Rough country

19

SLIBE ASHBACH SLIPPED OUT the back door of his house, stood in the dark, and listened. If you listened hard enough at night, you could hear a background crackling, as if the leaves of the trees were talking to each other, or the bugs were foot-racing through the long grass…

He heard that, but didn't hear anything human. There was still light from Wendy's trailer; the light, Slibe knew, that pulled in the Deuce, like a moth.

He stepped out in the yard, in near pitch darkness, walking quiet in tennis shoes, along the back of the double-wide, his head below the bottom of the windows. He peeked at the corner and saw the Deuce standing there, on his cinder block, eye at the window. Slibe felt a clutch of anger at the sight of him; took a breath, got a grip, and asked, quietly, "See anything good?"

The Deuce didn't move. There was a circle of light on his eye, coming through the kink in the venetian blind, inside. He said, as quietly as Slibe, "I heard you coming from the time you closed the door. You sounded like an elephant coming through the grass."

Then he stepped down and moved closer to Slibe, eyes in shadow, and asked, "What do you want?"

"We need to talk, right now," Slibe said. "Go on up to the kennel, get out of the mosquitoes."

"Mosquitoes don't bother me none," the Deuce said, and he was telling the truth.

"They bother me. Go to the kennel."

They walked quickly, not shoulder to shoulder, but the Deuce trailing behind, so they moved single file, not talking. The dogs were mostly asleep, though one moaned at them as they walked past and up the stairs.

In the loft, the Deuce dropped onto a kitchen chair. "So talk."

"You saw the cops down there?"

"Yeah. I was sittin' up by the asparagus patch."

"That one guy, the state guy, Flowers, thinks you done it. Killed those people, and now this guy Windrow who was out here this afternoon. They can't find him anywhere, and they think he's dead."

"Didn't do it," the Deuce said.

"Listen, dummy. The cops don't care no more who did it," Slibe said. "They got one woman dead and one woman shot and one guy missing and all they want to do is arrest somebody so they can say it's over with. Flowers asked me where you were, and I told him you'd gone walkabout."

"Need some food, if I'm gonna walkabout," the Deuce said.

"I got food. Get it out of my cupboard. Get out of here."

"I dunno," the Deuce said.

"If you don't, they're gonna slap you in jail, bigger'n shit. I don't know when you'd be gettin' out."

"But I-"

"Listen to me. Didn't you hear what I said? They don't care. They just want to arrest somebody. The sheriff 's got to get himself re-elected. If they find somebody else, that's just fine-then they'll let you out. But if they don't, they'll try to hang it on you."

The Deuce put his head down, like he did when he was turning something over in his mind. After fifteen seconds or so, Slibe said, "I told them you were already gone. I believe if you stay out there for a while, they'll pick on somebody else."

The Deuce still didn't say anything, but he moved ninety degrees in his chair, and looked at a pile of outdoor gear that sat against the wall. "I got two boxes of shells at Martin's yesterday. I could stay out there for a while, if I had some Shake 'n Bake."

"I got a twelve-pack in the cupboard, never opened," Slibe said. "I got some cornmeal, I was down at the diner and got a bunch of those little packages of salt and pepper, twenty of them. You want to pack up, I'll go get them."

THE DEUCE WAS PACKED up in fifteen minutes-bivy sack, change of clothes, four pairs of socks, pump.22 with two boxes of shells, fifty rounds in each box, his knife, headlight, head net, gloves, bug spray. He thought about it for a minute, then added an ultralight fishing rod, a compact tackle box, and a yoga pad.

Slibe came back with a plastic sack full of food-Shake 'n Bake and cornmeal and a six-pack of beer. The Deuce said, "I'm not walkin'."

"What?"

"Takin' the canoe. You can drop me off on the river-I'll get down south of Deer River, in those swamps back there," he said. "Stay there as long as I want, eat sunnies and northern."

"I told them you went walkabout."

"If they ever ask, I'll tell them I keep the canoe hid out, and walked over."

Slibe said, "Okay. Okay. But we gotta get going. The girls have gone to bed. I want to move now."

THE DEUCE PACKED the food and tackle box, gathered up the rifle, fishing rod, and yoga pad, and carried them down to the truck. Slibe got two canoe paddles out of the woodshed. It was eight minutes out and over to the roughed-out landing at Big Dick Lake. The canoe, an old aluminum Grumman, was back in the woods, chained to a tree. They unlocked it, loaded it on the truck, and headed over to the river.

"Dark," Slibe said, as they turned off Highway 2 and rolled past a wild-rice processing place, and down to a boat landing.

"Not bad, when you get used to it," the Deuce said.

They put the canoe in the water next to the bridge, working with the Deuce's headlamp. He dropped in the pack, the rifle, the fishing rod, and the yoga pad.

Slibe said, "That pad, you're getting soft."

"Takes the hurt out of the roots," the Deuce said. "Sleep easier." He took the paddles from Slibe, and added, "I don't know what you're up to, Dad, but I'd 'preciate it if you'd leave me out of it."

He pushed off, pivoted the canoe, and disappeared into the night.

Slibe watched until he couldn't see or hear him, then spit into the water and climbed the bank back to the truck.

He stopped at an all-night gas station and bought a bottle of beer and drank it on the way home.

Thinking all the time.

Working the plotline.