Down River Part 10

"You wouldn't have him without me," I said.

"Stay out of it, Mr. Chase."

I left the hospital as a low moon pushed silver through the trees. I drove fast, my head full of blood and grim rage. Danny Faith. Robin was right. He'd changed, crossed the line, and there was no going back. What I'd said to Robin was true.

I could kill him.

When I got to the farm, it felt off: the road too narrow, turns in the wrong places. Fence posts rose up from colorless gra.s.s, barbed wire dark and tight between them. I pa.s.sed the turn for Dolf's house before I knew it was there. I backed up, hung right onto a long stretch where I'd once taught Grace to drive. She'd been eight years old, and could barely see over the wheel. I could still hear the way she laughed, feel the disappointment when I told her she was going too fast.

Now she was in the hospital, fetal and broken. I saw the st.i.tches in her lips, the thin slivers of blue when she tried to open her eyes.

I slammed my open palm against the wheel, then gripped it with both hands and tried to bend it in half. I pushed hard on the gas, heard the slam and bang of rocks on the undercarriage. One more turn, then over a cattle guard that made the tires thump. I slid to a stop in front of a small, two-story house with white clapboards and a tin roof. My father owned it, but Dolf had lived here for decades. An oak tree spread over the yard, and I saw an old car on blocks in the open barn, its engine in parts on a picnic table under the tree.

I jerked the key out of the ignition, slammed the door, and heard the high whine of mosquitoes, the slap and stutter of bats diving low.

I locked my hands into knots as I crossed the yard. A single light hung above the porch. The k.n.o.b rattled and the door swung away from me. I turned on lights, went in, and stood in Grace's room, absorbing the things she loved: posters of fast cars, riding trophies, a picture taken on a beach. There was no clutter. The bed. The desk. A row of utilitarian footwear, like snake boots and hip-waders. There were more pictures on the mirror above the dresser: two of different horses and one of the car I'd seen in the garage-her and Dolf smiling, the car on a flatbed.

The car was for her.

I turned away and pulled the door shut. I brought in my bag and tossed it on the guest-room bed. I stared at a blank spot on the wall and thought for what felt like a very long time. I waited for some kind of calm, but it never came. I asked myself what mattered, and the answer was Grace. So I searched Dolf's kitchen for a flashlight. I pulled a shotgun from the gun cabinet, cracked it, loaded it, then saw the handgun. It was an ugly, snub-nosed thing that looked about right. I put the long gun back, lifted out a box of .38 caliber sh.e.l.ls and extracted six of them. They were fat, heavy, and slipped into the machined holes as if they'd been greased.

I paused at the door, knowing that once I stepped outside, there'd be no stopping. The gun was warming in my hand, heavy. Danny's betrayal shot dark holes through me, dredged up the kind of rage I'd not felt in years. Was I planning to kill him? Maybe. I really didn't know. But I'd find him. I'd ask some hard d.a.m.n questions. And by G.o.d, he would answer them.

I went down the hill, across the pasture, and didn't need the light until I hit the trees. I turned it on and followed the narrow footpath until it intersected the main trail. I put the light on it. Except for the roots that rose above it, it was beaten smooth.

I went to the hard turn in the trail that Grantham had mentioned, saw the broken branches and bruised vegetation. I followed the ground as it sloped to a shallow depression filled with churned leaves and grasping red earth, a snow angel in the mud.

I was close to the spot where my father had pulled Grace from the river all those years ago, and as I stared at the signs of her resistance my finger found its way into the trigger guard.

I pa.s.sed the boundary of my father's farm, the river on my left; then the neighboring farm, the first cabin, empty and dark. I kept an eye on it. Nothing. Then I was back in the woods, and the Faith cabin was ahead. A half mile. Fifty yards. And moonlight pushed deeper into the trees.

Thirty yards out I left the trail. The light was too much, the trees thinning. I found the darkness of the deeper forest, and angled away from the river so that I would cut the clearing above the cabin. I stopped at the edge of the trees, settled into the low growth. I could see everything: the gravel drive, the dark cabin, the car parked at the door, the shed next to the woods.

The cops.

They'd left their cars on the drive above me, and were on foot, almost to the cabin. They moved like I thought cops would move, bent at the waist, weapons low. Five of them. Their shapes blurred into one another, separated. They accelerated across the last gap, reached the car, divided. Two moved for the door. Three split for the back. Close. d.a.m.n they were close. Black on black. Part of the cabin.

I waited for the sound of splintered wood, forced myself to breathe, and saw something wrong: a pale face, motion. It was by the shed at the edge of the woods, someone peering around the corner, then pulling back. Adrenaline slammed through me. The cops were pressed against the sides of the door and one of them, Grantham maybe, had his pistol in a two-handed grip, barrel at the sky. And it looked like he was nodding. Like he was counting.

I looked back at the shed. It was a man in dark pants. I couldn't make out his face, but it was him. Had to be.

Danny Faith.

My friend.

He ducked low and turned in a dead sprint for the trees, for the trail that would lead him away. I didn't think. I ran, down the edge of the clearing, toward the shed, the gun in my hand.

I heard cop sounds at the cabin, voices, crashing wood. Someone yelled "Clear!" and it was echoed.

We were alone, the two of us, and I could hear him thrashing through brush, limbs snapping into place behind him. I made for the tree line, the shed coming up; then I was there, and I saw the glow of fire shining through the cracks of the door and through the dirt-smeared windows. The shed was on fire. Raging on fire. I was next to it when the windows blew out.

The concussion threw me into the dirt. I rolled onto my back as flames poured skyward and turned night to day. I could see everything to the edge of the woods. The trees still guarded their blackness. But he was out there, and I went after him.

I was at the edge of the trees when I heard Grantham shout my name. I saw him at the cabin door, then plunged into the trees, half-blind. But I'd grown up in woods like this, knew them, so that even when I fell I popped up like I was on a spring. But then I went down hard and the gun spun out of my hand. I couldn't find it, couldn't waste the time, so I left it.

I saw him on the trail, the flicker of his shirt as he rounded a bend. I was up to him within seconds. He heard me, turned, and I hit him in the chest at a dead run. I landed on top of him, and saw how wrong I'd been. I felt it as my hands went around his neck. He was too thin, too brittle to be Danny Faith; but I knew him, and my fingers ground deeper into the withered neck.

His face showed his own bitter hatred as he struggled beneath me. He twisted to bite me, couldn't reach, and I felt his fingers on my wrists as he tried to force my hands away. His knees rose up; his heels drummed the hard-packed clay. Part of me knew that I was wrong. The rest of me didn't care. Maybe it had been Danny. Maybe he was at the cabin, arrested and in cuffs. But maybe we'd all been wrong, and it was not Danny Faith that had raped my Grace. Not Danny, but this miserable old f.u.c.k. This sorry, worthless, undeserving motherf.u.c.ker kicking in the dirt as I crushed the life out of him.

I squeezed harder.

His hands left my wrists and I felt them fumbling at his waist. When I felt something hard between us I realized the mistake I'd made. I rolled off of him as the gun hammered away, two enormous concussions that split the dark and blinded me. I kept rolling, off the trail and into the dampness under the trees. I found a wide trunk and put my back to it. I waited for the old man to come and finish the job. But the shot never came. There were voices and lights, badges glinting, and shotgun barrels as smooth as gla.s.s. Grantham was standing over me, his light in my face. I tried to stand, then something crashed into my head and I was on my back.

"Put this c.o.c.ksucker in handcuffs," Grantham said to one of the deputies.

The deputy grabbed me, flipped me onto my stomach, and slammed his knee into the center of my back.

"Where's the gun?" Grantham demanded.

"It was Zebulon Faith," I said. "His gun."

Grantham looked around, shone his light down the trail. "All I see out here is you," he said.

I was shaking my head. "He set the fire and ran. He shot at me when I tried to stop him."

Grantham glanced at the river, at the slow roll of water that looked like sucking black tar, then upslope, to the oily glow of the burning shed. He shook his head and spat in the dirt.

"What a mess," he said, then walked away.

CHAPTER 9.

They stuffed me in the back of a cop car then watched the shed burn to the ground. Eventually, firemen put water on the smoking debris, but not before my arms went numb. I thought about what I'd almost done. Zebulon Faith. Not Danny. Feet drumming clay and the fierce satisfaction I'd felt as the life began to fade out of him. I could have killed him.

I felt like that should trouble me.

The air in the car grew close, and I watched the sun rise. Grantham poked through the soaking ash with a white-haired fireman. They picked up objects and then let them fall. Robin's car rolled out of the trees an hour after dawn. She pa.s.sed me on the cratered road, and lifted a hand from the wheel. She spoke for a long time with Detective Grantham, who pointed at things amid the ruin, then at the fire marshal, who came over and spoke some more. Several times they looked at me, and Grantham refused to hide his displeasure. After about ten minutes, Robin got into her car and Grantham walked uphill to where I sat in his. He opened my door.

"Out," he said.

I slipped across the seat and put my feet on the damp gra.s.s.

"Turn around." He made a motion with his finger. I turned and he removed the handcuffs. "A question, Mr. Chase. Do you have any ownership interest in your family's farm?"

I rubbed my wrists. "The farm is held as a family partnership. I had a ten percent interest."

"Had?"

"My father bought me out."

Grantham nodded. "When you left?"

"When he kicked me out."

"So, you have nothing to gain if he sells."

"That's right."

"Who else has an interest?"

"He gave Jamie and Miriam ten percent each when he adopted them."

"What's a ten percent stake worth?"

"A lot."

"How much is a lot?"

"More than a little," I said, and he let it go.

"And your stepmother? Does she have ownership?"

"No. She has no interest."

"Okay," Grantham said.

I studied the man. His face was unreadable, his shoes black and destroyed. "That's it?" I asked.

He pointed at Robin's car. "If you have questions, Mr. Chase, you can talk to her."

"What about Danny Faith?" I asked. "What about his father?"

"Talk to Alexander," he said.

He shut my door and walked to the driver's side; turned the car around and drove back into the trees. I heard the car bottom out in a rut, then I walked down to speak with Robin. She did not get out, so I slid in next to her, my knee touching the shotgun locked to the dash. She was tired, still in last night's clothes. Her voice was drawn.

"I've been at the hospital," she said.

"How's Grace?"

"Talking a bit."

I nodded.

"She says it wasn't you."

"Are you surprised?"

"No, but she didn't see a face. Inconclusive, according to Detective Grantham."

I looked at the cabin. "Did they find Danny?" I asked.

"No sign." She stared at me. When I turned back, I knew what she was going to say before the words left her mouth. "You should not have been here, Adam."

I shrugged.

"You're lucky n.o.body got killed." She peered through the gla.s.s, clearly frustrated. "Jesus, Adam. You don't think right when you get like this."

"I didn't ask for this to happen but it did. I'm not going to sit on my hands and do nothing. This happened to Grace! Not some stranger."

"Did you come here to do harm?" she asked.

I thought of Dolf Shepherd's pistol lying out there in the leaves. "Would you believe me if I said no?"

"Probably not."

"Then why bother to ask. It's done."

We were both stripped-down, nerves exposed. Robin had her cop face on. I was getting to recognize it pretty well. "Why did Grantham let me go?" I asked. "He could have made my life h.e.l.l."

She thought about it, then pointed at the pile of black ash. "Zebulon Faith was running a methamphetamine lab in the shed. He was probably using the money to cover the debt on the property he's bought. He had it rigged to burn. He must have known that the police were coming in. We'll find something to that effect. A motion sensor up the road. A phone call from one of the trailers you pa.s.s on the way in. Something that told him to get out. There's not much left."

"Enough?" I asked.

"For a prosecution? Maybe. Juries are fickle."

"And Faith?"

"He'd have disappeared completely, with nothing but circ.u.mstantial evidence linking him to the lab." She faced me, pivoting in her seat. "If it goes to trial, Grantham will need you to put Zebulon Faith at the scene. He weighed that into his decision to cut you loose."

"I'm still surprised he did it."

"Crystal meth is a big problem. A conviction will play well. The sheriff is a politician."

"And if Grantham thinks I had something to do with Grace's rape? Would he sell her out, too?"

Robin hesitated. "Grantham has reason to doubt that you were involved with the a.s.sault on Grace."

There was a new tension in her face. I knew her too well. "Something's changed," I said.

She thought about it, and I waited her out. Finally, she relented.

"Whoever attacked Grace left a sc.r.a.p of paper at the scene. A message."