Jewelweed

by David Rhodes

  “She sleeps like a horse. You can tell Dart we’re driving something up to Dad and Mom, and she can tell Gladys if she wakes up.”

  Kevin began coughing, then quickly recovered.

  “Are you sure you’re up for this, Kev?”

  “I have to be.”

  “Any idea how we find them?”

  “I’ll get directions to the plant. There can’t be more than one in such a small town.”

  “Good man,” said Wally, pausing before he climbed into the pickup. “I’m going to step over here and take a pee while you’re looking that up. Be right back.”

  They drove south, Wally pushing the upper edge of the speed limit. Kevin looked out the window at the sleeping houses and fields, took a deep breath, and remembered his ride on Blake’s motorcycle, the feeling of surrender when they’d ridden into the fog.

  They crossed the Mississippi River at Dubuque, its dark muddy water reflecting the lights of slow-moving boats.

  When they arrived in Wormwood an hour later, Kevin had fallen asleep, his head leaning against the window. Wally reached over and shook his leg, told him to read the map.

  “We’re in Wormwood already?” asked Kevin.

  “Not much happening,” said Wally with a nod. He stopped the pickup at a deserted intersection in the middle of town. Absolutely nothing was moving. “Which way?”

  “Take a left, six blocks, and another left.”

  Kevin pointed and Wally turned and drove among crouching buildings, many of them boarded up. Broken sidewalks lined the street.

  “Turn left here.”

  Around the corner, Kevin pointed again. “There it is,” he said.

  “I can smell it,” said Wally, driving toward a complex of buildings with elevators, sheds, dumpsters, and a row of Porta-Potties. Beyond the parking area—filled with mostly older cars and trucks—were several large animal lots, with loading ramps leading into the main slaughterhouse. They could hear animals bawling. Smoke rolled out of chimneys and a small cloud of steam hovered around a row of condensers. A security fence surrounded it all.

  Wally stopped in front of the main gate. A line of spotlights tripped on.

  “They’ve got to be in there,” said Kevin.

  “How do you know?”

  “I just do.”

  “I’ll see if I can wake someone up,” said Wally, climbing out of the truck.

  As he approached the gate, two security guards stepped out of a booth on the other side of the fence. One adjusted his hat, yawned, and crossed his arms in front of his chest.

  “Evening,” said Wally, steadying himself against the side of the pickup.

  “We’re closed,” said the other guard.

  “I’m afraid we have a problem,” said Wally. “Two boys are missing and they might be inside, perhaps in the back of a trailer that arrived several hours ago, around eleven o’clock.”

  “They aren’t here,” said the guard.

  “Mind if we look around?”

  “You’re not coming in here, old man.”

  “It won’t take long,” said Wally. “We won’t cause any trouble.”

  “You’re not coming in here. This is private property.”

  “Those boys may be in trouble.”

  “They’re not here.”

  “But how would you possibly know if you haven’t looked?”

  “This is a private business. We’re closed.”

  “Pretty unfriendly way of doing business,” observed Wally.

  “We have an unfriendly business,” said the guard. “Now beat it.”

  Wally took out his notebook and wrote something in it. Then he climbed back into the truck, drove several blocks away, and parked along the side of the road.

  “What are we going to do?” asked Kevin.

  “We’re going in,” said Wally.

  “How?”

  “If I’m not mistaken, Buck has a bolt-cutter in the toolbox in back.”

  They climbed out of the truck, found the cutter, and began walking back in the direction of the plant. For the first time that night, Kevin felt a biting pain when he breathed.

  They went between two abandoned cars and a burned-out barrel, then along the row of trailers and shacks just outside the security fence. There was a light on in one of the trailers. An old dog chained to a doghouse got up, moved several feet, and lay down again.

  They continued along the line of impromptu dwellings until they reached the stretch of security fencing that ran along the back of the plant. Standing in high weeds, Wally took the bolt-cutter from inside his coat and began cutting through the thick links of wire.

  “Excuse me,” said a voice behind them. They turned to find a teenager, maybe sixteen or seventeen, his black eyes burning. “You can get into a lot of trouble going in there. The guards are big and mean. The last guy they caught sneaking in was beaten unconscious and thrown into the offal pit. They’re afraid of people stealing meat, and they try to set an example every chance they get.”

  “I’m going in,” said Kevin.

  “This may not be such a good idea, Kev,” said Wally.

  “It’s like August always says,” replied Kevin. “The right ideas don’t always seem good.”

  Wally took out his notebook and wrote something down.

  “If you’re going in, I can show you a good place,” said the boy. He led them twenty yards down the fence, then kicked a stand of horseweed aside, revealing the entrance to a hole.

  “Stay close to the stockyards, and if you need a place to hide, go in one of the Porta-potties. The guards don’t use them. What are you looking for, anyway?”

  “We think there are two boys trapped in a trailer.”

  “What was it carrying?”

  “Wrapping paper and plastic cling.”

  “They keep that kind of thing over by the animal pens, next to the slaughterhouse.”

  “Thanks.”

  “I’ve got to get back now,” said the boy, and disappeared in the tall weeds.

  Wally and Kevin crawled under the fence and moved toward the first building through an obstacle course of discarded packing crates, scrap metal, old tires, and abandoned pieces of machinery.

  They moved along the side of the building, keeping in the shadows. At the corner, Wally peeked around it. He watched workers come out of the next building to throw pails of something into a dumpster.

  Animals bellowed. When they let up momentarily, Wally raised his hand. When the animal sounds resumed, a man walked around the corner of the second building and into the first door.

  Wally and Kevin hurried across the lot, ducking behind a metal sewage tube. Keeping the tube between them and the building, they approached the first animal pen, where several hundred cattle crowded together in a space defined by a six-foot-high fence. The wire was heavy, the posts made of concrete. The beasts milled around one another in a state of quivering motion. When they bumped against the enclosure, the fencing banged against the concrete. Kevin’s nostrils burned from the acidic odor of urine and manure.

  Each lot had a ramp leading up to the side of a building. The ramps turned and ended at a narrow door that led onto the killing floor.

  Kevin watched the animals, then reached out and took hold of the sleeve of Wally’s coat. “They know,” he whispered.

  Wally nodded. “You’re right. The animals know why they’re here. They can smell the blood.”

  “It’s not right that they have to stand in their own shit while they wait,” said Kevin.

  A thin strip of light shone along one edge of the door at the top of the cattle ramp. Kevin pointed at it.

  “That door must be open,” he whispered.

  “The cleaning crews are probably working inside,” said Wally. “If they had the slaughter plant running, cattle would be standing on the ramps.”

  “You stay here, Grandpa. I’m going up there.”

  “Be careful, Kev. They have electric wires in the chutes, to shock the cattle if they rear up on
their hind legs. You’ll have to crouch down. And the door may be hard to open.”

  “Give me a lift up,” said Kevin.

  Wally clamped his hands together and Kevin stepped into his palms. Rising up, he clambered over the fence to the other side, then dropped down among the milling cattle. The liquid mixture of manure and urine came halfway up his shins, and the smell was so strong it made his eyes water.

  The cattle paid no attention to him as he walked among them.

  Kevin paused at the opening to the covered ramp leading up to the door. The line of light still shone through from inside. He saw the shock-wires Wally had described, sagging down five feet above the slotted floor. It was getting cold and he pulled his jacket around him.

  Kevin crouched down and started up, holding on to the sides of the chute with his outstretched hands, stepping on the wooden slats. He stopped twice to catch his breath. At the top, he pressed his ear against the door and listened, then placed both hands against the cold metal and pushed. The door opened a crack and he squeezed through.

  Inside, he stood on the killing floor, where cattle were shot in the head with a metal bolt, then hoisted up with hooks through the tendons in their back legs, gutted, skinned, and sent down on the conveyer toward waiting knives, saws, and cleavers. The implements needed for this work and the smell of blood and entrails surrounded him.

  Below him, Kevin saw men and women in uniforms cleaning the gutters, tubs, and conveyers. He moved to his right, along a small aisle that separated the killing floor from the processing plant below. After twenty or thirty feet, he came to another steel door and pushed it open.

  Inside was cool, cavernous darkness. He stepped into it, closing the door behind him.

  Moving by feel along rows of storage shelves, Kevin passed through a wide opening leading into the warehouse. At the other end, faint light seeped in from the yard lights outside.

  Most of the loading docks were closed, but the back ends of three trucks were visible in the middle. One was open and empty, the other two closed.

  Kevin opened the first of these two trailers, prying up the long locking bar.

  The trailer smelled of wood and dust, but it was empty.

  He opened the doors on the second trailer and was greeted by a cloud of smoke and the sound of coughing.

  A narrow light came on and two figures emerged from the smoke and rows of loaded pallets.

  “Kevin, is that you?” said a voice.

  August and Ivan walked out coughing.

  “What’s with the smoke?” whispered Kevin.

  “That was my idea,” said Ivan. “I started a fire.”

  “Bad idea,” said August, coughing. “It took our air. You got here just in time.”

  “Keep your voices down,” said Kevin. “We’ve got to get out of here.”

  “How did you find us?” asked Ivan.

  “Shut up,” said Kevin. “If they catch us they’ll throw us in the offal pit.”

  “What’s that?” asked Ivan.

  “I don’t know, but it can’t be good,” said Kevin.

  “Offal is digestible organs and intestines,” explained August. “Most of it is used in pet food.”

  “Did you bring anything to eat?” asked Ivan.

  “No, keep quiet. We’ve got to get out of here.”

  Just then a door closed at the other end of the warehouse and the overhead lights came on. The three boys ran to the end of the loading docks and opened the door.

  Outside, they jumped down and hid under a trailer, huddled against the back wheels.

  “Do you see that line of Porta-potties?” whispered Kevin, pointing across the open lot. “We’ve got to get to one of them. We can hide inside and then move on to where Grandpa is waiting in back.”

  “Let’s go, then,” said Ivan.

  “No, wait.”

  Four guards walked around the corner of the warehouse. One of them stopped and shouted, “There they are, under the trailer!” The boys ran out the other way, along the side of the building, keeping in the shadows.

  “Where’d they go?” shouted another man, breathing heavily.

  “We’ll get the little bastards.”

  The boys hurried along the Porta-Potties and continued toward the animal pens.

  “Over here,” called Wally, waving to them from the draining pipe.

  The boys ran toward him, through the piles of junk, under the fence, and into the horseweed.

  “Come on,” said Wally, picking up the bolt-cutter and moving along the edge of the fence.

  Back in the truck, the four breathed a collective sigh of excited relief. Ivan said he’d like to stop somewhere as soon as possible to get something to eat. Wally said everything was closed. August said he was sure Kevin’s bravery had made July Montgomery smile in his grave, but Kevin reminded him that July had been cremated, so smiling was out of the question.

  “Whose idea was it to get into the back of that trailer?” asked Wally, starting the truck.

  “Mine,” said Ivan.

  “And mine,” added August.

  “Well, I’m sure you had your reasons,” said Wally, driving quickly through town.

  “Blake Bookchester is my father,” said Ivan. “We found out for sure.”

  “That’s the best news I’ve heard all year,” said Wally. “You okay, Kev?”

  “I’m fine, but I’ll be better when I get this smell washed off.”

  They talked all the way back. August and Ivan explained what it was like to be in the bumpy dark for so long. Kevin, breathing through the oxygen tubing, talked about how he knew they were in trouble, and how when he saw the line of light at the top of the packing plant ramp, he knew he could get inside. And when Wally drove over the Mississippi River he told the boys about a time he and Buck had gone down the river as far as they could on a pontoon with an outboard motor.

  “How far did you get, Grandpa?”

  “Not very far. Neither of us knew anything about what we were doing.”

  After two hours of driving in Wisconsin, Wally parked halfway down the drive so August’s parents wouldn’t hear him pull in. Ivan asked Wally and Kevin to wait in the truck a couple minutes, while he accompanied August to the campsite, just to make sure everything was all right.

  “Thanks for coming with me,” said Ivan, as they reached the clearing in the woods.

  “No problem,” said August.

  “Are you going to stay out here or go into the house?”

  “I think I’ll stay out here for a while,” August said. “I want to think about what happened tonight.”

  “I thought you would,” replied Ivan. “I’d better be getting back, though.”

  Ivan, Kevin, and Wally arrived back at home just as the sun was coming up. Ivan thanked Kevin again for coming after him. Kevin went down the hall, threw his dirty clothes into the laundry room, took a shower, and went to bed. His nurse didn’t wake up.

  Wally said he could feel important dreams forming in his mind, and went upstairs.

  Ivan heard his mother banging around in the big kitchen. When he walked in she was making biscuits, flour on her hands and arms. She looked up and said, “I thought you were over at August’s. What’s going on?”

  “I need to talk to you about something, Mother,” said Ivan, taking the picture out of his pocket.

  Grass Fire

  After Dart talked to Ivan she carried Flo’s breakfast up to the third floor. The two women ate oatmeal with brown sugar and cream, along with fruit jam and biscuits.

  “What’s the matter with you today?” asked Flo, setting her spoon down.

  “Why?”

  “You’re different.”

  “There’s a grass fire burning in my life and I don’t know how to put it out.”

  “Do you want to?”

  “Something is chasing me faster than I want to run.”

  “Does that frighten you, Dart?”

  “Yes.”

  Florence took a drink of cham
omile tea. “When my husband and I first moved out here—this was over seventy years ago, during the Depression—we had two big dogs. We thought we needed them for protection. One was a great dane, the other a German shepherd. They were magnificent creatures, but thunderstorms frightened them both. The dane would cower under the table in the dining room, shivering and whining. The shepherd would attack the rain, snarling and barking.”

  “Which one did you like better?” asked Dart.

  “I liked them both.”

  “If it were me, I’d have no use for the shepherd.”

  “Why?”

  “I just wouldn’t.”

  Dart felt the blood pounding through her veins. She gathered their bowls, plates, silverware, and cups, and placed them on the carrying tray. “Do you have everything you need for the rest of the morning?”

  “Yes.”

  Dart checked on Kevin and his nurse, and found them both still asleep. Then she drove to Red Plain and walked into the cement plant. A man and a woman were standing at the counter, talking to Bee about having a patio poured behind their house. The man thought they were too expensive and the woman wanted more choices in pattern-stamping. After they left, Dart stepped forward.

  “Do you remember me?” she asked, her voice unsteady.

  “Of course I do, Dart,” replied Bee, looking over the top of her reading glasses.

  “I was hoping you’d be here today.”

  “I just got back from a vacation in Slippery Slopes.” Bee yawned. “I’m afraid I’m still a little behind on my sleep.”

  “I need your honest opinion about something.”

  “Okay.”

  Dart looked around the office, reinforcing her memories. “I was so young back then,” she observed, more to herself than to Bee. “I was dumb as a post and afraid of everything. I lied about my age when I started working here.”

  “I know,” said Bee. “And you’re still young in my book.”

  “I’m almost thirty.”

  “That’s just getting started.”

  “Is it true you’re going out with Blake’s father?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you think Blake and I could ever . . . I mean, do you think his father could ever . . . I mean, if something terrible was built in the past, do you think the same people who built it could tear it apart? And do you think that after they’d torn it apart they’d still be able to look each other in the eye—”