The Well by Jack Cady

Author:Jack Cady [Cady, Jack]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Valancourt Books
Published: 2014-01-31T00:00:00+00:00

“You seem to be taking this awfully easy.”

“Happens all the time,” she said. “In this place you just notice it more.”

He did not understand.

“You weren’t raised a Catholic,” she said. “You’ve never even been an actor. It’s like going to church,” she said. “People say it’s like stepping into another world. On stage you do step into another world…except it really isn’t. It’s like a frame in time that’s separate from the rest of time. That’s all. Easy.” She actually smiled.

“Hell isn’t hot,” he told her. “Hell is cold, like that storm out there. Hell imitates fire, imitates heat, but fire is the enemy of evil — ” He stopped, surprised at his inappropriate answer.

“She’s coming,” Amy said. “Is that what’s the matter? Is Vera out there?”

“This is the Middle Ages around here.” He had fumbled, and felt he was recovering badly.

“And Vera is coming?”

“I suppose she is,” he said dully. “And here we go again.” The trick was to draw your strength together, prepare yourself, and turn your face blandly toward the unspeakable.

“You’re looking better,” he now said to Vera, in flat bored tones.

“You aren’t.”

She was walking awfully slow, but there was no hesitation or uncertainty. A few hours ago she’d looked like something recently excavated. Now her face showed a faint flush of color. Her hands did not crawl or tremble.

“You look tard,” she said. “You look all crackeldy and ’bout to blow up.”

His elbow, which had ceased aching, twinged. His knee felt fine, but behind his knee was a dull torment, as though his leg had been held too rigidly in a cast or brace.

The sag seemed to be leaving Vera’s face. Wattles of loosely hanging flesh seemed tighter. Her face was old, old. She wore a red scarf over her baldness. Her eyes were brilliant and diverted his attention from her face. Her eyes seemed to demand that he concentrate on them.

And time was shifting. Was — is — will be; he didn’t know. Vera’s eyes were bright spots floating in her wrecked face. Mesmerizing spots that drew you painfully from inside yourself.

Amy clutched his arm so tightly that he had a momentary impression that she was drowning, or falling, or felt her sanity was being robbed.

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