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Stories from the Verse
Con Version
Chapter 134: Brown 330
Table of Contents
Previous chapter: Cooper 43
It was a bit of a challenge figuring out where he had left off, as Morach returned the next morning to overfly the near edges of Cajun territory. There wasn’t much to tell him that he had already seen this part but not that part. He made his best guess, and started a new search pattern.
After something over an hour of searching he spotted something--a gleam of polished stone, he thought. The trees were thinner, and it was the first thing he had seen that might be what he sought. He descended carefully, not sure whether there would be any kind of protections or defenses, or indeed whether he might be mistaken and find himself descending into someone’s private property. He’d been taken out by a blunderbuss once; he wagered a shotgun would be even more effective.
He reached the ground unmolested and unimpeded, and immediately observed the remains of weathered tombstones in an almost orderly array. What he sought stood in the middle, and he flew over to it and perched on a headstone. The name ‘Carter’ was clearly inscribed above the door, with two badly weathered names below it that were presumably the brothers. There were no dates, but this was clearly the place. There was one other detail that confirmed it in his mind.
There were footprints in the dirt in front of the door.
Not knowing what might be on the inside, Morach decided that the best course was to look for the trail they took between here and the city. Recent footprints in the soft earth led him to a gap in the trees with a path, not well-worn but clearly used, headed east. He flew along this slowly, sometimes rising above the trees to see the lay of the land, sometimes turning to look behind himself to see what it would look like coming the other way. By this method, he got a fairly good idea of the path, and in about an hour came out by an old wooden bridge in disrepair that was on the edge of the city.
He flew back home, and as he was getting ready for their performance at the restaurant he told Vashti, “I found it. I know how to get there, I think.”
“Good,” she said. “We’ll talk about it this afternoon. We’ve got to hurry or we’ll be late.”
They rushed to the restaurant; the band was waiting, and they joined them. “Give me a minute to catch my breath,” Derek said as he drew out his trumpet and worked the valves. He took several deep breaths, and then said, “O.K., I think I’m ready.” On his cue they opened with Also Sprach Zarathustra, and played their regular set.
Derek felt too excited to eat, but persuaded himself to do so. He had an extra glass of root beer trying to calm down. He wanted to tell the others what he’d learned, but didn’t really want to do so in the crowded restaurant, so he was keeping it to himself. Maurice asked what had him so edgy, and he only said, “Later. When we get home.”
The band was still eating when a man near the door started making noise. “Waiter!” he shouted. “This is terrible; take it away!”
Henri responded politely and swiftly. “What’s the problem, sir?”
“The food here is terrible. I’m surprised anyone can stomach it. And the service is shabby, and even the music, well, we could do without noise like that in this town.”
Quietly, Maurice said, “Dem’s fightin’ words.”
“Hold on,” Derek said. “There’s something going on here, more than we can see. He might be trying to provoke us.”
“What makes you think that?” Pierre asked.
Derek looked around at his companions. “I didn’t tell you then,” he said quietly, “but when the rats invaded the kitchen I spoke with them.”
“You spoke with the lats?” Lei reacted.
Pierre answered, “With everything else he does, that’s not really surprising.”
“They had been sent. For some reason, the devil decided to attack Hannah’s place. Maybe it’s only because we’re here; maybe there’s something else we haven’t seen yet. Anyway, let’s see whether Henry can handle it before we make a bad situation worse.”
They had missed a good part of the conversation between Henry and the irate customer, but by now Hannah had also come out. She was not exactly calm and sweet, but she was maintaining an even temper. Apparently she had offered to not charge him, because he argued.
“Free meal? You should pay me; I’ll probably need to see a doctor after eating that.”
“Now sir,” Hannah said, still polite but clearly about to lose her temper. Derek decided to intervene.
“Pardon me,” he said, “but I think you’re out of line, and I suspect you are just here to make trouble. We all know that Missus Johnson’s food is some of the finest in the city, and I think you know it, too. The waitstaff and the kitchen staff do a remarkable job of providing swift and courteous service in an overcrowded dining room. As to the music, I won’t be so arrogant as to make any claims; I’ll just let it speak for itself.”
He walked to his trumpet and started to play Amazing Grace. The rest of the band scrambled to get their instruments, and joined in. As they reached the end of the first verse, Derek called out, “Sing it with us; you know the words.” Soon the crowd had joined in, and the room was filled with “Amazing grace, how sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me. I once was lost but now am found, ‘twas blind but now I see.”
By the next verse the troublemaker had stormed out of the building, and the crowd was singing several different sets of lyrics against each other, but they kept going. In fact, they kept singing for about twenty minutes, after which the band stopped and there was a lot of weeping and praying and praising that continued well into the afternoon.
As the band walked back to the shack, Maurice broke the silence. “Brotha, we jes’ had church.”
“The unity of the speelit in the bond of peace,” Lei said.
“I joined this band,” Pierre said, “because I wanted to do music. It seems, though, that God had something much bigger in mind.”
“Amen,” Derek said.
“Amen,” several of the others answered, and they continued in silence for another minute or two.
It was Lei who broke it. “You wuh excited about something uhlieuh. What was it?”
“Oh,” Derek said. “I found the mausoleum, and I think I know how to get there.” He looked at the late afternoon sky. “But it’s too late to go today. Maybe we’ll go tomorrow afternoon.”
They got back to the shack and ran over a couple of parts of the songs, but it was a short rehearsal and everyone soon returned to their own homes.
As to the old stories that have long been here:
