After Eli (28 page)

The night air washed over Tolly and he stopped and lifted his face toward the sky like a listening deer. The air swept around his neck and cooled him. He stepped from the trees into the road leading to Yale and stood quietly on the gravel edge of the pavement. He was very close to Hollings Bridge, which crossed the Naheela River off the heel of Yale Mountain. He pulled his pocket watch from the bib of his overalls and popped a match on the thick nail of his thumb. He held the match over the face of the watch. It was ten minutes after nine. He was a mile from Yale, two miles from his house. On another night, he would not have hesitated; he would have gone home. But on this night, he had to see the sheriff. He flipped the match to the pavement and watched it darken. He pulled a hard biscuit from the pocket of his denim jacket and bit into it and chewed slowly. Then he turned in the road and began to walk in a long stride toward Yale.

* * *

At the outer rim of the town, Tolly stopped and studied the street. He could see a line of cars parked in front of Pullen’s Café and he realized that it was Monday night. For a moment, standing there, he had been distracted, deceived by time. How long had he searched for Owen? Two days. Two days without a sign, except for the Irishman. There had been no cars at Pullen’s on Sunday night, for on Sunday night John Pullen did not permit drinking.

He knew why the men were there: The news of Owen’s escape had spread into the hills like a hissing flame, fanned by George English’s venomous anger. He had known early—on Sunday morning—that George would not be silent about Owen. George had needed a mob audience and he had ordered one with his careless talk. Tolly did not want to see George. George had blamed him for not finding the trail of the killer of Lester and Mary Caufield months earlier and the tension between them had grown. But Tolly knew the men of the Naheela Valley believed he would find Owen, and they were waiting for him at Pullen’s.

He did not want to risk being seen and slipped behind the hedge of trees growing along the bank of the Naheela River and approached the jail from the back. He remembered the barred back door. It would mean going in the front, in the light, and there might be men watching from Pullen’s Café. He stood at the cell window, thinking. Inside, he heard the muted voices of the sheriff and the doctor and, he thought, George. The men in Pullen’s might see him, but that couldn’t be helped. He had come to speak to the sheriff and he would. He walked quickly around the corner of the building to the front door and opened it. He stepped inside and pushed the door closed behind him. The sheriff was sitting in a chair at the rolltop desk. The doctor was in the rocker. George paced the floor angrily. They turned in unison to Tolly and stared at him.

“Tolly,” Curtis said, rising from his chair. “I didn’t expect to be seein’ you. You find him?”

Tolly shook his head. He removed his felt hat and turned it slowly in his hands. His eyes settled on George.

“You see anything?” Garnett asked eagerly. “Any sign of him?”

“Nothin’,” Tolly answered. He looked from George to Garnett. “He ain’t out there,” he added.

“What the hell does that mean?” demanded George. “What kind of stupid goddamn thing to say is that?”

Tolly’s head snapped back. His eyes narrowed on George and his lips trembled.

“He ain’t out there,” he answered deliberately, slowly. “Like I said.”

Curtis felt the anger building in Tolly. It was cold, and Curtis remembered what a man—a stranger—had once told him: There were two kinds of anger; one was hot, one was cold. The one to fear was the cold. He stepped between Tolly and George.

“George,” he said, “you been ravin’ like a dog all day, and I’m tired of it. Now, you shut up or get out and I mean it. You been holdin’ a grudge against Tolly since that killin’ and it’s time you put it away.” He turned to Tolly. “Don’t pay him no attention,” he added. “He’s been up at Pullen’s.”

George’s face flushed. He glared at Curtis but did not speak. He whirled unevenly on his heel and walked to the cell and leaned against the bars.

“Now, what’d you mean, Tolly?” Curtis asked. “He ain’t out there?”

“He didn’t go south,” replied Tolly. His voice was heavy and tense.

“Then where?” Garnett said.

“North, I reckon. Goin’ north’ll be easier. Not as many houses that way.”

“How do you know he didn’t go south?” Garnett asked.

“Because I do,” Tolly answered bluntly. “The boy ain’t old enough not to leave some sign.”

Garnett leaned forward in the rocker. He shook his head thoughtfully and wiped across his mouth with his hand.

“But the Irishman told us Owen went south,” he protested. “He came back into town this morning. We walked the direction the boy ran. He said he watched Owen until he was out of sight.”

“He was out in the woods,” Tolly said.

“Who?” Garnett asked. “The Irishman?”

Tolly nodded.

“He was followin’ me,” he said.

“Well, dammit, I told him to go home,” Garnett said.

“Why was he followin’ you, Tolly?” Curtis asked.

“I don’t know. He was. He said he wadn’t, but he was. Said he was lookin’ for the boy.”

“Now, goddamnit, Tolly, maybe he was,” Garnett said. “He’s been worried about the boy, feels responsible for what happened.”

Tolly pulled the felt hat back on his head, tight over his brow.

“Maybe the boy hid out and circled back to throw us off,” he remarked. “I don’t know.”

“Then we’ll look north,” Curtis replied. “In the mornin’. You can bed down here if you want to, Tolly.”

Tolly shook away the offer. He said, “I’ll go on up the road a piece. There’s a couple of places I’ll look tonight. Maybe he ain’t far, if he was weak.” He reached for the door.

“Hey, Tolly, he ain’t no bear, is he?” George barked defiantly. “He ain’t out there thrashin’ around, plain as day. That’s it, ain’t it? And you ain’t no goddamn bloodhound, like we should’ve had before when you couldn’t find nothin’. That’s it, ain’t it? You can’t find him and you’re sayin’ he ain’t out there.”

“Shut up, George,” Curtis snapped. He stepped in front of Tolly.

“Why, hell’s bells, Tolly’s right,” George crowed. He spit out an acid laugh. “Don’t know why none of us never thought about it. Owen did just that. Turned back, struttin’ right through the middle of town, leadin’ a band. You got it, Tolly. You got it right on the head, you asshole.”

Curtis felt the rush before it began. He reached to grab Tolly, but Tolly’s left arm lashed out and shoved him stumbling across the room into the chifforobe. He saw George pushing himself from the cell bars as Tolly moved over to him in one stride, like a cloud. George’s right hand dropped instinctively for the pistol at his side, but never reached it. Tolly caught him by the wrist
and twisted it viciously and Curtis heard a bone snap like a dry stick. George screamed and fell to his knees, tucking his head into his shoulder. Tolly held to the splintered wrist and raised his right hand, with the palm opened and cupped. The hand dropped across George’s face in a splattering slap of flesh on flesh and George fell forward like a slaughtered animal. He rolled on the floor, on his back. His body convulsed once in a violent heaving and his eyes wandered dully across the ceiling of the jail. A trickle of blood oozed from his nose and left ear.

“God Almighty, Tolly,” Garnett whispered in shock. He had not moved from the rocker. The swiftness of the attack had immobilized him. It had taken no more than four seconds.

Tolly stood over George like a tree. He looked calmly at Garnett and then Curtis.

“Hope I didn’t hurt you none, Curtis,” he said matter-of-factly. “He pushed me too far.” He stepped across George and walked to the door. “I’ll meet you up at the bridge across Deepstep in the mornin’,” he added. He opened the door and stood for a moment staring at the cars parked in front of Pullen’s Café, and then he was gone.

MICHAEL LAY on his back across his bed, his legs crossed at the ankles, and counted time in a silent, monotonous ticking that clicked in his mind like a precisioned march. His eyes were closed and he rested peacefully in the silky cradle between sleep and exhilaration. It was a calm that he loved, that intoxicated him like a sweet wine. He was not like other men, he thought. Other men would be tense and fearful, praying for courage. He was at ease.

He moved his head on the feather pillow and opened his eyes and looked out the window cut into the side of the barn. He could see nothing but a single dim star, like a phosphorous spot smeared on the pane. It was late. Eleven, he imagined. The time was nearing. Soon Owen would be tapping at the window like a timid beggar. He closed his eyes again and began humming the melody of his song, and the words floated on clouds in his mind: “
I have loved you with poems… I have loved you with daisies… I have loved you with everything but love…
” He smiled at the euphoric giddiness rising in him and he could feel the blood flooding to his loins. He thought of Rachel. Soft. And fierce. And afraid. Yes, above all, afraid. And, also, helpless. He remembered her from the walk of the night before. Touching her, feeling her pull away from him with her weak protest. But she had opened her arms in wings and gathered him to her and he had felt the spasms of that gathering beating inside her. It
had happened quickly and she had suddenly been embarrassed. He had held her and kissed her lightly on the eyes and then had led her back to the house. That morning, at breakfast, she had looked at him secretly and her eyes had smiled and he knew her embarrassment was gone.

She had told him there was no money, no hidden treasures. It was all a story, she had said, one of Eli’s harmless lies. But he knew different. Yes, and she would tell him. What he was about to do would bring her closer and she would open her secrets to him as willingly as she had opened her legs. He smiled again and moved his locked hands behind his head. But what if there was no money? he thought. What if Rachel had told the truth, that it was nothing more than a boasting legend left by Eli, the mocking epitaph of a wanderer? He shrugged as if answering the question for a stranger. Would it really matter? He was content. The search—if it was a search at all—had become as intriguing as the prize.

* * *

Tolly Wakefield paused on the bridge crossing Deepstep Creek. He could take the road to the house where the Caufields had lived and died, or he could go through the woods. It was shorter by the woods, though there was a hill to climb and he was tired. Still, it was shorter by the woods, and somehow the distance, and the time to travel it, mattered to Tolly. He wanted to rest, but he could not dismiss the house from his mind. It gnawed at him, aggravated him. There was a picture in his mind of Owen at the house and he wondered why it was there and why he could not push it aside. The Caufield house was the only empty house north of Yale. No one would ever think of Owen hiding there, in the place where murder had been committed. He was a boy. Just a boy. He could not have the courage to go to the Caufield house. Yet Tolly felt it: Owen was at the house. He turned on the bridge and crossed it and he could hear the sound of his footsteps echoing against the creek banks beneath
the bridge. He could feel a chill tightening the muscles in his shoulders and neck. Owen would not go to the house by his own choice, he thought. He would never do that.

Tolly stepped quickly from the road and began his climb up the hill, measuring a straight line to the Caufield house.

Owen could not judge the time. He had watched the lights blink out in the Pettit house and had waited across the road, squatting in the darkness of a water oak at the edge of the field, until time had no meaning for him. He had stared at the rising moon and the stars that seemed to chase it like small, proud warriors, and he had tried to plot the time, but could not. Only the moon and its chasing stars seemed to move; not time, nor the earth around him, nor space. He had not slept in two days, or if he had, he could not remember it. He was numb and confused. The only thing his mind could hear was Michael’s voice, like a whisper deep in his skull. The voice was his master. It repeated his instructions like a litany, a sweet propaganda that would deliver him safely to the life of a new person in a new world. Owen had never wanted to leave, but he did not know how to stay. He did not know how to disobey the voice that was deep in his skull.

A star broke apart millions of miles away and sizzled across the universe and died in a single fiery drop beyond the hills above the Pettit house. Owen’s eyes widened and focused on the house. He stood, pulling himself up by the trunk of the oak. There was a dull pain in his neck and he rubbed it gently with both hands. He lifted the sack of provisions that Michael had hidden. He had waited long enough. He walked hesitantly out of the field and crossed the road a hundred yards from the turnoff to the house. He knew he could circle wide and be hidden by the stand of sassafras trees that grew along the house road, and he could reach the barn easily. His neck ached. The pain drove into his spine and his mind flashed to his mother
patiently massaging his back after he had fallen from a tree. He had been ten years old and she had made a lotion out of bark and had rubbed it into his muscles. Her hands had been as warm as the lotion. She had told him stories as she tended him—giddy stories that were private—and they had healed him as quickly as the lotion. His mother’s face formed in his mind and then vanished and he found himself standing at the lot fence that looped around the back of the barn from the stables. He saw the mule under the umbrella of a persimmon tree in the barn lot, and the cows rooted into the ground on their great bellies. The cows turned their heads to him like bored onlookers. He caught the fence with his left hand and crept slowly along it, bent forward, his head swiveling from the house to the barn and to the house again. He saw the window in the side of the barn. It looked odd, being there, an out-of-place remedy for the boarder inside. He slipped close to the barn, dragging his shoulder along the slatted planking. Then he was beneath the window and he rose cautiously to full height. His heart was racing, driving the blood into his temples like a storm. He tapped the window lightly with his fingers. Once. Then again. And suddenly there was a face, smiling, pressed against the pane, a round pocket of hollow shadows in the lifeless light of the weak moon. The face mouthed “Wait” and disappeared. Owen dropped to his knees, close against the barn.