Gbiralter shook his head and looked back at the porch. Louis lifted his head again, straining to hear something on the porch. Nothing, except the crack of a shotgun opening. Cole was reloading. There was a small thump, then the sound of something rolling across the wood porch.
“Cole?”
“Fuck…fuck,” Cole whispered.
“Cole, that was a shotgun shell. You dropped it.”
“I have more!”
“I don’t hear them going into that gun.”
Cole was silent but then came more shuffling and another log falling. He heard Cole curse softly.
“Cole, you’re out of shells,” Louis said. “And if you try for the door I’ll have to shoot you. I don’t want to do that.”
Louis waited. He saw Gibralter rise slowly, one hand on the bed of the truck, the other holding the revolver.
“Cole, throw the gun out,” Louis yelled. “I’ll come up there and get you.”
“No! Stay back! He’ll kill me!”
“I can protect you.”
“Like you protected my dad? You held him while he killed him!”
“I was trying to save him. You’ve got to believe me.”
“Fuck you, fuck both of you,” Cole said hoarsely, his voice dying to a whisper. “Fuck everyone.”
Louis stood up. “Cole, I’m coming up.”
With a look at Gibralter, he started slowly around the front of the truck. He knew Gibralter wouldn’t shoot him in the back with his own gun but he prayed he was right about Cole being out of shells.
“Don’t, don’t…” Cole’s words were more plea than threat.
“Cole, I’m in front of the truck,” Louis said calmly, glancing back at Gibralter. Gibralter had rounded the back of the truck. Louis leveled the shotgun at him.
“Stay there,” he said. “You’re not touching this kid.”
Gibralter stared at him. Louis braced the shotgun against his side, his finger on the trigger. With his left hand, he pulled the flashlight out of his belt and shined it up on the porch.
The beam fell across logs. Louis swung it back to Gibralter. He hadn’t moved.
Slowly, Louis sidestepped up to the hut, his eyes darting between Gibralter and the porch. He reached the step.
“Cole, I’m coming up.”
A whimper from behind the logs.
Gibralter took a step forward. Louis swung the flashlight to shine in his face.
“You lift that gun, you’re dead,” Louis said.
“There is no dishonor in death, Kincaid,” Gibralter said softly.
Louis shined the light back to the porch and it picked up a spot of blue, Cole’s denim shirt. He was crouched behind the woodpile.
“Cole?”
Louis heard a sound and swung his light back to Gibralter. His gun was moving.
Louis spun to the porch and his flashlight caught Cole’s face only for an instant, just long enough to give Gibralter a target. Louis swung the beam away.
He saw the flash of Gibralter’s gun go off. His own hand jerked back on the trigger of the shotgun and it bucked violently against his ribs.
An explosion of noise, followed by echoes that seemed to pound in his head. Then it was quiet.
Gibralter was lying on the ground, his body dark against the snow. His palm was up, the revolver inches away in the snow.
Louis stared at him, his chest heaving.
Cole moaned.
Louis swung the flashlight beam around, picking up Cole lying on the porch.
He fell to his knees next to Gibralter and pressed a finger to his throat. Nothing. He tried the wrist. Nothing. There was a large black hole in the blue nylon of the parka.
Gibralter was dead.
CHAPTER 41
Louis gathered both revolvers and the radio from Gibralter’s body and hurried up to the porch. He knelt next to Cole, propping the kid’s head on his knee.
“Where are you hit?”
“In the belly…God, it hurts. Fuck…”
Louis caught Cole under the arms and dragged him inside the hut. He spotted a cot in the corner and carefully lifted him up on it as Cole screamed in pain. In the spare light of the room’s single kerosene lantern, Louis looked down into Cole’s pale, sweaty face.
He pulled up Cole’s shirt. Blood was pouring out of the small black hole below Cole’s rib cage.
“What are you doing?” Cole asked, his eyes frantic.
“Put this on it. Keep pressure on it,” Louis said, grabbing the army blanket from the foot of the cot and handing it to Cole.
“I’m going to die,” Cole said.
“No, you’re not.’
“I’m going to die. I’m going to die.” Cole was crying.
“Cole, stop. Listen to me. We’ve got to get some help. Tell me where we are.”
“I’m bleeding! I’m going to die!”
“Cole! You’re not going to die! Now help me. Tell me where we are, damn it!”
Cole wiped his face and pointed across the room. Louis saw a scarred footlocker.
“Maps,” Cole said.
Louis went to the locker and jerked it open. He rummaged through the dirty clothes and debris, finally pulling out two maps. The first was nothing but a series of undulating circles, a topography map that he couldn’t read. He tossed it aside. The second one he unfolded was a county map that detailed every highway, road and landmark, even the old logging roads. He brought it back to Cole.
“Where are we?” he demanded, holding it up to Cole’s face.
Cole’s eyes were closed. Louis shook his shoulder. “Cole! Show me where we are!”
Cole’s eyes fluttered open and he struggled to focus. With a shaky finger he pointed to the map, leaving a bloody smudge. He fell back with a grimace.
Louis grabbed the radio and called Loon Lake. A voice came back to him, Edna’s voice, the sweet sound of Edna’s nasally voice.
“L-11? Where are you?”
“Edna, listen carefully. I need a flight-for-life chopper. And contact Chief Steele — ”
“Chief Steele? But he isn’t — ”
