Lullaby

Chapter 33

The crowds of people shoulder around us, the women in halter tops and men in cowboy hats. People are eating caramel apples on sticks and shaved ice in paper cones. Dust is everywhere. Somebody steps on Helen's foot and she pulls it back, saying, «I find that no matter how many people I kill, it's never enough.»

I say, let's not talk shop.

The ground is crisscrossed with thick black cables. In the darkness beyond the lights, engines burn diesel to make electricity. You can smell diesel and deep-fried food and vomit and powdered sugar.

These days, this is what passes for fun.

A scream sails past us. And a glimpse of Mona. It's a carnival ride with a bright neon sign that says: The Octopus. Black metal arms, like twisted spokes, turn around a hub. At the same time, they dip up and down. At the end of each arm is a seat, and each seat spins on its own hub. The scream sails by again, and a banner of red and black hair. Her silver chains and charms are flung straight out from the side of Mona's neck. Both her hands are clamped on the guard bar fastened across her lap.

The ruins of Western civilization, the turrets and towers and chimneys, fly out of Mona's hair. An I Ching coin bullets past us.

Helen watches her, saying, «I guess Mona got her flying spell.»

My pager goes off again. It's the same number as the police detective. A new savior is already hot on my tail.

The more people die, the more things stay the same.

I turn the pager off.

And watching Mona scream by, Helen says, «Bad news?»

I say, nothing important.

In her pink high heels, Helen picks through the mud and sawdust, stepping over the black power cables.

Holding out my hand, I say, «Here.»

And she takes it. And I don't let go. And she doesn't seem to mind. And we're walking hand in hand. And it's nice.

She's only got a few big rings left so it doesn't hurt as much as you'd think.

The carnival rides thrash the air around us, diamond-white, emerald-green, ruby-red lights, turquoise and sapphire-blue lights, the yellow of citrons, the orange of honey amber. Rock music blares out of speakers mounted on poles everywhere.

These rock-oholics. These quiet-ophobics.

I ask Helen, when was the last time she rode a Ferris wheel?

Everywhere, there are men and women, hand in hand, kissing. They're feeding each other shreds of pink cotton candy. They walk side by side, each with one hand stuck in the butt pocket of the other's tight jeans.

Watching the crowd, Helen says, «Don't take this the wrong way, but when was your last time?»

My last time for what?

«You know.»

I'm not sure if my last time counts, but it must be about eighteen years ago.

And Helen smiles and says, «It's no wonder you walk funny.» She says, «I have twenty years and counting since John.»

On the ground, with the sawdust and cables, there's a crumbled newspaper page. A three-column advertisement says:

Attention Patrons of the Helen Boyle

Real Estate Agency

The ad says, «Have you been sold a haunted house? If so, please call the following number to be part of a class-action lawsuit.»

Then Oyster's cell phone number. Then I say, please, Helen, why did you tell him that stuff?

Helen looks down at the newspaper ad. With her pink shoe, she grinds it into the mud, saying, «For the same reason I didn't kill him. He could be very lovable at times.»

Next to the ad, covered in mud is the photo of another dead fashion model.

Looking up at the Ferris wheel, a ring of red and white fluorescent tubes holding seats that sway full of people, Helen says, «That looks doable.»

A man stops the wheel and all the carts swing in place while Helen and I sit on the red plastic cushion and the man snaps a guard bar shut across our laps. He steps back and pulls a lever, and the big diesel engine catches. The Ferris wheel jerks as if it's rolling backward, and Helen and I rise into the darkness.

Halfway up into the night, the wheel jerks to a stop. Our seat swings, and Helen makes a fast grab for the guard bar. A diamond solitaire slips off one finger and flashes straight through the struts and lights, through the colors and faces, down into the gears of the machine.

Helen looks after it, saying, «Well, that was roughly thirty-five thousand dollars.»

I say, maybe it's okay. It's a diamond.

And Helen says that's the problem. Gemstones are the hardest things on earth, but they still break. They can take constant stress and pressure, but a sudden, sharp impact can shatter them into dust.

Across the midway floor, Mona comes running over the sawdust to stand below us, waving both hands. She jumps in place and yells, «Whooooo! Go, Helen!»

The wheel jerks, starting again. The seat tilts, and Helen's purse starts to fall but she grabs it. The gray rock's still inside it. The gift from Oyster's coven. Instead of her purse, her planner book slides off the seat, flapping open in the air, tumbling down to land in the sawdust, and Mona runs over and picks it up.

Mona slaps the book on her thigh to knock off the sawdust, then shakes it in the air to show it's okay.

Helen says, «Thank God for Mona.»

I say, Mona said you planned to kill me.

And Helen says, «She told me that you wanted to kill me.»

We both look at each other.

I say, thank God for Mona.

And Helen says, «Buy me some caramel corn?»

On the ground, farther and farther away, Mona's looking through the pages of the planner. Every day, the name of Helen's political target.

Looking up, out of the colored lights and into the night sky, we're getting closer to the stars. Mona once said that stars are the best part of being alive. On the other side, where people go after they die, they can't see the stars.

Think of deep outer space, the incredible cold and quiet. The heaven where silence is reward enough.

I tell Helen that I need to go home and clean something up. It has to be pretty soon, before things get worse.

The dead fashion models. Nash. The police detectives. All of it. How he got the culling spell, I don't know.

We rise higher, farther away from the smells, away from the diesel engine noise. We rise up into the quiet and cold. Mona, reading the planner book, gets smaller. All the crowds of people, their money and elbows and cowboy boots, get smaller. The food booths and the portable toilets get smaller. The screams and rock music, smaller.

At the top, we jerk to a stop. Our seat sways less and less until we're sitting still. This high up, the breeze teases, rats, back-combs Helen's pink bubble of hair. The neon and grease and mud, from this far away it all looks perfect. Perfect, safe, and happy. The music's just a dull thud, thud, thud.

This is how we must look to God.

Looking down at the rides, the spinning colors and screams, Helen says, «I'm glad you found me out. I think I always hoped someone would.» She says, «I'm glad it was you.»

Her life isn't so bad, I say. She has her jewels. She has Patrick.

«Still,» she says, «it's nice to have one person who knows all your secrets.»

Her suit is light blue, but it's not a regular robin's-egg blue. It's the blue of a robin's egg you might find and then worry that it won't hatch because it's dead inside. And then it does hatch, and you worry about what to do next.

On the guard bar locked across us, Helen puts her hand on mine and says, «Mr. Streator, do you even have a first name?»

Carl.

I say, Carl. It's Carl Streator.

I ask, why did she call me middle-aged?

And Helen laughs and says, «Because you are. We both are.»

The wheel jerks again, and we're coming back down.

And I say, her eyes. I say, they're blue.

And this is my life.

At the bottom, the carnival man snaps open the guard bar and I give Helen my hand as she steps out of the seat. The sawdust is loose and soft, and we limp and stumble through the crowds, holding each other around the waist. We get to Mona, and she's still reading the planner book.

«Time for some caramel corn,» Helen says. «Carl, here, is going to buy.»

And the book still open in her hands, Mona looks up. Her mouth open a little, her eyes blink once, twice, three times, fast. She sighs and says, «You know the grimoire we're looking for?» She says, «I think we just found it.»