Pain exploded in his leg. The blade made a horrible sucking sound as the child jerked it free. Blood spurted outward, painting the boy’s face, and Wellman staggered, his free hand clamping down on the wound. His back hit the wall of the house and he struggled to remain standing even as waves of agony washed over him. The blood continued to fount, jetting from between his fingers, and “oh,” was all he could say as the strength started to leave him. Still, he kept the gun in his hand, the sweat beneath his finger on the trigger guard cold, but even though the temptation to turn that weapon on himself and end this now was greater than ever, he knew there was no need. Despite the unbearable pain, which felt to him as if someone had ripped wide the wound and were tugging on the nerves and muscles in his leg, he was aware of what had been done to him, and what he still needed to do before he bled to death. He willed himself to raise the gun, even as he slid down the wall. The figures in the yard had gathered around him, one of them laughing. Standing with the headlights behind them, they looked like devils come from Hell itself.
So much blood, Wellman thought, as he watched it continue to spurt from between his fingers in time with the beating of his heart. Little bastard got the femoral artery, most likely. Gives me about five minutes, if I’m lucky. But he had been given no reason thus far to think himself lucky, and so he shook his head to clear it of the clouds that were already starting to gather behind his eyes, and summoned every ounce of strength he had left to keep his head from nodding forward and pitching him into a darkness from which he was not likely to return.
“You got ’im good Isaac,” Papa said, though he didn’t sound entirely pleased. “But this ain’t how I wanted it.”
Wellman wasn’t sure what that meant. Had they been bluffing? Had they meant to just scare him into telling them what they wanted to know, or to warn him as they had Jack Lowell all those years ago when he’d stuck his nose in where it wasn’t wanted? No, there was no bluff here. Perhaps if he hadn’t seen the faces of those boys, the cold malevolence in their eyes, he could have told himself that this had all just been some kind of terrible mistake, a rash move perhaps from a boy too young, or too simple, to know what he was doing. But he had seen them, had felt the threat saturating the air the moment they’d arrived. These people had come to kill him, just as they had butchered those poor kids and God only knew how many before them, just as they would murder Claire if he told them where she was.
“You can end this,” he said weakly, his gaze directed at the tallest shadow now dropping to a crouch before him. “Hit the road, clear out of town and never look back. You’ve got time.” He let out a long low breath. Part of him seemed to escape with it. The pain was maddening, a raging itch deep inside his leg he would have to tear himself asunder to reach. His heart ached as it strained to compensate for the amount of blood he was losing. He could smell himself in the air, the urine and feces as his bodily functions gradually started to relax and void themselves, giving up before the rest of him. He could smell them too, their foul breath, the old sweat, the dirt and filth. These were not the scents he imagined would herald his death, but on some level he supposed it was apt. Abby’s death had been no more elegant.
“Ain’t about time, Doc,” said Papa-in-Gray.
“Then what is it about?”
They were closer now, or maybe that was just his own failing vision playing tricks on him, but the light penetrating their semi-circle seemed thinner, as did the air allowed to infiltrate the group. It was getting harder to breathe.
“We’re gonna get that bitch girl, then come back,” Pa continued. “And we’re gonna make it look like you kilt yourself, though that leg wound won’t help us none.”
One of the smaller shadows swallowed audibly and looked away.
“Then we’re gonna put your body right back in that house’a yours, get you all comfortable, maybe with that pretty picture of your wife. Make it look all peaceful.”
Wellman was fading fast, the ground beneath him warmed by his own life’s blood, the flesh above it growing steadily colder.
“Why’s he smilin’?” one of the boys asked.
“I expect he’s acceptin’ his fate.”
Get this one last thing done, Wellman told himself, but his own thoughts sounded distant, a voice heard calling from beyond the hills. Then: “One last…thing,” he said aloud. It was not until he drew in a sudden breath and forced his eyes wide that he realized they’d been shut. His vision wavered, the figures around him blurry and indistinct as if seen through billowing sheets of plastic. He clenched his teeth, and willed his hand to bring the gun up. Miraculously, for it felt as if it existed independently of him, it obeyed, though the gun seemed to have increased in weight and size.
“Well lookit that,” Pa said, and chuckled.
“Best step back, Pa.”
The man’s tone darkened. “And you best watch who you’re advisin’, Aaron.”
Wellman gasped as a bolt of pain shot through him. For a moment he thought he’d been stabbed again, but realized as it ebbed away that it was merely an involuntary spasm, his body protesting the systematic shutdown of its component parts.
Papa-In-Gray’s face was mere inches from his own.
Wellman straightened his arm and aimed the gun point blank at the man’s right eye.
Knives found his throat. The twins, he suspected, on either side of him, their hands small as they brushed his chin.
“Easy boys. He ain’t shootin’ nobody.”
“But Pa—”
“Get in the truck.”
Wellman drew back the hammer. The ratcheting click sounded impossibly loud. The only sound in the world. The boys tensed.
“You heard me, now get movin’ dammit,” Papa commanded.
Wellman felt their reluctance as they moved away, heard their footsteps crunching gravel, the truck doors opening and closing again. Then it was just silence, one shadow, and the gun.
“You change your mind, old man?” Papa asked. “Fixin’ to go out a hero?”
Wellman’s eyes were starting to close, the shades on his evening coming down to usher in endless night. He jerked himself back to consciousness and muttered a curse.
“Go ahead,” Pa told him, leaning in so the gun was pressed beneath his eye. “Pull the trigger. God might forgive you for doin’ what you thought was right while the pain had you addled. And I ain’t scared none. You might say I’m awful curious about what’s waitin’ for me up there.”
“Let her go. Please. She never hurt you.”
“She kilt my boy’s what she did to me.”
“She was… Just… let her go. She’s suffered enough.”
“Only reason you gotta stake in this is ’cuz you got in the way, ol’ man. What happens to her ain’t none of your concern. Shouldn’t’ve wasted your time on her.”
“You’ll burn in Hell,” Wellman whispered, his breath whistling from his mouth. Shuddering, he put as much pressure on the gun as he could muster, digging it into the flesh beneath the other man’s eye. “You’ll burn for what you’ve done. And someday… someone will stop you.”
“Oh?”
“People like you…” He grunted as another bolt of pain shot through him. “Monsters like you…don’t last long. Someone will put an end to this.”
Pa sounded as if he was smiling, but his face was nothing but darkness. “But not you?”
“No.” Wellman drew a breath he was afraid would be his last. He was wracked with pain, every muscle contracting, making it an effort to breathe, to think, to see… “No,” he said. “Not me.”
With the last of his strength, he swung his hand to the left and pulled the trigger. Pa jerked back with a grunt, one hand clamped over his ear as he spun away. The gun kicked in the doctor’s hand, sending a shock of pain up his arm and he almost dropped it. But he brought the weapon up one last time, tightened his quivering grip, and pulled the trigger again, and again, even after he could no longer see, and the sound of the bullets leaving the gun was
a distant echo.
* * *
The truck bucked and dropped low on the right side, the headlights tilting, sliding away from their father and the dying doctor before coming to a halt at a crooked angle. The windshield shattered, scattering glass, and from the back seat Joshua gasped as a bullet sheared off a piece of his right ear and punched a small hole in the rear window, starring but not breaking it.
“That son of a bitch,” Aaron roared, jerking on the door handle. “He got the goddamn tire.” Then he was out and running, door swinging wide, the knife held at his side in a fist so white it could have been sculpted from limestone.
“You all right?” Luke asked quietly, his eyes on the mirror and his younger brother’s pained expression.
Joshua nodded, one hand cupping his bloody ear.
Isaac shoved the newly vacated driver seat forward and filed out with Joshua at his heels. They slammed the door hard behind them as if they had sensed Luke wasn’t going to follow.
They were right.
Instead he sat still, and watched, absently picking fragments of glass from his hair and brushing them from his clothes. The cuts on his face stung where the shrapnel from the windshield had punctured the skin, but he was only barely aware of them. The tender area on his left cheek hurt more, even though the pain was no more potent than the nicks made by the glass. Shame made his face fill with blood and throb with the impotency of anger. He should have lashed back at the old man, snapped his bones and torn his flesh. There had been time. But he had just stood there in shock, overwhelmed by the dawning of what this new development would mean to his family.
The old man caught Luke a good one, he imagined them muttering to each other as they grinned up at their father, who would shake his head in disappointment. Should’ve seen that comin’ a mile away. Boy’s gettin’ slower’n a dog in the summertime. And y’all know what needs to be done when a dog ain’t no good no more don’tcha?
Panic lodged in his throat at the image of them turning as one to look at him wherever he stood waiting for their verdict.
We do, Pa.
Doubt delayed him, one clammy hand slippery against the door handle. These people were all he had. They were all he knew, and maybe at the back of it all he was getting too far ahead of himself. There was no doubt that Pa had no time for him, but would he go so far as to end his life? Over this?
Out in the yard, Pa was rising. Like Joshua, who stood by his side, nudging the doctor with his foot, he had one hand over his ear. Luke had seen the doctor move the gun away from his father’s face and pull the trigger, shooting out the tire, and while Aaron had cursed and ducked, Luke had stayed where he was, watching until the moment the windshield exploded, hoping against hope that one of those bullets would tear through his brain, curing it of confusion and fear once and for all, or that the doctor would save at least one round for Papa.
It was a terrible thought and one he couldn’t help but feel guilty for, and yet up until Pa had risen just a moment ago, proving he was still alive, Luke had prayed the man was dead and out of their lives forever. Now he watched as Aaron plucked the gun from the doctor’s hand and checked the chamber. “Ain’t got but one bullet left,” he told their father.
One bullet, Luke thought. F’only he’d used it. F’only Aaron’d use it now. But his brother would never do such a thing. Aaron would forever be loyal to their father, whether out of fear or respect was unknown, and it hardly mattered. Aaron had watched Susanna die. Despite his apparent concern back at the Lowell farm, he would not intervene should Pa decided to kill Luke. It would be their father’s will, and that will was as good as God’s own for them. They served and did not question, and it was something Luke, despite his own years of faithful service, had never understood. If not for Momma-In-Bed’s words, he might never have comprehended why they did the things they did, and the confusion and inner conflict of emotions that had manifested itself in those days after his sister’s death might have driven him mad, or forced him to run away to escape them.
A farmer shoots the crows and sprays the bugs to protect his crop, don’t he? Momma had once told him. Shoots wild dogs and foxes and them sonofabitchin’ coyotes to keep ’em from eatin’ his chickens’n killin’ his herd, don’t he? Well, that’s what we do. We’re a rare breed, all of us, and what’s outside there in the world would love nothin’ better to destroy us because of what we believe in, because of our closeness to the Almighty God. To kill us outta jealousy because they ain’t never gettin’ so close to Him. They’re the predators, Luke. They’re the skulkin’ dogs creepin’ up on us, tryin’ to snatch you from my bosom, from God’s grace, like they did with your poor sister, fillin’ her head with sick thoughts and vile dreams, corruptin’ her till she was so diseased she went crazy and had to be put to sleep. Don’t let them do that to you, boy. Let your Papa show you how to protect yourself, and your kin.
“Luke,” Pa called. “Get your ass out here.”
It was too late. He could run, but they’d run him down. He could beg and they would ignore him.
He was going to die. Right here. Right now.
The warm breeze through the glassless window flowed over him, and still he did not move.
One by one, their heads turned to look at him. It was the scene from his worst imaginings come to life.
Y’all know what needs to be done when a dog ain’t no good no more don’tcha?
We do, Pa.
His father spat. Wiped his mouth on his sleeve. “You hear me boy?” He was holding the doctor’s gun. The gun with a single bullet left with which to end a life. His life.
Trembling uncontrollably, Luke let his hand slip from the door handle.
“Maybe he got shot,” Aaron said. Then louder, “Luke, you shot?”
Papa stared for a moment, waiting for a reply, then started to walk toward the truck. “He better be goddamn shot,” Luke heard him say.
He had seen their victims piss themselves many times over the years, had even seen the old doctor do it tonight, but had never really understood the kind of fear that could make that happen, make a person forget their dignity, and reduce them to the level of scared little children. But as he watched the lithe shape of his father striding toward him, that gun gleaming in the light from the truck, the understanding finally came to him, manifesting itself as a sudden wet warmth at his crotch. And as if everything that had been holding him back had been flushed out in that hot stream, galvanizing him into action, Luke choked back a sob and quickly scooted over into the driver seat.
“Pa?” Aaron called, in a worried voice.
Their father said nothing, but stopped walking. “Whatcha doin’ son?”
Son. It was the first time Luke had heard the man call him anything but “boy” in years, but whatever power Pa wanted it to have over him was diluted by the fact that affection didn’t suit him, and never had. His father was trying to stall him.
With clumsy hands he reached down, praying that his fingers wouldn’t find only air down there in the dark beneath the steering wheel, the keys tucked securely in Aaron’s pocket. A slight jingle of metal and he allowed himself a breath, then quickly straightened in his seat and turned the key. The engine rumbled to life.
He looked up, out into the night, into his father’s face.
The eyes looking back at him almost sucked the soul from his body, leaving him a withered empty shell with his hands clamped on the wheel.
“Don’t you fucking dare,” his father said, and his right arm rose, knuckles tight on the trigger of the doctor’s gun. Behind him, the boys were frozen, pale faces making them ghosts in the headlights.
Time seemed to stretch, as if those dark tendrils Luke had feared earlier had finally burst from Papa’s eyes and mouth, and were anchoring the truck in place, crystallizing the breath in Luke’s lungs before it had a chance to reach his mouth.
When they were kids, Aaron had once surprised a backpacker who had stumbled upon the body of her friend. Before she had a chance to
scream, he burst forth from the trees and wrenched her head around, breaking her neck. For Luke, who had been crouching on a branch above the scene, it was the first time he had heard the sound, and the memory of it had never left him. He’d heard it a hundred times since, but that first time had stayed with him because it had sounded like the hinges opening on a forbidden door, a door to a new and terrifying world he was preparing to enter.
This was the sound the gun in his father’s hand made as he slowly cocked the hammer.
“Was it the old man?” Pa called to him over the sound of the engine. “He say somethin’ that tripped the switch? Make you feel bad? Get you thinkin’ about your poor ’ol cocksuckin’ sister? Get you all choked up, wonderin’ if what we’re doin’ ain’t right?”
Luke cleared his throat, watched the exhaust fumes tumble out around his father’s feet.
“Maybe it was that pic-ture,” Pa said, mockingly. “You got a hankerin’ for some wrinkled ’ol cunt, that it?”
“Luke,” Aaron cried out, his voice unsteady. “What you doin’?”
“Fixin’ to run,” Pa answered. “Ain’t that it? He’s ready to turn his back on us. On God.”
Luke’s heart thumped so hard against his ribs he figured they could all hear it, even over the engine. His breath shuddered out of him, as he slowly brought his hand down to the gearshift and jerked it out of neutral, keeping his foot planted firmly on the brake. The vehicle rocked. The engine started to choke, and for one heart-stopping moment, Luke thought it was going to stall. But it coughed once and ran steady.
“You ain’t gettin’ far boy.”
Luke knew he was right. But then, he hadn’t far to go.
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