Shadows of Home: A Woman with Questions. A Man with Secrets. A Bayou without Mercy

by Deborah Epperson

  “I pulled a relief crew off one of our local wells. I’m taking them back with me.” He looked at his watch. “They’re waiting for me at the office.”

  “Send Cliff with them.” She caressed his cheek. “You need a good night’s sleep.”

  “Would love to, but production is my department. They’re my men, my responsibility.” He ran his hand over his face. “Oh God, I sound like my father, don’t I?”

  “A little bit.”

  “I sound a lot like him.” Royce walked down to the water’s edge. She followed.

  “When Cliff and I were young, we’d ask Daddy to come to our ballgames and birthday parties. He’d promise to come, but he seldom did. He always gave us the same excuse. ‘Something happened at work and I couldn’t get away.’ Cliff didn’t seem to mind, but I hated my father for putting the company first.” Royce kicked at the remnants of a crawfish chimney. “Now look at me. I’m just like him.”

  “You’re nothing like him. He was cold and aloof even when he was home. You’re warm and caring.” Elita laced her fingers with his. “But maybe now that you are responsible for Sutton Oil and its employees, you realize how demanding such a grueling job can be.”

  He lifted one brow. “Are you saying I should forgive him?”

  “I’m saying that as kids, we see our fathers one way. As adults looking back, we discover they weren’t the men we thought they were.”

  “Did you say you were majoring in pharmacy or psychology?”

  She smiled. “Don’t mind me. When it comes to understanding fathers, I’m more mixed up than you.”

  “I don’t know why you say that. Your father was funny, caring, and always there for you. He was a great man.”

  She pulled her hand from his. “Maybe he was or maybe he was a coward who drowned himself because he couldn’t bear to look at Mama after he let Ricky wander off and get killed.”

  Royce’s eyes widened. “How can you say that about your dad?”

  Elita shook her head. “I don’t know why I said that. I’ve never said it out loud before.”

  “How can you even think it?” He grabbed her shoulders. “You don’t really believe your father committed suicide, do you?”

  “I . . . I guess not.”

  “You know he didn’t.”

  She pushed his hands away. “I don’t know anything for sure. I wanted to go to Moccasin Bayou the day after Luther found Daddy’s body. I wanted to see the place where he died so I could make some sense of it, but the sheriff and Uncle Matt wouldn’t let me go.”

  “Sheriff Glover told you what happened. Your dad was fishing next to a dead tree that had fallen into the bayou. He dropped his paddle in the water and when he reached for it, he leaned too far over the side and tipped the pirogue over. His clothing caught on the tree branches and he couldn’t get himself untangled.”

  “That’s what they think happened, but they don’t know for sure.”

  “Your father drowned in a tragic accident.”

  “Haven’t you heard? ‘There ain’t no accidents in the Caddo,’ Royce.”

  “Who told you that nonsense?”

  “Jax Boudreaux. He knows the Caddo better than anyone.”

  “Why would you listen to him? He’s got mental issues.”

  “He’s just a little slow, that’s all.”

  “A little slow? Didn’t he tell you the loup-garou was after you?”

  “Yes, but—”

  “But nothing. Jax is a sweet guy, but you have to take what he says with a barrel of salt.” Royce heaved a weary sigh. “Your father’s death was an accident just like Dale Butler’s. When people get careless, accidents happen.”

  Elita fisted one hand on her hip. “Daddy wasn’t a careless man.”

  “Everyone gets careless sometimes.” Royce pointed at the flowers.

  He had a point. Her father’s inattention gave Ricky the time to slip away to his death. Even so, she couldn’t stop the thorn of doubt that pricked her mind.

  A cackling sound followed by a mumbled voice came from up the trail where Royce had parked his Jeep. “Someone is calling you over your CB radio,” Elita said.

  Royce checked his watch again. “Probably my crew leader wondering where the hell I am.”

  “You need to go, don’t you?”

  He pulled her into his arms. “I’m not leaving until I know you’re okay.”

  “I’m fine, but I’m worried about you. Well fires are dangerous.”

  “I’ll be careful, and I’ll call every night.” He kissed her until they both needed air.

  Elita leaned against his chest, panting. “Don’t make promises you may not keep.”

  “If I don’t keep this promise, you can break my little finger.”

  “I’ll break more than your damn pinky, Buster.”

  He laughed, gave her rear end a gentle slap. “I love it when you talk tough.”

  CHAPTER 11

  Moccasin Bayou lay on the Texas side of the south shore of Caddo Lake, halfway between Bird Island and Old Folks Playground. Spanish moss and dangling vines overhung the backwater inlet. The lush green carpet on the water’s surface looked like slime, but Elita knew the tiny leaves belonged to a small flowering plant, duckweed.

  Before heading back to Cameron, Royce gave her keys to his house and ski boat. But the shallow waters of Moccasin Bayou were easier to traverse with her uncle’s simple aluminum fishing boat.

  Elita cut the engine and let the boat drift forward on its own wake. She scanned the thick vegetation on the bayou’s southern shore. After her father’s funeral, Matt and a couple of her mother’s relatives had pulled the downed cypress out of the bayou, cut it up, and burned it. Now, her eyes searched for a stump, a faded piece of yellow sheriff’s tape, or anything that might mark the spot where Yancy Dupree drowned. She found nothing. She repeated her uncle’s directions, “Past the old settler’s cabin, but before the southern tip of Goose Island.”

  On the left bank of the bayou stood the remnants of an old log cabin. It’d been built at the turn of the century when men who hoped to strike it rich in the infant days of the oil boom flooded the area. Elita started the engine, headed up the bayou forty yards before stopping again.

  A solitary Great Egret perched on a log at the water’s edge. Like a lone sentinel, it scrutinized the water’s surface, waiting for any underwater movement or the slightest splash that would betray the location of its next meal.

  Elita checked the south bank for a sign. Again, she found nothing. Luther had discovered Yancy’s body and would’ve been able to point out the exact location to her. Even so, she squelched a budding regret of not taking him up on his offer to escort her to Moccasin Bayou. This was something she needed to do alone.

  Dense vegetation enclosed the bayou, making it feel like a leafy, vaulted chamber. Few rays of the bright May sun managed to pierce this soggy sanctum. Elita let the texture and tone of the bayou soak into her. Something wasn’t right. She’d been fishing with her daddy since before she could walk. She remembered the sort of fishing grounds he favored. The sluggish water, the dark surroundings, the thick air hanging over Moccasin Bayou—it was all wrong. The father she knew would’ve never set out trotlines here. So why did he come to Moccasin Bayou?

  She shook her head in a futile attempt to erase the word flashing in her mind—suicide.

  A high pitched eee-i-ee warning cry cracked the silence. The egret rose from his perch, his beak empty as he spread white wings and sailed down the bayou.

  What threat caused the large bird to take flight so suddenly? Elita turned around, searched the north shore and found the reason for the egret’s hasty departure.

  Gator eyes. Two sets watched her. One alligator looked about seven feet long. The larger one measured at least ten feet. Why hadn’t she noticed them before? It was a mistake to have stopped so close to them. A mistake she wouldn’t have made five years ago. Her cousins teased her about being in the city so long she’d forgotten her country root
s. She hadn’t, of course, but the winds of change had smoothed her rough edges and dulled her instincts.

  With unblinking stares, the kings of the bayous watched her. The largest alligator slipped into the duckweed-splattered water and with a predatory grace, glided along the surface toward her. Her uncle kept a set of paddles in his boat in case he had engine trouble. Elita grabbed a paddle, choked the handle like a baseball bat.

  Halfway across the bayou, the marauding reptile disappeared beneath the murky surface.

  Elita tightened her grip on the oar. Her eyes searched the stained water around her boat. She looked for bubbles, the slightest tremors in the smooth water, but the Caddo lay still as death.

  Her hands cramped. She glanced at the gator still basking on the other side of the bayou. Its broad snout curled in a permanent grin as if laughing at her.

  Sharp squeals of terror pierced the air. Elita turned in time to see the alligator shoot up out of the water. A frantic nutria fought in vain against the powerful jaws wrapped around it. The alligator rolled beneath the water taking the web-footed rodent with it. Elita remembered her father telling her alligators often kill their prey by drowning it.

  She laid the paddle down. The brutal scene she’d witnessed sickened, but not shocked her because at her core, Elita Pearl Dupree was still a child of the Caddo. The Caddo had always been a study in compromise and contrast. Earth and water. Security and danger. Life and death. One life given so another could survive.

  Elita scanned the south shore once more. For five years, she’d wanted to come to Moccasin Bayou to see the place where her father died. Something inside pushed her to travel here, told her she’d find the answers to her questions here. But the truth of what had happened that day in Moccasin Bayou would remain the Caddo’s secret. She’d find no answers here, no resolution of the internal conflict raging in her heart, no peace of mind.

  “I’ll never know for sure if Daddy accidently drowned or committed suicide,” she mumbled, as the reality of her defeat settled in her chest.

  The air around her lay thick and heavy. Her breathing grew ragged. She must escape this place of death! She started the engine, turned the boat around, and fled to Tadpole Island.

  * * *

  With hatchet in hand, Elita stomped across Tadpole Island searching for the small stand of sassafras trees she’d seen the first time she’d tried to go to Moccasin Bayou. According to Mamaw Pearl, a hot cup of sassafras tea helped her arthritis better than any medicine prescribed by a doctor. Best of all, it was free and could be found growing wild in the thickets around Caddo Lake.

  She spotted a couple of small trees and checked the leaves. One oval, one divided into three lobes, and one mitten-shaped. Three different shaped leaves with smooth edges, the typical foliage of the sassafras tree.

  Elita slogged deeper into the thicket, slashing at undergrowth, searching for a tree with a vigorous colony of root sprouts. She stumbled into a large clearing and found several hardy sassafras trees. She pulled a washed flour sack out of the back pocket of her jeans.

  The hatchet was razor sharp and she quickly filled the bag, taking a few roots from each tree so she wouldn’t permanently damage the trees. As she worked, Elita recited her father’s version of the golden rule. “Take only what you need. Take care of the Caddo, Baby Girl, and she’ll take care of you.”

  She cut a small piece of bark and lifted it to her nose, inhaling deeply. The sweet fragrance of root beer filled her senses. It reminded her of the stories Mamaw Pearl told about how her mother boiled the sassafras root, combined it with molasses, and allowed it to ferment into root beer.

  Elita slipped the last piece of root into the sack and tied it tight. She turned to leave, but stopped. A thick U-shaped vine hung from a spreading oak. A vine swing—three feet off the ground. Perfect. How could she resist trying it out?

  Several strong tugs assured her the swing would support her weight. Cautiously, she grabbed the sides of the vine and stepped on the woody swing. The vine twisted left, then right. Elita fought to keep her balance. A forgotten instinct emerged as a wave of strength flowed from her shoulders to her thighs. She pushed her feet apart. The swing righted itself.

  Memories flooded her. Elita closed her eyes and she was fourteen again, begging Royce to push her higher. A throaty laugh slipped past her lips as she recalled how he’d warn her against going too high. The vine could break. She might fall. He worried about everything. Elita worried about nothing because she knew he’d be there to catch her, to pick her up, to save her.

  Wind whipped her dark hair around her face as the swing carried her back and forth. A vestige of freedoms lost five years earlier drenched her mind. She felt positively giddy. All worries about the future, all qualms about the past, and all doubts about her abilities evaporated. Wrapped in the arms of the Caddo she’d known in her youth, Elita rolled back the pain of the last five years and discovered that Caddo girl again—a smart, strong, sassy gal, sure of herself and those she loved.

  With deep reluctance, Elita opened her eyes and her self-induced trance was broken. She rested her head against the vine, determined to savor every second of her fleeing serenity until nature’s swing came to a complete stop.

  She checked the sky. Streaks of a waning sun beamed into the clearing. Shadows were lengthening. Knowing that darkness comes on fast in the Caddo, Elita stepped down from her woody perch and started toward her sack of sassafras roots when a clump of rich, green foliage snagged her attention.

  Tickseed, an annual wildflower, also known as beggar-tick and stick-tights. That’s what she thought the plants were at first, but a growing dread balled in her stomach as she examined the finely-cut leaves closer.

  Marijuana. She’d stumbled upon someone’s marijuana crop. All the warnings about traipsing through the Caddo alone scrolled across her mind.

  She noticed a few more patches of the illegal plants. Small groupings of four or five plants tucked neatly among the palmetto, hawthorn, and underbrush. Clever bastard, she thought. Locating the plants where they’d get the morning sun, but would go unnoticed by a plane flying overhead or anyone passing through. If she hadn’t stopped to swing and reminisce, she’d have overlooked them too.

  The hatchet and her bag of roots lay at the base of the sassafras tree. She’d started toward them when a flock of blackbirds and warblers suddenly took flight, verifying what the growing knot in her gut was telling her. She wasn’t alone.

  Fighting the instinct to run, Elita forced herself to take brisk even steps. Beads of sweat pearled on her brow. She felt a pair of eyes watching her and resisted the urge to scan the woods for their owner.

  Relief flooded her chest the moment her hand wrapped around the handle of the small axe. She turned to leave, but something made her stop. Only minutes before, she’d felt like her old self again—strong and sure. Where was that girl now? Why was she letting some unseen presence run her out of the Caddo? But as soon as the question formed in her mind, Elita realized it was fear driving her away. Throat-choking fear.

  As a girl, she’d faced down the things that scared her most because she viewed herself as invincible. As a woman, she’d taught herself that fear was to be analyzed, dissected, and rationalized as something conjured up by the psyche and fed by her insecurities.

  The fear she felt now wasn’t imagined. It was palpable and real. As real as spilled blood and broken bone. Even so, it had to be faced. Summoning the courage of the girl and the wisdom of the woman, Elita stepped to the edge of the clearing.

  “Is anyone there?” She gripped the hatchet tighter.

  Nothing but silence, as if the Caddo was holding its breath too.

  She called out again, “Is someone there?” Again, no reply, no rustling of leaves, no movement of any kind. Nevertheless, Elita felt a presence.

  A ray of late afternoon sun reflected off something on the opposite edge of the clearing. Breath wedged in her throat. A glint caused by the sun striking a knife blade, perhaps? Time
to get the hell out of here.

  A chill pricked her spine as she turned her back to him. Fighting the desire to hurry her steps, she strode through the thicket toward the safety of her boat. Panic gripped her as a briar vine wrapped its thorny tentacles around her leg. With one slash of the small axe, she freed herself.

  Reaching the landing, Elita threw the sack of roots into the boat, but held on to the hatchet. She pushed the boat off the muddy bank, glanced over her shoulder, and caught a glimpse of her stalker’s shadow as he ducked behind a tree. She jumped into the boat.

  She used the paddles to maneuver the craft out beyond the rows of lotus blossoms with their long, underwater roots that could wrap around a propeller. Once she reached open water, Elita started the engine. Only then did she feel safe enough to look back at Tadpole Island.

  An early evening fog began to crawl over the land. The feeling of being watched still lingered, but she no longer cared. Elita had faced her fear, while her stalker had hid in the shadows as if playing a game. Whatever the game, it didn’t matter now. She’d won.

  * * *

  Lost in the delight of the moment, the woman hadn’t seen him slip into the shadow of a bald cypress some forty feet behind her. He’d been careful to stay out of sight, but still, she’d sensed his presence somehow. But then, she was a Dupree and knew the Caddo better than most.

  Following her may not have been a smart decision, but he had to be certain she left the island. Would she tell anyone? His grip tightened around the serrated piece of steel poking out of his closed fist like a single, giant claw.

  Daylight was fading, and he still had work to do. Afterwards, he’d inform the sheriff that the nosy Miss Dupree had discovered their secret.

  CHAPTER 12

  White sheets and a faded assortment of towels lined the clothesline back of Mamaw Pearl’s house. Elita moved down the line, removing clothespins, folding dry towels and putting them in the basket at her feet. Bringing in the clothes—a job she’d done hundreds of times, a job she could do without thinking. It was a good thing because all her thoughts swirled around the phone conversation she’d had with Royce the night before.