South of Evil

by Brian Dunford

  It was his lonely walk through the desert, with an inhuman load trying to break his body. He put his left foot forward. He knew it touched ground. His knees groaned, but he repeated with the other leg. He thought of sitting alone by the fire with a warm whiskey drink in hand.

  It hit him. He came to a complete stop and listened. Curtis no longer heard his footsteps. He no longer heard money being dragged. He no longer heard anything.

  He couldn’t hear Virgil. He looked around and couldn’t see him either.

  He called and heard no response. He tugged off the ropes and his skin screamed. Curtis felt his thighs tighten, like a giant fist was squeezing them, and it pinched deeper and deeper until he was free of the ropes and calling for Virgil again.

  He had the flashlight out and on, but it only shone a short distance. There was no Virgil in sight.

  Panic filled his chest. He felt the grip on his thighs return. He shouted Virgil’s name as loud as he could. Then he screamed it.

  Curtis told himself to stop. When he was calm, he breathed through his nose. This was remarkably clean air. He’d always heeded the warnings of the Mexican water, but it didn’t apply to the air. This was good stuff.

  Curtis shined the light on his feet. They were planted in the sand. His legs were beginning to shake. He looked a little further in the sand and saw a footprint. Then another. He slowly walked back in the dark, following the long flat seam in the ground from where the bundle had dragged. The bag had erased almost all of his footprints. He was pulling. He was directly in front of it. Virgil, however, had been walking and stumbling alongside. He had gone almost three hundred feet and had begun to doubt his methods. That was when he wondered if they had been followed. That was when he wondered if maybe something more hadn’t happened. How quietly could a man be killed? Very quietly, if he were sick. Even a strong man could be killed quietly if he were sick.

  The flashlight strayed a few feet from the track, and at the edge, Curtis spotted a footprint in the sand. There was another a few feet away. Curtis followed them. They wandered through the dark and into the sand, then right up to a pair of shoes with feet in them. Virgil turned slowly and blinked when he saw the light.

  “What are you doing?” Curtis asked.

  “I was walking,” replied Virgil. His tone was spacey and his eyes unfocused. When he spoke, his breath came out in little clouds.

  “Where were you going?”

  The question seemed to confuse him. He had his eyes closed.

  “I see people dancing.”

  Curtis put his hand to Virgil’s forehead. He was burning hot. He smelled bad too. In the cool crisp clean air, there was no hiding.

  “You’re having a fever dream.”

  They backtracked to the money with Virgil stumbling alongside. Curtis pulled the ropes over his chest. It hurt putting them on, but what hurt more were Virgil’s pleas.

  “I don’t need this money,” he said.

  “You’re sick.”

  “I’m not.”

  Curtis had taken the small bag that carried the ammunition. He hung it on Virgil. He unclipped the strap, hooked it around the ropes, and fastened it again.

  “This is a leash,” said Virgil.

  Curtis gave him the shotgun.

  “We need this,” he said.

  “I know.”

  “Don’t lose it.”

  “I won’t,” said Virgil.

  Curtis leaned into the ropes. They bit back.

  ***

  His body did what he wanted it to do even if his mind refused.

  Curtis ordered his foot to rise. He ordered it to trudge forward. Fresh air now had the weight of water, like sloshing through a muddy river. He ordered the foot to drop. Then came the hard part. The pull.

  His mind, however, was running amuck. He had remembered the weight of a dollar bill. It was a tiny fact learned from the IRS, buried under layers of more important stuff, but once it was out, the calculator started. It worked on its own.

  Each bill weighed one gram. From there, it was just adding zeros. He couldn’t stop himself. He focused on the money. He focused on the heft. He focused on the slow, painstaking movements, because keeping his mind busy kept his body busy. His mind busied itself more and more, stack by stack, case by case, million by million, until a huge number began to materialize in his mind. Suddenly, the big blue bundle of cash that he was dragging through the sand had been struck by the force of gravity. The number, already in the hundreds of pounds, would be that much worse if he realized it.

  Curtis noticed the satchel that was tethered to Virgil. It was sinking closer and closer to the ground. Virgil crashed through the ropes and landed in the dirt himself. Curtis felt himself being dragged backward. He ordered his legs to drop out from under him, and he landed on his hands.

  “I’m sorry,” said Virgil.

  “That’s okay,” said Curtis. “You need to get up.” Curtis had the weight of the money and Virgil’s weight on his shoulders.

  “I know,” said Virgil, but he didn’t. He just lay where he was.

  “You need to get up,” Curtis said again when he hadn’t moved.

  He still didn’t move.

  “Can you help me?” Virgil asked. It was a pathetic voice.

  The ropes came down on him like rails. Virgil was putting all of his weight on them now. His mind calculated the pounds in Virgil’s body, even though he told it not to. He added that weight. He felt that weight.

  “Get up!” Curtis shouted. It came out of nowhere. How far did sound travel through the desert at night? His voice might have travelled for miles.

  Gradually, he saw an arm rise. Then he saw a foot kicking for purchase. Virgil was tangled up in the ropes again. Curtis helped him.

  “Why are we walking?”

  “Men are after us.”

  “They’re going to kill us,” Virgil said. He said it calmly and in a light tone, as if it weren’t bad news.

  “Not me, they’re not,” said Curtis. He managed a smile. He strapped himself back into the load. He cleared his mind. He took a breath. He told his body to move.

  His body obeyed.

  ***

  The sun was up, and Curtis looked at where he was. He was in the middle of vast flatness. There was nothing distinguishing about this place. He could dig a hole right now and drop the money and be guaranteed of nothing except never finding it again.

  There was one jug left, and only half of the water remained in that. His mind started to calculate, but he stopped it. Whatever it was, it was tiny, and it had to be divided by two. Virgil stumbled, as if his feet had read Curtis’ mind. Divided by two, and one of them was dying.

  He had pretended through the night that Virgil was only sick. When the sun had risen, Virgil’s damaged skin was visible. The wound looked worse. It smelled worse. Its brightness was even brighter, and its swollenness more pronounced. The wound didn’t look angry. It was positively furious and waiting to explode.

  “When can we bury the money and go home?” Virgil asked.

  Curtis agreed that it was a good question. He found the satchel that tethered Virgil to the money. One pocket had the shotgun shells. One had the matches. He found the pocket with the binoculars.

  He scanned the horizon in front of them. This was where they were headed. All they needed was one point of distinction. A building would do. An electrical tower would work. A mailbox on the side of the road with a number on it.

  Instead, all he saw were miles and miles of nothing. He had to cover that distance when he was moving inches by the minute.

  He looked to either side, hoping for something different. He turned around and did the same. He saw where they had been.

  What he saw made his jaw drop.

  ***

  The boy remembered the advice that Strauss had given. In close, they will kill you.

  He dropped.

  He had almost run up on them. There was still distance between them. A handgun was too far to hurt him, but when
he had frozen, his vision had frozen as well. He saw a massive blue bag. It had caused the trench. He saw the one in the bright shirt and he saw the one in the dark shirt. The one in the dark shirt had killed his father. The one in the dark shirt was holding a long gun.

  ***

  Curtis tackled Virgil and held him down. Suddenly, Virgil came alive and wanted to struggle. He shouted, and Curtis covered his mouth. “There’s a sniper out there.”

  “A sniper?” Virgil asked.

  “Someone followed us.”

  “Who?”

  “I don’t know,” said Curtis, but he did. He knew very well. He knew as soon as he saw him in the binoculars.

  “It’s the boy,” he said.

  “What boy?” asked a completely perplexed Virgil.

  “The boy from the barn.”

  He could see from his face that Virgil still hadn’t made the connection His face was too red to be pale, but it was a weak pink. His lips were blistering. There was an unhealthy sheen to his skin.

  “The boy who thinks you killed his father,” said Curtis. When he saw Virgil’s eyes dilate, he knew his words had registered.

  “What’s he doing?” Virgil asked.

  “He’s coming for us,” said Curtis.

  ***

  When the boy finally poked his head up, he did so very, very slowly, and with that long gun in the forefront of his mind. He thought of what his father had taught him. He moved slower than any human being ever should. He moved like the plants grew, so gradually that not even an animal would notice. He moved slower than a cloud, and with less sound.

  When he could see, the men were gone. The blue bag was still there. That meant the men were there too. The trench was a few feet away from him. No man would carry a weight like that through the desert and then leave it without a fight.

  He had seen the Americans, and they had seen him. They wouldn’t be hiding if they hadn’t.

  The killer had a long gun. That was all he saw. If it were a shotgun, he had nothing to fear at this range. If it wasn’t a shotgun, that meant a rifle. He had a twenty-two. That was as small as rifles went. They were still out of his range. If they had a larger caliber, he might not be out of theirs.

  He tilted the rifle so the rear sights were closer to his mouth. He pursed his lips and pointed down, leaving his eyes on the desert. He blew any dust out of the aperture.

  His eyes were dry. His sights were clean. He was ready.

  ***

  Curtis leaned out again, very cautiously. It was a gamble. The boy was alone. They might be able to wait him out, wear him down, force his impatience. A boy wouldn’t be good at waiting. A boy would make a mistake.

  “I’m sorry about your father,” he heard Virgil calling.

  Curtis turned to see Virgil on his feet. He was walking back where they had come, right toward the boy. He walked past the money and into the firing line.

  ***

  The American stood up and began to walk toward him. The boy put a round in the chamber.

  He wore the same black shirt. He wore the same blue jeans. He looked dirty. He was shouting in English. He held his arms out wide.

  Stop. Count to three. He ignored the voice in his head. Before him, his father’s killer kept walking. The boy climbed to his knees and brought the rifle to his eyes. He saw him clearly. He watched him turn to a dark blur as he disappeared behind the front sight.

  Count to three.

  He remembered the long gun they had. He remembered there was another man. He remembered the range, and the caliber. He felt his finger touch the trigger.

  His eye caught movement. He ordered himself not to shoot. He lowered the sight just in time to see the American drop to the ground. The boy dropped down too.

  ***

  Curtis held him down, and this time, for good. Virgil kept calling to the boy.

  “What are you doing?” Curtis hissed. He had Virgil in a headlock and was trying to pull him backward, behind the money, to the one spot with cover in the entire desert.

  “I’m trying to say I’m sorry,” Virgil said.

  “Pull it together!” Curtis hissed.

  Virgil tried to get loose. He thrashed and kicked dust into the air. It was in their faces and their eyes. It was in their mouths.

  “I’m sorry!” Virgil shouted.

  “It doesn’t matter!” Curtis screamed. “Some things you can’t apologize for!”

  ***

  The boy let out a breath as gravity hit him. His belly was on the dirt again where it belonged.

  It was a trap. Strauss had told him to beware of these men and he hadn’t listened. They had lured him. One had presented himself as a target, and, like a fool, he had taken the bait. When he stood to take the shot, he had given away his position. He had stood when he couldn’t see the other man: the skinny one with the glasses and the stupid yellow shirt.

  He thought of the lessons he had been taught. Caution and control had been drilled into him. His father hated thrill seekers and risk takers. He watched the field in front of him. He could see the top of the blue bag. He could not see the Americans.

  ***

  The water bottle was in Virgil’s hands. It was almost empty. Curtis peeked at the area around them. There was no sign of the boy, but he was out there. This boy was patient.

  Curtis rested his head on the blue tarp. It felt good under his head. It was softer than he had expected. The miles of being dragged and shifted had softened the load. He closed his eyes for the tiniest of seconds.

  “Virgil, can you hear me?” he asked.

  “Yeah.”

  “I mean, can you really hear me?” He looked to see which version of the man he knew was with him. Would it be the sick and dazed Marc Virgil, who had barely a notion of what was at stake, or an alert but damaged Marc Virgil, who was a proven survivor?

  “We need to talk about that boy out there.”

  “You should have killed him when you had the chance,” Virgil said. He laughed a little.

  “Maybe I should have. But I didn’t. Now he’s here.”

  “Where do you think he is?”

  “I don’t know. He was a hundred or so yards that way. He moved.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I think he can hunt. I think he knows what he’s doing.”

  “The hole in my stomach agrees with you.”

  “If he has his chance, he’s going to put more holes in you. You understand that, right?”

  “Of course.” The sick and hazy Virgil was gone, at least for now.

  “He can wait. We can’t. We’re dehydrated now. We’re going to get worse. We haven’t slept in days. Eventually, I’m going to close my eyes for a minute and I won’t wake up. And you’re not well. You’re not yourself.”

  “I know. I’m sorry.”

  “It’s not your fault. You didn’t get shot on purpose.”

  Curtis broke open the shotgun, blew on the action, and slid in two shells.

  “What do you think we should do?” asked Virgil. He was well enough to be aware that there was a point to this conversation. He was well enough to see that whatever was on Curtis’ mind wasn’t good.

  “I think we should split up,” Curtis said.

  ***

  Stop. Count to three. It usually worked. But when the man who killed his father stood for the second time that day, the words turned to mist, and blood shot throughout his body.

  He saw him, dark t-shirt, the shotgun in hand, climb to his feet. He had his back to the boy. The boy had no problem with shooting him in the back. That was a kill. He saw the American look over his shoulder once, quickly, and then lean. The blue bag moved again, and he realized that the American was pulling it.

  The bag was heavy, and the man walked slowly. If he had been closer, he might have risked a shot. He was glad he was not closer. The other one was still in hiding.

  He brought the rifle up and set a bead on him. He found him in the rear sight and brought the front sight to bear on hi
m. He desperately wanted to do it.

  He realized the second man was on his feet and walking away from him. He was walking away from his partner. His ridiculous yellow shirt hung loose as he headed to the north.

  This was a trick. They couldn’t find him, and they couldn’t wait him out, so they would force his hand. He asked himself which one they wanted him to follow, but he only had to ask once. He knew who he would follow.

  The fool in the yellow shirt walked quickly. Soon, he was almost out of sight. That meant nothing. He had found their tracks effortlessly. It would take nothing to double back and hunt him. He would have to constantly look behind himself.

  Meanwhile, the man who had killed his father trudged on, loudly, obviously, and painfully slow. The boy knew it was a trap, but he didn’t care. He could live by the rules.

  Keep one just out of range. Watch for the other. Beware the long gun.

  The boy still hadn’t moved. He didn’t need to. It would take nothing to follow this man. He watched the American as he grew smaller and darker and further away, hunched over from the weight.

  The first time this man stopped or let his guard down, he was dead.

  ***

  When Curtis stood, he expected to be shot in the back of the head. It wasn’t fear. It was a certainty, and one he accepted. When Curtis got to his feet, he paused, figuring that this was it. Every muscle in his body tightened and strained. The hard part was releasing when it never came. There was nothing left to do but walk.

  Curtis walked. Virgil walked. They both walked slowly. The sun was high and hot. They needed more water to recover from yesterday, not counting today, and today was just hitting its stride. Today might kill them.

  He felt overwhelmingly guilty. It grew worse when he saw Virgil, though soon, he knew, he wouldn’t see him at all. He tried to avert his eyes. He could see Virgil struggling. He knew Virgil needed help. Instead, he walked.