The Outlaw Stinky Joe (Baer Creighton Book 4), page 9
Couldn’t be. Impossible to wrap the brain around it.
Lester righted himself. Looked away, to the expanse of black nothing over canyon’s edge. A perfect place to look while pondering imponderables.
Preparation allowed him to avoid random danger. Sometimes, however, sound strategies had gaps. One girl out of two might want to pull a trigger. Thinking with superstition instead of logic, he could infer God preferred his survival.
But the existence of happenstance ridiculous curiosities, such as two girls dying with life-saving pistols in hand, only proved God didn’t exist. For in no one’s book was Lester virtuous and the world wicked. Some of the craziest of killers, Lester read, considered their actions noble. Usually the ones who murdered prostitutes. But Lester was not so deluded. If good and evil existed, Lester understood which uniform he wore.
If it existed.
Most likely, evil was a brand imposed on others by the folks who had the power, to keep it from the ones who didn’t.
From that light, Lester’s work was virtuous.
Coffee—even instant coffee—did the mind good.
But now he had a problem.
He couldn’t add the kids to the body pile in the truck and send it over the cliff. Someone surely knew the kids were packing Sycamore Rim Trail. The search party would stumble on the blood. An observer from an airplane could see the windshield reflected through the trees.
This whole thing went from simple to compound disaster.
Better take it slow and think things out.
If he hadn’t shot each man in the heart, setting up the murder/suicide would have been easy. But folks rarely—Lester knew it for a fact—shot themselves in the chest, and then the head. Plus, neither girl had a .357, and the striations wouldn’t match if they did, and he didn’t want to leave his .357, as he was fond of it.
No choice but gather the bodies and move them someplace else, unassociated with any of the victims. Give himself more time to think.
Lester looked at his watch. Still only 1:30. Plenty of night left to handle things.
His plan was to call El Jay for a ride from the forest road at dawn. Now he’d leave El Jay out of it.
For now. There were things to consider on that front as well.
Lester found a stump and rested the flashlight with the beam on the camp. He pulled pegs, collapsed each tent, rolled a girl on it, and dragged them each to the truck. There he stood them like he did Paul, except the cab had no room for more corpses. So he placed them in the bed, to ride with Lucky. He shoved the tents into their backpacks, along with sleeping bags and everything else lying around, in the bed as well. So long as not viewed from above while under a street lamp, it would do.
The engine had been running. Lester worked himself to the seat and let his back settle in, let the vertebrae loosen, while his mind calculated the angles. He rolled down the windows to let the smell of WD-40 dissipate.
The real problem was the proximity of the bodies to each other, and to the truck. Paul and Clyde together without identification were just bodies. But the truck’s registration would lead to Clyde. Paul was in Clyde’s outer orbit, and once they identified him, Lester would be within their circle of inquiry. And the kids, they associated with each other, but not Paul or Clyde. None of the kids could illuminate the identities of Paul or Clyde. It seemed the only trouble was the truck.
So why the hell was he ready to haul six corpses back to Flagstaff, when all he had to do was separate the bodies from the truck?
Lack of adequate caffeine. Brain can’t think without adequate caffeine. He drank more from the canteen.
Lester stepped out. Placed the still-burning flare two feet from the rim edge. He turned the truck, backed in so the extended tailgate was over the cliff. He shoved each corpse over, listened for the impact, then pitched the backpacks after them. Next he pulled forward, loaded Paul and Clyde in the back of the truck, and again backed the tailgate over the abyss. Easier to pitch them, with the added clearance.
He dumped Clyde, then Paul, invited Lucky up front. Pulled forward twenty yards, and swept the ground with a branch to remove any tire imprints.
Chapter 20
A few dozen yards from the site of the showdown, Joe detected the scent of the young female that had left the coyote pups to their destruction. The way she bounded high, graceful like a pronghorn, suggested vitality. Joe’s biology urged him to find common purpose with her.
His rear leg sent a twitchy pain signal akin to a tingle—a caution. He distributed his weight to his other limbs. The change in his gate emphasized the discomfort of having his chest ribboned by the lion’s claws.
Blood had coagulated and the gashes, though deep, barely seeped. But his right front was as ineffective as his left rear. As he walked, the injured limbs moved at the same time. They stayed planted at the same time. He was weak regardless of whether the legs provided thrust or stability. He attempted to trot, but tumbled.
Resuming his footing, motion resulted from will, not strength.
Joe arrived at a stream and lowered his head to the water, parched but reluctant to limit his senses. Who knew what invisible attack might be drawing close?
He sniffed the air. No mountain lion—unless it had circled him, and remained downwind.
Joe lapped cold water. He’d had so many mouthfuls of hair and blood, the water rolled cool down his throat, washed his mouth clean, and invigorated him.
Again putting his nose to the breeze, Joe waited for scents to accumulate. He’d prefer the wind to come from ahead.
Weakened by the fights and attack, biology urged Joe to locate the young female coyote who abandoned the others. In not attacking him, perhaps she had chosen him.
Joe drove onward, each step tightening his muscles and sharpening the pain of using them. Every few feet he smelled the ground, following the she-coyote’s steps. Finally he stopped at a crag that stood half the height of the nearby trees. The rocks formed a wall as far as night permitted him to see. It seemed built of boulders, some small and some the size of houses. Between them, overhangs and caverns provided winter shelter for animals over many centuries. The territory burst with their scents. Porcupine. Skunk. Mountain lion.
And coyote.
Joe followed her along the base of the crag. He turned inward at a crevice, nosed inside and lowered his shoulders. Squeezed to make them fit. The rock abraded his cuts; his rear leg throbbed with the pressure of trying to thrust him through the hole.
From inside—very near—she growled.
Joe halted. Her scent was strong—but the lair presented her smell in mixed form, jumbled with the others he’d vanquished, and the pups. Inside must be large, but the opening tiny.
Her growl increased intensity.
Joe wriggled back, but the rock held him. He pushed with his front paws and shook his rear but barely moved. The pressure from the walls was great, as if they closed tighter to trap him. Unknowing what beast stalked from behind, and unable to lift a paw or jockey his shoulders and head to fend off an attack, Joe snarled. He wriggled off his backside and heaved with both rear legs. The pain in the left, where the tendon was half torn, shot a bolt of panic through him. Near frantic, he raised his back high, planted his feet and dropped downward. The motion stretched his shoulders, and he popped free.
Joe fell back, landed sitting. He spun, anticipating attack by a mountain lion or some other speedy beast.
None came.
From inside the crevice the she-coyote growled again, this time her voiced turned higher in pitch.
Plaintive.
Joe continued along the face of the crag, stopping to investigate likely rest areas. A hundred yards beyond the she-coyote’s lair, he stopped at a cavern with an opening large enough for a bear. There were no recent animals there.
He sniffed to learn the history. The dry leaves and rock walls were a maze of ancient smells. Mountain lion. Bear. Coyote. Dog. Man. And a dozen small beasts he couldn’t place, most likely ones that had already tasted delicious to some other predator.
Compared to the hole he’d nearly trapped himself in, this lair was huge. The large opening would permit entry to any attacker, no matter the size. Joe sniffed along the base of the wall and, at the back, found where ground had been stacked high. Some digger had enlarged a passage. Joe lowered himself and followed an old scent into the hole. After a foot, he could turn around.
The temperature was much warmer than outside, and the air, while fresh, was still. The outer cave blocked most light, and inside the back room, dark was near total.
Curled, Joe attempted to lick the slash on his left rear leg, then gave up and licked what he could reach of his chest. At last, he lowered his head to his paws.
From outside arrived a long howl—the wind.
His wounds ached. His eyes sometimes opened and sometimes closed, until at last he trusted he was hidden from a world that attacked at every turn.
Chapter 21
Wake on the couch. Cover’s hard like the quarter inch of rubber they made dodge balls with. Television on all night. Crick in my neck. Feet cold. Old Baer. No dog.
But I got an eighteen-year-old girl so desperate for love she’d poke a grizzly Baer.
And I have so many dead bodies accusing me, the stink clawed its way through two feet of concrete.
“JOE!”
Fall off the couch.
“Where’s the remote?”
Volume’s off—morning news on the screen. Crime scene lights a-flashing. They cut to a grainy black and white from some surveillance camera, and freeze the shot.
“Where the fu—”
Grab the remote. Hit the volume. That’s Stinky Joe if ever I saw him.
... gruesome scene was discovered by Trevor Smith, of Flagstaff, night manager at the Hardees restaurant located on Richmond Drive. Viewer discretion is advised.
They show blood on pavement. Cut back to the police car strobes. Uniform walking about, thumbs in his belt loops, but serious writ on his face.
The tape will show—okay, here’s the tape. This is the victim before being attacked, apparently after discovering the pit bulldog trapped in the pen surrounding the restaurant’s garbage dumpster. He’d dragging a chain, which he planned to use to secure the dog, to help the animal to safety.
“He tell you that?”
Ah! Woman got the red eyes.
I look close. Man has the chain doubled and the end wrapped on his hand, ready to swing.
That man beat Joe.
The killer pit bulldog—and the killing—was caught on video.
“No such thing as a pit bulldog!”
The animal about to come on the screen is a pit bulldog, the breed known for its destructive jaws and violent nature. Although the full attack was recorded by the restaurant’s security cameras, out of respect for the victim, we’re only showing the aftermath, as the killer trots away, perhaps to hunt another.
I’m so close to the television there’s little dots. Back away. They show the police car. Yellow tape. A couple uniforms.
Hardees on Richmond, she said.
Richmond.
Run to my room. Pull on boots. Grab the map book. Shows Arizona, got a section for the towns. Find Richmond on the street list and the grid square for J-23. Okeydokey. Street right at the edge of civilization, got the wood on the other side. Back a ways, a draw—and what I seen of Flagstaff, that’ll be where the rocks are. If Joe lived all winter, he’s familiar with the caves and fissures. Somewhere in those rocks—I guarantee—that’ll be where I find Joe.
Either that or shot dead.
I had wheels, it’d be forty-five minutes to Flag. But even if there are vehicles at the Graves place, I can’t get one.
Best I can do is hijack a car on the interstate. Except I got no gun. Left Smith on the ground at Graves’ when I was liquored up and Tat gave me the orange hair drugs.
Tat has a gun—a Sig Sauer ole Cinder gave her. But she loves on that gun like most girls love on kittens. No such thing as borrowing it. Have to knock her cold to steal it.
And all the guns and ammo Graves bought to withstand Armageddon are still at the house. Lazy bastard never hauled anything up here save dehydrated food, and I suspect that was part of the construction deal, like the Flintstone furniture.
Figure thirty, forty mile to Hardees. One-two days’ hard march.
Got the escape plan already figured. Just needed the reason.
I find a ride, so much the better.
“What’s that?”
“Uh, morning, Tat. That’s a map.”
“Because of last night?”
She’s cool. Shoulder on wall. Hip out, arm hangs graceful. I was twenty, I’d be begging another poke.
“Huh?”
“You want to leave because of last night?”
“No. No. Hell no. Stinky Joe. They had him on the television. They’ll hunt him down. Kill him.”
She studies me.
All of a sudden my mess is itchy.
“I got to save my dog, is all. Plus—time to move on, Tat. I—uh, wish you the best.”
Got nothing here so packing is easy—I’ll leave with what I’m wearing. Got a buck knife one of the Graves boys gave me. A coat. Boots. Ready to trot.
“They will find you.”
“Yeah.”
“You will go to prison.”
“No.”
“You need help.”
“Need aluminum foil.”
I step past her. She grabs my hand. Stares, haunted. Girl has demons. She connects long and hard like our brains are wired, and she’s trying to shoot love across the lines, but has so much despair, it just comes off lonesome. I squeeze her elbow.” You’re stronger than you think.”
“We—”
Shake my head. Pull free. “Accident, is all. You and me. And I have to save Joe.”
“Baer?”
“I was young or you was old, we’d scrog sixteen hours a day. Lordy, I promise. But it’s the moral. I can’t poke a kid.”
“You didn’t like the sex?”
“Nah. You kidding? If I was in charge—”
“Who the hell is in charge? Of what?”
“Your English is coming along fine.”
She got me. I dunno. Who put it in my head that screwing young girls is wrong?
“You’re a tight ass man.”
“You mean hung up?”
“I mean a prude.”
“Yeah, that. Well—”
At winter’s start, we stocked a closet in the kitchen with one of everything stored in the warehouse they dug on the side. I grab a box of foil and roll out eight foot strips until I hit cardboard tube. Stretch them on the floor and fold the seams over like Ma used to make a tent for turkey. Press the seams flat with a rolling pin, three folds over. In fifteen minutes of cussing, I manufacture a single sheet of silver, seven feet tall and eight wide. I fold the ends several times over, make a quarter inch solid so nothing will tear, then fold the whole sheet twice.
Grab a pocket of dried meat and a couple bites for the belly.
Tat hasn’t moved.
“That won’t work.”
“Okay.”
“You are stupid man.”
“Yes.”
When I was a boy, I didn’t understand myself. I got not a shot in hell grokking a girl.
Marisol joins her at the kitchen entry.
“What is he doing?”
“He is leaving.”
Marisol shrugs. Comes in the kitchen and fills a cup with water. What the hell is it with girls walking around in panties?
I squeeze past. Got to save Joe. Can’t save everybody. Especially since most people I meet end up dead or wanted. These girls have a safe place, and their smarts have done them fine.
“You ladies will get on just fine.”
Push open the main door. A foil dunce cap covers my whole body, except a scrunched up oval at the eyeballs—looks like a tin asshole—so I don’t bust my leg walking blind. The wound in my calf from the punji stake seeps now and then. I press out the nastiness every couple of days. The drip smells like sewage, but in all, the wound doesn’t hurt much, and I’m stronger every hour. Barely favor the leg.
Five months inside. Ain’t comfy breathing cold, natural air. Feel like a thousand eyeballs study me. I swing the door closed so if the FBI comes on me quick, they won’t grab the girls too.
I take a minute to figure the lay. Look about the slope, how the trail feeds down a steep drop-off and joins a hundred year old logging road.
Full grown man wearing foil head to toe.
Way I figure things, safest route out of here’s straight up the hill behind me. They placed cameras down the front, all about the Graves house and lawn. The quarter mile driveway to the road and most of the hill. I head straight up the dome, I’ll pass through a hundred yards they pay attention to. According to my map.
I had to guess some locations for the X’s where the FBI boys located their surveillance. I watched the federal police through Graves’ cameras, but some of the fields of view have no recognizable point of reference. Not without knowing the name of every tree on the property, like an owner might. But a fella walks off one camera view and ten seconds later into another, the second’s close to the first. So my life rests on guess work.
And maybe they have satellites too.
Satisfied nobody watches, I follow the bend around the hill, until I spot a deer path goes straight up the dome.
Muse on Tat, now that I left her. She’s a good girl. Hard girl, but good. Sometimes you can’t reach the itch between the shoulder blades. I have a thought like that. Tat. Can’t scrape out the thought.
How she felt, on me.
The thinking is there, but I can’t think it.
How would life be, if I stayed and enjoyed her regular?
Or come back with Stinky Joe—sneak back inside the mountain home? Old men hole up with pretty young gals all the time.
Not like I asked for the situation. I went looking for Joe and had to choose between prison with the girls or prison with the boys.
