Script:
"Jasper,"
she whispered, her shadow mooncast against the tent wall. Night smell of damp canvas and a dark wind
off the river. My mouth watered, I imagined
her lips as they rounded out my name.
She whispered "Jasper!" And I told her, "I am
coming." I said, "Wait," struggling into my clothes. "I am coming." I crawled right over
Ogleby the snake man, who was snoring with his mouth wide open, his big feet
blocking the door flap. She moved beside
me, beyond the canvas wall, yet with me, just inches away. Then her shadow drew up suddenly and fell
into the greater darkness, By the time I
got outside, she was gone.
I
stood there, searching, tents and wagons an eerie white in the moonlight. We were camped in the fairgrounds by the
river. I listened past Ogleby's great
snores and the nearby rustle of animals and the tin pans of the mess wagon
tapping in the breeze. I listened hard,
to the susurration of the water rising up, to the air moving lightly thought
the trees. It was quiet but for the wind
and thus, when the preacher spoke, his voice breaking the silence like a whip, I
jumped a mile.
He said, "You are treading
near fire, Jasper. You had better
beware."
My fists clenched at his words,
for I knew my young and willing girl was gone, my hours of sweet talk
wasted. "The righteous need no
candle," he went on mocking my night blindness, "neither light
of the sun."
"Leave me alone," I
demanded, turning toward his voice.
"Do you hear?"
"Oh, I hear you," he
said, his voice so soft I had to strain to listen. "but the great question is do you hear?
Jasper? Do you hear what the spirit sayeth?"
He shifted, stepping from the
shadows. Moonlight streamed down his
pale skin, caught on his ring, heavy gold, stones inset like a fireburst, which
he waved before the sinners in each new town like a tiny piece of heaven, hard
and shiny, of value beyond reckoning, nearly impossible to attain. The next day I might even see my sweet-talk
girl hovering beside him, bedazzled and saved and lost to me forever. I stood poised, waiting. I would not stagger after him like a fool,
but like a fool I was furious enough to fire the argument that had been
smoldering between us all these years.
"You saved me once
already," I reminded him. "And
once was too much for a lifetime."
"Blasphemer," he said,
his voice a whisper now, floating to me amid the tree sounds, the water
murmurings. "You will burn in a
lake of fire."
I knew he was gone. But of course, so was she. I walked to the edge of the river, leaving
the cluster of tents behind me, willing her to appear, firm and supple, draped
with light. The wind rusted in the
leaves, trapped the hanging pans, but he had scared her good, and despite my
longing she did not come again.
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