The Best American Mystery Stories 2020

by C. J. Box

  Twenty feet away was the land of the dead, where Hannah lay, now and forever.

  “Ever see anybody bleed to death, Reverend Brown?” William said abruptly, and felt a rush of pleasure as the complacent face on the man of God melted away.

  “I can’t say that I have,” he answered. “I’ve been at the bedside of the dying—”

  “Ever seen someone you love bleed to death, regardless of what you did, ever watched the life seep out of them until their heart stopped and they lay staring at you, cold and dead? Ever put them away in the ground, Reverend, under six feet of earth and left them there and gone home alone?”

  The minister’s face was somber now. William feared the man would reach for the Bible and start flipping pages, but he didn’t.

  “No, I haven’t, William. I’ve lost loved ones, of course. Who hasn’t?”

  “Of course,” William said, but in truth he had no mind for other folks’ loved ones at the moment. “I’ll tell you something, Reverend. I do appreciate you trying to help me catch these boys. I don’t know if they’ll even come or not, but at least we did what we could and maybe the Grant boy can rest in peace knowing that. But I can’t say I want the Almighty here too, in the form of that book you keep reading. I don’t have much use for the book or its subject.”

  William felt a strange sense of liberation, as if he had just had words with God himself, expressing an anger that had existed since time began. He waited for the preacher to sermonize, but the blasted man just kept looking at him, waiting. William decided to give him what he was waiting for.

  “You said at Hannah’s funeral that we’d see her again. Well, it doesn’t make me feel any better that I’ll see her in fifty years or ten years. I want to see her tonight. I want to see her now.” He stopped and thought of her just thirty yards away and forever beyond his grasp, and the cruelty of it enraged him. “Can you show me,” he said, nearly choking on his own anger, “can you show me one verse in that damned Bible of yours that justifies a mother being taken from two daughters who need her? One reason that makes sense, why God allowed her to bleed to death when he could have spared her?” By the last sentence he was shouting. He couldn’t help himself.

  “No, I can’t, William,” the preacher said. “There’s absolutely nothing in the Bible to make sense of it, and no one could truthfully say that there is.”

  William waited for the next part, for the list of buts—but our Heavenly Father knows what’s best; but we have to rely on faith alone; but Hannah was called by God to be an angel; but we’ll all understand one day. Instead the minister was finished. A fountain of rage that had been building for weeks and would have erupted if the man had said more suddenly eased off and dissipated. William slumped against a tree trunk and took a deep breath. The blister had burst at last and had not killed him.

  He was still catching his breath when they heard more hoofbeats. The minister held up one hand for silence as the animals slowed and then stopped in front of the church. Around them the spring peepers abruptly fell silent.

  * * *

  “It’s them all right,” Mark whispered into the darkness. He had extinguished the lantern on hearing the horses being led around to the back of the church.

  Lying low, silent and motionless, they heard intermittent talking and a loud nervous giggle coming from behind the church. After a pause of several moments, a light sprang to life near the building. While William watched, it diminished slightly and then began moving from the back of the church to the lower end of the cemetery.

  “They’ve got a lantern,” he whispered from where he lay stretched on his belly. “They just turned it down because they don’t want to be seen back there at work. I did the same thing when I dug the boy up last night.”

  Finally the lantern stopped moving and appeared to hover in the air for several moments. Then they set it down and William heard the sound he had been hoping for since a row of shiny gold teeth had popped into his mind like a dream. They were digging in the earth, lifting the soil away from a boy they had robbed once and now a corpse that they hoped to rob again. William smiled.

  A half hour passed and then another and William thought his soul would burst from the flesh, he was so impatient for the final scene to begin. At last, when the boys were waist deep, he whispered to the preacher, “Let’s move up now. They’re about halfway down and concentrating on the dirt under their feet. They’re not going to look up for another half hour at least. I’ll go first and find us a good spot. When you hear me stop, count to ten slow, then feel your way up till you find me.”

  William moved forward on his hands and knees, putting his weight down silently like a cat stalking his prey. He stopped once, when they did, and waited for them to rest. After a moment he realized he might be missing just the thing he’d come to hear and so began moving forward again, an inch at a time. By the time he had gotten close enough to understand their words, they had taken up the shovels and gone back to work.

  In a few minutes the Reverend Brown came up beside him, shaking and kissing the heel of his palm. “Sweetgum balls,” he whispered when William glanced at him. “How much deeper do you guess they’ll go before they start wondering?”

  “We’ve got another good half hour of waiting time, I’d say. Settle down and get comfortable. Go to sleep if you want to. I’ll nudge you if they start getting peevish.”

  “I’d just as soon keep my eyes open, William. Have you noticed those rifles they’ve got at the edge of that hole they’re working in?”

  “Sure,” William said, patting the stock of his shotgun. “I’m ready for ’em,” he added, and then fell silent and watched as the diggers went deeper and deeper, their breath now tearing in and out of their lungs like fire. They spoke little, and when they did, the words were muffled by the thrusting and pulling of shovels.

  “William,” Mark whispered after a bit, “you think we’ll be able to hear them from here? I can’t understand a word they’re saying.”

  “We’re gonna have to,” William said, “because we can’t risk getting any closer. I don’t think we’ll have a problem once they get back on the surface and Eddie’s temper gets fired up.”

  The Reverend Brown nodded and the ground crackled as he shifted his position. Still they watched as the diggers went down into the ground, until at last they were watching shovelfuls of soil flying up from a gaping hole in the earth. When one of the boys scrambled up and out and took the lantern back into the pit with him, William gripped the preacher’s arm.

  “Get your ears ready, Mark. I reckon they’ve gone far enough now to start expecting their reward.”

  For fifteen minutes there was nothing but an unearthly glow from the grave and random scrapings and William knew they were checking for substance beneath the soil. There was some indistinct mumbling, then more soil came flying out of the open hole, and more scraping, and finally Wendell Pike’s head and the lantern appeared at the edge of the pit. In a moment the rest of him followed, hoisted up by Eddie. When Eddie followed and thrust his shovel into the ground like a spear, William held his breath.

  “How far down do you reckon they put him?” Wendell said, and his voice had a nervous edge to it that William relished. “We musta gone six feet by now.”

  “Yeah, we’ve gone six feet,” Eddie said, stalking around the grave but looking at Wendell. “We went six feet pretty damn quick seems like to me. That dirt lifted up mighty easy, like it’s been lifted up before, lately. What do you guess, Wendell?”

  “What the hell are you talking about?” Wendell answered, turning with Eddie as he paced back and forth. “Of course it was lifted easy. He ain’t been put down but a couple of weeks.”

  “You know damn good and well what I’m talking about,” Eddie said, his voice rising a few notches. Good, William thought, his temper was already outstripping his caution.

  “All I know,” Wendell said, “is I just spent half the night digging up an empty hole in the ground. How do you even know this is wher
e they put him?”

  “’Cause this is the only grave in the swamp ground. You see another one, Wendell? And you’re the one who walked right down here to it, even though I was carrying the lantern. You knew where it was right off, didn’t you? You musta done it this afternoon, musta gone straight from your place after I told you about it. I reckon it didn’t matter if you got caught ’cause your big old daddy would get you out of it.”

  “Done what?” Wendell said, getting in Eddie’s face and shouting. “Done what?”

  “You know what,” Eddie said, and jerking his shovel out of the earth, he slung it into the field of headstones that stood as mute witnesses to his fury. “You came out here already this afternoon and dug him up and knocked them teeth out of his head and probably already traded ’em off. Then let me come out tonight and dig at an empty hole for two hours.”

  “You’re crazy,” Wendell shot back, and the shouting began in earnest. “I never been out here before in my life, but you thought the idea up, so maybe it was you that dug him up, then was too scared to admit it and tried to blame it on me. How stupid do you think I am?”

  “How stupid do you think I am?” Eddie yelled back in his face.

  “Stupid enough to miss half a dozen gold teeth in a dead man’s mouth.”

  “Like you didn’t?”

  “I’m not the one who had their hands on him, am I, Eddie? I’m not the one who killed him.”

  “You reckon I opened his mouth and looked in after I finished him?” Eddie shouted, pushing Wendell backward into the dirt pile.

  William sat up at once, his fingers closing over the shotgun beside him.

  “At last, thank the good Lord,” the Reverend Mark Brown said aloud, getting stiffly to his feet. “You ready to end this, William?”

  “I am,” William said. “Thank the good Lord, at last.”

  JERRY M. BURGER

  Home Movie

  FROM The Briar Cliff Review

  Elaine threads the Super 8mm film through the projector, connects the loose end to the return reel, and closes the panel door. She turns the control knob to Play, and the dimly lit room is suddenly cast in silver and gray hues as images of men and women flutter onto the screen.

  “Reel One,” she says aloud to no one. “The Birthday Party.”

  She sees a version of herself from decades earlier sitting at her old dining table, hair permed to flip away from her face, an effort that she knew even then fell pathetically short of the intended Farrah Fawcett look. Neighbors dressed in 1977 fashion—​tight blouses, wide lapels, oversized glasses—​dart silently in and out of the picture. The old projector sounds as if it’s grinding the film; worn sprockets cause an occasional stutter and jump. Everyone is aware of the camera. They squint and smile, some wave. Dan Carpenter, who would die two years later from stomach cancer, sticks his face close to the lens with an exaggerated expression that is supposed to look as if he is having a great time but that always strikes Elaine as an omen of tragedy.

  The camera zooms to a cake adorned with a forest of pink and white candles. It’s her twenty-eighth birthday. Nathan made all the arrangements and extended the invitations before he told her. By design, too late to talk him out of it or to call the whole thing off. There are two ashtrays on the table, and no one seems to mind that several guests are smoking. As she recalls, she was one of the few nonsmokers in the neighborhood.

  The quality of the photography is awful. At any other gathering, Elaine would have been in charge of the camera. She was the one with the talent and the training. The behind-the-scenes person, the one never pictured in the photo. But that day Bruce had insisted. She was the guest of honor, he said. He would take care of recording the event. Unfortunately, her bighearted next-door neighbor was oblivious to his limited skills. There is no sense of framing, no point of entry for the eye. Full body shots are taken when torsos would have worked better, poses are held so long people signal “cut” with their hands. Clueless Bruce. She wonders if he had his suspicions even then, three months before he came to see her.

  Elaine tastes her bourbon, swirls the ice, and takes another sip before setting the glass down on the TV tray next to the projector. Nathan is about to make his appearance on the screen.

  * * *

  Her husband enters the kitchen with his usual broad smile. He shakes a few hands and hugs the women. His eyes are set too far apart and his forehead is too large for him to be considered handsome, but he engages everyone with a confidence that belies his physical appearance. On the right edge of the screen, the red sleeve of a woman’s dress moves in and out of the picture. A few seconds later, Samantha steps into the middle of the frame. Her bright red dress, flawless and radiant, instantly captures the scene. Her long dark hair is expensively styled, the hem of her dress two inches higher than women her age wore them back then. She is a woman in control. Every glance, every gesture, is calculated and perfect. Elaine had been wary of her from the start, from the day Samantha and Bruce moved next door. Elaine’s first observation: boob job. Apparent to all the women in the neighborhood, even if Nathan and some of the husbands disagreed. Weren’t boobs that size supposed to bounce when you walk?

  Nathan reenters the scene. His face brightens when he sees Samantha, and he mouths words that Elaine has come to read as “Don’t you look nice.” He raises his eyebrows and grins at Samantha’s reply, as if she has said something delightful or, more likely, a tad racy. Always the master flirt. Before Nathan has a chance to respond, the camera spins to a chubby woman entering the room with a large wrapped package in her arms. Elaine doesn’t remember the woman’s name.

  The screen turns white, the room brightens. The dangling end of the film slaps against the back of the projector with each rotation of the reel. Whamp, whamp, whamp. Three minutes, the length of a home movie back then. Elaine rewinds the film. While the projector whirs, she lights a cigarette.

  * * *

  “Reel Two,” she announces. “The Backyard Barbecue.” This time she is behind the camera, and so it’s just the three of them on the screen—​Nathan, Samantha, and Bruce. Samantha had insisted that Elaine and Nathan come over to celebrate Bruce’s promotion. My husband, a vice president! Can you believe it? What’s not to believe? It’s the kind of thing that happens to women like Samantha. Elaine had known them all her life, had studied them from afar. Vacations in Europe, ballet lessons, clothes from stores Elaine felt uncomfortable just walking through. Of course Samantha went to a private all-girls college. Of course she never had to work. Of course heads turn when she enters a room. What a lucky guy that Bruce is! Even Nathan had uttered those exact words.

  It’s the middle of summer, and the harsh outdoor light makes her job as photographer a challenge. Although few would ever notice, Elaine always took the task seriously, even when relying on something as rudimentary as a home movie camera. Her first camera had come to her by chance when she was ten. An old Kodak box model her father found when going through his mother’s belongings. Did Elaine want it? It seemed disrespectful to say no. Her first roll of black-and-white prints had consisted largely of family members smiling on cue with either the sun in their eyes or shadows across their faces. But the last picture on that roll, taken quickly so that she could run the film to the drugstore, captured something Elaine had never seen. Her father, an endless source of comfort and reassurance, unaware of her presence, gazing at his feet, shoulders slumped and weary, as if beaten down by a powerful foe. The image changed forever the way she saw not only her father but everyone. In that moment she understood in a way a younger child cannot the dark underside of being, the weight of hidden burdens. It also was the moment she discovered the power of the camera. For years she spent every cent she earned buying and developing film. Then came a better camera, subscriptions to photography magazines, two years as photo editor of her high school newspaper, a professional camera, her own darkroom in the garage, and a bachelor’s degree in art with an emphasis in photography. Those were the days she coul
d always be found with a Nikon strapped around her neck, engaging the world through the lens of her camera.

  On the screen Bruce stands next to the Weber, spatula held high to greet his arriving guests. Nathan hands him a beer, and the two men pose for the camera with their bottles, chests expanded as if mocking but also somehow validating their masculinity. It’s too small a gathering for Elaine to blend unnoticed into the background; capturing candid moments is next to impossible. But there is much to see if one knows where to look. The outdoor light accentuates the deepening lines around Nathan’s eyes. When he turns his back, a flash of sunlight reflects off his newly formed bald spot. Bruce pauses for the briefest part of a moment before returning to his work at the barbecue, considering and dismissing a thought he never puts into words. The strap of Samantha’s pink bra peeks out from under her thin blouse in almost every scene. But the most striking revelation that day—​what Elaine had succeeded in capturing with the movie camera—​is the nonchalant way Bruce manages to act around his wife. So different from the visibly shaken man who had knocked on her door a week earlier. Nathan’s not here, she had told him. He knew that; it was her he wanted to see. Maybe Samantha had said something. Maybe Elaine saw something he was missing. Twice he broke into tears while laying out all the reasons he was certain his wife was having an affair. No kidding, she had wanted to say. If any woman’s fooling around, it’s Samantha. But she held her tongue. She said all the right things.

  * * *

  Everyone sits down to eat. Elaine has positioned the camera just above the lip of the table, with place settings in the foreground and the swimming pool in the background. Bruce and Samantha have the only pool in the neighborhood. Their casual backyard dishes are more expensive than any dishware Elaine owns.