The Bone Tree

by Greg Iles

  “Alphonse told me you want to talk,” he says. “You here to give me another ultimatum? That last one didn’t work out too well.”

  Yet again I note that Forrest is darker even than Sonny Thornfield was, and could well be Lincoln Turner’s father.

  “Maybe I can save us some time,” he says, impatient with my silence. “You made some serious threats yesterday. I don’t know what your plans are, and you don’t seem in a very talkative mood. But I know one thing without you saying a word. Today you know something you didn’t know yesterday, which is that loss is not theoretical.”

  I say nothing, and he takes my silence as encouragement to go on.

  “Mayor, sooner or later, your fiancée was bound to die like she did. She nearly died two months ago during that gambling mess, didn’t she? See, her way was to grab the snake by the tail and try to pull it from its hole. Henry Sexton had the same problem. He lacked an appreciation of nature’s laws. It may be a cliché, but when you enter a lion’s territory, you become prey.”

  Forrest waits for me to object, but I don’t.

  “Let’s look at how things stand as of today.” He ticks off points on his fingertips. “Your mother and daughter are still alive, which is a blessing. Your father is also alive, which isn’t ideal from my perspective, but something I can tolerate under certain conditions. Besides, Doc hasn’t got that much time left, from what I understand. As for me . . . any minute now I’ll be superintendent of the state police. The FBI may have an army wading through the swamp a few miles from here, but nothing they find there will ever be tied to me. They already searched this lodge.” He gestures around us, then leans back again, satisfied. “They found nothing. So, no worries here. The Double Eagles aren’t going to say a word to anybody, especially since that planted meth disappeared from the evidence room at the Concordia Parish Sheriff’s Office.”

  Forrest stops talking and regards me with the seemingly detached interest of a poker player. But the animal cleverness in his eyes tells me that, despite his calm affect, he’s trying to decide whether I’m an annoyance that can be mollified or a threat that must be eliminated.

  “The long and the short of all this,” he concludes, “is that I’m content with the way things stand. You paid a heavy price, granted, but I’m hoping you’re smart enough to count the blessings you still have, rather than dwell on what you lost.”

  When my silence becomes intolerable to him, he gives me an odd look and says, “I think it’s time for you to talk, Mayor.”

  “You ordered Caitlin’s death,” I say softly. “I can prove that.”

  Knox blinks twice but otherwise shows no surprise.

  “You also raped Viola Turner when you were sixteen. Like father, like son, right? Grandfather, too.”

  Now some color has come into his cheeks. With any other man, I’d have expected to see blood drain from them, but Forrest Knox is not a man to run from threats. “Go on,” he says, “if you have more to say.”

  “You raped another woman, too, at the Bone Tree. I don’t have her name yet, but I will. You probably raped a dozen or more over the years, right? Killed them, too.”

  Forrest cocks his head as though unsure of my sanity. Then he gives me a broad, conspiratorial smile that reveals gleaming yellow teeth. “Let me tell you a little secret, Mayor. If you’ve never taken a woman by force, you’ve never had a woman. Do you understand?”

  “I can’t say that I do.”

  Knox gives me a skeptical look. “Are you sure? See, it’s the same as with killing. Until you’ve killed a man, you haven’t become a man. I know you know that, because you’ve killed men. You know it transforms you. Most men don’t, these days. That’s why I’m paying you the courtesy of this audience. But there are many levels to the mystery of life, Mayor. And at bottom, what you learn is that there is no mystery. There are sheep and there are wolves. That’s it. You follow?”

  “Maybe you’d better enlighten me.”

  “Since you’re not wearing a wire, I will.” Knox takes a tin of Copenhagen from his desk drawer and stuffs a plug behind his bottom lip. “The only gods who ever existed were men who had the courage to live as gods. You follow? Men who seized the power of life and death, embraced it, ruled through it.”

  “You’re the Ubermensch, huh?”

  “You think I’m ignorant,” he says, betraying some bitterness. “Unread, like my father. But you’re wrong. You, your father, Henry Sexton . . . do you know what kind of men you are? You’re the ones who plant crops in the river valleys, who invent gods, who pray for rain. You build houses and write laws, then beg forgiveness for every natural impulse.”

  Knox leans forward, puts his elbows on his desk, and speaks with naked disdain. “I’m nothing like you. I’m like my father was. We’re the men who swept down off the steppes on horseback like a storm. We burned your cities, devoured your crops, salted your fields, pillaged your treasure, raped your women, and left them pregnant and wailing. Men like your father took black slaves to do the hard work, then mated with them and corrupted both races. But to us, you’re all slaves: to be used, worked, fucked . . . and finally killed, if necessary.”

  “You did some mating yourself, I believe,” I say in a neutral voice. “In fact, I’m pretty sure you’re Lincoln Turner’s father.”

  Forrest barks a laugh. “So? What could I possibly care about that?”

  “You’re as guilty of corrupting your race as anybody else. That’s my point.”

  Knox leans sideways and spits in a trash can. “The difference is, I don’t give a shit whether some nigger whelp lives or dies. A man takes his pleasure where he will and moves on, same as the buck.”

  “You’re full of shit, Knox.”

  Startled from his rant, he regards me as he might some a mentally defective child. “How’s that?”

  “You think you fucked Viola Turner, but she fucked you ten times over.”

  Suspicion comes into his face. “What are you talking about?”

  “Viola Turner killed your father, dipshit. She killed the great Frank Knox.”

  At last my words have struck home. The whites of Forrest’s eyes have grown larger. “Are you drunk?” he asks softly.

  “I wish I was. It’s hard to think about this shit sober. But I’m going to, because you need to hear it. See, two days after you and your father’s crew raped Viola, Frank was brought into my father’s office, hurt. Viola saw her chance at payback and took it. She injected him with enough air to stop his heart. That doesn’t sound much like a sheep, huh? I’ll tell you something else, too. My father saw it happen, and he didn’t do a damned thing to stop it. He watched your father die like a dog, Forrest. Not a lion. A dog. Or a sheep, maybe.”

  Knox’s Adam’s apple bobs in his throat.

  “Frank Knox died in terror on a cold tile floor,” I press on. “He died helpless and begging for mercy from a black woman who cursed him while he bled out.”

  Forrest has gone so still that I wonder if he’s even breathing. The blood has finally drained from his face. He raises a callused hand and rubs his jaw, the sound like the scrape of sandpaper.

  “Doesn’t sound like the death of a Hun to me,” I say simply. “Sounds like one more broke-dick factory worker too dumb to see death coming for him.”

  Knox’s eyes have narrowed to slits, yet I sense that he no longer sees me. Rather, he sees his father dying under the hand of a woman they both raped nearly forty years ago. Suddenly his eyes clear, and I feel the single-minded stare of a true predator upon me.

  “You just signed your daddy’s death warrant,” he whispers. “Your mother’s, too. And your kid. And last of all . . . you. You’re going to watch them all die, Cage. And then, when you least expect it . . . I’ll step out of the shadows and gut you.”

  In the wake of Caitlin’s death, his threats mean nothing to me. Perhaps this is a sign that my mind has come unmoored from reality.

  “I’d like to do it now,” he says. “But too many people know
you’re here.” His eyes suddenly flash with comprehension. “Or do they?” He raises a hand and points at me. “You came here to kill me, didn’t you? You want to cut my fucking throat. Only you can’t do it without going to jail.” A weird glint comes into his eyes. “Shit, Cage, you might just have some potential after all. Same as your old man. I guess Daddy was right. The blood never lies.”

  I take a deep breath, then slide back my chair and get to my feet.

  “You going somewhere?” Forrest asks.

  “Yes. But you haven’t seen the last of me.”

  “Oh, I know that. Well . . . there’s one thing I forgot to mention. I’d spare you, but the medical examiner’s going to tell you anyway, so I might as well enjoy it.”

  Something in me rises to his goad, like iron filings to a magnet. “What are you talking about?”

  Just before he answers, I feel a sickening dread that he’s going to tell me he raped Caitlin—which I could not bear. Because of her past experiences, Caitlin had a special hatred for rape, and it was an ever-present fear.

  “Your fiancée was pregnant,” Forrest says. “Ain’t that a shame? You thought you just lost one person, but you lost two.”

  For a moment I lose track of his voice, so loudly is my blood rushing in my ears. “How do you know that?”

  “She told the nigger who killed her, when she was pleading for her life. She figured he might spare her, I guess. And the truth is, he might’ve. He was awfully upset about shooting her when he came out of that swamp. He was talking crazy. Scared to death.”

  “But you killed him,” I say in a flat voice.

  Knox laughs again. “Alphonse did. Stuck a knife in his gizzard, to make sure he stayed quiet. You know what Daddy always said: a man’s worst enemy is his mouth.”

  My next breath is a gasp, and I realize I haven’t breathed for so long that I’m dizzy from oxygen deprivation.

  “He was right,” I whisper, more to myself than to Knox. Without looking away from his eyes, I gauge the distance to the holster hanging in the corner. Twelve feet. Knox’s knees are still under the desk. . . .

  Two backward steps cause me to bump into the giant razorback standing on its pedestal. Turning as though surprised, I lay my hands on the shaft of the spear.

  “That’s no toy,” Forrest says. “That’s a man’s weapon. You think you could kill a monster like that?”

  “What do you call this thing?” I ask dully.

  “A spear, or a dart. But you throw it with an atlatl, which comes from a Nahuatl word, which is Aztec.”

  My eyes go once more to the pistol in the corner. It’s too far away.

  “That’s gotta hurt about your girl,” Knox says with mock sympathy. “She could’ve been carrying a son. Guess you’ll never know now, unless you ask the M.E. to check.”

  He’s pushing me to go for the gun. With the speed and power of a man with everything to lose, I yank upward on the shaft of the spear. For a sickening moment the whole animal rises, and I sense Forrest aiming a gun at my back—but then the shaft slips free and I’m whirling with the gleaming black point before me.

  Forrest is moving too, shoving back his chair and reaching for something below my line of sight. I lunge toward him, but the distance is too great. Then, just as his bright pistol clears the desktop, the wheeled chair skates backward and he grabs for the edge of the desk with his free hand. In that instant of uncertainty, I drive the spear into the hollow at the base of his throat. His blinding muzzle blast scorches my face, but I cling to the shaft and drive forward until the point strikes bone.

  Knox’s hands fly to his throat, and his gun caroms off the wall behind him. His eyes follow its path, but instead of chasing that pistol, he hurls his body toward the corner, reaching for the gun on the coatrack. The spear point goes with him, but the shaft remains in my hands. As his right hand closes on the holster, I twist the shaft with all my strength and jab it forward. There’s a sharp crack, then Knox drops like a puppet whose operator has snipped its strings.

  His weight tugs the spear from my hands, but the threat is no more. My final thrust must have severed his spinal cord. Forrest Knox lies on his side, the spear lodged in his neck, blinking mechanically and gasping like a catfish dying on a riverbank. His gray lips are fast turning blue, and the only emotion I see in his eyes is horror.

  The sound of the door behind me registers too late.

  By the time I turn, Alphonse Ozan is aiming his pistol at my chest. He takes two steps into the room, far enough to see what’s happened to his boss. When he looks back at me, his eyes blaze with rage.

  “You just killed a cop,” he says. “You die for that. And nobody will even question why.”

  I’m weaponless, but it hardly matters. He’s got me cold. All I can think about is Annie wondering why she had to lose her father as well as her mother. But I can’t simply stand helpless and wait for his bullet.

  As my legs tense to spring, a soft creak comes from behind Ozan, and he whirls. Before he can fully turn, a silver blade flashes down, slicing through his shoulder and deep into his chest. The blasts from his pistol deafen me, but the rounds blow harmlessly through the floor.

  When Ozan falls, I see Walt Garrity standing framed in the doorway behind him. He looks as dazed as a sleepwalker awakened in the midst of traffic. The curved blade of the katana jutting from Ozan’s back pulses for a few seconds, then goes still.

  “Walt! Are you okay?”

  “Is Knox dead?”

  Forrest’s eyes are closed, his face gray.

  “He’s dead.”

  “Come on, then.” Walt beckons me forward. “We’ve got to get out of here.”

  “What’s the point? There’s no running from this.”

  He starts to reply, but then he touches the back of his head. When his hand comes away, I see blood. Lots of it.

  “Ozan hit me with his pistol,” he explains. “I’m foggy, Penn. We’ve got to move.” Walt rolls Ozan over, wipes down the hilt of the sword with his shirttail, then pulls me to the door. “Did they take anything that belongs to you?”

  “I didn’t bring anything but my gun.”

  “Find it. I’m going to do what I can in here.”

  As I hunt through the main room, Walt calls from the study: “I saw game cameras on my way in. Mounted on trees. I avoided them, and I took the memory cards on the ones I saw. We’ll just have to hope I got them all.”

  At last I find my .357 in the drawer of a maple cabinet. “We can’t get away clean on this,” I shout. “You need a hospital.”

  The old Ranger marches out of the study and grabs my shirt front, his eyes wild. “Listen to me, goddamn it. Think about your kid, okay? Even if Tom gets out of jail, he doesn’t have long to live. Which means you’re the only one left to take care of the women. You get it? So get your ass moving!”

  “Okay,” I tell him, following toward the front door. “But you’re hurt, man. You need a doctor.”

  “All that matters now is getting clear of this place. We don’t know who else might be out there.”

  He stops me at the door, then opens it a crack and peers through. “We’ve got to run for it. We’ll take the car you brought and drive to mine. I’m down the drive a ways. I don’t know if anybody’s out there, but we’ve got no choice. You ready?”

  “I’m right behind you.”

  “If I’m hit, don’t stop. Get the hell away, and call Kaiser or Mackiever. Nobody else.”

  I nod, recalling the night I told Henry Sexton something similar.

  Walt shoves open the door and goes flying down the stairs with amazing speed for an old man. I leap off the porch and quickly pass him, racing for my mother’s Camry.

  “Go!” he yells. “Go, go, go! Start the car!”

  When the Camry’s engine roars to life under my hands and feet, a manic exhilaration blasts through me. Then Walt slams into the door, yanks it open, and gets in beside me. Three seconds later, we’re fishtailing down the road toward the highway
.

  “I’ll tell you where to stop,” he says breathlessly, one hand cupped behind his bloody head. “I’m in Pithy’s maid’s car.”

  “Screw that. You’re coming home with me.”

  “I can’t. I’ve got to take care of something.”

  “What?”

  Walt digs in his pants pocket, then opens his hand beside the steering wheel. In his palm lies a small silver key.

  “What’s that?”

  “I found it in Forrest’s pocket.”

  “What does that fit?”

  “I don’t know. But I think it may be a padlock. I mean to find out.”

  “How?”

  “Stop here! I’m parked right through those trees.”

  I slam the brake pedal and skid to a stop near where he pointed. “You’re crazy if you go off by yourself now. You could die, Walt.”

  When he shakes his head, the look in his eyes tells me it’s pointless to say another word.

  “Get back to your mother, Penn. Your mother and Annie. You were never here.”

  CHAPTER 89

  THE BLOOD WAS still wet when Billy Knox walked into his office at Valhalla and saw his cousin lying dead in the corner with Alphonse Ozan sprawled across his legs. Billy had asked his pilot to wait down at the airstrip in case he wanted to make a swift exit, and he thanked God he had. But after the first rush of panic eased, he decided to learn what he could before running back to Texas.

  Taking a small Walther from his ankle holster, Billy moved quickly through the office. The floor safes behind the desk were open—open and empty. His second instinct was to call Snake, but then it struck him that his father had been out of jail long enough to have done this himself.

  Billy propped his butt on the edge of the desk he’d sat at for so many hours and stared at the sword jutting from Ozan’s back.

  What’s the smart move? he wondered. What would Forrest do?

  Then he realized that the man he’d always looked to for guidance was dead. For the first time in his life, he was truly on his own.

  Before he could make any decision, he had to know whether his father was behind this or not. This desire triggered the first brilliant idea Billy had had in a long time. Keeping his pistol in his hand, he slipped out through the glass doors and trotted around to the front of the lodge, moving swiftly from tree to tree. There were eight or ten game cameras between the lodge and the main road, and at least fifty more on the larger property. But it was the ones near the drive that interested Billy.