And he turned then and many things happened simultaneously, as his gun lowered onto Lee and Vaun cried out and Kate finally made her move, diving low for his knees, and the high upper window blossomed in glittering fragments into the room and two guns went off. Then there was blood like paint spattered across the room and there was death and there was the sound of two women groaning in deep and eternal agony, and then came the sound of more smashing glass and the absurdly unnecessary flat buzz of the breached house alarm, and then running feet and shouts and the wail of distant sirens, and Hawkin pulling Kate off Lee and muffling his partner's choking groans in the hollow of his shoulder, and the sirens louder now and the sudden silent chasm as both house alarm and siren shut off, and the calm rush of the ambulance men, and Hawkin holding Kate back—and then Lee was gone, and it was over, over, it was over.
EPILOGUE THE ROAD
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Works of art are always products of having been in danger,
of having gone to the very end
—Rainer Maria Rilke, letter
There was also a nun, a Prioress
and thereon hung a brooch of gold full sheen, On which there was first writ a crowned 'A,'
And after Amor vmcit omnia
—Geoffrey Chaucer, Canterbury Tales, Prologue 33
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Tyler's Road was a very different place in the June sunshine. Even the redwoods through which Kate had run that disgustingly wet night seemed more benevolent. The roses along the fence were a glory of color, the rusty shed roof had disappeared beneath an expanse of green, and brilliant flags flew from every fence post, each printed with a helm, a lute, or a quill and proclaiming the boundaries of the Medieval Midsummer's Night Faire.
There were still a few press vans, Kate was amused to see, although they were vastly outnumbered by the buses, bugs, pickups, vans, station wagons, and just plain cars of the participants, which even at this early hour lined both sides of the narrow road for nearly a mile on either side of the Barn. She parked her own car at the suggestion of a longhaired boy in jester's motley and began to walk toward the sounds and, soon, the smells of Tyler's Barn. There was a steady flow of long-haired, bearded, long-skirted types whose costumes ranged from monastic robes to gowns that would have seemed modern in Marie Antoinette's France, with a scattering of self-conscious families in shorts and cameras. She herself was dressed in proper period style, thanks to the bullying of one of Lee's clients—but as a young man, in tunic and lightweight leggings. No ruffs or farthingales for her, thank you.
As she neared the entrance gate she fished out from the leather pouch at her belt the pass that had come in the mail and handed it to the gatekeeper, a vaguely familiar woman in rustic brown who stamped her hand with something that was either an octopus or a musical instrument. Behind the woman stood a mountainous figure in green tunic and leggings, leaning on a rough staff the size of a young tree, a walkie-talkie grumbling from his hip. She looked at him more carefully, and at last knew him by the earring.
"Mark Detweiler?"
He looked at her with uncertainty.
"Kate Martinelli. Casey?" she suggested.
"Casey Martinelli!" he boomed, and crushed her hand in his. "Good to see you. I wouldn't have recognized you in a million years. How've you been?" And then his face changed as he remembered, and still booming he continued, "I was so sorry to hear about your friend, we all were. Is there—"
She interrupted quickly, not wanting to hear it.
"Thanks, no, I'm fine, have you any idea where Tyler is, or Vaun Adams?"
He looked furtively to either side and bent down to whisper in her ear.
"Vaun was around. She's helping Amy with the cart rides, or maybe doing faces, I'm not sure which. Tyler's around." He waved vaguely into the multicolored swirl of humanity. Kate thanked him and began to turn away, but was stopped by his booming voice. "Tell you who I did see, though," and he waited.
"Who?" she obliged.
"Your partner." Seeing her confused look, he repeated it. "Your partner. Al Hawkin."
"Al's here?" She was surprised. This didn't seem his sort of show, but then, maybe he was here for reasons similar to hers.
"Got here about half an hour ago, with the most gorgeous wench—oh, sorry, we're not supposed to call them wenches this year. What was it now?" He scratched his grizzled head in thought, pushing the feathered cap awry. "Oh, right. Buxom ladies, we're supposed to say. Anyway, she's a looker. They went towards the food tents—see the white ones?"
She thanked him again and set off, aiming well downhill from the blazing white canvas from which all the smells were drifting. She wasn't sure she wanted to see him, not quite yet. Later in the day perhaps, after she had talked with Vaun.
Inevitably, perverse fate decreed that the first familiar face she saw was that of Al Hawkin, dressed in twentieth-century open-necked shirt and tan cotton trousers, standing by himself across a clearing and listening to a quartet of three recorders and a viola da gamba. She had not seen him for nearly two months, since the night he had come to the house with the intention, she had realized only recently, of apologizing for his failure to send the marksman up the neighbor's tree in time to save Lee's spine. Kate had been in no state to receive him or his guilt, being on the edge of exhaustion and frantic with worry over yet another infection that was trying to carry off what was left of Lee, and had thrown him out with scathing, bitter words.
Those words hung in front of her now and she hesitated, tempted to duck back behind the tent, but was stopped by the absurdity of it. He saw her then, half raised a hand in greeting, and waited until he saw her start toward him before moving from his post. They met halfway.
"Hello, Al," she said with originality.
"Kate," he answered. "How are you?"
"I am well," she said, and was vaguely surprised to find that she meant it.
"And Lee?"
"You saw her a couple of weeks ago, I think?"
"Ten days ago. She was due to be discharged the following day. How is it going?"
"She's much happier at home, sleeping well. And she seems to be doing better just generally."
"Changes?" He was as sharply perceptive as ever and picked up the nuance of hope in her voice.
"The doctors say they aren't sure, but you know doctors. She says there's some feeling in her right foot, and the other day she moved it in reflex."
"Oh, Kate. That is good news. I'm very glad to hear it."
The sincerity behind the hackneyed phrases stung her eyes, and she looked away at the musicians. Some people were beginning a dance.
"Al, I'm sorry about how I acted when you came to see me. I didn't mean it, I hope you know that."
"I do. I chose a poor time to come. Forget it. I'll come to see her sometime, shall I?"
"She'd like that."
"Tell her I said hello, and that I'm glad to hear she's doing better."
"She's sure she'll be jogging by Christmas. Of course, she never jogged before—I don't know what her hurry is."
He smiled at her, hearing what lay behind her feeble joke.
"Buy you a beer?"
"A bit early for me."
"You have to get into the medieval spirit. They drank it all day—no coffee, can you imagine? and no tea other than herbs that they drank as medicine—and got a large part of their vitamin and caloric intake from beer. Why, do you know, court records show that the lady's servants—the women, mind you—were each issued something like three gallons a day?"