by Tim Johnston
Moran stepped to the front of the cruiser and stood looking at the shot-out headlight. Then he walked back to Gordon and stopped before him, his hands on his sheriff’s belt. “Well, Gordon, we’ve got us a situation here. I put you in cuffs and take you in, you’re gonna have to explain why you decided to ambush me, and I can’t say I’m too crazy about that idea. On the other hand, you have committed serious crimes here, felonious crimes, and damn well could’ve blown my head off to boot.”
He looked up into the trestles then, or the dark sky beyond them, and it was the kind of thing a man would do just before he pulled his pistol and shot you dead, and Gordon considered what that would be like—to be shot dead where he stood. To fall back in the snow and feel the life drain out of you, to see the world go dark. And the face that came to him then, that hovered over him in his last seconds, was not his own daughter’s, but Audrey Sutter’s, Oh, Mr. Burke . . . what were you thinking?
But Moran did not pull his pistol and shoot him. He looked at Gordon again and said, “Give me that hat.”
“What?”
“The hat. Give it here.”
Gordon reached up and felt the hatbrim. There was a hat on his head. He took it off and handed it to Moran.
Moran held the hat in one hand, turning it upside down and righting it again.
“That’s what I thought,” he said. “Not even the real deal.” And he turned and flicked the hat Frisbee-style over the rail and they watched it fall out of the light and into the darkness below the bridge. Wherever the hat landed it made no sound. As if it had never landed at all.
“Tell you what, Gordon,” Moran said, facing him again. “I think we’d best call this whole thing a wash. I’ll take care of this headlight and you go on home and get some sleep. Some serious sleep. I won’t tell anyone you pointed a loaded rifle at me, and you’ll get some sense into your head again.” He stood staring at him. “That work for you?”
Gordon said nothing. He hadn’t moved since he’d let go of the rifle. He did not know if he would ever move again. Just stand here until the blood stops flowing, until the heart stops beating. Some old farmer coming along in his pickup and seeing the Crown Vic, seeing you standing here in the middle of the bridge, in the snow, Blue and just stone-dead on his feet, Officer, never seen nothin like it in all my days . . .
“Go home, Gordon,” said Moran. “We both of us dodged one here, and tomorrow will look a whole lot better.”
Moran turned then and walked back to his cruiser. He took off his hat and climbed in, and there was the sound of the shifter dropping into gear, and the single headlight began to withdraw toward the far end of the bridge. When the light was beyond the bridge it swung away, lighting up the trees to the side of the road, and then it swung away again as Moran completed his three-point turn and accelerated back the way he’d come. The two red taillights trailed away into the darkness until they were small as the eyes of an animal, and Gordon watched as they rounded the bend, as they shone briefly on the county road, as they blinked through the trees and were gone.
56
She had seen a light, several lights, small and moving way off in the darkness, way off in the trees, and she’d said, There’s someone in the park, Daddy.
What?
There’s someone in the park.
She was nine and riding shotgun. They’d been out for pizza and they were driving home and it was November and already dark out and you could see the moving lights from the road that went alongside the park; they looked like jumpy little fairies way deep in the woods. He’d leaned to look past her and after a moment said, That’s a sharp eye, Deputy. Why are there flashlights in the park at this hour?
Because it’s dark out, Sheriff.
Why are there people in the park at this hour, I meant.
Are we going to check it out?
Well, he said. He watched the road ahead. Then he turned to her again. What do you think, Deputy?
She didn’t like going into the park at night. At night the park was not a park; it was a woods so dark and deep it made the hair on your arms stand just to think about it—and that was before they pulled Holly Burke out of the river.
I think we’d best check it out, Sheriff.
All right then, he said, and they pulled into the park and drove toward the far-off lights. There were three of them, they saw as they came closer, but when they rounded the bend toward the river the lights all blinked out and did not come on again.
He pulled over and switched on his spot and swept it over the line of trees that ran between the road and the river, lighting up the trunks one by one like faces, and the beam lighting up the black water in the distance between the trees, and he swept it over the white wooden cross and its faded flower wreath, and lastly he swept it over the trees of the woods on the other side of the road.
They’re gone now or else they’re just gonna ride this out, he said.
Who?
The people with the flashlights. Who do you think?
She didn’t answer—not so sure now that it was people at all. Or flashlights.
He got on the speaker and said, The park is closed after dark. Go home. Then they sat in the silence watching the woods for any movement, but there was none, and Audrey turned back to look at the white cross and the wreath, visible in the glow from the headlights.
That’s where it happened, isn’t it, she said.
He looked where she was looking. Then he placed his hand on her head and moved it like a hairbrush to the back of her head and then down to her neck, and gently squeezed.
That’s where she went into the river, yes.
Did Mr. Burke put the cross there?
I don’t know. I don’t think so.
Who did then?
I don’t know. Someone who knew her. Friends, maybe.
Will it stay there, like a gravestone?
Probably not. The park will probably remove it.
She thought about that. They were silent.
And you’re going to find who did it? she said.
Yes, I am. He looked at her. Sweetheart—are you worried about that?
She shook her head. She thought she would cry and she didn’t know why, but she didn’t cry. She said, No, Sheriff. I know you will.
But he hadn’t, and the cross had been removed and there were no more flowers or stuffed animals or notes or anything at all to mark the place where Holly Burke had been hit by a car, they said, and thrown into the river still alive, still breathing, they said. There was the bank of snow, shaped by the snowplow blade, and there were the pine trees—jack pines, she thought—and there was the snow between the pines where someone had walked not long ago, and beyond that there was the wide frozen river, patches of icy black in the snow, and all of it lit weirdly blue by a bright, lopsided moon.
Audrey had not been standing long, three minutes maybe, between two pines, looking at the footprints in the snow, when she saw the light, as she’d seen the lights ten years ago from outside the park, and this light was coming along through the park as her father had come along back then, and she took it to be the headlamp of a motorcycle—but who would be riding a motorcycle in the snow and ice? And it wasn’t a motorcycle; it was a car with one of its headlights out, some kid or drinker or both cutting through the park in his beater car to avoid the cops.
She’d pulled the sedan over as far as she could against the bank of snow and there was room to get by if the driver was not too drunk, and she stood between the pines watching the single light snake its way through the woods until it came around the bend and shone briefly in her eyes like her father’s spot and she closed her eyes until the light passed on. When she opened them again she saw the SUV, the sheriff’s cruiser, pulling up behind the sedan. It was not local. It was the same Iowa sheriff’s cruiser she’d seen in her driveway when he came to show her the pictures, and seeing it again here in the park she knew one thing absolutely: he’d followed her. Had waited for her somewhere near the house and followed
her here.
But why would he do that?
And how had she not seen it—a one-eyed car tailing her across town?
He parked the cruiser behind the sedan but did not get out and she could see his profile in the lights of his dash. She held her breath so he would not see the clouds. Her heart was pounding.
He sat looking at the sedan in his headlight. Then the headlight blanked out and the engine went silent and the last of the exhaust slipped away and he turned and looked right at her where she stood in the pines.
He stepped out of the cruiser and put his hat on and shut the door behind him and stood looking at her.
She let out her breath.
He put his hands in his jacket pockets and walked across the road, the packed snow grinding under his bootsoles like glass. He reached the banked-up snow and stopped.
“Now what in the heck are you doing out here?” he said.
“I could ask you the same thing,” she said.
He cocked his head. “I’m here because you’re here and this park is closed after dark, which I know you know full well.”
“And you’re out of your jurisdiction, Deputy.”
“Sheriff, young lady. And don’t get smart with me.”
She looked to her left and to her right, as if some other car might be coming along. She looked toward the far road that ran alongside the park, but there were only trees and darkness, the weird blue light of the moon, and she wondered how you could see flashlights this deep in the park from the road yet not see the lights of the road from here. Like you had traveled deeper than you thought. Or that the physics of time and distance changed once you entered the woods, as it did in fables and certain ghost stories.
She thought of her father’s phone. Saw it sitting on the passenger seat of the sedan, charging. Stupid.
She looked at Moran again. From where he stood on the road it was four, maybe five big steps through the snow to where she stood. Even if she could get by him and get to the car—even if you got in it what would be the point? Who would you call? A cop is chasing me . . .
Her nose was running and she drew her good hand under it and returned her hand to the jacket pocket. The keys were there. She arranged them between her knuckles, sharp ends out. She wondered for the first time what had become of Caroline’s pepper spray—if the little canister had been carried away or if it had ended up in the hands of her parents down in Georgia.
Behind her was the riverbank and the short drop down to the ice.
“What do you want?” she said.
“What do you mean what do I want?”
“What do you want to let me go?”
He stared at her. He removed one hand from its pocket to tip his hatbrim up on his forehead and returned the hand to the pocket.
“Do I look like I’m keeping you from going anywhere? What in the heck has gotten into everybody around here lately? Did you know your old buddy shot out my headlight earlier tonight? Shot it out with a deer rifle.” He turned to look at the front of the cruiser.
“What old buddy,” she said, although she knew.
He turned back to her. “Who do you think? Your old buddy Gordon Burke.”
“What did you do to him?” Her jaw was trying to chatter but she would not let it.
“What did I do to him? Honey, he was the one holding the rifle. What do you think I did? I talked him down and sent him home. Told him to get some sleep and just give all this nonsense a rest.” He watched her. “I’m thinking you need to do the same. I’m thinking you are somewhat out of your depth here.”
“I talked to Katie Goss,” she said. “I know what you made her do.”
“Now, see there—that’s exactly what I’m talking about.” He shook his head. “I didn’t put it together right away, when I had that deer rifle pointed at my head. But afterwards I thought to myself, now who would go talking to Katie Goss all these years later, and who would tell Gordon Burke about it? And then I remembered a phone call I got from a man, day or two ago, telling me about a certain someone coming into his place of business, asking questions about Danny Young.” He raised his hand again to tap a finger on his temple. Returned the hand to its pocket.
“And so I decided to drive on up here and just have this out, just straighten this all out before someone gets hurt for real. But then I see you driving off and I think, Now where’s she going? And turns out you were going here.” He looked around at the pines, the snow, the ice beyond her. “What did you think you’d find, hey? Something your daddy and us never saw?”
He watched her. She said nothing. Did nothing.
“What ever happened to you, anyway?” he said. “You used to be this quiet, shy girl.” He gave her a kind of smile. “I think you even liked me, once upon a time.”
“I think you’re mistaken.”
“No, I’m pretty sure you had yourself a little crush, back in the day.”
She shuddered. It was all so familiar. She’d been here before, at just this moment. There was a foulness and a bitterness in the air. The stink of a greasy hand.
“You’re pathetic,” she said, and he stopped smiling.
“I’m pathetic. Is that what you said? Are you forgetting who you’re talking to?”
“I know exactly who I’m talking to. I know all about you.”
He looked down and shook his head. Then he looked up again. Staring at her with those bug eyes. “I think you’d best come on outta that snow now, before you get yourself into some real trouble. Come on now.”
“I won’t do it,” she said. “I won’t do what Katie did. You’ll have to kill me.”
“Kill you?” He stared at her. “I knew you when you were in pigtails. I watched you grow up. Your dad was my boss. And now you stand there talking to me like that?”
“My dad knew what you were. He knew. He just didn’t have the proof.”
Moran grinned crookedly and huffed a smoky laugh and looked back toward the road. No lights. No one coming or going. Nothing but the trees and the moon.
And then he stepped up over the bank of snow and he was coming for her. “We’re done talking. Let’s go.”
She backstepped, keeping the distance between them, the river at her back—the bank how many steps away? She would not turn to look. Would not take her eyes off him.
He stopped and stared at her. “Where do you think you’re going?” He reached behind him and there was a flash of moonlight on chrome and a rattle like dog tags. “We can do this the easy way or the hard way, honey.” He swung the cuffs as if to dazzle her with them, their shininess, as you would a child. If he got them on her that was it, it was all over.
“Is that what you told Holly Burke?” she said, and the cuffs stopped swinging. Moran watching her, dark-eyed under the hatbrim. The breaths pulsing from his nostrils.
“You have no idea how crazy you sound,” he said, and stepped forward again, and again she backstepped. The bank was there . . . so close. He took another step and she backstepped, and her boot fell through space and she followed it down—stumbling backwards, arms rowing in the air and both legs going out from under her. She landed on her back and went sliding down the short ramp of the riverbank and she knew what was next and raised her head so that she struck the ice with her shoulders, then watched as her legs, following some instinct of their own, carried on overhead, her boots swinging through the stars and landing toe-first in two heavy chops behind her, ice chips flying, so that when she looked up again she was on her hands and knees on the ice and facing the bank she’d come down backwards.
Moran stepped to the edge of the bank and stood looking down on her.
“Come up off of there,” he said.
She shuffled backwards on her hands and knees, then got to her feet. She stood listening, feeling—her heart pounding, remembering the water when she first went in, the shock of it, how the entire body jolted in amazement, in disbelief. At the same time, standing there, she knew she would not fall through again, and it was silly, it was irr
ational, but she believed that the ice knew her. Or the feel of her, her particular weight and stance. She and the ice had a history, and after all it was the same river here as it was across the state line . . .
Moran took a small, careful step down the bank, his hand held out to her, and she turned then and walked out onto the ice.
“Wouldn’t do that if I were you,” he said. “That ice ain’t as thick as it used to be.”
She continued on, putting distance between herself and the bank. When he shut up she could hear the thin dunes of snow compressing under her boots, could hear the blood beating in her ears and nothing more—no cracks, no pops. Ten. Fifteen. Twenty steps before she stopped and looked back. He wasn’t following. She’d had her hands out for balance and now she slipped them back into the jacket pockets. She stood facing him. The ice would be thinnest in the middle of the river but she would go there if she had to, and beyond, all the way across and into the nameless woods on the far bank.
“Just gonna stand there all night, is that the idea?” He didn’t have to shout; his voice carried easily over the hard, flat surface.
She said nothing. The river made no sound—not the ice, not the water flowing beneath it, although it did flow; she could feel it, like her own blood. So fast and silent in its dark rushing and so cold.
Moran folded the cuffs and returned them to their place on his belt. He watched her. Then he took another sideways step down the bank, took one more and then onto the ice, one boot only, but that was enough—she felt the change before it reached her: a shift, a shooting nerve that ran through the ice and expressed itself, finally, in the smallest pop, just beneath her boots.
She took her hands from her pockets.
The ice sighed, it took a breath—then pitched beneath her. A sharp edge rose like a fin, and her boots slipped down the incline of it and she fell to her chest on the upended slab and slid legs-first into the water, plunging into the dark and the cold up to her ribs, clinging to the upended slab of ice, and there was the moment before the cold soaked through her clothes, and then it simply squeezed the breath from her like great jaws clamping down. She clung to the slab of ice but her own weight pushed it under, dunked it like a smaller body she meant to drown and it slipped under the surface of the ice and she let go and grabbed for the ice itself and she could hear the slab scraping and knocking along the underside of the ice, carried away by the same current that shoved her against the edge and pulled at her legs.