Smudge was confused and disoriented and bleeding a little. This left navigation entirely in Bubba’s hands. It meant he alone had to restrain two dogs on leashes to make sure that one or both of them didn’t go after a coon.
‘Watch the root there,’ Bubba said to Smudge as they trudged through brush and trees so thick they could have been in a rain forest for all Bubba knew.
‘How far?’ Smudge slurred.
‘Can’t be much farther.’ Bubba said what he had been saying for the past eight hours.
Smudge wasn’t going to be able to walk much longer. It was a good thing Bubba had brought food, although it was a shame he had stuffed half of his Cheez Whiz sandwich in a knothole. Boy, what he wouldn’t give for that now. At least water wasn’t a problem. The fucking stuff was everywhere, and each time they happened upon it, Half Shell would dig in her feet and bark, and Bubba would have to carry her over another creek, some of which were very swift and deep. The only thing that kept Bubba going was anger.
‘I still can’t get over what a rotten thing that was to do,’ he said to Smudge yet once again.
Smudge was too exhausted and disoriented to answer.
‘I could’ve had a heart attack. You’re just lucky I’m a nice guy.’
They reached another creek, this one a trickle, but Half Shell didn’t care.
‘I’ve had it,’ Bubba said to the dogs. ‘I can’t drag your asses another step.’ He unhooked their leashes. ‘You’re on your own.’
Tree Buster shot off like a rubber band, crashing through brush and barking three times for a strike that no one gave a goddamn about. Half Shell went off to the left. She kept looking back at Bubba every couple of steps, her eyes intense and caring.
‘What is it?’ Bubba asked her.
Half Shell ran ahead ten feet and looked back again.
‘We supposed to follow you?’ Bubba asked his dog.
Half Shell barked. Bubba and Smudge followed her for another forty-five minutes while Tree Buster treed coons and wondered why nobody showed up. Mist was rising, the world silent, sunlight breaking through the canopy of trees. It seemed a miracle when suddenly they were in a clearing, Smudge’s truck straight ahead on the muddy road.
It was important that Pigeon venture out at dawn to avoid the thunder of rush hour, and more important, to forage before Dumpsters were emptied behind restaurants that would not open for hours.
Often he discovered unexpected treasures such as money, jewelry and doggie bags that drunk people dropped on their way back to their cars. Once he found a Rolex watch and got enough money from the pawn shop to keep him happy for months. He had found a number of portable phones, calculators and pagers, and an occasional gun.
‘You can stay here if you want,’ Pigeon said to Weed.
Weed was sitting on the blanket and didn’t know what to do. In daylight, his predicament seemed even worse, maybe because it was harder to hide when the sun was looking him in the eye.
‘There’s got to be places the devil won’t go,’ Pigeon said.
Weed gave it some thought.
‘I guess he wouldn’t go back to the cement-tary,’ Weed decided.
Pigeon got an idea.
‘People ever leave good stuff on the graves? Like the dead person’s favorite food, whiskey, wine, cigars, sort of like they used to do in the Pyramids?’
‘It was dark when I was in there,’ Weed told him. ‘I didn’t see nothing ‘cept those little flags you see everywhere. But it’s a big place.’
The world was no longer big enough to accommodate traffic, and this was fortunate for Officer Otis Rhoad. It was almost seven-thirty and rush hour was out of the gate.
Soon there would be thousands of personal cars driven by solitary commuters indifferent to the wear and tear of the ozone and jealous of their right to come and go when and how they pleased in whatever they could afford to drive, using their own flight plans.
He steered his cruiser with a bony knee as he lit a Carlton Menthol, one eye in the rearview mirror, the other on a traffic light that was about to turn red and the guy in the Camaro next to him who thought he was going to make it. He did. Rhoad was disappointed.