went to the Land Cruiser with the M-16. I checked that the keys were still inside, lowered the rear seats ready for Carrie, then climbed into the Mazda and fired it up.
The headlights bounced up and down as I bumped through the mud to Aaron. He was heavy to retrieve, but I finally got him into the back of the Mazda and wrapped him up in the sheet. As I tucked one corner over his face, I thanked him quietly.
Closing the tailgate, I left the wagon where it was, then dragged Blue and hid him amongst the tubs before walking back to the house. I turned off the livingroom lights and closed the door before kicking Blue's empty cases under the desk and storeroom shelving. Luz didn't need to see any of that: she had seen enough already today. I knew what happened to kids when they were exposed to that shit.
Finally, using a torch from the storeroom shelves to light me, I dragged the cot out into the rain and threw it into the back of the Land Cruiser. It just fitted on the opened lower half of the tailgate. Then I headed for the dead ground and the treeline.
THIRTY-SEVEN
The wipers pushed away the flood with each stroke, only for it to be instantly replaced, but not before I glimpsed the entry point in the treeline.
The Land Cruiser hit a tree stump and reared up, tilted over to the left, and came back down just as the headlights hit on the palm-leaf markers.
I left the lights and engine running, grabbed the torch from the passenger seat, ran round and dragged out the cot. With a firm grip on one of the legs as it trailed behind me, I broke through the treeline.
'Luz! Where are you? Luz! It's me, it's Nick, call to me!'
I shone the torch in a broad sweep but it only reflected back at me off the wet leaves.
'Luz! It's me, Nick.'
'Over here! We're over here! Nick, please, please, Nick!'
I turned to my right and pushed towards her, dragging the cot away from a stand of wait-a-while that wanted to hang on to it. Just a few feet more and the torch beam landed on Luz, soaking wet, kneeling by her mother's head, her hair flat and her shoulders shaking. Carrie was lying beneath her, in pain, covered in leaf litter. Seeing Luz's face in the torchlight, she raised a hand, trying to remove the hair stuck her face.
'It's OK, baby, everything's OK, we can go back to the house now.'
I dragged the cot alongside them, and inspected the job I'd done on her leg. It wasn't as good as it should have been: maybe I didn't deserve that first-aid badge after all. Thunder rumbled and cracked above the canopy.
'Where's Daddy? Is Daddy at the house?'
Luz looked at me from the other side of her mother, squinting into the torchlight, her red face wet with rain and tears.
I looked down and busied myself with the dressings, pleased that the weather, distance and canopy would have soaked up the sounds of automatic gunfire. I didn't know what the fuck to say.
'No, he went to get the police ...'
Carrie coughed and screwed up her pale face, smothering her ;M child into her chest. She looked at me quizzically over her head. I If closed my eyes, put the torchlight on to my face and shook my head.
I?
Her head fell back and she let out a low cry, her eyes shut tight.
Luz's head jumped up and down as her chest convulsed. She ;
tried to steer her mother's thoughts elsewhere, thinking it was ;
only physical pain.
'It's OK, Mom, Nick's going to get you back ;
to the house. It's OK.'
;V
I'd done as much as I could with the dressings.
'Luz, you've got r to help me get your mum on the cot, OK?' Moving the torch slightly so as not to blind her, I looked at her scared face, nodding ' slowly as rain coursed down it.
'Good. Now get behind your mum's head, and when I say, I want you to lift her from under the armpits. I'll lift her legs at the same time and we'll get her on the cot in one go. Got it?'
I shone the torch above Carrie's head as Luz got into a kneeling position behind her mother's head. Carrie was still thinking of Aaron. That pain was far greater than anything her leg was causing.
'That's right. Now put your arms under her armpits.' Carrie raised herself limply to try to help her daughter.
I jammed the torch into the mud. The beam shone up into the canopy and rain splattered on to the front of the lens. On my knees, I slid one arm under the small of her back and the other under her knees.
'OK, Luz, on my count of three are you ready?'
Thunder reverberated over the canopy.
A small but serious voice answered, 'Yes, I'm ready.'
I looked at what I could see of Carrie's face.
'You know this is going to hurt, don't you?'
She nodded, her eyes closed, taking sharp breaths.
'One, two, three up, up, up.'
Her scream filled the night. Luz was startled. Carrie had gone down harder than I'd have wanted, but at least that phase was over. As soon as she landed she started breathing quickly and deeply through gritted teeth as Luz tried to comfort her.
'It's OK, Mom, it's OK ... ssssssh.'
I pulled the torch from the mud and placed it on the cot next to Carrie's good leg so that it shone upwards, creating horror-movie shadows on their faces. The hard bits are done.'
'It's OK, Mom. Hear that? The hard bits are done.'
'Luz, grab your end, just lift it a little and I'll lift this end,
OK?'
She jumped to her feet and stood as if to attention, then bent her knees to grip the aluminium handles.
'Ready? One, two, three, up, up, up.'
The cot lifted about six inches and I immediately started crashing backwards through the vegetation in the direction Carrie's feet were pointing. More thunder rumbled, swamping Carrie's sobs. Luz still thought it was just pain.
'We'll see Daddy soon. It's OK, Mom.'
Carrie couldn't hold back and cried out into the storm.
I kept checking behind me and soon made out the lights of the Land Cruiser penetrating the foliage. Just a few paces later we were out in the open.
The rain was relentless as we lifted Carrie into the back of the vehicle, like a patient into an ambulance, her legs protruding on to the tailgate. 'You need to stay with your mum and hold on to her in case we hit a bump, OK?'
There was going to be no problem with that. Carrie pulled her child down and mourned covertly into her wet hair.
As I drove very slowly towards the rear of the house, the headlights cut through the rain and bounced back off the shiny skin and Plexiglass of the Huey. Its rotors drooped as if depressed by the weather.
Carrie was still getting soothing messages from Luz as we pulled up by the storeroom door. It took longer than I'd expected to get her inside, kicking cans out of the way, not worrying now there was no one to alert. We waddled with the cot into the brightly lit computer room. She was in a bad way, with soaked, bloodstained clothes, pruned skin, glued hair, red eyes and covered from head to toe in leaf litter.
As we lowered her to the floor near the two PCs, I looked to Luz.
'You need to go and turn the fans off.'
She looked a bit confused but did it anyway. The fans would make the moisture evaporate quicker, producing a chilling effect. Carrie was in enough clanger from shock as it was.
As soon as Luz left us, Carrie pulled me down to her, whispering at me, 'You sure he's dead, you sure? I
