Randy White - Haunted

“Maybe it’s because of what happened to Lucia.”

I unclipped the fuel line from the engine and squeezed the rubber bulb until pressure built. “It was an ugly thing to see, Belton. Let’s not talk about it.”

“I met her and her friends my first night here. There was something nasty about those three. Or sinister. I’m not sure how to describe it. Mean , I guess.” The boat skated ahead, the oarlocks creaked, while frogs and night birds trilled. “Hannah… if you killed Lucia, I’m sure you had no choice. We were kidnapped. The police will understand that.”

“The chimp got his hands on her,” I said. “It was… awful. He’ll kill us, too, if we don’t get away from here.”

“You don’t think that… thing is smart enough to come after us? He picked me up like I was nothing, could’ve ripped my arms off. I don’t know why he didn’t. Theo and Carmelo are bad enough.”

“The chimp knows what I look like, knows my scent, too. I cut him pretty badly with a razor-”

“Good!”

“And I tricked him into grabbing a coral snake.”

“A snake? Outstanding. Then he’s dead by now.”

“I’m not sure he was bitten. Even if he was, it’s a slow poison. What I’m telling you is, Oliver the chimp has got his reasons to attack me. You should know that in advance.”

“As if I’d leave you. He’s just a damn animal. Short attention span and all that. No… Carmelo’s the one we need to worry about.”

“The girl Oliver killed, Krissie, she wouldn’t agree.”

Belton murmured, “Ah yes… poor little thing,” then went silent and concentrated on the oars while I knelt in the boat’s stern. It was possible the carburetor was flooded. I pulled the rope starter several times, then reconnected the fuel hose. In the microsilence that followed came the baffled roar from far downriver of an outboard motor starting.

Belton continued to row but now harder. “That’s Carmelo’s Bass Cat. He’ll come here first, thinking we’re on foot.” He started to say something else but then jerked around in his seat. “What the hell was that?” Oars out of the water, the man stared at the nearby shore.

“Did you see something?”

“You didn’t hear it? Branches breaking, something high up in the trees, I could’ve sworn.”

I crouched to get the pistol while my eyes searched, seeing stars above the river’s gloom. The tree canopy was a ridge of gray that pulsated in the wind. “How far?”

“Just over there. But now… I don’t know. Maybe I imagined it.”

I said, “Cross your fingers and pray this works.” I leaned over the motor and yanked the rope. After two failures, I opened the choke and tried again. Finally the engine caught, belched smoke, and fired to life. I slammed the choke closed and sat with the tiller in my left hand. “Get those oars in and move forward. Let’s see if I can get this thing on plane.”

Belton did it, but his eyes remained focused on trees that lined the shore, a silver tunnel of oak and moss that followed us as we snaked upriver in a boat that wasn’t fast and plowed a wake.

Carmelo was following us. I could feel the rumble of his engine through our hull despite the smoke and clatter of the little outboard. Nothing to see behind us, though, because we had rounded several bends, and another sharp turn lay ahead. I said, “He’s following our motor slick.”

“Our what?”

I motioned toward a trail of froth left by the outboard’s exhaust. “He knows there’s a boat ahead of him.”

“But he can’t be sure it’s us. It could be anybody-unless Tyrone set us up.”

“Tyrone wouldn’t do that,” I said, which came out sharper than intended. “We can’t outrun him, we have to find a place to hide. Do you recognize this part of the river? We need a spot too shallow or too narrow for him to follow.”

Belton sat facing me, looking aft, still fixated on the branches he’d heard breaking ten minutes before. “A spotlight. Carmelo just turned on a spotlight.”

I glanced back to see a smoky beam ricochet off the clouds. “That’s good. The moon’s bright enough, he’d only use a light to search for us onshore. That means he’s not sure we’re in a boat. If he was sure, he’d be on us by now. Top end, that Bass Cat probably does sixty.”

Belton said, “Then I was right,” and allowed his eyes to explore ahead. “We never got more than a few miles north of the RV park. It gets narrow fast and Carmelo was worried about damaging his propeller. There was a little spot I wanted to see. I suggested we use his trolling motors, but he wouldn’t give in. This was two days ago.” He swung his legs around to face forward. “I remember a place where the river forks. Oh, and a couple of feeder creeks where Carmelo said the bass fishing was particularly good.” His head swiveled like slow radar. “I don’t know… it all looks so different at night.”

I pivoted the tiller without slowing for the next turn and followed the concave bank. The current wasn’t strong enough to abrade snags that lay beneath the surface, but shoals and sunken limbs were easy to spot because the moon was bright behind low sailing clouds. Around the next bend, trees funneled closer, a section of river so narrow it would be difficult for Carmelo to spin his twenty-foot Bass Cat around without coming to a stop. I asked, “Does this look familiar?”

“It’s hard to see anything until we’re past it. I wish we had a light.”

“In my bag there’s a flashlight, but I don’t want to use it unless we have to.” I craned my head forward. “There… to your left… does that look like an opening to a creek?”

It was, but I plowed past because there was another opening ahead and to our right-a pool of shadows like the mouth of a cave where low trees sealed the entrance. I slowed the boat and idled into the bushes after telling Belton, “Duck your head, then get the oars ready. Unless you want me to row.”

“You’re kidding. We’d need a machete to cut our way in here.” He was fighting off leaves and spiderwebs.

I killed the engine, stood, and snapped a few limbs, letting them hang. As I did, the rumble of Carmelo’s boat moved closer, no spotlight showing now. “Okay… help me push us back into the river. Once we’re clear, I’ll row. “

“Row where?”

I waited until I had the boat moving, skating across the surface like a water spider. “He’ll follow our motor slick and think we somehow disappeared into that cut. Or even get out to explore on foot. That’ll give us time to find a hiding spot in the creek we just passed.”

“Smart girl.” Belton nodded, but then reconsidered. “I don’t know… We’ll be on the same side of the river as the serpentarium. Maybe we should keep going.”

“There’s no time,” I said. “Open my bag. There’s mosquito netting in there and spray. We’ll need it.”

Belton replied, “I still think the other side of the river is safer.”

It wasn’t snakes he was worried about.

CARMELO AND THEO were in the Bass Cat, close enough to hear their voices but impossible to see because we were twenty yards up a feeder creek, hidden under moss and limbs, when they stopped and used the spotlight.

Theo’s voice: “Boats don’t just disappear. See the broken branches?”

Carmelo: “Get that damn light out of my eyes. More likely, they went to the road and hitchhiked. Probably already talked to the cops. Fat old man, should’a broke his neck and taken all them maps and files. How you think he knows so much?”