Burial Ground (27 page)

“Got a better idea?”

I saw her expression twist into a mask of disgust.

“How about my canteen?” I asked him. “Mind giving it back?”

He reached down and handed it toward me. As his hand came forward I drew my own back slightly, making him extend himself, and then, without warning, I reached out, grabbed his wrist, and pulled him forward. He dropped the spear and lashed out with his other hand, catching me a glancing blow to the head, but I managed to twist his arm behind him, and then we toppled forward onto the sand.

He thrashed under me but I outweighed him and kept my body against his.

“My pack,” I yelled to Pepper. “There’s a rope in it.”

She hesitated a second, then made her decision. She reached into my knapsack and came out with a length of nylon cord.

“Here,” I called and grabbed it with one hand.

“Goddamn it, let me go,” Ben shouted.

“Here,” I yelled to Pepper. “He’s too lively for me. You’ll have to tie him.”

“Are you sure?”

“Can you think of any other way to get him back to town without killing him?”

She looped the rope around one of Ben’s wrists.

“I’ll kill you,” Ben promised.

“No, you won’t,” I said. “Tie it, quick.”

She drew the loop tight and then slipped another length around the other wrist.

She pulled and all of a sudden, as if sensing the effort was no longer worth it, he gave up. I rolled off him and saw him turn his head away, and I realized he must be crying. I took the rope and made a few more loops around his arms and then dragged him to a sitting position. He buried his head in his chest.

“You’ll have to carry me,” he threatened. “I won’t walk.”

I looked over at the little boat. If we could make it upstream to the ferry landing at St. Francisville there would be people there to help.

“Have it your way,” I said. I knotted the rope and then hoisted him half-upright. “Give me a hand,” I told Pepper. “We’ll load him in the boat.”

She helped me drag him to the vessel. I pulled it up onto the sand and then wrestled him inside, to the center, and motioned for Pepper to help me push it back into the water and maneuver it around parallel to shore.

All the while he lay unmoving in the bottom and I thought I understood now what was going on: He didn’t really want to die, just to be able to tell himself he’d done all he could. Well, we’d made it possible for him to feel good about himself, but now I was feeling very old and tired.

I stepped into the stern and Pepper handed me my pack. The outboard was an old Evinrude 25 and I didn’t know how much gas it had left.

The boat rocked as Pepper got in. I pulled the cord. The engine sputtered, but on the third pull it caught and I nosed the craft out into the stream.

The first twenty minutes were uneventful. The wind whipped my face, a hot breath filled with the smell of oil and mud. The shore passed agonizingly slowly and I tried to calculate our progress: By my reckoning we hadn’t gone more than a half-mile, staying between the powerful current on the left and the snags and shoals of the shore on our right. The engine probably hadn’t been full when Ben had stolen the boat. He hadn’t used much fuel coming downstream, but there still couldn’t be much left in the tank.

I cast a leery eye at the woods and swamps on our right and saw the little trail where we’d put in a few days ago. It would be a long walk out with a captive but it was better than drifting… All of a sudden my idea of going upstream to St. Francisville didn’t seem like a very good one at all.

I looked down at Ben. He lay motionless in the center of the hull, his eyes on my face. He mouthed something but it was lost in the noise of the motor. Pepper pointed at something ahead and I saw that we were coming up on a high bluff, the first of the hills that marked the end of the floodplain. The river made a slight curve here, cutting into the side of the promontory and I felt the increased velocity as the little boat fought the current, coming almost to a halt.

Maybe, I thought, I should steer out further into the river, try to get around this current, but I discarded the idea almost as soon as I had it: If the engine quit then, we’d be at the mercy of forces we could never control. Pepper was still pointing, yelling something back at me, and I realized she was indicating something on the top of the bluff. I looked up and blinked.

Something metallic flashed in my eyes.

Ben saw it now, twisting around.

The flash gave way to an outline, a man silhouetted against the sky. He had something long and sticklike in his hand, and he was pointing it in our direction.

Ben sat up suddenly and I realized why he’d been so quiet: He’d been slipping out of his bonds and now he raised a hand, as if to shield himself, but it was too late.

The bullet hit him in the midsection and I heard him grunt at the same time I heard the explosion. He rocked back, his hands flying up, and I jerked the tiller left, to get us onto the shore.

It was too late: Ben was standing now, rocking the boat from side to side, and the next bullet hit him in the shoulder, spinning him around and causing his body to fall left, against the side of the boat.

The little craft went over, and I gulped a mouthful of muddy water. Wetness surrounded me and something under the surface struck my leg. I grabbed for the side of the hull and felt my hand grip the edge. Ben was gone now, swept away by the current, but I saw Pepper a few feet away, arms flailing in the air. I reached out, caught her hand with my free one, and pulled.

For a terrifying second our eyes met and then her hand let go and the waters took her away.

T
WENTY-FOUR

When I opened my eyes I was staring into the sun. The bottom half of my body floated, rising and falling on unseen currents. A fly buzzed near my ear, and I turned my head. There was tall grass on my left and above it, trees.

I rolled onto my side and started to cough. Water trickled out of my mouth and with it the remains of my noon meal. When I finished retching I hoisted myself onto my hands and knees and looked around.

My legs were in the water and my hands were invisible in a sea of mud. I tugged my arms loose and dragged myself forward, into the grass and out of the water.

I had no idea where I was. Someone had shot at us, that much I vaguely remembered, and then I remembered the sucking waters and the terrible feeling as Pepper’s hand jerked away from my own.

Gone. She and Ben were both gone and only I was left.

I don’t think it sunk in.

The sun was still hot but it was already low in the sky. Another hour or two and dusk would fall.

I hauled myself to my feet and stood swaying on the river’s edge, trying to orient myself. What bank was I on? The current was flowing from my right to my left. So I’d beached on the same side we’d been on when the sniper had struck.

But how far downstream was I?

I craned my head, trying to look out over the water, but I was in a slight, convex bend, so that each end was blinded by vegetation. I could be a few feet from where we’d cap-sized, or a mile. I turned and took a step forward, my brain telling me I had to find a way out, and then my legs gave way and I toppled forward, into the brush.

For a long time I looked down at the baked mud, my eyes following the cracks. I was alive, but what did it matter? I fought an overwhelming urge to close my eyes and slump forward.

Then I heard branches breaking.

Something was in the brush above.

The trouble was I didn’t have the energy to fight it.

Probably the man with the rifle. He’d find me here and then it would be over.

“Come on,” I croaked. “Get it done.”

The movement stopped, and then I heard a rushing of steps.

I raised my eyes to the forest and saw movement.

The vines parted and Pepper lurched out.

She looked like a mudhead kachina, slathered over with gray gumbo, her straw hat replaced by a nest of dried mud and leaves.

“Alan!” she cried out, and I thought she’d never looked better.

I scrambled back to my feet and lurched toward her.

“My God, I thought you were dead,” I blurted.

“Same here,” she said and grabbed my hands with both of hers. For a brief second we embraced and then drew away, mutually, as if we’d shocked each other.

She sat down then and I saw deep scratches on her arms and streaks on her face.

“I’ve been wandering along the bank,” she mumbled. “I kept telling myself there was a chance that you might have made it …”

“And you were right.”

“I wonder if there’s a chance for Ben,” she said.

I shook my head. “He took one bullet in the midsection and then another one in the arm or leg. If they didn’t kill him he must have drowned.”

“But who?”

I shook my head. “Somebody who feels threatened by our being out here.”

I thought of the silhouette atop the bluff. I couldn’t see the face or even get a good notion of the body size; all I knew was it was a man—or someone in a man’s clothes.

“There’s only one person that’s got any stake in this,” she said. “Your friend Willie Dupont.”

“Isn’t there another?” I asked.

The sound of the motor cut off her reply.

It was an outboard, coming upstream, on our side of the river. The noise grew louder and as we waited it emerged from the trees on the left, skimming against the current, thirty feet from shore. A lone figure hunched over the tiller, baseball cap shading the face.

Pepper raised an arm to wave and then, before I could say anything, dropped it. We were thinking the same thing, of course: What if it was the killer?

We watched the motorboat round the bend. Five minutes later the sound of the engine had died away.

“Well,” she said. “What do we do now?”

“You don’t have a plan?”

“Not at the moment.”

I managed a smile. “That man in the boat was going somewhere. We could toss a coin but I say let’s go up-stream.”

“And if he was the killer?”

“Then we’ll have to watch ourselves, won’t we?”

“Alan, listen, about all the trouble I’ve given you …”

“That way,” I said, pointing.

We started along the beach, trying to keep on the dried mud strip between the thick grass and the plastic goo at water’s edge. Logs barred our way, and every time I climbed over one I felt more strength drain away. We came to the end of the bend and I stopped. Ahead was a bluff, jutting out over the water. Even from this angle it was unmistakable: It was the cliff on which our attacker had stood. The river had swept us only a couple of hundred yards downstream.

I stood motionless, waiting for a figure to appear against the sky, but there was none.

“Maybe he’s gone,” Pepper whispered.

“And if he isn’t?” I looked around for a path and she pointed to a breach in the forest. There was a narrow game trail and we followed it, ducking into the protective darkness of the woods.

We had to climb to the top of the bluff, because if someone had been there, that meant there might be a road, and a road meant a way out. Unless he was still there, waiting.

Fifty steps into the woods I saw a rise to our left and motioned to her. We trudged upward, trying to ignore the thorns and vines. The bluff was a relict ridge, poking out into the floodplain from the hills at its back, with the river eating away its base. Eventually the river would claim it all, but not quite yet.

I paused, panting, and wiped the sweat off my face with an arm. What if we were wrong and there was no road above, no trail of any kind? What if our attacker had just moored a boat there and climbed up to pick us off as we passed?

I took a deep breath and flailed away at the briars, managing to edge upward another two feet. Pieces of shirt and skin came off together and then I was free. I looked back for Pepper. She was taking a slightly different route, but I could tell it was no easier. I turned back to see what was in front of me.

High grass.

I blundered into it and ten feet on halted.

There was a clear space ahead, with no trees. I forced myself the rest of the way, and thirty seconds later I stood in a clearing. To my relief, I saw a faint vehicle track leading from the direction of the hills, on the right.

It was a way out.

I waited until Pepper was beside me.

“Let’s check it out,” I said. “You wait in the woods and I’ll see if the coast is clear.”

She shook her head. “No way. I’ve come this far.”

Too tired to argue, I began to edge along the clearing, heading toward the river. Whoever had shot at us was probably gone now, but maybe we could find some shell casings as evidence.

The clearing was eerily still and the only noise was the muted wash of the river below. Even the birds were quiet, and as I scanned the yellow grass that stuck up in clumps, I had the sense of visiting a dead place.