The Wind of Lonely Places

9.

The room was smaller than the shadowed view from the window had 
implied.  The rafters had been left unceilinged, except for an area 
beneath the dormer where planks had been laid to create a railed loft; a 
ladder to one side led up to a gap in the rail.  Beneath the loft, a
section of the cabin had been partitioned from the main room with
rough planking, light leaking from cracks between the boards.
	The fireplace was massive, though the hearth itself was relatively 
small, built from mortared field-stone.  A fire was leaping busily among 
logs laid upon the black iron firedogs, sending waves of heat across the 
room.  A sudden draft at Kelly's back reminded him to close the door.  
The cabin's furnishings were modest: a ladder-backed chair and writing 
table near a window, and a pair of cushioned chairs by the fireplace.
	Sounds of movement could be heard from behind the partition.  
Kelly hesitated, then moved across the room toward the fire, his ski 
boots drumming a slow double-beat, heel and toe, upon the floor.  He 
slipped his day pack from his shoulders and swung it to the floor beside 
one of the chairs.  The heat of the fire persuaded him to remove his 
jacket, revealing beneath it a red and black flannel shirt.  He sat, 
sighing, and laboriously unlaced his ancient leather ski boots, pried them 
from his feet.  He slouched into the chair, feet extended toward the 
flames, waiting, watching passively the rustling shadows sliding restlessly 
about the firelight.
	Kelly accepted a wine glass from a long-fingered hand, looked 
past a slender wrist, along a forearm etched sharply by the tendons 
under smooth skin, up into eyes like snowclouds, grey and shadowed.  
She stood beside his chair, a wine glass in her left hand, dressed in cut-
off denims and a navy sweatshirt, the sleeves pushed back to her 
elbows.  He nodded his thanks, sipped the pale liquid.  A light, dry 
Riesling, he guessed, and quite familiar.  Wine was a special hobby of 
his.
	"Excellent," he said.  "It's really quite astonishing, the way you 
hold it all together.  How do you do it?"
	She curled herself into the other chair, the fire's image swimming 
in her eyes, in her wine.  "It's really not that difficult," she said, her 
voice soft.  "You're doing most of it yourself."
	"I am?"
	She nodded, gestured vaguely with her glass.  "This is a cabin I 
visited with my parents once, when I was a child.  But I don't remember 
it very well.  Most of the details are drawn from your memories of 
another place."
	Kelly's expression registered skepticism, then thoughtfulness 
and, finally, wonder as he looked about the room.  He spoke slowly, 
with a pause between each sentence.  "Franangar.  Near the town of 
Cresta, in Switzerland.  1937.  I think."  He shook his head in 
amazement.  "You learn something new every day, in this racket."
	"You've improved it," she said.  "As I said, my memory is very 
rough."  She sipped from her glass.  "You did the wine, too."
	Kelly looked blank a moment, then grinned.  "Of course!" he 
murmured.  "Fable Valley, 1922.  A fine year for wines, that was."  He 
looked at her.  "But I didn't imagine you," he said.
	"No," she said sadly.  "I'm real."
	They sat for a time, sipping their wine, and later, while she toyed 
with her empty glass, she said, "You're taking this all very calmly.  Are 
you some sort of medium, or spiritualist?"
	"No," said Kelly, looking at her intently.  "So you realize that 
you are dead."
	"Yes.  I know I'm dead."
	Kelly leaned over the arm of his chair and pulled a bota from his 
rucksack.  He filled her glass, then his own.  "What do you remember 
about it?" he asked, sipping the wine.
	She frowned slightly, and spoke in a halting voice.  "I remember 
waiting in a cold place.  This place.  I remember the snow falling.  My 
ankle hurt.  I was very tired, but I knew I shouldn't sleep, because I 
would drift away, and I couldn't do that because I had to wait."  She 
paused.  "That's all," she said then.  "I was in this place, after that.
With that thing out there in the trees."  She sipped her wine, and her 
eyebrows arched in surprise.  "This is marvelous," she said.  "What is 
it?"
	"I make it myself," said Kelly, "It's a special vintage, distilled 
from the wind of lonely places."
	"You would seem to be something of a poet," she said dryly.
	Kelly chuckled.  "Just a romantic.  I haven't the passion to be so 
self-involved.  I must borrow another man's words:

"'The wind of lonely place is her wine.
"'Still she eludes us, hidden, husht, and fleet,
"'A star withdrawn, a music in the gloom.
"'Beauty and death, her speechless lips assign,
"'Where silence is, and where the surf-loud feet
"'Of armies wander on the sands of doom.'"

	She looked down into her glass, her face hidden in her hair.  
"That is...unusual.  Disturbing, even."
	"George Sterling," said Kelly.  "He is not greatly regarded in 
these decadent times."  He sipped.  "Do you remember why you were 
waiting?"
	"I...I was told."
	"You were told to wait here?  Who told you?"
	"I don't remember."
	"Were you here with..." Kelly started, but she interrupted him.
	"I don't want to talk about it."
	"That's all right.  What would you like to talk about instead?"
	"You."
	"Me?"
	"You.  Where are you from?  I don't know your accent."
	Kelly shrugged.  "My father was born in Ireland, and traveled 
abroad.  The formal term was 'transportation'.  It was a way of 
removing undesirable elements from society, which evidently described 
my father."
	"I thought they stopped transporting felons a long time ago."
	"Well, I'm a bit older than I look.  In any event, my father didn't
care for the place he was transported to, so he re-transported himself to
New Zealand, where he married a Maori girl, and raised me and my two 
sisters.  That's where I learned to ski, and a ski-bum is what I've been 
most of my life since."
	"When you're not skiing with ghosts."
	Kelly leaned over and refilled her glass.  "I thought you didn't 
want to talk about it."
	She tossed her head to move her hair away from her face, and 
stared into the fire.  "I changed my mind."
	"All right.."
	"This place seems comfortable enough, and I suppose I should 
feel grateful to exist at all, but I find I'm not enjoying the afterlife 
very much."
	"Why not?"
	She closed her eyes, and tears leaked out beneath the lashes.  
"Because..."  Her voice caught, and she began to sob.  Kelly rose and 
pulled her into his arms, where she wept against his chest.  "There, 
there," he whispered soothingly, "hush now, girl."
	"You should hate me," she said, her voice muffled.
	"There now, girl.  It's not your fault."
	"It is," she cried fiercely, her fists twisted into the fabric of 
his shirt.  "I wanted to live!  When I felt the world fading away from me,
I would lure them down across the pale border, where the thing could 
reach them.  They would scream as it fed; their pain would follow me, 
and when at last it was over, I'd feel strong again, for a little while.
And now I've killed you as well!"
	"No Kate.  You haven't killed me at all."
	She stiffened against him, jerking her head back.  "How do you 
know my name?" she demanded.
	"It took a little research," Kelly told her.  "Not much.  Few 
people die, or even disappear, unremarked these days."
	She pulled away from him, and Kelly let her go.  "Why are you 
here?"
	"Too many have died on this mountain Kate.  It has to end."
	"You have come to kill me!"
	"I could never harm you, Kate.  I can't harm anyone, really."
	She backed away from him, stumbled, and caught at the edge of 
the chair.  "I...I feel strange."
	"It's the wine," said Kelly, leaning forward to lend support.  
"Come over here and sit."
	He guided her to a soft fur rug that had suddenly appeared before
the fireplace, and helped her to sit. He lowered himself to the rug behind 
her, placing her between his legs, supporting her with his chest and his 
arms.
	"I feel so light," she said in a wondering voice.  "Wine has never 
made me feel this way."
	"It is a special wine.  It loosens your ties to the world."
	She wept strengthlessly, leaning heavily against his chest.  "Why 
have you done this to me?"
	"Try to understand what I must tell you, Kate.  There are many 
parts that make a person.  When you die, these parts separate.  Your 
body decays, but your spirit goes elsewhere - to a place beyond my 
knowledge.  The will, that which held your spirit within your body, 
wanders lost for a time, and finally fades.  It has many different names in 
many different lands and times: the ancient Egyptians called it the ba-
soul.  The Navajos call it the chindi.  I call it the enemy.  Without your 
body and spirit, it becomes malevolent and murderous, although it can 
do little harm by itself.
	"Sometimes a person dies in such despair, or rage, or 
heartbreak, that the bond between the enemy and the spirit continues 
unnaturally.  The enemy is nearly always able to dominate the spirit.  
You never felt yourself fading, Kate.  You felt your enemy fading.
You felt its hollow joy as it fed, rending another's spirit and 
devouring its will, for the enemy is a cannibal.  You do not need the 
enemy, Kate - it needs you, uses you, and keeps you in this place 
between the worlds.  Believe it, Kate!"
	"I'm frightened.  Stay with me, please."
	"It's all right.  I'm here."
	"I don't want to go."
	"You must," Kelly said gently, firmly.
	"I feel strange...so light...like I'm floating away," she said, her 
voice distant.
	"The wind of lonely places is bearing you to another world."
	"Will I see you in that other world someday?"
	"I...hope so.  I don't know."
	"Hold me please, until I have to go."
	"I will."
	And the wind howled round the cabin, and the fire began to die.