Nevermore: A Novel of Love, Loss, & Edgar Allan Poe Page 7

  "And if someone needs help…" Lenore said.

  "Yes, we'll be there to do what we can."

  They turned and hurried toward the tavern. The doors were open, and a small pool of light had leaked out onto the porch, but there was no one in sight. All of the sounds they heard came from the back of the building. Edgar stepped through the doorway first, and Lenore followed. They stared inside at an almost empty room. The doors in back also stood open wide.

  There were lanterns lit along the walkway leading down to the docks, and the two stepped through the main room and out the far side. It was about fifty yards from the back of the tavern to the water. Boats arrived at all hours of the day and night, dropping and receiving passengers and supplies, but any sort of normal traffic on the waterway wouldn't cause such a ruckus. If there was serious violence or gunplay involved, those inside would have hunkered behind their tables or slipped off to their rooms, hoping to avoid being shot. The place was absolutely empty. Not even the bartender, or a serving girl had been left behind to watch the till.

  Edgar turned, looked at Lenore, and raised an eyebrow.

  They started down the path toward the water.

  "Get her up here," a voice cried. "I have a blanket."

  The sound of water splashing and loud cursing followed. As they drew near, they saw men and a few women circled, holding lanterns. There was a raft tied up at the dock, but there were no boats in sight. Some of those on shore were pointing at something in the water.

  "Damn it!" a man cried. "She bit me!"

  There was a sudden flurry of splashing. Men bellowed, and those on the dock worked frantically to light the struggle, but whatever was happening in the water was moving too fast.

  "Get more lights," Someone called. "Someone get a boat!"

  "Use the raft."

  "It's too hard to maneuver…get a damn boat!"

  The cries flew back and forth in rapid succession. Edgar worked his way down toward the bank, keeping well back from those involved. He scanned the faces of the onlookers. Their eyes were wide, and they scanned the dark water intently, each hoping to spot something the others had missed.

  "What happened?" Edgar asked a man in a dark suit.

  "Not sure," the stranger said. "Something about a girl in the water. Giving them quite a run for it, it seems. Someone said she had no clothes."

  Lenore studied the trees on the far side. Beyond those trees The Great Dismal Swamp stretched out into the night. It seemed endless, and very suddenly, she sensed that immensity, and how it pressed in on their tiny, dimly lit stronghold.

  Then a very different sound intruded. There was a sharp whizzing, followed by the sound of something being struck. A man cried out. The sound repeated, and suddenly everyone in the water was less interested in being there. Men dove for the shore, or the cover of the small dock. Those on the shore backed away, uncertain. Then an arrow shot out of the night and stuck in a tree about four feet from where Edgar stood with a solid WHAP! The crowd broke and ran, all but Edgar, and Lenore, who stepped back behind two of the larger trees near the shore and waited.

  Edgar edged around the tree, angling to get a look at the far bank of the waterway. There was no one clearly visible, but as he watched he saw a face, surrounded by wisps of gray hair, press forward through the trees. A moment later, two large men, and a slender girl crept onto the beach. They stood very still for a long moment, waiting. When there was no reaction from the tavern side, they hurried to the water.

  They entered without hesitation, and moments later climbed back onto the shore. Between them they supported another young woman. Her hair was long, hanging in damp strings down her back to her waist. She wore nothing at all, and moonlight gleamed off the pale curves of her body. As the two men half dragged, half-carried her into the trees, the girl kept her back to them. She held a long, supple bow, and an arrow was notched. A quiver rested easily on her shoulder, and Edgar saw the feathered ends of several more arrows waiting to be fired. He chose not to become their target.

  "Did you see?" he hissed.

  Lenore nodded, but even as she did, there was a solid THUNK! as another arrow embedded itself in the tree directly behind Edgar's head. He fell silent, and they waited. After several moments of silence, Edgar once again chanced a look around the trunk of the tree. There was no one in sight. The shoreline was bare on both sides of the water, and there was no sign that anyone had passed.

  He stepped around the tree, and inspected the arrow. It was very long, thin and solid. Though obviously hand-made, he could find no fault in the workmanship. It was beautifully fletched with what appeared to be the feathers of a red tailed hawk. Where it bit into the tree, he saw a wickedly sharp metal barb.

  "Glad I was on the other side," he said.

  Lenore stepped up beside him and studied the arrow, then glanced back at the trees nervously.

  "I'm sure they're gone," Edgar said.

  Lenore shivered. She didn't look fully convinced.

  "What just happened?" she asked. "I mean, who was that girl, and who were those – others? Some of the men who were out here had guns, why did they take off running the second that first arrow flew?

  Edgar didn't answer. He had turned, staring at the water, as if lost in thought, or trying to remember something. Then his eyes widened.

  "Damn!" he said. He started for the dock at a run. Lenore followed, though more slowly.

  "Where are you going?" she cried. "Why…?"

  A moment later, his purpose became clear. He laid down on the dock and peered over the edge. A moment later, he reached down and pulled. A man's prone form bobbed under the edge of the short pier and then floated. Edgar held the man by his collar and dragged him toward shore. Another of the arrows protruded from his shoulder, and he was not struggling.

  "Is he…?"

  "He's alive," Edgar said. "Get up to the tavern and bring help. He's too big for me to carry, and I don't want to do any more damage. See if there's a doctor."

  Lenore took off at a run, and Edgar continued, slowly, to drag the unmoving man toward the shore.

  The man, Jebediah Nixon, was breathing raggedly, but he was unconscious. The arrow wound, while deep, was also clean. It had struck true, and run straight through, the tip protruding from the back of his shoulder. By some miracle, it had missed damaging anything of vital importance. The wound had bled a lot, and he was in shock, but a traveling veterinarian who'd been staying on the Virginia side of the roadhouse had cleaned the wound, doused it with enough whiskey to make Jebediah bellow, and stitched it up neatly. The scar would not be pretty, but the wound would heal.

  As it turned out, Jebediah had served in the war under General Lee, and it wasn't his first battle wound. Once the burning from the whiskey had passed, and the ache from the wound settled to a dull throb, he was easily pacified by more whiskey poured slowly into a tumbler.

  Everyone had gathered back in the tavern. Enough ale and whiskey had been poured to calm nerves and loosen tongues. After helping with the injured man, and accepting a round on the house, Edgar, his soaked sleeves and shirt drying slowly, and Lenore had retired to her usual table to wait and see where it would all lead.

  "Who were they?" Edgar asked no one in particular. "I've seen Indians, and those two larger men were no Indians. Still the girl was incredibly accurate with the bow and arrow."

  "Did you see the old woman?" Lenore asked.

  Edgar nodded. "Only for an instant. She appeared first, just before the girl."

  They stared at one another for a moment, and then, suddenly Lenore burst out laughing.

  Edgar cocked an eyebrow and waited.

  "We sound crazy," she said, fighting for breath. "The two men who were not Indians, an old woman who disappeared, and a girl with a bow and arrow, stealing a naked woman from the shore and disappearing into the swamp. If you were to write this into one of your tales, how do you suppose your editor would react?"

  "I've not had all that much luck with editors thus f
ar," Edgar said, "but I get your point. It is crazy, and it didn't start with the girl in the water."

  Anita stopped by their table. She'd been kept busy serving drinks and taking orders for more. It was the first chance she'd had to stand still.

  "They are not Indians," she said. "That was Nettie. The men serve her – the girl – no one is sure. Nettie has always lived in the swamp. When my family came to the swamp, she was already here, and she seems – the same. There is always the old woman, and the young girl."

  "What are you saying?" Edgar asked. "She's a witch?"

  "There are things in the swamp," Anita said, "that I do not understand. When the harvest comes, there is a celebration. Nettie is a part of that – or the girl is – or both. No one ever quite remembers."

  "But the woman in the water," Lenore said. "Where would they take her? Where do they live; why did they shoot that man with an arrow?"

  "No one knows where she lives," Anita said, "and no one will follow her in there. Some have tried. Most of them never made it out of the swamp alive, and those that did found no trace. If she took someone into the swamp, we won't know why unless she tells us."

  "You talk to her?" Edgar said.

  "Many have talked to her. She can heal, and they say she has the power to help find lost things, or to change your fortune. There is always a price."

  Lenore shivered.

  Edgar turned to stare out the window into the swamp. He had heard two words that drove into him like a steel blade. Heal – and change. One of the reasons he was on the road was to consult with specialists over Virginia's health. The answer was always the same. Some claimed to have cures, or procedures that would help, but they sounded like madmen, and as desperate as he was, he would trust none of them near his wife. This felt different. There was a lot of power in this swamp, and near it. Strange things had happened since the moment he'd arrived, and none of them appeared to be coincidence. He had approached Virginia with such solutions in the past, but she had rejected them. Her faith was strong, but apparently not strong enough to stop the withering of her health.

  "I believe I could find her," he said. "Or, more precisely, I know that Grimm could find her. I don't know what would happen if I did, but I feel – somehow – as if it's something I have to do."

  "What in the world are you talking about?" Lenore asked. "You know nothing of the swamp, and it appears to me that if you manage to get too close, what's likely to happen is you'll be shot. You are a handsome man, Edgar, but you will be much less so with an arrow protruding from your heart."

  "You are forgetting about the girl," he said. "You freed her, Grimm carried her. I won't abandon her to some crazy woman in the swamp without at least trying to save her."

  "What if she doesn't need saving?" Lenore said. "What if this Nettie knows what has happened, and knows what to do, and all you manage is to interfere?"

  "You'd really be content not knowing? This is not as simple as one of my stories, or one of your drawings. There are powers stretching out through time. There are tales within tales, and powers within powers. It's like walking the roads of a dream within a dream. I can't just let it go. It's begun, and that's how it is with stories. There is a beginning, conflict, and an ending. I'm afraid I'd go mad without knowing all three."

  As Edgar talked, the boy, Tom, had worked his way closer across the room. He pretended to sweep the floor, but he'd been eavesdropping, and he already knew more than most.

  "I can guide you," he said.

  He stood, red faced, expecting to be silenced, or sent on his way. Instead, Edgar turned and regarded him seriously.

  "You've been in there?" he asked.

  "I fish in there, and I've hunted with my pa, and my uncle," Tom said. "I can take you in, and I know the old stories. I know where to take you – where she might show up. If you find her…that's probably as far as I go."

  Edgar nodded. "I will need to see something from your father, and from the tavern keeper, showing that you are allowed," Edgar said. "You may tell them that we are going hunting, which is true. If I find Nettie, you are released with full pay."

  Tom could barely contain his excitement.

  "I believe," Edgar said, "that you'd better get back to your work, if you want a favorable decision from the bar keep. He's watching you, and he is not smiling."

  Tom turned and hurried away, swiping the broom randomly at the floorboards.

  "You really mean to do this?" Lenore asked.

  "I do. I had hoped that you…"

  "I cannot," she said. "I would, if I was free to, but I have my own quest – my own nightmares and demons to exorcise. I did not come here randomly, as you guessed. Tomorrow before you leave, I will tell you – but at that point, I'm afraid, we must part ways, at least for a time."

  Edgar smiled, but there was little humor in it.

  "It seems I am always parting from someone," he said. "But this one time, I will allow myself the hope that when our tasks are complete, our paths will cross again. It would give me hope, and that is something I am too often without."

  Lenore smiled.

  "Let's finish these drinks, split up, and see if we can get any more information," she said. "I think we've had about enough adventure for one day."

  Edgar nodded.

  At the table next to theirs, the veterinarian who'd patched up the unfortunate Mr. Nixon sat with a large mug of ale. He'd pulled away from the others, and seemed lost in thought.

  Edgar walked over.

  "Good for that man you were here," he said. "He might easily have bled out from a simple wound without proper care."

  The doctor looked up, momentarily confused as he was pulled from his thoughts.

  "Oh, thank you," he said softly. "I'm certain someone would have helped him. There are military men here, and more than a few of them have encountered injuries much more serious without a doctor's aide."

  "Still," Edgar said, sliding into the chair opposite the man, "I believe he was lucky, if there is such a thing. My name is Edgar, Edgar Poe."

  "Simons – Brentley Simons. It was a brave thing you did, pulling him out of the water as you did. How did you know they would not come back and turn you into a human pincushion as well?"

  "Honestly?" Edgar said. "I did not know. I merely acted, and I am sure, had I not done so, that another would have acted in my stead. I almost didn't chance it. All I could think of, after the arrows stopped flying, was that everyone had run back to the tavern and forgotten he was there. I heard him cry out when he was hit."

  Simons nodded. "The thing I cannot fathom," he said, "is why. I was here at this very table when it all started. A man came in from the docks, very excited. He'd seen a woman, floating in the water. She was naked, and he didn't know what to do. That –I believe – is the crux of the matter. If he'd simply pulled her out when he found her, none of the rest of it would have happened at all, and we might have some answers instead of a mystery."

  "The locals seem to know something of our bow-hunting strangers," Edgar said. "When they realized who was out there, they disappeared like smoke."

  "I wondered about that. It was a tense, dangerous moment, but their reaction seemed out of proportion. I followed along, but I believe, if they'd stayed, I'd have done that too. I was caught up in the crowd."

  They fell silent for a moment, sipping their drinks. Then Simons spoke again.

  "You know," he said, "that was an odd wound. I mean, I'm not used to treating men, and I've only removed arrows from dogs, and one cow. Hunter claimed he thought it was a deer – owner claimed the hunter was drunk. I think maybe it was a bit of both. The thing is, I did study anatomy, and I read the journals. I guess what I'm saying is that, in a pinch, I wouldn't be a bad man to have around in an emergency."

  "I believe we could get Mr. Nixon to vouch for you," Edgar said.

  Simons chuckled.

  "The point is," he said, "while Mr. Nixon is a lucky man, it had little if anything to do with me, and everything to do with h
ow, and where the arrow struck. Nearly a miracle, I'd say."

  "Why?"

  "Did you get a good look at the arrow? The tip was hand made from jagged bits of metal. Looked as if it had been pounded into shape, and then honed like a razor. It's a wicked piece of work, and not designed to wound. In fact, half an inch higher, and it would have severed his Axillary artery. There is no way you could have gotten him ashore in time, had that happened. He'd have bled to death in moments. A little more to the side, and there could have been irreparable damage to the bones and muscle of the shoulder. If we were in a city, they might have saved full use of the arm, but out here?"

  Simons shrugged and took a long drag from his beer.

  "What I'm saying is, that shot was either a miracle, or absolutely perfect. It caused him to release the woman, who, by the way, gave him a nasty bite on his forearm for his troubles, but it did not cause any permanent damage."

  "You don't think it's a miracle?"

  "Did you get a good look at Mr. Nixon, Edgar? I'm not much of a church-goer, but from what I know of miracles, they are generally reserved for God-fearing folk. Unless I'm missing something, I'm going with perfect shot. Whoever that was out there in the woods, they didn't come here to kill anyone."

  "Then what?"

  Simons shrugged.

  "I guess we'll never know the answer to that. As far as I can tell, no women have gone missing around here. No carriages have arrived since the one that brought you. She could have swum here from somewhere on the Virginia side, or been dumped off a passing boat. Without knowing who that woman is, it's a matter of simple mathematics. We don't have enough variables to solve for why."

  "A mystery, then," Edgar said. "I'm no stranger to those. Unfortunately, I am used to creating them in my head, and writing them down. I'm afraid my real-world detective skills are untested."

  "A pity," Simons said, "But I'm not sure what there is to learn here. Whoever those people were, and whoever that woman was, they're gone now. That's some of the wildest land in this great country."