Randy White - Deceived

I sent the text, waited for the message to clear, then put the truck in gear.

Ahead, mangrove trees leaned in to form a tunnel that sprinkled sunlight on the windshield. The shell road became sand and showed tire tracks coming or going. Both maybe. Definitely fresh.

A UPS truck, I hoped, delivering the wig Loretta had mentioned.

The house where Rosanna Helms’s husband, Dwight, had been born, and where his mother had been born, resembled a tobacco barn on pilings that, for a hundred years, had been jettisoning the junk that now surrounded the place. Oil drums, trailers, crab traps, pieces of Mica’s Harley-Davidson scattered around a hot-water heater, rusting near a satellite dish, and a bicycle frame perched trophylike atop a sheen of glass fishing net-Crystal’s bike, I remembered the pink streamers.

Crystal and I had played in this yard as children. She had been a shy, big-boned girl who enjoyed Barbie dolls, which I’d tolerated out of boredom more than politeness. But she was also game enough to paddle a canoe I’d found in the mangroves, then patched with roofing tar. We had never been close, but childhood is a powerful link, so it felt strange to be here alone, an adult woman sent to check on a playmate’s mother, a mother who had chosen to live amid the wreckage of her own shattered family. I had never liked the feel of this place. I didn’t like being here now.

Like a few other outposts on the coast, the Helms property had prospered when commerce was conducted by water, but the first roads had bypassed it, and better roads had left it as isolated as an island, the acreage not worth much because it was the only high ground in a tract of mangroves now protected by law. Yet the house remained as I remembered, a resolute structure two floors high, wood black as creosote, with four small holes cut for windows and a fifth added for a door.

From the truck, I could see that the front door was open now, hanging lopsided on its hinges-unusual in a place where mosquitoes swarmed.

I considered getting out to check but was reluctant. Instead, I honked the horn to get attention, then honked again, expecting Mrs. Helms to appear in the doorway. She didn’t.

After another minute, I hollered out the window, “Miz Helms? It’s Hannah Smith!”

Overhead, an osprey whistled. A mosquito found my ear, whining the good news, while trees filtered a gust of wind, then clung to the silence that was my answer.

It made no sense. Rosanna Helms’s car was parked beneath the plywood shed-an old Cadillac as swaybacked as a horse but still hinting at the wealth her family had enjoyed during the pot-hauling years. She was a competent driver-better than Loretta, anyway-and had no trouble getting around. Unless the car wouldn’t start, which was possible considering its age and the years of abuse dealt to it by Pay Day Road.

I recalled the fresh tire tracks I’d seen on the way in. Maybe that explained the woman’s absence. Even so, the possibility didn’t excuse me from checking inside the house-but what about the pit bulls I remembered? They hadn’t come running at the sound of my truck, which suggested I had nothing to fear. On the other hand, the dogs could be a hundred yards away, where the shell road dead-ended, enjoying sunlight and water on the commercial-sized dock that had been rotting there since Dwight Helms had died-shot by drug dealers, most believed, even though the murder had never been solved.

No… it was safer, I decided, to try dialing again from my cell and hope the woman answered. At the very least, I would hear her phone ringing through the open door, which would have been a comfort because my mother had used the absence of an answering machine as evidence her friend was in trouble.

Twice I hit Redial before realizing the problem: No service. I moved the phone around, touched it to the windshield, even held it out the window, before finally giving up. No way around it, I had to go inside that house.

Please, God, don’t let Loretta be right about this. That’s what I was thinking when I slid out of the truck and hurried across the yard to the porch. Every step, my eyes were moving, worried about those dogs. When I got to the door, I had something new to worry about. The door was leaning on its hinges because someone had used a crowbar to shear the doorknob off, then rip the dead bolt free of the framing.

No… not a crowbar, I saw when I looked closer. The door, which was plain but solid, had been split down the middle by a single blow, only weather stripping joining the two pieces.

An axe, I thought. A strong man with an axe did this.

I took a step back. Where was the man now? Where was the axe?

“Miz Helms! Pinky! Are you there?” I had never used the woman’s nickname before and embraced the absurd hope it would shock her into responding. It did not.

The house was as dark inside as it was outside, just as I remembered. Through the open doorway, in the shadows of the living room, I could see a mix of antique furniture and modern appliances, a wide-screen TV that was on but muted. A game show, one of my mother’s favorites, same with her bingo partners. A topic they squabbled about on the phone.

Eyes scanning the trees to my left, to my right, I backed to the porch railing and checked my cell. Still no service-but why was the Helmses’ satellite dish working?

Does it matter?

No, it did not. My brain was avoiding the real question, which was: Should I bolt for the truck and get help or go inside the house to see if Mrs. Helms was hurt?

What if it was Loretta in there? my conscience argued. Your own mother injured, maybe dying? Then it asked a more painful question: What if it was you thirty years from now? A helpless widow unable to cry out!

My pounding heart urged Run! Get out of here now! but I couldn’t do that. Why is the most difficult choice almost always the right choice in a tough situation? The good and decent person in me ignored a final reproach- You have only yourself to blame!- then took charge of the situation. I had to find a weapon. Something I could swing or throw to fend off a strong man carrying an axe.

Propped against the porch steps was a shovel I hadn’t noticed until now. It seemed a handy discovery until I hefted it and saw that the blade was soiled with dog feces. Which caused me to notice other unseen details in the yard: a bucket nearly empty of water; a galvanized chain clipped to a tree where the earth had been trotted into a circle; a second tree and another chain where there were mounds of dog spore fresh enough to draw bluebottle flies. Midway between the two dog runs was a cushion that had been shredded and a bone the size of a steer’s leg that had been gnawed in two.

My hands began to shake. I held the shovel tighter to steady them, then cleaned the blade by jamming it in the sand. Pit bulls. Mrs. Helms still owned pit bulls. She had lost her husband, Dwight, to drug dealers, and her children to drug dealing, but the progeny of the family’s dogs had survived it all.

Where were they?

Not in the house. I was certain of that-they would have charged me by now. Suddenly, the house seemed a safer choice than standing alone on the porch.

I slipped past the door and went inside.

MRS. HELMSused snuff, Peach Blend, which wasn’t uncommon for women her age. “Rubbing snuff,” Loretta calls the practice, and believes it relieves menstrual cramps and gives energy, which is why the odor was familiar when I entered the living room. But why so strong?