The witching hour - By Anne Rice Page 0,584

I felt in my hate.

“The crowds were sparse since it was the very end of the day and the whole season, and there was no problem at all finding a comfortable place to stand on the neutral ground, in all the beaten-down grass and litter from the day-long mayhem, and I wound up leaning against a trolley line pole, hands behind my back, as the first floats came into view.

“Ghastly, ghastly as it had been in childhood, these mammoth quivering papier-mâché structures rolling slowly down the avenue beyond the heads of the jubilant crowds.

“I remembered my dad bawling me out when I was seven. ‘Michael, you’re not scared of anything real, you know it? But you gotta get over your crazy fear of those parades.’ And he was right of course. By that time, I had had a terrible fear of them, and been a real crybaby about it, ruining Mardi Gras for him and my mother, that was true. I got over it soon enough. Or at least I learned to hide it as the years passed.

“Well, what was I seeing now, as the flambeau carriers came marching and prancing along, with those beautiful stinking torches, and the sound of the drums grew louder with the approach of the first of the big proud high school bands?

“Just a mad, pretty spectacle, wasn’t it? It was all much more brightly lighted for one thing, with the high-powered street lamps, and the old flambeaux were included for old times’ sake only, not for illumination, and the young boys and girls playing the drums were just handsome and bright-faced young boys and girls.

“Then came the king’s float, amid cheering and screaming, a great paper throne, high and ornate and splendidly decorated, with the man himself quite fine in his jeweled crown, mask, and long curling wig. What extravagance, all that velvet. And of course he waved his golden cup with such perfect composure, as if this wasn’t one of the most bizarre sights in the world.

“Harmless, all of it harmless. Not dark and terrible and no one about to be executed. Little Mona Mayfair tugged at my hand suddenly. She wanted to know if I would hold her on my shoulders. Her daddy had said he was tired.

“Of course, I told her. The hard part was getting her on and then standing back up, not so good for the old ticker—I almost died!—but I did it, and she had a great time screaming for throws and reaching for the junk beads and plastic cups raining upon us from the passing floats.

“And what pretty old-fashioned floats they were. Like the floats in our childhood, Bea explained, with none of the new mechanical or electric gimmicks. Just lovely intricate confections of delicate trembling trees and flowers and birds, trimmed exquisitely in sparkling foil. The men of the krewe, masked and costumed in satin, worked hard pitching their trinkets and junk into the sea of upthrust hands.

“At last it was finished. Mardi Gras was over. Ryan helped Mona down off my shoulders, scolding her for bothering me, and I protested that it had been fun.

“We walked back slowly, Aaron and I falling behind the others, and then as the party went on inside with champagne and music, this strange thing happened, which was as follows:

“I took my usual walk around the dark garden, enjoying the beautiful white azaleas that were blooming all over, and the pretty petunias and other annual flowers which the gardeners had put into the beds. When I reached the big crepe myrtle at the back of the lawn, I realized for the first time that it was finally coming back into leaf. Tiny little green leaves covered it all over, though in the light of the moon it still looked bony and bare.

“I stood under the tree for a few minutes, looking towards First Street, and watching the last stragglers from the avenue pass the iron fence. I think I was wondering if I could chance a cigarette out here with no one to catch me and stop me, and then I realized that of course I didn’t have any, that Aaron and Aunt Viv, on the doctor’s orders, had thrown them all away.

“Whatever the case, I was drifting in my thoughts and loving the spring warmth, when I realized that a mother and child were rushing by out there, and that the child, seeing me under the tree, had pointed and said something to the mother about ‘that man.’

“ ‘That