The Last Child

by John Hart

  Seconds passed. “You left me,” Johnny said.

  Jack leaned farther over the wall, his head close. “You’re going to get killed out here.”

  “Lightning falls.”

  “What is that supposed to mean?”

  “Nothing. I don’t know.” The sky lit up. Johnny pointed at the old oak tree. “That’s the tree they hung them from.”

  Jack looked at the gnarled tree, its giant limbs spread and restless, black when the lightning fell. “How do you know?”

  A roll in Johnny’s shoulders. “Can’t you feel it?”

  “No.”

  “The cemetery’s built around it. Three headstones at the base of it.” He raised a finger. “See how small they are. How rough they were cut.”

  “I can’t see shit.”

  “They’re there.”

  “You’re losing it, Johnny.”

  Johnny said nothing.

  “There’s a stove in the barn. I got a fire going.”

  Johnny stared at Freemantle. “I can’t leave.”

  “You’ve been out here for hours. He’s not going anywhere. Look at him.”

  “I can’t take the chance.”

  “Have you thought about this? Really thought it through? He’s burying his kid, man, and from the way her coffin looked, I’d say he was burying her for the second time. That means he dug her up from some other grave. Do you even know how the girl died? Or why he carried her all this way to put her in the ground with no one around to see it?”

  “We saw it.”

  “We don’t even know if it’s really his kid.”

  Light spilled from a distant cloud. “Look at him.” Both boys looked at Freemantle, slumped into himself, shattered by a grief so true it was unmistakable.

  Jack lowered his voice. “Have you asked yourself why he’s covered with blood or how he got so injured? The real reason he grabbed you up the other day?”

  “God told him to.”

  “Don’t go smart-ass on me, man. When this guy comes in from the rain, we’re going to have to figure out what to do with him. I don’t want to be the only one thinking about that.”

  “I just have one question, and as soon as he’s done with this”—Johnny gestured at the rain, the grave, the mud—“I’m going to ask him.”

  “And if he won’t answer?”

  “I helped bury his daughter.”

  Jack’s voice rose. “If he won’t answer?”

  “Give me the gun,” Johnny said.

  “You threaten him, he’ll kill us.”

  Johnny held out a hand. Jack looked at the giant in the mud, then dropped the gun in Johnny’s lap. It was cold and wet and heavy.

  “I’m this close,” Johnny said.

  But Jack was already gone.

  Johnny watched the man and the rain and the silent, rising mud. After a minute, he dug into a pocket. When his hand came out, it held a feather, small and white and crushed. He held it for a long time, watched it go limp in the pounding rain. He thought hard about throwing it away, but in the end he closed his fingers and waited, gun in one hand, last feather in the other.

  —

  Hours later, lightning dwindled in the north. The forest dripped. Freemantle looked up at the racing clouds, the hint of moon behind them. It was the first time he’d moved since smoothing the earth above his daughter. There’d been no more sign of Jack, no more entreaties to come in out of the rain. There’d been the slow march of hours, the flash and noise, the storm that drove the cold water down. There’d been hard stone at Johnny’s back, and there’d been the two of them, twenty feet apart and unmoving. That had never changed.

  Johnny tucked the feather back into his pocket, slipped the gun under his shirt.

  Freemantle pushed himself up and stared after the storm. “I thought I’d get hit.” In the dark, his eyes were spilled ink, his mouth a gash of surprise and disappointment. It was after midnight, time a hard road behind them. Freemantle picked up the shovel, his discarded shoe. Using the shovel as a crutch, he walked past Johnny. “It doesn’t matter. It’s done.”

  “I need to talk to you.”

  “I’m done.”

  The white gate swung on silent hinges. Freemantle moved slowly and Johnny fell in behind him. “Please.”

  “I’m tired.”

  Tired, Johnny thought. And sick. He could smell infection in the air that came off the big man. He stumbled once as the barn drew near. Johnny put out a hand, but it was like trying to catch the weight of a tree. His skin was hard and hot. He almost went down. “Tired,” Freemantle said, and then they were at the barn.

  Inside, Johnny saw dust and straw and metal tools, two big lanterns that hung from chains. Heat rolled over them as they stepped through the door. In the far corner, an iron stove stood on slabs of slate. Its sides were rounded, and coals glowed behind the grate. Jack was laid out on a mound of straw, his jacket folded for a pillow. He jumped when Freemantle closed the door.

  “It’s okay,” Johnny said, stepping closer. Jack’s eyes caught the glow from the stove. “You crying?” Johnny asked.

  “No.”

  It was a lie, but Johnny let it go. In the closed confines of the barn, the shadows stretched long. Freemantle looked immense and dangerous. Johnny kept the pistol out of sight. “My name’s Johnny. This is Jack.”

  Freemantle stared. His eyes were tinted yellow, lips cracked deep enough to show hints of meat. “Levi.” He pulled off his shirt and hung it on a nail close to the stove. His chest and arms were padded with muscle. There were long, thin scars that looked like knife wounds, a hard tight pucker that could have come from a bullet. The branch in his side was jagged and black.

  “That looks bad,” Johnny said.

  “It only hurts if I try to pull it out.”

  A smell rose, wet and earthy. Where Levi stood, water dripped onto stone, faded to a dark hint, and was gone in the heat. His eyelids drooped. “Almost there,” he said.

  “What?”

  He opened his eyes. “Forgot where I was.”

  Johnny opened his mouth, but Jack spoke first. “Why did you carry the coffin out here?”

  Freemantle pinned him with yellow, fevered eyes. “Why did I carry it?”

  “I’m just asking.”

  “I can’t drive. Momma said driving was for other folks.” His eyes drifted shut and his body leaned left; he staggered once to stop from falling. “Momma said …”

  “You okay, mister?”

  His eyes snapped open. “Who wants to know?”

  “My name is Johnny, remember?”

  “I don’t know nobody named Johnny.”

  “You need a hospital. You need a doctor.”

  Freemantle ignored him and limped to a shelf on the far wall. Johnny saw machine oil, rat poison, hooked metal tools, and rags gone stiff with age. Freemantle picked up a rusted box cutter and a plastic bottle smeared with cobwebs. He sat by the fire and cut the legs off of his pants, throwing the rags on the ground by the stove. The top came off the bottle and he poured brown liquid into the wounds on his knees.

  Jack appeared next to Johnny. “That’s for animals,” he whispered.

  “Bullshit.”

  “It says for veterinary use only.” He pointed and the boys watched. Whatever it was, it hurt when he poured it.

  “Are you okay?” Johnny finally asked. Freemantle nodded, then tipped the bottle over the wound in his side. “You need antibiotics.”

  Freemantle ignored him. He tried to pull the rag from his finger, but the flesh was so swollen that the cloth bit like wire. He cut it free, and Johnny saw the shredded wound his teeth had made. He turned his face away as Freemantle poured more of the liquid on the finger. Twice. Three times. His muscles locked up, relaxed, and then he lay down on the stone. “You boys shouldn’t be out here.”

  “I just want to talk.”

  “I’m done,” Freemantle said.

  “How did your daughter die?”

  “Jesus, Jack. Shut up
.” Johnny’s whisper was fierce. He was here, now, and Jack was going to fuck it all up.

  “They say you killed those people.” Jack’s voice was tight. “If you had a good reason, then I won’t worry so much about you killing us.” Jack was ready to bolt. Already he was angled for the door.

  Levi Freemantle sat up slowly. His eyes looked even more yellow, his skin like ash. “Killed what people?”

  He knew what people. Johnny saw that as plain as day. A wariness moved into the man’s eyes. A new tension took his shoulders. Johnny’s fingers settled on the pistol under his shirt. Freemantle saw the movement, and their eyes met. He remembered the gun. Johnny saw that, too.

  Suddenly it all fell away. Freemantle slumped. “They can have me now. Shoot me. I don’t care.”

  Johnny’s hand came away from the gun. “Because you’ve buried her.”

  “Because she’s gone.”

  “How did she die?”

  Freemantle pulled a wet envelope from the front pocket of his pants. It was crushed, so damp that the paper was almost pulped. Much of the ink had smeared, but Johnny recognized Freemantle’s name. The address was the Department of Corrections. Freemantle tossed the envelope and Johnny picked it up. Inside was a newspaper clipping. Bits of paper came off on Johnny’s fingers. “Somebody had to read it to me,” Freemantle said.

  “What is it?” Jack asked.

  But Johnny was trying to read. The headline was clear enough. “Toddler Dies in Hot Car.”

  “The little ones are a gift.” Freemantle tilted his head and the bad eye caught fire. “The last true thing.”

  “They left his daughter in the car.” Johnny squinted. “They went drinking in some bar at the beach, and they left her in the car.”

  “My wife,” Freemantle said. “Her boyfriend.”

  “There was an investigation. The cops ruled it accidental.”

  “They buried her without a preacher, just put her in the ground with people that don’t have names or family. My wife never even told me. I wasn’t there to say goodbye.” He paused again, then his voice broke. “Sofia went in the ground without her daddy there to say goodbye.”

  “Who sent this to you?” Johnny held up the clipping. It was from one of the newspapers at the coast.

  But Freemantle had gone distant again, eyes unfocused, hands turned up on his knees. “I left my baby a picture so she wouldn’t miss me. I drew it in her closet so she could see it every day and not be sad that her daddy was gone. She liked to play in her closet. She had a doll baby with tiny white shoes.” He held up two fingers, an inch apart. “She had some Crayons for coloring, some paper I brung home from the store one day. That’s why I drew us in the closet, ’cause she felt so good in there, ’cause it was her play place.” He tilted his big head. “But a picture can’t take care of nobody. Picture can’t keep a baby girl safe.”

  “I’m sorry.” Johnny meant it.

  “Who sent the clipping?” Jack asked.

  Freemantle smeared fingers across his face. “A neighbor lady with two babies of her own. She never liked my wife. She found out about what happened and sent that to me in jail. That’s why I walked off, so I could stand over my baby’s grave and make sure it was done right and proper, but it was just bare dirt that rose up in the middle. No flowers, no stone. I sat down and put my hand on the dirt. That’s when God told me.”

  “Told you what?”

  “That’s when he told me to kill them.”

  The boys looked at each other and both had the same thought.

  Insane.

  Crazy fucking insane.

  “God told me to bring my baby here.” Freemantle looked up, and new life stirred in the desert of his face. “The little ones are gifts.” He cupped his giant battered hands. “The last true things. That’s why God told me to pick you up.”

  “What?”

  “Life is a circle. That’s what he said to tell you.”

  “Johnny …” It was Jack, a bare whisper. Johnny held up a hand.

  “God told you to tell me that?”

  “I remember now.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “Johnny …” Jack’s voice hinted at panic. Johnny tore his eyes from Levi Freemantle. His friend was pale and rigid. Johnny followed his gaze to the pile of filthy fabric by the stove. Shreds of pants. The twist of bandage from the infected finger. Jack pointed and Johnny saw it. A name tag sewn into the cloth Freemantle had used for a bandage. A name tag. A name.

  Alyssa Merrimon.

  Bloody and stained.

  Johnny looked at Freemantle, who drew a shape in the air with one finger.

  “Circle,” he said.

  And Johnny pulled the gun.

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  Hunt was late getting home. The dinner was cold in the bag, but Allen made no comment. They ate in the kitchen, together but silent, and tension came off them in waves. At the door to his son’s room, Hunt apologized. “It’s just the case,” he said.

  “Sure.”

  Hunt watched his son kick off grungy shoes. “It’ll be over soon.”

  “College starts in three months.” He pulled off his shirt and tossed it after the shoes. Fine hairs textured his chest, rose from the hollow place at the base of his neck. His son was all but grown, Hunt realized, as close to a man as a boy could get and still have boy in him. Hunt paused, knowing that there was nothing he could say that would make this better.

  “Son …”

  “She never calls.”

  “Who?”

  “Mom,” he said, and there was nothing but boy in his face.

  “I don’t know what to say.”

  “Don’t say anything.”

  Hurt, angry boy.

  “Allen, I—”

  “Just close the door.”

  Hunt could not move.

  “Please,” Allen said, and the look on his face was a blow to the gut, a hammer stroke. A stone settled on Hunt’s heart and it carried the weight of a million failed expectations, the certainty that it should not be like this for his son.

  “Please,” Allen said again, and Hunt had no choice.

  “Good night, son.”

  Hunt closed the door, then went downstairs. He stuffed cartons and paper bags into the trash, then poured a slug of scotch that he knew he would never finish. The day was all over him: death and despicable men, the lives of children cut short, and a host of still-unanswered questions. He wanted a shower and ten hours of sleep. Under his fingers, his face felt like an old man’s face. He walked into his study, unlocked the desk drawer and pulled out the Alyssa Merrimon case file. He stared for a long time at her picture, glanced over the notes, the jotted questions, but his mind was on Yoakum. He replayed the moment that Meechum had died, the smell of gun smoke and Yoakum’s steady hand, his eyes, so glassy smooth and still.

  The call came at twelve thirty. “You awake?” Yoakum asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Drunk?”

  Hunt closed Alyssa’s file. “No.”

  “I am.”

  “What is it, John? What’s on your mind?” Hunt knew the answer.

  “How long we been doing this?” Yoakum asked.

  “A long time.”

  “Partners?”

  “And friends.”

  A silence drew out, Yoakum’s breath on the line. “What did you tell them?” he finally asked.

  “I told them what happened.”

  “That’s not what I’m asking and you know it.”

  Hunt pictured his friend, saw him in his own small house, a glass in his hand, in his living room, staring at the ashes of a long-dead fire. Yoakum was sixty-three. He’d been a cop for over thirty years; it was all he had. Hunt didn’t answer the question.

  “You’re my friend, Clyde. He was going for you with an ax. What was I supposed to do?”

  “Is that the reason you took the heart shot?”

  “Of course.”

  “It wasn’t anger? Not payback?” />
  “For what?” A different anger was waking.

  “You know for what.”

  “Tell me, Clyde. You tell me for what.”

  “For those kids. For seven graves in a patch of muddy woods. For years of bad shit in our own backyard.”

  “No.”

  “All this time, Yoak. All this time and I’ve never seen you do personal. Today looked personal.”

  “A killer came after my partner with an ax. He came after my friend. You could call that personal, but you could call that the job, too. Now, what did you tell them?”

  Hunt hesitated.

  “Did you tell them it was a clean shoot?”

  “We stuck to the facts. They asked for my opinion, but I didn’t give it.”

  “But you will.

  “Tomorrow,” Hunt said. “Tomorrow, I will.”

  “And what will you tell them?”

  Hunt reached for the scotch. In the low, cut-crystal glass, a small light kindled in the liquid. He replayed the moment in his mind, the ax starting down, Yoakum stepping into the room. What had his angle looked like? Did he have to take the kill shot? The computer was off to the side, but by how much? Hunt put himself in Yoakum’s shoes. He thought he could see it, the way it could have looked.

  But Yoakum spoke before Hunt could. “Have you filed that obstruction charge against Ken Holloway?”

  In the aftermath of Meechum’s shooting, Hunt had almost forgotten about Holloway’s phone call. “No,” he said.

  “But you will?”

  “I will.”

  A silence invaded the line, and it was an ugly one. Hunt knocked back the scotch. He knew where this could go, and prayed that it would not.

  “None of this would have gone down if we’d left Holloway out of it,” Yoakum finally said. “We’d have taken Meechum clean at the mall. No shooting. No burned discs. That was you, Clyde, your call. That was personal.”

  The phone seemed to hum in Hunt’s hand. “Good night, Yoakum.”

  A heavy pause. “Good night, Clyde.”