Saving Cecil (22 page)

My nap lasted a few hours and helped clear my thinking. I woke resolute that the only option left to me was to blow the door open. I relit the hurricane lamp and went to work.

It took another hour to come up with a contained explosive, which I hoped would serve to simply blow off the latch as well as the board that had been nailed to the door. I made a handy dandy little bomb by pouring a small amount of the hobby-grade gunpowder into one of the short sections of pipe. A little visco fuse and some tape from my tote and I was ready. I taped the bomb to the crack in the middle of the double doors, right over the latch. Before I lit the fuse, however, I had to be sure that Tulip would be behind the shed. I went to the far corner and called her to our communication crack. “Stay, girl!” I told her in my I'm-not-kidding-around voice.

I removed the glass from the lamp, took three quick strides to the door, and lit the fuse. Then I blew out the lamp and jumped back into my corner. To keep Tulip from going back around to the door, I counted out loud to her as I pulled the bean bags over me. “Five. Four. Three. Two. One.”

Nothing.

I pulled my fingers from my ears but kept talking to Tulip. “Stay, girl, you know, fuse burn rates can vary greatly.” I lay still, but kept talking to keep her with me.

Still nothing. Just when I was about to peek over my quickly improvised blast shield … Kaboom!

“Whoa!” I yelled to Tulip. “That was way bigger than … ”

“Lawd God!” screamed a familiar voice outside.

What the hell!
I threw back the bean bags and a zillion Styrofoam beads flew everywhere. Apparently shrapnel, pieces of the exploded pipe, had ripped into them. Staggering to keep my footing on a sea of white beads and swatting furiously to clear the heavy smoke from the air, I stumbled toward the light coming from the now wide open doors.

In the bright moonlight, I saw Luther Green sprawled on the ground, a two-by-four laying across his chest and Tulip on his head.

“Luther?” I yelled, noticing immediately that Tulip wasn't attacking him. She was licking him! She wouldn't do that if he posed a threat. “Where the hell did you come from?”

He gently pushed Tulip aside, groaned, and sat up. “Ugh. I come looking for you. I was worried when I saw your new car still at the well but you wasn't around. Wasn't no one around, so I went back to the house and asked Ruby what she thought I ought to do and we got to talking about all the things what's been going on around here and … well, I was worried something bad had happened to you. Tried to think of where you might be. Checked down at the pens. Thought you might be snooping around there again. When you wasn't there I went to the old clay works, but you wasn't there, so I come here … ”

“Wait. You know about the … ”

“Them bones that Clint was digging up? Of course, I did. Ain't nothing goes on 'round here I don't know about.”

“Really?” I huffed. “Well, if you know everything that goes on around here, maybe you can enlighten me about a few things. First and most important right now, whose shed is this? What are they planning to do with the bomb they made in here?”

“Bomb …” Luther breathed as he took my proffered hand and allowed me to help get him on his feet.

“Yes, bomb,” I said. “Check this out.” I stood aside as Luther stepped into the shed. I followed him in, relit the hurricane lamp, and pointed to the bomb makings on the shelf.

“Oh, lawd, what has that child done now?”

“What child? Who are you talking about?”

“Junior,” he said, shaking his head. “I'm talking about that sad excuse for a son. A son who is supposed to take over this business. That child ain't never been nothing but a miserable failure at everything he tried. His momma and daddy know it too. And Ruby, she'd know it if she'd jus open her eyes. But she won't. He was the first baby born here and he might as well have been hers. She's doted on that boy every second of his life. He can do no wrong … ”

“What time is it?” I interrupted, checking my watch. “Jeez! It's almost dawn.”

I knew Bud, Chris, and the wildlife officers would soon be in place to conduct their bust of the illegal hog hunting operation. But that wasn't important to me now. I had to reach them. I jumped back outside the shed, jerked my iPhone from my jeans, and was relieved to see that I now had a signal.

I tapped Bud's number and waited. Then there was a bleep and the phone cut off. I checked the screen. The battery had died!

Great. Now what?
Luther was watching me, rubbing his chin studiously. “Luther!” I snapped. “Tell me honestly. Do you really think Junior is capable of making a bomb?”

“Yes 'um,” Luther sighed. “I 'spect he could've. He's smart enough and if he's been doing that crack cocaine … ”

TWENTY-THREE

“Cocaine?” I wailed. “He's
a crackhead too? Please tell me you don't think he wants to blow up the well!”

“I can't tell you that,” Luther said without hesitation. “I don't have no proof and he ain't never said anything to me, but I know from Ruby that he thinks it's evil. He's very religious, you know.”

Panic shot through me like I'd stepped into an empty elevator shaft. “Give me your cell phone,” I demanded. “Mine's dead and I've got to call the site foreman.”

“I ain't got no cell phone. Ruby does. Just to keep up with the kids, you see, but I don't need one. Too new fangled for me … ”

“Come on,” I said impatiently. “We've got to get to the well. We can talk on the way. I want the truth about the hog operation. I want to know if Junior is involved in it, too, and if so, how. Where's your truck?”

Luther floored the old Chevy and we careened along the dirt paths I'd never tried to navigate. Tulip and I braced ourselves as best we could on the bench seat—she didn't seem any the worse for wear from her encounter outside the shed—as Luther told me about how Junior's being a sickly child had contributed to everyone spoiling him.

“Uh-huh,” I said impatiently. “Let's skip his early childhood and how he got to be the way he is and jump right to what's eating him now. Why do you think he built a bomb?”

“Well, I noticed some big changes in him once he started going to college. He was home most weekends ‘cause his daddy insisted he help in the dairy. In the last couple of years, he's been quoting scriptures to me. Avenging kind of scriptures, you know?”

“Not really,” I said as we broke out of the woods and made a 90-degree left turn that plastered me against the window before we straightened up and skirted a field planted in winter wheat. “What's that got to do with the well and why he'd want to destroy it?”

“I don't know that he does,” Luther insisted. “I'm just saying it's a possibility because of the way he feels about it and because he's been acting crazy lately. Like maybe he ain't on his meds.”

Good Lord! Can this nightmare
get worse?
“Meds?” I asked tentatively.

“Yes 'um. He's been … er, um, hospitalized several times over the years. The Lauderbachs say he suffers from depression and mood swings but as long as he takes his medication, he's able to, you know, deal with life. But, if he don't, he'll fall into ranting about the devil and how everyone's out to get him. I don't know if there's a name for his problem. I just know he can get real sick at times.”

Paranoid schizophrenia comes to mind.
I rubbed my temples. My head was still pounding from breathing lamp fumes. “What about the hog operation,” I asked as we rounded a corner of the wheat field and cut a sharp right into the woods that sheltered Cecil's fossilized bones. “Was he involved in that?”

“Now, Miz Cooper, I done told you …”

“You can skip trying to make me think I just dreamed seeing feral hogs in some of your pens. I know all about Mr. Fred Butcher and how he organizes expensive hunts for ‘sporting swine,'” I said, making air quotes he probably didn't see in the dark cab of his truck.

“Don't nobody know about that,” Luther snapped, losing his soft southern drawl. “Not even Mr. Lauderbach and it needs to stay that way. I've got two girls at expensive colleges and my boy gonna be attending in another year. I need extra money and what we've been doing ain't hurting no one but them sorry hogs and they
need
killing! They're tearing up crops, even lost a sickly calf to one.”

“Be that as it may,” I said. “I tried to get you to tell me about it that day when I found the pens and you wanted to play dumb. When I told Mr. Lauderbach about what I suspected …”

“You done told him about it?” Luther asked incredulously. “Now why'd you want to go and do something like that?”

“Because in case you've forgotten, someone has already been killed by a hunter and I'm bringing in a team of paleontologists to finish excavating the fossil Clinton found—with the blessings of the Lauderbachs, I might add—and I can't take a chance of someone else getting killed. Come hell or high water, we're getting that fossil out so that kid, Clinton, will have accomplished something lasting in his life!”

“If that's the case, then seems to me like you'd want me to kill all the hogs. Ain't you seen their tracks down in the clay pits? It's a wonder they ain't rooted that creature up by now. And for your information, Clint wanted 'em dead. He knew they were a danger to his work.”

“He talked to you about the fossil?”

“Yes 'um.” Luther said, pulling to a stop in front of the very hog pens where I'd been chloroformed.

“Why are we stopping here?”

“I got something to show you,” Luther said, climbing out and heading to the feeding shed.

“Come back here!” I shouted, but he was gone. I jumped out, closing Tulip in the cab, and followed him into the dark shed. I grabbed his arm and shook him. “Don't you understand? We've got to get to the well! What if Junior strapped a bomb on the temporary cap? People could be killed! Your boss will be wiped out financially and you'll be out of work!”

“Just one sec, Miz Cooper,” he said as he reached in a bag. “You need to see this.” He stepped around me and stood silhouetted in the doorway holding something in his closed fist.

“Okay,” I snapped. “Then, please, take me to the well!” Pointedly, I looked down and fell for the oldest elementary school trick in the books. Luther tossed some type of funky hog feed in my face.

Blinded and choking, I staggered backward and tripped over my own feet onto my butt just in time to hear the shed door slam! “God dammit!” I yelled, scrambling to my feet. “Not again! Luther! Let me out!” Rubbing my hands against the rough wood, I tried to find the latch in the pitch dark. It didn't take long to ascertain there wasn't one. “What's with you people?” I yelled. “You've never heard of two-way latches?”

The only response from the other side was the snap of a hasp closing, but my intuition told me Luther was still standing on the other side. Maybe he was considering whether he'd made a big mistake. Thinking maybe if I just talked to him, he'd come to his senses, I bit my tongue and sucked in a deep, calming breath.

“Please, Luther,” I begged. “For the love of God, help me. Don't let this day dawn on a tragedy so catastrophic it can never be set to right.” I gave him a few facts about gas well fires, how hard they are to contain, thus the need for the Red Adair types who are few and far between. The silence between us was deafening, but dammit, I knew he was standing just inches—and a stout wooden door—from me.

There was a shuffling noise—sounded like grit under work boots on the concrete blocks that acted as a step—then nothing. My face protested as I mashed it harder against the rough wood, straining to hear. Was he leaving?

My heart sank as I distinctly heard the creak of the truck door open. But hope sprang up again when I didn't hear it slam shut. Suddenly I heard Tulip sniff at the door. She must have jumped out. Then I heard footsteps back my way!

“Luther, come on, buddy. Please, help me,” I pleaded.

There was no mistaking the sound of his boot on the step or his deep sigh. “Miz Cooper,” he said sadly. “You got to believe me. I'm leaving you here to keep you safe. That boy can go plumb crazy sometimes. And you're wrong. I
can
fix all that's happened. Make it right again. There's other things going on that you don't know about that I got to take care of … ”

“If you're talking a
bout this morning's stupid hog hunt, I know all about it. In fact,” I smacked the door with my palm to get his attention, “I'm doing you a favor. Because you aren't there, you won't get arrested with your good buddy, Fred Butcher. Wildlife officers are going to catch his ass in the act of moving and
confining a feral hog. As we speak they're staking this place out at my request!”

“Arrest Fred Butcher! Oh, now you've really gone and done it!” Luther cried out. “Junior loves him better than Peter loved the Lord. Ain't no telling what he'll do. I've got to stop this from happening … ”

“Luther,” I pleaded. “Fuck the hogs! You aren't hearing me. You can't imagine how bad it'll be if Junior sets off a bomb on the gas well!”

I pressed my face hard against the door again, straining to hear what was going on. For a moment everything was quiet on the other side. Just when I thought Luther might be having a change of heart, I heard a grunting noise from him, then something slammed against the door—and my face—so hard I saw stars.

Tears sprang to my eyes as I struggled to remain standing but failed miserably. I sunk to my knees and curled into a ball. Fighting to stay conscious, I turned my face toward the only light, the crack under the door. Moonlight greeted me. Within seconds, I heard the truck start. Someone gunned the engine and roared away. I didn't move. I just stayed there, trying to gather my senses.

I used to think the saddest sound in the world was that of a far-away train, racking down a track somewhere deep in the night. Now I know that's not true. Trust me, the saddest sound you'll ever hear is someone in dire pain, moaning, “Help me, help me.” Only you can't reach them.

I pushed myself to a sitting position and shook my head, hoping to dispel the confusion. Darkness spun around me. It helped to rest my hands against the door, so I did.

Luther moaned again.

Blinking hard to hurry the return of all my faculties, I reached for my Beretta. No time to worry about ricochets. I patted my side. Oh, no. My gun was back in my canvas tote in the bomb-making shed. I'd been so worried about the well being bombed, I'd forgotten it. Now what?

I struggled to my feet, but with nothing except moonlight shining through cracks in the boards for reference, I promptly careened into a corner, knocking over a bunch of tools. Tools! Grappling blindly, I felt each one in turn.

Imagine my joy at finding a pick ax! Supporting myself with the stout wooden handle, I pushed myself up. My head cleared and I swung the ax like a major leaguer at the brightest crack, the one that marked the opening of the door.

It took three swings, but on the last try, wood splintered, the hasp broke, and the door flew open. For the second time in only a few hours, I witnessed Luther sprawled out before me in the moonlight. Only this time he didn't sit up. Tulip whined and licked his face.

He didn't move.

Kneeling over him, I slapped his face softly and called his name. Someone must have come up behind him and knocked him out, but who? I had a sinking feeling I knew. He groaned and said something. I leaned closer. “What?” I asked.

“Look out for Junior,” Luther whispered, confirming my fear. “He's gone crazy again … .” Then he slipped back into unconsciousness. I tried to rouse him, but when he didn't wake up, I had to face reality.

I was going to have to leave him.

I was the only one who knew what was probably about to happen and I had no phone. “I'll be back with help,” I told him and stood up. “Come on, Tulip,”

I ran a few steps but she didn't follow, so I returned to Luther and knelt over him again to feel his brow. It was clammy. He was going into shock. Jeez. What to do?

I scrambled around in the shed and found a stack of empty feed bags.

I carried the whole stack out to Luther and spread out a few of them beside him, then knelt on the other side and pulled him toward me. The idea was to slide the bags under him, then cover him with more bags to keep him warm and prevent him from going deeper into shock.

When I rolled him up, however, my hands came away bloody. Very bloody. “What the hell?” I said aloud. It didn't take a brain surgeon to see that he'd been stabbed in the back. Immediately, the fact that the coroner had said a stab wound to the stomach killed Clinton came to mind. I took one of the feed bags, folded it into a compress and mashed it against the wound. The good news: it had missed his spine by several inches. The bad news: I was pretty sure his lung was punctured.

I ran back into the shed, grabbed the corners of a fifty-pound bag of feed, lugged it to Luther and laid it beside him. With a little he-woman maneuvering, I managed to lay the top half of his body, wound side down, on the bag, the idea being to keep his lung from filling with blood. I covered him with more feed bags, tucking the edges under him. “Come, Tulip!” I commanded. “We've got to get help and we've got no wheels!” This time she seemed to understand and loped off ahead of me.

Her mostly white coloring made her easy to follow in the moonlight. We ran hell-bent through woods and fields until my lungs were screaming. When we finally reached the base of the low hill where the rig had been, I dropped flat and crawled until I could see the doghouse and my Hummer. Rows of Diesel trucks and massive generators loomed in the moonlight, silent now. Since the reclamation crew hadn't come in yet and both drill crews had moved to Lauderbach #2, the place was deserted.

At least I hoped it was.

I wanted to charge up the steps of the trailer and plug in my iPhone so I could call for help, but I knew I couldn't. I had to be sure Junior wasn't lurking somewhere waiting to jump me. After all, I couldn't help anyone if I was dead.

After a few seconds, when I saw no movement anywhere, I took a chance and dashed for a stack of oil drums. From there I could see the rest of the site, including the temporary well cap. It was silhouetted in the early dawn light. I almost gasped out loud when I saw the Cyclone fencing enclosing the wellhead had been cut open and a man-sized hole gaped where the wire had been pulled back. And, there was definitely something strapped to the temporary cap.