“Dandelion.” Greta almost choked. “Dandelion?” “Give it a rest, Greta.” I walked over to the window and called to Wingate. “Did you break in here uninvited looking for your daughter?” He froze for a moment, his eyes narrow and angry. “Did you start the fight?” He looked up at me furiously. “He wouldn’t let me see her, said she wasn’t in there and that he didn’t even know who I was talking about. I saw her with my own goddamned eyes. We followed her here, for Christ sake. Why do you think I came to this house in the first place?
e lied to my face. He’s lying right now.” I sensed violence surging within him, but for the moment at least the man in the Robert Hall clothes maintained his self-control.
I told Fox, “You can press charges if you want.” “What?” Greta asked, visibly surprised.
Rennie answered for me. “It’s the law-Wingate was trespassing.”
Greta looked at me. I just nodded.
“We don’t wish to press charges,” Fox said in a quiet voice. “You want him to pay damages?” Again Fox shook his head.
“We may have a kidnapping here,” Greta’s voice was a notch higher.
“I demand that we be allowed to search the building.” It was good line of bluster, but, knowing Greta, I could sense her sails beginning to flap.
“That’s way out of line,” Rennie said behind her. She whirled on him. “Since when the hell did you become such a gal hotshot?” “We don’t mind.” Fox’s calm, resonant voice spread between em like oil on water.
We could’nt search so much as amble from room to room, like tourists visiting a museum. And the analogy held, for in many wayS, the tour revealed a life style of long ago. There were no lamps or electric lights-the only illumination came from homemade candles; the floors, apart from an occasional small wool or braided rug, were bare; dried foods hung from hooks in the kitchen; the beds upstairs were nothing more than wood frames strung with rope supporting straw-stuffed mattresses. Everything was neat, clean, and frugal to the point of being bare.
At the foot of the stairs, there was a jury-rigged wood stove made from an upended fifty-five-gallon drum. It was supported on bricks and had wire supports running from the wall and ceiling to the stovepipe.
Rennie passed his hand near the hot surface. “This ain’t the safest stove I’ve ever seen. I got no bone to pick with you about how you live, but you better fix this: new stovepipe, new supports, some kind of firewall behind it. We don’t really have a fire code around here, but this is dangerous. I’ll get you a pamphlet on what you need if you like.” Fox nodded. “Thank you.” He escorted us to the door, his small family mute behind him.
Greta suddenly marched up to the woman called Dandelion.
“Do you know where Julie Wingate is? Has she been hidden someplace?” All four of them looked at Fox. “You may answer.” “No,” the woman said. “Christ.” Greta stormed out.
“Would you like to see the basement?” Fox asked politely. I could hear a slight inflection of victory in his tone. Rennie patted his arm as we filed by, pretty amused by the entire proceeding by now. “I think we’re outta here.” The Wingates were standing outside with Greta.
“Better luck next time, Bud,” Rennie called over to Wingate. “My name’s not Bud.” The sheer hostility in his voice caught us all off guard. For some reason, it made me think of when the light gets strangely yellow, just before a big storm hits from out of nowhere.
Rennie heard the menace in Wingate’s voice clearly. “Hey, look, “I’m not your problem. If you can’t keep your shit together, don’t lay it on me.” Greta looked from one to the other. “Never mind, Rennie.”
But Bruce Wingate seemed to have found an outlet for his anger and frustration. He was like a stove glowing cherry red. Rennie stared at him for a moment, typically unwilling to walk away and let the situation cool. “What the hell’s the matter with you?” “You people make me sick.”
The words slipped out between unmoving lips.
Greta tugged at Rennie’s sleeve. “Drop it, Rennie, the man’s upset.” “I can see that. What I don’t see is why he’s pissed at us.
Seems to me we put up with enough bullshit from these assholes-them and their fucked-up daughter.” Wingate hit him with his fist hard across the face, making him stagger back. Rennie’s mouth was open, his expression stunned. Buster and I instinctively caught him by his arms and held him. But he didn’t attempt to react. He just watched as Wingate stalked off, stiff-legged, with his wife in tow. Buster patted Rennie lightly on the back. “You okay?” Rennie straightened and shook us off.
“Yeah. Fucking dink.” He walked away in the other direction, rubbing the side of his face.
The three of us, Greta, Buster, and I, were left standing in the dark street. “Christ almighty,” I muttered. “What’s been going’ on around here?” Greta looked at me for a moment, and then left us without saying a word.
As I stood there in the evening chill, I knew one thing: The violence and frustration buried deep inside all of us was working its way to the surface in Gannet, building up slowly, like the sweat of exertion n a hot summer day.
Buster and I stood quietly for a while, watching Greta’s stumpy figure receding up Atlantic toward the Inn.
He sighed gently, the vapor from his nostrils caught in the light from the moon and the blanket of brilliant icy stars overhead. I sensed n him a resignation of sorts, not just about tonight’s behavior, but about the causes behind it. He was one of life’s observers, and the social integration I sensed in this town must have been a focus of his tension for years. I felt the sadness emanating from him like the heat from dying embers.
Buster shoved his hands deeper into his pockets. “You going home?”
I hesitated. “I don’t think so, not yet. I thought I might go back to the Inn. I would like to talk to you about all this, though.” He nodded. “I’ll walk with you. I’m stiffening up.” I let him hit his stride in silence for a couple of minutes, knowing he hadn’t forgotten my request. He wanted to give it some thought.
“You know anything about this group here?” He jerked his thumb over his shoulder. “Rennie told me they’re headed by a guy who calls himself The Elephant. They’ve spent a lot of money making friends.” “Right.
Edward Sarris. Well, Greta and I are still Selectmen, along with Renie Cutts. About five years ago, this guy Sarris comes to one of our monthly meetings and introduces himself. He says he’s moving up here with some friends and that they’ll be buying up a bunch of property. He knows people are going to talk ‘cause his bunch is a little unusual, but that we’re all going’ to be real good neighbors.
He’s not asking us for anything, you know-it’s more like an announcement, just so we don’t think he’s sneaking around trying to pull a fast one. “Well, sneaking was hardly a problem. They came in here gangbusters, paying top dollar for about a dozen houses, buying the old Morse farm north of town, building something like a church up in the woods beyond Atlantic, opening that restaurant, spreading money around like snow in January. People were so busy stuffing their pockets, they didn’t see half the town had switched hands.” “How many members are in the Order?” “Oh, I don’t know-seventy-five to a hundred. Anyway, problem was, once they were in, the town was split in two; they didn’t mix with us and we weren’t invited to mix with them. It’s against their religion, or whatever they call it. You saw it in that house: They’re real structured and keep to themselves. They say they’re anti-materialists and that everybody who ain’t like them are the bad guys. It’s like any other bunch of oddballs, I suppose-you got to hate something or someone to make yourself feel better. Maybe that’s what Greta’s doing.” I had seen Greta’s hatred, and Wingate’s, but Fox had seemed downright gracious in the face of our invasion. “Who do they hate?” “The ‘material world,’ as they call it: the pollution, the moneygrubbing, the commercialism, electricity and plumbing and cars-us, in other words.” “Does that animosity ever come out? Have they ever threatened anyone?” He gave a surprised look. “Oh, no, they wouldn’t touch us with songs. Except for Sarris he’s their ambassador in dealing with the outside world.” I shook my head. “So it’s a time bomb?” He chuckled, which came as a relief. “We could be close-minded y now. I don’t know. There’s more, though, a feel to it that unsettles people.