Trouble No Man

by Brian Hart

  “OK.”

  “You too, little one,” he said to Sarah. “You’re gonna be inside the truck but I want you to watch for people and if you see something, you honk the horn.”

  “OK.”

  “And what do you do with the doors?” he asked her.

  “I keep them locked and don’t open them for anybody,” Sarah said proudly.

  “That’s right,” Roy said. “Because I have a key and nobody is getting it from me. Ever.”

  The two girls hung on the side of the cart while Roy jockeyed through the potholes and vendors that were allowed to operate within the perimeter, and then it was another thirty minutes to get through security. Everything had to be weighed again and checked against the receipts, and then his “Preservation ration vouchers” had to be validated and after all that they had to reload the cart themselves. Thanks for shopping at Walmart. The family ahead of them wasn’t allowed to keep their olive oil because their vouchers had expired, never mind that they’d already paid for it. They used to ask you if you wanted an armed escort to your vehicle but not anymore.

  The sun was down and bats were smudging the sky. The lights on the lampposts in the parking light were mostly broken and if they weren’t they were so dim they didn’t do much good. Roy grabbed Sarah from the cart and opened the truck and put her inside. He checked over his shoulder and put his pistol in his waistband. The parking lot was filled with other families loading up their cars and trucks, same as it had always been, but there were some stragglers out there too. Again, he wished he’d brought the dog. So much time in the country, when he was out in the open in the city like this his nerves went to shit and he wanted to flee or start shooting. He took a deep breath and opened the tailgate and the camper shell hatch. Then he handed Wiley the pistol, butt first. She took it and pulled the slide to make sure it was loaded. She knew how to shoot. He had to trust her.

  “I got you, old man,” she said. “Do your thing. I’ll be right here.”

  One bag at a time, he loaded the truck. He was done quickly, and if he wouldn’t have crawled back in to get some candy for the drive back to April’s, they might’ve made it out no problem.

  He heard Wiley say something and he asked her what and he was turning around and sliding off the tailgate when he heard her say, “Keep the fuck back!”

  A man with a plastic cat mask covering his face had a sawed-off shotgun pointed at his daughter. Without thinking, Roy charged him, shoved the shotgun barrel aside as he stepped in and hit him in the jaw. The blow moved the mask over the man’s eyes. He went to bring the shotgun up to shoot blind and Wiley fired three times, quick, into the crumbled asphalt at the robber’s feet.

  “Hey hey hey.” The robber lowered his weapon and ripped off his mask, scared, blood where his teeth should’ve been, junky face, dead eyes. “Easy now. Take it easy. I just—”

  “Shut up.” Roy snatched the shotgun away with his left hand and hit him hard in the nose with a straight right. The robber took two steps back, clutching his bleeding nose with both hands, and fell down on his ass. Roy chucked the shotgun into the back of the truck. The sirens at the security gate started wailing but Roy wasn’t waiting to be rescued.

  “What now, Dad?” Wiley said, her voice trembling.

  Roy held out the keys for Wiley and traded her the pistol for the keys. “Get in the truck and pop the hood. I’m right behind you.” To the man on the ground: “Run fast.”

  “I’m gone, brother. I’m gone.” And he gathered himself and ran. People were staring. He was a fast runner. A baby was crying. Roy shut the tailgate and the camper, shoved the pistol in his waistband, reinstalled the fuel relay, and slammed the hood.

  Wiley had the truck started by the time he sat down in the driver’s seat. “It’s OK,” he said, to Wiley, to Sarah. “We’re fine. We’re good. Put your seat belt on for me, honey. Hurry up now.” He gave Wiley a once-over to see if she was OK. She was shaking and her face was flushed, but she wasn’t crying.

  “Can we get outta here?” she said.

  Roy put the truck in gear and drove fast toward the exit. He glanced again at Sarah and then reached back to give her shoulder a squeeze. There was a line of cars trying to turn left and he wasn’t waiting so he banked a tire-squealing turn and drove over a weedy island and smashed a rotten tree with the cowcatcher and got back on the highway.

  “Next time we’re bringing Pecos, right?” Sarah said. She’d started to cry and Wiley hugged her.

  “It’s OK, girls. I mean it. We’re OK.” Roy popped the magazine and handed it to Wiley. “Top that off for me.” He put the pistol in the slot on the console and waited for Wiley to find the shells in the lockbox under the seat and reload the clip. He turned on the stereo and they listened to Joan Jett with Evil Stig and he couldn’t remember ever being more scared, more proud.

  [41]

  R=M

  OR XXXXX

  The downhill to the Columbia goes on for miles and with the washouts and loose gravel it’s slow going. In the haze there is no bottom, no river, no Hood or Adams, just rock and dirt, the ghostly wind turbines. Bones of poached cattle litter the dry irrigation canals and the roadside. After a long, clear downhill section, they have to wait for the dog and the man wishes he’d kept the trailer.

  Near the burnt heap of a farmhouse—the barn still stands—they find a hand pump that delivers cold, clean water. They rest in the shade of the barn and drink. Roland wanders off and when he doesn’t come back the man goes after him. The dog is sleeping and doesn’t get up. The barn door is open.

  Inside, a man is hanging from the main beam. He’s been there for a long time, has bird shit on his skull. Roland is poking around in the clutter of the tack room, oblivious.

  “Get out here,” the man says. “We’re leaving.”

  Roland pitches the crusty riding crop in his hand against the wall, glances at the dead man, and walks out the door.

  The grade eases and they have to pedal instead of coast. The dog stays with them. Smoke fills the lowlands and they didn’t realize how good they’d had it.

  When they reach the confluence, they dismount. Roland follows the man to the edge of the blacktop to piss and they look down on the John Day. Narrow enough to step over and dirty brown with green algae at the margins. The confluence is peppered with pale and crusty boulders and a junked semitruck, no trailer. High-water marks on the Columbia’s north shore seem impossible, and if the man hadn’t seen it himself, he’d never believe it.

  There’s traffic on 84, not much, and no one is stopping for anything, but there’s movement going both ways. As a group they keep inside the rumble strip, hug the shoulder, but cars give them plenty of room. The man waves the boy in behind him so he can get out of the wind.

  A few miles from the park, the rubble from the ruined John Day Dam cuts the river and forms a filthy, impassable cataract. Downstream, the Dalles and Bonneville dams must be holding because the river begins to thicken.

  When they get closer they see the fishing camp for what it is, a few long tables under canvas, poles and nets heaped on the shore, a dozen people of various ages sitting down to lunch at the smallest of the tables. The man and the boy stop but stay on the roadside.

  An older man stands up and comes toward them. He’s wearing a western-style pearl-snap shirt and camo hip waders. He shades his eyes and studies the man on the road. “You can join us for lunch if you like.”

  The man asks Roland if he’d like to eat and he nods yes. The dog is looking east, back the way they came. Black trucks, troop carriers, moving fast.

  “C’mon,” the man says to Roland, shoves him, still on his bike, down the steep dirt road. At the bottom the man steps off his still-rolling bike and plucks Roland from his and hurries upstream, away from the fishermen, toward some boulders at the waterline. The people at the tables are standing up, watching them. The old man has seen the trucks too. He turns to the table and says something. The man calls the dog just as the troop carriers com
e barreling down the hill and skid to a stop. The dog turns to see what the commotion is, watches the trucks. The man calls him again but he won’t budge.

  Printz is first out of the lead rig. He spots the bike, then the dog. “Son of a bitch,” he says to the dog. “Where’s your buddy?” The dog lowers his head and growls. Printz pulls his pistol and levels it at the dog. “Come on, then.” The dog barks three times, loud big barks. The rest of the militiamen are out now, weapons up.

  “Always loaded for bear, you guys,” the old fisherman says, staggering, wide-eyed, a pantomime of fear. Printz covers him and waves his men by, toward the people at the tables. They’re all on their feet now, moving away toward the water. Nowhere to run.

  The militiamen stride after them, yelling, On the ground, on the fucking ground. Warning shots are fired into the river. There’s more militiamen than before, new faces.

  The man pushes Roland down and stands and steps around the boulder, hands up. When Printz sees him he smiles and renews his aim on the dog.

  “Just fishin’ here,” the old man says, catching Printz’s attention. “You wanna buy some, come back tomorrow. We’ll have more by then. Don’t need to come so hard.”

  Printz lowers his pistol, scans the water, the people on the ground. The man calls the dog to him and Printz waves him away, doesn’t care. This is about something else.

  “We didn’t come for fish,” Printz says. “We came for our boats.”

  “What do I know about your boats?”

  “We had a deal,” Printz says.

  “Not with me,” the old man says. He looks away from Printz to the militiamen holding his people at gunpoint. He raises his hand, as if to block the sun, then drops it and points at the ground. Shots ring out, dozens, the air is filled with them. The man grabs the dog and rolls on top of him and covers him with his body.

  When it’s over he finds Roland on the ground behind the boulder. The wind is pushing the river shoreward and the ground is wet. He kneels beside the boy. The dog is there, his hot breath on the man’s neck. Small-caliber fire up the hill. Pop. Pop. Mercy, execution.

  “Are you OK?” the man asks, touching his back.

  “Yes,” Roland says.

  The old man in the waders is beckoning them. “You can come up now.” He has a small pistol in his hand.

  The bodies are crumpled on the ground. Printz is on his back watching the sky with dead eyes, a cigarette-sized hole in his forehead. Latham is dead. Sampson. Sei brav. All of them are dead.

  “They knew you,” the old man says, shoves the pistol into his waders, an unseen holster.

  “I wasn’t one of them.”

  “That’s good.” The fisherman nods to the shore, where the others, women mostly, but a few men and children too, are on their feet, hugging and moving away from the bodies, back to the tables. None of them are armed. The fisherman follows the man’s gaze and points to the cliffs on the other side of the highway. Eventually he finds the dry stack-stone wall with the turrets. “We got our sharpshooters up there.” The fisherman smiles. “We knew they were coming. And we already sank their boats so their buddies won’t think we stole them.”

  The man sits down on his haunches. Roland does the same. The dog stands shivering in front of the boy and waits for a belly rub. The smell of fish guts is overpowering and the flies are thick.

  “What’re you gonna do with them?” the man asks.

  “We’ll take them to a pig farmer we know. Sell their rigs.”

  “Jesus.”

  “I don’t think he cared much for bacon.”

  The man stands up. “I need to get to Alaska. We both do.” He doesn’t look at Roland because he knows he’ll argue. He’s not leaving without his sisters.

  “You don’t wanna ride your bikes.”

  “We wouldn’t make it before winter.”

  “What winter?”

  “Yeah, is anybody here headed north? Or to the coast? We might be able to figure something out from there.”

  The sharpshooters—six men, two women, a couple teenage boys—are working their way through the rocks, down the hill to the freeway.

  “The feds have been sending a boat up here every month or so,” the old man says. “They drop off supplies and see if anybody needs rescued. You look like you need to be rescued.”

  “Where does it go?”

  “Points north, I hear. There’s a shelter in Portland, but that’s only if you got a tribal affiliation. I don’t know what they’d do for you.” He smiles, turns to look at Printz. “The benefits of being a white man in America seem to be dwindling.”

  “We had a good run.”

  “Compared to what? Fruit flies?” the fisherman says. “Is this your boy?”

  “No,” the man says.

  “They killed my parents,” Roland says. “And they took my sisters.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that, son.” The fisherman holds out his hand to Roland. “My name is Mortimer.”

  “Roland.”

  “Roy,” offering his hand. “And that’s Pecos. The last of the good dogs.”

  A week later, the feds arrive, tie up at the fish dock. The crew look like college kids but the skipper’s older. Carries a sidearm. Two of the crew help Roland as he climbs over the rail. He’s carrying a backpack he’d gotten from Mortimer’s grandson, Joshua. A change of clothes, a few pounds of smoked fish, and a bag of crab apples. The man goes empty-handed except for the redwood box and some dried fish for the dog. He slaps the rail and Pecos leaps over and lands on deck. Mortimer comes aboard and goes into the wheelhouse to talk with the skipper. When he comes out he shakes their hands and wishes them luck. The dog licks the old man’s hand. “See ya, Pecos. Come back and see us.”

  The fed ship is an ancient steel fishing boat and once they’re under way the twin diesels rarely change their tune. A deckhand has them fill out forms detailing who they are and where they’d come from, asks them to list a destination. Alaska. Roy writes it on Roland’s too.

  They stay on deck and watch from the rail as they motor downstream. Pecos sleeps. Mount Hood emerges suddenly through the smoke and just as quickly disappears. The air is hot and acrid. They tie up at the Dalles and Roland chats with the lock tender while Roy pretends to be sleeping. Takes an hour to get through, cool in the windless wet shade of the lock. Walls drip. Noisy gulls.

  Structure fires dot the hillsides in Hood River. Militia graffiti on the billboards. People are fishing on the dirty shore. The vertical lift of the bridge has been destroyed and hangs twisted from its towers. At Bonneville, the lock tender is unseen, gates open and close, murky water pools and spills, flood debris, tires. They take on no passengers.

  When night falls, they can see the lights of the small towns along the banks and later, near dawn, the shimmering lights and sky glow of Vancouver and later on, Portland. Bridges pass overhead and people look silently down on them. They don’t stop. There is an international refugee facility near Astoria that one of the crewmen says will help them continue on their journey north.

  The refugee center is at an old high school that’s perched on a hill and they have to walk ten blocks through flooded streets where the water is too shallow to get the boat through, and then navigate muddy catwalks made of high-density plastic over landslides to get there. A gray-haired woman meets them outside and offers to take Pecos to the sports field where the rest of the dogs are being boarded. The man hesitates for a moment and then sends him off.

  Inside, Roy and Roland are given hot noodles and bottled water and clean clothes. After they’ve eaten they take turns in the showers. Lukewarm water but there’s soap. Roy doesn’t bother shaving. When he steps out of the locker room, he finds Roland sitting on the bleachers with two little girls, his sisters. They’d been dropped off here by some militiamen three weeks ago. Roland isn’t going to leave without them and the people that run the shelter aren’t going to let Roy take them with him. They tell him they’ll take care of the children and Roy has no choi
ce but to believe them.

  In the morning, while Roland and his sisters are still asleep, Roy slips the baseball cards, along with directions on how to find him in Alaska, inside Roland’s shoes.

  He finds Pecos waiting for him at the gate of the football field. They wander down the hill until the water is too deep to walk and flag down a passing skiff.

  That afternoon, Roy and the dog are once again offshore. The skiff pulls alongside a massive trawler and a crane lowers a platform over the side and lifts the skiff and everything in it onto the deck. The captain comes down from the wheelhouse to meet them. She’s younger than Roy, closer to Wiley’s age than his.

  “I need to get to Juneau,” Roy says. “Farther if possible.”

  “If you come with us, you’ll be working,” the captain says. “Once we get going, we don’t stop. It’ll take us a week. Sixteen-hour days. Hot bunk. Food is meh.” She makes a face.

  “Meh is fine,” Roy says. “What about the dog?”

  “He has to stay up here with me.”

  “I can keep him out of the way if that’s what you’re worried about.”

  “No, it’s because I like dogs. I like dogs more than people.” She points at the first mate and then points to Roy. “Get him sorted. We’ll be under way in ten.”

  Roy tells Pecos that he’s staying and as he’s heading down the stairs he looks back and the captain is clapping her hands calling him to her and the dog does his little dance and hustles over to get some attention.

  The trawler has been retrofitted to harvest algae and kelp and Roy spends most of the trip in the hold filling the drying trays and when they anchor outside Juneau he stands on the deck and his arms and face are tinted strangely green from the work and the darkness. Pecos won’t stop licking his hands. “Stop it, goddamnit.” He won’t stop. Earns himself a smack.

  In town, generator fumes and wood smoke fill the streets even though the power and, more important, the phone system is still up and running. He walks into the white-marble-and-gold-handrail swankiness of a hotel lobby and without thinking of how he looks or if they allow dogs, asks to borrow a phone from the desk clerk and she cheerily obliges.