The Devil's Punchbowl

by Greg Iles

  “This is fucked-up,” he says.

  “I can smell it. I don’t need to look.”

  “You said you needed to be able to testify about what we found, right? Well, here it is.”

  I peer through the hole long enough to see half a dozen malnourished, extremely dehydrated cats. Three or four others appear to be dead. Half-buried piles of excrement litter the dirt floor. My horror deepens when I realize that some of the cats are wearing collars. Mercifully, Kelly shines his light into the corner of the shed away from the animals, onto some short metal bars leaning in the corner.

  “What are those?” I ask.

  “Break sticks. Bars to pry a bulldog’s jaws loose from something.”

  Kelly takes out his camera and begins videotaping the contents of the shed.

  “We’ve got to let them go,” I say.

  Kelly makes a humming sound I can’t interpret, but it sounds negative. “We don’t want anybody to know we were here. I’m going to put that board back in place.”

  I look back at him for a few seconds, then kneel and yank one end of the bottom-most board away from the wall. While Kelly stares with a curious look on his face, two cats shoot through the opening and race away into the darkness.

  “Put the other board back up,” I tell him. “They don’t know how many cats were in here.”

  “There go the rest,” says Kelly, pointing at several dark shapes escaping cautiously through the opening. The last cat through seems barely able to keep its feet.

  “Okay, Gandhi,” says Kelly, hammering the top board back on with his hand. “Let’s put it back like we found it.”

  As I wedge the bottom board back into place, a chilling sound reaches my ears. It’s a low, haunting howl, coming from somewhere deeper in the trees. It sounds like the crying of a soul that’s wandered lost for a thousand years.

  “I know I don’t want to see that,” I whisper. “Whatever it is. Let’s get the fuck out of here.”

  “Wait,” says Kelly. “Danny’s talking to me.”

  I’d forgotten that Kelly’s still wearing his earpiece.

  “The VIP boat’s getting close to where we are,” he says.

  “What do we do?”

  “Let’s check out that noise, and by then we’ll know if they’re going to put in here or not.”

  With a silent groan I follow him toward the wavering howl.

  “We’re on a path,” he says, shining the red beam along a sandy track worn through the grass. “I bet this ends where they fight the dogs.”

  Thirty yards farther on, the path terminates in a small clearing. In the middle of the clearing lies a shallow pit dug in the earth. It’s about eight feet square, and eighteen inches deep.

  “That’s where they do it,” says Kelly. “One place, anyway. In Afghanistan they fight them right in the street, but most places use a pit.”

  Staring into the hole, I try to imagine two heavy-muscled pit bulls exploding out of the corners and smashing into each other, dueling for a death grip. But even standing in this spot, it’s difficult to believe that happens here. The howl comes again—lower in pitch, but much closer now.

  “Over there,” Kelly says, pointing the beam toward the trees.

  He trots across the ground, and I reluctantly follow. The first thing I see when I reach the trees is some sort of block and tackle hanging from a branch, the kind deer hunters use to gut animals. But as I try to look closer, the red light vanishes. Kelly has knelt to examine something at the base of the tree.

  “Easy now,” he says, as though talking to a child. “Just take it easy. We’re not going to hurt you.”

  Dread flows into me like an icy tide, but after a deep breath, I force myself to take a step to my right. Four feet in front of Kelly, at the base of a cottonwood tree, a pit bull terrier lies shivering on its belly. It’s a brindle, I think, but so much of its coat is covered with dried blood that it’s hard to be sure. The howling has stopped. Now all I hear is panting, accompanied by a strange whistling sound.

  “What’s wrong with it?” I ask, wondering why the dog hasn’t bolted in terror. “Can’t it move?”

  “I don’t think so,” says Kelly. “I think her back is broken.”

  “How do you know it’s a her?”

  “No balls. Just checked.”

  “Can a dog break its back in a dogfight?”

  “No way. Easy, girl, easy,” Kelly murmurs, sweeping his beam around the tree. The light stops at the trunk of the next tree. “That’s what did it.”

  Leaning against the next tree, a blue aluminum softball bat gleams dully in the red light. Like the dog, it’s covered with dried blood. Beside the bat, three car batteries stand on a small square of plywood. Kelly shakes his head and aims the beam back at the wounded dog. The terrier’s eyes look plaintive, almost human, but shock and exposure have obviously taken their toll. Both forelegs have deep, suppurating gashes at the shoulder.

  Kelly edges forward, but I grab his arm. “That dog can still take your hand off.”

  “Don’t worry, I know what I’m doing.”

  As he moves closer to the dog, I ask, “What’s that whistling sound?”

  He leans over the animal, training the beam on the top of its skull. Even with its back broken, the dog instinctively jerks its head away from Kelly’s arm.

  “Christ,” Kelly says in a stunned voice. “They cracked her skull with the bat. When she breathes, the air goes through it. Kind of like a sucking chest wound, I guess. I can’t believe she’s still alive.”

  As I stare in horror, Kelly takes out his camera and videotapes the wounds, then painstakingly videotapes everything in the clearing. As sick as it makes me, I can’t take my eyes off the suffering animal. Her plight is beyond understanding, like that of so many human victims I encountered in Houston. The sound of running footsteps makes me jump, then Kelly is at my side.

  “What is it?” I ask. “Did the VIP boat land here?”

  “No, it passed us. Goddamn it!”

  “Maybe they are fighting dogs on the boat.”

  “No. That cruise was some kind of con—a diversion. It’s like they knew we were coming. I think we’d better get out of here.”

  He stuffs his camera into his pack and starts walking away.

  “Wait,” I call. “What about her?”

  He stops and looks back at me. “I told you. They can’t know we were here. We got nothing tonight, unless Sands himself owns the land we’re standing on. We’re going to have to do this again.”

  “We can’t leave her like this. Can’t you ”

  “What?”

  “Shoot her?”

  Kelly shakes his head. “I can’t be sure the wound wouldn’t show, and I can’t get close enough to stick the gun in her mouth.”

  “We can’t leave her like this,” I insist.

  He sighs like a soldier being forced to consider the feelings of civilians. “You want to put her out of her misery?” He shines his flashlight back on the softball bat. “There you go.”

  A wave of nausea rolls through me. “They already hit her with that,” I stammer, recoiling at the thought.

  “They weren’t trying to help her. They were having a party. If you hit the cervical spine as hard as you can, death should be instantaneous.”

  I look down at the dog, then back at Kelly.

  “You wanted to come,” he says, shining the light in my eyes. “If you want to finish it, finish it.”

  This is not like Kelly at all. Whenever we’ve worked together, he’s always been ready and willing to do whatever dirty work was required. I’ve never completely understood the dynamic between us, or what motivated him to go beyond what I consider the call of duty. He’s always operated by a private code, one I thought I understood. It’s as though together, we function as a complete man—a rational mind capable of enforcing its decisions with implacable force. But in the past, I realize now, Kelly’s willingness to kill has always been demonstrated while he was protecting me or my family. This situation falls outside those parameters. In fact, letting the dog die in agony is probably the safer choice, from that perspective. But I can see that Kelly
feels for the animal. Is he testing me? Is the iron fist performing a gut check on the mind that wields it? Or is he trying to find out whether I’ll let my emotions override my reason? Knowing there’s no sure answer to any of these questions, I walk to the tree and lift the bat, certain that the last person who did so was the one who battered the helpless dog into what huddles at my feet now.

  “Wait,” says Kelly.

  I stand over the shivering dog, waiting to feel the bat taken from my hands.

  “Danny thinks he’s got something. Uh-huh Right How far?” He checks his watch, then says, “Shit, we can do that. We’ll come in the boats . No, no, if you drop us in close enough, they’ll hear the chopper. Stay well clear. If they leave before we get there, try to get a license plate, but don’t let them know you’re there. I’ll radio our coordinates en route . Right. Out.”

  “What’s going on?” I ask.

  “Danny saw something suspicious earlier on the FLIR, down past where the VIP boat turned around. He went back and checked it out. It’s a big metal building, and it’s throwing off heat. There’s a couple of SUVs out front with men sitting behind the wheel like drivers waiting for people.”

  “What do you think it is?”

  “Tonight’s dogfight. I think they tried to pull a fast one on us. They knew we might be following the boat, so they handled transport a different way.”

  “Where are they?”

  “An island. About five miles downriver.”

  “Five miles?”

  “Yeah. If we dig in, we can make it in twenty or twenty-five minutes.”

  “Won’t the fight be over by then?”

  “Not necessarily. A single dogfight can go two hours or more. But we don’t have time to waste. Put the bat back, and let’s move.”

  “Damn it, Kelly, just shoot the dog. We can throw her in the river. They’ll never know.”

  “Bullshit. Dogs aren’t like cats to these people. They were punishing this dog, probably for losing a fight. They know she can’t move, and when they come back, they’ll expect to find her here, dead. Come on.”

  Kelly takes two backward steps, but he doesn’t turn away. I feel the weight of his gaze upon me. There’s a pregnant tension between us, but I won’t kill a helpless creature because a man is testing me. Stepping over the dog’s rump with my left foot, I brace my foot against a tree root, then grip the bat’s taped handle with both hands and raise it over my right shoulder. The terrier lifts her head, trying to look back at me, but before her eyes find mine I swing the bat with all my strength, aiming for the neck, where the spine meets the skull. In the adrenaline-flushed second that the bat completes its arc, instinct tells me to shut my eyes, but I keep them open, knowing that to look away could result in more torture.

  The bat doesn’t ring on impact, but it jolts my arms and rattles my spine down to my pelvis as a wet crack like a boy stomping on a sodden limb echoes through the trees. The awful whistling has stopped. The dog lies motionless. I stumble back to the other tree, lean the bat against it, then march past Kelly toward the river.

  As I wedge my knees through the cockpit of my kayak, he walks into the shallow water and looks down at me. “You did the right thing. But I think that’s enough for tonight. I should take it from here.”

  Thrusting my legs forward, I set my feet against the pedals, jerk the lanyard that flips down my rudder, and push away from the sandbar. “I’ll see you down there.”

  CHAPTER

  32

  Walt Garrity takes a sip of ice-cold Maker’s Mark and gazes around the vast gaming floor of the Magnolia Queen. Most casino boats are floating barns filled with slot machines and few table games, but the Magnolia Queen is magnificent, harkening back to the days of the floating palaces that cruised the river after the Civil War. The Queen has a three-hundred-foot salon built in the style known as steamboat Gothic, with Gothic arches, stained-glass skylights, gilt pendants, and eight massive chandeliers. There are hundreds of slot machines, yes, but there are also table games of every type.

  Walt spent the first part of the evening putting on the same kind of show he’d given on the Zephyr last night, making a spectacle of himself at the craps table and tipping everyone beyond all reason. He’s stayed with Nancy because since their scene in the RV they’ve had a certain understanding about the sexual component of their relationship that he doesn’t want to explain to a succession of prostitutes.

  She stands a few feet away, losing wads of Penn Cage’s money at the blackjack table. Nancy doesn’t seem to mind Walt’s frequent absences, so long as the flow of chips and alcohol continues uninterrupted. She probably assumes that a man of his age is making repeated trips to the restroom. In fact, Walt has conducted a casual but very thorough inspection of Golden Parachute’s floating casino. This is the second time they’ve been aboard the Queen today. They first visited it after lunch, then spent some time on both the Zephyr and the Evangeline. Walt was glad to learn that the opulence of the Magnolia Queen would justify J. B. Gilchrist’s spending most of his time in Natchez aboard her, and not the lesser boats.

  During his first visit, Walt twice saw Jonathan Sands—the first time coming down the escalator from the upper deck where Walt now knows Sands’s office is, and the second in the cashier’s cage, talking to some employees. Despite his bespoke suit, Sands moved like an alert and graceful animal padding through a herd of less sentient creatures. Most of the gamblers on the boat blunder around like shoppers in a mall, their eyes on the slot machines, the tables, or the young women that seem so plentiful. Sands’s eyes miss nothing. He actually made eye contact with Walt long enough to register that he was being watched as he descended the escalator. Even after seeing Sands only twice, Walt knows the Irishman will be a difficult man to outwit, much less capture.

  Walt has paid some attention to the women as well. Several of the younger ones are Chinese, and from their behavior he guessed they were prostitutes. Nancy confirmed this when Walt asked about them and showed more than a little jealousy when she did. Apparently this perk of the Magnolia Queen is becoming well-known to out-of-town businessmen, who don’t seem to mind that the girls speak little or no English. Walt understands the attraction. As a young soldier in 1953, he fell in love with a young Japanese girl during an extended R&R in Kobe, Japan. Most of the women he’d met in Korea were prostitutes, but Kaeko was a nurse he met by chance in a restaurant. Walt had married his high school sweetheart before shipping out, and he’d sworn to be faithful while he was overseas. Kaeko had tested his vow to the limit, not physically so much as by slowly and completely inhabiting his soul.

  The Chinese girls on the Magnolia Queen look different from Kaeko, but their resemblance is enough to trigger a feeling in Walt that shames the twinge of lust he felt when Nancy bared her bottom in the van.

  “Why do you keep running off?” Nancy asks. “You’re tired of me, aren’t you?”

  “No, I’m just taking it all in. I’ve been on a lot of boats, but I haven’t seen one like this in many a year.”

  Thus reassured, Nancy begins chattering mindlessly, but Walt suddenly becomes aware that several people are looking up over his shoulder. When he turns, he sees one of the most beautiful women he has ever encountered descending the escalator. She looks like a princess being carried down steps in a royal litter. She wears a jade green dress that lies close against her petite body, and her hair is long and straight. What strikes Walt, though, as it must have the other watchers, is the sense of self-possession radiated by the girl. Reaching behind him, he takes hold of Nancy’s cheap dress and turns her so that she can see the escalator.

  “Daddy, I’m playing,” she protests. “Hit,” she tells the dealer. “Stay.”

  “Do you know who that is?” Walt asks.

  “Who?”

  “That girl on the escalator.”

  Nancy turns and stares for a few seconds. “No, I never seen that one before. She looks like she thinks her you-know-what don’t stink, though.”

  Nancy’s harsh voice intrudes on Walt’s reverie like the squawk of a crow startling a man contemplat
ing a pristine dawn. He cannot imagine that the girl on the escalator could be for sale. If she were, the price for a night with her would have to be ten times that for a night with the Nancys so common on the boats. But Walt knows one thing: If her time is for sale, he intends to buy as much as he can afford.

  CHAPTER

  33

  As we near the island, I start to ease my kayak along the sandy shore, but Kelly pulls alongside and points. “Farther down. That brush’ll keep the boats out of sight if a patrol comes down to the main bank.”

  I nod and wait for him to lead the way. I almost vomited during our sprint downriver from the first stop. Sweat is pouring off me, but not from the eighty-strokes-per-minute pace Kelly set. Not even from the shock of killing the dog, which was an act of mercy by any measure. What has shaken me to the core is that the glimpse of hell I saw under the trees was less than five miles from the place where I grew up. My meditation on the ironies of Tim’s “heroic quest” as Kelly and I paddled down from Natchez has filled me with shame, and any doubt about our purpose tonight has vanished. Standing among the chains and hooks and infernal machines, I felt as though I’d stumbled into a death camp, one designed for animals rather than humans. The eerie whistling of the dog breathing through its skull will haunt me to my grave.

  “Penn? You with me?”

  “Right behind you.”

  Kelly turns his rudder and knifes silently toward the shore. He pulls parallel to an overgrown bank that looks a little steep for my taste—not to mention snaky—then braces his paddle and climbs out of his cockpit. As I pull in behind him and follow suit, Kelly drags his boat behind some kudzu, then unloads his pack and takes out his night-vision scope.

  “Come on,” he says, seizing the grab handle on my bow and dragging the Seda into the weeds.

  I insert the earbud Kelly gave me for my Star Trek—which I’ve discovered is on the blink—and follow Kelly up the bank. According to Danny McDavitt, no dogs or guards are on the river side of the towhead, only a couple of men by the building that he believes could be the site of tonight’s dogfight.