"I've been cramming antibiotics down you for about twelve hours," she said. "I came to the conclusion that I really had nothing to lose, and you're the only one who can get me out of here. I don't even know where I am."
My mouth was hanging open. I took the cloth from her hand and wiped my face, took stock, and decided I was going to live. "I still can't believe you got me out of the river," I said.
"It wasn't easy," Candy said. Looking into her eyes was like seeing Katherine, except Katherine's eyes were filled with anger, Candy's with fear.
" I thought you were feeding me rocks," I said. I put the cloth back down. " I thought I was drowning. Help me to my feet."
Candace wrapped my good arm around her shoulders and strained to lift me as I stood on brand new, shaky legs, boneless and weak. She walked me to the edge of the strip of tall hardwoods, and I could see the billowing smoke from Mel's house. My heart ached, and I sat down.
My arm was wrapped in gauze and tape and, though it hurt, it was useable. We ate most of the food she'd brought, and I washed myself off and put on the clothes Candy had collected from my room. She also brought a box of ammunition.
"I thought those might be the ones for your gun," she said. My pistol was lying on a folded blouse and looked clean and dry. The clip lay beside it. I filled the clip with shaky hands and slipped it into the pistol.
"Is this ever going to stop?" Candy said.
"I promise you," I told her, "I'll do everything I can to finish this, Candy. None of this is your fault. Do you understand that?"
"Not really," She said, averting her eyes.
"Well," I said, "It's not. And, I do love Katherine. Your mom has brought me back, and I'm scared for her, too. I really believe I can get her out of this, but I'm going to need your help all the way through."
She nodded, and I looked into eyes that were as worn out as they were beautiful. The tree I leaned against was warm and solid against my back, and I needed time to think. I pulled her over and she was too far gone to protest, asleep before her cheek settled on my thigh. I munched on cookies and rubbed her back gently, remembering Mel Shiver and hoping Torrea was safe somewhere.
No one seemed safe. The normal rules of playing politics between the forty yard lines was out and the fanatics were making a run for the end zone. I had serious doubts as to what we'd accomplished, and as much as I tried to avoid it, I thought of Katherine. I had a hard time believing she was still alive.
Here, sleeping beside me, was the nice daughter of a very nice woman, and they were both going through hell because a handful of powerful fools believed they had a better plan for running the world. I didn't know how to stop them. Several hours slipped by as I came up with new ideas and plans, only to cancel each of them.
I still refused to admit that Lieutenant Patrick had turned us in to these rodents, but I didn't know where else to take it. Katherine told me the day James left that he had made plans to drive to New Orleans and lie low until this thing was over. He didn't seem the type of man to turn the woman he still loved over to killers.
I slipped out from under Candace and let her head down gently on a stack of clean clothes. Mel kept his truck in the barn because, since his broken leg, they'd used Torrea's car for everything. He'd asked me to drive it to meet Mark that day just to make sure the battery hadn't run down.
It occurred to me that his truck, an Isuzu Trooper, might've been overlooked. I had put it back in the barn after my trip, and Mel kept a spare key in his workbench. The fact that they burned his home might mean they were abandoning the search for us at Mel's. I guessed they were shouting at each other a lot.
Bob Birk was sweating tiny bullets, because I was sure he'd convinced his handlers that he was without blemish when they chose him to be the leader of their new world.
Before I made the trip to the barn I drew a map of the surrounding roads and wrote down a few phone numbers of people who might be willing to help Candy if I didn't make it back. I placed it beside her and used the box of ammunition as a paperweight.
There wasn't a soul anywhere, not even the curious neighbors, but they'd be around soon if the soldiers were gone. I didn't have much time. The barn door was closed, and it opened noisily. I knew it would, but I wanted to make a racket. If there were any of the general's boys anywhere nearby, I wanted them to find me before I brought Candace out of hiding. Nothing stirred. The key was in its box, and when I cranked the Trooper it fired up instantly. The gas needle showed almost a full tank. I dropped the pistol into the pocket on the driver's side door and turned off the ignition. When I stepped out and shut the door behind me, a figure appeared in the space between the open barn doors.
"Don't ever leave me alone again, Mac," Candace said, her arms full of supplies. "Not ever. Not until we get Mom back."
'Okay," I said. "Sorry."
They'd left my car where it slammed into the trough, and I retrieved my shoes. There was still a dark circle of dried blood beside the cattle crossing, and it was surrounded by a scattering of curved barbed wire fencing someone had clipped from the soldier's flesh.
These people were paying dearly for their mistakes. They weren't soldiers. Not yet, anyway. At the moment, they were that terrible mutation that comes from believing your own propaganda. The kind of officer that allows his troops to blast heavy-metal rock music at top volume throughout the night outside a church embassy. The kind of officer like the famous Colonel at the Men's Club - the kind of soldier who stood in front of the American Congress and said proudly that he only follows the laws he agrees with.
I was told in boot camp that anarchists are the death of Democracy, but I guess not everyone learned that lesson. Real soldiers are ethical, in spite of the nature of their jobs. Or, perhaps, because of it. That's why the chain of command is so important in the military. It's a strong rope that binds the bottom to the top and gives the foot soldier a purpose to do what needs to be done and the knowledge that he's following a well-worn path. These men were vigilantes, and they would only get worse.
I thought of Mel as I drove slowly from his ravaged farm, of the irascible old fart who believed in things I couldn't comprehend, who upheld the most liberal of theories. I used to shake my head in wonder as he tried to share his visions of the world with me. The difference was, his beliefs were based on lifelong convictions, not thirty-second sound bites. When you pulled them apart to see how they worked, Mel's had something inside.
I didn't agree with Mel very often, but I always respected him. The world changed for the worse with his death. These men were different, in my eyes. They were the tares between the wheat. Mel told me once that what made us Americans wasn't our laws but our attitudes, that laws are just reflections of our attitudes.
I tried to image Florida under these new laws there were even now slipping quietly through the legislature, being readied to pass unnoticed by a bored and jaded club of politicians. I couldn't imagine it.
I drove uneasily down the dirt road, past the bend where Katherine and I had spent the night. Candace rode silently, and I could feel her eyes on me, another stranger controlling her destiny. After we left the clay road and eased smoothly over the blacktop, she leaned on the window and slept. I ate another handful of antibiotics and, as the lush countryside passed in a blur, I thought of Katherine.
Bob Birk's sordid past was costing his backers a fortune, and I knew that didn't make them happy, but I got no pleasure from it, either. Katherine had been taken from me, and I wanted her back. Alive. Mel was dead, and I didn't know where Torrea was. There was still no place in my mind where I could find shelter, no road signs for me. I was lost, and there was at least one person still alive who needed me. As I watched Candace in the stillness of her sleep, I wished the burden was on someone else. I prayed again to my neglected God.
It was hard to believe Lonnie Patrick turned us in, but I didn't want to think Mark would, either. Someone had let them know where we were. I slipped the Trooper into a parking space in the crowded shoppi
ng center across the street from Barret, Barret and Finch, the law firm that Mark Thornton called home. A dull grey box of architectural arrogance, rescued from the ordinary by the line of expensive cars in front and a heavy blue surf that roared a hundred yards beyond.
Happy, unconcerned people frolicked in the sand. Children built castles as young men and women turned a golden brown. Just a few miles up the road, Mel Shiver's house had been burned to the ground and, somewhere in the river, a dead man was bouncing along with a knife in his chest.
Political zealots were getting ready to turn Florida into an experiment of truly despotic proportions, and either I was crazy for worrying about it, or these happy people were insane for not paying attention.
I listened to the music playing softly on the radio while Candace slept, and when my eyes drifted down her long, slender forearms I was shocked to see a double line of ugly white scars, dimpled with stitch marks and stark against her brown wrists.
They weren't the hesitant scratches of someone looking for sympathy, but the healed lips of deeply sliced skin, the signs of someone who had intended to check out for good. I thought of how she saved my life, and I was humbled. My grief had, for years, elevated me above those around me as I convinced myself that only I had truly suffered.
When the top-of-the-hour news came on the radio, the lead story was of yesterday's shoot-out at the home of a long-suspected drug kingpin, and reported the deaths of four DEA agents during the raid of Mel's heavily armed fortress. The newsman said that Torrea Shiver was under protective custody because of fears of retaliation from the smuggling ring, hinting she was the one who, suffering from guilt, had turned her husband in to the authorities.
A strange undercurrent was there, however; one I hadn't seen before in this case. The reporter read all the words in their proper order, but there was the sound in his voice of disbelief, of a dubious tale. He practically made fun of the story.
I suddenly found energy and, restless, I dug around in Mel's truck, looking for a quarter for the pay phone. I searched the glove compartment, then the box between the seats. Candace stirred, then sat up quickly, staring at me with furrowed brows.
I saw the wildness, then. The cold, frightening glimpse into a dark and lonely soul, and I could see how close to the line she was, knew how tenuous the hold she kept on herself. I could be the catalyst that kept her on one side or pushed her to the other. She blinked, rubbed her eyes with curled fingers, and looked around at the bright sand and busy street. Our nerves were raw and we were running on adrenalin - not the best thing for our mental health, not to mention decision making.
"Do you have any money?" I said as she grappled with the reality of waking to a hostile world.
"I don't know," Candace fumbled in the bag she'd brought with her. She held up a fat bankroll of bills. "I have this. Why? Do you want to buy some whiskey?"
"God, no," I said, stripping a ten from the roll and handing the rest back. "I'm depressed enough, already."
I got out of the truck and stretched, careful not to jiggle my left arm. I walked to the grocery store and bought orange juice and a couple of packs of gum, then sidled up to the pay phone and called Mark on his personal number. He answered on the second ring.
"Mac?" He was startled, and I waited while he rummaged around for words. "Sweet Jesus, Mac, I thought you were dead."
"I am," I said. "Booga-booga."
Candace was watching me from the truck, and I looked at her pretty face. I thought of Birk's abuses, and felt another stirring of anger. "Mark," I said, "I need some answers..."
"Wait!" He sounded scared. "Just wait!"
He put me on hold. I stood first on one foot and then the other. My shoulder hurt, and I wondered how Candace had stuffed her feet into the Reeboks. I cursed lawyers. When the phone clicked in my ear it wasn't Mark on the line. I hung up, dropped in a quarter, and dialed again.
"Mr. Clay," It was the voice from the old dental-hygiene films. "Please don't hang up. I'm inspector Prossett of the Federal Bureau of Investigation."
"You have thirty seconds," I said, trying to remember how much time it took to trace a call. For all I knew, they could do it instantly. "Talk to me."
"Good enough," he said. "The bottom line is that general Hart and his troops were arrested today by federal agents. Katherine Furay is safe and she is with my people." My knees turned to rubber.
"We're afraid her daughter has been murdered," he said. "Ms. Furay is taking it very hard." I made a quick decision.
"Her daughter is with me," I said. "We're at the north end of the county now, but we'll head for the beach. We should be there in thirty minutes or so, depending on the traffic." I hung up, then called again.
"Don't come here," the man said. "We have made a sweep of suspected conspirators in Palmetto Bay, including Mr. Thornton's employers, and we've set up a command center at the Sheriff's office. Ms. Furay is there now - do you know where it is?"
"Yeah," I squinted into the sun, counted off the seconds in my head, and hung up. I used my last quarter.
"I will have agents there waiting to help you, Mr. Clay," the man went on as though I hadn't been chopping the conversation into little pieces. "You can meet them in the lobby of the Sheriff's office."
This time I hung up and walked back to the truck. I shared the orange juice and gum with Candy and pointed out the legal office. In less than a minute, a small crowd of men in suits poured from the front doors and, in the second group, a bedraggled Katherine could be seen held tightly in the hands of two big men. She was still in the same white dress.
"Mom!" Candy shouted, and I grabbed her arm, holding her down until they drove away. "Let me go!" she screamed at me as the cars sped through the traffic light and headed toward town.
"No!" I shouted back. "If they see you, they'll kill both of you and it's over! She's alive, Candy, she's alive! And, if we do the right things, she'll stay that way." I let go of her arm, rose from my protective crouch over her, and she crossed her arms, leaning away from me. In her rage, everyone was the enemy, including me.
Mark hadn't been in the group, and when I looked again his was the only car still parked at the office. I pushed around a stack of soggy cards and papers that had been in my wallet and were now drying in the sunlight that washed the dash. I found the right one, and held it out to Candy. She unwrapped a hand and took the card, looking down at it with disdain. "Can you drive this truck?" I asked, and she said she could.
"Good," I said. "I want you to drive through that intersection," I pointed, "and go north to the interstate. Don't stop until you get there. You'll see a Holiday Inn and you can call this number from there. Ask for Lieutenant Patrick, Candace, and tell him who you are. He'll come for you, and he'll bring help." At least, that was my hope. Just about the only one left. She held the card in both hands as I slipped my pistol from the door pouch and tucked it into my pants.
"What about you?" she said.
"I'm going to find out where Katherine is really going. I'll do everything I can to keep her safe, so hurry. Tell Patrick what really happened at Mel and Torrea's. I got out again, and Candy climbed over the shifter and settled into the driver's seat. She cranked the truck and reached out, squeezed my hand.
She put it in gear and I leaned against a car, watching until she was out of sight. I walked across the road to the office, crossed its small parking area, and stepped through the unlocked door in to a cool, plant-filled interior. Mark was throwing papers into a briefcase, his coat hanging over the back of a chair. He looked up when I came in and a handful of papers slid to the floor.
"Mac," he said, frozen as I crossed the room. A radio played low and, from another room, a copier shuffled papers, throwing light against the wall as its top slipped back and forth.
"Hey, dickhead," I said. "You picked the wrong side."
SIXTEEN
I'm not a physical person, and even if I do wind up in a confrontation, I'm more of a counter-puncher. This was different, though, and a
s soon as I was in range I brought my fist up from my waist with an uppercut that slammed his gaping mouth shut. I hit him again with the same hand, then whipped it around to the side of his face. I kept my left tucked close and out of the way. When he spun away, his feet tangled together and he crashed down onto his desktop, his elbows scattering pens and little framed pictures. I stepped closer and hit him three times in the kidney, punched as hard as I could, then grabbed his shirt and pulled him back until he fell on the floor. My knee came down hard on his sternum, and I dug my fingertips into his larynx and squeezed.
"Tell me everything, or I'll rip your fucking throat out." The venom in my words wasn't an act; I had to work to keep from crushing his windpipe with my fingers.
"Mac?" It came out as a coarse whisper. "Please."
"Where did they go?" I said through clenched teeth.
'The Sunset Hotel," Mark rasped. "I don't know which room."
He raised a hand and put it on my wrist.
"Why do they want me to go to the Sheriff's office?" I said.
He gripped my wrist weakly. His face was turning red. My eyes blurred and I couldn't catch my breath. I knew I was killing him - the man who sat up with me through months of booze and drugs, poured coffee, brought doughnuts, and kept me company after Sheevers died. My friend.
I released his throat and sat back on my heels as he wheezed and searched for air. Fighter pilots in Vietnam had a saying. One version went, "You build a thousand bridges and you're a hero. But just let one of those bridges fall down on market day and you're a bum again." Mark had lost a bridge.
"A trap," he said at last, with some difficulty. "I was headed to town with these papers." He waved toward his briefcase.
"I thought maybe I could stop them somehow. I don't even know for sure where I was going with them. Maybe to the newspaper. All I know is I was desperate to stop them." Mark rubbed his throat, the side of his face swollen and turning purple where I'd hit him. "They're crazy, Mac. Out of control. They were going to kill both of you as soon as you got out of the car and say you flipped out - started shooting at them, you know? I just heard them say that as they went out the door with Katherine.
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