The fire was once again out when Cody finished. He knelt beside Hootie and gathered him in his arms. “Let’s go, little buddy. And remember, Hootie, Raymond got away.”
***
Rain fell for days. For the first time in over twenty years, the Red River broke free of its banks and spread across the bottomlands, inundating Sanders Creek and submerging the Rock Hole under nearly ten feet of water. When the flood receded over a week later, the bank was as pristine as the day the first Indians found the deep hole.
The flood completely obliterated Raymond’s grave, rendering it impossible to tell the young tree hadn’t grown there from an acorn. It was as if the good Lord swept his hand across the creek bank to forever seal their secrets from prying eyes.
Chapter Forty-five
I was good as new when Grandpa’s term as constable ran out. He didn’t run again. Folks had finally quit talking about the flood and Raymond Chase, and went to talking about Uncle Cody and Norma. Her divorce from Calvin finally came through and she married Uncle Cody. After the ceremony, they climbed on a plane at Love Field in Dallas and flew to Las Vegas.
The new constable took office when he came back from his Vegas honeymoon.
The FBI finally gave up and left when they couldn’t find hide nor hair of Raymond Chase. They worked on me and Pepper pretty hard, but for all they knew, we told everything that happened. I don’t mean they weren’t suspicious. Those old boys knew the truth and a couple of kids weren’t going to pull the wool over anyone’s eyes. But they never got us to say what they wanted to hear, because either Grandpa or Mr. O.C. kept a tight rein on our answers.
Cody’s name never came up at all, and they never knew what happened that night, because Uncle James carried him up to our house the morning after Raymond took us. Cody kept apologizing as soon as he got out of the car about not being there because, truthfully, the flood covered the Sanders Creek Bridge and folks had to drive clear around to Forest Chapel to come in the back way.
He had Hootie with him and told how he’d found him walking down the highway. “He must have run off in all the excitement.”
I broke down and cried and cried when he jumped up on the bed with me the next morning. I’d seen Raymond kill him, but when he licked my face, everything seemed like a horrible nightmare.
It was funny. The FBI never did ask Miss Becky any questions about that night. If they had, she wouldn’t have lied, because she’s not like that, and they’d have gotten everything they wanted.
Pepper went through a long, hard spell. For a while she wasn’t herself and didn’t have much to do with anyone. From time to time Miss Becky would find her standing in front of the dresser mirror, looking over her shoulder at the scar shaped like an arrowhead.
A year later Pepper and I decided to finally go swimming at the Rock Hole with Uncle Cody. I found her in her bathing suit just before we left, looking at the scar in the mirror again.
For some reason it seemed like the time to ask what Raymond whispered in her ear that night. Staring at her scar, I just had to know. “He said some things to me that I didn’t understand, about rain and looking inside things. He was gonna brand me, too. That feller was nuts.”
She wouldn’t give me a straight answer and didn’t take her eyes off the mirror. “You ain’t a-woofin’. He was talking nasty and saying other stuff too, about everything being full of Irish ’taters. Full of ’taters. Shitfire, that man was crazy. If I’d remembered my knife that night I’da cut Raymond’s throat and this never would have happened.”
But it did happen, and now it’s over except for our scars, inside and out.
Today Grandpa and I went down to the river, and the water was flowing calm, strong and thick, but I knew that depending on her mood, the Red can turn mean. That old river has a hold on us and is part of who we are. These bottoms are our home, and we take care of ourselves here.
You see, we’re from up on the River.
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Table of Contents
Contents
Dedication
Author Note
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-one
Chapter Twenty-two
Chapter Twenty-three
Chapter Twenty-four
Chapter Twenty-five
Chapter Twenty-six
Chapter Twenty-seven
Chapter Twenty-eight
Chapter Twenty-nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-one
Chapter Thirty-two
Chapter Thirty-three
Chapter Thirty-four
Chapter Thirty-five
Chapter Thirty-six
Chapter Thirty-seven
Chapter Thirty-eight
Chapter Thirty-nine
Chapter Forty
Chapter Forty-one
Chapter Forty-two
Chapter Forty-three
Chapter Forty-four
Chapter Forty-five
More from this Author
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The Rock Hole Page 28
