Chapter Seventeen

Zachary Tutton sits with his back to the door, unaware of people entering the room. His hair is long, mid-brown, greasy. He's wearing a pair of closed-ear headphones, leaning forward in an operator's chair.

In front of Zach are rows of amplification units—rack-mount tuners, strips of dials and switches.

Whicher studies the young man—thin shoulders, curving back, a dirty, long-sleeve top. The jeans have a sheen of grime. But the sneakers are new-looking, fresh from a box.

The air in the room is hot. Fans whirring on amps, receivers, transformers. It's like the comms unit of a mobile ops post.

Shanon Summers steps a pace into Whicher's sight-line—eyes bugged, seeing it all for the first time.

Zach senses movement, spins around, pushes back sharp in his chair. He rips off the headphones, “Shit, man...”

“US Marshal,” Whicher says.

Zach stares at Shanon, eyes startled, skin taut across his cheeks. “What're y'all doing here?”

“Looking for Lindy Page,” Whicher says.

“Lindy?”

“It's about her boyfriend, Todd.”

Zach clutches the arms of the chair.

“I was up to Crystal City, couldn't find her,” Whicher says. “Somebody mentioned your name. Miss Summers here helped me find my way over.”

“I didn't think you'd mind,” she says.

“Lindy's not here...”

“You have any idea where she's at?” the marshal says.

“No.” Zach looks at Shanon. “She'd know better'n me.”

“It's you I'm asking.”

He puts a foot on the ground. “I don't hardly know her even...”

“But you do know Todd. You know—about what happened?”

“I heard he was shot.”

“What else you hear?”

He stares at his knees. “Well, nothing.”

“He was found with a bunch of wetbacks—out in the brush. You ever hear he might have been involved with something like that?”

No reaction.

“You need to think real careful,” Whicher says.

“He was working as a guide, the huntin' camps. Is what he told me...”

Shanon rubs the back of her bare arm. “That's what he told Lindy.”

Whicher studies Zach—thin, lank, awkward in his own skin. Not hard to picture him friends with a guy like Williams. “You see much of Todd lately?”

Zach scratches at his hair.

“When was the last time?”

“Couple weeks.”

The marshal stares at the equipment, glowing in the darkened room. “What's all this gear, radio?You got a license?”

“I'm qualified, got my papers, an' all.”

“What else you do?”

Zach looks at him.

“You have a job?”

“I help out.”

“Doing what? I don't see any animals, crops...”

“It's rented out—all the land.”

“That's how you make a living?”

“There's a bunch of it,” Zach says. “From here, on out to the river.”

The marshal scans the gear. “Who you talk to with that stuff?”

“All kinds of people.”

“Folk here?”

“Yeah.”

“In other countries?”

“It depends on the signal.”

“How about Mexico?”

The young man shifts in his seat.

Whicher looks at him. “I saw that bunch of wires in the trees yonder. How come you don't have a regular mast?”

Zach loosens the headphones at his neck. “Pop won't have one, land this flat. There's a risk of lightning, anything up high.” He looks at Whicher, needle starting to creep in. “Are you here to search the place? You got a warrant or somethin'?”

“Maybe time I got one,” Whicher says. “Now that I know the way, I guess I can come on back.”

The headlight beam of the Chevy falls like a rolling wash on the deserted county road. Whicher steers through the dark, windows open. Smoking on a Marlboro Red.

The land's empty under a moonless sky—he thinks of people, silent people walking through the night, one behind another; spirits from a shadow world.

Ahead is Crystal City, lights winking over the high scrub.

He searches for the turn, for the road to skirt the edge of town south.

Shanon Summers watches from the passenger seat.

He takes a hit on the cigarette. “Pretty quiet?”

He blows out a stream of smoke, asks himself when he's going to quit. The Gulf, he had an excuse, everybody smoked. Year down the line, things ought to be different.

“I was thinking on Lindy,” Shanon says.

“I'll get you home. Head down 83, stop by that roadhouse. Maybe she went out there, after all.”

“You want me to come?”

“It's on the highway, The Silver Dollar? I reckon I could find it.”

Beyond the cemetery the turn is coming up. He slows the truck, steers off the county road.

“I guess I don't really understand any of this,” Shanon says. “Todd getting killed an' all.”

Whicher flicks ash out the window, warm air buffeting through the cab. “Were they close? Lindy and him?”

“Not really. They pretty much broke up.”

“They broke up?”

Shanon stares out the window at a warehouse—stacks of empty palette crates caught in the headlight beam. “Around here,” she says, “a lot of things don't amount to much. People hook up. It works out, it don't.”

At either side of the lane lights show from houses. They're coming into a run down subdivision.

“The thing I don't get?” she says. “People crossing the border is nothing here, nothing at all. It's every night of the week.” She wraps her arms around the thin fabric of the sundress.

“Seven people don't get killed.”

They drive the blocks of the subdivision. Big tires whining in the night air.

“I didn't know it was that many,” Shanon says.

Whicher grinds the stub of the cigarette. “You need to keep that to yourself. I don't know how much of that all went public...”

At the corner of the last block is a sign for West Nueces Street. He turns out onto the dead-end lane.

Either side of the road is deserted, cars and trucks in their owners' yards. Except for one. Fifty yards down. A lone sedan.

Whicher pulls up by the hedge at the side of the red clapboard house. “There be somebody home?” Light from the street catches the frame of the wheelchair by the house. “Your old man be alright?”

“He's okay.”

“What happened to him?”

“He got in a car wreck.”

Whicher rests his hands on top of the steering wheel. “I'm sorry to hear that.” He looks over at her. “'Preciate you helping out.”

“I don't mind.”

“One last thing,” he says. “Did Lindy have somebody else?”

She gazes at the lit-up dials in the dash.

“She's not on trial,” he says.

Shanon gives a little snort. “You don't know folk round here.”

He stares out the windshield at the empty lane.

“You want to go somewhere?” she says quickly. “After...”

He turns to her.

“After you get done?”

He looks at her in the passenger seat of his truck. Fingers tracing the green and white pattern down her dress.

“Probably not a good idea.”

“Oh.”

She tilts her head.

“Me being a cop.”

“That all you are?”

He smiles. “Maybe not all.”

She looks off into the dark along the sidewalk.

“You could do a lot better than me,” he says.

“You think, around here?” She opens the passenger door, steps out.

He sets the Resistol forward.

“You know,” she says, “you scared me a little. When you put it like that—seven people getting killed.”

“Miles from here,” he says. “Out in the brush.”

“Well.” She swings the door shut. “Goodnight.”

Whicher nods, drops the truck into drive.

He steers from the curbside down the empty subdivision, takes another smoke out of the pack. He lights up, rubs a hand across his jaw, settles at the wheel.

In his rear-view a set of headlights snap on.

He screws his head around, checks—it's the sedan from the street, nothing else is moving.

At the end of the block he makes a right, heading south.

Thirty seconds later, the sedan lights are pulling out from the junction—turning out behind him.

He stamps on the brakes, locks the wheels.

In the rear-view he sees the headlights dive.

The sedan's stationary.

“Jesus Christ,” he mutters. A snatch of tire smoke curls in the open window.

He clamps the cigarette in his mouth, cranks the steering, floors the gas—whipping the Chevy round till it's facing the opposite direction.

The headlights on the sedan glare at him along the street.

He shifts his foot on the throttle, the motor picks up under the hood.

The sedan pulls out, front wheels spinning.

Whicher feels his breath stop—the car barrels toward him on a straight collision course.

He yanks the steering, braced for the hit.

The sedan mounts the curb, a blur of metal speeds by—inches from him, over the yard of a house.

Whicher freezes the image—a Buick Le Sabre, windows dark, male driver in a suit. He turns the Chevy in a circle, ditches the smoke.

The tail lights on the Buick disappear up a side road.

He hits the gas, heart hammering in his chest. At the turn, he follows the Buick—it flicks right into another side street, fast, tight, in control.

Whicher floors it out, gripping the wheel, tearing along the road to the next turn. The road's narrow, scarcely lit. No Buick. He keeps his foot in, speed climbing.

Ahead is a blind bend—he snaps the steering, pinning the truck in a drift.

Out of the turn, the lane's full dark, no lights, no sign of the Buick. He feels his gut twist, slows at an intersection, staring down each side road in turn.

Moments pass, thirty seconds, a minute. No sign.

He comes off the gas, listening through the driver window.

Nothing but the beat of cicadas in the night air. Low rumble of the highway in the distance.