Ravens (32 page)

“You got him,” said Shaw. “Take him.”

The fish kept fighting. But it gave and then gave some more, and pretty soon Jase was cranking him in. Finally it was close
enough for them to net. Mr. Lonsdale said it was one of the biggest redfish he’d ever seen. Dad clapped Jase on the back and
Tara applauded. Mom took photos while he held the fish. For one shot he puckered up his lips as though about to kiss it, and
everyone laughed. Nobody told him his humor was gross, or stupid or childish; they just laughed with him. They were all with
him, and he was with Shaw. Everything was awesome.

Then Shaw’s phone started to buzz.

Jase knew who it was. It was Romeo.

Not
now,
he thought. Not in the middle of my perfect day! You jerk, stay out of our lives, we’re sick of you!

Shaw took the phone from his pocket.

“Wait!” Jase cried. “Don’t even answer.”

Shaw said, “I got to, buddy.”

“No, it’s that buttwipe! Just let him go! We don’t need him!”

Shaw turned away and opened the phone and brought it to his ear. Jase grabbed his arm and cried, “No, don’t!”

Shaw yanked free, but the phone slipped from his grasp and went sailing. It bounced against the gunwale and flew out over
the river and plunged in, vanished.

One long moment of quiet when they all stared after it.

Then Shaw turned and glared at Jase. With dark menacing rage. Jase burst into tears. “I’m sorry! Shaw, I’m
sorry.
I didn’t mean to do that.”

All of Shaw’s fury was in his eyes. Otherwise he made no sign.

He drew a slow breath, and then asked Mr. Lonsdale, “How deep is this, Henry?”

“Nine, ten feet. Mud bottom. I’m afraid you won’t find it again.”

Shaw said hoarsely, “It’s gone?”

“Afraid so.”

More silence. Then Shaw said, “Well. No big deal, I guess. It was an old phone. I’m just concerned because my mother’s supposed
to be calling me from the hospital.”

Said Henry Lonsdale, “Nothing serious, I hope?”

“Oh. My father had a stroke.”

“My God, I’m sorry to hear that.”

“So I’ve really got to get to a phone in a hurry.”

“You can use mine.”

“That’s kind of you. But I don’t have my mother’s number. It was in that phone. I guess I better get back to shore.”

“Sure. Of course.”

“Hate to spoil the fishing.”

“No problem,” said Lonsdale, and he went to the wheel and cranked up the engine. “The fish’ll be here tomorrow.”

Shaw asked, “How long will it take to get back to your dock?”

“Well, this gal is pretty fast. Fifteen minutes?”

“Can we make it any quicker?”

“Do the best I can.”

Jase sat in the bottom of the boat and curled his knees against his chest, and held his feet in his hands, and stared at his
toes. He knew what he’d done. He’d unloosed Romeo into the world. He was the one who had brought Romeo into their lives in
the first place, when he’d bragged to his friends about winning the jackpot. Now this. His fault again. Always his fault.
Like he’d been sent here to destroy everyone’s life. Like he was secretly working for the devil. He wished he were dead. He
wanted to throw himself in the water and drown — although mixed with that was a deep shiver of pride that he knew he couldn’t
tell anybody about ever.

Burris
found plenty of trailers on Balm-of-Gilead Road. No trailer parks proper, but all along were singles, or clusters of three
or four. At each he pulled in, knocked, displayed the mugshot.

Some of the trailers had boxes of geraniums and stone reindeer and stained-glass caterpillars, and nice old ladies who offered
tea and wanted to talk; some were less friendly. Set back in the pines, with Firebirds on blocks and chewed-up screen doors
and the gaping tombs of freezers. At one stop, a brace of pit bulls charged him. The sound of galloping, the earth trembling,
and there they were, leaping at his throat — but midair they hit the ends of their chains and were hurled into the dust as
though stricken down by lightning.

The dogs’ owner said he didn’t know Romeo, but maybe his brother did. His brother was in the state pen at Reidsville.

Burris kept canvassing, canvassing patiently until he’d used up about three-quarters of Balm-of-Gilead, and nobody knew anything,
and it was near three o’clock in the afternoon. Rose called again. “43? Burris? Where
are
you, Burris? You better get the Sam Hill in here.”

He ignored her. He kept working.

He came upon a unit with a convivial jigsaw skunk out front, and a gardenful of happy tulips and sweet pea. He pulled up.
Old lady standing at the door, behind her walker. When he told her his business, she laughed out loud. “
Romeo
? My goodness. And he’s
dangerous
?”

She had a great growly voice. Burris got a kick out of her, and thought Nell would too.

Stop thinking of Nell. Nell is not the measure of everything. What Nell will get a kick out of, or won’t get a kick out of,
is not your concern.

“We’re just looking for this guy, ma’am. Have you seen him?”

“Well, he looks like that fella I saw going into Claude’s.”

“Who’s Claude?”

“Used to live right there. He died though. I think his daughter’s there now.”

The trailer she pointed to was away from the road, almost hidden. Burris walked up and knocked. He heard a grunt, which he
took to mean
Come in.
He opened the door.

A large woman lay in bed, smoking, drinking beer and watching TV. She wore a faded pink nightie. “Sorry I don’t get up,” she
said. “I’m in mourning.”

He said, “I’m sorry about that.” He didn’t ask her who’d died because he didn’t care. He just showed her the mugshot and said,
“You know this man?”

Her face darkened. “Oh, yeah.
Ro
-meo. What’s his game this time?”

“Why do you say ‘game’?”

“ ’Cause he’s a bullshit artist. He tried to tell me he was like some kind of hit man. For some insurance scam or something.
I never knew what the hell he was saying. Officer, why don’t you get yourself a beer out of the fridge there? Come have a
chat.”

“No thank you. He said he was a hit man?”

“He said he was the angel of darkness. Wait, you wanna see something? Let me show you something.”

She reached into the drawer of the nightstand beside her. Fumbling around. “You’ll like this. This is a hoot. Wait. Where
is it?”

She reached down into the flop of tabloids on the floor beside the bed. Stirring them around. Burris took a step back, afraid
she might roll off the bed.

Then she sat up and waddled in her nightgown to the TV.

On top of it she found a map. “OK, here. He left this. His little tourist map.”

The map had been issued by the Brunswick Chamber of Commerce. Stars had been scrawled at various places. Near the top, someone
had written, ‘Points of Interest.’ But Burris’s eye was drawn immediately to the bottom, to the old part of town, where one
of the stars had been drawn right on Egmont Street, near the corner of Albemarle.

Nell’s.

Another star, encircled, was on Oriole Road: Mitch and Patsy’s. There was a star on Poinsettia Circle, but Burris couldn’t
place it. But the Belle Point star? That would be the house of Shelby Manford, Patsy’s brother.

The stars assembling themselves into a pattern as he looked at them — the way the figure of Orion will jump out from the confusion
of the night sky. The pattern was: Mitch Boatwright’s family.

“Ma’am,” said Burris, “do you mind if I borrow this?”

She shrugged. “
I
sure as hell don’t want it. But wouldn’t you like to join me for a beer, Officer? One PBR, come on. Don’t be such an old
lady.”

Mitch
went to the back of the boat, where Shaw was looking out at the water. Mitch said under his breath, “You know my child meant
no harm.”

Shaw gave him a tight-lipped smile.

Mitch asked him, “What does it mean? If he calls and you don’t answer?”

Shaw shook his head.

Said Mitch, “You can stop him, can’t you?”

“If we get to shore. Yes. I think I know where he’ll go first.”

They bounced along through the waves. Mitch watched as Patsy opened the ice chest and carefully measured out a little cocktail
for herself. Tara was gazing at the riverbank, at the solemn oaks. Jase sat in his heap of misery. Shaw said to Mitch, “It’s
my fault. I shouldn’t have left Romeo out there.”

Said Mitch, “There’s lots of things you shouldn’t have done. You shouldn’t be here in the first place. But I know one thing.
You’re here because God wants you here.”

They sat without speaking. Shaw began to softly weep. He said, “Is there a prayer for me? Is there anything that could save
me?”

Mitch put an arm around him, and held him, and said, “There’s the psalm. My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Why art
thou so far from helping me, and from the words of my roaring?”

Mitch turned his gaze to the boat’s wake, as it opened into the river, and he went on: “I am poured out like water, and all
my bones are out of joint: my heart is like wax; it is melted in the midst of my bowels. My strength is dried up like a potsherd;
my tongue cleaveth to my jaws; and thou hast brought me into the dust of death.”

Shaw wept into Mitch’s chest. Mitch said, “Be not thou far from me, O Lord. O my strength! Haste thee to help me!”

Romeo
had been braced for the world to collapse at any moment, but he’d supposed this fall would come violently, with lightning
and thunder. Instead it was all happening in silence: the walls just quietly caving in.

Shaw wasn’t answering his phone.

That was all.

Romeo kept up the rhythm with his thumb, calling again and again, but each time he got Shaw’s message machine.
You know what to do.

He kept driving. He took a left at the Sonic. Another left at Zachary Wiles’s Funeral Home. He passed the Empire Title Pawn
Shop. He thought about that cry he’d heard:
“No, don’t!”
Whose voice could that have been? Someone younger than Patsy, shriller than Tara — maybe Jase? But Jase was too shy and timid
to shout like that. Some girl at the fairgrounds? Just some girl Shaw was flirting with, and this was only a game?

But then he’d have called right back.

Maybe he’s got no signal? He’s out of range?

But then why doesn’t he get back
into
range?

Well. He’s thoughtless. Like a child sometimes.

Romeo was back at the Sonic. He turned left, and made another left at the funeral home. Passed Empire Title again. He was
driving in circles. Why not admit it? he thought.
They’ve got Shaw.
It’s so clear. Here’s what happened: the porks came, Shaw pulled his gun, someone yelled, “No, don’t!” So that’s it. It’s
over. He’s either caught or dead — and I better hope dead, considering the torture that prison would be for Shaw.

Shit.

3:06. Time was running out. Fourteen minutes left.

Call me, goddamn it!

He stopped at a construction site on 17. He took half a dex; then he went back to the trunk but couldn’t remember how it opened.
He looked everywhere before he finally checked the glove compartment and found the release switch. He went back and opened
the trunk and took out the Phoenix .22. Above him were black stormclouds. The very air was stressed. He’d have to start killing
any moment. He needed the whirling. Oh shit. Shaw,
call me.

Burris
called the Lieutenant as he drove toward town. He didn’t want to be overheard so he used his cell phone. It took a while
to get through. When he did, he said, “Lieutenant, I need a BOLO on this guy and I need it right now. His name is Romeo Zderko.”

“Who?”

“Friend of Shaw McBride’s.”

“Burris, you can’t work this case.”

“This time I’ve got real evidence.”

“Chief’s gonna
fire
your ass.”

“But this guy, this Zderko, he’s stalking the Boatwrights. He’s got a map of Brunswick with little stars where all the Boatwrights
live.”

Silence, while the Lieutenant tried to process this. It was painful for Burris to wait, but he did. After a long while the
Lieutenant said, “What do you mean, stars?”

“It’d take too long to explain. The point is, he’s targeting the Boatwrights.”

“Where’d you find this map?”

“The trailer where he’s been staying.”

“You had your warrant and all?”

“Didn’t need one. His girlfriend gave it to me.”

A sigh. “OK.”

OK
was just two letters but the Lieutenant drawled them so slowly it was like he was reeling out the whole alphabet. Then he
said, “Burris, this map, would you say it represents an imminent threat?”

“He’s never met them! Yet he’s got a map showing their houses!”

“Yeah. I guess that’s a threat. You bringing this in?”

“Fast as I can. But we need a BOLO right now.”

“Can it wait till the Chief gets back from lunch?”

“For God’s sake. Jimmy! Gimme the fuckin BOLO!”

He hadn’t called him Jimmy for years — not since his demotion. Soft crackle of static.