CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
Robert told Sarah, “There are more ways through the woods than one.”
No point in trying to figure that one out. It took all her concentration to keep from falling as they walked across the overgrown, uneven forest floor. Thank God she wasn’t wearing her State’s Attorney power pumps. Heels were good for treading on the rights of law-abiding citizens, but they were useless in the woods.
After a few hundred unsteady paces, the trees and dense underbrush gave way to a waist-high stand of grass. Sarah’s tear ducts worked overtime washing away pollen. Her nose filled up with sneezes.
She looked and listened for sounds of pursuit every few seconds. That would have made her easier to catch if the policemen hadn’t already given up the chase. They were probably afraid of poison ivy or chiggers. God knew there were plenty of both in this godforsaken wilderness.
“They’ve retrieved a stolen SUV,” said Robert. “They’ve chased two desperate felons into the forest and emptied their pistols. All in all they’ve had a pretty busy day.”
There was also the matter of the unconscious policeman lying in the shadow of his cruiser, posed like a model for a Red Cross CPR course. Who could blame his brother cops for remaining on the scene. It occurred to Sarah she’d seen four policemen rendered comatose with mushroom powder, but she’d seen none of them revive.
It was a little late to consider unpleasant possibilities, but that’s just what she did.
“Do you think the powder is dangerous?” The yellow dust had put Victoria Tiger in the hospital and killed Jimmy Mankiller’s wife. Grand theft auto was one thing; felony homicide was quite another. And then there was the moral issue. Considering that first would have been nice.
Robert told her, “It’s safer than bullets.” Years of psychotherapy had given him a facility for stating the obvious.
She’d checked the newspapers and the Internet. No mention of comatose policemen anywhere. “It would have made the news if one of those cops died. Wouldn’t it?”
“Not if the medical examiner thought he died from natural causes.” Robert’s comments weren’t helping.
“It’s not like we had any choice.” She stared daggers at Robert Collins, daring him to contradict her.
“We always have a choice.”
Damn you, Robert Collins!
Like Marie, like Archie Chatto, like Big Shorty, like the hundreds of crazy people Sarah had met in her short, eventful life, Robert didn’t grasp the most fundamental rules of empathetic conversation. She sputtered at him for a few seconds trying to explain what he hadn’t learned in two decades of human observation, but gave it up as soon as she realized which choice he was referring to.
The nearly invisible set of ruts they’d been following through the weeds split into two equally undesirable trails.
“Left, or right,” Robert said. “One way looks as good as the other.”
Sarah didn’t think either trail held much promise. “No oil on the grass between the ruts, no bent or broken weeds, no tire impressions in the dry, dusty areas. No one has been this way in a very long time.”
“Trails always lead somewhere,” Robert said, “And we can’t go back.”
“What would Archie do?”
Even though Robert must have understood Sarah’s question was rhetorical, he answered her anyway. “He’d sit quietly and watch the trails for animal activity.”
That sounded right. Wildlife would be more cautious along the most frequently used trail. It was worth a try.
Neither Robert nor Sarah had the patience of a renegade Apache, but after a thirty-minute wait with a minimum of sighs and fidgeting, rabbits emerged from the underbrush and hopped along the right hand trail. Birds and field mice also favored the pathway on the right. Only crows and other carrion eaters liked the left fork. The road most traveled by—take that, Robert Frost.
Robert and Sarah followed the “Archie trail,” keeping a careful watch for signs of human traffic. They saw scat from deer and coyote. They saw raccoon and javelina tracks. They saw a partially decomposed black Labrador retriever wearing a collar with one tag verifying his rabies vaccination and another that declared, “My name is Nig.”
Sarah saw the racially offensive appellation as a bad omen, but they continued following the “Archie trail” because there was no reason to believe the other path would be better. The problem was there were hundreds of wild acres in this region of Oklahoma where no one ever went unless they were hunting out of season or cultivating marijuana. There would be a lot of trails through this empty land, but they would be confusing and infrequently used by design. Robert and Sarah traveled only a half mile when they came to a second fork.
“We don’t have time for another wild life survey,” Sarah said. In a few hours the sun would set and all decision making would come to an abrupt halt as they fought off the mosquitoes and the evening chill. She tried to picture a map of the area in her mind.
“Lake Clayton is somewhere near,” she recalled. “We might find camping sites there, maybe even cabins.” Sarah hadn’t quite decided to abandon the search for Hashilli’s hideout temporarily, but with every setback, she moved more in that direction.
Robert was as optimistic as ever. “I know what Archie would do next.” He grabbed up a handful of dried leaves and crumbled them into organic confetti.
“We’ll let the wind lead us to Hashilli’s place!” He spoke with the enthusiasm of a newly converted Christian. He tossed the leaf fragments into the air and watched the Oklahoma wind pick them up and carry them down the left fork, dropping bits and pieces along the way like Hansel and Gretel’s trail of breadcrumbs.
“That’s how Archie would do it!”
Sarah knew Robert was exactly right. If Archie didn’t have time to rely on clues from the natural world, he’d let supernatural forces to make his decisions. As good a way as any. Whichever path they chose would take them somewhere, and somewhere was a better destination than nowhere.
They hadn’t taken more than twenty steps when a rough voice that couldn’t make its mind up whether to be male or female ordered them to stop.
“Might oughta turn around real slow,” the voice told them, “so my trigger finger don’t get nervous.”
Sarah and Robert automatically raised their hands and turned in response to the command. It was a woman who held the two at gunpoint, but Sarah didn’t think her estrogen level played a very prominent role in her appearance.
The woman’s shape didn’t look particularly masculine, but it didn’t look feminine either. More like a fireplug, Sarah thought. A fireplug dressed in worn-out blue overalls with the words, “DeKalb Seed Corn” embroidered across her chest. The woman’s hair was gray, and her face was the same color and texture as her brown work boots. There was a dense black mole on her upper lip covered with thick sprouts of hair.
Marilyn Monroe reincarnated. The thought took shape in Sarah’s mind against her will. Marilyn, slapped ugly by Karma for the sin of vanity. No doubt about it. Sarah had spent too much time in the company of crazy people.
The most important thing about the woman was her double-barrel shotgun. It had two antique looking hammers, both pulled back. The stock was varnish free and most of the bluing was worn off the barrels. The weapon might have been used to hunt squirrels sometime before statehood. The woman’s dirty finger rested on one of the two triggers. She didn’t look as though her conscience would be troubled by a couple of dead anonymous strangers.
“This is Maytubby land,” she told them. “Trespassers wasn’t never welcome here, especially them with a witch’s name on their lips.”
“You’ve got this all wrong,” Robert told her. He stepped in front of Sarah, ready to shield her from the first load of buckshot that might fly out of the incredibly large shotgun barrels at any moment. Close enough to grab the muzzle, if he wanted to plunge headlong into the afterlife. Sarah realized he was ready to do that if it would prolong her life for even a fe
w seconds.
Like a scene from one of Marie’s romance novels. Suicide as statement of devotion. More personal than a card, but way more expensive. Sarah hoped Robert would try negotiation first.
“I’m a cop,” he told the woman with the shotgun. He placed a hand very slowly and carefully into his jacket pocket and withdrew Jerry Daugherty’s badge wallet. He tossed it to the woman, hoping she would fumble the weapon. Instead, she poked him in the chest with the barrels.
She used her boot to flip the badge wallet open. She compared the face on the ID with smiling face of her captive.
“That ain’t you!” She spat a murky wad of saliva onto the gold shield.
“Pick it up,” Robert told her. “Look closer. You’ll see.”
She didn’t pick the wallet up, but she did give it another glance. Sarah hoped it was enough distraction, because Robert was reaching for one of the packets of mushroom dust he carried in his pocket. A little puff would send this woman off into the land of dreams, hopefully before she squeezed off a shot.
“Nothin’ wrong with my eyes,” she said and brought the butt of the shotgun around, clubbing Robert in the temple just as he withdrew his closed fist from his jacket pocket. “Nothin’ wrong with my wits, neither.”
Sarah sat down beside him. She cradled his bruised head in her lap. His pulse was strong and steady. His breathing was regular.
“Reckon he’ll be all right,” said the woman with the gun. “What mischief is he holding in his hand?”
Sarah pretended she did not understand.
“Open that hand,” the woman said, “or I’ll shoot you dead and open it myself.”
Sarah held Robert’s hand so that the woman could see it. She pried the fingers open one at a time until she revealed a small pyramid of powder in his palm.
“What is that?” The woman moved closer. The shotgun barrel wavered slightly.
Sarah drew a breath as deeply and silently as she could and blew into the pile of dust
Hard enough to take the icing off a birthday cake, she thought before a yellow cloud of puff ball spores covered the three of them. Hard enough to collapse a house of sticks. Hard enough . . . .
Both barrels of the shotgun discharged, singeing Sarah’s hair and spattering her face with hot sparks of nitrocellulose. Her ears rang with a cosmic test signal. In case of an actual emergency, tune to the following channel for instructions.
That was her last cogent thought for several minutes and then the spirits of the forest danced into her dreams accompanied by the banjo soundtrack from Deliverance.
Owl Dreams Page 47
