that the bloody water dripping down through the ceiling was there because I'd willed it into being. I pushed the thought away and immediately replaced it with an angry surge of resentment toward my brother, sitting there on the toilet, fat, passive, judging me while it was his own panic, his own rashness and stupidity that had trapped me into my crimes.
'None of this would've happened if you hadn't killed Lou,' I said.
Jacob lifted his head, and I saw with a shock that he was crying. There were tear tracks running down his cheeks, and the sight of them filled me with regret: I shouldn't have spoken so harshly to him.
'I saved you,' he said, his voice choking a little on the words. He turned his head to the right, trying to hide his face.
'Don't do this, Jacob. Please.'
He didn't answer. His shoulders were shaking. He had one hand pressed against his eyes. The other one, the one that held his glasses, was resting on top of Sonny's boots in his lap.
'You can't fall apart now. We still have to deal with the police, the reporters--'
'I'm okay,' he said. It came out like a gasp.
'We have to be composed.'
'It's just...,' he started, but he couldn't find the words to finish. 'I shot Lou,' he said.
I stared down at him. He was making me scared. I was beginning to see how, if we weren't careful, it could all unravel on us. 'We have to get going, Jacob,' I said. 'We have to call it in.'
He inhaled deeply, held it for a moment, then put his glasses back on and struggled to his feet. His face was wet with tears, his chin shaking. I took Sonny's parka and boots from him and carried them out to the hall closet. The living room was a shambles. The coffee table was shattered, the TV imploded. Great, white, round hunks of stuffing protruded from the couch, like clouds, the way children draw them.
Jacob had forgotten his rifle in the bathroom, so I had to go get it for him. He followed me there and back like a dog. He was starting to cry again, and hearing him gave me a hollow pit in my stomach, a vertiginous sensation, as if I were falling off a building.
I opened the front door. 'Go out to the truck,' I said. 'Call the police on the CB.'
'The CB?' His voice sounded far away, like he wasn't really paying attention. I shivered. I could feel the cold air rising along the damp, sweaty skin of my back. I zipped up my jacket. Like my gloves, it smelled of gunpowder.
'It has to look like you're calling in scared,' I said. 'Like you saw me shoot him and, instead of going inside, ran back to the truck.'
Jacob was staring down at Lou's body again, his face limp.
'Don't tell them too much, just that there's been a shooting. Tell them to send an ambulance, then get off.'
He nodded but didn't move. His tears kept coming, seeping out the corners of his eyes one after the other and dropping down his face. They were dripping onto the front of his jacket, darkening the fabric.
'Jacob,' I said.
He dragged his eyes upward, glanced over at me. He wiped his cheek with the back of his hand.
'We have to be alert now. We have to remember what we're doing.'
He nodded again, took another deep breath. 'I'm okay,' he said. Then he started out the door.
I stopped him when he reached the porch. I was in the doorway, right where Lou had been standing when Jacob shot him. 'Don't forget your rifle,' I said. I held the gun toward him, and he took it. I was still out over the abyss, I realized. There was a fourth step to be taken before I could reach the other side.
As I watched him begin to pick his way down the icy walk, I brought the shotgun up against my body and pumped the last shell into its chamber.
Because he was my brother, I'd forgiven him for telling Lou about Pederson, and for lying to me about Sonny being in the car, but I couldn't forgive him for his weakness. That, I saw now, was a greater risk even than Lou's greed and stupidity. Jacob would break down when they questioned him tonight; he'd confess and turn me in. I couldn't trust him.
When he reached the end of the walk, I called his name. I was tired, exhausted with what I'd already done so far that evening, and this made it easier.
'Jacob,' I said.
He turned around. I was standing in the doorway, with Lou's gun leveled at his chest.
It took him a moment to realize what was happening.
'I'm sorry,' I said.
He tilted his head, like a giant parrot, confused.
'I didn't plan to do this, but I have to.'
His body seemed to settle somehow, to freeze and solidify. He understood finally. 'I'd never tell, Hank,' he said.
I shook my head. 'You'd fuck up, Jacob. I know it. You wouldn't be able to live with what we've done.'
'Hank,' he said, pleading now. 'I'm your brother.'
I nodded. I tightened my grip on the shotgun, raised it a little, adjusting my aim. But I didn't fire. I waited. It wasn't that I was wavering -- I knew that I couldn't go back now, that it was as good as done -- it was simply that I felt like I was forgetting something, skipping some crucial step. Something had to happen still.
Mary Beth appeared suddenly out of the darkness, making both of us jump, dog tags clinking together on his collar, his tail wagging madly. He went up to Jacob and pressed close against his legs, asking to be petted. Then he started toward me.
Jacob, when he saw me glance down at the dog, quickly raised his rifle and pulled the trigger. It made a clicking sound. The chamber was empty. There'd only been the one bullet in it, the bullet he'd loaded back on New Year's Eve, at the very beginning of all this, when we'd set off into the woods after the fox. My brother's face settled into a rueful smile. He seemed almost, but not quite, to shrug.
I fired the gun into his chest.
BEFORE calling the police, I went inside to pee. The bathroom floor was covered with water. It dripped through the ceiling now at several points, like a miniature rain shower. The plaster was stained a light brown from it.
I picked up Sonny's clothes from the porch and carried them to the bedroom. I dropped them into the water beside the bed, then retrieved the pistol, dried it off with my jacket, and returned it to its drawer.
Downstairs again, I took the leftover shells and stuck them into Lou's pocket. I laid his gun on the floor beside his shoulder. His expression hadn't changed. The puddle of blood had spread to the edge of the living room and was dripping quietly onto its shag carpet.
Sonny had left his lights on, so I had to drive over there quickly and turn them out. While I was there, I hung Nancy's robe in the trailer's bedroom closet and set her tube of lipstick on the sink in the bathroom.
As I drove back to Lou's, I looked for the dog, but he'd disappeared, scared off by the sound of the shotgun.
I called the police from Lou's driveway. I was brief on the radio, trying to sound panicked. I gave the address, said there'd been a shooting. I didn't answer the dispatcher's questions. 'My brother,' I said, forcing a sob into my voice. Then I clicked off the radio. I sounded good, I knew, convincing, and I felt a sudden infusion of confidence.
It's believable, I said to myself, it's going to work.
I took the tape recorder from my shirt pocket and played it one last time. It was eerie, sitting in the cab of the truck like that, listening to their voices go back and forth, and knowing they were dead. I stopped it before it was through, erased the whole thing, and hid the machine beneath the seat.
I waited in the truck for a while, then climbed out and went up the walk. I wanted to be by my brother when the ambulance arrived, crouching there, holding him in my arms.
I tried calling Mary Beth, but he didn't come. I stood on the walk for several minutes, shivering in the cold, listening for the sound of the dog's tags. I'd hidden my gloves with the tape recorder and was hoping that the wind would air the smell of gun smoke from my jacket.
