ice chest into his hands and begged him not to hurt her baby. Hurt your baby? Huey had echoed, as though the idea had never entered his head. But what had he really meant? Had the idea of hurting Abby been so alien that he’d been shocked by the suggestion? Or was Huey just too simpleminded to do anything but repeat what was said to him?
Karen covered the mouthpiece of the phone that connected her to Abby. “I can’t answer that. He’s huge, and he’s simpleminded. Hickey says he gets angry when children run from him, something about the way he was treated growing up. And Abby just ran from him.”
“Jesus. Do you think Abby could hide from him until dawn? Or maybe walk to a road?”
“It’s the middle of nowhere, Will.”
“But you left some insulin with her, right?”
“Yes. Hang on.” She uncovered the mouthpiece of the other phone. “Abby? Do you have your ice chest with you? The one I left with Mr. Huey?”
“No. I picked it up when I first ran. But when I went back inside for the phone, I forgot it.”
“That’s all right. You’re doing great. I’m talking to Daddy.”
“Are ya’ll coming to get me?”
“Yes. We’re figuring it out right now. Where’s Mr. Huey?”
“I’m still getting the answering machine,” Will said.
“I don’t know,” said Abby. “He stopped yelling.”
A shiver ran through Karen. “Don’t make a sound, baby.” She covered the phone again. “She doesn’t have the insulin. She doesn’t know how to inject herself even if she had it.”
“I think she could do it if she had to. I just don’t know if she’d know she was in trouble in time.”
“She’s only five years old, Will. Do we have any alternatives?”
“Abby gives herself up and we trust Joe to give her back after he gets the money.”
Karen looked across the bed at Hickey’s glittering eyes, his prison tattoo, the bleeding leg. “No. We’ve got to try to save her now.”
“Let me talk to him again,” Hickey said.
Karen threw the phone across the bed.
“Doc? Let me tell you a quick story. Me and Huey are cousins. We grew up in different states, but our mamas were sisters. They both married sons of bitches, only Huey’s daddy was the leaving kind of son of a bitch, and mine was the ass-whipping kind. After Huey’s little sister died, he had to move down to Mississippi with us. He’d got in some trouble up there trying to talk to little girls after that. Hurt some of their parents. Anyhow, my old man could be okay when he wasn’t drunk-which wasn’t often. He was nice to Huey, but when he was loaded he’d lay into him over being useless. Then he’d whale on me, just for kicks.”
Karen wanted to hear Will’s responses, but she knew Abby might break down if she was put on hold again. She hoped Will was still ringing the president of CellStar.
“So, Pop takes us deer hunting one day,” Hickey said. “We didn’t let Huey carry a gun, of course, but we always took him. You couldn’t beat him for hauling dead deer out of the woods. Anyhow, I was climbing through this bobwire fence, and my gun went off. Pop was drunk, and he started yelling how he’d felt the bullet pass his cheek. He threw down his rifle and started whalin’ on me right there in the woods. I was about thirteen. Huey was twelve. He was a big boy, though. So, Pop whales on me till he runs out of wind, then he stops to rest. I try to go for my rifle on the ground, but soon as I do, he gets between me and it. Then he takes a sip from his flask and starts whalin’ on me again. Huey has this funny look on his face. Then, real slow like, he walks up behind Pop and grabs him around the arms, like he’s hugging a tree. And he just holds him there. Pop goes crazy. He’s kicking and screaming how he’s gonna kill us both when he gets loose. I pick up my rifle and point it at him. I know when he gets loose he’s gonna tear me to pieces. But I can’t shoot him too easy with Huey holding him, except point-blank in the head, which wouldn’t look right.”
Karen made sure her palm was sealing the phone Abby waited on.
“So Huey gets this scared look on his face and says, ‘I just wanted him to stop hitting you, Joey. I don’t want to hurt him none.’ I say, ‘He ain’t ever gonna stop. Not till he’s dead. You kill him, Buckethead, and we’ll be done with it. We’re blood brothers, boy, you gotta listen when I tell you something.’ So Huey thinks for a minute. Then he picks Pop up where his legs won’t touch the ground and carries him over to this big rock and lays him down and smashes his head against it till he stops wiggling. He carries the body the top of a ridge, just like I tell him to, and drops him down onto the creek rocks. Like he fell there.”
Karen closed her eyes, praying for Abby with all her being.
“Now, Huey didn’t want do that, Doc. But he did it. He won’t want to hurt your little girl, either. But if I tell him to, he will. ’Cause he can’t envision a world without cousin Joey in it. And if he thinks your little girl living means me going to Parchman, she’ll die sure as old Pop did.” Hickey winked at Karen as he spoke into the phone. “He could break Abby’s neck without even meaning to. Like dropping a china vase.”
Hickey listened to whatever Will said, then laid the phone near the middle of the bed, a confident smile on his face. Karen picked it up.
“What are we going to do?” she asked.
“While Hickey was telling his story, I called CellStar and tried to find out if Ferris is even in town. I told them it was a medical emergency. Their security department said he should be at home.”
“But you’re still getting the machine?”
“Yes, but I’m going to keep ringing it. Somebody’s bound to wake up eventually. I want to talk to Abby right now. I need to hear her voice. Can you hold the phones together?”
Karen raised the gun to Hickey’s face. “Sit on the floor by the wall.”
“Why?
“Sit!”
He backed to the wall and slid down it, keeping both hands pressed to his lacerated thigh. Karen laid the. 38 on the comforter, then inverted one of the phones and held them together.
“Punkin?” Will said, sounding like a transistor radio. “This is Daddy. Are you all right?”
Karen heard Abby sobbing. It made her want to pick up the gun and blow a hole in Hickey’s heart.
“I’m coming to get you, baby,” Will said, his voice cracking with emotion. “But what I need now is for you to stay hidden. It’s just like the Indian Princess camp-out. Just another game. It may take a little while, but Daddy’s going to be there. Do you hear me?”
“Yes.” The voice sounded tiny and alone.
“I want to ask you a question. Has there ever been a time when you really needed me and I didn’t come?”
“No.”
“That’s right. And there never will be. I swear that on the Bible.”
“You’re not supposed to swear on the Bible.”
“If it’s real important, you can. I’m coming to get you, baby. If you get scared, you just remember that. Daddy’s coming.”
“Okay.”
“I need to talk to Mom again. I love you, baby.”
“Please hurry, Daddy.”
Karen separated the phones. “Will?”
“It would be good if we could get Abby to shut off that phone for a while,” he said, “to conserve the batteries. But I don’t think she could handle it. Just keep her calm and quiet. I’m doing everything I can.”
“Hurry, Will.”
Huey Cotton paused in the rutted road leading to the cabin and looked up at the sky. His heart was full of sadness, and his eyes felt fuzzy from staring into the dark trees. Huey experienced much of the world as colors. A doctor had questioned him about it once. Like the woods. The woods had a green smell. Even at night, when you couldn’t see the green, you could smell and taste it. The clean green of the oak leaves overhead. The thick jungly green of the vines tugging at his pant legs.
Joey was two colors. Sometimes he was white like an angel, a guardian who floated at Huey’s shoulder or walked in his shadow, ready to reveal himself when needed. But there was red in Joey, too, a hard little seed filled with dark ink, and sometimes it burst and bled out into the white, covering it completely. When Joey turned red,
