by Scott Smith
"This is what we'll do," I said. "You'll stay here. I'll go in, straighten things out at the plane, and come back as quick as I can. If anyone drives by while I'm gone, you can pretend you're fixing something with the car."
"And if they stop to help?"
"You talk to them."
"Talk to them? What the fuck am I supposed to talk to them about?" His voice came out thin and tight sounding. I couldn't tell whether it was from fatigue or disgust.
"Tell them it's okay. Tell them you've got it fixed."
"And what about the tracks?" He waved off into the woods.
"I'll bring the dog with me," I said. "If anybody asks, you can just say Mary Beth ran off, and Lou and I went in after her."
"We'll end up getting in trouble if someone comes by. They'll remember we were here when they finally discover the plane."
"It'll be spring before anyone finds the plane. No one's going to remember our being here after all that time."
"What if the sheriff comes by again?"
I frowned. I'd forced myself to forget about Carl. "He won't come by," I said, with exaggerated self-confidence. "He had to work late last night. I guarantee you he's still in bed."
"And if he isn't?"
"If he comes by, you can tell him we lost something here last night. Tell him I dropped my hat in the woods and wanted to come back to search for it."
"Yesterday you yelled at me for taking risks. This seems like more of a risk than what I did."
"It's a necessary risk, Jacob. There's a difference."
"I don't see what's so necessary about it."
I shrugged, feigning indifference. "If you want, we can just burn the money right now. It'll save me the hike."
"I don't want to burn the money, I want to leave."
"I'm going in there, Jacob. You can either stay here and stand guard, or come along with me."
There was a long pause while he looked for a way out. He didn't find one. "I'll stay here," he said.
I put on a wool hat, the same dark blue as my jacket and gloves. Then I took the keys from the ignition and shoved them into my pocket.
MARY BETH ran on ahead as I moved into the woods, disappearing through the trees, then came galloping back, the tags on his collar jingling, his fur dusted with snow. He made a few tight circles around me and sprinted off again. I strode after him, feeling good, the cold air invigorating me, waking me up.
It took me about fifteen minutes to reach the rim of the orchard, and I paused there for a moment, surveying the scene. The plane sat in the middle of the shallow bowl, its metallic skin looking burnished, like silver, amidst the dark branches of the apple trees. Our tracks surrounded it, black holes in the snow.
A wind came up, making a rushing sound through the trees around me, and it carried with it a subtle wetness, a sense of imminent change. I glanced at the sky. It was a deep, slow-moving gray, full of the promise of snow.
The crows were still in the orchard. I didn't notice them from the rim of the bowl, but as I started down into it, they suddenly seemed to be everywhere, moving restlessly from tree to tree, cawing incessantly, as if they were arguing with one another.
I moved toward the wreck, my hand cupped against my stomach, supporting the weight of the baby pouch. The dog followed at my heels.
The plane's door was hanging open, exactly as we'd left it. I could see the mark the duffel bag had made in the snow when I'd pushed it out, a long, shallow trough. Mary Beth circled the wreck, sniffing the air.
I stuck my head in through the doorway, allowed my eyes a moment to adjust to the lack of light, then squeezed my whole body inside. I was hurrying, thinking about Jacob sitting out on the road in my car, and of all the possibilities for things going wrong because of that, when I felt the same unnatural warmth on my face I'd noticed the day before, the same heavy stillness to the air, and the memory of the bird shot through my mind.
I crouched on the floor, right where the duffel bag had been sitting, rested my hand against the wall to keep my balance, and peered toward the pilot.
He was in his seat, in the same position I'd left him the previous afternoon. His head was leaning back, staring upside down toward the rear of the plane, his arms thrown out, crucifixlike, to either side. His face was wearing the same mournful expression -- the white rings of bone around his eyes making them seem clownishly grief-stricken; the bloody icicle coming out of his nose and protruding up past his open mouth; the tip of his tongue -- swollen and dark -- sticking out between his lips.
I slapped my hand against the plane's fuselage.
"Hey!" I yelled. "Get out of here!"
My voice echoed back at me. I listened to it, waiting. Mary Beth approached the open doorway, sniffing loudly. He made a little whining sound but didn't stick his head inside. There was no sign of movement from the front.
"Hey!" I yelled again. I stomped my boot against the floor.
I waited, but nothing happened. Finally, satisfied that I was the only living thing in the plane, I stood up, scanning the floor to see if I'd dripped any blood the day before. Finding none, I started to inch my way toward the front. I unzipped my jacket as I went.
I came up quietly behind the pilot, walking in a slight stoop, trying to decide where I should plant the money. I'd planned to just lay it on the copilot's seat, but now I saw that this wouldn't work -- it would've fallen off in the crash. I'd have to put it at the dead man's feet, stuff it up tight against the nose of the plane.
I unzipped my jacket and removed the money from the knapsack. I wiped the garbage bag with my gloves, to erase any fingerprints, then crouched down and slid it forward along the floor. I pushed it past the two seats, past the pilot's boots, all the way up to the front of the plane. My back started to sweat while I worked, a cold, clammy feeling. I was holding my breath, and it made me dizzy.
When I'd jammed the money in as far as it would go, I stood up, grasped the pilot by his shoulders, and eased him forward. He bent at his waist with surprising ease, his feet sliding backward along the floor. At the last second his head rolled forward on his neck, landing on the plane's control panel with a smacking sound, like a bat hitting a ball. The bloody icicle broke, fell to the floor, and shattered.
I took a deep breath, and stepped back. I straightened my body until the top of my hat touched the plane's metal roof; then I held myself there, thinking, checking things off in my head. I'd looked for blood, I'd planted the money, I'd repositioned the pilot. There was nothing left to do.
I zipped up my jacket, turned, took a single step, and froze. There were two birds sitting just inside the open doorway, watching me. It was the strangest thing -- I seemed to think of them before I actually saw them, their images floating across my mind as I turned my body, two shadows emerging from the plane's darkness to confront me. It was eerie; it was as if I'd willed them into being.
I stared at them. They didn't move.
I waved my arms. "Scat!" I yelled.
One of the birds edged toward the doorway. The other remained where it was.
Very slowly, I took a step forward. The first bird shuffled quickly to the door. It stopped on the threshold to watch me, its plumage shiny in the light streaming in from the orchard. The second bird lifted its wings, as if to threaten me. It moved its head from side to side on its shoulders. Then it stretched its neck and cawed. The sound ricocheted off the walls. When it died down, the bird settled its wings back into its body and took a tentative step toward me.
"Out!" I yelled.
The first bird gave a little cry and disappeared with a quick hop through the doorway. I could hear the push of its wings as it flew away. The other bird simply sat there, turning first one eye toward me, then the other.
I stepped forward, stomping my boot against the floor.
The bird shuffled backward, away from the door. It lifted its wings again.
I watched it, waiting. "I'm leaving," I said, like an idiot. I took two shuffling steps forward, closing in on th
e door.
The bird retreated, sinking into the darkness at the rear of the plane, its wings still raised. I had to move at a stoop, my shoulders hunched over, my boots making a rough, scraping sound against the floor.
When I reached the door, I went out backward, so I wouldn't have to take my eyes off the crow. It raised its wings a little higher, turned its head to watch me disappear.
"I'm leaving," I said again, squeezing myself out into the snow.
Outside, the world seemed brighter, just as it had the day before. I leaned my shoulder against the door and, straining, pushed it shut. It swung closed with a violent metallic shriek.
Mary Beth had disappeared. I followed his tracks with my eyes. The trail headed off toward the road. I called his name, twice, halfheartedly, then gave up, assuming that he was already back at the car with Jacob.
As I started up the gentle slope away from the wreck, I sensed that there was something different about the orchard, something besides the illusory change in light, but it wasn't until I reached the bowl's rim that I realized what it was. It was a snowmobile, a low, whining hum hanging beelike in the air around me. It was coming from the direction of the road.
I paused, my body tense, listening, trying to decide what it meant. The wind had died down, the day felt warmer, and when I glanced at the sky I saw that, rather than thickening toward the predicted storm, it was actually clearing. I could even make out a large patch of blue to the south.
The snowmobile's buzz slowly gained in volume, far away still but moving closer. The crows in the orchard called loudly back and forth to one another.
I took one last look at the plane, glinting dully in the bottom of the hollow, then turned and started back toward the road at a run.
I STRAINED to listen for the snowmobile while I ran, but I couldn't hear it. The sounds of my breathing, of my arms rubbing against my jacket, my boots slapping down into the snow, and the trees flashing quickly by, all hid the hum of its engine. The footing was slick, my boots heavy, and I tired quickly. I slowed to a walk after a few minutes, when I was still only halfway back to the road. As soon as I ceased to run, I heard the engine. It was close now. It sounded as if it were right in front of me, just out of sight through the trees. I could hear Mary Beth barking. I listened, walking for about twenty yards to let my heart slow down a bit, then took a deep breath and started to run again.
I saw the car first, my dark green station wagon pulled off at the side of the road. It appeared like a shadow before me, suddenly materializing between the trunks of the trees. Then there was my brother, standing in front of it like a giant red beacon. Next to him was a smaller man, and beneath this man, between his legs, was the snowmobile, its engine idling now, spitting out a dense cloud of light gray smoke.
The man was tiny, old, dressed in an orange hunting jacket. It was Dwight Pederson -- I recognized him immediately. He had a rifle slung over his shoulder.
When I saw who it was, I dropped back to a walk. I still had about thirty yards to go before I reached the road, but I realized instantly that whatever damage Jacob had managed to produce through talking to the old man would only be increased by my sprinting frantically up to them out of the woods. I had to go slow now, react rather than act. I put my hands in my pockets and carefully picked my way toward them through the trees, trying to appear calm, in control, casual.
Pederson saw me first. He stared at me, seemingly uncertain who I was, then raised his hand halfway up his body in greeting. I waved back, smiling. Jacob was talking very fast. I couldn't hear what he was saying, but it looked like he was arguing with the old man. He was making a cutting motion in the air with his arm and shaking his head. When he saw Pederson wave at me, he threw a panicked look into the woods but didn't stop talking. Pederson seemed to be ignoring him. He gunned the snowmobile's engine, then said something short to Jacob and pointed down at the snow in front of them.
What happened next happened very quickly.
Jacob took a step toward the old man, reared back, and gave him a wide, swinging blow to the side of his head. Pederson fell sideways, his body collapsing onto the edge of the road, absolutely lifeless, his left leg still draped partway over the seat, his rifle slipping from his shoulder. Jacob lost his footing on the follow-through, tumbled over the back of the snowmobile, and landed directly on top of the old man.
Mary Beth started to bark.
Jacob struggled to raise himself off Pederson's body. His gloves slipped in the snow; he couldn't seem to regain his feet. He'd lost his glasses when he fell, and, still lying there, he patted his hands around him in the snow until he found them. Then he put them on and started struggling upward again. When he finally made it to his knees, he paused, resting for a moment before, with what looked like a superhuman effort, he rose to his feet.
The snowmobile's engine continued to idle, a deep, steady rumble. The dog cautiously approached Jacob from the center of the road. He gave his tail a slow, hesitant wag.
Jacob stood there, motionless. He touched his face with his glove, took his hand away to stare at it, then put it back.
All this time, I hadn't moved. I'd stood there frozen, watching in horror. Even now I only partly shook myself free. I took a single step toward the road.
Jacob leaned back and kicked the old man. He kicked him twice, with all his strength, once in the chest and once in the head. After that he stopped. He put his hand up to his face and turned to look toward me.
Mary Beth started to bark again.
"Oh, Jacob," I said, very quietly, as though speaking to myself. Then I began to run, moving quickly through the snow toward my brother.
JACOB stood there, his glove covering his mouth and nose, watching me approach.
The snowmobile's engine was making a coughing sound, threatening to stall, and the first thing I did when I reached the road was bend down and turn it off.
Jacob was crying. This was something I hadn't seen since we were children, and it took me a second to accept that it was actually happening. He wasn't sobbing, wasn't weeping, there was nothing violent or dramatic about it, he was simply seeping tears; they moved slowly down his cheeks, his breath coming a little more quickly than usual, coming with a certain shakiness to it, a trembling and hesitation. His nose was bleeding -- he'd banged it falling on top of Pederson -- and now he was pinching his nostrils shut between two of his fingers.
I glanced down at the old man. He was lying on his side, his left leg still propped up on the snowmobile's seat. He was dressed in jeans and black rubber boots. His orange jacket was hitched up around his waist; I could see his belt, thick and dark brown, and above it an inch of thermal underwear. Jacob had knocked off his hat when he hit him, revealing a sparse head of long, gray hair, dirty looking, oily. An orange wool scarf covered most of his face. I could see where Jacob had kicked him, right above the left ear. There was a dull red scrape there, around which his skin was already beginning to darken into a bruise.
Mary Beth stopped barking finally. He came up and sniffed at Jacob's boots for a second, then moved off into the center of the road.
I crouched over Pederson's body. I took off my glove and held my hand against his mouth. He didn't seem to be breathing. I put my glove back on and stood up.
"He's dead, Jacob," I said. "You've killed him."
"He was tracking the fox," Jacob said, stuttering a bit. "It's been stealing his chickens."
I rubbed my face with my hand. I wasn't sure what I ought to do. "Jesus, Jacob. How could you do this?"
"He would've gone right by the plane. He would've found it."
"It's all over now," I said, feeling my chest begin to tighten in anger. "You've ruined it for us."
We both stared down at Pederson.
"They're going to send you to jail for this," I said.
He gave me a panicked look. His glasses were wet from the snow. "I had to do it." He sobbed. "We would've been caught."
His eyes glittered, small and wild in the white, dou
ghy expanse of his face; his cheeks were damp with tears. He was terrified, bewildered, and, seeing him like that, my anger collapsed, immediately replacing itself with a rush of pity. I could save him, I realized, my older brother, I could reach down and pluck him out of this trouble, and in the process I'd save myself, too.
I glanced quickly up and down the road. It was empty.
"Have any cars gone by?" I asked.
He didn't seem to understand. He took his hand away from his nose, wiped at the tears on his cheeks. Blood was smeared across the skin above his upper lip, giving him a comical appearance, as if he were wearing a fake mustache.
"Cars?" he said.
I gestured impatiently at the road. "Have any passed? While I was in the park?"
He stared off into the distance. He thought for a second, then shook his head. "No. Nothing." He put his hand back over his nose.
I glanced across the road, toward Pederson's farm. The house was very small and far away. I thought I could see smoke rising from its chimney, but I couldn't tell for sure. The snowmobile's tracks headed off straight down the center of the field, running parallel to the fox's.
"What do we do now?" Jacob asked. He was still crying a little, and he turned away from me, pretending to stare at Mary Beth, to hide it. The dog was sitting in the middle of the road.
"We'll make it look like an accident," I said. "We'll drive him away from here and make it look like a snowmobile accident."
Jacob gave me a frightened look.
"It's all right," I said. "We can get away with this." For some reason seeing him panic made me all the more calm. I felt confident, completely in control.
"They'll follow the tracks," he said. "They'll come here and they'll see our tracks and they'll follow them to the plane."
"No. A storm's coming." I waved at the sky, which, despite what I was saying, was continuing to clear. I ignored this, bullying my way forward. "Any minute now it'll start snowing, and all of this'll be covered up."
Jacob frowned, as if ready to disagree, but he didn't say anything. He brought his hand back up to his face, and I saw the blood smeared on his glove.