“ Pretty good, huh?” Mick said, crawling out of the tent.
“ How do you plan on keeping the meat fresh?”
“ I don’t, it’s only for today. From tomorrow on I’m eating out of cans.”
“ How about water? That juice won’t keep.”
“ Come on, there’s a whole river down there,” he said, pointing. “You should know that.”
Earl watched while the kid lit a can of sterno. The boy was an experienced outdoorsman, the kind that only another who loved living out of doors and camping could appreciate. Earl pulled off his wet shoes as Mick smeared some butter on a fry pan and set it on the stove. He was taking off his socks as the boy cut the wieners in half and dropped them in the pan. The sizzling meat had him salivating in seconds. He was hungry and the boy was cooking up the best dinner possible, fried hot dogs, out-of-doors, nothing better.
After he’d eaten his fill, he lay back and closed his eyes. He faded off to a quick but restless sleep. Random thoughts turned into short dreams and faces kept flashing beneath his eyelids, Johnny Lee, Maria, Old Loomis and most of all, Jackson. Then finally he sank into a deep sleep, where his only dream was of the flowing river. The dark river. The dream turned into a nightmare when the river grew hands, clear water dripping hands, reaching for him, tugging at him, pulling him under. He screamed himself awake.
He jumped up to the setting sun, pushing himself from the ground to his feet with athletic grace. He rubbed the confusion and delirium from his eyes, blinked, squinted, then turned away from the sun and faced the river below, and it all came rushing back to him.
“ Hey, Mick,” he said, turning around.
The boy was gone. He’d moved his campsite like a true woodsman. Only a pro, like himself, would ever know a tent had been there. His socks had been laid out and were dry. Mick must have dried them over the camping stove. He sat back down and tugged them on. His shoes were still damp, but he put them on anyway. He wished the boy hadn’t gone, but maybe it was for the best. He didn’t think he could kill a child, but he would have given it some thought, because he hated the idea that someone had seen him climbing out of the river. It was lucky for the boy that he was gone.
First order of business was to get himself back to the bridge and his car. He pushed back to his feet and brushed off. He couldn’t go walking around wearing wet, bloodstained, and torn clothes. He was going to have to do something about that.
He walked to the edge of the cliff and looked down at the river, trying to get his bearings. He’d been down it so many times, but he’d never looked at it from this perspective. He tried to imagine himself down there, rushing on the raft, paddling furiously on the right, Jackson digging his oar into the water on the left. What would that bend up ahead look like if he was down there? Then he saw it, pictured it in his mind as clearly as if he was flying over the water.
Right around the bend there were a couple of houses overlooking the river. He started walking. The green river grass grew high and the trees he wound through often blocked his path and confused him, but he kept the river at his left as he pushed through the thickening woods, thinking of the money in that briefcase. It had to be in the car, but was the car safe? Could he get back before it was towed away, or worse, stolen? And then, just as his anxiety was reaching a fever pitch, the woods fell away into clear ground and he saw a neatly manicured front yard.
He studied the house. Then the one next door, looking for signs of life. He found none. Both homes faced the river. Both were built in log cabin style and Earl guessed that a man must be mighty rich to have an extra home, just for the weekends and holidays.
He crossed the front yard and made his way to a garage between the two homes. It had no windows and the door was locked. The chances were slim, but he needed to know if there was a car in there. The door was too thick to kick in and he didn’t have his weapon. He checked the lock, a dead bolt. The garage was locked good.
A bird called overhead and Earl turned, quickly spooked. He looked out toward the sound of the rushing river, then back toward the first of the two vacation homes. His mind made up, he crossed the lawn to the front porch, taking the steps two at a time. He tried the door. Locked. But not deadbolted. He thought about that. Maybe there was a car in the garage after all. Then with a swift side thrust kick, made powerful by twenty years of Shotokan Karate workouts, he blasted the lock and the door flew open.
Too easy. Inside, he went straight toward the bathroom, dropping his wet shirt as he crossed the hardwood living room floor. He kicked his shoes off in the hallway, and stepped out of his pants as he faced the tub. He reached in and turned on the water. Cold only, but that was all right, he’d had plenty of cold showers in his lifetime.
Once the dirt was off he padded to one of the bedrooms and rifled through the bureau drawers and closets. He found a pair of Levi’s a couple of sizes too big, but a thick leather belt took care of that, and a white sport shirt made him look close to presentable. He stared at his reflection in a mirror above the bureau as he buttoned up the shirt. The scabbing cut above his eye and the black and blue bruise on his chin made it look like he was the loser in a heavyweight battle, but there was nothing he could do about that, so he left the mirror.
There were several pairs of shoes in the closet, both men’s and women’s, but the men’s shoes were several sizes too small for Earl’s size twelve feet, so he put his own wet shoes back on. Then he made his way to the kitchen, scooping up his wet clothes as he went.
In the kitchen he made a beeline for the refrigerator, but stopped dead when he saw a ring of keys on a wall hook. People could be so stupid. Lock up the garage, then leave the keys in plain view. In the garage he found an almost new Jeep, gassed up and ready to go. Ten minutes later and still hungry he parked it behind his unmarked cruiser.
He wiped his prints off the wheel and the door handle before stepping out of the Jeep. He looked around. He was alone. He closed the door and hustled over to the unmarked. He looked through the open driver’s window and saw the briefcase and a surge of relief flowed through him. The money was still there. He tossed his wet and dirty clothes on the floor in the back. Then he stepped back from the car and moved to the side of the bridge, to the spot where Jackson had draped him over the rail, not so long ago, and looked down into the river.
Jackson was dead, Loomis was dead, the boy Darren and Johnny Lee Tyler were dead. He thought about Johnny Lee and he examined himself for signs of remorse and was surprised that he couldn’t find any. He’d killed for money before, but doing Johnny Lee wasn’t quite the same.
The first time it was a spaced out drug dealer that had been dealing to the kids down to the junior high. Earl had been so pissed off he put three shots into the fucker’s chest. Then Jackson had calmly gone to the car and fetched a throw down, fired it once and put it in the bastard’s hand. They split forty-five hundred dollars. There wasn’t even an investigation.
The other time was after a high speed chase. They caught up to the two out-of-staters that had robbed the Farmer’s and Merchant’s bank after their car slid out of control and crashed into a tree. One was dead, the other barely alive when they arrived on the scene. Without a word Jackson lifted the money bag from the back seat, and Earl smacked the driver on the back of his head with his pistol, hastening a certain death. Then they torched the car. They split thirteen thousand and again there wasn’t an investigation.
But Johnny Lee was different, it was hard to rationalize that. He’d known the boy all his life, and although he wasn’t a particularly good kid, he wasn’t a bad kid either. If he had it do to over he might not act so hastily, but when he saw the money he’d gone nuts. He supposed the first two killings kind of conditioned him.
He thought of the dead at the warehouse. He knew what had become of Loomis, but he wondered where the bodies of the two boys were. Did Jackson throw them in the river too? And he wondered how much trouble he was in. The boy Darren had been shot with Jackson’s gun, he’d killed Johnny Lee with Darren’s gun. He didn’t know how Loomis had died, but Jackson had probably done him with his own piece. Maybe he could walk away from all of this. Maybe all he had to do was claim that Jackson and Loomis cold cocked him and hightailed it with the cash. When their bodies were found it would look like one of them got greedy and decided he wanted all the loot for himself, they had a fight and they both lost. Not the best scenario, but not bad.
He needed to see what was what down to the junkyard and the warehouses.
It was dark when he got there. Clouds still covered the moon and the hot Texas air smelled like rain. The electric gate was closed. He parked to the right of it and got out of the car, leaving the headlights on. He whistled, but the dog didn’t answer. He wasn’t surprised. Loomis’ dogs were well trained. They would wait for him to enter, then be on him like a wraith.
Earl turned away from the gate, sniffed the air, looked at the sky, then quick stepped to the office. He tried
