Steve Cash - The Meq

It began with a dream I was having while dozing on the sofa in Daphne’s sprawling living room, waiting for the return of Willie and Tillman Fadle. In the dream, I was standing alone on a cliff near Kepa’s camp and thought I heard the sound of castanets behind me. I turned, expecting to see the Spanish Lady, and saw instead a rattlesnake, coiled and ready to strike. I opened my mouth to scream and could make no sound. It was a hopeless, helpless feeling. I couldn’t turn away and I couldn’t stop the rattle. It was Daphne who shook me awake.

“Wake up, Z, my dear. You are dreaming.” I looked up at her bright blue eyes and she winked. “Come,” she whispered, “and come quietly.” She pointed at Geaxi and Opari on the floor in front of the fireplace. They were sound asleep under the blankets and shawls that Daphne had thrown over them. I could see the gems embedded in Opari’s Stone. Her necklace had fallen loose from inside her shirt and the firelight bounced brilliant blues off the tiny sapphire and diamond. I bent down and put the Stone back in her shirt. I knew Daphne had seen it, but she said nothing. As I was to find out, the secrets and mysteries of the Meq were unimportant to her. She was a Cornish woman first and last; a survivor. Magic was everywhere in Cornwall, in song and story, and she’d grown up with it, but she knew it could heal neither body nor soul. “Grief,” Daphne told me, “is like a wound, and one treats a wound with tenderness and kindness, not magic. You let it heal in its own time from within. My goodness, it’s quite simple, really. A living thing loves to live. It’s the same with all of us, my dear.”

She led me through the long and cluttered kitchen out of a rear entrance and along a path beside a low stone wall. I had to hurry to keep pace. The wind was blowing strong from the west and Daphne leaned into it. There was a faint scent of sea in the air, though I knew we were miles inland from harbor and coast. Low clouds kept the sky gray from horizon to horizon. Behind us, a few gray and yellow cats followed and watched.

She stopped in front of a combination stable and garage and unlatched two tall wooden doors, then swung them open. As she did, I blew on my hands and looked around quickly at the startling beauty of Caitlin’s Ruby, even in November. On distant ridges I could see several cedar trees, rare for where we were, and everywhere there were paths leading off somewhere, lined with heather and wildflowers and marked at crosspoints with unique structures, lookouts, and shrines. Daphne put her hands on her hips and stared down at me. Her mouth opened in that odd smile, but her eyes were all business.

“I fear there shall be a quarantine placed on us.”

“What?”

“A quarantine,” she said, pausing. “Perhaps you are not familiar—”

“No, no, I know what a quarantine is, Daphne. It’s just that I need to find someone now, soon, right away.”

She let another long moment pass. “Is it Carolina?”

Her question stopped me cold. I stared up at her crooked smile. “I thought you didn’t know who Star and Nicholas were?”

“I did not, but I know of Carolina through Owen. My goodness, he rarely mentions her by name, but I certainly know of Carolina. I also knew of her missing daughter and absent husband, but never by name until last night.”

“Absent husband?” I was confused and wondered if we were talking about the same person.

“Yes, that’s right, the poor soul of a man who slipped away last night. I assumed you knew him, Z.”

“I do, I mean I did, but how did you—”

“Nova told me all about who was what to whom this morning and the. urgency you might feel to find Carolina.”

“Where is Carolina?”

“I think you should ask Nova.”

“Where is Nova?”

Daphne smiled again and turned toward the darkness inside the garage.

“With Star and the baby,” she said. “That is my point. I think we should try and take Star and Caine into Penzance before the quarantine is imposed, for quick help if it’s needed and, my goodness, to contact Carolina, finally. Do you agree?”

“I. I don’t know.”

“You and Geaxi and Opari could wait here for Willie and Tillman. There is an old milk truck in the garage. I’ve driven it before and it runs perfectly well. What do you think, my dear?”

“I. I want to talk to Nova first.”

“Certainly” Daphne said. “She is right behind you.”

I turned and saw Star hurrying toward us, carrying Caine inside her jacket and lugging a suitcase that seemed to keep coming undone, causing her to pause every few steps and pick up the falling contents. At least a dozen of Caitlin’s cats brushed against her every time she knelt down. Not far behind, Nova followed at her own pace, looking out over Caitlin’s Ruby as I had done, and even stroking a few of the cats as they appeared and disappeared along the way. Daphne said simply, “I’ve never seen them let any person do what they’re letting Nova do.”

I could tell at a glance that both Star and Nova had already put last night behind them and resolved something in their hearts and minds, especially Nova. She seemed to have transformed herself. There was a calmness in the way she walked and moved, the way she stroked the cats and scanned the landscape. It was as if she was “seeing” something else, something more. I suddenly remembered what Ray had said about her, that he thought she might be able to “see things.” I knew at that moment he was right, though I had no idea what she was “seeing.” She wore a hat pulled down low over her forehead that looked familiar, but I couldn’t tell what it was until she stopped in front of the garage and turned my way. It was a bowler exactly like Ray’s only without the wear and tear that his had seen. She wore red lipstick and dark blue eye shadow that made her look like an Egyptian. I almost laughed, and would have, except for the look in her eyes. It was all Meq. Compassion, mystery, trust, everything that usually came through the eyes of an old one, shone through Nova and out to me.

“Where is Carolina?” I asked. The worst thoughts imaginable were running through my head.

“She is. she was. ”

“What? Is she dead?”

“No, no, Zianno, that is not what I meant.”

“Is she sick with this virus?”

“No. at least not that I know of.”

“What then, Nova? Tell me. Where is she?”

Nova took a deep breath and turned her head toward the garage where Daphne was cranking up the old milk truck. “Your friend,” she said, “Captain Woodget?”

“Yes,” I said slowly. “What about him?”

She turned her head back and looked in my eyes. “He passed away in New Orleans. It was only a week after the woman he lived with had died in her sleep.”

“Isabelle?”

“Yes, and Mama was supposed to go with Owen to their funeral. Owen insisted on giving them a full New Orleans funeral with lots of pomp and circumstance. Carolina took her place at the last minute and Mama and I stayed in St. Louis with Jack and Ciela.”

“Where was Nicholas?”

“Not at Carolina’s. That’s the ultimate irony, Z. We hadn’t seen him in six years and he suddenly appeared, not ten minutes before Sailor’s message arrived.”

“Where had he been?”

“I don’t know.”

“Why did he leave?”

“It’s complicated. I think Carolina should answer that. But there he was and he almost came apart when he found out about Star. He wanted to leave for England immediately, but Mama and I wouldn’t let him go alone. He was a ghost of himself. We left that afternoon for New York and paid a shameless amount of money to get aboard the first ship out. We had no luggage and actually slept on the decks, but we made it, or thought we had. You know the rest. Somewhere en route, Nicholas and Eder must have contracted the virus.”