Nightwitch (20 page)

“
I gotta finish my paper route,” Arty said. The police figured he was a boy in shock, but Harry knew better.

“
Folks will understand if they don’t get their paper today,” Officer Harrison Harpine, said.

“
I only got a block left to do, less than five minutes. Then I’ll go home.”

“
Do you want to meet me there, so we can tell your mom together?” Harry asked. The officers were more than willing to let Harry break the news. Nobody wanted to tell someone their husband was dead.

“
No, that’s okay, I’ll do it. Besides she’s still asleep.” He was shuffling his feet back and forth as he talked, but he kept his eyes locked onto Harry’s. He liked Harry and he knew Harry understood.

“
You’re sure you don’t want someone to go home with you?” Ray Harpine’s father asked, wanting to make sure.

“
Yes, sir, I’m sure. I can handle it.”

“
The boy will be fine,” Harry told the cops. Then he turned to Arty, “Why don’t you finish your paper route. I think the police can take care of everything here.”

“
How long before they take him away?” Arty asked. He didn’t care if his father lay across the sidewalk forever, till his skin rotted off, till buzzards ripped him apart, till his bones bleached in the sun, till hell froze over, but he didn’t want Carolina to see.

“
Doc Willets is on the way now,” Harry Lightfoot said. “Your father will be in the mortuary before sunrise.”

“
Thank you,” Arty said, turning and walking back toward his bike.

“
Hey Arty,” Harry said in a smooth even voice, “Wait up a second.” Arty stopped at the bike and waited, while Harry approached.

“
I’m okay, Harry,” he said, voice barely above a whisper. The officers couldn’t hear.

“
You really don’t care about your father, do you?” Harry whispered, putting his hand on Arty’s shoulder.

“
No.”

“
You’re not going to miss him?”

“
No.”

“
So why do you care how long he’ll be out in the cold?”

“
I don’t want Carolina to see,” he told Harry the truth, because everybody knew you couldn’t lie to Harry.

Chapter Twelve

“
What do you think?” Carolina asked him as they were leaving the Rec Center. Sheila moved and she adjusted her backpack to make the ferret more comfortable.

“
My legs hurt,” Arty said, walking stiff legged, “but I liked it. I especially liked the part where he was talking about me.”

“
You?” She had to adjust the backpack again, Sheila was restless.

“
He said only one of us in the room was going to be a black belt. That’s me.” He rubbed his thighs and laughed.

“
Oh, I don’t think so. I think he was talking about me.” She was laughing, too.

“
Then I guess he was wrong when he said only one, ’cuz it looks like we both are gonna get a black belt.”

“
No matter how hard it is,” she said.

“
No matter how long it takes,” he said.

“
Nothing will stop us.”

“
Nothing.”

“
Swear,” she said.

“
I swear,” he said.

“
That looks like a good spot.” Carolina pointed to a tall shade tree at the edge of the park. “We can study there, by the river.”

With his father dead, Arty didn’t have to pretend about going to Spanish lessons, but he didn’t want to tell Carolina about what happened after he left her house. He thought about it, but rejected the idea, because he didn’t know how to tell her without sounding like he was glad his old man was dead. Also he didn’t know how to tell her without telling her that he died on her street, just six houses away, face down on the sidewalk, covered in blood. And he didn’t know how to tell her, without telling her that the wolf lady did it. So he kept it to himself.

Carolina sat on the grass, with her back against the tree, and opened the backpack. Her face lit up as the ferret scooted out and jumped into her lap. She stroked its fur, causing it to wiggle. Arty laughed and sat down next to her.

“
Okay,” he said, “now the fun begins.” He opened his backpack and took out two beginning Spanish books, but, before they could open them, they heard Brad Peters’ booming from across the park.

“
Well, lookee here, boys.”

“
Oh, no,” Arty said, “that’s all we need.”

“
Maybe they’ll go away.”

“
Not a chance.”

“
Then let’s get out of here.” She handed her book over to Arty.

“
They’ll just catch us.”

“
Not if we get into the woods and hide.”

“
We’ll never make it.”

“
Sure we will. They’re twice as far from us as we are from the woods.”

“
I don’t know.”

“
Well, I’m going to count to three. Then I’m going for it,” she said, “so get ready to run.”

This was a bad idea, he thought. If they stayed put, Brad and his bully friends would hassle them for a few minutes, then move on, but if they ran away and forced Brad to run after them, he’d be mighty mad once he caught them.

“
One,” she said, holding open the top of her backpack as the bullies got a step closer.

They’d leave her alone, but he was sure that Brad would pound his head into the ground, especially after the fight. Oh yeah, he’d pound his head into the ground all right, or something worse. Last month they made Tom Swan eat dirt. Arty didn’t think he could do that. No. Running was a bad idea. Besides, he was too fat. No way could he even outrun a tree stump.

“
Two,” she said, and the bullies were another step nearer as Sheila scurried into the backpack.

He saw her muscles tighten. Her hand snaked out and she wrapped her fingers around the backpack, and against his better judgment he found himself stuffing the two Spanish books into his. She pulled the backpack toward herself and started to put it on.

Then she surprised him.

“
Hey, Mom,” she yelled out, standing up and slipping the pack onto her shoulders. She waved and Arty followed her lead, standing and slinging his own pack over his shoulders.

The three bullies turned to the direction she was waving.

“
Three.” She took off toward the woods, like a base runner stealing home, and he took off on her heels.

She was out of the park and into the woods, and he was at the edge of the park himself, when he heard a loud, “Hey.” He didn’t have to look back to know their ruse had been discovered. They would be coming now, running flat out, all three of them were faster than him. He sure didn’t want to get caught.

Branches whipped against him as he entered the woods. Which way—the pathway to the right offered an easy escape. He turned left, smashing through dense brush toward the creek. They’d expect him to take the easy route. He hoped Carolina thought like he did.

“
Hurry,” she said, ahead of him. She did. He caught up with her and together, they pushed branches aside as they made their way to the creek. “They’ll most likely take the path for a few minutes, because they’re stupid, but when they find out we didn’t go that way, they’ll come back.”

He heard the babbling creek up ahead. “They’ll never find us now,” he said.

“
Don’t be too sure. Even as dumb as they are, they’ll know there’s only two ways through the woods back to Palma. The jogging path, or the hard way, along the creek.”

“
They’ll run on the jogging path all the way to Palma,” he said.

“
How fast can you run?”

“
Not very,” he said, pulling a branch aside for her.

“
Do you think they know that?”

“
Probably.”

“
Then they’ll be coming,” she said. Arty was impressed with her logic. She was awful smart for a kid.

“
Do you know the way?” he asked.

“
Sure, you just stay by the creek all the way into town. It’s not easy though, we have to go up the side of the mountain over by Mountain Sea Road, and past that clearing by the cliffs, then down again into town. We wind up by the dunes on the south side of town.”

“
You’ve done this before?”

“
Sure, lotsa times. I love walking in the woods.”

“
I hate it.” Arty pushed still another branch aside for her.

“
Once we get to the creek it won’t be so dense. It’ll be easy, till we have to start going up. Oh, yeah, and there’s a couple of places where you have to walk on rocks to the other side, because you can’t always go along this side.”

“
Those guys aren’t gonna push their way through all of this just to catch us.”

“
They don’t have to.” She stopped for a second to catch her breath.

“
What do you mean?” An insect landed on his hand and he slapped it.

“
All they have to do is take the jogging path back to the park, turn right for about hundred yards to the creek, and come right up after us.”

“
They don’t have to push through all this stuff like we do?”

“
No. Sorry.”

“
We should get going.”

“
Maybe not,” she said, “because there is one other thing.” She stuck her lower lip out and blew hair out of her eyes.

“
What?”

“
They could be waiting for us up ahead.”

“
How could they do that?”

“
If they know the jogging path crosses the creek about halfway between here and the mountain.”

“
Jeez, do you think they know about that?”

“
I’ve only lived here for three months and I know about it.”

“
I didn’t.”

“
But you don’t like to come into the woods.”

“
What are we gonna do?”

“
I don’t know,” she said. “We could go on ahead and maybe get caught, because they’re waiting for us. Or we could head back along the creek and maybe get caught, because they’re coming up that way for us. Or we could head back to the jogging path, and take it either toward Palma, or back to the park, hoping they came up the creek after us. Or we could stay here and hide, till we’re sure they’ve gone home.”

“
I don’t wanna stay here.” He slapped another insect.

“
Me neither, so we have to make a choice.”

“
What if they split up?” he said.

“
They won’t.”

“
How do you know?”

“
They’re too stupid for that, besides, without Brad egging them on, the other two would just go home.”

“
Then let’s go up the creek and over the side of the mountain.”

“
Why that way?” she asked.

“’
Cuz we gotta make a choice.”

“
Okay,” she said, smiling at him, “let’s go.”

They pushed their way through the brush and in a couple of minutes they were at the creek. Arty followed as she turned right and started walking against the flow of running water. She seemed to have endless energy as she followed the creek, sometimes leaping from stone to stone, where he had to stop and take a breath, say a small prayer and jump like an ungainly elephant, but miraculously he landed on every stone with enough balance intact to keep from falling in.

But sometimes there were no stones and he had to step in the wet, coarse sand along the creek’s bank. A couple of times he had to step in mud. His new Nikes would never be the same. After about thirty minutes, he found himself huffing and sweating and feeling every extra pound.

“
I gotta rest,” he said, ashamed of himself.

“
Okay.” She stopped and pointed. “Right up there is the widest place we have to cross over.”

“
It looks dangerous.” He hoped he didn’t sound like a chicken.

“
It’s not that bad, really. It looks a lot worse than it is. Besides, the water is only about six inches deep, so even if you fall in, all’s that’s going to happen is that you’ll get wet.”

“
That’s not so bad,” he said.

“
But you’ll probably freeze to death.” She laughed and he found himself laughing with her.

“
Alright, I’m ready,” he said.

She got up and led the way to the stones that crossed the twenty feet to the other side of the creek.

“
There they are!” Brad’s voice rang through the forest.

“
Come on, we have to hurry,” she said, but Arty didn’t need any urging. She skipped across the rocks like a ballerina and he followed like a lumbering, sure footed bear.

When they reached the other side, she said, “Come on, up the side.” She started to climb out of the gully the creek had taken thousands of years to make. It was only six feet to the top, but there were no easy hand holds. By the time they scrambled and clawed their way up, Brad Peters and Steve Kerr were at the other side. Ray Harpine wasn’t with them. Either he’d gone home or he was waiting up ahead.

Brad charged to the first stone and was moving to the second when something hit him in the chest, causing him to lose his balance and fall in the water.