From the Dust Returned

“Their name—” Again a terrific blow struck his midriff. The church bells exploded!

“Your voice, my god, your voice!” cried John.

“My voice?”

“It sounds like—” John pushed his hand out toward the sheriff’s face. “Like—”

“Yes?”

“It’s her voice. She’s behind your eyes, back of your face, on your tongue!”

“Fascinating,” said the sheriff, smiling, his voice terribly soft and sweet. “You were going to give me a name, a family, a place—”

“No use. If she’s here. If your tongue is her tongue. Gods!”

“Try,” said the fine and gentle voice inside the sheriff’s face.

“The Family is!” cried the staggering, raving man. “The House is!” He fell back, struck again in his heart. The bells roared. The church bells wielded him as iron clapper.

He cried a name. He shouted a place.

Then, riven, he lunged out of the office.

After a long moment the sheriff’s face relaxed. His voice changed. Low now and brusque, he seemed stunned in recall.

“What,” he asked himself, “did someone say? Damn, damn. What was that name? Quick, write it down. And that house? Where did someone say?”

He looked at his pencil.

“Oh, yeah,” he said at last. And again, “Yeah.”

The pencil moved. He wrote.

The trapdoor to the attic burst upward and the terrible, the unjust man was there. He stood over Cecy’s dreaming body.

“The bells,” he said, his hands to his ears. “They’re yours! I should’ve known. Hurting me, punishing me. Stop! We’ll burn you! I’ll bring the mob. Oh God, my head!”

With one last crushing gesture he crammed his fist to his ears and dropped dead.

The lonely woman of the House moved to look down at the body while Timothy, in the shadows, felt his companions panic and twitch and hide.

“Oh, Mother,” said Cecy’s quiet voice from her wakened lips. “I tried to stop him. Didn’t. He named our name, he said our place. Will the sheriff remember?”

The lonely woman of midnights had no answer.

Timothy, in the shadows, listened.

From Cecy’s lips far off and now near and clear came the soundings of the bells, the bells, the awful holy bells.

The sounding of the bells.

CHAPTER 21

Return to the Dust

Timothy stirred in his sleep.

The nightmare came and would not go away.