Moon Underfoot (43 page)

“I wish I could, babe,” he said out loud and then smiled.

He read the rest of his messages.

5:35: “Where are you?”

6:01: “Did you go hunting?”

6:20: “Jake I’m worried Call me.”

6:33: “Richard Pharr at ur office said u never came back from lunch Where r u?”

6:51: “I called the police Please call or text!!”

7:02: “Jake I love u! Call me”

7:07: “Dad when r u coming home ☺”

Jake choked up. His missed his family. The more texts he read, the more upset he became. The water falling over him was relentless. He couldn’t imagine that waterboarding was worse than what he was experiencing. He would confess to anything to get out of this pipe. Jake did his best to wipe the moisture from the phone, and with great effort, he placed it into his right pocket. He felt it hit something and remembered the flashlight. As Jake pushed himself against the left side of the pipe, intense, fiery pain shot from his left leg, almost making him black out.
What the hell happened? Somethin’ ain’t right
, he thought as he struggled to catch his breath.

Careful not to apply pressure on his left leg, he reached slowly down into his pocket for the flashlight. His mind was working faster than his muscles, and he assumed that was caused by all the electrical jolts. He was shaking from the cold and the pain, but the flashlight in his hands was comforting…until he clicked it on and could now clearly see that he was in a death trap.

The steady flow of cold swamp water was growing stronger. Vapor from his heaving breathing filled the pipe. The outside temperature was in the low forties. That and the cold water were taking their toll on Jake’s body. He considered that hypothermia might kill him before drowning did.

Jake knew that he had to get the water flowing out of the pipe so the rising level didn’t overtake him. His right leg would barely move but it didn’t hurt like his left. He tried to push down with his legs to clear some of the mud and limbs, but it was no use. At least the water backing up was beginning to numb the pain in his legs. He tried to see his left leg with the flashlight, but the beam couldn’t penetrate the muddy water. He noticed that every movement he made stirred more silt, so he remained still to let the dirt settle enough so he could see.

Standing motionless and looking up, Jake tried not to think that this would be how and where he died, never to be found.
Moon Pie—that son of a bitch—is gonna win.
Jake shook his head, trying to clear his mind, but he was beginning to feel claustrophobic.

The water in the bottom of the pipe had cleared somewhat. With his left hand, Jake lowered the flashlight, shining it down into the water. He could see his blood flowing like spilled red ink. Apparently a bark-skinned stick had impaled his leg. Jake looked up, took a deep breath, exhaled, and contemplated trying to pull it out. He looked down, shined the light again to get a better
assessment and then realized that it was not a limb sticking into his leg but his exposed bone protruding through his pants.

Jake’s head fell forward, hitting the pipe with a thud, as everything went dark.

S
HAKING HIS HEAD
, Moon Pie was having difficulty focusing his eyes as he drove. Blurred vision and bouts of confusion were making the drive out of the dark woods even extremely difficult. Grimacing in pain, he touched his side and saw that his hand was covered in blood. He knew that he needed to get to the ER, but being gunshot was going to necessitate police involvement, and that would be a problem he didn’t know how to solve. He sped up, grabbed his cell phone, and tried to remember Levi’s number, but his mind went blank. As he began searching his cell phone’s address book, he glanced up to see that he was running off the side of the old dirt road. His instinctive reaction was to punch the gas. The truck dug down in the mud and slung rooster tails. The limbs from an oak tree scratched down the side of Jake’s truck, causing Moon Pie to laugh deliriously, missing the turn that led to the highway.

After another mile, the river cane became more prevalent, and Moon Pie realized that he had missed his turn. He was now closer to the river and deeper into the swamp. The road had become muddier, and Moon Pie was in danger of getting stuck. He stopped on a dry spot and turned on the windshield wipers, smearing mud. “Son of a bitch!”

Moon Pie looked around inside the truck for something to wipe the windshield. The only thing he found was Jake’s corduroy sport coat. He smiled at that and enjoyed the thought of Jake struggling inside the muddy drainpipe, waiting to die.

While Moon Pie was wiping the mud-spattered windshield, his knees buckled, and he barely caught himself before hitting the ground.
Shit! I gotta get the hell outta here!

He climbed back into the truck and looked for a place to turn around but didn’t find one. Beginning to panic, Moon Pie reversed the truck, plowing through bushes and small trees. He dropped the gearshift into drive and stood on the accelerator, causing the truck to fishtail out of the muddy ditch.

As he raced down the muddy road, he tried to think of something to tell the hospital that wouldn’t raise too many suspicions. He knew that going to the hospital was a huge risk, but he couldn’t think of an alternative. He was about to bleed out, and he knew it. He drove faster, screaming, cussing, and pounding the steering wheel. This was not how he wanted to die…or get caught.

T
HE COUNTY GAME
warden was patrolling the back roads that night, looking for spotlighters. He had received a tip that some Louisiana boys, staying near Columbus, planned to poach wherever they could jump a fence or find a clean stretch of road. The warden was by himself, as usual. His wife had reminded him for the millionth time to be careful. Everyone he ran across, particularly at night, was armed and potentially involved in some illegal activity. As he drove, he monitored the various law enforcement agencies’ frequencies, in case he needed to help. His friendship with one of the locally stationed Mississippi troopers had really been helpful in covering his own back and backyard and was much appreciated. As a game warden, he encountered all sorts of riffraff these days, especially with meth labs popping up in old barns and outbuildings everywhere. Plus, the newest “shake and bake” method of manufacturing methamphetamine in a two-liter plastic bottle was a constant physical and psychological drain, since any seemingly benign situation could turn deadly in a breath.

He had listened to all of the radio reports regarding Jake Crosby’s disappearance. He had first met Jake at a National Wild Turkey Federation banquet a few years back and had since
checked him on a few dove shoots. Jake was a good guy, always polite and always legal. He wrote down the description and tag of Jake’s pickup, just in case.

When his cell phone rang, he checked the caller ID and saw that it was the general from the Columbus Air Force Base. This guy was the most rabid duck hunter he had ever known. He’d lived on base for longer than the warden could remember, and the general considered the public hunting areas along the river to be his personal domain. During duck season, the general had his pilots buzz certain areas for daily duck reports. The warden was happy to answer the call.

“Hello, General.”

“Hey there, Warden. Sorry to be callin’ so late.”

“Not a problem. What can I do for ya?”

“At nineteen hundred I was bein’ flown back from a meeting. Our approach was low due to the ceilin’. At any rate, I clearly saw a truck with its lights on inside the Buttahatchee area.”

The warden knew that no vehicles should be inside those locked gates. It was strictly a walk-in area. He also knew that the general was extremely concerned that poachers were wreaking havoc all over the area.

“Are you sure the lights were on the inside of the gates? I mean…it’s dark and y’all woulda been flying pretty fast.”

“Hell yes, they were inside. You know that pond that I call the Honey Hole, where I always kill so many pintails? That’s where the vehicle was. It wasn’t a four-wheeler either. The lights were too far apart and too bright. It was parked on the levee, pointing out on the water.”

“It coulda been some Corps of Engineer boys workin’ late.”

“No way. It was a civilian’s truck,” the general replied bluntly.

“Okay, I’ll check it out.”

“Duck season’s close, and I bet it was somebody baitin’ my hole.”

The warden smiled. They were picking right up where they had left off last January.

“You know that I don’t see much baitin’ on public areas, sir.”

“They’re tryin’ to set me up.”

The warden smiled, knowing that the general worried more about ducks than anything else. “I tell you what, I’ll call a Corps buddy of mine and find out if they are workin’ around there, and if not, I’ll drive by and take a look.”

“Please let me know what you find out.”

The warden was amazed at how clearly the general could see at night while riding in a Lear.
Good military training
, he thought.

“Will do, General.”

W
HEN JAKE REGAINED
consciousness, he couldn’t feel his broken leg and he was shivering uncontrollably. The water inside the tube was now around his waist. He desperately tried kicking with his right leg, to force mud and debris down the pipe, and then, realizing that his body was also blocking the flow of water, he strained to wiggle and twist. Jake fought through the pain, knowing that his life depended on it. For the moment, the water level appeared to recede.

Jake quit moving when he realized that he wasn’t holding the flashlight. He had dropped it when he passed out. Rocking back and forth as he squatted into the water, he was able to reach the light, but doing so was costly.

He was completely soaked and knew that his core body temperature would be dropping like a stone. The higher cost, however, was that all his movements jarred the pipe, causing mud from the beaver dam to loosen and erode, allowing more water to rush into the pipe. The greater the water flow into the pipe, the farther down it sucked Jake. It was a vicious and rapidly escalating circle.

“Shit! I gotta fight this. I gotta figure a way out for my girls,” he said aloud.

Jake looked up and shined the light out of the pipe into the misty fog and in desperation screamed, “Help me! Can anybody hear me! Help!”

Jake Crosby was exhausted and growing drowsy from the onset of hypothermia and, unbeknownst to him, blood being forced into his legs by the suction of the current. He’d been defeated, and the realization was settling in. He leaned his head back against the pipe and slowly closed his eyes in silent prayer.