The Devil's Bones

by Larry D. Sweazy

  No one had been upstairs in a long time.

  He relaxed for a second and moved to the window. The view from the second floor did not allow for much. He could see over the roof of the volunteer fire department, see a few houses beyond, but the tall maple and oak trees that lined Jefferson Street obscured everything else.

  Dusk was settling in, daylight was fading into a cloudless night sky. But it was still hot, and the second floor was stifling and humid. He could barely breathe.

  The wood window was swollen and Jordan had to put some effort into pushing it open. His shoulder screamed with pain, and he felt something tear, felt the first drop of blood ooze out of the gunshot wound.

  The radio crackled again.

  “01 is 10-97. What's your 20, 1187?”

  “I just passed the city limits sign.”

  He leaned outside and eased the boxes of ammunition onto the metal grate and then stepped outside, trying his best to stay in the shadow of the building. Hogue was close, on the other side of the building or across the street.

  Jordan hoped he could make it to the van without being seen, but his hopes were dashed when he stood up and looked down into the parking lot. The van was nowhere to be seen.

  Spider was gone.

  CHAPTER 27

  August 22, 2004, 7:01 P.M.

  The only car in the parking lot below was Louella Canberry's Buick. Jordan stood with his back against the wall, trying to blend in, unsure of what to do next. The maddening chorus of cicadas and other insects buzzed high in the trees—would they ever shut the fuck up? Cars stopped and idled at the intersection on the other side of the building. The ever-present rumble and groan of the SunRipe plant pulsed distantly beneath all of the other noises, pumping stinking excesses from tomato sauce and ketchup into the sewers. A smell that was hardly noticeable to anyone who had lived in Dukaine for any length of time, but for some reason it was more noticeable tonight, and it made him nauseous.

  The heat of the day would not relent until the wee hours of the morning, and then it would be a brief respite, if that. There was nowhere to run, nowhere to escape the drought, the presence of the plant, and the anger Jordan felt as he searched the empty parking lot for Spider's van.

  He couldn't go back downstairs, or inside the second floor for that matter. Hogue would discover Louella's body soon enough, and the entire building would be searched, would become another crime scene wrapped in yellow tape.

  He couldn't go across the street to the tavern, either.

  And he couldn't go home.

  The radio was turned down low, crackling with voices, and Jordan knew he had to move. Finally, he decided to head to Holister's house—to see if Celeste had made it back from the hospital, if there was any word on Ginny, and borrow Holister's pickup truck. If she wasn't home, he knew where the keys were. He would just have to break into the house to get them.

  He made his way down the fire escape as quietly as he could with the Remington over his shoulder and two boxes of bullets tucked under his good arm. Blood was beginning to soak through his shirt from the wound, but it was not gushing, just a steady dribble. The pain was minimal, quelled by his growing rage and distrust of Spider.

  Jordan's mind was chattering like the police radio—only he was not on a search and find mission, or serving a warrant at the tavern, which Hogue was now in the process of—he was silently screaming at Spider. Goddamn you, Spider . . . Goddamn you. Where are you? How could you do this to me?

  Once on the ground, Jordan hunched and scurried his way across the parking lot, staying in the shadows as much as possible, using Louella's Buick for cover, and then on to the nearest telephone pole where he stopped and took stock of what was going on across the street. He could see the tail end of Hogue's brown and tan cruiser parked in front of the tavern. The other unit was nowhere in sight, but he figured it was parked at the back door.

  He wondered if Angel knew what was coming her way—if Spider had gone to the tavern and got caught up in the search.

  Still, it was no excuse for leaving him. Spider had a cell phone—he could have called Angel.

  Jordan regretted not having a cell phone, they could have stayed in contact if he did. But as it was, Spider didn't know what he had found once he left the van and entered the police station. From Spider's point of view, when Jordan went inside, everything was as it was supposed to be. Louella was watching Dylan and the Cordova file had not been stolen. How could Spider know Louella had been murdered and Dylan was missing?

  He drew in a deep breath. Now he was rationalizing Spider's actions. It was better than looking at the other side of things—assuming Spider was involved as much in the present as he had been in the past. All Jordan knew was Spider had left him when he needed him most. One more time.

  The garage doors to the fire department were open. All of the vehicles were gone, still out at the pond. A collection of pickup trucks and cars with blue strobe lights sat behind the building. Jordan hunched down again and navigated through the maze of vehicles and made his way down the alley that led to Lincoln Street.

  A dog barked as he passed Sam Peterson's parents' old house—a mixed-breed Doberman was tied to a tree and danced at the end of its chain, baring its teeth. The alarm signaled other dogs in the neighborhood to start barking, and before long, all of the sounds of early evening were drowned out.

  Jordan hurried along the fence lines, past the one-car garages that faced the alley, ignoring the dogs, trying to stay as hidden as possible, still hunched down. He felt like a little kid playing army.

  Someone would see him. Call the police. Louella wouldn't answer. They'd call the county dispatcher then. Hogue would put two and two together, and know Jordan had been inside the police station, make him a suspect again. He squelched the radio at the thought, turned up the volume slightly, and hoped he would make it to Holister's house before someone made the call.

  The alley ended at Lincoln Street. Holister's house was a block away and there was no easy way to get there, no alley to cut through, no other path to take but the sidewalk, which would leave him totally exposed. He thought about cutting through yards, but most of them were fenced in, home to more barking dogs. He stopped and hid on the dark side of an oak tree to get his bearings. For the moment, he was safe, a good distance from the tavern, from Hogue, from Louella staring at the ceiling.

  A car was coming. Jordan pulled tighter into the shadows, brought the rifle to his chest, and leaned face first into the bark. The street was lined with fifty- and sixty-foot oak and elm trees. Even on the brightest summer days the full foliage cast long shadows across Lincoln Street. All of the yards had patches of dirt in them where grass would not grow. Ivy clung at the bases of each tree—which even now was a vibrant green. The overhead shade had its benefits, huge limbs towering over almost every house, creating a natural form of air-conditioning, protecting black shingled roofs against the beating sun. But the air was still, there was no breeze, and Jordan felt more like he was in a jungle than a block from home.

  As the car passed, Jordan peered around the tree. It was not a car, but a truck. A red truck. It was José Rivero.

  Jordan took a deep breath and stepped out of the shadows into the street and waved his arms. He knew he was taking a risk, but he trusted José . . . as much as he could trust anyone right now. The truck slowed and the brake lights came on. Jordan hoped he wasn't making a mistake.

  “I've been looking for you, señor,” José said through the window as the truck came to a stop in reverse. “Get in.”

  Jordan hesitated until Hogue's voice came over the radio calling for another unit. He tossed the boxes of bullets on the floor, slid the Remington off his shoulder, and climbed into the truck. The .38 poked his back and he reached around and pulled it out, keeping the gun in his lap while he propped the rifle up between his legs.

  “You are bleeding,” José said.

  “I'm all right,” Jordan answered as he pulled the door closed and José put the truck i
n gear.

  “You do not look so all right, Señor Jordan.”

  Jordan said nothing. He gulped in some cool air-conditioning and wiped the sweat from his face. He closed his eyes for a second. When he opened them, the first thing that caught his attention was the plastic Jesus glued to the dashboard. “I've got a lot of questions for you, José,” he said, thinking about the St. Christopher's medal and letter.

  “I am sure you do. There will be time enough for those once you are not bleeding. Once you are safe.” José looked at Jordan sideways, and then returned his sad eyes to the road.

  They turned at Lincoln and Kennedy and headed out of town away from the SunRipe plant, toward the camps.

  “Where're we going?”

  José turned up the air-conditioning so it would blow even colder air. “There are many places no one knows about but us. I think it is best to get you as far away from here as I can. I owe the abuela that much.”

  Jordan scrutinized José's face at the mention of Kitty. “Louella Canberry is dead.”

  José nodded. “It continues. I am not surprised.”

  “What the hell's going on, José?”

  “I am not sure. But it will not end. Not now. Not until the truth is known by everyone. I must leave soon. You know that.”

  “Because of the bones? The graves at the pond?”

  “Partly. Señor Buddy will face many questions because of my actions, because of the secrets we share. If he lives to see another day. I fear my protection of him is coming to an end.”

  Jordan settled back into the seat. José's weathered face was drawn long with sadness. His brown eyes were glazed and distant, barely fixed on the road ahead. “Why were you looking for me?”

  “To warn you.”

  “About what?”

  José shook his head no. “There are many things you do not know. I wanted to tell you before now. I tried to find you, but when I did it was not safe.”

  “At the house? When it was on fire?”

  “Sí.”

  “Spider was with me,” Jordan said, realizing what José meant when he said it wasn't safe.

  José nodded.

  “He already told me. I didn't know it then, but I know now. He was with Ed Kirsch when he took Tito Cordova.”

  The Mexican exhaled. “I suspected as much. But that is not why I fear your brother. Though now knowing this, I am glad I trusted my instinto, my instinct.”

  As the houses thinned and the fields began to take over the landscape ahead of them, daylight dimmed even further, covering the entire world in a blanket of thick gray shadows. It was not yet dark, but not light either. The sky remained cloudless. Wispy clouds of vapor hung over the fields, holding steady as if they were attached to the ground by invisible strings. Kitty called this time of day the gloaming—a moment between night and day that was as magical as it was dangerous.

  Jordan coughed. Pain rippled through his torso. He cringed, grabbed his shoulder, and put pressure on the wound.

  “Resto, por favor, señor. Rest, please. . . . There will be time enough for this once you are better.”

  “There's no goddamn time, José. You don't understand. Dylan is missing. Ginny's son. Holister's grandson. He was at the police station. Louella was watching him. He was gone. Vanished just like Tito Cordova . . .”

  “Do not say that,” José commanded harshly.

  “It's true.”

  “Maybe. But please, do not say that name.”

  “You have to believe me. Louella was shot in the head. No skirmish, no mess. It was as if someone walked in, aimed and fired, and then went about their business.”

  “I do believe you,” José said. “There is nothing that surprises me now. I am too old not to expect the worst.”

  They turned onto a gravel road and then turned quickly again down a well-worn path that was just wide enough for the truck to pass through. Tall trees skirted both sides of the road. Darkness filled the inside of the cab. The dashboard lights cast long shadows on José's face. Jesus glowed in the dark, a little green man now, with His arms stretched out to both sides like he was taking a sobriety test.

  “Unit 01, please be advised of a 10-66 in the alley behind Lincoln Street. Subject is white male, six feet tall, wearing blue jeans and a white shirt,” the dispatcher on the police radio said.

  “10-4. I'm finishing up here right now. We'll check it.”

  “01, also be advised that the subject was carrying a rifle. The caller said they tried to call Dukaine dispatch but received no answer.” Static hissed through the small radio speaker.

  “Can you repeat?”

  “10-4, 01. The caller tried to call Dukaine dispatch, but received no answer. The dispatcher's car is still in the lot. Could you check that out?”

  “10-4. Did the caller identify themselves?”

  “It was the dispatcher's brother. He's concerned because she should have been home by now.”

  Jordan turned down the radio. He knew what was coming. He looked at José and sighed. “All hell is about to break loose,” he said.

  “It already has, Señor Jordan. It already has.”

  José slowed the truck as they rounded a bend. The headlights swept through the darkness, catching tall dry brush and the rough trunks of hickory and walnut trees, until the bright lights finally came to rest on a small travel trailer partially hidden by a tall bank of weeds.

  Jordan saw the shadow of a man walk slowly past the window as José brought the truck to a stop. He clutched the .38 and stared at José curiously.

  “You will be safe here for now,” José said. “I have been moving often. Soon, I will leave for Mexico for good. But I cannot leave until I have done what is expected of me.”

  “Who's inside?”

  José did not answer. Even in the shadows of the cab, Jordan could see José take a deep breath, look away from him sadly.

  “There are some things you need to know,” José said. “Tito Cordova did not die. It is not his bones you found at the pond.”

  “I already know that,” Jordan said, his fingers wrapped tightly around the grip of the .38. He was watching the window of the little trailer. “Who is it?”

  “There are many of my amigos there. But that was Rosa's grave. Do you remember her?”

  Jordan nodded yes. He wanted to ask what happened, why she was at the bottom of Longer's Pond, but he restrained himself and waited.

  “I know you do not understand this, our world in the fields. We are not to be seen in life or death. But I convinced Señor Buddy many years ago that we needed a place to bury our dead, a place where we could go and mourn even over unmarked graves. For a long time he knew nothing of this. But after Tito disappeared, that changed. He changed. I had placed Rosa's worn-out little body in the pond by then—and her sister, the baby that had been born dead in the abuela's hands.”

  Jordan nodded, remembering the night Kitty and José argued fiercely about giving the baby a proper burial.

  “I feared this day would come,” José said. “As the drought took hold there were many malavisos, bad omens. The night before Holister was shot, I saw seis buhos, six owls, lined up all together on the branch of a dead oak tree, and the shadows of four more flying through the air. The next day, a hungry coyote jumped out of the woods and into the road in front of me in broad daylight. I barely missed hitting him and came stop a few feet from it. I yelled at the coyote to move, but the ragged beast planted its paws firmly and showed its teeth.” José's face paled as he stared into the darkness.

  The radio was buzzing with activity. They had found Louel-la's body. Jordan reached down and turned it off. He knew the procedures, knew everything Hogue would do next, including putting an APB out on him.

  “I feared the spirits were walking the earth, so I went to the pond. But I was too late. It was surrounded by the policia.”

  “Tell me about Tito,” Jordan said.

  José drew a deep breath. “I would rather wait until we are inside. It is not my
story to tell.”

  “Who's in there?”

  The Mexican did not answer again. “The past never sleeps. It is a river that runs south and then returns as rain. Sometimes as a great storm uprooting trees, other times soft and gentle, just when it is needed. A storm comes soon—see how the leaves dance and the clouds gather?” José pointed through the windshield. “Great trees will fall.”

  Rosa's voice swam up from deep inside Jordan's memory. “El diablo es flojo. The devil is loose.” He looked up through the trees and could barely see the sky. A few stars twinkled, but he could see heavy clouds gathering in from the reflection of the moon. A wind had kicked up and the leaves looked like they were turned inside out, shining silver in the darkness.

  José opened the door and stood up out of the truck. “Come, I need to tend to your wound. You will not need your armas. Your guns will do you no good for now.”

  Jordan followed, taking each step cautiously as he stuffed the .38 in the holster. He wasn't going anywhere without a gun.

  José knocked on the door once, opened it, and stepped aside for Jordan to enter.

  Jordan hesitated, eased up onto the weak metal step, pulled himself slowly inside, aware of every sound, every movement.

  Buddy Mozel sat in the corner, waiting for him.

  CHAPTER 28

  August 16, 2004, 12:05 P.M., Nuevo Laredo, Mexico

  Tito Cordova stood outside of CERESO I, the Central Facility for Social Rehabilitation, and sucked in his first breath of freedom in nine years.

  The inmates called the prison el agujero grande, the big hole, but Tito had mixed feelings about leaving. Time had stood still as he had grown into a man, had become part of a familia inside the whitewashed walls. Now, he was alone again—no one waited for him outside the gates. Aidia had stopped visiting him a few months after he'd been convicted of murdering Chavez, and beyond her, there was no one he could call family. Thankfully, he had a place to go, a mission to carry out, and that made leaving el agujero grande easier than he thought it would be.