Говард Уолдроп - Them Bones

There was a crash behind them.

They lived there for a year , Basket had said. They raised crops .

‘Look out!’ yelled a state trooper from above. They heard the dam tear.

They thanked the catfish and the crow , he had said.

Her shovel scraped something.

‘Help me,’ she said.

Their shovels scraped. ‘Help me!’ she said.

She found The Box.

They grabbed at it, lifted. It cracked. Water sloshed into their legs. They held the box together and ran. Water hit the backs of their knees.

‘Kincaid,’ she yelled. ‘Help!’

The dam burst.

The trooper’s face was all eyes and mouth. Bessie fell. Something pulled her by the feet, upside down, up the bluff face. She didn’t let go of her hold on the box.

A million gallons of water smashed the bluff face below her head.

Upside down, she saw skeletons and horse bones flying around like tumbling dice.

There was a small sign, too, that said SEE ROCK CITY.

The village was quiet and there were no guards out.

Then I saw the buzzards, some flying low, some sitting still in the trees nearest the walls.

Then I heard a low chanting coming from inside.

I rearranged Took on my shoulders and walked in through the west gate.

The smell hit me then. Death.

A small group of people danced in the center of the plaza. The rest of the huts seemed empty, or places filled with the dead.

I went to the dancers.

They were Buzzard Cult people, and Moe was in there with them. They continued to dance in the bright sunlight as I walked up to them, still in the woodpecker skins.

Moe left the group and came to me.

‘Where are the others?’ I asked. ‘Did the Huastecas attack again?’

‘Those that are left are across the River,’ said Moe. ‘They have abandoned the village. They carried their gods with them,’ he said, pointing to the temple. The woodpecker effigies were gone.

‘It wasn’t Huastecas,’ Moe continued. ‘Hamboon Bokulla was right. Look around you,’ he said, sweeping his arm over the still village. ‘Death came, a disease, while we were gone. We found the last of them. They sneezed and coughed up blood. Their skins burned to the touch and had turned purple with spots. They raved and they died yelling for water. It was not nice. You can look if you want. We only found the last few, and one old man who lived through it. The others are all east of the Mes-A-Sepa, starting over.’

‘Are there any canoes left?’

‘Take mine,’ said Moe. ‘I won’t need it any more.’

‘What are you going to do?’

‘We? We will dance up and down the River, bringing news of the coming of Lord Death to all who will listen. Eventually there will be many more of us, even on your side of the River. Death is here, Death like we have never seen. Perhaps it will take the Huastecas too, and they will join us in our dances. Perhaps we shall all die soon. It is the End Time. Will you join us in our dances?’

I thought of what the Woodpecker God had said, and looked at the dead village. I felt Took’s weight on my back.

‘No,’ I said. ‘Perhaps we will meet again. I have to give Took back to his people.’

‘A happy death to you, then,’ said Moe. He started to walk away, then turned. ‘Thank you for saving me from the slab so I could see the triumph of Lord Death.’ Then he rejoined the shuffling dancers – two steps left, half step, two steps right, his crying skull tattoos shining in the morning sun.

I found Moe’s canoe at the landing, put Took-His-Time in the bow and paddled across the water, every muscle aching, fatigue hallucinations jumping at the corners of my eyesight. The River was a bright sheet of mud. More and more buzzards were circling in the skies, west of the River. Perhaps the dancing of Moe’s people was keeping them out of the deserted village, maybe something else.

The people were easy to find. A few skin huts stood on a small bluff half a kilometer down and across the waters.

I put in to the landing where other canoes lay. Somebody blew a conch horn. I carried Took up the bluff across my arms. A small crowd gathered.

I saw familiar faces. Coming toward me in Sun Man’s robes was his nephew on his sister’s side. I looked past him to the far corner of the huts where a clearing had been made. In the center was a small mound covered with charcoal. Past it the three woodpecker effigies stood blank and silent.

I heard crying, and Sunflower came up to me, touching Took’s body with her hands. I carried him toward the charcoaled mound, still warm from Sun Man’s funeral. Sunflower helped me straighten the body. Others went to the hut and brought back a handful of Took’s unfinished pipes.

We arranged them around his head and on his chest. Someone brought a torch. We put a few dried limbs and chips on him, and dragged some brush over to the mound.

Then I pulled off the woodpecker outfit, beak upward, and placed it on top of Took-His-Time, and was handed the torch.

‘He told me to tell you,’ I said, and lit the costume which burst into flames, ‘that He is gone.’ I pushed brush onto the fire, then went to the woodpecker effigies. I pulled and pushed one and lay it across the flames. Then another and the other, straining and sweating under their weight.

Then we stood and watched the smoke and flames rise into the buzzard-dotted sky. Sunflower cried beside me. Sometime before the flames died down, six days and nights of fatigue crashed over me, and I slid down into bright blue dreams.

Smith’s Diary

This will be it.

The diary goes in the box with the official stuff and the beacon. I hope someone finds it.

It is quiet out there, and a starry night.

They are out there, more of them than we ever thought there could be. They seem to have been coming for days, from all directions, and now they are ready.

They mean to kill us all, or make slaves of us – whatever it is they do.

I can’t blame them, but I don’t want to die either, so far away from everything. We will kill each other tomorrow.

Hennesey is ready. God have mercy on us, and them too. We can’t help being what we are. Neither can they.

We tried.

DA FORM 12003

18 April am

Pres dty

34

KIA

76

KLdy

8

MIA

13 B. F. Jones /M. Smith

MLDyAst Sta Chief /CWO1 RA

2 CIA /act Comm.

AWOL Civilian contgt/US Army Gp.

1

The Box lay on the table in the humidity-controlled room in the University museum.

The team slowly opened it around the cracked place, removing the chipped shellac and pitch until they could get to the seams and pry them.

The wood came off in slips thin and pliable as paper.

It took hours to get it open.

Inside was rot and maché. There were hard flat disks that could not be moved. They had become part of the box walls.

There was a book, its covers ghosts, its pages spiderwebs, but they could see words. There was a ream of paper solid as a butcher block. There was a small black box gone to sludge, with metal inside showing dimly through.