He ripped his own shirt off and used it as a compression bandage. He figured it was useless, but it was the only thing he could think to do.
John and Jim Ed came back outside after clearing the house. Jim Ed frowned when he saw Cody in his undershirt. “What are you doing?”
“Trying to stop the bleeding.”
“I thought you said she was dead.”
“Thought she was. We gotta get her out of here. She’s about bled out, and I think there’s a hole in her lung.”
“Is it bubbling?”
“Yeah.”
Jim Ed launched himself off the porch and opened the trunk. He rummaged around for a second and ran back through the rain with a roll of silver tape.
“What’s that?”
“Duct tape. Where’s the hole in her lung?”
“Through her brassiere.”
“Take it off.” Jim Ed ripped off a piece of tape.
Cody dug a pocketknife out of his pants pocket, selected the largest blade, and cut Anna’s bra off to reveal the bullet wound.
Jim Ed wiped the hole with the palm of his hand, brushed her breast upward, and slapped the tape over the round wound. Anna immediately convulsed and twisted in Cody’s hands. She gasped, breathed in, and then coughed blood.
Jim Ed nodded. “That’ll seal it for a little while.”
Big John shouldered past. “Let’s go.” He picked up the petite deputy and rushed toward the car. Jim Ed opened the back door as Cody hurried around to the drivers’ side. John fell backward into the seat and Jim Ed piled into the front.
Cody slammed the shifter into reverse then paused. “We can’t go back the way we came. The water’ll be too high.”
“Turn left and pray the slough hasn’t trapped us here.”
Chapter Sixty-five
Pepper was gone and I was getting punished for it in more ways than one.
I was missing my best friend so bad it hurt, and she was off somewhere without me.
Second, I’d spent my time in church while Miss Becky prayed, and I admit, I prayed some too, but not as hard as she did. Now, here I was again sitting in that crazy woman Melva Hale’s house while Miss Becky and Norma Faye talked to her about how hard it was to live alone.
When Miss Becky called Norma Faye to come get her, she said it was because even though we had problems, other folks like Melva Hale did, too, and she thought the Lord wanted her to do for others and maybe he’d make sure Pepper was okay.
I’m sure Norma Faye was feeling a little put upon, too, having to haul Miss Becky everywhere she wanted to go while Grandpa was gone.
I couldn’t take that old woman’s giggles anymore, so I went outside to watch it rain. I was feeling pretty sorry for myself, because there weren’t any chairs to sit on, not even one with a cane bottom, and I couldn’t hang my legs off the edge of that raggedy-assed old porch for the water running off the roof.
I hadn’t even brought a book with me, but I’d seen all those romance magazines scattered around in Melva’s house and thought about going inside to get one of them. I struggled with the idea of reading love stories, and decided that at least it was something to read. I was ready to go through the trash and read the labels on soup cans.
When I came back inside, Norma Faye waved at the screen. “In or out.”
“I need something to read.”
She softened. “All right hon. Miss Melva, is it all right if he reads one of your magazines?”
She was sitting there, rubbing her forehead. Her eyes were closed. “He can have all he wants. I’ve done read ’em up.”
A couple of magazines on the couch had covers I was interested in, but wouldn’t pick them up with Norma Faye and Miss Becky watching. One called Daring Love reminded me of a comic book with a drawing of a smiling blond woman in a pile of hay, with a guy leaning over her like he was going for a kiss. Her shirt was unbuttoned down far enough to see her brassiere.
There were others; Western Romance, The Love Book, True Romance, and True Confessions. It seemed like they ran toward what might be the truth, so I steered away from them. A cheap magazine rack was stuffed full of even more titles, and I saw something like a newspaper with the title of Police Gazette.
It had women with big boobs on the cover, too, but I took it anyway to read about police stuff. Tucking it under my arm, I jumped off the porch and ran through the rain to stretch out in the backseat of Norma’s car.
The headline read, “The Lure of LSD.” In a little box toward the bottom I saw a story about hippies. When I opened the paper to that double page spread, there were a dozen pictures of hippies, and most of them were fighting with police officers.
The headlines screamed “Youth Goes to Pot” on one page, and “Cop Fighters” on the other. The first story was about something called “love-ins” and “sit-ins” and hippie girls who smoke cigars. The cop fighters’ side was mostly pictures of colored people hitting police.
I’d never seen anything like that paper, and disappeared into a world I didn’t know existed, the world that Pepper had left home for. It didn’t take long for me to think she’d made a big mistake.
I jumped when Marty knocked on the glass with a knuckle. I rolled the window down enough to talk. His eyes were dull, almost dead. “Now what are y’all doing here?”
“Miss Becky’s in there with Norma Faye. They came to visit with your mama.”
“You damn Parkers are over here too much.”
“You ain’t a woofin’. I didn’t want to come in the first place.”
“Hey, you seen my lighter? I lost it the last time y’all were snoopin’ around over here?”
I shrugged, but he took it the wrong way.
He studied me for a long moment with dead eyes. “Yep. Keep it, and I don’t want y’all back over here.”
I didn’t try and explain. “Believe me, I’m with you on that one.”
He straightened up and headed toward the barn. I saw a pistol sticking out of his waistband as he walked away. I made sure he was gone, then went back to my magazine. Rain drumming on the roof made me sleepy and I put the magazine down. It was pouring so hard that I couldn’t see through the water sluicing down the windshield, so I closed my eyes.
I dozed and slipped outside and into the air. It wasn’t raining and the talking horse was whispering in my ear. “See it?”
I tried to rouse up, but sleep pushed my lids back down. They were so heavy…
“Don’t you see?”
Grandpa appeared and rubbed the horse’s ears. “It’s hard to see.” The horse squeezed against Grandpa, pushing him into a barbed-wire fence so hard it started cutting through his clothes. “It’s right there in front of us all.”
He held up a Police Gazette. The headline was fuzzy.
The car door opened and jolted me awake. I sat up quickly, rubbing my eyes. Miss Becky slammed the passenger door.
“You ready to go home and get some supper, sleepyhead?” Without waiting for an answer, Norma Faye started the engine and backed up. When she did, I saw the old swaybacked horse standing beside the barbed-wire fence.
Chapter Sixty-six
“There’s an old iron bridge up ahead. It’ll take us across the river, and maybe we can get out that way.”
“Maybe?”
Jim Ed keyed the microphone. “Dispatch. This is Jim Ed. I have an officer shot and we’re in need of emergency care.”
“Where are you, Jim Ed?”
“Not at the scene. We’re about to cross the old iron bridge over the Sulphur. Everything’s flooded out east of Cooper. If it’s not underwater, we’re gonna go hit 2675 and take it toward Roxton.”
“Ten-four. Who’s shot?”
Jim Ed raised his eyebrows. “Anna…Anna how much?”
“Sloan.”
“Deputy Anna Sloan.”
> “I’ll notify St. Joseph’s emergency. They’ll be waiting on you.”
“She’s ’bout dead.”
“Better be quick, then.”
Filled with anxiety, John shifted his weight in the backseat and bent his knee, forcing her legs higher. “Jim Ed. Get back here and hold her head up. She’s as limp as a rag doll and she cain’t breathe good with her head back like that.”
John cradled Anna in his arms while Jim Ed crawled over the front seat, knocking his hat off in the process. What little cowlick he had left was standing straight up on his forehead, and the big empty patch on the back was white as a fish’s belly.
“Lordy, we got to cover this gal’s titties up. This ain’t right.”
His chest tight, Cody didn’t take his eyes off the road. “Don’t worry about that. They can cover her up when we get to the hospital.” He braked hard when they came around a wide curve. “Well, shit! Jim Ed, you think this bridge’ll hold us?”
The swollen river, full of branches, trash, and logs, washed from the damaged earth overcame everything it touched. Water boiled around the rusty structure that had been built over the deep riverbed not long after the Civil War. Logs and whole trees washed up against the railing and white waves lapped over the top, mixing with muddy water bubbling like a gurgling cauldron.
“It’s been here over a hunnerd years.”
“That’s what I’m afraid of. Can we go back around?”
“This is the best and quickest chance we have.”
From their position, the bridge seemed to bend in the middle. The railing vibrated like guitar strings as if the whole thing would go at any second, as soon as the water stacked a few more trees against the side.
Driving blind and hoping all the grid plates were still in place, Cody eased forward and paused, testing the weight and stability of the crossing with the front wheels, prepared to quickly back up if there was any question of continuing.
Anna grunted and gave a weak, wet cough. That was all he needed. “Y’all hang on.”
Swallowing his terror, Cody drove onto the old bridge in a slow roll, focusing his eyes on the far side, allowing the car to maintain a constant speed while the water gushed only inches under the floorboard. The sedan plowed a wake ten yards, twenty, and they were halfway across when he heard John’s voice. “Oh, my God.”
Cody’s head snapped to the right, stunned to see a huge oak tree rolling in the current, heading right for them. They all knew that when it hit, it would take the bridge down as if it were made of matchsticks.
Chapter Sixty-seven
The minute we got back home I told Miss Becky I needed to call Uncle Cody.
“He’s working.”
“I know, but this is about law work.”
Norma Faye thought for a moment, fingers stuck in the front pockets of her jeans. “Can it wait?”
“No. I don’t think so.”
Miss Becky tilted her head toward the telephone table. “Go ahead on, then.”
I dialed the sheriff’s office, but it was so late no one answered. I tried dispatch. “This is Top Parker.”
Martha Wells’ voice softened. “Top, hon, I can’t talk right now.”
“I need to tell Uncle Cody something.”
She hesitated. “Hon, he can’t talk right now. He’s on the way to the hospital with someone who’s hurt.”
“Who?”
“Somebody, but it’s gonna be all right. I’ll take a message and give it to him.”
“No. Thanks.”
I hung up and dialed again, a number I’d memorized a long time ago.
“What? It’s late.”
“Judge O.C.?”
His voice changed. “Top?”
“Yessir.”
“You all right? Is Becky okay?”
“Yessir, we’re fine, but I have to tell you something to tell Uncle Cody. It’s the only way I know to get the message to him.”
“He’s busy right now, son.”
“I know it, that’s why I’m calling you.”
“I’m listening.”
I told him about my dreams, about the horse, and the grass. “Mr. O.C., it all means something, but I don’t know what.”
He knew all about our family’s Poisoned Gift, and how it figured into the Rock Hole kidnapping a few years earlier. I could hear his chair creaking through the phone line while he rocked back and forth, thinking.
“All right. I’ll let him know as soon as he gets to where we can talk.”
Not having anything else to say, I simply hung up. The phone jangled with our ring. “Hello?”
“I have a collect call from Flagstaff, Arizona, from a Miss Beatrice Parker. Will you accept the charges?”
I laughed out loud. “Sure!”
Beatrice Parker.
It was Pepper.
Chapter Sixty-eight
Rain continued to fall.
Torn from its roots by the floodwaters a half a mile upstream, the great oak tree joined a mass of limbs, smaller trees, boards, and other debris rushing downstream over the deepest part of the old channel. Weighing well over forty tons, the old goliath headed directly toward the weakest portion of the bridge, a questionable point in the arch that long ago had rusted badly enough to lose over half of its original strength.
If the oak didn’t take the bridge out upon impact, the sheer weight of the water against the tree’s mass would quickly shove it completely off its already compromised foundations.
“Cody, go.” Not taking his eyes off the oncoming tree, John’s deep voice seemed abnormally calm, given the situation.
Terrified, Cody mashed the accelerator and the car’s rear end immediately slid sideways. He gripped the wheel tightly and forced himself to let off the gas to increase his speed with agonizing deliberation as the tires dug in. Staring out of the passenger side window, John and Jim Ed couldn’t take their eyes off the approaching tree.
Growling deep in his chest, Cody gave it more gas, feeling the tires slip for a frightening moment, and then regain tenuous traction. He tore his eyes off the far end of the span when an unseen log leaped out of the muddy water like a porpoise and rode over the rail. The angle was such that it rose high overhead, then the submerged portion slammed against the bridge’s substructure. The entire bridge shuddered as the log stood straight up like a telephone pole.
They passed close enough to touch it.
Only a third of the way across, more water shipped through the tangle of debris against the passenger side rail. The powerful current pushed the car, and Cody instinctively steered into the flow as if he were sliding on ice, for all the good it did.
More gas.
They were halfway across and the tree seemed impossibly close.
“Gogogogogogo….” John spoke softly.
Jim Ed groaned. “Faster, hoss.”
Their speed increased on an incline so slight that none of them felt it. In addition to pushing the bridge sideways, the heavy press of water against the old steel caused a sag in the middle of the supporting arch. Feeling the tires grip, Cody sped up. Taking a chance, he glanced over to see the tree was almost on top of them. The wide branches spanned over half the width of the bridge, reaching toward them in a great swath of leafless wood.
The tree slowed as the trunk slid underneath the bridge, two-thirds of the way across with a solid crunch. The oak clutched at the structure to keep from being dragged beneath the surface and shuddered to a stop as the bridge groaned and shifted.
“Gogogogogogo!” John’s voice rose.
Someone in the car made a steady, ahhhhhh sound. Cody barely realized it was coming from him.
They were close, damned close to the other side, when the bridge surrendered to the pressure. Bending in the middle, it sagged out and down. The main supports pulled the concrete foundati
on completely out of the soft ground. They rose like long, cylindrical caskets dragged out of a grave, bringing tons of dirt with them.
“Hang on!”
The car’s front wheels thumped across the widening gap as the bridge separated from the crumbling pavement. The entire structure pulled free and for a moment they were twenty degrees off square. Cody stomped the gas, snatching enough momentum to carry the car over the widening void and onto level ground.
As Cody mashed the pedal to the floorboard, Jim Ed looked down at Anna’s head in his hands. “She’s barely with us.”
John faced forward. “Sweet Jesus!”
Chapter Sixty-nine
“What are you doing answering the phone? I figured it’d be Miss Becky.”
I couldn’t believe Pepper was on the other end of the line. I must have gaped like a fish for a second, because she didn’t wait for me to say anything. “Hey, I need somebody to come get me or something. Who’s there?”
“What?”
“Well, Jesus. You got wax in your ears? I need to talk to Grandpa or Daddy.”
“Who is it?” Miss Becky asked.
Wait a second, I mouthed while Pepper kept talking.
“Give the phone to somebody else, will ya? At least they’ll talk back. Where is Daddy anyway, or Mama? I called the house but it didn’t do nothing but ring and ring. I want somebody to come get me. This idea wasn’t all it was cracked up to be.”
The back door opened behind Miss Becky and Norma Faye, and Aunt Ida Belle came through the kitchen. Setting her purse on the table, she paused. “What’s going on?”
“Are you gonna say something, or what, dumbass? This is a collect call! I’ve never made one of them before.”
I grinned wide. “Sure. Where are you?”
“I’m in Flagstaff, Arizona, and believe me, this ain’t no place I want to live, that’s for damn sure.”
Dark Places Page 24
