Arkansas Assault

“She’s my niece and she ain’t but ten years old.”

“Oh.” Fargo knew that this wasn’t going to be fun or fast. Here was an old man who loved to talk and ramble while he talked. And getting him to focus would take some work.

“Most witches don’t get good ’til they get their menses.”

“I guess I hadn’t heard that one.”

“That’s ’cause you’re like most people. You don’t want to hear it. It scares ya to think about, that there’s a whole world all around us—this invisible world—that really controls everything we do. But you’d rather not know about it because then you’d have to do somethin’ about it. You’d have to start wearin’ garlic to keep the vampires away, and keep a silver bullet to fend off the werewolves, and wear special amulets and crystals at special times of the year so the demons don’t get you.”

It crossed Fargo’s mind that sitting out here with this old fart could get downright spooky if he let it. Just the river and the wild woods on both banks and a span of sky that seemed eerily alive with glowing stars. He half expected to see some lizard-like monster come up from the water.

“I actually came here to ask you about Skeleton Key.”

“You stay away from Skeleton Key.”

“How come?”

He was dressed in a soiled captain’s hat and a ragged red shirt that had once had longer sleeves. Apparently he’d torn them off when the weather had turned hot. He had one glass eye, an earring dangling from his left lobe, and several holes where teeth had once resided. He set his squeezebox down and picked up a violently hairy gray cat and began to stroke her.

“The screams.”

“The screams?” Fargo said.

“I’ve heard ’em.”

“On Skeleton Key?”

“You bet on Skeleton Key.”

“Anybody else hear these screams?”

“You don’t take my word for it?”

“It’s always better when you have two or three other witnesses.”

“Well, for one, Queenie here heard ’em.”

“The cat?”

“You damn betcha the cat. You got somethin’ against cats?”

“No, nothing at all. It’s just that Queenie might have a hard time telling me about the screams. If you see what I mean.”

“Well, I can hear her just fine and dandy. She talks to me all the time. Don’t you, Queenie?” At which point the cat looked up and lapped his chin with a long pink tongue. Hell, maybe they did communicate with each other.

“And she wasn’t the only one who heard them screams.” He nodded down to the sad-eyed beagle lying beside him. “Pirate Jack heard ’em, too. You said you wanted two or three witnesses. Well, you’re lookin’ at ’em, son. Me, Queenie, and Pirate Jack.”

Fargo hesitated, taking in the soft aromas of weeping willows. Life on this tug boat—at least at night—could be comfortable and relaxing. As long as Cap’n Billy and his talking pets were far, far away.

“What I need to know, Cap’n Billy, is how I can get on that island.”

“Ain’t no way. Not with the dogs.”

“What dogs?”

“I ain’t actually seen ’em but I sure as hell have heard ’em. Man killers, for sure. Plus there’s the timber itself. I played there when I was a young’un. Really easy to get lost. Thickest timber I ever seen. Like one of them African jungles you read about.”

“I couldn’t get past the dogs?”

“Not them dogs. The Key’s good sized but not that good sized. Them dogs would find you right away. You’d be dead in two minutes.”

Fargo set to rolling himself a smoke. He offered Cap’n Billy the makings but Billy shook his head. “What else is on the Key? You got any idea?”

“I got no idea. Not for sure. But I got suspicions.”

“Like what?”

“Well, I was goin’ by there one morning when it was real foggy. Could barely see your own hand. If I didn’t know this part of the river so well, I’d never have chanced it. Anyway, I got a little lost and got closer to the key than I normally would. They’ve got NO TRESPASSING signs everywhere and who knows if they wouldn’t just start shootin’ at somebody who got too close to them? Now I can’t swear this because I could only see in little bits and pieces through the fog. But I’m pretty sure I saw what they was off-loadin’ that day. And this was two days before the Fourth of July a couple of years ago.”

“You didn’t say what they were off-loading.”

“Well, it looked to me like they was takin’ bodies off and puttin’ them on the key. The funny thing was, the little look I got at them, the bodies didn’t seem dead. Their arms was flailin’ around too much. They looked like they might justa been knocked out or somethin’, you know what I mean? Kinda flounderin’ around. But you’d never see a dead person flounder like that. I had a lotta experience with dead people, believe me.”

He obviously wanted Fargo to ask him about all the experiences he’d had with dead people, but Fargo knew that he might be here for hours if he let the Cap’n start slinging the shit.

“You ever think of any way you could sneak on that island, Cap’n?”

The old fart laughed. “Sure. There’s an easy way.”

“There is?”

“Get yourself captured and let them take you there.”

11

A few minutes later, Fargo was on the road to the Noah Tillman ranch. Given all the turbulence around him, Fargo realized that the deep shadows on either side of the road could hold people who wanted to get rid of him. The animals in the surrounding woods sounded lonely and desolate in the transition from day to night.

Soon enough, Fargo passed the spot on the stage road where Daisy had been buried. Her only sin had been being the missing man’s sister. No matter where you went, there were predators like the Tillman family. And no matter where you went, there were innocent victims like Daisy. The primitive law of the jungle also applied to the affairs of human beings. He was most interested in meeting Noah Tillman. He just hoped he could hold his temper in check.

As he approached the Tillman ranch twenty minutes later, he noticed that a pine tree shook slightly, even though there was no wind at all. Man with a rifle, for sure, monitoring Fargo. And if there was one, then there’d be two.

The second one appeared moments later, stepping out from behind a pile of boulders off to the side road.

Even in the dusk, which tended to soften things, the gunny looked formidable. Short, wide, and looking very comfortable with the carbine he’d pointed right at Fargo.

“Private property here, mister.”

“I was hoping to see Noah Tillman. Name’s Fargo.”

“Mr. Tillman only sees people by appointment. You got an appointment, mister?”

Fargo smiled. “Not so’s you’d notice.”

“Then head back to town.”

“Which one of you’s the better shot?”

“What the hell you talking about?”