicious terror. Kids love it.”
Ramona grunted. “If you can find a way to put all that in a sack, you could go into the fertilizer business.”
Mirakle laughed heartily; as his face reddened, Billy saw the broken blue threads of veins in his nose and across his cheeks. “Ha! Yes, that’s a possibility I hadn’t thought of! Ha!” He shook his head, genuine mirth giving his face a rich glow. “Well, well. I’ll have to consider it.”
“You’re a faker,” Ramona said. “That’s what it boils down to.”
Mirakle stopped laughing and stared at her. “I’m a performer. I’m a supernatural artiste. I admit the ghost show isn’t for everyone’s taste, and I suppose that with movies and television the effect of a ghost show has taken a beating, but rural people still like them.”
“You haven’t answered my question yet. What are you doing here?”
“In a few days I’m going to be joining Ryder Shows, Incorporated. I’ll be touring with them on the carnival circuit for the rest of the summer; then, in the fall, Ryder Shows becomes part of the state fair, in Birmingham. I need to upgrade my ghost show, to give it style and dazzle; there’s a lot of work to be done, maintaining the machinery—which is in a Tuscaloosa warehouse right now—and getting the show in shape for Birmingham. I need an assistant.” He looked at Billy. “Have you finished high school yet?”
“Yes sir.”
“No,” Ramona snapped. “My son workin’ with a…a fake thing like that? No, I won’t hear of it! Now if you’d please get your caboose on down the road, I’d be grateful!” She angrily motioned for him to get up and leave.
“The pay would be quite equitable,” Mirakle said, looking up at the boy. “Forty dollars a week.”
“No!”
Billy dug his hands into his pockets. Forty dollars was a lot of money, he thought. It would buy tar and shingles for the roof, caulking for the windows, white paint for the weathered walls; it would buy new brake shoes for the Olds, and good tires too; it would buy gasoline and kerosene for the lamps, milk and sugar and flour and everything his folks would ever need. Forty dollars was a world of money. “How many weeks?” he heard himself ask.
Mirakle smiled. “The state fair ends on the thirteenth of October. Then I’ll need you to help get my equipment back to Mobile, for winter storage. You’ll be home by the sixteenth, at the latest.”
Ramona grasped his arm and squeezed it. “I forbid it,” she said. “Do you hear me? This ‘ghost show’ stuff is blasphemy! It mocks everything we stand for!”
“You sound like Dad used to,” Billy said quietly.
“I know what you’re thinkin’! Sure, forty dollars a week is a lot of money and it could be put to good use, but there’s better ways of makin’ an honest dollar than…than puttin’ on a sideshow!”
“How?” he asked her.
She was silent, the wheels turning fiercely in her brain for an answer. How, indeed?
“You’d be my assistant,” Mirakle said. “You’d get a real taste of show business. You’d learn how to work in front of an audience, how to hold their attention and make them want more. You’d learn…what the world is like.”
“The world,” Billy said in a soft, faraway voice. His eyes were dark and troubled as he looked back at his father again, then at his mother. She shook her head. “It’s a lot of money, Mom.”
“It’s nothing!” she said harshly, and turned a baleful gaze on Mirakle. “I didn’t bring my son up for this, mister! Not for some sham show that tricks people!”
“Fifty dollars a week,” Billy said. Mirakle’s smile disappeared. “I’ll do it for fifty, but not a red cent less.”
“What? Listen, do you know how many kids I can get to work for thirty a week? A few thousand, that’s all!”
“If you looked so long and hard to find my mother and me, I figured you must think I could add something to that show of yours that nobody else could. I figure I’m worth the fifty dollars to you, and I think you’ll pay me. Because if you don’t, I won’t go, and all that looking you did will be wasted time. I also want a week’s pay in advance, and I want three days to fix the roof and put brake shoes on the car.”
Mirakle shot up from the ground, sputtering as if he’d been dashed with cold water. His head barely came up to Billy’s shoulder. “Nope! Won’t have it, not at all!” He strode to the porch, got his seersucker jacket, and put his hat on; the seat of his trousers was dusty, and he brushed it off with red-faced irritation. “Try to take advantage of me, huh?” He marched past Ramona and Billy, dust stirring up around his shoes. After ten steps his stride slowed; he stopped and let out a long sigh. “Forty-five dollars a week and two days,” he said, looking over his shoulder.
Billy kicked at a pebble and considered the offer. He said, “Okay. Deal.”
Mirakle clapped his hands together. Ramona clutched her son’s arm and said, “So fast? Just like that, without talkin’ it over?…”
“I’m sorry, Mom, but I already know what you’d say. It won’t be so bad; it’ll just be…pretending, that’s all.”
Mirakle walked back to them and thrust out his hand. Billy shook it. “There’s no business like show business!” the man crowed, his face split by a grin. “Now did you say you wanted thirty dollars in advance?” He brought out his wallet again, opening it with a flourish. Billy saw, sealed in a plastic window, a yellowing picture of a smiling young man in a service uniform.
“Forty-five,” Billy said, evenly and firmly.
Mirakle chuckled. “Yes, yes of course. I like you, William. You drive a hard bargain. And speaking of driving, do you have your license? No? You can drive a car, can’t you?”
“I’ve driven the Olds a few times.”
“Good. I’ll need you at the wheel some.” He counted out the bills. “There you are. It just about breaks me, too, but… I suppose you’ll put it to good use. Is there a motel around here that might take a personal check?”
“The Bama Inn might. It’s in Fayette. There’s a Travel-Lodge, too.” Behind him Ramona abruptly turned and walked back toward the house.
“Ah, that’s fine. I’ll see you, then, in two days. Shall we say at four in the afternoon? We’ll be meeting Ryder Shows in Tuscaloosa, and I’d like to get on the road before dark.” He put his wallet away and shrugged into his jacket, all the time staring at Billy as if afraid the boy might change his mind. “We’re set then? It’s a deal?”
Billy nodded. He’d made his decision, and he wouldn’t back down from it.
“You’ll have to work hard,” Mirakle said. “It won’t be easy. But you’ll learn. In two days, then. A pleasure meeting you, Mrs. Creekmore!” he called out, but she stood with her back to him. He walked off down the road, his stubby legs moving carefully as he avoided sliding on loose stones; he turned around to wave, and from the porch John suddenly called out, “Come back soon!”
28
“IT’S FINISHED,” BILLY SAID, and stood on the ladder to appraise his work. It was a good job; chinks and holes in the roof had been filled in with pitch, and new shingles laid down smoothly and evenly. Midafternoon sunlight burned down upon Billy’s back as he descended the ladder with his jar of roofing nails and his hammer. The gloves he wore were matted with pitch, and black streaks of it painted his chest and face. He scrubbed his face and hair with strong soap, then put away the ladder and the pitch bucket.
He let the sun dry his hair as he stood and looked in all directions. I’ll be back, he told himself. Sure I will be, in mid-October. But something within him told him that when he did come back, he wouldn’t be the same Billy Creekmore who’d left. He walked past the Olds—new brake shoes installed, the tires put back on but one of them already dangerously flat—and around the house to the front porch. John was in his favorite chair, a glass of lemonade at his side, the Bible in his lap. John smiled at him. “Sun’s sure hot today.”
Something clenched hard in Billy’s st
omach and throat; he managed to return the smile and say, “Yes sir, sure is.”
Inside, Ramona was sitting in the front room, in the old gray easy chair. Her hands were gripping the armrests; beside her, on the floor, was a battered brown suitcase packed with her son’s clothes.
“I’ll be fine,” Billy said.
“Tuscaloosa isn’t so far away, y’know. If you don’t like what you’ve gotten yourself into, you can just catch the bus and come home.”
“I won’t give it up at the first sign of trouble, though,” he reminded her. “I’ll stick with it as long as I can.”
“A carnival.” Ramona frowned and shook her head. Her eyes were red and puffy, but all of her crying was done. Her son was going out into the world, following the winding road of his Mystery Walk, and that was what the Giver of Breath had decreed. “I went to one of those once, when I was a little girl. The lights cut your eyes, and the noise sounds like a tea party in Hell. They show freaks at those things, poor people who can’t help the way they were born. And folks stand around and laugh.” She was silent for a moment. “Don’t let them make a freak out of you, son. Oh, they’ll try, just like the folks in Hawthorne have tried; but don’t let them. You’ll be tested, mark my words.”
“I know.”
“Do you understand”—she turned her face toward him—“that the Mystery Walk is more than the ritual your grandmother took you through? The ritual was to get your head opened up, to expand your senses; it was to make you ready for what’s ahead. You began your Mystery Walk when you were ten years old and saw the Booker boy’s revenant, but your whole life will be a Mystery Walk, just like mine has been. Events will hinge on events, like a series of opening doors; people will touch and be touched by you, and you must never belittle the power of the human touch. It can work wonders.”
She leaned slightly toward him, her eyes shining. “You’ll have to go into places that are dark, son, and you’ll have to find your way out alone. What you saw in the smokehouse—the shape changer—isn’t the only kind of darkness in this world. There’s human darkness, too, misery and pain and torment that comes right from the soul. You’ll see that kind, too.