“They're over yonder, ignor'nt.” It was the voice of Donny Deveroe, I was certain.
“Boys?” I called out. “Is that the Deveroes?”
“What the hell are you doing?” Andrews rasped at me. Stage whisper.
“Who is it?” another voice shouted.
“Is that Dover?” I yelled back. “Stop shooting at us. It's Fever Devilin.”
There was a flurry of conversation we couldn't make out.
Silence.
“Dr. Devilin?” Donny called innocently. “Is that you?”
“Didn't mean to startle you,” I said, walking their way, light still off. “I wanted to show Andrews the graveyard. You remember my friend Professor Andrews fromâ”
Another shot spattered the clay inches from my right foot.
“Sorry, Dr. Devilin,” Donny said, genuinely apologetic. “We're kind of in the middle of something here and we would rather have our privacy.”
“I understand.” I looked back at Andrews.
He sat up, trying to make out who else was in the grove.
“We heard someone yell for help,” he ventured from the ground.
Another rustle of whispers.
“Dover. He fell in a muskrat hole.”
Silence. Cricket, frog, crow, wind, breathâall kept still.
“Is he all right?” Andrews managed, coming to a stand.
“Oh. Absolutely. Say something, Dover.”
A thin, clear cloud slit the moon, moved on.
“Ow.”
Andrews came to my side.
“We'll go on back to the cemetery, then,” I said. “I was thinking of paying you a visit tomorrow; would that be okay?” I aimed the flashlight in the direction of the voices and switched it on.
Bodies exploded in motion; I counted four before the next shot was fired, wrecking pine straw a foot to our left. Andrews did his best not to jump right.
“Turn off that damn torch!”
I did.
“Sorry,” I told them. “I don't know this part of the mountain very well and it's hard to see.” I handed Andrews the flashlight. “Catching snakes?”
Silence.
“Yes.”
I leaned close to Andrews's ear. “Take the flashlight, shine it toward the cemetery, head back to the truck.”
“What are you doing?” he whispered back harshly.
“I'm going to find out what they're up to. How many did you see?”
“Four.”
“And there are only three Deveroe brothers.”
Before he could object I crouched low, lumbered to a nearby stump, waving him on his way.
He took a second to consider his predicament, then turned away, switched on the light, and moved carefully back over the fence, into the knot of trees that hid my truck.
Satisfied I had waited long enough, I moved, still low, toward the boys. They weren't talking, but they made sufficient fuss cracking twigs, thudding the ground, tossing leaves, grunting. If I hadn't known better, I might have considered they were wrestling swine.
Their noise covered my movements; their activity distracted them. I was able to get within twenty yards, hiding behind the branches of a wild holly.
The moon had difficulty breaking apart the shadows in the grove, but here and there a shaft of silver cut the night and I could make out all three brothers, rifles in hand, surrounding a fourth man. He had a gunnysack over his head pulled to his mouth, where the edge of it had been made into a gag. His clothes were in shambles, torn, rubbed with mud. His hands were tied loosely behind his back. He staggered, trying to get away, muttering through the cloth.
It wasn't until they put the noose around his neck that I realized what they were doing. Dover held one end of a length of heavy twisted hemp and Donny put the other end over their captive's head.
My heart doubled, I took a step past the holly before I could consider the consequences. They didn't see me.
Dover hauled the rope over the lowest limb of an older pine; Donny tightened the knot. All three brothers set their guns against the trunk, grabbed high, and hauled their victim into the air.
“No!” I crashed through the undergrowth, the whipping twigs, bent on tackling the Deveroes.
They were startled, turned my way, but kept hold of the rope.
The man in the air kicked and twisted like a fish on a hook, flailing almost sideways in the air.
“Stop!” I huffed, five feet from them, diving to tackle.
As Dover reached for his rifle there came a thunderous wooden crash like a house falling down. The limb cracked and fell on the boys.
Some unseen part of it managed to catch the side of my skull. The victim, miraculously thrown to one side of the fallen branch, only took a heartbeat to realize what had happened. Adrenaline burst him free from his fetters. He got to his feet, ripped the bag from his head, took a single look around, and shot like a bullet into the night.
When I saw who it was, I wanted to sprint after him, but my legs wouldn't work and my temples were exploding.
“Damn damn damn!” Dover struggled, swatting at the immovable limb, gasping for air.
I touched my head. There was blood, but the cut wasn't deep.
I managed to stand, cracking smaller twigs away.
“Who's hurt?” I croaked.
“
You
don't sound too good, Doc!” Dover sang out, obviously smiling.
“So.” I came to stand beside the branch, looked down at him. “You're not angry with me?”
“Not hardly,” Donny said, straining against the part of the tree that held his leg. “You ain't the one that broke this damn tree.”
“I told you it ain't hold him,” Dover said plainly, looked up at me. “'Sbeen too wet these past days.”
“Well, it's holding you down right good.”
The third brother was silent, unconscious.
I couldn't figure why they were being so cordial to me when I'd just
foiled their hanging and let the quarry escape. It was stranger than the rest of the event, but I was grateful for whatever angel watched over me, and set to the matter at hand.
“I'll see what I can do about the branch,” I told them. I prepared. “I'm going to push it back, if I can. If I make things worse, like it starts rolling over you, sing out. Right?”
I leaned my back against the branch, dug my heels in, took a deep breath, got my palms underneath the thickest part. Arching my back, I strained my legs. The wood creaked, moved. Donny and Dover pressed the branch away from them hard, gasping. The limb rolled away enough for them to drag themselves out, retrieve the third silent family member.
“Is he hurt?” I said, moving slowly out of the way, making certain the limb wasn't coming back my way. “He's unconscious.”
He moaned, opened his eyes, blinked, belched, grinned.
Clearly the boys had been drinking more than copiously.
“What did you think you were doing?” I had to ask, breathing hard, leaning against the fallen pine.
“We wasn't gonna kill him or nothing, if that's what you're thinking,” Donny said slowly. “But we surely did scare him a good sight.”
“Shut up,” Dover said, swatting at his brother. “We were only messing around.” He stared up at me. “Did you see who it was?”
“Did you see where he went?” the one on the ground said, rallying.
“I wouldn't tell you where he went,” I assured them calmly, “and he had a bag over his head. Honestly, what's the matter with you boys?”
“I miss Truvy,” the one on the ground said softy. “That's what's a matter with me anyway.”
His sentiment silenced his brothers.
Moonlight brushed away a small portion of darkness in the grove; crickets took up their communion once more; night resumed. I peered into the woods where the hanged man had run, but he was long gone, no movement there at all.
“Lucky you was here, Doc,” Donny said finally, reaching out his hand. “No telling how long we'd a had to lay out under this here tree.”
I helped him up.
“I'm glad you see it that way.” I couldn't help a quick glance at their rifles.
Dover noticed. “You know you'd already be gone if I'd a wanted you dead.”
I knew. They were perfect shots; the night was clear; I was a big target.
“I'm still coming to visit tomorrow, if that's all right.”
They looked at one another.
“Problem?” I folded my arms, legs apart.
“It's just that since Truvy's gone,” Donny said, eyes to the ground, “the place is kind of a mess.”
“It's a train wreck is what,” Dover agreed.
“I don't care about that,” I started.
“Maybe not,” Donny interrupted, “but Tru, she'd be mortified for you to see her house in such a state. Could we meet out on the road?”
“Or we could come to your house,” the nameless brother offered.
“Hush!” Dover commanded.
“How about ten tomorrow morning?” I relaxed. “I'll pull up and honk the horn.”
“Good enough,” Dover said quickly.
An owl called, an arrow sound through the air.
All four of us jumped.
“I'm going back to the cemetery now,” I said. “Andrews is in my truck drinking apple brandy and I'm afraid he might try to drive.”
“You don't want that,” Donny said, retrieving his rifle. “When you have a lot to drink, it's better to walk.”
“Good night, then.” I turned without another word, my back to three armed men. I heard the shuffling boots, clacking barrels, sniffing.
As their sounds receded behind me, I let out a breath, realized my fingers were shaking. The image of the dangling man, barely real, batted inside my head.
Up toward the path, moonlight spilled an abundance over the open field. Moths and night birds zagged the air; a rabbit, roused by our noise, was looping around white rocks by the fence.
Aching a little from the strain of moving the tree, I held the top
wire down and managed to step over the fence. I stood a moment, calming. The tombstones seemed cleaner in moonbeams than in flashlight. I stared at the oldest, the war hero's grave. Part of the engraving was covered over by dead honeysuckle; I pulled the vines aside.
Cursed be him that moves my bones.
I knew Andrews would be amused to hear that a phrase written on Shakespeare's tombstone was to be found in our graveyard as well.
A short drift of autumn breeze lifted my hair; a spiderweb fluttered in the brambles that topped the stone. Woven into the new edge of the web were three frayed strands of artificial thread from a cloth or a dress, the color of roses. I pulled one; the web shuddered but held, collapsed when I removed all three.
I pocketed the thread, took a last look about. The Deveroes were gone, as far as I could tell. The night had closed around the place where they'd tried to hang a man. The rest was fall: crisp breeze, flurry of brown leaves, white beams brushed across a dying landscape.
Once, walking the last few hundred yards back to the truck, I saw a figure move out of the corner of my eye, but when I turned, it was a billowing pine bough, beyond it the Angel of Death.
Andrews had locked the truck from the inside and it took a little doing to get him to open my door.
“God, if you had been one minute longer,” he said waving his empty bottle in my face, “I swear I'd have started this truck and gone home without you.”
“I told them I was afraid you might,” I said, sliding in behind the wheel.
I told him what had happened; he listened with growing attention, widening eyes. It had all gone so quickly. I realized as I was talking how stunned I was. The retelling of the events assumed a dreamlike vapor in my mind.
“I don't know where to begin,” he said, slumping at the end of my
report. “They weren't angry with you for breaking up their lynching. They were grateful to you for taking the tree limb off, which I'm not sure why you did. And you let them go to catch the poor man again? Do we go to Skid's house or call him or what?”
“I thought you said there was a Raymond Chandler on television tonight.” I started the truck.
“Are you out of your mind? We have to find the man they were trying to hang. We have to call the police!”
“Look.” The truck's headlights blasted the way in front of us. “The boys aren't quite as stupid as they seem. They know I saw what they were doing tonight, so they know better than to go on with the plan now. They realize I'll tell Skidmore what I saw. If anyone ends up hanging from a tree, they'll be the only suspects. Also, they didn't want me to come in their house tomorrow. It could be they're actually embarrassed about the state of the place, or it could be they're hiding something. I don't want the police up there messing with things before I get a look.” I pressed the accelerator. “I haven't told you the worst of it, the main thing.”