Darkling I Listen (52 page)

"I need a gun."

Ruth chewed her lip, then, "Sweet Jesus, I gotta feelin' I'm gonna regret this. Come on.
Clyde
keeps a Glock in his desk in case somebody decides they want to knock off the safe durin' work hours." She led Alyson down the hall.

Ruth unlocked the door and turned on the light. She proceeded to the desk, where she pulled out a drawer and reached far back, her face screwing into a frown of concentration. Finally, she pulled the gun out and put it on the desk. They both stared at it.

"You know anything about guns?" Ruth asked.

Alyson shrugged. "A little. I took a class once in self-defense. There were karate experts there, a cop. Someone brought in handguns." She reached for the automatic, kept it pointed toward the floor as she regarded it.

"He keeps it loaded," Ruth said in a whisper. "He showed me once. You flip the safety off here,
then
you just aim and fire. Says it's got a hard trigger on it. Means it ain't gonna go off on you too easy."

"What about a boat?" Alyson could feel the first real clutch of fear seizing hold of her throat.

"
Clyde
keeps his boat down at the docks. He was helpin' in the search, so I know it's already got whatever you need. Aly, I—"

"Don't," Alyson interrupted her. "We're wasting time." With a resigned groan, Ruth led her out the door.

*

They took Ruth's car, driving south down 59, back toward
town. The rain had stopped, thank God. The roads were wet, and reflected the light beams like oil slicks. With the gun in her lap, Alyson stared out into the dense, black trees crowding the road. When fear for her own safety began to take hold, she focused on
Brandon
and what might be happening to him in that very moment.
He's alive,
she mentally repeated to herself.
Dear Heavenly God, let Nora be right again.

"I ain't gonna pull no punches," Ruth said as she drove. Her face glowed with a green tint from the dashboard lights. "These waters are treacherous now. They always are, but especially now, 'cause of these rains. Creek is up and fast—"

"Why didn't they search the compound?" Alyson interrupted. "Why didn't the searchers look there—
"

"They've been lookin' for a drown victim, or a disposed body. The compound is nearly three miles north of the docks where the Carlyles kept their boat. Creek runs south. That's where the search and rescue teams focused. Look, don't
nobody
go there. We don't hunt there, we don't fish there. I went there once with my daddy. That was way back, maybe twenty years ago, and I don't mind tellin' you, it's a damn spooky place. Like somethin' prehistoric."

"Like
Caddo
Lake
?"

"Honey,
Caddo
Lake
is Disney World compared to this baygall. Never forget my daddy tellin' me about the Baygall Bogeyman."

Alyson gave her a dry smile. "Sounds like a story parents made up to keep their kids from exploring the baygall."

"Sugar, we don't need
no
bogeyman to keep kids out of that baygall. The place is a mire of mud and quicksand. Flood waters get trapped up in those flats, and it becomes a breedin' ground for snakes, frogs, and mosquitoes. I'll never forget the smell of that place. Like somethin' dead and rottin'
."

They drove in silence then. Finally, Ruth turned down a gravel road. The car bumped in and out of water-filled trenches, inched along for a quarter-mile until the headlights splashed across the covered, compartmented docks sheltering a line of fishing boats that hung from cables over the water.

As Ruth stopped the car, she turned again to Alyson. "Please don't do this.
You ain't got nothin' to go on but the word of some weirdo who thinks she's got a vision.
Brandon
wouldn't want you to do this. The man was deep in love with you. If he thought you was gonna risk your neck like this—"

"If you think I'd turn my back on someone who loves me that much, then it's pretty damn obvious you don't know me." Alyson smiled into Ruth's eyes. "I've waited my entire life to belong
to
somebody who loved me that deeply, Ruth. For twenty-nine years I ached with
an emptiness
so bottomless and dark, I didn't think I'd ever see the light. Then suddenly there were Brandon and Henry, and I felt like I'd come home at long last. That I belonged. I think
Brandon
felt that way, too. We just sort of
…
fit."

Ruth squeezed Alyson's hand. "And by the looks of you two together, I'd say you fit pretty damn good."

Alyson reached for her purse and took out pen and paper. "This is the name and number of my friend. If something happens, and I don't come back—"

"Don't even think about it—"

"If I don't come back, call him. His name is Dr. Alan Rodgers, and this is his number. He'll take care of everything." She laughed. "Knowing Alan, he's probably on his way here, he and Ron. Maybe here already." Taking a fortifying breath, she said, "Let's go."

Alyson turned the cable crank that lowered the aluminum fishing boat into the water. Ruth checked the gas in the motor, flipped a switch that turned on the lights on the bow, secured the paddle in the hooks,
then
gave her a brief lesson on steering.

"It's pretty simple. If you want to go right, you turn this thing left. Left, right. You got it? You want more power, rotate this doomaflicker. Got it?"

"I think so." Alyson nodded, keeping her eyes on Ruth's face and not on the water lapping against the hull of the boat.

"You want to kill the power, just hit this lever right here on the side of the motor. Once you get up into the baygall, you'll wanna kill it. You can never tell how deep the water is once you get up the road away. You don't want to ground the propellers. Not only that, but the vegetation gets pretty dense—water lilies—and they can act just like a lot of fishin' line around your propellers. They'll gum you up real quick and burn up the motor. Best you paddle your way in at the first sign of the lilies, understand?"

Ruth tossed her a life preserver that Alyson shrugged on like a coat. It felt tight around her chest, but Ruth nodded. "That's good. The last thing you want is to slide out of your vest." Then she tossed her a flashlight and toed open a metal box on the boat floor. "
There's
a couple knives in here in case you get caught up in vegetation and need to cut your way out. Your boat lights are fixed
good
so you don't have to worry much about seein' where you're goin'. Hell,
Clyde
has this baby rigged up so bright it looks like a frickin' Ferris wheel. Jim's always teasin' him that he blinds the damn fish with his lights then clubs 'em over the head."

Ruth nervously rubbed her hands up and down the butt of her jeans. "You go right up the middle of this water, you hear? Don't let yourself get pushed too close to the banks. Too much underbrush. This is a good motor, but in these currents you're gonna have a fight on your hands to keep her straight and steady. Three miles up you'll see the road on your right. 'Course it just looks like a wide gap in the trees. There's an old wagon wheel nailed to the tree on the left corner. At least most times you can see it. Maybe not now 'cuz of this rain, I don't know. Anyhow, you go up that road. Things will start to look real different real quick. You'll know what I mean. It's just
…
different. Pine trees will start givin way to cypress. The water gets dead still. Soon as you start to feel like you want to turn around and get the hell out real quick, you know you're in the right place."

"How far up is the compound?" Alyson asked. Her voice sounded thin. Her mouth felt dry.

"Mile, maybe. By then you'll be paddlin'. Flip your propeller up when you get there, so you don't drag. And remember, please remember, if you have to get out of the boat to push or pull it over a sandbar, the ground could give out from under you at any time. You can go from knee deep to real deep with no warnin'. You'll see the compound on high ground. It's surrounded by water, like an island. There's a fence. A high one, 'bout ten feet, maybe."

Alyson nodded and looked down at the boat. "Go call Jack. If he won't listen to you, call Tommy Greene, or the
Tyler
police. Call Barbara Walters or Senator Whitehorse. Get someone to listen."

"You bet I will," Ruth said, nodding. "They're gonna listen whether they want to or not."

Carefully, Alyson slid off the dock and into the boat, which rocked dangerously as she stumbled to the back and dropped into the seat by the motor. Ruth showed her how to start the motor, which cranked the first time. The yellow and orange lights up front flashed on, illuminating the water for ten feet around her.

"Remember," Ruth yelled, "left is right and right is left, and use that thingamajig you got your hand on to regulate your speed. It's a little like drivin' a motorcycle!"

Alyson nodded, and with a slight rotation of the thingamajig, the boat slid smoothly away from the dock and through the black water.

*

Jack Dillman sat in his Barcalounger in the dark staring at
his image on the television
screen,
blundering his way through an inquisition by a Fox News correspondent he'd seriously considered punching. Only one thing had stopped him: he was in enough goddamn trouble as it was. Jeezus, how the hell had his career gone south so damn fast?

Carlyle again.

The son of a bitch had to go and get himself killed.
Dixie
'd been right. There wasn't a rock he could hide under that somebody wasn't gonna be there waitin' for him with a frickin' camera to satellite his humiliated face to ever' goddamn television in the civilized world. His town was lost under a sea of reporters, outside law enforcement, politicians, and fans with a hunger to tear him apart limb by limb—like on those old Tarzan movies he watched as a kid.

He was starting to get death threats. His car had been stoned twice, and windows of the courthouse had been busted by flying yams the size of cantaloupes. He had a meeting
at
ten in the morning with the Town Council, who would, no doubt, ask for his resignation.

All because of Carlyle. Frickin' Carlyle. Always Carlyle.

He turned up the television volume and winced as he watched himself gulp in nervousness and wipe sweat from his brow.

"Sheriff Dillman, can you explain why, when you were first notified that something wasn't right at the Carlyle residence, you didn't follow through with the customary check? Didn't you, in fact, radio your dispatcher that everything checked out okay at the Carlyle residence when, in fact, you didn't actually check the residence at all? Sheriff Dillman, has it occurred to you that if you'd followed through with the check, you'd undoubtedly have discovered that some sort of confrontation had taken place at the residence, and that Carlyle was, indeed, missing at that very moment? Not only that, but when Carlyle's disappearance was first reported, you waited six hours before requesting help from outside search and rescue units."

"Sheriff, is it true that you've had a personal issue with Carlyle over the years? Did this cloud your judgment when it came to following through with your responsibilities as sheriff
…?"

"
Sheriff,
is it true that your own sister was arrested for…
"

"Can you tell us if you have any leads on the disappearance of Betty Wilson?"

"Do you feel she's more responsible for Carlyle's disappearance than you first believed?"

"There's talk of your resigning
…"

"Sheriff, if Brandon Carlyle is dead, you'll certainly be held accountable. But on a more personal level, how are you feeling, knowing that a man so beloved by the world might have died due to your negligence?"

"No comment. No comment. No goddamn comment!"

Jeezus.

He hit the Power button, throwing the room into complete darkness except for the illuminated eyes of a black-and-white plastic Felix the Cat clock on the distant kitchen wall. Its tail moved from side to side, ticking in the silence.

The phone rang; he jumped. Jeez, if another frickin' reporter had somehow found his number—he had a goddamn mind not to answer it. Who the hell would be calling here this time of night except a frickin' reporter?

Cursing, he climbed out of the Barcalounger and stalked to the phone. "Give me a goddamn break!" he yelled into it. "It's four in the mornin' and I—"

"Ruth. Ruth Threadgill. Jack, you ain't gonna believe this, but…
"

He stared down at his bare feet, listening, feeling his blood pressure rise even higher. "Wait a minute, wait a minute, you callin' me at four in the mornin' with some cockamamie story of a goddamn psychic?
You been
dippin' too damn heavy into
Clyde
's cheap whisky. Go to bed, Ruth—"

Rolling his eyes, he interrupted her again. "Look, when I get my hands on that Farrington woman…
She's a goddamn nut too, Ruth. She what? She's done whaaat? Jeezus…" He kicked the wall, hurting his toe. Jumping up and down, he shouted, "I'm a goddamn laughin'stock as it is. If you think I'm haulin' my officers into that baygall on the word of some nutcase supposed psychic and a tabloid reporter, then you deserve to be slam-dunked in the Terrell loony bin along with the rest of 'em. Now go to bed and leave me the hell alone!" He slammed the phone down, causing it to ring like a bell.