The Narrows(113)
In fact, there were a great many things that had happened in Stillwater that no one would ever know, although some folks would come close to knowing them. Ben himself had come close to learning that the unidentified hairless boy who had washed up along Wills Creek had spent the weeknights prior sleeping in a semicatatonic state up in the trestles of the Highland Street Bridge. He was the troll that Jim Talbot’s seven-year-old sister thought she had glimpsed while traveling along Route 40 with her father. He would have also never been found had the Highland Street Bridge not been washed away in the previous flood, casting his hibernating body into the muddy reeds where it was discovered the following day by a group of drunken watermen.
On this day, the Narrows itself continued to gurgle and roil and spill over its concrete barrier. It took some things with it and deposited others as it saw fit, just as it always had throughout the years. Ben pulled over onto the shoulder of Route 40 and climbed halfway down the embankment toward the rushing gray waters. It was a difficult climb and he nearly lost his footing twice. He decided not to descend any farther and merely remained halfway down the embankment, clinging to the old Witch Tree as he watched the risen waters moving at a quick clip. On the other side of the Narrows and up the hillside, the plastics factory held court over the town, the mummified corpse of a king presiding over an abandoned kingdom. Ben turned away with a feeling of dread crawling around inside his belly.
He stopped by Hogarth’s Drugstore on Hamilton but the place was dark and locked up tight. The storefront hadn’t been properly sandbagged, and peering into the darkened front windows, Ben could see rubber masks, Halloween decorations, and various other sundries floating about in what looked to be fifteen or so inches of murky brown water. A three-eyed toad was perched on a box of tampons that floated by the window while Ben peered in. He left and drove out to Hogarth’s place on Trestle Road. The front door was unlocked and there was rubbish, sodden and mildewing, strewn about the front porch. He entered the house, calling out the old man’s name, but no response greeted him. Eventually, he found the old man’s body in the back bedroom. He lay in repose on his back, his hands balled together on the swell of his stomach. A St. Christopher’s medal was clenched in both his hands. By Ben’s estimation, the old fellow appeared to have died of a heart attack sometime in the night.
He stopped by Shirley Bennice’s house out on Truckhouse Road to say good-bye. Yet he found the place dark and locked up, Shirley’s Grand Prix gone from the driveway. He nodded, as if confirming her decision to run away from Stillwater, and turned back to his car.
When he arrived at the police station, he didn’t bother to go inside. Instead, he locked the front doors then put a note in the mail slot that read: This station has been abandoned.
Contact the Cumberland Sheriff’s Department or 911 for assistance.
He thought about adding something about the three dead bodies inside, but in the end, he decided against it.
5
It was closing on dusk when he finally made it around to the Crawly house. He knocked several times on the front door but no one answered. Wind chimes tinkled in the cool breeze. After a while, he climbed back down the steps and headed toward his police car before pausing then cutting around to the rear of the house.
Brandy sat on the top step of the back porch in a sweatshirt and jeans. Her hair was pulled back in a ponytail and her face looked stoic and clean. When one of his boots snapped a twig, she looked up at him without an expression on her face at first…but then she smiled softly at him. She’s going to be a beautiful woman someday, Ben thought, surprised and a bit frightened by the fatherly nature of such a thought.
“Hi,” she said. “You look different in regular clothes.”
He was dressed in jeans, an old Towson University T-shirt, and a lightweight windbreaker. Her comment caused him to smile, too. “How are you feeling?”
She shrugged. “Okay, I guess.”
“How’s your mom?”
“She’s getting better. She spends most of the time asleep, but I guess that’s best.”
“Her arm?”
“It’s healing.”
“That’s good.” He followed her earlier gaze out across the yard and beyond the Marshes’ cornfield. “You out here waiting for someone?”
“Not really,” she said…and he knew instantly that she was lying to him.
He didn’t press the issue. “Well, I just wanted to say good-bye.”
“So you’re really leaving?”
“I am,” he said. “I’ve been meaning to do it for a long time. Got no reason to stay now.”
“I guess not,” she said. “Mom says we’re leaving too.”
“Everyone’s leaving. They’re blaming the floods and maybe they even believe that, but these families put up with the flooding for generations without batting an eye. Whether they know it or not, they’ve sensed what happened here. And now it’s time to go.”
“People are gonna want to know what happened,” she said with genuine worry in her voice.
He sighed. “Probably. But there won’t be anyone around to tell them.” And he winked. “You dig me?”
Again, that smile. “I do,” she said. There were other thoughts flitting around just behind her eyes that Ben could see clear as day. “What do you think happened to the other boys?” she asked. “To my brother and Billy Leary?”