The Truth About Love and Lightning (11 page)

And Hank didn’t appreciate being reminded that he wasn’t the one who held the cards in this particular game.

Of course, he told Nadya nothing of the confrontation. Instead, he acted as if Coonts had given them both the green light to electively depart the caravan and start their new lives.

“I think we should pack our bags now,” he said as she pressed her small hands to his chest, such an eager smile on her face that Hank hated to lie. “If all goes well, we may leave tonight.”

That evening when he performed onstage, he was keenly aware of Coonts in the box seats on the balcony to his left. As he chanted and danced, the same anger that had arisen within him in Coonts’s hotel room swirled inside his blood like a fever. The more he tried to bury it, the larger it got, until a mounting pressure swelled in his head as words came out of his mouth that he’d never meant to say, ancient phrases that came from somewhere deep in his subconscious, pleas for the sky and earth to feel the same fury he felt, for the spirits to rise up and assert their true power over man.

Answering his call, the theater lights began to flicker and thunder rumbled through the building, swaying the lamps above and shaking the stage beneath Hank’s feet. The audience gasped and applauded, awestruck, as if it were all part of the act, concocted purely for their enjoyment.

Until the air inside picked up strength and lifted paper programs and wayward kerchiefs, flinging them upward and rotating them like a twister. Above Hank’s head, the velvet curtains billowed and the fog from the dry ice blowers dissipated in the swirl of wind. As a white-hot choler seared his heart, Hank begged the Great Spirit for lightning to strike Coonts’s box. His final, unforgettable act.

Within seconds, a ball of fire appeared out of nowhere, hitting the pillar positioned just beneath Coonts’s box. The flames licked at the painted column below, spitting upward toward the balcony as smoke belched and the audience coughed.

“Help!” people screamed, but Hank barely heard them. He focused solely on Wilbur Coonts, suddenly on his feet and backing away from the gray clouds billowing from below. The man’s mouth moved, cursing him, but his voice was lost in the howl of wind and the frantic cries of the audience.

Hank willed the wind to toss Coonts over the brass rail and into the fire below. As he watched, an invisible hand bent Coonts over the banister while the frightened man desperately tried to hang on.

“Stop this!” Hands grabbed at Hank’s arm, and there was Nadya’s voice, sharp in his ear. “Please,” she begged him, “stop it now!”

Somehow the touch of her hand and the fear in her tone doused the fury inside him, and Hank went still, breathing hard, the swirl of air settling down until the conflagration went out and the howling winds ceased. Though the panicked audience still cried out as they pushed their way toward the exit doors, inside Hank’s mind, all went deathly quiet.

Though the silence existed only for a moment before Coonts began to shake his fist and yell, “You’re done, Chief, you hear me? You’re finished in vaudeville!”

Hank met Nadya’s eyes, and his own filled with tears. “I’m sorry,” he meant to say, only no sound came out. Still, she seemed to know just what he said.

“Let’s go,” she whispered and reached out her hand.

Hank nodded, doing as she bid and hurrying after her as they slipped out a side door to avoid any crowds gathered outside the stage door. Huddled together, heads ducked against the torrential rain, they hurried back to the hotel.

When he asked Nadya to grab her things and leave with him, she did just that, never questioning, simply trusting him.

Within minutes, they had gathered what they could carry and descended via the fire escape so as not to be seen. Once they’d reached the alley below, they scurried away from the dingy building toward the bus station. Hank bought two tickets on the last bus out of Omaha bound for St. Joseph, Missouri. They arrived just before dawn and changed buses en route to Kansas City.

By afternoon, they’d caught a train bound for Washington, Missouri, the closest spot to Walnut Ridge that Hank could find on a map.

By the time they arrived, the light of day was exhausted, the plum of dusk slowly staining the once-blue sky. With a bit of cajoling, they begged a ride in a hay-filled Ford pickup and were jostled atop the bales for several miles until they reached the outskirts of Walnut Ridge. The fellow dropped them off beside a decrepit wooden mailbox on the shoulder of the unpaved rural route.

“You sure this is the old Hansen place?” Hank asked the man, who gave him a solemn nod.

“It was, at least until a decade back when the Hansens died off and left it to some distant cousin. You the new owners?” he asked, squinting at them.

“Yes,” Hank said, “I guess we are.”

“Well, good luck then,” the fellow grunted. “You’ll need it if you aim to bring this place back to life. It’s been nigh on dead for years.” Then he took off, the thin tires kicking up a cloud of dust.

Hank carried their bags as they trudged down a weed-choked gravel drive on the patch of land that now belonged to him. From what he could see through the dusk, it wasn’t much. The beams of a full moon showered gauzy light enough to discern a tiny house, barely more than a shack. Beyond stood the gnarled shapes of trees in what had to be the walnut grove. Why did everything look so sad and overgrown? Was it merely the night and fatigue warping his view? Or had nothing been cared for or loved in so long? Either way, he would find out in the morning, when the light of day showed him the truth about the farm.

He heard a series of soft clucks and wondered if any chickens had been left behind to fend for themselves, turning as wild as the rest of the farm.

“So this is ours?” Nadya asked.

“All twenty acres of neglect,” Hank replied and tried not to wince, hoping she wasn’t too disappointed.

When they reached the end of the private lane, when they stood at the foot of the broken-down steps leading up to the ramshackle porch, Hank felt gripped by a horrible panic. Was there still a working well so they’d have water to drink and cook with and clean themselves? Was there a chair to sit upon, a bed on which to sleep? He doubted there were electric lights or even rudimentary plumbing, at least not any that worked properly.

Though Nadya nudged him forward, Hank couldn’t move. He set down their bags, truly wanting to weep.

“I didn’t realize what kind of shape the property would be in. I didn’t even think to ask—” he started to say, so disheartened he could barely breathe, only to stop short at the touch of Nadya’s hand on his arm and the sound of her sigh.

“But it’s yours and mine, yes?” she said again.

And he nodded, giving her a definitive “Yes.”

He could see her smile through the dark. She reached for his hand and set it on the slight swell of her belly, holding it there. The warmth of her skin seeped into his. “It’s our home, the three of us,” she told him. “No matter what it looks like now, there’s nowhere else I’d rather be.”

Hank sighed, too grateful to speak.

“Come on.” She drew him up the creaking steps and through the unlocked door, batting at cobwebs and bumping into the shadows.

Nine

Hank did the best he could that first night to make the place habitable. With only the glow of an oil lamp to guide them, he cleared debris and removed discolored sheets from the few pieces of furniture that remained. He beat the dust from the straw-filled mattress that sat atop the creaky springs of a paint-chipped iron bed.

Neither of them slept much. Instead, Nadya rested her head on his chest, and he put his arms around her as they whispered in the dark.

Once the day finally dawned, they got up quickly and dressed. While Nadya plundered cabinets in the kitchen, searching for anything canned to open for breakfast, Hank did a cursory walk around the grounds, poking his head into the broken-down barn, assessing the battered chicken coop, and taking stock of the barren-looking walnut trees before he headed the five miles into town on foot. Once there, he found the nearest church with a breadline and hired the first three men he met who said they were willing and able to work with their hands. Then he went to the general store and bought nonperishable foodstuffs for delivery to the farm, enough to last them several weeks. He purchased tools at the hardware store and wire to mend the chicken coop. Hank even found a donkey for sale, one that he was sure could pull the old buggy he’d spied half buried behind moldy hay bales in the barn.

On that day and every day after, he and Nadya labored from dawn to dusk: she scrubbed and sewed while he hammered, repaired, and painted. The small crew that Hank had cobbled together became indispensable, so much so that they set up bunks in the barn once that building got patched up so they could stretch their working hours.

Several months after, with the tiny house finally livable and bright and the barn nearly ready for livestock, the only trouble spots remaining for Hank were the walnut trees themselves. No matter what kind of advice he got—no matter that he pruned the old trees and planted seedlings to grow new ones—nothing seemed to flourish in the grove. The only thing he could see growing day to day was Nadya’s burgeoning belly.

When he told her what he had to do, she tried to talk him out of it at first.

“You can’t perform another ceremony,” she said point-blank, pacing the newly sanded floor of their sparsely furnished parlor. “Every time you do, it drains the life out of you. What if you don’t recover this time around?”

“I’m not going to leave you, if that’s what you’re worried about,” he assured her as he wove an eagle feather into the single plait of his hair. “But I need to ask for help, more than anyone in Walnut Ridge can give.”

“I don’t like this,” Nadya murmured, hands rubbing circles on her belly. “I don’t like it at all.”

“One last time, and then I’m through,” he promised and finished fastening the strand of turquoise around his neck, giving her a thin smile.

“One last time,” she repeated sternly and didn’t smile back.

The deep purple of dusk filled the windows as he kissed her and left the farmhouse, his doeskin moccasins quiet on the patched porch steps, his movements blending into the shadows. He avoided the barn, where the laborers had settled for the evening, skirting the chicken coop as well to avoid unsettling the birds, which might in turn wake the hands. He didn’t need the men spying on him and tattling in town that Hank Littlefoot was prancing around after dark, performing mystical mumbo jumbo, or whatever they might call it. He knew folks were already gossiping about the “pregnant gypsy woman” and the “long-haired Indian” who’d taken over the Hansen farm. For the most part, he seemed to get on well enough with those he encountered. No one in Walnut Ridge recognized him from his vaudeville days, and the last thing he needed was to draw attention to himself.

Hank moved unseen through the falling dark until he was amidst the gnarled walnut trees with their peeling bark and twisted limbs. For a while, he merely walked amongst them, touching their trunks with gentle hands and whispering reassurance, telling them not to be afraid.

“You will be reborn tonight,” he promised them, and he didn’t let himself believe otherwise.

What Hank desired most wasn’t a heavy rain or winds. He needed lightning to hit the grove, not just once, but many times. His goal was not to burn down the barren trees but to give them a rebirth. He’d often heard his grandfather say that a lightning strike worked magic on the soil, causing plants to thrive and become greener and stronger. Hank figured the walnut grove was as good as dead, the earth unyielding as if it had been poisoned. If he and Nadya were going to support themselves on the farm, they needed a crop to harvest. It was up to him to make it happen, and he was determined that this was the path.

So Hank did what he had done dozens of times before. He began to chant and rhythmically shuffle in a circle beneath the stars, calling on the Great Spirit to send down lightning upon the land, to enrich the dirt and make the walnut trees flourish. He made an oath that he would care for the earth as if it were his own child, until he had no breath left in his body.

Please,
he begged,
let me have this one last thing, and I will ask for no more.

The chanted words and familiar motions soon put him into a trance so that he was unaware of the passage of time. He felt only the beat of his heart through his veins and the pulse of every living thing around him. The moon had risen high above and suddenly tugged at the air like a fierce ocean tide.

Hank ceased his dance at the first ripple of tension that whipped through the sky. As he looked up, sweat dripped down his brow and stuck the turquoise beads to his flesh. He swayed, so exhausted by his efforts he was sure his knees would buckle beneath him. But, somehow, he stayed upright.

In the heavens above, he saw brilliant veins of light pulse and disappear against the dark. Faint at first, their silver forks quickly lengthened and deepened, the electricity snapping and arcing, creating such a fierce illumination that Hank was temporarily blinded by the sight.

Thrown by an unseen hand, jagged spears of electricity shot to earth, hitting spots all about the grove, knocking Hank off his feet. He fell to the dirt just as a bolt split the gnarled tree nearest him and set its dry limbs ablaze.

The world seemed on fire around him, the air so alive that it breathed, brushing his cheek, tugging his hair, scattering sticks and twigs. A shadow winged its way past, and he blinked at the sight of an eagle, swooping down from the sky, eyes as yellow as the lightning.

“Grandfather,” he said, and he smiled, sure the old man was there with him.

Hank could do no more. Now it was up to the spirits to finish the task.

He closed his eyes as the lightning strikes ceased and it began to rain, softly at first and then in earnest. He lay still as the water soaked through to his skin; he was too tired to move.

You have done your piece,
he heard a voice say in his ear
. Now you are free.