I feel no great love for Virgil Ball.
The woman takes a step toward me, hesitates, then lets out a cautious breath. Her face is heavier, slacker, not its earlier shape at all. She teeters subtly on her heels. The thing inside her is uneasy in its new body, unsure of where it ends.
Parson comes forward, cock-sure as a stable-hand, to assist her.
“Tell Virgil about the Trade,” he says, smoothing back her hair.
I never saw Parson, never recognized him for what he was, until this day and hour. Never before has he been so vivid, so convincing, so exquisitely detailed. Now I see how many of Morelle’s airs and affectations — even his peculiarities of speech — were Parson’s own. How could I have mistaken Thaddeus Morelle, even for an instant, for the architect and master of the Trade?
The Trade would have found its way without Morelle. It would have flourished without Kennedy, without Harvey, certainly without Virgil Ball—; without Parson, however, it would never have drawn breath. It was Parson who sheltered it, Parson who shaped it, Parson who gave it suck. Morelle was useful to him, of course, perhaps even beloved. But when Morelle was taken from him — cruelly and prematurely taken — Parson simply found himself another. She stands before me now.
The woman lifts her arms and gathers in a breath, stuffing it into her mouth like spun-sugar at a fair. I begin to see the Redeemer in her face and force my sight away. Delamare lies splayed across the bed, his fists opening and closing, his chest arched off the pallet as though the weight of the sheets might crush him. His eyes are shut but I know him to be listening. For some reason this emboldens me.
Parson has misjudged me. Belief is nothing to me now. I choose Clementine, not Virgil. I have only to take her hand in mine, to depart this house — this revival tent, this medicine-show, this cabinet of horrors — and leave Parson and his witchery to the wolves. I have only to take hold of Clem’s hand and away.
“I don’t believe in you,” I say, stepping toward her.
Parson kisses her on the cheek. “Tell him, dearest.”
IN AN EAGER, GRACELESS VOICE, a voice still strange to the mouth that shapes it, the woman begins our lesson. Her voice is a river, a hold full of slaves, a high attic window. Her voice is an education. Bright reels of time unspool as I listen, hang between us in the air, then plait together into history. Whole ages pass in a single turn of phrase. The voice is both Clem’s and the Redeemer’s and I have no defense against it. The lesson is one I’ve heard before — many times, in fact — but have always failed to master.
The lesson is called “The Future.”
The future is made of passings, she explains. The passing of slavery, the passing of the Confederacy, the passing of the South. The passing of proclamations, of reconstructions, of humiliations run through centuries. The Trade, however, will not pass. A newer, more resilient strain will issue from the old, fashioned entirely out of breath. Its transparency will be its shelter. It will pass unnoticed, a low and lifelong fever, feeding temperately on its host. “The country itself will have this fever, Virgil.” She trembles at the beauty of this idea. “The country itself will keep it fed!”
She tells me more, far more than this in her euphoria and her spite, and Parson lets her rave, knowing that she grows stronger with each breath she draws. I’m given to see, as if through leaded glass, a future in which the Trade has been mistaken for natural law. Canaan’s tongue will be spoken by whores and archbishops, sales-clerks and senators alike. The life of the elect will be the only life, she tells me. Their law the only law. Their Trade the only—
“You’re proud of your handiwork, I suppose,” I say to Parson, cutting the lesson short.
Parson grants me an indulgent smile. “I am, Virgil. Aren’t you proud of her?”
I shake my head.
“That hardly matters. She wasn’t fashioned to amuse you, google-eye.”
I study Parson for a moment—: his hands, his mouth, his perfectly opaque gray eyes. Something’s hidden just behind them.
“I think she was,” I say.
“She was fashioned—with no small amount of care — as the vessel for the Redeemer’s wandering spirit.” Parson toys, as he speaks, with the woman’s filthy collar. “I thought you understood that much.”
Escape from the river is possible.
“No,” I say. “There is no Redeemer, Parson—; Delamare and I snuffed his candle. I took a piece of pier-glass—”
“And yet, you can’t snuff the Redeemer’s candle, as you see.” Parson clucks contentedly. “The Redeemer stands before you, hale and full of fire.”
I look hard at the woman now, dreading what I’ll find—; but the illusion has passed away like winter steam. I see nothing but an empty body.
“You might as well have poured the Trade into a paper sack,” I say.
A change has taken place in me — a small but indefatigable change— and Parson knows it. The smile is still fixed on his face, but the naturalness has gone out of it like water from a sponge. We stand facing one another like book-ends, a column of dead air pressed between us. Only Clem’s shallow breathing cleaves the quiet. Her breathing—; not anybody else’s. I don’t look toward her yet. I keep my eyes on Parson. To my great satisfaction his face begins to twitch.
“You’ve been a delightful under-study, Mr. Ball. A proper little bumbler. But that was your part, after all, in our Punch-and-Judy show.” His grip on Clem’s shoulder tightens. “Don’t try to write yourself another.”
“I’m not writing any part,” I say quietly. “Your under-study is leaving the theater, Parson. And he’s taking your Judy with him.”
So saying, I take Clem lightly by the hand.
As soon as I touch her the floor drops out from under me and a number of things happen all at once. Parson and Clem start hissing like tea-kettles, Delamare thrashes in his corner like a bull at stud, and my vision is flooded by a host of shapes, so many the room is all but set afire. I don’t let any of this unsteady me, however. I’ve been moving toward this moment since the night of Harvey’s death, since my arrival in this hell-hole, since my earliest apprenticeship to the Trade. Not toward the discovery of Harvey’s killer, not toward an answer to Parson’s riddles, not even toward Morelle’s murder—; only toward this moment. My investigation failed because I had no idea what I was after. I found answers wherever I looked, all of them to questions that I hadn’t dreamt of asking. Now, at long last, I’ve hit upon my question—: I have only one, it seems. And it carries its answer within it, savory and chaste, like a peanut in its shell.
What is there to keep me in this house?
My vision clears. No more than a few seconds can have passed. Delamare is still splayed across the bed, but he is gripping his Colt Peacemaker now and his eyes are wide and blood-shot. Parson is unchanged, studying me through slitted eyes as though I were a sparrow-hawk he’d previously mistaken for a sparrow. Clem is still breathing in short, brittle gasps. Her hand is warm and spirited in mine.
“You’ll have to excuse me, Parson,” I say, passing an arm around Clem’s waist. “I don’t feel the need for a Redeemer any longer.”
“Back, Virgil! Step away from it!”