Gone to the Forest: A Novel (17 page)

Tom indicates the road east. These men also go east. They pass and Tom and Jose lie still, flat on the ground, underneath the bush. They are followed by more and then more men. There are not that many, they are maybe two or three dozen. But they fill the road, they are grabbing hold of it as they go. No wonder—it occurs to Tom, Tom thinks to himself, they will take this country. They will take it. If thirty men can do
this then with three hundred, with three thousand, the country will be theirs.

They believe it belongs to them, or they do not care and will take it anyway, in any case it will be theirs, he can see it. Things are splintering around him, Tom can feel the foundation crack. It will never be put together again. It is not going to be restored. He gasps for breath. It is like he is growing transparent, like he himself is now becoming invisible, as in front of him the terrain is hacked to machete slices.

It is no wonder they do not see him. The Oath Takers patrol the road. Everything around them falls silent. Even the animals and the animal noises. The rebel soldiers walk with swagger and exaggerated grimness. Their limbs are loose and they pull faces and shout to fill out the silence. We are performing a duty. We are doing what needs to be done for the country. Behind them is a trail of justified blood and they are carrying, they are dragging, the trail forward.

Tom and Jose crouch in the shadow of the trees and wait for the men to go. They are not very many but they come in small clusters, it takes a long time for them to go. Even when they are gone Tom is afraid to move. After a little while, Jose swallows.

“They are gone.”

Tom nods. He no longer remembers what they have come here to do. It seems a long time ago, it seems far away. He crouches beside Jose, trembling. His legs have the cramp and he cannot move them. Jose turns to him.

“Let’s go.”

“We should wait a little longer.”

“No. Let’s go. Now.”

He steps out into the road and Tom has no choice but to follow. He scrambles after Jose.

“Where are you going?”

Jose stops.

“I am going in the opposite direction from the rebels. That is where I am going.”

He turns and continues down the road in the direction of the village. Tom scrambles to catch up. Black smoke rises up from the soil and into the air. Up ahead, the rebels have torched the shacks and houses. They have torched anything that will burn. The side of the road is lined with giant heaps of hot ash and ember. Tom and Jose walk along the ash heaps and the air is full of smoke and the smell of blood and charring.

They should go, Tom says. He wants to go, he does not understand what they are doing. His voice rising to a screech. Tom has been unfastened by panic. He only wants to go, now. But Jose is not listening. Jose is ignoring Tom. He steps from the road and begins looking through the rubble. He lifts pieces of charred wood, blackened metal and finds a body. The head has been hacked off with a machete. Jose ignores the black stump of bone and vein and carefully opens the pockets. He pulls out a gold chain. A couple of bills. He takes these and pushes the body away.

“Jose! Jose!”

There is a warmth spreading through the seat of his trousers and down to the ground. A puddle of hot piss growing
in the dirt. Tom cries and whimpers and continues to piss himself. The relief and hot warmth being a comfort while Jose moves further down the road, looking for bodies, poking through the ash. He finds things and they make their way into his pockets. He looks back at Tom.

“Come.”

Reluctantly, Tom follows him, soaked in piss, his bare feet completely wet. Jose strides ahead, having picked up a rifle. Tom does not know when Jose found the gun. Now he carries it over his shoulder like he has always carried a rifle over his shoulder. Tom can smell the acidic register of his own clothes, soaked as they are in urine. In front is more smoke and more bodies. A chicken wailing in distress.

They enter the village. An army jeep has been overturned in the middle of the road. It lies on its side like a dead animal. The glass has been shattered and the driver hangs limp from the half open door. He has been shot in the head and his mouth is wrenched open in protest and his palms are spread into the dust.

Around the jeep are dead soldiers—real Government soldiers this time. They are sprawled across the road like they have been flung there by way of explosion. Their torsos are slashed and entrails spill into the dusty road, viscera sit in the dirt. The rebels have stripped the soldiers of their jackets and boots. Their feet are coated in a layer of fine dust. They have also taken all the guns.

By the side of the road bodies hang from trees like spectators made to watch against their will, not finding the
entertainment to their liking. Their trousers are twisted around their ankles and their faces are petrified. Their mouths stuffed with their own testicles, they are slack jawed with shock and surprise. Their penises lie shriveled and scattered in the dirt beneath their feet. Tom vomits and then wipes his face with his shirt. The smell is terrible.

It is terrible and it is everywhere. There are bodies in the road and in the trees and there are children as well as women and men. Women and men as well as soldiers. The killing has been expert and senseless. Up ahead a tree is also burning. The fire spreads from branch to branch. It jumps from limb to limb. The whole thing will burn down, thinks Tom. The entire forest will be destroyed.

“Tom!”

He turns. Jose stands by the army truck, he is attempting to prize a canvas case from the collapsed trunk of the vehicle. He motions to Tom.

“Here. Help me.”

The case is enveloped in warped steel and rubber. They try to bend the metal with their bare hands. Jose steps back. He yanks an abandoned machete from a dead man’s torso. He returns to the jeep and hacks into the metal until the case is free. He snaps it open. It is full of syringes and vials and pills. He examines the labels and then tosses the case to Tom.

“What is it?”

“There is some morphine. Take it.”

Tom takes the case.

“What now?”

“We need to find horses.”

“Where?”

He shrugs. He turns and goes deeper into the village. Tom thinks about not following. He thinks about waiting here by the jeep. Soon Jose disappears and Tom is left alone. He looks—in every direction is a dead body, a rotting body, a burnt corpse. He hurries after Jose and hears a crack like loud thunder. The burning tree has fallen into the road and is blocking it. Jose looks at Tom.

“Take off your jacket and cover your face.”

“Let’s go back. Jose, let’s go back.”

“We need horses. There will be horses somewhere in the village.”

He wraps his head in his own jacket and bolts forward, the rifle cradled in his arms. He leaps over the burning rubble. Tom stares after him. He leaps and hops and jumps and then stops. Only his feet and head are visible through the smoke. He motions for Tom to follow, a movement Tom sees dimly through the smoke and debris. Tom shakes his head. Jose pulls the jacket off and turns to go. Left with no choice, Tom removes his jacket and plunges down the road.

At the other end, Jose pulls him out and thumps him on the back. One. Two. Three. Tom gulps fresh air and is better. He wipes the soot from his face and eyes and can see. Ahead on the road are more bodies, more overturned army vehicles. Jose points.

“Look. There are horses.”

And in fact there are horses. There are three, there are four,
standing by the side of the road. Jose walks forward with his hands by his side. He moves like the old man, Tom suddenly realizes. He has become exactly like him. Tom sees, in a flash of understanding, that this is also part of the new order. That Jose should take the place of the old man. Tom watches as Jose slides to the horses, he holds his palm out, they approach, he grips their manes and then they are no longer free.

The horses’ owners are more than likely dead, somewhere ahead or behind them on the road. Jose tells Tom to mount the calmest and the broadest horse. He has found some rope, he uses it to lead the other two horses, two horses in addition to the two they ride, four horses altogether, what will he do with four horses? The horses are terrified by the chaos and are reassured by being led. They are comforted by the human weight astride their backs.

Jose leads the two spare horses and also Tom and his horse and together they make their way down the road, out of the village. The horses jumping over the bodies in the road. Where are we going? Tom asks. We will circle around, says Jose, we will find our way back to the farm. You have the morphine, he says. You have the case? Yes, Tom says. I have the case. So you see, we found what we were looking for in the end. Yes, Tom says. Yes.

They are ten minutes outside the village before the smell of burning flesh and blood is gone. The rebels must have come this way, says Jose. But there is no sign of it. They pass a large farm with a gate and emblem. Jose stops.

“I know this farm.”

Tom nods.

“It belongs to the Wallaces.”

Tom nods again. There is a large stone house, visible from the gate. Jose looks up at the house. Then he quickly dismounts and ties the horses to the gate.

“What are you doing?”

“I am getting more morphine.”

“We have morphine. I have it right here.”

“That will only last a few days. The Wallaces are addicts.”

Tom does not know how Jose knows the Wallaces are addicts, how he knows this and so many other things. He watches Jose disappear down the path. He has no choice but to tie his own horse and follow him. The house windows are broken and the door is charred black. Jose kicks the door open. He enters ahead of Tom and he holds the AK-47 at the level of his waist. He could be an Oath Taker for all Tom knows. Nothing would surprise me now. Everything is surprising me now. It is one or the other, he is not sure.

The house is empty and it is silent, in a bad way. There are pieces of furniture overturned and there are bullet holes in the wall and splashes of blood on the floor, on the wall, on the overturned furniture. Jose stops and listens but the house is silent. He nods and goes to the dresser. He opens drawers, he looks for bottles and syringes. In the process he pockets things—jewels, coins, packets of bills and bonds—that the rebels have missed or not looked for at all.

Tom goes into the sitting room and finds Mrs. Wallace. Who has been slashed in the throat and torso. She sits on the
sofa secreting a stream of blood. The cushions are stained and there are splatters of blood on the walls and on the floor. Mrs. Wallace stares up at the ceiling. Her expression is one of shock and disapproval. The family hounds lie on the floor around her, shot in the head and chest, tongues draped from their open jaws.

Tom stares at Mrs. Wallace. He has not seen her since the girl first came to the farm. When all the trouble began, a long time ago. Now Mrs. Wallace sits frozen in this well-furnished room. There are pillows and throws on the chairs, not all of which are ruined by blood. There are brass lamps and paintings on the wall. A trio of flies buzzes around Mrs. Wallace’s head. One and then another lands on her open eye. Which is turning to jelly, her eyes are decaying quickly in the heat. Soon they will slide out of their sockets like liquid gel.

Slowly, Tom backs away. Then he turns and runs out of the room. He is running past the marble heads and silver cigar boxes, past the walnut credenza and the cupboards, the mahogany cupboards that line the room. He is knocking over chairs and occasional tables in his haste to get out of the room. When one of the cupboard doors swings open and a foot, a leg, the girl steps out of the furniture. Tom comes to a halt.

Of course she would have come here. Of course they would have taken her in. These are times of trouble but they are family. The girl is family. Even in her current state. Tom can understand. But it is still a shock to see the girl and her belly, climbing out of the cupboard, coughing to clear the dust
that has gathered in her throat over the hours—how many?—she has spent hidden, cramped inside the cupboard.

Tom stares at her. He opens his mouth.

“Mrs. Wallace—”

“I don’t want to look.”

He nods. Jose enters the room and looks at both of them. He does not seem surprised to see Carine. Yes—Jose has become like the old man. Who is also seldom very surprised. Briefly, Jose looks across the room at Mrs. Wallace. Then he looks at the girl.

“So you came here.”

“Yes.”

“How did you survive? Where did you hide?”

“I hid in the cupboard. I was sitting with Martha when they arrived. There wasn’t time to hide anyplace else.”

“And Mrs. Wallace?”

“She did not move quickly enough.”

“Unfortunate for her.”

The girl shrugs. Jose looks away.

“Where is Mr. Wallace?”

“They shot him outside.”

Jose nods. He is carrying a leather satchel and it is full to bursting with pills and vials and gold and silver objects. He looks at the girl.

“Where is the safe?”

She shakes her head.

“I don’t know.”

“We will need money.”

“I know.”

“Then where is the safe?”

“Her jewels are upstairs in her dressing room.”

They leave Mrs. Wallace on the sofa and follow the girl up the stairs. She stops by a window on the second floor and points out the window.

“Look. There is Robert.”

A man lies facedown in a ditch. His back is riddled with bullets. Jose looks out the window, then continues down the hall. The girl looks out the window a little longer, then quickly turns away. They reach the dressing room. Inside there are silk gowns and feathers and flowers. The faint smell of perfume. Through an open door, the bathroom is visible. The tub sits full of lukewarm water.

Jose walks to the vanity table. He sets the rifle on the gilt and glass surface. He picks up and pries open a jewel box and begins lifting out necklaces and bracelets. He pauses and looks up at the girl.

“You should wash the soot off.”

She nods and goes into the bathroom, where she sponges her face and arms and legs with the water in the bath. Jose empties two boxes full of diamonds and sapphires and pearls into his satchel. He drops in ebony hairbrushes and mother of pearl hair clips. He finds, at the bottom of the stocking drawer, a wad of bills tied with a piece of string.