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Berryhill’s mitt. “The ones buried out there on the property.”
    “Buried? The hell you talking about?”
    “There’s a small graveyard out behind the house.” Jim rolled the newspaper into a tube and looked for somewhere to pitch it. “The Corrigan clan all died there.”
    “Oh come on. That’s just an old spook tale.” Hitchens guffawed at him but Jim wasn’t smiling.
    Berryhill swatted him. “You’re an ignorant bag of rocks, Hitch.”
    Kate’s smile dropped as she looked at Jim. “Have you seen this graveyard?”
    “They’ve been hidden under brush all this time. Corrigan’s cut back all the weeds so you can see ‘em.”
    Berryhill spat onto the pavement. “So what’s this guy doing? Turning that shitty firetrap into Disneyland?”
    “God knows.”
    Kate scanned through the ad again. “Says here it starts Sunday. Anyone going?”
    “Hell yeah,” said Hitchens. “Nothing new ever happens around here. You going, Jimmy?”
    Jim tossed his paper into a bin. “I got better things to do.”
    “Our Jim’s gonna be in church,” Berryhill laughed.
    Jim ignored the oaf and walked back to his truck. Like Berryhill could talk, the man hadn’t seen the inside of a church since the day he was baptised. Even then he was trouble. Screaming blue bloody murder as Father Toohey poured holy water over his wee head, as if it burned.
    ~
    Over the next two days Jim kept an eye on his new neighbour, watching the Toyota FJ roar away and come back in. Watching Corrigan unload lumber and supplies. The overgrown weeds and timothy choking the yard were mowed down and cleared away. Corrigan dragged the framed posts out to the end of the driveway and hammered the big signboard to it. It stood fourteen feet in the air, its neatly stencilled face declaring the site of ‘ The Corrigan Horror’ .
    To Jim’s relief, the man never took them up on Emma’s invitation. No unannounced pop-in visit or borrowing of a cup of sugar. In town, the stranger was still the subject of endless speculation as to the veracity of his claims and his bogus stunt.
    Friday night, Jim caught sight of a glow beyond the treeline and walked the halfacre to the stone fence. A clearing in the elm trees gave a clean sightline to the old Corrigan property. An enormous bonfire blazed on the front yard, the flames trailing up twenty feet into the night sky. The mound of trash and debris pulled from the interior burned up, spewing foul black smoke south to the creek. A hazy silhouette shimmered before the rippling flames, tossing more debris into the fire. Corrigan, no doubt. Jim watched the man feed the fire and stoke the flames like some evil hobgoblin intent on torching everything in sight.

7
    SUNDAY. JIM OILED the chainsaw and took Travis to the eastern property line to clear away three dead trees that needed felling. Not an urgent task but he wanted to keep an eye on their neighbour and his attraction, or scam, or whatever it was. By noon they had felled all three trees and cut the trunks into logs, Jim letting his son have a go with the chainsaw. Not a single vehicle came up the road to the Corrigan property, no trail of dust disturbed the Roman Line this Sunday morning. Good. People had the good sense to stay away from the carpetbagger’s shenanigans. Emma came out to the yard and waved them in for lunch.
    Eggs and salsa, toast with the last of the elderberry preserves. It was Travis who spotted the first car on the road, spoiling the pristine sky with its dust cloud. It was followed by two pickups and a minivan. Jim went to the window, surprised to see Puddycombe’s Cherokee turning into the Corrigan lot.
    Damn.
    “Are we going?” Travis looked up, hopeful.
    “No.”
    “Oh come on,” Emma said. “Let’s see what all the fuss is about.”
    “Plain foolishness is what it is.” Jim turned away from the window, ending the matter.
    Emma cocked her hip. “Aren’t you even a little bit curious?”
    ~
    Jim counted nineteen cars, crowded ass