by A. American
“Best we can do for him,” Sarge said. He went back to the console and turned the boat back down the river.
• • •
“Let’s go drop off the food before we start on the pump. If she really is out of food, then I want to get it to her quick,” I said as Danny climbed onto the Polaris.
“Cool. Let’s go by the house and drop mine off. I’ll ride with you.”
I nodded my head as he started the machine. I followed him down to his place and waited at the gate while he drove it up to the shop and parked it. Danny walked back out to the gate and climbed in and we headed down toward Miss Janice’s house. She had forty acres at the end of the street, which turned into her driveway. Her gate was closed and Danny got out and opened it. I drove through and he closed it behind me.
Pulling up in front of her house, I honked the horn as we got out. Danny went toward the house and I went around to the back of the truck to get the food out. I could see the old woman talking to him at the front door as I walked up with what we brought. She looked frail and sickly, but she was very warm and welcoming.
“Come in, come in,” she said as I came up, holding the door for the two of us.
We went in and the old woman was upset she didn’t have anything to offer us except hot water with a little lemon juice.
“Don’t worry about us; we’re here to bring you some stuff,” I said.
I set the bag of venison on her little kitchen table, then a cloth shopping bag with a couple pounds of lentils, five pounds of rice, a couple dozen tea bags, a Ziploc bag of sugar, some assorted cans of veggies and two cans of SPAM. When I looked up at her, she had tears in her eyes. Her thin hands were pressed together in front of her mouth and were shaking.
“You okay?” I asked.
She stepped over and reached out and wrapped her arms around me. Patting her on the back, I tried to comfort her. “It’s okay. Mark said you might need some help, so we came down. I just wish we had known earlier.”
Through her tears she thanked us, hugging Danny as well, and told us how desperate she had been. How she couldn’t bear the thought of asking anyone for anything when no one had anything to give. She didn’t know what she was going to do and had prayed to God, then there we were, and she knew it was an answer to her prayers. I told her I didn’t know about an answer to her prayers, but it would help for a while. I told her that it was very important that she not tell anyone.
She didn’t understand why I wouldn’t want anyone to know; she had heard bad things about me from some of the people in the neighborhood, but what she had been told couldn’t be right. “You can’t be as bad as they say; here you are bringing me all this.”
I told her I appreciated the vote of confidence and let her know she was in the minority for thinking that way. Looking around her place, I saw a big fireplace in the living room. It was an older-style one that had a big black iron hook on one side for suspending a pot over the fire. That answered my question about where she was going to cook.
We finally got around to asking her about the men she had seen on her property. She told us she had seen two men on the other side of the pasture. They were standing on the outside of the fence looking at her house. When I asked if they had guns, she just laughed, “Sweetheart, these old eyes can’t see that far.” She couldn’t tell how they were dressed either. When I asked if she was sure she saw people, she replied, “Unless Bigfoot is wandering around out there, they walked down the fence yonder,” and pointed across the field.
Danny told her to take care of herself and that if she needed anything to drop by his house. He then asked if she had a gun. “Hang on,” she said, and walked out of the room. She returned with a 1903 Springfield. It looked kind of comical. Before us stood this little old woman, not more than five foot two, her frail hands wrapped around the stock of a big old rifle held up at her waist. It was something out of an episode of The Beverly Hillbillies: Granny goin’ out possum huntin’.
Danny was shaking his head. “You know how to use that thing?”
The old woman smiled, opened the bolt and closed it with a slap. “You betcha.”
I couldn’t help but laugh. “You be careful with that artillery. We’re going to go and take a look at the fence.”
We finally got out of her house, after several rounds of thank-yous and good-byes. We went to the Suburban first to get our rifles, then headed out across the field. We were both laughing about the ’03, how big it looked in her hands and what we thought would happen if she pulled the trigger. Once we got to the fence, Danny went right and I went left. We were going to walk the length of it to see if we saw anything. I was almost to the north end of the fence line when Danny called out, “Over here!”
Walking back down the fence, I saw what he was looking at: on the other side of the fence were several sets of footprints. The prints went off into the bush on the other side of the fence. “I’m gonna hop over and see where they go,” Danny said.
“I’ll come with you,” I said. “We need to be careful, though.”
The tracks went down a little trail that intersected with a larger one where there were tracks from an ATV. It looked like there were two people that came in on it. Worse was that it looked like they had been there more than once. The trail went off into the Ocala National Forest; they could have come from anywhere. We talked about the possibilities for a minute, then about how long since they had been there. The tracks were not fresh; it looked as though it had been several days at least.
Danny had the idea to sweep the trail. If anyone came again the tracks would be clear, and if they came in and saw the trail swept, then they would know someone knew they had been there. We cut some scrub oaks and took a few minutes to wipe out the tracks for about twenty feet of the trail. We’d done everything we could for the moment and headed back to the truck to go and get the pump installed at Danny’s.
The pump installation didn’t take long, but if it weren’t for the huge pile of PVC parts Danny had it wouldn’t have been possible. Danny liked yard sales and always looked for those boxes or buckets full of miscellaneous parts that seem to be at every yard sale. He had piles of assorted stuff; PVC parts were just part of that inventory. Initially we were just going to connect a hose bib to the discharge side so he could fill a drum every few days, but I had another idea.
Using the wires that were already there, I spliced them into the cord of the pump. I went to his panel and moved those wires to a single pole breaker in his panel on the same phase as the inverter. Wired like this, the pressure switch for the pump would control this pump as well. When the pressure dropped, the pump would kick on and pressurize the tank, then cut off. It would function just like the in-well pump. Bobbie was positively thrilled when she realized she could use the toilets again.
Chapter 16
As Thad ran back down the trail toward the fence, he heard automatic weapons fire, then nothing, save himself crashing through the brush. His mind was racing, his heart was pounding and he was scared shitless. He gripped the old side-by-side in his right hand, and all he could think was, Let me just get there, let me just get there.
He let out a cry as black smoke started to rise into the sky. As he got closer to the fence, he caught glimpses of the flames through the trees. He didn’t know it, but he had started to cry. Reaching the fence, he could now see the nightmarish scene in full. Flames leapt from the roof of the house, and thick black smoke was pouring out the kitchen door. Thad put a palm on a fence post and vaulted the fence. Without thinking about his own safety, he ran toward the house. Smoke poured from the open front door.
He stopped there for a second looking at his worst nightmare unfolding before him. He took a quick look up the road just as a white mail Jeep turned off the road. Thad put his forearm over his mouth and ran through the front door, but it was futile. The smoke was so thick it burned his eyes. They teared up immediately to the po
int he couldn’t see. He dropped to the floor and tried to crawl in, but the thick smoke was now less than a foot from the floor. He crawled out the front door coughing and gagging. Once outside, he fell on the ground still gagging.
Finally getting a breath, he stood up, screaming for Anita and Tony, but there was no reply. Kneeling down, he stuck his arm in the front door and groped around beside it. He felt a pack and pulled it out: his. Sticking his arm back in, he felt for the others, and his heart sank when he found them and pulled them out. He sat there holding little Tony’s pack, crushing it against his chest and wailing. He was crying so hard he was convulsing. Reaching out, he pulled Anita’s pack over and cradled it in his arms. Looking into the hellfire behind the door, he again screamed for Anita, and again, there was no reply.
Thad got to his feet and remembered the SKS in the wall. Reaching around the corner, he grabbed the hook and yanked the panel off, then knelt down and felt for the rifle. Finding it and the other stuff he’d put in there, he took it all out. He chambered a round in the SKS. The fire was growing in intensity and he had to back away from the house. He carried the three packs over to the truck and dropped them in the bed. Lowering the tailgate, he sat down. All he could do was wait for the flames to die down.
Thad sat there as the fire consumed the house, its progress marked by small pops, windows falling out, the roof falling in and then the walls collapsing. Thad sat and watched, feeling completely and utterly impotent. He pushed away the thought that his wife and little boy were in the house to a deep part of his brain. He sat in the bed of the truck and cried throughout the night.
The fire burned itself out in the early morning. The thoughts of Anita and Tony were clawing to get out, but he succeeded in pushing them back in the hole in his chest. He tried to look around in the ruins of the house, but it was still hot and too dark. It would be several more hours before the sun came up, several more hours to keep those thoughts shut up.
When Thad opened his eyes, the sky was just starting to lighten. It was overcast and the layer of clouds looked like slate. He knew he needed to go into the house, but he didn’t want to. He stood there for a moment, surveying the scene before him. Rubbing his chin, he stepped up to where the door once was and looked again.
Inside the angular blackness was what one would expect to find after a house burned: the springs from the living room furniture and the beds. There was a pile of pots and pans, the cabinets having turned to vapor around them. In the center of the black was the bowl from the toilet, the tank lying in shards around it.
His eyes settled on a form in front of the springs of the sofa. A rather large charred lump with soft curves was covered with ash and charcoal. He wasn’t consciously observing it, but his eyes were fixed on it. It was the lines of pink and white that brought him around; in all the black there were cracks of pink and white under the char. Thad slowly walked through the ash and debris, stopping just short of the form. As he stepped around it and turning his head, the form slowly took on a recognizable shape.
In an almost detached manner he made out a head, then an arm. Under the arm was another head, though smaller. Though he was looking at the charred remains of his family, that wasn’t what he saw. He saw Anita lying on the floor holding Tony. That was how he would always remember them, not this: this wasn’t them. Turning away from them, he went out to the barn, which hadn’t burned, and found a shovel. Going out to where he had buried the old man, Thad started to dig.
The digging lasted into the midday. Thad dug without stopping. When the first grave was complete, he stepped out and shoved the spade into the ground to start the second. With the spade buried in the ground and his foot still on it, he paused, looking into the hole. Pulling the blade out of the ground, he stepped back into the hole and started to cut the side out, enlarging it. Widening the hole didn’t take long. With the digging complete, he stepped back out of the now-larger hole, walked over to the old pump and took a long drink.
Walking back out to the front of the house Thad reached into the bed and took out the two smaller packs. Setting them on the tailgate, he opened them and pulled out some items out of each. From Tony’s pack he took a Transformer. He held it and looked at it. After a moment, he opened his pack and stuck the toy inside. In Anita’s pack he found her hairbrush. It was an old heirloom she’d had for as long as Thad had known her. The silver was tarnished and the bristles worn, but she treasured it, and now he would. Holding it to his face, he breathed deeply, taking in her scent with his eyes closed. Letting out the breath, he stuffed the brush into his pack as well.
He took the two ponchos from their packs and went back into the scorched remains of the house. Unrolling the ponchos on a fairly flat spot, he steeled his nerves for what came next. He was standing there flexing his fingers, tense, anxious and nervous. Looking down at his hands, it suddenly struck him that he could not do this bare-handed. The thought of having their . . . of having them on his hands was too much. Thad went back out to the truck and pulled the old work gloves from his pack and returned to them. With the gloves on, he knelt to the task at hand. It was gruesome, grisly work. For the first time since the sun had risen, the tears returned to his eyes. Getting them both out and wrapped, Thad went back to the barn and returned with a wheelbarrow. They were so small he was able to move them both at the same time.
He gently placed them in the grave still wrapped up. Looking at the two bundles, it didn’t feel right. As gently as he could, Thad unwrapped them, leaving one poncho underneath them both. He placed Tony’s little form back into his mother’s arms, then covered them both with the second poncho. He stood and looked down at them, the tears running down his nose, small round spots shining on the poncho where the tears landed. Thad reached up and pulled the watch cap from his head and ran his hand over his stubble. He looked at the cap, then back at the poncho. Leaning down, he lifted the poncho and placed the cap between the two of them. That little act made a difference to him. He suddenly felt better. He had them to keep with him and now they had him, for eternity.
Thad filled the grave slowly. He worked steadily, and the grave was full too soon. He decided against a marker. If he marked the grave, then others would be able to find it, and he would prefer that no one ever know where they lay.
Realizing there was nothing more he could do, Thad looked down at the fresh dirt. The mound barely rose above the surrounding grade.
He said, “I love you, and I always will. I will see you again, and until that time I will carry you in my heart.”
With that he went back out to the front of the house and began putting his gear together. He was going to go get the Scout and all the stuff he had in the cache. He knew what he needed to do and where to start. How wasn’t important; getting it done was. He’d move the Scout closer to where he would need it. With what he had in mind, the old pickup would be useless shortly.
Thad knew the post office was on 45 in Land O’ Lakes, and that was where he was going to start looking for that son of bitch. The problem was going to be getting there. He couldn’t just drive the truck into town; that was guaranteed to get him snagged. He had to find another way to get there. At his old house he had a mountain bike. He, Anita and Tony used to go for rides together, but that was not something he could think about right now.
Parking the Scout at the burned house, he took the truck and went over to get the bike. Pulling up in front of his house, the house where he had lived for so long with his wife and son, he almost couldn’t get out of the truck. There was no way he could go inside, so he walked around the house to the barn out back. The bikes were leaned against one wall, covered in a tarp. Thad pulled the tarp off and dropped it to the ground. He stood there for a minute, looking at the three bikes leaning against the old boards of the barn. He remembered the day he had put the basket on the front of Anita’s bike, and the day he had taken the training wheels off Tony’s. He was starting to well up thinking about them, b
ut he pushed it back down, grabbed his bike and returned to the truck.
He tossed the bike into the bed of the truck and headed back to where the Scout was parked. Having seen the way the mail truck turned when it left the house, Thad knew which way it had to be going to get to the post office, if that’s where it had gone. The opposite end of Swift Mud Road dead-ended into Pump Station Road. It was a county road and was usually blocked by gates at either end, but it was the most direct route into town. They must have opened it up for their use, Thad figured. If they were using that road, that was where he was going to get him.
Thad drove past the road to the burned house and headed toward Pump Station Road and just as he had thought, the gate on that end was open. About halfway down the road was the pump station, and just before he came to it Thad turned off the paved road onto a dirt road off to the right. He drove the truck down the little dirt road until he was a pretty good distance into the swamp, then pulled off the road and concealed the truck in the swamp. He cut limbs and palm fronds to hide the truck. Once that was done, he got on the bike and headed back to where the Scout was parked.
Riding the bike was another trigger for the memories to surface; they had ridden on this very road many times before. It had been a safe place for Tony to ride, as there wasn’t any traffic on it. Again, he pushed those memories back into that deep, dark place, the pit that was getting bigger every hour. He was back at the Scout in just a little more than a half hour. Once there, he loaded the bike on the roof of the old truck and headed back to where he had hidden the pickup. He hid the Scout farther down the dirt road and on the other side. Since it was four-wheel drive, he was able to drive it farther out into the swamp before concealing it.
Thad got on the bike and headed for town. He wanted to see if the mail truck was at the post office. He took his pack and pistol with him. In the pack he had some MREs and two canteens of water.