The Cypress House

    They'd
been on the train for five hours before Arlen Wagner saw the first of the dead
men.

    To
that point it had been a hell of a nice ride. Hot, sure, and progressively more
humid as they passed out of Alabama and through southern Georgia and into
Florida, but nice enough all the same. There were thirty-four on board the
train who were bound for the camps in the Keys, all of them veterans with the
exception of the nineteen-year-old who rode at Arlen's side, a boy from Jersey
by the name of Paul Brickhill.

    They'd
all made a bit of conversation at the outset, exchanges of names and casual
barbs and jabs thrown around in that way men have when they are getting used to
one another, all of them figuring they'd be together for several months to
come, and then things quieted down. Some slept, a few started card games,
others just sat and watched the countryside roll by, fields going misty with
late-summer twilight and then shapeless and dark as the moon rose like a
watchful specter. Arlen, though, Arlen just listened. Wasn't anything else to
do, because Paul Brickhill had an outboard motor where his mouth belonged.

    As
the miles and minutes passed, Brickhill alternated between explaining things to
Arlen and asking him questions. Nine times out of ten, the boy answered his own
questions before Arlen could so much as part his lips with a response.
Brickhill had been a quiet kid when the two of them first met months earlier in
Alabama, and back then Arlen believed him to be shy. What he hadn't counted on
was the way the boy took to talk once he felt comfortable with someone.
Evidently, he'd grown damn comfortable with Arlen.

    As
the wheels hammered along the rails of northern Florida, Paul Brickhill was
busy telling Arlen all of the reasons this was going to be a hell of a good
hitch. Not only was there the bridge waiting to be built, but all that sunshine
and blue water and boats that cost more than most homes. They could do some
fishing, maybe catch a tarpon. Paul'd seen pictures of tarpon that were near as
long as the boats that landed them. And there were famous people in the Keys,
celebrities of every sort, and who was to say they wouldn't run into a few, and
. . .

    Around
them the men talked and laughed, some scratching out letters to loved ones back
home. Wasn't anyone waiting on a letter from Arlen, so he just settled for a
few nips on his flask and tried to find some sleep despite the cloaking warmth
and the stink of sweating men. It was too damn hot.

    Brickhill
finally fell silent, as if he'd just noticed that Arlen was sitting with his
eyes closed and had stopped responding to the conversation. Arlen let out a
sigh, grateful for the respite. Paul was a nice enough kid, but Arlen had never
been one for a lot of words where a few would do.