T. Bunn - The Great Divide

Marcus tried to shrug off the day’s impossible weight. “I can’t see how having anybody else witness the ordeal would have made it easier to bear.”

“Ain’t talking about witnessing.” Deacon stuffed the cloth into the back pocket of his coveralls. “I’m talking about being there for a friend in need.”

Deacon’s kindness threatened to unravel the cords holding his mangled heart in place. Marcus set his briefcase onto a sawhorse and flipped back the latches. He extracted a manila folder and held it up. “The court has ruled on your church’s request.”

The elderly painter’s eyes widened. “It’s all done?”

“Signed, sealed, and delivered. Go on, take it. This is your copy.”

“No sir. Not before I wash the paint off my hands.” He climbed down from the ladder, his eyes never leaving the folder. “Got the hopes of a thousand living souls in that file. Six generations and a whole world of memories, yes, I need clean hands to take hold of that.”

Marcus opened the file and turned so Deacon Wilbur could read over his shoulder. “I asked the court to make what is called a declarative judgment. It basically tells both New Horizons and the county commission to leave your property alone.”

“Not mine, no. I’m just a trustee for a lot of people, both here and in the hereafter.” The old man’s voice had taken on a preacher’s gentle cadence. “You’ve made a lot of folks indebted to you.”

“Just doing my job.”

“Yes sir, a lot of folks.” Going on as though Marcus had not spoken. “Lot of families gonna sleep better, knowing their loved ones will rest peaceful till the Lord comes with trumpets and chariots of fire. Yes, lots of families.” He lifted his gaze to Marcus. “It’d mean more than I can say for these folks to have a chance to thank you personally.”

“There’s no need.”

“Yes there is, now. Strong needs. Strong. Families from all over the county’ll want to shake your hand.” The dark and brilliant gaze held Marcus from beneath a protruding brow. “Gonna ask a favor of you, sir. Want you to come to our Sunday service.”

“Excuse me?”

“You don’t have to stay if you don’t want. Just come long enough for people to meet the man who’s worked to keep their families all resting peaceful. Yes.” He took Marcus’ silence as acceptance. “Sunday at nine. Much obliged, sir. Much obliged.”

As Marcus emerged blinking and stunned from the Sunday service, Deacon Wilbur extended one long arm to draw him near. “Mr. Marcus, come on over here, sir. Like you to meet two dear friends of mine. This is Alma and Austin Hall.”

“Nice to meet you.” Marcus heard the words as from a great distance. The entire world seemed filtered through the clamor that was no more.

The woman said, “Deacon tells us you took on New Horizons and won.”

“That’s right.” The old pastor did not actually smile, but he unbent enough to nod approval. “Mr. Marcus went in there and saved our families’ resting place.”

Faces turned in unison toward the cemetery. Today was the first time Marcus had actually laid eyes on the place, and part of him understood perfectly why New Horizons had found it so offensive. The cemetery was not only large, it had a ramshackle air that defied orderly profit-driven thought. Families walked the broad, graveled aisles, pointing out names, watching the children race ahead with bouquets and garlands streaming. Around the outer boundaries, a tumbledown fence fought against the onslaught of weeds. The oldest graves were marked with weathered crosses and bordered by pebbles and seashells and shards of colored glass. Sunlight and children’s laughter and echoes of the closing hymn danced in the air above the graves like the faint beat of unseen wings.

Alma Hall brought him back around with, “We need ourselves a lawyer willing to do battle with the behemoth atop that hill.”

The words hung there between them. Perhaps it was the way Alma Hall addressed him, as though she had been practicing the part for weeks. Or perhaps after that service whatever the woman said, however crude or poetic, would have chimed like crystal bells in the clear September air.

Marcus asked, “You’re also involved in a land dispute with New Horizons?”

Deacon Wilbur hummed a single note, as apparently Marcus’ query was the response he had been hoping for. But Austin Hall sighed so long and hard it seemed his wife’s words had punctured his heart and drained all breath from his body. Austin Hall said wearily, “Alma, come on now. Don’t let’s get started on that.”

Alma Hall chose to ignore her husband entirely. “Yes, we have a dispute with New Horizons, and no, it is not over land.”

Marcus pulled his eyes from Austin Hall, standing there stooped and vacant-eyed. He looked out over the cemetery to what once had been a wooded rise. Along the lower slope pines still fought for space with oaks and sycamores. But the crown had been razed flat, like a giant’s hand had swiped away all greenery before pounding the earth so hard it bled clay red. An older metal and glass building squatted to his right. Directly ahead, steel spindles were being planted in the raw clay, lifeless parodies of the growth that was no more.

“This is a matter of great urgency,” Alma Hall continued. “Would you please stop by our house this afternoon?”

Marcus turned back around. Alma Hall held to an attractiveness that was as much a matter of bearing as form. She was big boned and spoke with a carefully deliberate air. The sun shone with such strength it made her honeyed skin translucent, as though Marcus could delve through the multitude of layers and see the desperation that fueled her formal tone. “I’ll see you about three.”

After a solitary lunch Marcus moved about the house, supposedly puttering but in truth accomplishing little. He swept sawdust from the corners of his soon-to-be office and carried Deacon’s empty paint buckets to the dumpster out back. Sometimes such idle moments were enough to draw out memories of fonder times. Today, however, the ghosts of bygone eras did not rise to comfort him, and he was glad when it came time to depart.

The Halls lived in Rocky Mount, one of the many new subdivisions cropping up between Zebulon and Raleigh. The recently completed Beltline offered eight-lane access from the poorer east to the richer south and west. Computer technicians and lab assistants and secretaries and low-level executives could buy homes on large lots for money that would have scarcely paid for a doghouse adjacent to the Research Triangle Park.

The Hall residence was airy and light-filled and pleasant, in direct contrast to the welcome Austin Hall showed him. The man cast a resentful shadow as he silently directed Marcus into the spacious living room, then retreated, leaving Marcus alone.

Marcus stood by the large back window and pretended to take an interest in how the tall sentinel pines filtered the afternoon light. A quarrel between husband and wife carried clearly from somewhere upstairs.

“All I do is ask you to answer the door, and you’ve got to turn it into the drama of a lifetime.”

“I did what you said, Alma. I did it even though I don’t want that man in my house, not now, not ever. We don’t need him here.”

“You heard Deacon. That man has taken on New Horizons and won.”

“It doesn’t change a thing and you know it.”

“So what do you want to do, now? Just sit on our hands and let our baby suffer?”

“You don’t have any call talking to me that way. None at all. You know that as well as I do.”

“What I know is you are the most stubborn man it’s ever been my misfortune to meet up with.” Heavy footsteps thudded down the hallway overhead. “Now you come on.”