Postmark Bayou Chene (36 page)

She snuffled the ground at the end of the walk once more, then deeper, sharper. There it was, the beloved scent! Not just wafting on air, as before, but solid at ground level. A footstep. Loyce had touched down there. Nose to the ground, the little dog ran in ever-widening circles, but every time she locked onto the most concentrated essence of Loyce, the oily stench overpowered her. It oozed from the walls and rose up from the ground around the cabin. Drifter's hair ridged up her back, and her tail quivered a stiff arc. She issued a low growl and circled the entire cabin again but couldn't penetrate the reeking barrier. Finally, she gave up and backed into the brush to wait.

Inside Loyce paced through the hours after making the switch. Feeling every object in the cabin, counting the steps to the door, four. Then mentally counting the steps to the end of the plank walk again. What was past the walk? She couldn't risk finding out now. That fuel can was her only hope.

It was late afternoon when his boots hit the plank walk again.

“Well, Miss Priss, I'm ready to claim my prize” were the words that greeted her. The smell of whiskey improved his breath but not his patience.

“First I'll need a bath, and I'll need privacy to get ready,” Loyce said. “I'll bring in the water. You start the fire.”

Pank couldn't contain his excitement as he watched her feel her way to the door. He clanged the stove lid and started rummaging the coals. Just as she bent to pick up the two buckets, he stopped still, and she realized her mistake.

“How do you know where the water barrel is?”

She couldn't see his face, but she felt him scrutinizing hers. What could he read there? She knew sighted people picked up cues that way, but she had never been able to decipher what those cues were, even if her life depended on it. Now it did!

She remained bent over the buckets and hoped the curtain of hair brushing her cheekbones covered any expression that would give her away.

“Oh, you didn't expect me to sit here in the cabin all day, did you?” She forced herself to trip the words out lightly, even though her knees were quaking under her skirt. “I felt along as far as the walk could take me, and I'll tell you right now, we're gonna need more plank walks! I'll also need a line to hang washing, and I want an outhouse like any proper household has. If you aim to have a woman of your own, Pank, it will bring changes. There's no two ways about it.”

“All right! All right! Have it your way,” he blustered. “We'll see to that later. Just go get that water now and be quick about it before I change my mind about that washing up.”

She was out the door before he finished speaking. Making the most of her head start, she scouted with her foot toward the end of the plank walk, hoping he couldn't see that she went right past the rain barrel. The clank of the fuel can against the iron stove was loud, and Loyce knew that her life depended on something less than seconds. She dropped the buckets and stretched both hands in front of her, walking fast, faster than she had ever walked before, even in familiar surroundings.

By the time the explosion slammed her to the ground, Loyce had reached the limit of her previous explorations. Thirty-five steps. She lay stunned for precious moments while debris crashed up and then back down through the treetops. Flaming chunks hissed into water holes; others thumped into the mud inches from her face. She didn't know what lay in front, but she knew what was behind her—either a dead man in a flaming cabin with an untold number of fuel cans nearby or a live man who knew she had tried to kill him.

Scrambling to her feet, she poised to step into the unknown when something bumped her leg. The scream died in her throat when she realized there was something familiar about the touch. Another bump. She stretched one hand downward, and Drifter's tongue met her halfway. She didn't wonder how; she just trusted, stepping away from the barrier Drifter made with her body. Two steps, and there she was again, this time on the other side.

Heat told Loyce where she was in relation to the fire, but she'd have to depend on Drifter for the direction to take away from it. Step by step, the dog herded her away from the burning cabin. They went around trees, over logs.

Loyce felt the heat recede, but her terror intensified to the point she felt her heart would burst. Were those footsteps behind her? To the side now? Closing in from the brush? She couldn't tell whether the crashing sounds were of her own making or whether Pank was an arm length behind, reaching for her skirt tail. Thickets caught in her clothes, branches slapped her face, mud sucked at her feet and pulled off a shoe.

Suddenly, she cried out in pain, oblivious to the noise that would give her away. Something had bitten into the tender flesh of her calf and thrown her face first into the mud. Writhing in pain, her thrashing made it impossible to listen for clues. She tried to spring back up but then realized that no creature moved under her or held her down; pain simply radiated from her calf. She rolled over and felt the pull of a vicious briar. Relief flooded through her even as she strained to sit up and unwind the thorny bramble. In her haste and confusion she ripped its length deeper into her leg but finally yanked it free.

Drifter licked her face and urged her to her feet. Air burned back into her chest as she tried to stand, tripping over the long skirt, wobbling on the one shoe and bleeding leg. She was as unsteady as a toddler, but she never had to wonder about the direction. Every time she tried to take a wrong turn, the sturdy body pushed back against her.

Ever mindful of Loyce, Drifter was following the scent trail left by the bag of pups. It was faint, but she had traced it so many times she knew the way by heart. It led to where she and Sam had been together on the big water. Sometimes the scent disappeared completely, but now and then it wafted fresh in her nostrils, pulling her and Loyce in that direction.

Loyce was breathing hard when they broke into a small clearing. She could tell there was open space around her because of the slight currents of air. She waved her hands out to the side and above her head. No branches or tree trunks were within reach. They were standing in a grove of long-dead trees known as widowmakers. Lifeless trunks spiked into the sky, releasing twigs and dried branches over time. Eventually, each skeletal top would snap with no warning and plummet to the ground. Swampers knew them to be the most insidious danger in the woods. The slightest bump of a boat or even a wave of water could launch a dagger of splintered wood.

“Drifter?” She queried, knowing the little dog couldn't answer. “Is this the riverbank? Where are we?”

Loyce groped, unsure of where to turn. Arms outstretched, she tried to step but tripped over Drifter. As she tumbled, her hands broke her fall against a tree trunk. Unseen above them, a spire began to sway. Drifter pulled on the heavy skirt, urging Loyce onward.

30

Fate squinted across the gray expanse of Lake Chicot as he steered his bateau out of Little Bayou Chene. Sam, stripped down to his undershirt, crouched on the bow, waiting for Fate's word to drop the three-pronged hook again. Fate realized he was sweating inside his jacket. He had not even noticed when the morning chill had burned off to noon heat. Now he slipped off the garment without taking his eyes from the lake. Still focused on the water, he absentmindedly folded the jacket and slid it beneath him to cushion the wooden seat.

When the initial search of the island had failed to find Loyce and Drifter, every available boat in the community began dragging the bayou around the post office. They searched until dark. When daylight came again, the boats fanned farther afield. Adam and Val headed to the west side of the community, while Fate and Sam turned south, where the accumulated waters flowed into Lake Chicot. It was now late afternoon, and Loyce had been missing more than twenty-four hours. The expanse of Lake Chicot looked endless to their tired eyes. The engine put-putted steadfastly into the current.

Fate mopped his face with a sleeve. The cooling effect roused him enough to talk.

“She has to be somewhere, Sam.” His voice was barely more than a whisper from fatigue and despair. “Why would she have gone to the bayou, anyway? Is it even possible she could be this far from home? But she's not anywhere on land, and we can't just sit, doing nothing like she'll show up on her own. And where is Drifter? Did someone take them? It just doesn't make sense.”

Sam shook his head, concurring with Fate's puzzlement. Everyone had asked the same questions, but no answers came.

“Let's start here and work our way down,” Fate said without conviction, pointing to a logjam that made an easy landmark.

Sam stood and dropped the hook again, playing out line until he felt the weight hit bottom. Fate took up the slack with the motor. They both watched as the line sifted through the water, both dreading the soft thud that meant the prongs had snagged something that was not wood or metal.

So far they had pulled up barrel hoops, buckets, and something that looked like part of a wagon wheel. The collection of relics was mute evidence that the wilderness eventually reclaimed itself from civilization. Time and again, Sam dropped the hook and let the line slide through his fingers, probing for evidence of the most recent loss.

It was futile to think they could find a body if there even
was
a body in the river channel, Fate thought, but he could no more give up than stop breathing. An hour passed. When Sam's thick shoulders ached from the throwing and pulling of the weight, he maneuvered the boat while Fate dragged the bottom. They worked their way slowly down the river channel through the lake.

Suddenly, Fate's eyes hardened. Sam saw his jaw clinch. His long arms inched along the line, willing whatever it had hooked to stay on the prongs. Slowly, ever so slowly, the line coiled on the bow. Both men stopped breathing as muddy fabric billowed into sight. Tears blurred Fate's vision, but he continued to hoist. When the cloth broke the surface, Sam looked away to give him privacy.

But instead of the wail of grief he expected, Sam heard, “What the hell?” He glanced back to see Fate pulling up the remains of a small trunk, clasps broken, one side missing, but straps intact. Ragged clothing still trapped inside the wreck waved like a sodden flag. The remaining wooden sides gave way with the weight of being hoisted. Fate reached down and slipped the strap from the hook, sending the bundle back to the bottom.

He was still shaking from the shock when a boom rumbled in the distance. The sound came from upstream far enough away that they might have imagined it, except that blue herons and snowy egrets lifted from the shallows in alarm. Sam jerked the crank cord before Fate had a chance to sit down. They both hunched to reduce wind resistance.
Chug, putt, chug, putt
, the boat was slower going upstream, but still they made better time than if they had been rowing. Ten minutes, then fifteen.

Surely they had traveled far enough to be in the vicinity of the noise. The disturbance may not have anything to do with Loyce, but nothing was too remote to overlook. Two pair of eyes scanned the bank where last year's leaves had thinned and this year's crop had not filled in, the sparseness allowing them to see deeper into the thicket than usual.