Natchez Burning (113 page)

Tom felt his keenest guilt over his firstborn son, and all those loved ones who he knew would risk everything to save him. Walt Garrity was risking his life now, though he had a wife waiting for him at home. Melba would have stayed all night, knowing full well that she might die because of it. Tom couldn’t bear to think of what Penn and Peggy would give up to save him, and he had no intention of letting them do so. To that end, he had struck out on his own, separated himself from the lawful community of men, because he believed he had one chance to keep his family intact. The death of the state trooper had complicated matters, but one chance remained. The attempt might cost him his life, but Tom had risked his life before, and only for his country, not his family. This time, if he died, he would do so knowing he hadn’t died in vain.

But the price of freedom would be high. In order to keep his family together, he would have to make a deal with the devil, or that incarnation which had prospered in this country for the past fifty years. Tom was intimately acquainted with evil in its many forms, and in a way that Penn was not. Penn had seen some of the horrific things that humans did to one another, but almost always from the safe perspective of the government prosecutor. As young men, Tom and Walt had entered that transformative zone where the border between “moral” and “amoral” blurred into something not distinguishable by the human mind. In that existential arena, the soul could be seared and scarred or lifted into radiant ecstasy, but none who entered it emerged unchanged.

Most of the Knox family had spent decades in that zone. After leaving sanctioned combat, they hadn’t weaned themselves from the extreme emotions experienced there, but instead found ways to continue living in that realm where violence held ultimate sway. Inevitably, this involved crime, for only in life-and-death struggle could the most primitive and intense emotions be experienced. Normal men brushed up against those feelings by hunting animals or participating in dangerous sports, but men who had known combat—and thrived in it—achieved no rush from substitutes. And such men, Tom knew, were capable of any act. Even normal men and women would kill to protect their families or themselves. What, then, would monsters like the Knoxes do to preserve their freedom?

Tom had never forgotten something Leland Robb told him back in 1965, four years before he died in that plane crash. Lee had been home eating supper with his family when an FBI agent called with a medical question. The agent wanted to know whether it was possible for a human being to survive being skinned alive. He hadn’t given the reason for his inquiry, but Dr. Robb had known that it must concern the fate of one of the young black men who had recently disappeared. Strange to think that the FBI had so little forensic knowledge at that time, since now they were considered the experts. Dr. Robb had been unable to answer the agent’s question. But Tom, as an amateur historian, would have referred the agent to any detailed history of the medieval period, when flayings were quite commonplace. To think of such things in academic terms was one thing; to contemplate dealing with men who had actually performed such horrors was another. Yet Tom now found himself in exactly this position.

As if summoned by Tom’s thought, the low hum of an engine rolled down the slope to the shore of the lake. He wondered if his ears were playing tricks on him. Maybe a night fisherman had taken to the lake, and his motor was reverberating along the shore. But the sound steadied and continued, long enough for Tom to realize that a vehicle had parked in the driveway of Drew’s lake house. Logic said Walt had returned from Baton Rouge. And yet … something deeper told Tom not to walk up the hill just yet. The engine of Drew’s old pickup hadn’t sounded nearly so smooth as Walt had chugged way from the house.

As suddenly as it had appeared, the engine noise died.

Some part of Tom hoped that Drew or Melba had broken their promises and told Penn where to find him; another hoped that Lincoln had somehow run him to earth. At least then he could pose the questions he longed to ask the boy, with no one around to witness his pain upon hearing the answers. And yet, without any evidence, Tom knew that none of those people was at the top of the slope.

The men in that vehicle had come to kill him.

Tom was armed, but even as he felt the pistol in his pocket, cold against his skin, he knew he didn’t have the will to murder a stranger in order to remain free for a few more hours. What was the point? At bottom, he believed that Walt was already dead. Killed on a fool’s errand, trying to save a friend who had doomed himself.

Sure that he was living his last moments on earth, Tom did what Walt had warned him countless times not to do. He took out his cell phone and switched it on. If it connected with a tower fast enough, he might be able to call Penn and tell him he was sorry. Peggy, too, if he had time. Turning his back to the house on the hill, he cupped the glowing screen inside his coat to block the light, then watched the device strain to link with a transmission tower.

There! Two bars …

Tom was about to dial Penn’s number when a string of text messages appeared on his screen. Seventeen of them. He started to ignore them, but the most recent had been sent by Caitlin, and for some reason, he tapped on it. The message expanded to fill the tiny screen:

Tom. Whatever happened the night Viola died, you don’t have the right to sacrifice yourself, because I’m pregnant. Penn doesn’t know. I’m telling you because my child needs you in his life. It’s time for you to come home. This family can get through ANYTHING together. Caitlin Masters Cage (
your future daughter-in-law).

As Tom stared in dazed comprehension, he heard a wet compression behind him. Then another.
Footsteps. On damp grass
. He turned. Two shadowy figures were moving swiftly down the hill, toward the water.

With his heart pounding dangerously, Tom slipped the phone into his coat and shoved both hands into his trouser pockets.

Ten seconds later, they stood only a few feet away: two strangers in their thirties, their pale faces lighted by the moon. One pointed a pistol at Tom’s belly. As it glinted ominously in the moonlight, a nauseating flash of déjà vu went through him: two Chinese soldiers had confronted him exactly this way in Korea. Only it had been snowing then, and Walt had shot them both.

“Don’t shoot,” he said in a level voice. “I need to talk to your boss.”

“Just who do you think we work for?” asked the man on the left, the shorter of the two.

Tom’s life now depended on a fifty-fifty gamble. Was the answer Brody Royal? Or had Frank Knox’s son eclipsed the older man in power? After a moment’s hesitation, he said, “Forrest Knox.”

The two men looked at each other. Then the one on the right said, “You’ve got a syringe and some vials with Sonny Thornfield’s fingerprints on them. Where are they?”

“I’ll discuss that with Forrest when I see him.”

The man with the pistol shook his head. “You ain’t goin’ nowhere, Doc. This is the end of the road for you.”

Tom was sickened by the fear that surged through him. Only minutes ago he had resigned himself to death. But Caitlin’s message had resurrected the hope of something he’d given up expecting to live to see. Another grandchild. Maybe a grandson, this time. The realization that these two men meant to take that from him—to kill him on this lonely black shore—summoned a blast of adrenaline from his aging glands. Pain stabbed him beneath the left shoulder blade. He needed a nitro tablet, fast. But if he reached for one, the man holding the pistol would fire.

“That stuff isn’t here,” Tom said in a strained voice, closing his right hand around the pistol in his pocket. “Walt’s got it.”

“That Texas Ranger?”

“He’s lying,” said the taller man. “I’ll bet that junk’s right up there in the house.”

The shorter man was working up the nerve to pull the trigger—Tom could see it. The abstract thoughts that occupied his mind earlier had flown from his head like dandelion seeds. He was back in Korea, facing two captors who couldn’t understand a word he said. What he’d learned all those years ago was that speed didn’t matter that much in a gunfight. It was deliberation that counted. Deliberation and steady nerves.

Tom had already turned the gun in his pocket. For once he was grateful for the “geezer” slacks that did nothing to flatter their wearer. His vision telescoped down into a few square feet of the world: the shorter man’s eyes jumping from Tom’s face to his comrade’s, his gun trembling from the weight of the pistol and the knowledge of what he meant to do with it—

Tom fired as the taller man gave the order to execute him. The gunman staggered back and looked down at his belly, where a grapefruit-sized bloodstain was rapidly growing. As the short man tried to figure out where the bullet had come from, his partner grabbed for an ankle holster. Tom slowly pulled his pistol and aimed it at the man’s head.

“Be still, or I’ll kill you.”

When the man hesitated, Tom laid the barrel against the crown of his head. “Draw it slowly, with two fingers, then toss it into the water and stand up straight.”

After a couple of seconds’ hesitation, the man obeyed. After the splash, he rose slowly and gaped at Tom, clearly stunned by the sudden reversal of circumstances.

“Pick up your buddy and carry him up the hill,” Tom said, tensed against the pain in his shoulder and back.

“You’re not gonna shoot me?”

“I am if you don’t carry him up that hill.”

The tall man bent over and tried clumsily to lift his dead companion. While he did, Tom stuck a nitro tablet under his tongue.

“I can’t get him up,” the man almost whined. “I sure as hell can’t carry him all the way up to the truck. How ’bout I drag him?”

“Goddamn it!” Tom snapped, furious that he’d had to kill the man. “I once carried a wounded marine six hundred yards through barbed wire and shell holes. Grab him under the arms! That’s right … now get him up on his feet, like you’re hugging him from behind. Once he’s up, turn him around and heave him over your shoulders.”

Following Tom’s instructions, the thug heaved and grunted and cursed until he got the corpse over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry. Then he started trudging up the slope. Behind him, Tom powered down his cell phone and put it back in his pocket. After his heartbeat steadied, he slowly followed his would-be assassins up the hill. The pain in his shoulder burned like white phosphorous, but it reassured him of one thing as nothing else could.

He was alive.

WITH CAITLIN’S HELP,
I lay Sleepy Johnston down in the grass. Only now do I see the glitter of lights reflecting on water thirty yards away.
That’s Lake Concordia,
I think.
This is Brody’s lake house
.

“He’s alive,” Caitlin says. “We need a cell phone.”

“Don’t call no ambulance,” says Johnston. “We’re too far from the hospital. I ain’t gon’ make it. Just let me breathe this sweet air.”

Despite his request, Caitlin digs in the man’s pocket but finds only a walkie-talkie. She presses the transmission button and starts to speak, but I gently pull the radio from her hand. She stares at me with what seems like anger, but slowly her face softens into resignation. Below us, the ashy face and bloodshot eyes look up at the stars, seeing something I can’t begin to guess at.

“Don’t you want to live?” Caitlin whispers. “You can tell the world the truth about what happened all those years ago.”

Sleepy Johnston shakes his head. “That’s your job now. At least that old bastard’s gone. That’s enough for me.”

“You saved our lives, Mr. Johnston. You’re a hero.”

“No. I was Pooky’s friend … that’s all. Just one of Albert’s boys. That’s all I ever wanted to be.”

Caitlin shakes her head, then wipes her eyes and begins to sob.

“Why did you call yourself Gates Brown?” I ask, leaning over him.

The gray mouth splits into a smile. “Gates was my man when I got to Detroit … that brother won the Series in sixty-eight. Tigers recruited him right out of reform school … helped him make good, just like Albert had done.” Two long, rasping breaths stop his speech. “You tell this story, miss,” he whispers, his eyes on Caitlin. “Just like Henry would have. Tell people what that Royal done … what people
let
him do.”

“I will,” she promises.

“He ain’t the last, you know.”

“We know,” I tell him. “Take it easy, man.”

“I’m sorry,” he croaks. “It took me so long … to find the guts to come back.”

He lifts his hand as though searching for a familiar grasp. Caitlin takes hold of it and presses the hand to her breast.

“Thank you for what you did. We’ll never forget you.” Squeezing her eyes shut, she shakes her head helplessly.

Johnston, too, has closed his eyes. Caitlin leans over him, her ear against his mouth. I lay my hand on her back and rub softly.

When she rises, tears streak her face, and her mascara has bled into a bandit mask. “Jesus,” she says. “All of this out of some black kid liking a white girl?”