"I haven't."
"Then how do they all know you?"
"Some know your name too. You gonna ask them about that as well?"
Hellboy figured that he'd made the papers at least a couple of times even down here. "That's different."
"Mayhap."
"Enough with the mayhaps already."
"I know a good many of these folk from Enigma. Some of 'em have, ah, retired from town life and come out here to live. Others come because of their children. Some you might say commute between Enigma and the village. And some, well, you know-"
"I know? What do I know?"
Lament said, "Some I know from my dreams."
The children began to dance again, and the folk returned to their food and their music. Who knew a washboard and an empty jug and three strings drawn up a broom handle could create such complete and rich songs? More clapboard doors clattered in the wind. The air was full of laughter. Fishboy Lenny just hung in the background, waving his flippers. Hellboy waved back and the kid spun in happy circles.
Hellboy looked closely at the people, seeing the slight mutations in many of them. He saw webbed hands and vestigial gills in several people. Others who had animal-like, reptilian, or insectoid features. Maybe their mutations were just a leap in genetic adaptation to their swampy surroundings.
Pointing up the main street, he said to Lament, "I'm going to take a look around this way."
"I think I'll head in the other direction. Give a shout if you run into any more mischief. It'll be getting dark soon."
With that they stood and began to move off, Hellboy thinking maybe Fishboy Lenny could lead him around the town, show him the sights, the corn crib and the place where they shucked oysters or caught crawfish, or whatever it was that they did, but before lie took two steps Lament gripped his elbow. "Hold on, son. Town elder is a'comin'."
"Who would that be?"
"This here would be Granny McCulver."
Hellboy thought, Well sure, of course, another granny. What else had he been expecting?
This granny was a hell of a lot different from Granny Lewt, that was for certain. She was young and a stone knockout. She had all her limbs and features. As she moved among her people, the crowd parted to let her by. The music rose and the song grew in strength. He felt the pleasant pressure of her power exerting itself. The great force of her character.
He didn't know where the granny part came into it at all-she looked about thirty on the outside. A very fine and well-endowed thirty. He couldn't figure out exactly how she'd made it to granny status, but decided to put off the question as be stared.
"Son, your tongue is danglin'," Lament said.
"Oh boy."
Her glossy, lustrous black hair fell about her shoulders and swirled in the breeze. Eyes like burnished black diamonds were emphasized even more by her pale, heart-shaped face. She grinned with slightly parted rose-petal lips, her perfect white teeth shining through.
The pumpkin-headed kid stood nearby and smiled so widely, with his head tipped to one side, that he nearly fell over. She patted the little tuft of hair at the top of his dome and the kid swooned. Hellboy didn't blame him.
He breathed, "Wow."
She strode up and said, "John Lament, we welcome you to our village once more, and your friend as well. It's been some time since you've visited, and quite a changed sight this must be for you."
With a little nod of deference, Lament said, "Ma'am McCulver, nice to see you again."
Hellboy figured he'd just follow the routine. He nodded too, as in, yep, yep, well all righty then, and said, "Ma'am McCulver, how's it going?"
Lament stood there like he might be poised for anything, the hinges of his jaw tight and pulsing, and she said, "Ease your mind, John, Sarah and her two companions are at my home, resting."
Lament actually slumped and Hellboy had to reach out to keep him from falling. "Thank the Lord."
"They arrived last night, in the dark without hardly any moon. She found her way here because she was meant to. Becky Sue Cabbot was with her, ready to burst, and round about sunup she gave birth to a lovely baby girl. But Sarah and young Hortense-"
Hellboy thought, Hortense, ah jeez…
"-Millford, they're still holding on, though it won't be long now."
But Hellboy realized girls named Hortense, they were made of stern stuff. For her to have come through that slough, all this way, heavy with child, it brought his chin up in respect.
The rain began again, a slight drizzle that no one acknowledged, not even Hellboy who was getting used to it. Ma'am McCulver brushed a hand across her forehead and drew her hair to the side, and her force and beauty radiated even more strongly. He wondered if it was a bewitching, if he was really staring at some century-old hag trying to pull a fast one. He had charms that might break the illusion if there was one, but he decided, Why make life even tougher?
"Tell me what happened out there," she said. "I know the blackwater has been restless and a'grieved, the land agitated lately. I heard screaming and terrible crying at the rim of my ear, and a voice begging to burn away the children. Tell me, which children are in danger?"
Lament related the story of the Mother Tree and Mama's girlies. "It wasn't what I wanted, but we had no choice. There are fields of dead men out there in the wet grasses."
"Lord, if only I'd known about it sooner, but I've been distracted with events here. Since my sister's passing, I've struggled with new responsibilities. The town's growing faster than we can handle. Our numbers have become so inflated, even though so many of our kin have gone missing these last few weeks."
"A good many of them won't be returnin'."
"If only I'd been paying greater attention," she said, her lovely face folding into grimness. "But village concerns draw me from my leanings, the ways of my mothers and sisters. We're having this celebration to remind us of all we have, and to fight our growing despair."
"And to protect yourselves. The music has charms."
"Yes. The walking darkness approaches. I sense it. And times have grown rougher these past few years. The chemical dumping is becoming worse all the time. Too much time is spent in Enigma barring roads and keeping a lookout for the trucks. The soil and river fights us more and more. There's less fish. The gator poachers kill off whole strains."
Hellboy said, "I might be able to help."
"How?"
"I can make a call."
Ma'am McCulver didn't seem to understand. "Call? Call whom?"
"I work for some people who have pull. We'll track it down. I'll do my best make it stop."
"They won't stop, they'll simply go elsewhere. Another corner of a different swamp."
He shrugged. "You're probably right," he admitted, "but we do what we can, right?"
Still, she smiled and said, "I hear the deep truth in your voice. Thank you for your willingness to aid us."
"Sure."
Pushed to his very edge, Lament said, "I need to see Sarah."
"Of course," the gorgeous granny told him, "I'll take you to her."
In the soft rain, they walked the length of the village past cabins, pinewood shacks, and tin-roofed sheds. Several of the children came along, including the pumpkin-headed kid and Fish-boy Lenny, who murmured and muttered together, occasionally laughing.
Led by Ma'am McCulver, the party moved steadily toward a three-story coffee-colored house in the distance. Hellboy heard babies crying again, sometimes in his ears and sometimes, it felt like, at the back of his head. The granny woman glanced his way from time to time, smiling vaguely.
As they approached her home he saw it had a whitewashed wraparound veranda bordered by palm trees and sugarcane. Three teenage girls sat out on porch swing cut from fresh pine. One held a baby in her arms. Lament's step began to speed up until he was almost running. Losing a few pints of blood didn't mean much in the face of love. One of the pregnant girls broke from the others and moved to meet him.