Deep Shadow

human beings. He valued people. He admired them for their failings as well as their strengths. But Tomlinson sometimes also believed that he had perverted his own kindness into an effective trap. His affection for others had earned him many free drinks and forgiving friends, and it had won him an eager bedroom willingness from women who believed in his goodness—despite their own good sense, and their own moral obligations.

Tomlinson had many female friends. For him, women were neither a quest nor an obsession. Loving and adoring and pleasing women was more a way of life—a fact that he seldom discussed, even with Ford, and never, ever bragged about.

Tomlinson delighted in the perfumed tribe. It was his nature. He lusted for their confidences and their whispered secrets and their trust even more eagerly than he lusted after their bodies. It didn’t matter if the women were engaged or even married. He loved the ceremony of undressing a lady as much as a kid enjoyed unwrapping presents on Christmas Day. Snapping a woman’s bra free, then leaning to behold her breasts—those sacred, weighty icons of earthen femininity—ranked right up there with the very best God had to offer.

For Tomlinson, the actual sex act wasn’t as important as sharing the profound intimacy that women offered, although getting a woman into bed was one of the consistent perks, as he now had to admit to himself.

I’m a good-for-nothing dog, Tomlinson thought as he watched the teenager explore the chamber. I don’t deserve the air I’m breathing.

Convinced it was true, he began to move along the ceiling in slow pursuit of Will. As he did, he pulled open the Velcro straps of his BC and began to remove his vest and tank. He would give the boy the last of his air.

I’m not going to die wearing a damn straitjacket!

It was something Tomlinson had vowed long ago under circumstances that in fact were more stressful than being trapped underwater in a cave.

He thought, I’m dying a whole man. Free. Not stoned, unfortunately—but who could ask for more?

Tomlinson felt himself smile. In that instant, he perceived an unexpected truth. A final act of kindness was an invitation to absolution—and absolution was available in no other form.

When Will sensed Tomlinson behind him, he turned. The beam of the flashlight was flickering now. He watched Tomlinson take a long, slow breath—the man was smiling for some reason—before he removed his regulator and offered it to Will.

Will spoke through the Spare Air mouthpiece, saying, “Eeer-duho ’ippie. Auuk eet uff!”

Weirdo hippie. Knock it off!

Will refused the regulator. Instead, he took the light from Tomlinson’s hand and used it to point to something embedded in the ceiling of the cave. Tomlinson had been so lost in introspection that it took a moment to swivel his attention from death to what he was seeing only inches from his eyes.

What the hell had the kid found now?

Holding his breath, Tomlinson pressed his faceplate close to the ceiling in the failing light. Will had discovered tree roots, he realized. A network of roots. Cypress trees probably were growing overhead only a few feet above them.

Tomlinson reached for his dive slate intending to write, Use your knife!

Before he finished, though, the flashlight flickered, then went out.

FIFTEEN

PERRY FIRED THREE SHOTS AT ARLIS, EACH SLUG banging through the truck as loud as a sledgehammer, then he swung the rifle toward me. I was several strides away. It was too late for me to duck beneath the barrel, so I threw up my hands—in protest, not surrender—and yelled, “Stop shooting! Use your brain!”

My attention was on the truck as I continued running. I juked past Perry, seeing the black Dodge still accelerating as it lurched sharply, then appeared to buck when its right fender clipped a cypress tree. The impact levered the vehicle up on two wheels for an instant and stalled the engine. Arlis was attempting to restart the truck as it coasted into the swamp, losing speed, then banged to a stop.

“Get your goddamn hand off that ignition!” Perry yelled at Arlis, shucking another shell.

I tried to throw off his aim by jumping into the line of fire but too late. The truck’s rear window exploded. In the shock wave of silence that followed, birds spooked from the trees, dropping a detritus of leaves onto the Dodge, the vehicle’s sudden stillness exaggerated by wind and shadows.

I called, “Arlis? Are you okay? Arlis?”

Silence.

I began walking, then running, toward the cypress grove. I looked back at Perry, who was now pointing the gun at me. “If you killed him, the deal’s off. Understand me? You might as well shoot us both.”

King called, “Love to!,” and started after me.

I heard Perry tell him, “Stay here! Don’t go after him, you idiot!”

“But if they get that truck started—”

“Dude, stop arguing and do what I tell you!”

I was hoping Perry would lose his temper and pull the trigger. Shoot King once, end of King. Shoot King twice, end of Perry, because the Winchester held only six rounds.

Instead, I heard King say, “So you’re the boss man now, huh? Okay, boss man, just remember something. I warned you about that old fool. I told you not to let him in the truck, but you didn’t listen. See what happens when you don’t listen?”

“Shut up,” Perry hollered. He waved the rifle at King before starting after me, walking fast toward the trees.

“I’m not going to shut up, Per, because my nuts are in the wringer just like yours. Hear what I’m saying? One more time, I’m gonna warn you about Professor Jock-a-mo. He’s conning us, partner. I’m not sure how he’s doing it, but he’s setting us up. Let’s take the coins we got, grab the truck and get the hell out of here. Keep kissing his ass and we’re screwed!”

Behind me, I heard Perry say to me, not King, “Is he right? He better not be right, dude, ’cause I’ll use your own knife on you. Not a bullet.”

Perry had been carrying my Randall knife in his belt ever since I’d dropped the thing. I ignored him as I approached the truck, seeing the driver’s door open and Arlis slouched over the steering wheel.

The fourth shot had pierced the rear window, then exited through the windshield. Fragments of glass were on the old fisherman’s arms and stuck in his hair. To the west, the sun was low. It projected shafts of light beneath tree limbs and through the broken windows of the Dodge, causing the glass to glitter like jewels. There was blood everywhere.

I touched Arlis’s arm as I said his name, then my fingers moved to his neck feeling for a pulse. I was surprised. The man’s heart was still beating, his pulse fast but strong. The right side of his face had been peppered by glass—that was the source of the blood, I realized. He didn’t appear to be seriously wounded.

“Arlis, can you hear me?”

Futch’s head moved only slightly, but he opened his good eye wide, focused on me for a moment, then replied with an exaggerated wink.

He whispered, “Those assholes can’t shoot. Take the keys.”

I whispered, “Did you get hit?”

“Glass, that’s all.” He said it again. “Them dumb-asses can’t shoot.”

I squeezed his shoulder. “Quiet. They’re here.”

I turned toward Perry, who was approaching cautiously, his rifle pointed at me from the waist. “Did I get him? Is he dead?”

I said, “It looks bad, I’m not sure.” I pretended to check Arlis’s pulse again. “No . . . he’s still alive. But just barely.”

To Arlis I said loud enough for Perry to hear, “Where are you hit? I need to get you out of the truck and onto the ground. Think you can stand?”

Arlis moaned and cussed, feigning a concussion or worse.