Dead Man's Song (Pine Deep 2)

“No, not like before, and that’s a plus,” Val said. “Maybe it’s because we have a hospital here now, or maybe the antibiotics and drugs are better now. Who knows? Some older folks and some kids have gotten sick, but we haven’t had a real killer plague this year, thank God. ” Crow reached out and gave her thigh a small squeeze.

Newton said, “Did the blight spread to other towns?”

Crow shook his head. “No, and that’s pretty weird, don’t you think? Some folks said that it was because Pine Deep is surrounded by water on all sides, it’s kind of like a little island. They said that the water boundary stopped whatever infection was in the actual soil. Of course that wouldn’t stop an airborne virus, nor would it stop much of anything else with all the traffic that goes back and forth between Pine Deep, Crestville, and Black Marsh, but none of the surrounding towns experienced any increase in sickness or mortality and none of the crops of the other towns was in any way affected. ”

“Jeez, that is weird. ”

“On the other hand,” Val said, “it’s different from the current blight. This time there are cases of crop disease as far away as Lambertville, Stockton, and Frenchtown in New Jersey, and all through this part of Bucks County. New Hope, Upper Black Eddy, Doylestown, New Britain. Understand, it’s not as bad anywhere else as it is here in Pine Deep…but it’s spreading this time. No doubt about it. ”

Newton looked at her, then at Crow. “I have to say, folks, that this is making me feel a little sick myself. ”

“Buckle up, Newt, ’cau

se it gets worse,” Crow said drily. “Folks who got sick back then, but who went to hospitals outside of town, or who went to stay with relatives in other towns, got better quickly and never had any lingering symptoms. Not one sick person who left town to recuperate died as a result of the disease. ”

“Oh, come on—”

“It’s a matter of public record,” Val said quietly. “Look it up. ”

“Yeah,” Crow agreed. “That was a terrible year. I got sick, too, but not bad. My brother Billy never got sick, so he was okay. A couple of my friends from school died, though. ”

Val said, “Eventually the blight and the epidemic ended. Slowly, but it ground to a halt. There were fewer new cases of the sickness, and fewer deaths as the weeks passed and it got closer to October. Of course by then most of the crops had been chopped down and burned, so perhaps that halted the spread of the infection. ”

“I know you’re going to think that this is romantic or morbid or something,” Crow said, “but it was as if the souls of the people of Pine Deep were being harvested that year, instead of the crops. ” The reporter said nothing to that, nor did Val add anything to it. After a moment, Crow said, “Okay, so that sounded stupid. ”

“‘Sounded’?” Val said with a wicked little smile pulling at one corner of her mouth.

Crow motored on. “Obviously I didn’t work at the farm that year, but the bunch of us hung out there all the time. Morse was there sometimes, too, but not to work. My brother Billy said that Morse was working out at Griswold’s farm that season. ”

“Griswold’s farm wasn’t hit?”

“Oh, his farm was all but smashed flat. Nearly all of his cattle died in the first few weeks, and the meat must have been spoiled because Morse worked his ass off hauling off dead cattle and trying to keep alive all the new ones Griswold would import, but they all died, too. It must have been some nasty, disgusting work—but it was work. Drifters can’t be all that picky, you know. So the weeks passed and Morse kept at it, and at the same time the town kept going to shit. Finally, by the middle of September the plague and the blight were over, probably because every harvestable crop was already dead. The crop that year was a complete and total loss. Just a year after the Golden Harvest, that year turned out to be a financial disaster. Whole families went down the drain, people lost their homes, their farms, and, as you can imagine when things go really bad really fast, there was a lot of anger and frustration. Even some violence. Fights broke out, people started getting hurt. ” He paused and looked up at the ceiling. “My dad was one of the ones who took his frustrations out with his fists. ” That statement hung there, and Newton was sharp enough to read into it what was meant.

Into the silence, Val said, “For some reason my family’s farm wasn’t hit by the blight…just like it hasn’t been hit by this current blight. We were actually having a pretty good year, good crops. My dad took on more help than he really needed, hiring as many of the locals as wanted to work here, adults and kids. He hired Billy and Crow to be gofers on the farm, and, I think, to keep me company. Crow and Billy became friends with me and Terry Wolfe, who was my best friend at the time. That whole season we were always together. ” She paused. “Terry’s little sister used to tag along with us. Terry and I were ten, Crow was nine, and Billy was twelve. It was fun having my own little ‘gang. ’”

“Her dad also hired Oren Morse when there was no more work at Griswold’s. ”

Val nodded and sipped her coffee. “Dad had heard him play his guitar a bunch of times the year before, and the two of them had talked quite a bit. Politics mostly, and books. Dad liked him, and maybe felt sorry for him, thought that Morse could have been someone. So, when Griswold cut him loose from the cattle job, Dad hired him. Dad was like that. ”

“No one better,” Crow said, almost to himself and he toasted himself on the sentiment and sipped his drink. “As for Morse, we were the ones who gave him his nickname. The Bone Man. ”

“You never met him,” she said, leaning forward to make better eye contact, “and probably the only things you’ve heard about him are the rumors and local legends, making him out to be something between Jack the Ripper and the Boogeyman, but that wasn’t who he was. He really was a good man. My dad was almost never wrong about people. He was a very good judge of character, which is one of the reasons he was so good in business. ”

“She’s right,” Crow said. “Henry’d look you right in the eye and he’d know right away if you were going to deal straight or if you were a shifty bastard. As I recall,” he added with a smile, “he didn’t much care for me when he met me. ”

“He liked you when you were a kid, honey,” Val said. “He just had some issues with you when you were…” She trailed off, realizing that she was talking in front of a reporter.

“It’s okay, baby, you can say it,” Crow said, then he looked at Newton. “I used to be a drunk. Or…I am a drunk, though I haven’t had a drink in years. What they call a sober drunk. I go to meetings. Val and I had kind of drifted apart as friends for a while there and when we met up again I was hitting the sauce pretty hard. That didn’t wash too well with Henry and he told me in no uncertain terms to dry out or buzz off. ”

“He didn’t phrase it that way,” Val said.

“The hell he didn’t. You weren’t there, sweetie. Your dad looked me right in the eye and he was about fifteen feet tall and he told me to stay the hell away from his daughter until I had some self-respect. ”

“Jeez,” Newton said, grinning.

“I tell you this, Newt,” Crow said, “because I want you to understand Henry Guthrie. If he thought Oren Morse was a bad man he’d have never let him near his farm, let alone near his daughter, and yet we worked side by side with the man, and almost every night Henry’d have us all on the porch—us kids, a few of the regular farm staff, and the Bone Man—and we’d hang out and drink ice tea Val’s mom made, with mint and lemon slices, and we’d listen to the Bone Man tell stories and sing the blues. We knew that man. ”

Newton considered this for a moment, and then nodded. “Okay, you sold me. If Henry Guthrie gave him the seal of approval then he’s okay with me. ”