John Saul - Nathaniel

When it had happened again, her bitterness had only increased. And once more he had come to Potter's Field, burying what he had come to think of as Nathaniel's child near its brother.

Then there had been Mark. And Laura. Healthy children, who had lived though both had seemed frail at birth.

With Anna's last child, it had been different. Amos still could not bring himself to remember that night. On that night, he had not come to the field. That night, Charles Potter had done it for him, and Amos had never even asked where that child lay.

He didn't want to know, for it was after that night that Mark had left, and Anna had retreated to her wheelchair, and Laura's mind had begun to weaken.

Laura.

He hadn't even tried to explain the truth to Laura. Instead, he'd merely been there, as he'd been there for Anna, to help her with her labor, and take away the tiny boaies when she inevitably gave birth to one of Nathaniel's children. For Laura, he'd been here twice.

If other people ever came to Potter's Field, Amos Hall had never known about it.

Except for Mark.

Mark had come to the field twice. Once, the night Anna's last child had been born. That night, he'd said nothing. Instead, he'd simply disappeared. But then, last spring, he'd come home, and once more he'd come to Potter's Field. And after that night in Potter's Field, he'd sought Amos out, confronted him with wild ravings about dead children who still lived, shouting about Nathaniel and punishment.

Amos had tried to explain the truth of what had happened so many years ago. But Mark hadn't wanted to hear. Instead, he'd only stared at Amos with hate-filled eyes. "I was there, Pa," he'd said. "I was there the night my brother was born. You thought you'd killed him, didn't you? And you gave him to Doc to bury. But he wasn't dead, Pa. I could hear him, crying out, calling to me. I followed him that night, Pa. While Doc carried him into the field, I followed him, and I watched what happened. Doc buried him, Pa. The baby wasn't dead, but Doc buried him anyway. And he's still not dead, Pa. He's alive. Nathaniel's alive."

Mark had been shouting, shouting and screaming, and then, Mark had died. And Amos, in his own mind, was still not sure if it had been an accident, or if he had meant to kill Mark. All that had mattered was that suddenly there was silence in the barn. Silence and peace. There had been too many years of pain, too many years of misunderstandings. Now, all that mattered to Amos was that Potter's Field lay undisturbed, that Nathaniel's children have their peace.

But today, Anna had come, and Michael, and Michael had prowled the field, turning over the stone markers, disturbing the soil that covered Nathaniel's children.

Tonight, carefully, reverently, Amos was repairing the damage.

He worked slowly, moving from grave to grave, checking each stone.

Twice, he thought he heard sounds in the night, sounds that didn't fit. Twigs snapped, and he knew well that the creatures of the night moved silently, never betraying their presence with more than a rustling of leaves that could be mistaken for the wind. Tonight, there was no wind.

He paused each time he heard a sound, and listened, but all he heard was silence, and after a few moments he returned to his work.

Then, as he was replacing the sixth stone, he felt something. It was a presence, and it was near him. And suddenly the night was filled with sound-the sound of running feet, human feet, fleeing into the woods by the river. And yet, despite the sounds, Amos still had the feeling that he was being watched. Nervously, he cast the beam of light in a circle around him, and finally saw them. Two yellow eyes gleaming in the darkness, and beneath them the bared fangs of Shadow, his lean body slung close to the ground in readiness for the attack.

His rifle. Amos had to find his rifle. He groped around in the dark, but it wasn't there. Finally, in desperation, he used the flashlight. The gun lay on the ground a few feet away, just out of reach. As Amos moved toward it, Shadow launched himself into the air.

Neither the man nor the dog uttered a sound, and for Amos the dog's silence was the most frightening thing about the attack. Shadow's first lunge knocked him off his feet, and he tumbled to the ground, expecting the dog's fangs to sink into his flesh immediately. It didn't happen.

Instead the dog placed himself between Amos and the gun, his cold yellow eyes fixed on the man, his teeth bared. For several seconds, Amos lay still on the ground, waiting for the dog to renew his attack.

Then, when Shadow made no move toward him, he pulJId himself up onto all fours. Shadow watched him, but still made no move.

But when Amos started forward, moving slowly and carefully, Shadow tensed, and his tail began to twitch.

Amos backed off, and Shadow's tail stopped moving, but he inched forward, closing the distance between himself and Amos to what it had been before.

Every time Amos tried to move toward the gun, it happened again. The bared fangs, the dangerously twitching tail, the tensing of the body.

Slowly, Amos began backing away, and just as slowly Shadow closed on him, never crowding him, but never letting the distance between them increase.

Then Shadow began playing Amos, moving him slowly across the field, circling him slowly, guiding him toward the fence that separated the field from the woods. At first Amos rejected what was happening, but each time he tried to define the direction of his own retreat, Shadow countered him.

And still there was no sound, either from the man or from the dog.

Minutes later, Amos felt the sting of barbed wire as the lowest strand of the fence gouged into his leg. He stopped, sank into a crouching position for a moment, then finally stood up. Shadow, too, came to a halt, as if sensing that for the moment the man could go no further.

After a few seconds had passed, Amos took a step to the left. For the first time, Shadow growled, then countered the move. Amos tried going to the right. Again, the growl, and the counter.

"Goddamn you," Amos muttered. Carefully, he made his way through the fence. The moment he was free of it, Shadow slipped easily beneath the bottom wire and began relentlessly driving the old man through the woods toward the river beyond.

Michael made his way slowly across Potter's Field, carefully avoiding the worst of the undergrowth but nevertheless having to stop every few yards to free himself from the weeds and vines that seemed to grasp at his ankle with every step. For a while he kept a careful watch on the light that still bobbed in the darkness fifty yards away, but even as he watched it, he knew it posed no threat: Shadow was out there, and Michael was certain that the dog was stalking whatever was in the field. Soon he shifted the focus of his attention to the barn.

His headache began to ease as he drew close to the looming structure, and by the time he had come close enough to touch it, his mind was clear, and the pain was gone.

And all his memories of Nathaniel had returned. He could remember everything he had talked about with Nathaniel, every word Nathaniel had told him.

And he knew he had disobeyed Nathaniel.

He moved slowly around the corner of the barn to the side door. When he had achieved his goal, he stopped for a few moments and gazed out into Potter's Field, but the light was gone now, and the darkness of the night was once more complete. All he could see was the silhouette of the forest against the night sky, and even that was little more than a vague line across the horizon. Above, he could see the stars; beneath, there was nothing but blackness.

Creeping as quietly as he could, he slipped through the darkness to the front of the barn.