The Marauders (31 page)

“Well, I figured you know.”

A pause. “Lindquist’s got problems, son. And that’s all I’m at liberty to say.” Then, “Relax. He’ll turn up. Probably on his way back now.”

Wes went into the Barataria with one of the deputies, Melloncamp, on the sheriff’s motorboat. It was a humid night, the only wind their movement. A mile behind them the lights of Jeanette glimmered like an altar of votaries.

“Smell that oil?” the deputy shouted to Wes.

Wes looked at him. Face as round as a pie tin, a red copstache and shock of hair.

“All my dad talks about,” Wes shouted back. The wind tore at his ears and whipped his hair. The sweat on his forehead was beginning to dry and his skin felt stiff.

“Those commercials,” the deputy said. “You seen them? BP oil, some actor playing a trawler. Guy looking like Sam Shepard or somebody saying yeah, oh yeah, come in, the water’s fine. Meanwhile birds and fish dying all over.” The deputy tutted. “Ask me, somebody should be drawn and quartered.”

“Dad says that all the time too,” Wes said. “Only with a lot more cuss words.”

The man smiled. A stubby row of hayseed teeth. “I worry that some son of a bitch will do just that. Some vigilante.”

When they reached the island with the willow, Melloncamp cut the motor. The sudden silence rang in Wes’s head. Astern, a fish shot out of the bayou, its fat body rolling in the moonlight. The white of its belly, the silver of its scales. Then it smacked back in the water and a cascade of wavelets slapped the sides of the boat.

“You sure it was here?”

Wes nodded.

The deputy got out his bullhorn and flipped the button and hello’d into it a few times.

“He ever find anything out here?” Melloncamp asked.

Wes wondered what he should say. “I’m not sure.”

The deputy shrugged like he didn’t care either way and called again into the bullhorn. He scratched his chin with his thumbnail. “Lindquist, always with that metal detector.”

“Yeah.”

“Always felt a little sorry for him growing up. Kids always pickin’ on him. Making fun because he acted funny. Then they’d dog him into lots of crazy stuff. Do this, do that. Like he was some kind of performing monkey. He thought they were laughing with him, you know. But they were laughing at him.”

They watched the island in silence until Melloncamp began to chuckle. “One time? This math teacher, Ms. Hooven? Lindquist put a condom full of tapioca pudding in her desk drawer. Oh boy, the look on her face. I’ll never forget. Like somebody threw a brick at her head.”

They laughed together about this for a little while.

Melloncamp sniffed. “Another time, I don’t know where we were going. A field trip, I think. But I saw Lindquist eat a ladybug on the school bus.”

“Say what?”

“Everybody dogging him. Lindquist was all like, don’t think I will? Then he palms it and swallows it. A live ladybug. Like it’s nothing. A piece of candy.”

“Holy mackerel.”

“Wait a second though. There’s more. Now I remember. We were on one of those swamp tours, one of those boats. You won’t believe this, but a little later Lindquist burps and the ladybug comes flying right out of his mouth.”

They laughed together again.

“I never saw it, but another kid did. Swore by it.”

Silence.

“He’ll be back. Shit, guy lost an arm. Tough son of a bitch.”

The Toup brothers trudged up the shoreline of the island and advanced into the brush. Within a minute they saw light through the trees and they heard rustling, tentative and human.

When they came into the clearing they saw a short man with his back turned to them. About five feet nothing, baseball-capped and pony tailed. He was wearing headphones, pulling up marijuana plants and stuffing them into a black garbage bag. Victor moved stealthily through the brush toward the man, making no sound as he stepped over the soft dead leaves and nettles. When he drew closer he heard a familiar song coming out of the headphones. “Don’t Do Me Like That” by Tom Petty.

Victor pulled the Sig Sauer from his waistband. “Hey,” he said.

“Nothing stupid,” said Reginald.

The small man went obliviously about his business.

“Hey,” Victor said, louder.

No response.

Victor moved closer and kicked the man in the ass. Hard. He flew forward, howling like an animal, and landed face-first in the dirt.

“Cosgrove,” the man said, an enraged wail. He snatched off his headphones. “Fuckin’ kill you.”

“Who’s Cosgrove?” Victor said.

The man’s posture stiffened and he scrabbled up and turned around. He stared wild-eyed at the twins. “How ya doing?” he asked. A jerky nervous smile. He was wearing a Tom Petty
DAMN THE TORPEDOES
T-shirt and jean shorts, and bits of chaff stuck to his chin and forehead. His baseball cap had a fleur-de-lis and
LE BON TEMPS ROULE
on the front.

Victor had the gun pointed at the jockey-bodied man.

“Why you pointin’ that gun?”

“You been picking this crop?”

The man looked around. “Didn’t know it was anybody’s.”

“What’s your name?”

The man seemed reluctant to answer but then saw something in Victor’s face that made him. “John Henry Hanson.”

“Just growing in the wild, you thought?”

Hanson said nothing.

“Who’s Cosgrove?”

“Guy usually with me.”

“He here now?”

Hanson’s jaw worked as if grinding a sunflower seed.

“Is he here now? You have exactly one second.”

“Yeah, he’s here,” Hanson said, quieter now.

“Where?” Victor asked.

The man pointed his chin vaguely. “Probably the boat.”

“What a colossal dumbfuck.”

Reginald stooped under the low-hanging boughs and went through the underbrush looking for the man called Cosgrove.

Pointing his Sig Sauer in the man’s face, Victor told him to get on his knees. He did, lacing his hands behind his head, his face muscles jerking with panic.

“Look, man,” he said. “I’m sure sorry about all this. Take whatever I picked. It’s yours. I don’t need it.”

“You’re saying I can have it?”

“Yeah. Yes sir.”

“That’s real generous.”

Silence.

“Mine, you say?”

“Yes sir.”

“So why’d you take it in the first place?”

Hanson slowly shook his head.

Victor stepped forward and pressed the barrel of the gun into the flesh of Hanson’s forehead. “So you’re in charge now. Telling me what’s what. Take what’s mine, you’re telling me. Like it’s a favor.”

“We’ll leave. Right now. Never come back.”

“That won’t work.”

Hanson gaped up at him, swiping his tongue over his parched lips. “Sure it will.” A high pleading note had entered his voice.

“No, it won’t.”

“Why not?”

Victor stayed quiet.

“Why not? We’re no narcs.”

Victor stared without blinking at Hanson. At a loss for what else to say, Hanson looked at the ground, eyes ticking back and forth as he plumbed the depths of his brain searching for the right thing to say, the magic word that didn’t exist. Around them insects hummed and scratched. Then there was the sound of approaching footsteps, the dragging of shoes across sleech and dead leaves. Reginald emerged from the brush with the other man, a broad-shouldered guy with a beard and the beginnings of a gut. Cosgrove.

“Found this rougarou,” Reginald told his brother.

Cosgrove shot Hanson a weary, I-told-you-so look. Reginald had the barrel of his Bearcat Ruger revolver held to the back of the man’s head and told him to kneel. He hesitated.

“On your knees,” said Victor.

Cosgrove winced and got down on his knees next to Hanson.

“What’s your name?” Victor asked the new man.

“Baker.”

“What Baker?”

“Larry Baker.”

“You sure?”

Silence. The hoot of a night owl from a nearby chenier. The wind sighing through the marijuana plants.

“We’re already off to a bad start,” Victor said.

“Why’s that?”

“Because your name ain’t that.”

Cosgrove was quiet.

“What’s your real name?”

“Nate Cosgrove.”

“If I check your wallet, that’s what it’ll say?”

“Go ahead. Check.”

“How about you?” Victor asked Hanson.

“I don’t have my wallet. Check if you want. Go ahead and check, mister. I swear to God.”

“Names’re probably besides the point now,” Victor said.

Hanson’s lips twitched over his crooked teeth. He rolled a frightened glance at Cosgrove, who was making an effort it seemed to stare straight ahead without looking at the twins’ faces.

“Neither of you are too bright, are you?” Reginald asked.

“I guess not,” Cosgrove said.

“That’s the first true thing you said all night,” Victor said.

“I just don’t know what to do with you two,” Reginald said.

“Let us go,” Cosgrove said.

“Let you go,” Victor said tonelessly.

“We’ll give all your money back.”

Silence.

“With interest,” Cosgrove said.

“What’s in it for me?”

“You get your money back.”

“So I just accept the money and let you go? For my troubles?”

“Yeah.”

“Why?”

“We’ll give whatever you want,” Cosgrove said. “For your troubles.”

“Whatever I want.”

“Whatever you want,” Hanson agreed.

“Your lives?”

Hanson’s head drooped as if his neck had turned to rubber. “Whatever I want. Right?”

“Fuck,” Hanson said.

“I don’t care how much money,” Cosgrove said. “We’ve got thirteen, fourteen thousand back in the motel. Cash. I can get it right now. Right this second. Thirteen, fourteen easy.”

Hanson glanced at Cosgrove, shook his head. His chin quivered. “These guys are fuckin’ with us.”

“Shut up,” Cosgrove said.

“They’re fuckin’ with us.”

“Shut the fuck up,” Cosgrove said.

“Fourteen thousand?” Victor asked.

“Cash,” Cosgrove said. “Right now.”

“Fourteen thousand is nowhere near the number you gotta be. Not even in the same universe.”

“You’re marijuana growers,” Hanson said. “You’re fuckin’ with us. Right? What’s this,
Scarface
?”

“You’ll never be found,” Victor said. “That’s the thing. Never.”

“You’re fuckin’ with us.”

“Blah, blah, blah,” Victor said. He raised his gun and without hesitation shot Hanson in the face.

Hanson’s head exploded like a melon, the dark mist of blood hanging in the air even as the last echoes rippled across the swamp. For a moment the body remained propped on its knees before thumping backward in the dirt. The insects and brush animals ceased their thousand small stirrings, as if afraid a similar fate might befall them. Then there was only the ringing quiet of night.

The brothers looked down at Hanson’s body through the gun smoke. The one without the tattoos glared at his brother. Clearly shooting someone had not been part of his plan. The brother with the tattoos dragged his fingers through his hair, thinking what to do with him now. Not whether to kill him: that was already decided. But what to do with the mess of Hanson, the mess of him.

Cosgrove shot to his feet and in the same motion launched into the brush. A gunshot rang behind him and a flak-burst of broken leaves stung his cheek. He ducked and tottered forward, clung onto a vine, righted himself. Another gunshot cracked and this time the bullet sang so close overhead that Cosgrove felt his hair curling like a spider in flame.

He batted both-handed through the gnarled growth and glimpsed the dimly speckled sky. He wondered if it was the last thing he’d see before ultimate darkness. A bullet through his brain. The executioner’s hood lowered once and for all.

Cosgrove felt the third bullet before he heard it. His body shoved forward and there was the ugly roar of the gunshot in his ears. Pain like fire in his shoulder. He grabbed at the burning place and held his hand up to his face and saw that his fingers were slicked darkly with blood.

But he couldn’t stop.

He staggered through the mire, his boots huge with mud, his vision swimming with white light. He shook the dizziness away until the jungle around him lurched back into focus, the wizard beards of moss, the tangled serpents of ivy.

He heard heavy footfalls following him. Snapping branches and crackling brush. Now one brother cursing at the other. Fuckface this, fuckface that.

Cosgrove’s boot caught on something and he tripped forward. He fell on his hands and knees, noxious mud splattering his face. Behind him the sound of running stopped and one brother told the other to shut up. Cosgrove scrabbled on all fours to the nearest tree and hunkered down with his back against the trunk. His boots were sopping with muck and he could feel warm slime seeping into his underwear.

Several yards away, a flashlight shined through the trees. “You hit him?” said one of the twins.

“Yeah.”

“Where?”

“The head.”

“You sure?”

Silence. Then Cosgrove heard the rumble of an airplane flying high overhead. What he would have given to be in that plane right now, on his way to another place, on his way to a life besides his own.