River Mourn

by Bill Hopkins

Chapter 31

  Sunday Morning, continued

  Rosswell shouted, "Can you see the highway?" He pressed both hands around his face until he realized that shading his eyes from the flames surrounding them wouldn't help him spot the road.

  Ollie gawked. "No." Rosswell doubted if Ollie could see any better than he could.

  "If we stumble onto it and some other fool comes tearing down the highway, we're dead."

  Ollie grabbed his chest and coughed. "We're dead if we stay here."

  Smoke wafted up Rosswell's nose-his love of the nostalgic scent of burning leaves in the fall had fluttered away-and he gauged the strength of the fire around them. "I estimate we have five minutes before we're crispy critters." He could hardly breathe. When a gust of hot air rushed around them, fanning the flames, singeing his hair and evaporating the sweat from his brow, he said, "Maybe less. Let's run that way."

  Rosswell was certain that Ollie couldn't see where his finger pointed, but the faithful research assistant stayed within a foot of him as they ran for what Rosswell hoped was the highway.

  Ollie could get killed if I'm wrong. Or, worse, I could get hurt.

  Through the smoke ahead of them, Rosswell spied cars burning. Burning cars in front of them meant they were headed for the highway.

  I don't see any bodies. Maybe the drivers and passengers made it to safety before the explosion. Or the explosion ripped everyone to shreds.

  Ollie tripped over a thick poison ivy vine and slammed into Rosswell, knocking them both to the ground.

  Ollie rolled to his back. "I don't think I can make it."

  "Don't crap out on me now or I'll kill your ass." Rosswell tried breathing shallow breaths. If he continued sucking in smoke, he estimated that soon he'd be at the pack-a-day level with a twenty-year head start.

  Through the thickening smoke, Rosswell spotted a round opening slightly downhill from him. "Ollie," he screamed. Ollie's eyes lacked depth, shiny as old glass in a deserted house. Ollie didn't respond, even after Rosswell yelled at him again. Rosswell smacked Ollie across the face. When Ollie's eyes seemed to focus, Rosswell said, "Follow me."

  "That's what I was doing before and look where it got me." Ollie gasped and choked between every word.

  Rosswell slipped his arms under Ollie. "Move, damn it. I'm trying to turn you over." Ollie wriggled enough, allowing Rosswell to flip him onto his stomach. "Start crawling. It's only a couple of feet." Rosswell slithered like a snake on an oily slide down the embankment into a culvert running under the highway. On his way down, the rocks along the embankment cut into his face and arms. Scuttling around to where he could see out the end of the pipe where he'd entered, he couldn't find Ollie. Scrambling out of the culvert, then digging his shoes in the dry ground for purchase, he gained the top of the embankment, grabbed the neck of Ollie's shirt and dragged him down to what he hoped was safety.

  Rosswell cupped his hands and splashed water from the ditch onto Ollie's face. "Where's this coming from?" Ollie dipped his hand into the trickle of water running through the pipe. "We're having a drought."

  "From a spring? We'll do a geological survey if we survive." Rosswell ripped off his shirt, dunked it in the water, and covered his face. "Protect yourself."

  When Ollie didn't follow suit, Rosswell unbuttoned Ollie's shirt, wet it, and covered his research assistant's face. "That will save you."

  "I'm being waterboarded!" Ollie choked, then coughed. "This water stinks." Ollie's words, dampened by the cloth over his head, sounded to Rosswell like a badly tuned radio broadcasting incomprehensible news. "Torture is a felony in this state. You're using tainted water!"

  "Since when did you get so picky?" Rosswell's voice was also muffled when he spoke. "I know a fire marshal who will be interested in our blackened corpses. In a couple of minutes, we're going to get fried by hot air."

  "No." Ollie gagged. "We'll be broiled, not fried. When you're cooked by direct exposure to intense heat, that's broiling." Ollie tried and failed to sit up.

  Rosswell thought he should shoot Ollie, but he didn't want to give his research assistant the pleasure of dying before he did.

  Rosswell said, "This water is coming from a sewage lagoon." He lied, hoping to shock some sense into Ollie.

  Ollie gagged again. "I'm ready to die now."

  "The oxygen is being sucked into the firestorm." Rosswell wheezed. If his lungs survived this onslaught, he promised himself he'd never fear anything again. Except the loss of Tina. "We'll suffocate before we fry. Or broil. Or baste."

  Without a word or a sound, Ollie slumped to the bottom of the pipe.

  Rosswell said, "Goodbye, Ollie. This is it, my friend."

  Ollie didn't stir. Rosswell knew his research assistant was dead and it was his fault.

  "At least you went before me. I'm going to suffer a lot, but you're now at peace." Rosswell placed his right hand on Ollie's heart. "Peaceful trip."

  Rosswell heard a sound cut the air. It sounded like a building collapsing. Trees falling? Another car exploding? He was beyond caring.

  "Ollie." Still no response. "Ollie, are you dead?"

  "Yes."

  "All right, you stay here. I'll fetch the coroner to make it official."

  Ollie struggled to a bent over position, vomited, and waddled from the pipe. Rosswell followed. Ollie managed to put his shirt back on, but it was inside out.

  "There's a break in the fire." Rosswell pointed to a place where the fire didn't look quite so dangerous. "Through there. Run for the highway."

  Behind them, the farm truck-or what was formerly the farm truck-cooled in the morning sun, its frame bent into the shape of a humpbacked whale.

  "Judge, you're mighty hard on vehicles."

  "Walk north, away from the fire."

  "Yeah. Great idea."

  "Ollie, stick your thumb out. We're hitchhiking back to town."

  "Then we're going the wrong way. Sainte Gen is south and we're going north."

  "We'll take the long way around. I'm not going back into the flames."

  "Let's hope Nathaniel doesn't stop to pick us up."