Led by Giovanni Bruno and the voice of Domiron!
We shall look upon God’s Glory after all the world is gone!
For the end of time has come!
So come and march with us to Glory!
Oh, come and march with us to Glory!
Yes, come and march with us to Glory!
For the end of time has come!”
The helicopter lowered, cameras whirred and shutters clicked on all sides, the crowds trotted by, filling the ditches. The guys here in the grove with him folded up their gear, hiked it to their shoulders and set off, keeping pace with the procession, the vanguard of which was now virtually out of sight. The kid started to trail the others, turned around. “Hey, you coming?” He cocked his head, spat. “Say, man, you feeling okay?” Miller nodded, leaned away from the tree. Nothing to do but go on, see it out, find out what he could. “Got a little too much last night, hunh?” The kid, thank God, didn’t wait for an answer.
There must have been at least three or four hundred tunicked followers in the procession, it was strung out for nearly a quarter of a mile. Others joined in, some wrapped in sheets, some merely in streetclothes, all barefoot. Behind the caravan were cars and trucks as far as the eye could see. A rumble in the sky. The singing broke off. Everyone looked up. A kind of moan or mumble rippled through the crowd, Brunists and spectators alike. Slowly, unevenly, the singing resumed:
“O the sons of light are marching to the Mount where it is said
We shall find our true Redemption from this world of woe and dread,
We shall see the cities crumble and the earth give up its dead,
For the end of time has come!
So come and march with us to Glory …!”
Miller trailed wearily along, the crowds ahead dissolving into a shifting white mass, bordered by browns and grays, Marcella’s body floating as though on a raft. Further rumbles overhead. Nervous jokes about that, strained laughter about his ears. He heard his name on occasion, nodded to people. What if, he wondered, what if he’d deflowered her first, talked after? He shuddered, as though with a chill. Ahead of him, the procession seemed to have stopped. People butted up against one another and began to murmur. He heard whisperings of “blockades” and “powers of darkness” and “police.” He edged up the slope of the ditch, made cautious inquiries of people in the rear ranks about Marcella, but they saw his camera and no one answered him. Back into the ditch then and toward the bottleneck, protected from Brunists who knew him by the thick hordes of massing spectators, staying as deep in the ditch as possible, passing under the body — he saw only the slight depression her cadaver made in the brightly striped canvas of the lawn chair — and the thick shapes of the tunicked women and the white banners, now becalmed.
At the head of it all he discovered a barricade and — goddamn! — a ticket booth! Manning it were Wally Fisher and Maury Castle and a couple guys Miller didn’t know. Miller had heard rumors all week that Fisher was up to no good, and Fisher himself, with a dry cackle, had spoken of his “brainstorm.” The cop Dee Romano was there, too, palm resting on his pistol butt. He was explaining that it was all legal, that Mr. Fisher had rented the premises for the day for the purposes of promoting a small carnival, and that the admission charge of one dollar was entirely legitimate — all of which meant that Romano was getting a cut of the gate.
There was a tremendous protest boiling up, and Dee couldn’t cover it. His right hand grew very fidgety. Maury Castle took over. “Now, folks, we realize that there is a conflict of interests here today,” he boomed out. “And we want to do everything possible to alleviate that conflict.” TV and movie cameras rolled, flashguns popped, the helicopter hovered. “We respect all religions and it was not Mr. Fisher’s intention to interfere with the activities of you people.” Only man in West Condon who could talk to a square mile of people without a P.A. system. “Therefore, we have not bothered in any way the hill where you folks are going, and we have not mounted any of our stands up there. Moreover, we understand—” There was a sudden loud clap of thunder. The helicopter lifted and soared away. Castle grinned up at the sky, then continued. “Because we understand that you folks are not really interested in our carnival, why, we thought the only courteous thing to do would be to let you pass by at no charge. But I want to ask you to please be orderly and I’m afraid we have to limit the free entrance only to those who have these here jumpers on, these — what do you call …” His voice had sunk to a consultational tone, still audible, as he leaned toward Wosznik. “Yes, these here tunics. So now, if you other folks will please step back just a minute and let these people pass through, it will make things a whole lot easier.”
There was a lot of discontent, but also a lot of laughter. Good old pioneer ingenuity. Clara Collins and Ben Wosznik stood by the gate, explaining to those at the tail end what had happened, seeking to protect their people, but in effect doing Castle’s work for him. They argued with Fisher and Castle about those members not in tunics, and bare feet became sufficient criteria, whereupon the Brunist fold was increased temporarily by about twenty-five young gate-crashers. Miller hung back until Clara and Wosznik had moved on. At the ticket booth, Fisher said, “One dollar, please.”
“Press,” said Miller sourly.
“No passes today,” the old bastard said with a broad grin. “This is, in fact, hee hee, a press carnival!” And then, his dewlaps flapping, he nearly gagged with laughter.
Rather than argue, Miller fished up a buck.
“Say, you’ll never guess who the hell is here today!” Fisher said.
“Jesus Christ.”
Again that deep delighted wheeze. “No! Father Jones! He got a job on one of the city papers and pulled this as his first goddamn assignment!” The old man really thought that was funny, wheezed and choked so hard that tears came to his eyes. “I was so happy to see him, I even let him in for nothing!” Then he leaned forward, his face up against the ticket window, looking for a moment like an old father confessor, and whispered, “Say, Miller, you got a pretty ass!” Then back he roared again, nearly falling off his stool. “Jesus! I’m having so much fun, I’ll never live out the day!”
Miller turned away from Fisher, only to confront Romano. “Take it easy today, Miller,” the cop said. “We don’t want no trouble.”
Miller brushed by, feeling not so very great. The carnival amounted to a handful of refreshment stands, a bingo game, and a numbers game, the latter already in operation and manned by Doris, the hotel coffeeshop waitress. She winked lewdly at him as he passed by. The Brunists had already arranged themselves on the hill, were busying themselves with their own circle, as though afraid to look down on the threat at the hill’s foot. He saw now what the wooden crosses were for. Ben Wosznik digging and directing, they planted the crosses on the east slope, mounted Marcella’s lawn-chair bier on them, each rounded aluminum corner resting on a rustic wooden crossbeam. A statue of the martyr Stephen — Miller recognized it as the patron of the Catholic Church here — seemed to appear from nowhere, dressed in a Brunist tunic. Sorrowful and empty-sleeved, it was placed beside Marcella on the south slope, this side of her, as though to guard her from the powers of darkness who milled about below, eating peanuts and cotton candy, drinking bottled pop. The silver candelabra were placed at her head and feet, but efforts to light them proved futile. The two banners were set in holes already dug for them and, between, an altar was put up with all its now-familiar Brunist relics.