Children Of The Mountain (Book 2): The Devil You Know (29 page)

I start checking houses as soon as I leave the interstate. I’m pretty sure now this is the way he’s come. He struggles with the snow so he won’t have gone far, and out here by the highway it’s sparsely populated, just the occasional dwelling set back from the road. I don’t even have to check all of them. He’s too small to go clambering through windows and he doesn’t have the means to force a lock, so he’ll have been looking for somewhere that’s already been broken into. I allow my hopes to rise a little. It won’t be long until I find him.

But as I get closer to town roads start branching off to the left and right, each one lined with squat little boxes, and a lot of them have busted front doors. I begin to realize the enormity of the task that lies ahead of me. It might have taken Marv and me all day to work a single street like this when we were back in Eden. I have to find the kid in the next couple of hours if I’m to have any hope of catching Mags and Hicks.

I make my way up to the next house along, a brick and shingle single story with a sagging snow-laden roof, trying to figure out how else to narrow my search. Darkened windows stare back at me as I trudge up to the screen door and unsnap my bindings. And that’s when it hits me: he’ll have taken his snowshoes off outside. That should speed things up considerably. I’ll still have to hike up to each stoop or porch to check, but at least I won’t have to venture inside.

An hour and three streets later and I still haven’t found him, though. I cross the road and start up the next one along. The house on the corner is burned to the ground, just a charred chimney breast standing alone in what I guess used to be the yard. The next one’s not much better; the walls have been stripped to the studs and when I look up there’s little left of the roof between the gables. But the third house looks more promising. The boards have been pried loose, exposing the insulation underneath, but otherwise it looks in decent shape, and I can see the front door’s open. An old Bronco, long since sunken onto its tires, sits at a haphazard angle on the scrub of ground that might once have passed for lawn. There’s no tracks to tell anyone’s been here, but when I walk around to check the porch I find what I’m looking for: a pair of red snowshoes, already almost covered with gray snow. Another hour and I would have walked on by.

I climb the steps. The front door’s ajar; I push it open and look in. There’s no mistaking which way he’s gone; the prints left by his small boots stop at a door near the end. The pair of hiking poles I got him lie abandoned next to it.

I unsnap my snowshoes and step inside. There’s little to distinguish this place from the countless others like it I’ve scavenged over the years. The wallpaper’s peeling from the walls and the ceiling’s stained and cracked, in places the lathes showing through. I call out but there’s no answer so I make my way down the hallway and open the door. A narrow staircase winds down into darkness. I pull the flashlight from the pocket of my parka and turn the handle, but the faltering yellow beam doesn’t extend much beyond the first few steps.

It was Marv’s job to scavenge the dark places, that was the deal. Claus may not live inside my head anymore but I’d be grateful for that arrangement now, just the same. I call out again but still there’s no answer, and now that’s beginning to worry me too. He has to be down there. I wonder if he’s already turned. Hicks said it could happen at any moment, and when it did there’d be no warning; it’d be like a switch had been flipped. I look behind me at the busted door. Spidey’s offering all sorts of helpful suggestions, most of them variations on a single theme: let’s get out of here and catch up with Mags and Hicks. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t tempted.

I pull off my mittens and slip my hand into the pocket of my parka, feeling for Marv’s gun. I take it out and pull the slide back to chamber the only round it holds.

I take a deep breath and start down the stairs.

*

I
HAVEN’T MADE
more than a couple of steps when the toe of my boot catches on something and I stumble. I grab for the railing to steady myself and almost drop the gun. The beam from the flashlight briefly shows a pair of ski goggles, the lenses taped, before they skitter off down the stairs and are lost to darkness.

I wait for a long moment, my heart pounding, my breath white and heavy in the air in front of me. Once I've calmed myself a little I continue my descent. When I reach the bottom stair I stop and look around. In the corner nearest to me there’s a small furnace, the flue pipe snaking up to a rough hole cut into the low plasterboard ceiling. A washing machine and dryer sit side by side next to it, a pile of moldering clothes heaped in a laundry basket on top. Cardboard boxes have been stacked against the wall opposite. Snowmelt’s got to them, turning the card to mulch, spilling their contents across the concrete floor.

My pulse is still racing but the fading beam refuses to show me any further so I inch forward, the flashlight in one hand, the gun in the other. My finger’s already slipped through the slit Hicks cut in my liners and now it curls around the cold trigger. I slide the safety, feeling it click softly under my thumb.

I advance slowly, the yellowing cone of light sweeping the darkness uncertainly in front of me. It slowly illuminates a small boy, his knees pulled to his chest. He looks asleep, just like the little girl I found, in the closet in Shreve, all those years ago. She hadn’t been able to move, but still Marv had grabbed the straps of my backpack and hauled me away, like he’d found me with my hand out to a maddening dog.

Johnny’s not like that girl, though. He may not have gotten the hang of snowshoeing yet, but he can move just fine. My eyes flick to the floor. His mittens lie discarded, the frayed remnants of the duct tape still clinging to the cuffs.

The flashlight’s starting to dim. I raise the gun and level it at his head. My hand’s shaking a little and I only have one bullet, but I reckon from this distance not even I could miss. My finger tightens around the trigger. I feel the last of the slack come out of it.

‘Johnny.’

I hold the pistol on him, waiting for his reaction. For a long time there’s nothing and then his eyes fly open, flashing silver as they catch the beam from the dying flashlight. The muscles in his jaw are working now, clenching and unclenching, as though he’s grinding his teeth. Just like the little girl in the closet, after Marv held the knife with the blood on it under her nose.

I call his name again, louder. At last his face softens. He slowly raises one hand to ward off the weakening beam and squints back at me.

‘Didn’t you hear me calling you?’

He nods.

‘It was the other one’s turn. I had to push him out of the way.’

I don’t care to dwell on what that might mean. I reach into the pocket of my parka and toss him one of the plastic vials. It bounces across the dusty concrete floor and comes to rest at his feet.

‘Take that then put your mittens back on. We’ve got to get going.’

He looks at the container but makes no move to pick it up.

‘The girl sent you back for me.’

He doesn’t say it like it’s a question, but I nod anyway.

‘The soldier said I was holding you up. Maybe it’d be better if you went back and told her you couldn’t find me.’

The truth is it might. I don’t say that though. Instead I tell him Mags has gone on ahead; before we start worrying about slowing her down first we’ll need to catch up. A look of concern crosses his small face as he hears this.

‘The girl isn’t with you?’

I shake my head.

‘She and Hicks set off up I-81 this morning. We’ll meet them on the road.’

His brow furrows and he reaches for the container. He unscrews the cap and downs the liquid inside, grimacing with the taste. He reaches for his mittens. As I’m taping them up he looks at me.

‘The soldier’s like me you know. You shouldn’t trust him.’

We head back out to the porch. The kid hangs back in the shadow of the doorway, looking up at the darkening sky. The wind’s picked up since I went inside; there’s definitely more weather coming. I tell myself Hicks will know to get off the interstate and find shelter before it hits, and besides, there’s nothing I can do about that right now; I just need to focus on keeping us ahead of it. Storms this late in the season normally blow themselves out after a day or two. But right now that’s time I can’t afford.

I coax the kid out and we snap on our snowshoes and make our way back up to the interstate. I can see he’s trying but we’re moving far too slowly. It’s already well past noon. At this rate it’ll take us most of the night to reach Falling Waters.

I’m waiting at the top of the on-ramp for him to catch up when I happen to look back in the direction we came that morning. The snow’s drifting across the road, and I can barely make out the church where we spent the night. But then the wind drops and in the instant before it picks up again I spot movement. I tell myself it could be anything: the weakening light playing tricks with my eyes; some random piece of debris blowing across the highway. Part of me already knows better than that, however.

I motion to the kid to stay where he is then I crouch down and edge up onto the overpass, staring at the spot where I thought I saw something. For what seems like an eternity there’s nothing and then I see it again, closer now. Four figures walking line abreast towards us. Even at this distance Jax’s bulk is unmistakable.

I glance behind me at the small figure waiting in the middle of the road. By the time I get him down the on-ramp they’ll be at the interstate. We’d never make it around the bend in time, and even if we did they’d spot us on the next straight. My feet are mostly healed; if it was just me there’s a chance I could outrun them. But not with the kid. I cross to the guardrail on the other side. It’s a near vertical drop to the road below.

I tell him we’re going over. He shuffles forward and looks down suspiciously then turns back to me.

‘Go on. The snow’s deep. It’ll be fine.’

He takes one more look and then clambers up onto the guardrail. He stops on the top like he’s about to change his mind so I grab his parka and push him over. A second later I hear a soft
whumpf
as he disappears into a drift in a cloud of gray snow. I glance around. There’s no time to do anything about the tracks we made getting up here. They shouldn’t be visible from the other side, so as long as Truck doesn’t take it on himself to cross the interstate he shouldn’t see them. I unsnap my snowshoes, throw my leg over and the next thing I know I’m falling into soft powder.

It takes me a moment to dig myself out, then I find the kid and drag him under the overpass. We scooch behind one of the concrete pillars and wait. A few minutes later four figures appear at the top of the off-ramp on the other side of the highway, right by the
Do Not Enter
sign where I stood and said goodbye to Mags a few hours ago. They stop for a long moment as if in discussion and then the one who might be Truck bends down. He stays like that for a while, like he’s looking for something in the snow. Hicks said Truck was backwoods raised but I don’t care if he was suckled by bluetick coonhounds, there’s no way the tracks we made this morning will still be visible. At last he stands up again and they start down onto the interstate.

We watch them until they disappear around the first bend.

*

A
LL AFTERNOON WE FOLLOW
the soldiers up I-81. Mostly we keep to the median, always making sure there’s a turn in the road between us. On the long straight stretches we have no choice but to wait them out and then hustle to catch up. In the low ground between north- and southbound lanes the snow’s drifted deep and it’s heavy work. The kid’s making a real effort to keep up, but our progress is painfully slow.

The sky darkens; it has a mean look to it now. A churning mass of thunderheads crowds along the western ridge and then moves down into the valley behind us. The wind picks up. It blows off the mountains, driving the snow across the highway, filling in the soldiers’ tracks until only the deeper indentations made by Jax’s snowshoes remain. There’s little shelter from it, even in the gulley.

We pass a succession of exits but Truck shows no sign of quitting the interstate. Just as dusk’s settling we come to a long, straight section that inclines steadily. I break a HOOAH! from one of the MRE cartons and watch as they slowly trudge away from us in the failing light. The kid’s happy for the rest but I’m worried we’ll lose their tracks and stumble into them waiting for us. The drifting snow begins to hide them from me so I climb out onto the road and lay prone in the powder to watch. Just as I think they’re about to disappear over the next crest I see them heading for the off-ramp.

It takes us the best part of an hour to catch up to where they got off. Night’s almost on us and I’m having trouble picking out Jax’s prints now; if I hadn’t seen them take this exit I reckon I’d have walked us on by. Deep inside the clouds lightning shudders and for the first time I hear the low rumble of thunder, still some ways off, but doubtless headed our way. We make our way up to the interchange. A familiar Exxon sits at the top of the off-ramp, its forecourt canopy collapsed onto the pumps under a blanket of snow and I realize this is where Mags and I first got on I-81 almost three weeks ago now. I take us up to the Waffle House where we spent the night. It’s just as we left it, the door still leaning inward on its one remaining hinge. I tell the kid to wait inside, I’ll be back soon. He stares at the busted door but makes no attempt to go in.

‘Where are you going?’

‘To find where the soldiers are sleeping, see if I can’t figure a way to hold them up.’

I spotted a sign for a Holiday Inn as we were leaving the highway. I reckon Truck will have seen it too. There’s a good bet that’s where they’ll be.

‘I want to come with you.’

‘Well you can’t.’

This comes out a little harsher than I intend. But it’s already full dark, the temperature’s dropping and I don’t need to look at the map to know we’ve not made it a dozen miles today. Falling Waters is still the best part of a day’s hike ahead of us, and there’s a storm coming. And on top of that I have to think of something to stop the soldiers from catching up with Mags and Hicks. So right now I don’t have time to spit, much less worry about whether the kid might get lonely if I leave him by himself for twenty minutes.