The Cypress House (41 page)

    He
took a drink, but he had no taste for it, and then he slid the glass away from
him and went through the swinging door into the kitchen.

    Rebecca
had a slice of ham frying in a skillet on the stove, and she turned to him as
if to speak but instead she just stepped forward and wrapped her arms around
him and put her face to his neck. He wrapped his own around her, and they held
each other in silence for a long time. Her face was warm on his neck, and he
could feel her breathing and for some reason he had to close his eyes and hold
that moment in darkness.

    "I'm
sorry," she said.

    "Sorry?"

    "For
it all. This isn't something you should be a part of. I wish I could —"

    "Stop,"
he said, voice gentle. "We're going to handle this. All right? It's not
but a day left, Rebecca. By the time the sun goes down out there on the water
tomorrow, you'll be gone from this place. Going north, to Maine, just the way
you hoped. I'll see that it happens."

    He
pushed her back and lifted her chin and kissed her. Soft and slow. When he
broke the kiss, he said, "Is there a train that could be taken yet
tonight?"

    She
frowned. "One more before the end of the night, but it's an hour's drive.
What are you asking for?"

    "I'd
like to give Paul his share and put him on it."

    She
stepped back and looked at him in surprise. "Already?"

    He
nodded. "I want him clear of this, Rebecca. Make no mistake — I intend to
see it through just as we've planned, but I want him clear of it. He's ready to
leave this place. We've soured him on it, on us, on damn near everything. I
can't change that. But I can put money in his pocket and get him aboard a train
and hope for the best for him."

    She
put her hands on his shoulders and said, "I love you."

    All
he could get out was "Yeah." They both laughed then, and he took her
close and said, "I love you, too. And I don't give a damn what's happened
since I got here, or what's left to come — I found my way to you. Any price
that must be paid in exchange for that is a small one."

    She
kissed him again, and this time he could feel a tear gliding off her skin and
onto his own, and then she took the burlap sack with the five thousand dollars
down from the shelf and handed it to him. He left her there in the kitchen and
went for Paul.

    Paul
was drinking with Owen. Trying to engage him in some of the usual tales, asking
about Dillinger and Handsome Harry Pierpont, the one they electrocuted up in
Ohio, inquiring about them as if he thought Owen had ridden at their sides.
Even Owen wasn't having it tonight, though. He looked worn, and all he said was
"Ah, those boys didn't hardly spend any time in Florida at all. A few
months when they was hiding out once, but that was all."

    Arlen
said, "Paul?"

    He
turned and looked at Arlen with that usual expression of distaste, a glass of
liquor in his hand. "What?"

    "Give
me a minute, would you? Step out on the porch."

    "I'm
having a conversation."

    Arlen
said, "Paul," one more time, no change of tone at all. He got a sigh
of annoyance and the slap of the glass smacking down hard on the table before
the boy rose and followed him out onto the back porch. It was still raining,
but the wind had shifted direction and lessened enough so that it didn't spray
under the porch roof and soak them. They stood out there in the dark, and Paul
folded his arms across his chest and stared at Arlen.

    "Whatever
you got to say, it's probably not worth the time. I don't need to go through it
again. I don't need to hear your stories or your warnings or your —"

    "Open
that up and take a look inside," Arlen said, passing him the sack. He
watched as Paul took it warily, opened it, and went slack-jawed. He reached
inside gingerly, as if he were going to frighten the money right out of the bag
by moving sudden, and fanned his thumb over the edges of the bills.

    "Where'd
you get all this?"

    "The
same man you were hoping to earn it from."

    Paul
looked up. "Wade ?"

    "That's
right. There's five thousand dollars in that bag."

    
"Five
thousand
—"

    "And
it's yours," Arlen said. "Provided you get your gear together right
now and ride with me to the train station. You go wherever you like from there.
I'm not going to tell you another thing, not going to give you another bit of
advice. You don't want to hear it, and I don't deserve to say it. Not anymore.
But regardless of what you think or what you believe, I want you to know this:
you better get your ass out of this state, and fast."

    Paul
was still staring at the bag.

    "We
got an agreement?" Arlen said.

    "How'd
you get this?"

    "Don't
worry about that. It's my concern. The money, though, is yours. And it's enough
to take you far from here and put you up for a time. Be smart with it, though.
Use it to get yourself set in a way . . ." He stopped then and shook his
head. "Hell, I just said I was done telling you what you ought to do, and
here I go again. I'll shut my mouth now. But you take that money and tuck it
down in your bags and let's go. You ready to do that?"

    Paul
nodded. He seemed to have gone pale at the sight of the money. When he
swallowed, it looked like it took some effort.

    "Okay,"
he said. "Yeah, I'm ready."

    Arlen
hung back and sat with Owen while Paul got his bags together, moving slowly, as
if his limbs had gone numb. Rebecca came back out of the kitchen and watched
him ready his gear.

    "You
can't even stay for a meal?" she said. She was speaking to Arlen.

    He
shook his head. "Faster we move, the better. Aren't going to be trains
going through if we let it get much later."

    "Long
drive to the station, too," she murmured. She'd already given him
instructions on how to get there. With no train station left in Corridor
County, it would take some time. Might be longer than an hour, with rain like
this.

    Paul
straightened and looked around as if he had no idea what to say or do next. He
knew there was something playing out in the room that he wasn't privy to, but
in the end he decided not to ask. He just said, "You all take care."

    Rebecca
crossed the room and hugged him. He bristled for an instant, as if he wanted to
resist, but then he returned the embrace, and Arlen saw him, for just an
instant, close his eyes exactly as Arlen had done back in the kitchen.

    "Take
care," Paul repeated, and then he stepped away.

    They
went outside and splashed through the yard and climbed into the truck. There
was another band of storms passing over now, and the thunder was so loud and
close that for a moment Arlen didn't even realize the truck's motor had caught.
Once he had it in gear, he cast a backward glance at the Cypress House, the top
half dark, the bottom lit, Rebecca's silhouette in the window, watching them.
He saw her lift a hand, and he lifted his own, though he knew she could not see
it.

    The
road was a washout of gleaming silver rainwater, and the truck's tires spun
once in the wet mud and threatened to bog down before finding enough purchase
to push ahead. It was the hardest rain Arlen had seen since the hurricane
they'd come in with. Seemed fitting to take Paul out in the same weather.

    Paul
was quiet until they got to the paved road. Then he said, "You going to
steal that money or earn it by working for him on some crooked thing?"

    Arlen
didn't look at him, didn't answer.

    Paul said,
"Arlen, if I'm traveling with those dollars in my pocket, I ought to know
how they were gained."

    "You
know damn well. They belong to Wade. You think they came to him honest?"

    "But
how did
you
get them ?"

    "Don't
trouble yourself none over that. Just take them and go on. You have an idea of
where you might go ?"

    "Not
really."

    "Could
try that Carnegie school you've talked of," Arlen said. "Don't know
how much money would be needed for such a thing, but I imagine that's a hell of
a start."

    "It
is." Paul's tone had changed, the sharp edge dulling as they drove farther
into the swamp woods. "Arlen, what are you going to do?"

    He
stayed silent, wondering whether any harm could come from the boy knowing the
plan. If they caught up with him, Tate McGrath or somebody else entirely, would
ignorance help? Arlen didn't figure it would. Not at that point.

    "I'm
going to kill him," he said finally. They'd just passed their first car,
the road fading back to darkness as soon as its headlights went by.

    "Wade?"

    Arlen
nodded.

    "Are
you crazy? What do you mean, you're going to kill him?"

    Rebecca
had said it was an hour's drive to the train station. That was time to tell it.
Arlen figured it might as well be told.

    "You
remember the day McGrath came at you with that chair leg?"

    "Of
course."

    "You
remember the box Wade brought with them that day?"

    "Yes."

    "Good,"
Arlen said. "Let me tell you what was inside. It's as good a place to
start as any I know."

    They
drove along through the darkness and the rain and Arlen explained it all,
starting with the night he'd retrieved the box containing Walter Sorenson's
hands from the sea. He explained about Rebecca and Owen's father and the
threats that had been made to Rebecca while her brother was in prison.

    "There's
plenty of evidence as to what happens when a man tries to run from Solomon
Wade," Arlen said. "More than enough evidence for me. I'm not going
to leave him behind to chase her. I can't."

    "When
are you going to do it?"

    "Tomorrow."

    "Tomorrow?"

    "That's
when the Cubans are coming in," Arlen said. "It'll have to be done
then or he'll miss his money. We'll need that money to have a chance."

    Paul
dropped his eyes to the bag on his lap. "How much is there? Total."

    "Ten".

    "You
gave me half?"

    "That's
right."

    "Why?
I'm not doing a thing. You're giving me half that money and setting me out a
day before anything's to happen?"

    "Hell,
yes, I am," Arlen said. "I don't give a damn what you care to
believe, because I know that it is true: you'll die at that man's hand if you
stay in this place. All your words of argument aren't going to change the truth
of it."

    But
Paul didn't offer any words of argument. Instead he said, "Rebecca told me
about your father," in a soft voice.

    "I
heard that."

    Paul
looked up. "Is it true ?"

    "It's
true."

    "She
told me about France, too," he said. "The things you claimed you saw
. . ."

    "Claimed"
you saw. Still not believing.

    "Tell
you something about that," Arlen said. "The worst things I saw there
were the real ones. A man with smoke-eyes, he could still be saved, time to
time. The others, though? The fields I walked through stacked with corpses?
Those men's chances had passed, Paul."

    Paul
didn't say anything. Arlen knew he didn't believe it, and that was fine. He'd
long ago lost the hope of convincing people to believe him. Some might for a
time — Paul had once, Rebecca seemed to now — but most wouldn't or couldn't,
and he'd made peace with the realization that all he could do was provide help.
Tonight was more of that.