Candlemoth by R. J. Ellory Read Free Book Online Page B

way.
        'You
boys stop right there! You see what you've done? You see what's happening here?
Get back where you came from or I'll turn you into the lizards that you are!'
        Mrs.
Chantry's voice was commanding, like marshalling the forces in some
Union-Confederate engagement.
        And
the gang of teenagers behind us was shocked.
        Stunned.
        Silent.
        And
then they went.
        No
question.
        No
hesitation.
        One
after the other they went, caterwauling down the street like a pack of whipped
dogs.
        Even
at sixteen or seventeen you still remembered the stories well enough, the
eating of the husband, the gateway to Hell that lay right behind her porch
door.
        I
remember Larry James' face in that moment. He glanced back towards us before he
turned at the end of the street. He didn't know whether to feel angry he'd been
cheated of the kill, or sympathetic because we had encountered what appeared to
be a far worse fate.
        And
then she turned.
        I saw
myself at eleven years old, saw myself standing right there on her path with a
fish in my hands, wrapped in a piece of linen that once held a baked ham
sandwich, a baked ham sandwich just like the one Nathan Verney and I had shared
a million years before.
        And
that moment seemed like yesterday, like an hour ago, like the fleeting second
that had just passed by.
        Possibly
the last second of my life.
        And
then she spoke, and all I recall now is the sense of warmth in her tone, the
timbre, the depth.
        'You
know, boys,' she started. 'I really did eat the fish.'
     
           
        We
were there for nigh on two hours.
        Mrs.
Chantry cleaned Nathan's face, she dressed it, put some gauze over it and held
it with some tape.
        She
had homemade lemonade, some kind of dry cookie that tasted of nutmeg and sweet
cherry and something else indescribable that made you want two or three more.
        Her
house did not have walls daubed with blood. She did not have the skull of her
husband on the mantel over the fire. She had all her teeth, they were white,
not black, and she smelled faintly of violets and peppermint.
        She
even showed us a picture of her husband, and when we told her of the stories we'd
heard as children she told us she had in fact started most of the rumors.
        'Get
to my age,' she said, 'and you require a little peace and quiet. It was never
the intention to frighten a soul, least of all a child, but you know how people
are. They take something and they embellish it, they twist it and exaggerate
it, and when you hear that same tale come back it's twice as high and three
times as wide, and you barely recognize it. That was all that happened, and now
I'm kinda regretful folks took to such things in the first place.'
        She
smiled at Nathan.
        'Like
you,' she said. 'You saw something today that you were gonna have to deal with
one time or other. You understand what I mean, right?'
        'Dumb
as milk white folks is what you mean,' Nathan said.
        Mrs.
Chantry smiled. 'Dumb-ass white folks, sure enough.'
        'Trailer
trash,' Nathan went on. 'All up and marryin' their sisters and eating three-day
old leftovers out of a cooking pan.'
        'Nathan,'
I hissed, and he looked at me with this wide- eyed innocence.
        Mrs.
Chantry raised her hand. 'Ain't so far from the truth, Daniel.'
        She
turned and looked at Nathan. 'I know your daddy,' she went on. 'I know he knows
all about what's happening in Alabama and Georgia. Never suspected it would do
anything other than infect the whole country after a while. Figure there'll be
a lot more shooting and rioting and marching and hollering before people come
to their senses, you know?'
        She
looked at me and smiled. She turned once again to Nathan.
        'You
seem to have yourself a good friend here, Nathan Verney. Seems to me a white
boy who'll stand