“For what?”
Frances looks at Mercedes and smiles slightly, which makes the fresh seam in her lower lip gleam.
“For the thing you don’t know. And what you don’t know won’t hurt you.”
Mercedes says nothing. Frances reaches for Diphtheria Rose, hugs her and closes her eyes.
Mercedes has told Daddy that the picture has been burnt to nothing on the stove. But it’s a lie. She can’t part with it. She leaves Frances sleeping, but before going to the coal cellar to keep her promise to God, she climbs the attic stairs for the second time today. Mercedes knows that Daddy never looks in the hope chest. The photo will be perfectly safe there.
When the house is quiet, Trixie lopes up the stairs into Frances and Lily’s room and silently leaps onto the bed. She snuggles down amongst the dolls in the crook of Frances’s arm. She watches Frances sleep for a while. Then she lays her head upon the pillow, extends her paw and rests it against Frances’s forehead. Neither of them moves till morning.
We Are the Dead
… All by myself I have to go
With none to tell me what to do
All alone beside the streams
And up the mountainsides of dreams …
An opening in the earth a third of the way up a steep slope of limestone, thin grass and scant soil. Crazy pine trees grow parallel to the slant here and there. An archway in the earth. No inscription. An abandoned bootleg mine. A drift mine, the type that cuts into a hill-face and burrows horizontally.
Every time people find an old mine around here, they think they’ve found the old French mine. There’s no treasure associated with the old French mine, it just happened to be the first hole excavated for the purpose of extracting “buried sunshine”. This is the sort of thing that becomes important when you don’t have cathedrals.
“It’s the old French mine,” says Frances. “No one else knows it’s here.”
Frances and Lily stand at the base of the hill looking up. Behind them are the woods, where Frances has just blazed a trail in the pine trees with the kitchen scissors. She brings a hand up to shade her eyes in the manner of a French Foreign Legion commander, the overcast Cape Breton sky notwithstanding. Her left eye socket has healed to pale yellow, but her right one is still a pouchy mauve — wounds sustained in my last hand-to-hand bout with the Algerians, mon Dieu!
Frances cuts what she intends to be a plucky figure in her blue Girl Guide uniform. Her neckerchief is neatly knotted, her beret tweaked at regulation angle, her leather pouch buckled to her belt. The only things missing are badges. She has yet to earn one. She has yet to attend a second guide meeting. Lily is in her Brownie uniform. Daddy has finally let her join because she hasn’t had so much as a cold for a long long time. Frances was supposed to take her to her first Brownie pack meeting this afternoon, but brought her here instead. They walked all the way, and it’s miles. Frances told Lily she would earn her hiking badge.
“There are dead men in there, Lily. And diamonds.”
“Like in Aladdin.”
“That’s right.”
“Let’s go home now, Frances.”
“We’re going in.”
Frances reaches for Lily’s hand, but Lily backs away. “Come on, Lily, just for a little visit.”
“No, Frances, there’s dead people in there.”
“Dead people are completely harmless.”
“What about ghosts?”
“There’s no such thing.”
“Then who’re we visiting if they’re all dead?”
“Ambrose.”
Lily searches Frances’s face. “Ambrose is dead.”
“No he isn’t.”
“He is so, he drownded, you said.”
“Yes, he drowned, but he isn’t dead, Lily, he’s an angel, remember? He became an angel, it happens. And he’s in there. That’s where he lives. I think it’s time you met him.”
“No.”
“Come on, I’ll be with you.”
“No.”
Frances seizes Lily’s arm and pulls her along, like trying to get a dog up stairs.
“You’ll earn a badge for this, Lily.”
“I don’t want to go in there, Frances.” Lily’s voice is shaking with fear.
“You can’t get your wings and fly up to Guides if you don’t earn your guardian angel badge.”
Frances starts laughing and Lily knows it’s going to get bad. They’ve started up the slope, Lily twisting in Frances’s grasp. Frances grapples her into a sack of potatoes over her shoulder. Lily ceases to struggle. They climb up to the mouth of the mine. They enter.
There’s nothing much to see — a few rotting ribs of wood and pit props, a rusted shovel. Frances carries Lily forward. It gets darker. The air is musty. They follow a bend in the tunnel and lose sight of the light at the entrance. Frances walks on slowly into the dank and shapeless dark.
Lily asks quietly, “What if we get lost?”
“We won’t. Ambrose will find us.”
Lily whimpers.
“He loves you, Lily, don’t be afraid.”
“I want to go home.”
“We are home. We’re in his home.”
Frances stops and puts Lily down. Her fingers feel for the snap on her Girl Guide pouch. She withdraws a cigarette, and strikes a match against her belt buckle. The tongue of fire illuminates: a pool of still water inches from their feet, dear God, how deep is it? And over there, against the wall — Lily screams. Frances lights her cigarette and blows out the match.
“There’s someone here, Frances.” Lily’s voice is shaking.
“I know.”
“He’s standing over there. On the other side of the water.”
Frances takes a big puff. “What’s he look like?”
“He’s got overalls on. And a pick. And a peaked cap.”
“Is there a lamp on his cap?”
“Yes. The teapot kind.”
“He must have been dead quite a while.”
Frances blows invisible smoke rings.
“Frances” — Lily’s fear is spilling over.
“It’s not Ambrose, Lily. It’s a dead miner.”
Frances lights another match: the pool, the seeping wall — Lily cries out again as the flame disappears.
“It’s not a miner, Frances.”
“What is it?”
“He’s got a mask on.”
“A Hallowe’en mask?”
“A gas mask. He’s got a rifle with a bayonet on the end.”
“A dead soldier.”
Frances lights another match: the black water, stones and earthen walls —
“He’s gone,” says Lily.
“Ambrose took him away ’cause he knew you were scared. Baby. Brownie baby.”
“Ambrose isn’t here.”
“Yes he is.”
“Where?”
Frances drops her cigarette and it sizzles against the unseen pool.
“In there.”
Lily looks down, dizzy from the dark. “Angels live in heaven.”
“They live wherever the hell they want.”
“I’m telling. You smoked and swore.”
“Go ahead and tattle. Ambrose and I will still look after you no matter what.”
“There’s no such thing as Ambrose.”
“At night he dives down in this pool and swims in an underground river till it comes out at the surface and turns into our creek. He takes a breath and swims in the shallow water, long and white, all the way till he gets to our place. Then he climbs out over the top of the bank and slowly walks, dripping, across our yard and opens the kitchen door. He walks past the oven. He walks into the hall past the front room. He walks up the stairs without a sound, and past the attic door. He comes into the room where you’re asleep. He stands at the foot of the bed and looks down at you. He has red hair.