Bone by Bone

'I wonder if I could get a ride as far as your house?'

'Of course you can. Get in, and I'll drive you all the way home.'

'I noticed you were having a problem starting it. Could be the ignition. Want me to give it a try?'

'How gallant. An officer and a gentleman.'

'I'm not with the Army anymore.'

'So I heard, and there's nothing wrong with my ignition, but you'd never insinuate that I was drunk. Henry Hobbs did a good job of raising his boys.'

The lady stepped out and did her best to walk in a normal fashion as she rounded the BMW to the passenger side. Oren followed and leaned in to open her door. Mrs. Winston smelled of whiskey and roses. Her daughter had been wearing that same rose perfume on the day she had kicked him in the shin. Keys in hand, he slipped behind the wheel, and they were off.

They had traveled no more than a few miles when he saw a pair of high beams coming up fast in the rearview mirror. The car behind him was weaving all over the road as it gathered speed, and there was no turnout in sight. Around each blind curve was the chance of a wreck with an oncoming car, but the vehicle behind him was a sure thing-close to climbing up the BMW's back end. Oren pressed down on the accelerator and rounded a hairpin turn with only two wheels on the ground.

'Don't be scared,' he said to Mrs. Winston. But she was slow to understand what was happening. In the rearview mirror he caught sight of more headlights behind his pursuer. When he made a sharp left onto Bear Creek Road, they all followed him.

Up ahead, he saw the generous turnout carved into the shoulder. He Pulled into it, slamming on the brakes and shooting out one hand to keep Mrs. Winston from hitting the dashboard. At least twenty vehicles whizzed Past them to careen around the next curve.

'Ma'am? I don't suppose you have a cell phone.'

'No. You'd have to drive twenty miles before you found a town with a cell-phone tower.'

So much for their long conversation over a shared bottle of liquor. A caravan of drunks posed the problem of sudden death for anyone in their path tonight. He put the sports car in gear. 'We have to find a phone.'

The reporter's rental car was the last vehicle to travel up the driveway.

Dave Hardy sat in his pickup truck, counting money, five hundred dollars. He should have asked for more. An exclusive tip like this one was worth an easy thousand. One ear cocked toward his open window, he listened to the innocent racket of crickets and night birds. It made him smile to think that he'd been paid something for nothing-a better deal.

After a short stop at a gas station, the sheriff's office had been alerted to a runaway pack of drunks on wheels. And the smell of gasoline on a summer night was almost as sexy as the rose perfume.

They were under way again, Oren and Mrs. Winston, and there was not another car in sight. The road belonged to them. The convertible's top was rolled down, and the sky was banged with stars. The lady's hair was flying in long blond tangles, and the radio played vintage rock 'n roll at the top of the volume dial.

Oren smiled, and then he laughed. Life was hard.

The night was ending all too soon, and he pulled into the Winstons driveway with some regret. After parking the car in front of the lodge, Oren assured her that he did not mind walking home from here. 'I'm not that far down the road.'

'Maybe I'll drop by sometime. I haven't seen Hannah and the judge for a while. And I've always wanted to see Josh's photographs from the woods. She seemed puzzled by Oren's surprise. 'You've never seen his nature shots? I used to run into him on the trails from time to time. He always had a camera with him.'

'No, ma'am.' Oren's hands tightened around the steering wheel. So Josh had been stalking Mrs. Winston, too-a woman who had shown only kindness to his brother.

'That boy was a born mimic. I'm the one who taught him birdsongs.' She leaned toward him, surprised again. 'You didn't know? He never mentioned that?'

It would have been awkward trying to explain the language of brothers: a nod of the head to say that he had understood what remained unspoken; a hand on his brother's shoulder to ask, Hurt much? There had been a million gestures to replace a zillion words, and, best of all, they had known how to be silent together-except for that last day in the woods.

Mrs. Winston rested one hand on his shoulder. 'The grief is all new again, isn't it?… Now that you've found his grave. Your brother was the dearest boy I ever knew.' She held up her hands in a gesture of helplessness. 'I've lost the threads. What was I saying? Oh, of course. Photographs. My favorites are the pictures of my birthday balls. You stopped coming when you were how old? Twelve? Well, you must come to this one. I'm sure Isabelle's forgiven you by now.'

'No, ma'am. I don't think it's safe yet. Maybe next year.'

She laughed with high bright notes, almost music.

Was this how her daughter laughed? He was not likely to find out anytime soon. The front door flew open. Isabelle Winston had caught him in the act of conversation with her mother. She was one angry redhead, hands on hips in fair warning that a lethal weapon could be had at any moment. Oren said a hasty goodbye to Mrs. Winston. As he left the car and marched toward the road, a bullet in his back would have come as no surprise.

Near the end of the long driveway, he stopped to listen. The wind had changed, and it carried the sound of angry voices from the direction of Paulson Lane. He peered into the woods and saw fragments of bright light through the leaves.

A scream came from the lodge. He whirled around to look up at the tower. Sarah Winston stood on the deck and pointed the way for rum. Oren plunged into the woods with no thought of getting lost tonight. He was guided by the lights, the shouts and the sounds of breaking glass.

With a sidelong view of the mob and the house, he could see William Swahn moving across a lighted room, limping badly as he dodged bottles, rocks and shattering glass. The telephone by the man's front window might as well be on the moon.

Moving toward the house by way of sheltering trees and deep shadow, Oren stopped beside a cluster of large trash receptacles and ripped one lid from its rubber hinge. The driveway and turnout were jammed with vehicles. As he moved forward, the headlights blinded him. He raised his rubber shield and shaded his eyes with his free hand.

The front door opened and William Swahn hobbled outside to the confusion of his enemies. The catcalls subsided. The drunken silhouettes in the headlights stood very still-deadly quiet. Leaning against a marble pillar and squinting into the light, Swahn raised his cane, and his voice shook with anger. 'Most of your rocks hit my house instead of the windows! You morons throw like little girls!'

Break time was over.

They answered him with a fresh volley. Most of their missiles went wild. Only by sheer numbers, two struck home. A rock drew blood on Swahn's face, and a beer bottle slammed into his bad leg. He slid down the pillar to lie flat upon the marble slab.

And Oren came running.

Dave Hardy saw headlights slowing down in his rearview mirror. He had stayed too long on Paulson Lane -and the story was no longer exclusive to the reporter who had paid him. A van with a news-show logo pulled up beside his truck, and he could hear the static chatter of a police scanner.

Swahn must have called for help. Highway Patrol cars and deputies in jeeps were en route from all quarters of the county.

The van's passenger door opened, and a man's head and shoulders appeared over the roof. His camera was aimed at the pickup truck.

Dave sank down low in his seat.

I'm so screwed.

No matter what road he took, he would run into the law in oncoming traffic.

The van's driver leaned out the window and extended a microphone. 'I almost didn't recognize you out of uniform. You're a deputy, right?' Inspiration.

'Yeah, I'm the first responder.' Dave gave the man a short salute, then started his engine and put his pickup truck in gear.

Gaining the portico, Oren knelt down beside the fallen William Swahn and whispered, 'Close your eyes. Don't move.' He called out to the anonymous shapes who stood before the lights. 'He's dead! You killed him!'

Here and there, rocks and bottles thudded to the ground.

Oren understood the ugliest things about mobs. This one had just lost its reason for being. Cohesion was dissolving as some edged away from the pack, a sign that self-preservation had trumped herd instinct. But the mob might rise again as one body, one mind-in seconds. The window for action was small.

The time was now.

He picked up Swahn's cane and held it high as he walked toward the lights. 'I'm the law!' he yelled. 'And now I'm gonna start cracking heads, and every man I mark is going to jail!'

Though blinded by headlights, his eyes were wide open as he walked into the fray with the slow resolution of a tank. Swinging the cane in wide circles, he connected with flesh and bone. Beyond the bright lights, car doors were opening. One engine starting up and then another. Twin balls of light were backing away, men walking away, and some were on the run.

Squinting now, blurred sight returning, his cane hit a man's skull and felled him, and this one crawled away. Other men were frozen, some of them weaving, easy targets. One stood before him, witless. Oren made a mighty swing to bring him down. A tight group of figures were moving toward him-the resurrection of the mob, though a smaller pack, a tinier brain. He turned on them, using the trash-can lid to fend off rocks. His shield and lance were ripped away, and their hands were on him.

Above their heads was a flash of gunfire and a shotgun blast. Standing atop the cabin of a pickup truck, Dave Hardy yelled, 'Nobody move!'

And now the last of them scattered, feet running, engines revving, wheels spinning.

All gone.

Broken bottles and a trampled baseball cap, scattered rocks and a lost shoe were lit by the headlights of official vehicles, county and state. Reporters had been corralled at the other end of the driveway, where they screamed about their freedom of the press as their cameras were confiscated. And three men sat on the steps of the portico.

Dave Hardy sacrificed the last two beers in his six-pack. He handed a bottle to William Swahn and one to Oren, apologizing because it was no longer cold. 'But it'll do for medicinal purposes. You know you're bleeding, right?'

Swahn, still dazed, was slow to lift one hand to his face, touching the wound to his cheek. And now he stared at the blood on his fingers. 'I suppose it's bad form to mock people while they're chucking rocks and bottles.'

And by a nod, Oren agreed that this was so.

Dave Hardy grinned at the bleeding man. 'You did that? Well, good for you.' He turned to Oren and jingled his car keys. 'The sheriff's gonna be here any minute. I gotta go. If Cable catches me driving drunk one more time, I'm toast.'

When the deputy's pickup truck had rolled off down the driveway, Swahn lifted his beer to clink bottles with Oren.