Connelly did not answer.
“I want to go home, Connelly,” Hammond whimpered. His voice was terribly soft now. “I should have never come out here.” He coughed again. “I want to go home,” he said, louder. Then he shrieked, “I want to go home! I want… I want…”
His voice faded. Connelly looked below. The boy was rubbing at his wound, his eyes glazed and almost dark. “Connelly?” he whispered. “There’s… there’s…” Then the movement stopped and he lay still.
“Don’t,” said Pike.
“Don’t what?”
“Don’t go get the gun,” he said.
“What… what the hell do you mean?”
“I mean don’t go get it. It’s too dangerous. It’s not worth it.”
“I wasn’t going to, anyways.”
“They aren’t chasing us anymore. Whatever spine they had we took out of them, shot for shot.”
“Shut up,” said Connelly.
“What?”
“Just… just shut up. For once. I mean…” Connelly shook his head.
Pike turned his blank face back to the woods, waited a moment, then stood and started on the trail again. Connelly stayed for a second and then followed.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
They staggered through the bends and gullies of the mountain, fighting the dry cold. Pike tried to follow the gray man by bent leaves and broken twigs but eventually said he wasn’t sure what the hell he was looking at anymore and they limped along in silence. They walked until the sky was white with morning light.
“I’m thirsty,” said Connelly.
“I am, too.”
They sat down on the side of a steep embankment and drained their canteens. Connelly tossed his over the edge and listened to it clanking and rattling as it tumbled below. He could not see where it landed.
“You shouldn’t have done that,” said Pike.
“There isn’t going to be any water up here.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Yeah I do.”
Pike looked at his canteen and then hurled it over. They listened to it crash and stood up and dusted themselves off and started walking again.
“We should have asked those goddamn bastards for more food,” said Connelly.
Pike laughed. It was a nasty, grating sound. Connelly was not sure if he had ever heard him laugh before.
“Did I ever tell you about my friend?” Pike asked, shivering. “My friend, Jonas?”
“No.”
“He was my friend. Back in Georgia. I was a preacher and he was one of my flock.” Pike was quiet for a long time. “He was a beautiful boy. Most beautiful boy I ever saw. I-I was young then. At least… I think I was.”
Connelly took measure of the terrain and stepped over a wide ditch. Pike followed.
“He cut his throat,” said Pike. “I remember that. Cut it ear to ear, for no reason I can understand. You have to remember those things. Keeps you going.”
“I remember my daughter’s eyes,” said Connelly. “She had the most beautiful brown eyes. Eyes like… like molasses.” He stopped. “At least… I think they were brown.” He reached for his wallet but found it was gone. He could not recall when he had lost it.
“What happened to her mother?”
“She’s waiting for me.”
“Oh. I remember now.”
“She’s waiting for me. I’m going to go home. I’m going to go back home once this is done and everything’s going to be the way it was. Just the way it was.”
They heard something and stopped. It was whistling. They followed it and found Roosevelt sitting upon a stone, looking down a cliff at the fog, kicking his legs like a boy on a church pew. He heard them coming and looked and beamed at them.
“Hello, boys,” he said. “Hello. Morning. I think it’s morning.”
Connelly and Pike glanced at each other.
“Where did you go, Mr. Roosevelt?” asked Pike.
“I went here, of course. Walked right here. Just a stroll.”
“Are you sure no one told you to go and sit there?”
“No. No one told me. I just thought, well, there’s got to be a nice seat up there, I bet. I’d like to sit up there. Sit and look. So here I am.”
“I see,” said Pike. “What’s your name?”
“What?”
“Your name. What is it?”
Roosevelt faltered. “I… Something. It’s something,” he murmured. “I know I have one. I’ll remember it,” he said, and smiled again. “Don’t you worry.”
Pike nodded. “Well, stay here for a moment longer, sir. Just stay there while we talk.” He motioned to Connelly to follow. They walked a few yards away.
Pike said, “Roosevelt is not himself.”
“I know.”
“He led us to that town. When he first saw the pastor he said something. It was a code, or a message. Then the pastor looked at us and knew he had to kill us. Did you see?”
“Yeah.”
“The shiver-man did something to him in that jail. I don’t know what, but I have an idea. I think he told Roosevelt to lead us here. I think he tortured it into him. Like he wrote his orders in Rosie’s skin or on the inside of his skull.”
“I know. The pastor looked in his eyes and said, ‘There he is.’ He recognized the gray man had changed him. Somehow.”
“All right. Who’s going to do it, then?”
“I don’t want to kill him.”
“And I don’t mean to,” Pike said tonelessly. “At least, not yet. If the shiver-man told him one thing he might have told him others. We may not have his devilry but there are ways we can ask Roosevelt all the right questions and get him to answer.”
Connelly looked at Pike. Then he looked at Roosevelt, just beyond. Rosie was holding a small stone and cooing at it and telling it to wake up and give him water. Connelly watched him for a long time.
“I don’t want to do it,” he said.
“At least help me bind him.”
“Goddamn it, Pike.”
“Do you want this or not?”
Connelly took a breath. “All right, then.”
They walked back over to him. “Mr. Roosevelt!” called Pike. “Here. Let me help you.”
“Help me with what?” asked Rosie, curious.
“Help you with your hands,” he said, and he took off his belt and handed his gun to Connelly.
