We went back through the maze of hallways, and when we stepped outside of the building, he told us to get in our car, me in the driver’s seat, Lillian behind me. He climbed in beside me, his gun pointing at my head. ‘Go,’ he said.
‘Where?’
He said nothing, so I started the engine.
We drove out the company road. The sun glinted on the hood of the car, and I felt light-headed.
As we approached the security booth, Peterson set his pistol on his lap and waved at the Hispanic guard. She smiled big and waved back. I glanced at Lillian in the rearview mirror. Her eyes met mine, and she ducked below the seat. Her hand rummaged in the space under me, and, as I accelerated hard, she came up with Papa Crowe’s revolver. Peterson, realizing in a moment that he’d lost control, jerked his pistol up and pressed the barrel against my ribs. Lillian brought the revolver to an inch from his ear.
He remained steady. ‘Put it down or I shoot him,’ he said.
I looked over my shoulder, and Lillian and I locked eyes again.
She said to Peterson, ‘He’s been trying to kill himself for months. You’ll be doing him a favor.’
Peterson almost laughed. ‘And you? You want me to kill him?’
‘You know about me and Tom. If you pull the trigger and then I kill you, I’m free.’
‘Yeah, right.’ But he was losing his nerve.
‘Go ahead and do it,’ Lillian said.
Peterson’s eyes wavered between us.
Lillian shouted, ‘Shoot him!’
Peterson lowered the pistol to the center console.
I grabbed it and pointed it at him. Sweat broke on my back. I said to Lillian, ‘You overplayed that last bit.’ But she was breathing hard.
I drove another mile before finding a private road that crossed a long embankment with wetland marsh on either side. No one had driven this way for a long time, and gravel and sand crunched under the tires. When we were far from the cars and logging trucks on the main road, I pulled to the side and turned off the engine. ‘Get out,’ I said to Peterson.
He sat, defiant.
I held the pistol close to his head. ‘I have nothing to lose.’
He opened the door and got out. The hot midday air washed into the car.
‘What now?’ Lillian said.
I got out too, and she followed me.
Peterson stood at the edge of the marsh, the sun reflecting off the car and the brackish water. Dragonflies hovered and darted above the sawgrass and cattails. A blue heron stood in a shallow pool. A hawk circled off toward a stand of live oak trees. You could buy this kind of picture at weekend art markets around the Southeast, except that Peterson looked as if he was having a heart attack as Lillian and I held guns to his head.
‘How long have you worked for the Phelpses?’ I asked.
Peterson’s eyes looked down a tunnel of fear. ‘A long time.’
‘How long? Five years? Ten? Twenty? More?’
‘More than thirty.’
Lillian said, ‘Were you in Georgia with the Phelpses on the night those people got killed?’
He said nothing.
I pressed the pistol barrel against his soft skin. ‘Were you?’
‘Yes.’
‘You must have been young,’ Lillian said.
‘Twenty-three.’
‘Just a child,’ she said.
He said nothing.
She said, ‘You weren’t responsible.’
‘Go to hell,’ he said.
I asked, ‘Who told you to kill them?’
He said nothing.
‘Edward Phelps?’
‘No.’
‘Who?’
‘It wasn’t like that.’
‘What was it like?’
‘I told you to go to hell.’
‘What was it like?’ I asked again.
‘An accident. A goddamned accident.’
‘An accident? And all those people got killed? I don’t think so.’
‘You asked. I told you.’
‘You told me a lie.’
‘Go to hell.’
I looked at Lillian. She seemed to shrug with her eyes.
I said to Peterson, ‘Give me your cell phone.’
‘Are you going to kill me?’
‘Give me the phone.’
‘No.’
I held the gun to his head. ‘Don’t be an idiot.’
He reached into his pocket and gave it to me. I threw it far into the marsh. It disappeared without a splash or a sound.
I pointed down the private road, away from the direction we’d come. ‘Walk.’
He glanced nervously at me and then at Lillian, seemingly unsure whether we would shoot him in his back.
‘Go on,’ I said.
He did.
Lillian climbed into the car. I looked at Peterson’s pistol. It might be useful later. But I threw it into the marsh after the phone.
We drove back to the main road, kicking dust with our tires, the windows open to air out the smell of sweat and fear.
THIRTY-EIGHT
Lillian
None stir the second time – On whom I lay a Yellow Eye – Or an emphatic Thumb.
As night fell and the first stars shined in the sky over the highway, we drove back to the Phelps construction site. We had finished talking. More words might have broken our resolve.
The Interstate north of Jacksonville reached up through the Mid-Atlantic to the cold granite of Maine, but, on our stretch, sabal palms lined the embankments, truck drivers drove in T-shirts, and, now and then at night, headlights exposed the carcass of an armadillo or a possum on the road shoulder.
When we left the highway, and the lights of the interchange service stations dimmed behind us, we entered a quiet space. Palmettos and coontie flashed in the headlights and disappeared. Two enormous cylindrical power-plant cooling towers stood against the dark – dull red beacons flashing from their tops to warn away airplane pilots.
We passed the line of fuel storage tanks at a BP depot. We drove into the marshland. We crossed narrow bridges where, during the day, fishermen pressed against the steel railings to stay clear of cars and pickup trucks, and now we bumped on to the inclines, and the pavement slid under us before we returned to the solider road.
When we reached Little Marsh Island, the road into the construction site was chained, and we drove past to the spot where we’d left the car when we hiked to the clearing where Laura Greene set up her camp and where Peter Lisman found Sheneel’s body. We assembled our supplies in the dark – a flashlight for each of us, bottles of water in case we needed to wait, and Papa Crowe’s revolver.
‘You OK?’ Johnny asked.
‘I’m good.’
We got out of the car, and Johnny turned the revolver in his hands, sprang the cylinder, snapped it shut, and weighed the heft of the gun in his palm before sticking it into his waistband.
We walked in, our flashlights shining on the green and black plants. Frogs, insects, and night birds dropped into silence as we stepped near.
In the clearing, Laura Greene’s campsite was gone, all but the gray tent tarp, which had been ripped and thrown into the tree branches, and a bra that lay by the fire pit. Johnny kicked the charred wood. He stooped and felt the ashes for heat. ‘Nothing,’ he said.
We pushed through the branches, found the chain-link fence, and turned off our flashlights. Beyond the fence, a bright light showed in the trailer where the prostitute would sleep when she wasn’t watching the construction site for trespassers. A pickup truck and two cars stood in the shadows near the trailer. Farther along the fence, near the spot where Laura Greene had showed us the large hole, floodlights glowed in the brush and trees. An engine – from a truck or a big machine – purred, shifted gears to a low roar, and shifted back to a purr.
As we moved along the fence, the headlights on the pickup by the trailer flashed on, the engine raced, and the truck shot across the dirt and sand toward us. We froze. The truck boun
ced over the uneven ground, its lights flicking against insects in the night air. I sank toward the vegetation by the fence, but Johnny put a hand on my shoulder and held me still. For a moment, as the truck neared, the headlights shined in our eyes, but it veered and charged toward the gate to the service road. Seconds later, it went through the gate and disappeared.
A little laugh came from Johnny’s mouth.
‘Breathe,’ I said to myself.
Johnny said, ‘OK.’
A hundred feet farther along the fence, the floodlights grew bright and the machine engine loud. We slowed, lowering each footstep without making a sound. The floodlights, strung above the hole on wooden posts and running on the power of a generator that sat in the bed of a pickup, glared against the foliage and humid air. A white backhoe tilted to the side on tractor treads. In the open-sided cab, Peter Lisman held two of the four joysticks in his hands. Edward Phelps stood on one side of the hole next to Bob Peterson. On the other side, Daniel, holding a rifle, stood next to Stephen Phelps. The men watched Peter Lisman as he maneuvered the arm of the backhoe to a dump truck, lowered it, dropped its bucket into the dumping-bed, and raised it again. When the backhoe arm swung over the hole and the bucket tilted, a mix of sandy soil and broken pieces of yellowed and blackened bone fell out.
‘Christ,’ I said, too loud, but the engine on the backhoe keened as Peter Lisman raised the arm and swung it toward the dump truck.
As the bucket dipped low and scooped another load of dirt and bone, Edward Phelps reached into a shirt pocket, removed a pack of Newports, and shook out a cigarette. Stephen Phelps stood with his hands deep in his pants pockets. Daniel held his gun across his chest. Then the backhoe arm swung, the bucket tipped, and more bones tumbled into the hole.
The backhoe arm returned to the dump truck and scooped again. As it swung away, a skull fell from the bucket and bounced over the dirt. Bob Peterson picked it up, regarded it, and threw it into the hole. He turned, laughing, and said something to Edward Phelps. Phelps didn’t find the joke funny. He raised his cigarette to his lips and inhaled hard.
Johnny stepped out from our cover into the floodlight. He held the revolver in his hand. Peter Lisman was too busy swinging the backhoe toward the dump truck to notice him, but Daniel pivoted and aimed his rifle at him, and Bob Peterson stepped toward him but stopped when he saw the revolver. Stephen Phelps froze and stared. Edward Phelps let his cigarette hang in his hand a few inches from his mouth. Then Peterson yelled at Lisman to cut the engine, and, when Lisman saw Johnny, he did, and the night was silent except for the hum of the generator that powered the floodlights.
I stepped out from the cover and stood next to Johnny.
‘Oh, shit,’ Daniel said.
‘Shoot them,’ Stephen Phelps said.
Daniel pointed the rifle at Johnny. But he looked at me.
I felt nothing – no anger, no sadness, no fear, no regret.
Daniel turned his eyes to Johnny. Johnny pointed the revolver at him.
‘Shoot them!’ Stephen Phelps shouted at Daniel.
Daniel eyed me again.
Edward Phelps asked in a soft voice, ‘What now?’
Johnny said, ‘Now we’re done.’
‘What does that mean?’ Bob Peterson said angrily.
Johnny pointed the revolver at him. ‘This is over. It’s done. No more killing. No more burying.’
‘Shoot them!’ Stephen Phelps yelled.
Daniel stared at me, and in his eyes I saw none of the secrets we’d shared as children, none of the love and anger we shared as adults. But he lowered the rifle.
Stephen Phelps yelled, ‘Goddamn it!’ and tried to take the gun from him. Daniel threw a punch at his face and missed, and Stephen Phelps kneed Daniel in the ribs. The rifle fell to the ground. Daniel was bent – hurt – and Stephen Phelps leaned for the gun, but then Daniel straightened and kicked him in the face. There was a crack – maybe the jawbone, maybe the neck – and Stephen Phelps landed in the dirt and didn’t move. Daniel stared at the rifle on the ground. The other men stared at it.
Then a gunshot blasted from outside the circle.
Johnny fell backward and dropped the revolver – a patch of blood sheening on his shoulder. Cecilia Phelps stood by the open door of the pickup truck with the generator. She wore a white cotton dress. A white headscarf covered the burns on her forehead. She held a black pistol.
She shuffled toward us as if uncertain that the ground would hold her, aiming the pistol at me. She glanced around the circle of men, but she went to her son where he lay face down in the dirt. She prodded him with her toes. He made a sound, tried to push himself on to his hands and knees, thought better of it, and lay down. When she saw that her son was alive, she said to Daniel, ‘You’re very fortunate.’ She turned to me with a gentle smile. ‘I’ll protect myself and my family.’
She went to Johnny and stared down at him. Blood leaked from his shoulder and stained his arm. She said, ‘I did my best for you. But you kept coming.’ She gazed at his bloody shoulder. ‘You insisted on this.’
Papa Crowe’s revolver lay on the ground between Johnny’s feet and me.
Cecilia Phelps spun toward me. ‘And you. What in God’s name do you think you’re doing?’
I gestured at the bones in the pit. ‘What happened to these people? Did your husband kill them?’
She smiled gently.
Johnny pushed himself backward along the ground, inching away. Cecilia Phelps turned and watched him, fascinated, stepped toward him, and, as he slid backward, stepped forward in a touchless dance. The revolver lay on the ground behind her.
She said to Johnny, ‘Edward made me go with him. He said it would be fun. The boys were little – Darren was only a baby – and we seldom got out. Fun. I could use a little fun. I was so young myself. We drove into the woods, following the other cars. The roads were dirt back then.’ She glanced at me over her shoulder. ‘So much has changed in thirty years.’ Then, to Johnny, ‘And so much has stayed the same. When we got to the place where those people were living, Edward told me to stay in the car. He would go in with his men and put some scare into the trespassers – those were his words. He promised, no one would get hurt. He said he only wanted them off the land. But it wasn’t really about the land. It was jealousy and fear. They had something, and he wanted it. He needed it. You understand that kind of desire, don’t you?’
Edward Phelps dropped his cigarette and moved toward her. ‘Cecilia—’
She turned the gun on him. ‘Be quiet, Edward.’ She turned again to Johnny and said, ‘I begged him to stay with me or let me go with him, but he took a gun from the glove compartment and set it on my lap. He said, “You’ll be fine.” His words. He kissed me and got out of the car.’
Johnny had reached the edge of the circle of light. If he slid further, he would disappear into the brush.
‘I heard the shouts,’ Cecilia Phelps said. ‘I heard the dogs barking. The skies were blacker in those days. A man came from the woods about fifty feet from the car. Others followed. Dark shapes. Women. Children. More men. They moved on to the road and walked toward me.’
‘Cecilia!’ Edward Phelps’s voice was pained and gruff.
She seemed not to hear him. ‘What could I do? I told them to stop. But they kept coming and coming. The children and the man who led them – they scared me most. If they had all been women, I might have let them pass. But I felt they had come to do me harm. I felt they wanted me.’
Johnny stopped sliding backward, and Cecilia Phelps stood in front of him.
‘I had Edward’s gun,’ she said. ‘It didn’t seem like an extraordinary thing. I knew how to shoot it. Edward had taught me. More of his fun. I got out of the car and pointed the gun at the dark shapes of those people. I only wanted them to stop – only wanted them to go back into the woods. They must have seen me – the man who was leading them did. I saw his eyes. I swear they were the eyes of a man who already was dead. He could have turned around, but he
kept coming for me.’
Johnny said, ‘You shot him.’
She said, ‘I shot him and I shot the girl by his side. I didn’t want to, but they were coming.’
Johnny said, ‘They only wanted to pass. They wanted to get to the main road.’
But she was lost in her own mind. ‘Edward’s men came from the woods. They rounded up the others. We couldn’t let them go. They’d seen what had happened. You can’t blame us.’
‘We don’t need to,’ Johnny said. ‘Edward probably said it wasn’t your fault. The other men who were there that night probably agreed. But you knew better.’
She shook her head. ‘I don’t blame myself. The blame is gone. It’s about who survives.’ She stepped closer to Johnny and pointed the pistol at his head. ‘If Sheneel had survived, we wouldn’t have. If Alex had survived, we wouldn’t have. If you survive, we don’t. If you don’t, we do.’
‘You killed Sheneel and Alex?’ he asked.
She looked calm. ‘Did I have a choice? She would have told.’
‘And Peter cleaned up for you afterward?’
‘No choice.’
I went for the revolver.
Edward Phelps could have alerted his wife to the danger.
Daniel could have.
Peter Lisman or Bob Peterson – one of them – yelled, but too late.
As Cecilia Phelps spun and aimed the pistol at me, I lifted the revolver from the dirt and pulled the trigger.
Blood appeared on her chest like a magic corsage. She stepped back, off balance. She seemed to lose interest in the gun in her hand. Her eyes fixed on no one – not her husband, not her son Stephen, not Peter Lisman. She seemed to look inward. Then, as if, in her inward gaze, she saw no bone, no spine, nothing that would hold her vertical in the world, her legs melted and she collapsed.
Everyone started to move. Daniel went for the dropped rifle, swung it to his shoulder, and aimed at me. Stephen Phelps pushed himself to his hands and knees, his chin hanging crooked where Daniel had broken bone. Bob Peterson ripped the revolver from my hands, raised it as if to crush me with the butt – then, seeing Daniel with the rifle, lowered it. Peter Lisman scrambled from the backhoe and ran to Cecilia. He lifted her in his arms – the mother he had lost when he was an infant and she was only a teenaged child – and he looked frantically around the pit, but she was dead and there was no place to take her. Only Edward Phelps stood still and he made a sound that was more animal than human.
Second Skin Page 27