Mel stood just outside of the Townsend House on the lawn a few yards away from the front door. She had been wearing a thin dark sweater, but as it was getting cooler, she had taken her jacket with her, a ratty woolen wrap the color of cucumber rinds. She had gotten it back in her college days thinking that it was the greatest fashion. Now it was out of fashion, which was just as well. The only fashion she cared about these days was her photographs.
The afternoon sky was a turbulent gray—the wind was frisky, trying to tug at her hair which she had pulled back into a ponytail. The days were getting shorter. Time was getting shorter. She hugged her tote bag to her. A little earlier, she had phoned back to the office at Hot Tread asking Mad Dog’s secretary if there had been any progress. No, she had said, the doctors still couldn’t figure out why he was still in a coma. Mad Dog’s sister was still out of the country and no one could reach her. The editor’s fate was still in limbo.
There had been an itching at the back of her mind. Yes, the hospital was at a stand still concerning Mad Dog’s welfare, but there was something else. It was just one of those things, like cat spirits and real cats. You just knew what one was when you saw them. And she just knew that if she and Stuart didn’t solve whatever it was that drew Mad Dog’s attention to this little farming town before the end of the week, Mad Dog might never wake up again.
“It’s too bad that whenever we look back at childhood, it’s always through nostalgic rose-colored glasses.” Stuart stepped out of the bed and breakfast, quietly closing the door behind him. He stood at the doorstep, an eye on Mel’s back. His hair was wet, after a brief shower, and he had changed into a fresh pair of jeans and a plain beige long-sleeved shirt. “One forgets how scummy and brackish pond water is.”
“I’ve never gone swimming in a pond.” Mel turned her head to glance at the reporter. “I only took lessons at the local community pool when I was younger. But my parents didn’t let me become too serious about it. They made me take ballet lessons.”
“Did you like dancing?”
“I was horrible at it. I’m a complete klutz about that kind of thing. I can’t be graceful no matter how hard I try.”
“You could have fooled me,” he murmured.
The edge of her mouth curved. “Perhaps you don’t know me all that well after all.” She turned to walk toward the car. “Ida Townsend said we are to take State Road north for a couple of miles if we want to get to Grandbury Farm. There’s supposed to be a big red silo at the intersection we have to turn at.”
“She also said that Mad Dog stayed at the farm while he was visiting Gavot,” he said. “I wonder why—are they his relatives or friends? It doesn’t seem like Mad Dog to suddenly take to the country.”
They got in the car and Stuart drove. In the darkening afternoon light, the fields of wheat and corn looked like pale hairs rising from the ground. In the wind, the plants waved and bent like a thousand grasping fingers. The two journalists didn’t talk during the drive. Stuart kept his eyes on the road, expression slightly frowning. Mel stared out the passenger window not really seeing the outside scenery at all. She wasn’t thinking much at all either except for the fact that the clouds overhead looked like ghosts trying to claw their way back to the earth.
Then, as Ida Townsend had said, a red silo rose from the fields like a bloody finger pointing the way down the crossroads. After Stuart turned onto a bumpy, cracked, little-used road, Mel leaned back in her seat and momentarily closed her eyes.
“What is the connection between being chosen as the Horned King and receiving a string of horn silver beads?” she asked.
“Perhaps it is the name,” he replied. “Horn silver seems like an appropriate thing to give a horned king. But that’s just words.”
She breathed out, feeling dejected. “No one around here seems to know why any of their traditions started. Is no one proud of their own history anymore? And even if they aren’t, why aren’t they remembering for posterity?”
“Maybe we’re just asking the wrong people. There’s always the library.”
“What’s the chance that it’s open during the holidays?”
“We can always call up the librarian.”
“Yes. I’ve seemed to have forgotten that you call people up for interviews for living.”
Both of them lapsed into silence, feeling disinclined to talk. Perhaps it was the weather, Mel thought. The sky didn’t look particularly happy. It didn’t look like the morning which had been all blue and sunny. At least Stuart wasn’t talking either. It was a somewhat comfortable silence—which frightened her a little. She had never had remotely comfortable silences with men before. It was either filled up with chatter or stonewalled silence because her temper was acting up.
A few miles more, the fields momentarily gave way to a two story stone house with light blue shutters. A sign was staked out on the road. “Grandbury Farm.” Pictures of apples were painted under the name like a stenciled border. Several other cars were parked in a small part of a nearby field which had been cleared out. They stopped there. From the parking, they could see the backyard of the house where tables were set out displaying fresh produce, jams, and pickled vegetables. Pumpkins and squash of all sizes and colors littered the ground around the tables. People were milling about looking for the best fruit.
Mel inclined her head toward the makeshift produce sale at the back of the farmhouse. “I’ll meet you there in one hour. I’m going to try to get as many pictures in before the light fades too much.”
“Good luck.” He tucked his hands into his jeans and watched her briefly as she made her way to the front of the house. He turned and walked to where all the people were milling about.
Stuart plunged into the farm’s backyard bazaar, among the patrons dressed in overalls and jackets with tractor logos. The men were the burly types—either bald or mullet-haired and thick facial hair with long side-burns. These men liked to joke about the produce which they kept a somewhat disinterested eye on. Whose pumpkin was larger than the others? Or whose zucchini was bigger for that matter? And then the men would let out loud guffaws and slap each other on the back.
The real customers doing the produce picking were these men’s wives and girlfriends—women with frizzy hair and too much make-up, too tight jeans on either a bony frame or a chubby frame. There were no women of in between size. They would brutishly touch the vegetables and make either an exclamation of disgust or a self-satisfied snort. Some of them would gossip—none too softly—and then laugh like their husbands—car horns all of them.
He knew he stuck out from the backwater crowd like a target, just waiting to be hit. But what could he do? He would have to endure the sly looks for about an hour until Mel arrived. He scowled, feeling not as subtle stares prodding at him, asking why a nerdy looking city boy would dare penetrate their little enclave.
An older woman stood at the end of one of the tables with a battered tin cash box in front of her. She wore a thin jacket the color of wild raspberries and a shapeless floral dress. Her hair, gray-streaked brown, was tied back in a bun. Her face was lined and she wasn’t smiling as she watched the redneck patrons milling about with a dark gaze.
“Good afternoon, Ms…” began Stuart.
“Hannah Grandbury,” the woman replied. Her eyes narrowed slightly. “You’re not from around here, are you?”
He gave her a deceptively lazy smile. “No.”
“Are you just a visitor taking a look around or are you going to be buying anything?”
Stuart shook his head. “I’m a reporter from Hot Tread doing a story on the Harvest Festival. I heard about you place from some of the locals.”
“Hot Tread, huh?” The expression on her face relaxed a bit. “You don’t happen to know someone named Ralph Bartlett, do you?”
“In fact, yes. He’s the head editor of the magazine. He assigned the Harvest Festival to me and a photographer.”
“We called him Mad Dog,” she informed him. “It just seemed to suit his personality better, you know? He came down here to the farm not so long ago to visit.”
“He’s a friend of yours?”
She chuckled. “It’s a convoluted relationship, I’m afraid. He’s my husband’s uncle’s sister-in-law’s cousin’s nephew.”
Stuart blinked. “I see.”
“Our family occasionally has a really large reunion down in Callas. Pretty much anyone of any relation is invited. Last year, we had around three hundred people attend the reunion. And I tell you, it’s quite difficult to keep everyone straight in your head.”
“I bet.”
“My cousin Carl has taken it upon himself to map everyone onto a family tree. He has it privately published and he’s in the process of printing up some copies to distribute to everyone.”
“But excuse me, Mrs. Grandbury, I had the impression that Mad Dog had very little in the way of family. He only has a sister.”
“His only closest relative, you mean,” she said. “Well, I bet Mad Dog is out working in the big city. How is he?”
Stuart shuffled his feet, but he met the woman’s eye. “He’s not doing so well, I’m afraid. He collapsed about a week ago and had to be taken to the hospital.”
“Mercy!”
“He’s in a coma.” He swallowed but his throat was dry. He watched the woman’s face twist in what looked like shock. But her dark eyes remained cold and dull. “The doctors are doing whatever they can to help him.”
“I hope his sister has been contacted.”
“She has, although she’s overseas.”
Hannah Grandbury sighed. “If it weren’t the Harvest Festival and the height of the fall season when we sell the most produce, I could probably spare a day to go out to the city to see him. But as it is,” she shrugged, “perhaps we can contact someone else from the family to go out there.”
