The Borzoi Killings

40.

A chain link fence with razor wire on top encircled the landfill on the edge of the Sag Harbor-Bridgehampton Turnpike. In the twenty years since the landfill was closed the fence had steadily decayed. There was a rip in the mesh through which anyone could pass.

Billy Jones and Robert Hedges, both of them kids from the long-time colony of blacks who lived along the old road, often went through the rip in the curtain of fence. They were both thirteen. The rip was large enough not only for them but also for the worn mountain bikes they had waited all winter to ride. There had been a string of warm, spring-like days. After school they took long trips around Bridgehampton and Sag Harbor. At some point on each of those trips they went through the hole in the fence. The landfill was like a private preserve for them, a playground. They were able to smoke there.

After all the years of dormancy, the landfill sometimes gave up its secrets, just as in warm weather it gave up a sweet aroma of rot. Metal cans, broken glass, shattered plastic toys somehow appeared on the surface. Rain, moisture, snow, dirt, and time made anything Billy and Robert found completely useless, but the boys still felt like treasure hunters when they discovered something.

The landfill was a small mountain of dirt and grass draped over a steadily decomposing mound of garbage and debris that had accumulated from 1920 to the early 1990s. In any kind of sunlight, even in winter and early spring, the area of the landfill became warm. Its decaying debris was a heat source: snow melted more quickly over it than anywhere else.

Loose dogs often made their way through the fence to the landfill, attracted by the scent of decades of waste. Each time Billy and Robert went into the landfill they found new holes left behind by the dogs. Sometimes the boys kicked dirt back into the holes, and at other times they widened the holes.

Billy was the one who saw the ripped plastic bag that had been pulled part of the way out of a hole. The boys clawed and kicked and dug around the bag. It came apart. They reached inside it.

Inside was a large yellow rain poncho and a long knife. There were big brown stains on the poncho and the knife. These were the most interesting things the boys had ever seen this stale landfill give up. The poncho looked cool to them-it was still intact, as they saw when they stretched it between them. And the long, curved knife was even cooler than the poncho. They rolled the poncho around the long knife and took them home.