Our Daily Bread (27 page)

Albert had just long enough to register fury and terror in equal measure before his nose and mouth filled with flame, and his lungs sucked in flame, and there was no word for the pain for it was instantly beyond pain the way water is beyond wet and ice is beyond cold and nothing mattered but the pain beyond pain and then the universe was black and red and there was a moment's whirling and turning and falling into a strange dark whiteness and no way to scream for there was nothing left to scream with and then nothing to scream about nothing left at all no monsters in the forest and no more pain and nothing to fear and Albert's last thought was how different it all might have been the things he might have done and then somehow even that was all right and none of it mattered the things he'd done and he'd not done perfectly underst . . .

Harold had tom sitting up
against the side of the main house. Felicity and Meg had persuaded him not to do anything until the men got back with Albert. They didn't want whatever was going to happen to happen at the house. Too easy to trace, they said, and Harold allowed they were possibly right. What difference did a little while make, anyway?

Tom tried to talk sense to Harold, until the old man told him that if he said one more word he'd blow his balls off. And so Tom waited, his mind crackling with fear for Bobby, picturing him in any number of horrible ways—slung up to a tree, face down in the mud, in a shallow grave, cut or shot or burned. If Tom got out of this, he vowed he would kill someone. If Bobby wasn't in this house, where the hell was he? How many cabins were scattered through the woods? He wondered how long Dorothy Carlisle would obey his order not to call Carl. Wouldn't someone see smoke coming from the mountain and call the fire department? Wouldn't they come? He watched Harold Erskine adjust his testicles and spit into the dirt. Tom tried to determine if he really believed the old man would shoot him.

Then—
Boom!
—the explosion. A puff of orange and smoke over the trees.

“What the fuck?” said Harold and he looked away. It was all Tom needed. He launched himself upward and his fist connected with the old man's chin, snapping his head back, making him stumble. Tom jerked the gun out of his hands.

“Where is my son?! Where is he? You got three seconds you sack of shit.” He was shaking. Shaking so hard he didn't know where the shot would end up if he fired it. He didn't care.

“Dad! Dad! Over here!”

“Bobby! Where are you?” Without taking his eyes off Harold, Tom stepped backwards until he was a good distance from the old man, and then turned to see Bobby standing at the forest's edge waving both arms. Someone else was with him.

Tom looked at the truck. Flat tire, shot through the engine. “Stay!” he called to Bobby and ran to the cab, turned the key. Nothing. Again. Nothing. All right then. All right. What now? They'd walk down. He looked to Harold. Gone.
Fuck!
Into the house? The woods? Where? There would be other guns.

“Dad! Come on, come here, quick! Hurry!”

Tom ran to his son, carrying the gun. He threw his arms around Bobby, who held on to him tightly for an instant and then pushed him away. “I'm sorry, Dad, I'm so sorry.”

“Never mind. You're all right. We've got to get out of here.”

“There are kids, Dad. We have to take them. One of them's hurt. Albert's gonna meet us.”

“What are you talking about?”

And then he saw them. They looked up at him like small animals in a burrow—muddy and feral and battered. He imagined them baring their teeth, digging into the earth, or his flesh.

A boy of about Bobby's age stood. “There's no time. They'll come looking for us now—especially with you. We have to move. Can you carry her?” He indicated a little girl, clearly injured, in the arms of a battered teenager. “Well, can you? Don't just fucking stand there!”

“Give her to me,” Tom said, and then realized he still held the gun.

“Give that to me,” said the boy. “I know how to handle a fucking gun.”

Tom looked at the boy, and then nodded. “Point it at the ground and keep the safety on.” He held out his arms for the little girl.

“Her name's Toots,” said the girl. “Be careful with her.”

They stumbled and crept, trudged and dragged themselves and one other. The dark protective woods engulfed them, soothed them, made them jittery and startled them by turns. They were beset by biting insects and by shadows and all the while they went down, down, down, circling the top of the mountain and then switching back, in hairpin loops, along deer tracks and through patches of bramble and vine, following Jack's lead. At one point they heard an engine. “All terrain,” said Jack. Thorns and twigs scratched their faces, arms, and hands. Their aim was to move away from the sound of voices, from the sound of ever-more distant engines, from the smell of smoke and from the glow of burning things. They were afraid of shifting winds and the possibility of wildfire. They were small creatures sniffing the air, trying to bury themselves in the caliginous forest. Animals snuffled and grumbled and skittered past and around them, roused and unsettled by the smell of smoke, the distant crackle of burning and the unnatural night-time herd of humans. The children did their best not to cry out when they were startled, when fingers seemed to reach up from the ground to snag their feet, or from the branches to yank their hair.

Toots, in Tom's arms, urinated in her sleep or in her unconsciousness and the warm trickle of it wet his shirtfront and his jeans and mixed with sweat and grime. Near Ivy's age, Tom thought, and the idea of it pierced him.

If Tom or Jack or Jill heard something they could not explain as animal or wind, they threw an arm out and dropped to the ground and the children, as though by prearranged signal, did the same and stayed that way until it felt safe again to move on. Once or twice they thought they saw a car climbing the mountain, but couldn't be sure, and couldn't risk coming out for fear it was The Others. They drifted and swayed around the mountain, slipped and crawled, drooping with fatigue. Little Cathy cried silently in Jill's arms. Ruby snuffled. Jill's face shone like steel when the moonlight caught it. Bobby's eyes were as wild and resigned as a weasel in a leg trap. They slithered in the mulch of old leaves and mushrooms and once an owl swept in front of them on silent wings, so ghostly and pale none of them were even sure they'd seen it.

They arrived at the marsh in due course, eyes expectant and hopeful. They waited for Albert until they could wait no more, the mosquitoes feasting on them, the children crying, and Toots's condition urgent and prodding.

“He'll find his way to town,” said Jack.

They went on. Tom's jaws ached from clenching and now and then he willed himself to relax, afraid he'd crack a tooth with the force of his anxiety. His arms ached from carrying Toots, his legs ached from the pound and thud of downward walking, a slice of pain ran through his left ankle, his feet were blistered, and his skin was afire with bug bites. Vigilance burned his eyes. And then he began to sense the land levelling out and felt, more than saw, a hesitant shift in the darkness, more charcoal now than black and then more pewter than charcoal and then silver and gold, like treasure seen through the trees.

“We'll be on the road in a minute,” he said, his voice still a harsh whisper from the night's habit.

“I'm hungry,” said Rudy.

“Me, too,” said Brenda, lurching along, stoically insisting on walking.

The sound of their high-pitched voices was startling. He had thought them mute with shock from whatever it was they'd been through, as was Toots, he suspected. Toots who stared at him like he was an alien thing about which she cared not at all—a new sort of moving thing, like a conveyor belt with no useful destination. She was utterly without sound, not even her breath registered.

“We're near the road. Someone will stop, won't they?” said Bobby. “A car or something?”

“Sure,” said Tom.

“The family'd never think we'd dare,” said Jill. “Never in a million years.”

Sometime later, they came to the patch of ground that delineated mountain from not-mountain. The trees thinned. There was a patch of wetland, not too wide. They would get their feet wet, but wouldn't have to wade. After that lay a straggly swath of gravel and weeds and then, asphalt.

Tom handed Toots over to Jill. “Hold her and stay here for a minute. I just want to go look around. Give me the gun, Jack.”

He began by stepping on rocks, picking his way through the wetland, but at last there were no rocks, no path, and no choice but wading into the fetid mire. His boots squelched and mushed in the bog, which smelled of rot and algae. A frog jumped from a rock and dove, panicked, into a pool of mucky water. As he stepped, Tom's feet made sucking noises, as though the very ooze was trying to hold him back, just as he was getting so close to open, two-lane refuge.

On the highway, he looked this way and then the other, squinting, trying to see if anyone was out there scouting for them. It seemed not. It was barely dawn. The world was a great still wasteland beyond the mountain. Nothing and no one as far as the curve in the road would let him see.

He gestured for the others and waited while they picked their way through the bog. They would stay along the roadside, heading south, toward town. Someone was sure to come along. They would stop for children. A car would stop. A woman, probably, a woman would stop for children. He would send Jill and Toots and the younger ones, Cathy, Brenda, Ruby, Kenny and Griff, if there was room, along ahead in the first car, to the hospital. Someone in a car would have a cell phone. There would be cell reception here. They'd call Carl. Then this would be over.

He plucked Toots from Jill's sagging arms, noted that the older girl's face was pale as aspen bark. “You've done great, Jill,” he said, and she looked at him with an expression that might be taken for astonishment had it not been buried by her exhaustion.

“There's no cars,” said Frank. “Where are the cars?” He scratched bug bites on his cheek and smeared dirt, making him look like he was in camouflage.

Outside the softening effect of the forest's gloaming, they looked like refugees from some catastrophe, some vanquished children's army—their clothes filthy, ripped and stained. Their faces grim far beyond their years. Pinched and pale, underfed and over-exposed kids, all of them. Tom assumed he looked as bad. His eye was blackened and he'd been blowing blood out of his nose.

“It's early,” said Tom. “They'll be along. Let's keep walking.”

Brenda sat down, rubbing her misshapen foot. “I don't want to,” she said, her voice stubborn and flat.

At that, the rest sat down as well. Tears were close, hovering there just waiting for the slimmest invitation to settle. They had nothing to eat. No water.

“You can't stop here,” said Jack. “Look,” he turned to Tom, his hands out, “if we stop here, that's the end, get it? They will be coming. Don't you think they won't. You don't fucking know them. You don't know shit.”

“All right, son. I don't think anyone's coming after us.”

“Don't you fucking ‘son' me. And if you don't think they're coming, you're out of your fucking mind.”

“Mister. They are coming. They are,” said Jill.

He looked into her eyes and believed her.

“I'm not going anyplace more,” said Kenny. “I want to go home.”

There was a small chorus of
me, too,
and
I'm hungry
and the wet and whiney sounds of a number of tantrums in the making. Tom shifted Toots's weight. Looked down the long, curving and empty road.

“Piggybacks,” said Bobby.

“What?” said Jack.

“You never had piggybacks?”

“Maybe,” said Brenda, suspicious.

“It's like riding horses. You ever done that?”

“No.”

“Well, come on, then. You hop on your noble steed.” He crouched with his back to her and gestured to her to climb on. She moved hesitantly, as though afraid he was about to trick her. “Mount up now, on the horses. Jack and Jill, you're horses. Little Joe, you're one of the horses. Dad?”

“Good thinking, son.”

“Take Cathy, Joe, she's light,” said Jack.

Brenda still looked doubtful.

“Good girl,” said Jill. And she urged Brenda onto Bobby's back, then lifted Cathy onto Little Joe's back and hunkered down as Kenny climbed on her own, his arms tight around her neck.

“How are we going to do the rest?” said Jack. He looked at the two remaining boys, Frank and Griff. “Who's it gonna be?”

“We're not babies,” said Frank. “We can walk.”

“Come on,” said Jack. He blew his lips out and pawed the ground. “I'm a horse.”

“I can walk with Frank,” said Griff, looking at the ground, shuffling his holey sneakers in the dirt.

“Suit yourself,” said Jack.

“Maybe we could switch. You go first,” said Frank to Griff. “You're younger.”

And so Griff climbed on Jack and they set off walking. They trudged and kept looking behind them for cars. They kicked up little puffs of grey dust from the gravel. It would be all right, Tom reasoned. They weren't even that far from town, he figured, judging from where they'd come off the mountain. Maybe three miles, maybe a little more. It was a long walk, but he was sure they wouldn't have to make it all the way. Somebody would stop.

They had been walking maybe ten minutes when a low drone behind them signalled an approaching vehicle. They stopped and turned. “Get ready to run,” Jack said, “just in case.”

It was a car, pulling a trailer behind it. Tourists. Camping. Out to see America with the wife and kids. Room for all of them in that trailer. Bet there'd be water, too, in little green bottles all the way from a spring in France. Tom wondered if he should step out into the middle of the road, but then pictured himself as a hood ornament. “Jack, hide that gun in the ditch! Get off to the side a bit.” He shifted Toots so he could hold her with one arm, her head resting on his shoulder, and stepped out, not into the centre of the road, but enough so his intention couldn't be mistaken. The sun, just rising, was to his left, and behind him, which was good. Mr. and Mrs. Middle America wouldn't be able to tell what kind of condition he was in until they'd stopped. He put a big smile on his face, and waved his hand in what he hoped was a friendly wave. “Wave, kids. Wave at them.” He pointed at Toots, held his hand up like a traffic cop, telling the car to slow down, to halt, willing it to stop.

The car slowed, his heart raced and one of the kids said, “Yea!” and then the car moved out into the other lane, putting distance between them. Tom took another step out into the road, gesturing frantically. “Stop!” he called out, “Please, stop!”