Christopher Buehlman - Those Across the River

He said this mostly to his father, but his father didn’t answer.

Buster moved towards it, and it moved back. Coy like a little girl. The familiarity of the game raised the hairs on the back of my neck.

The whole party edged forward to catch up with Buster.

When Buster moved forward again, it retreated, keeping its distance exactly.

Calmly.

“Shoot that thing,” Arthur Noble said.

Buster said, “We won’t hurt you. It’s them we want.”

“Didn’t you hear Mr. Nichols? It is one of them. Shoot it!”

“No, Arthur. Not no kid.”

It was at that moment that Delilah yanked her leash out of Lester’s hand, startling him so that the other dogs got free, too.

“Hey!” Lester shouted after them, but it was too late. The three dogs charged hard at the boy. It ran farther into the woods. The dogs ran after it. We began to trot now, too, much slower than the dogs or what they were chasing. Just before the thing in the red dress fell completely out of sight, the dogs caught up with it and dropped it to the ground. I assumed from the thrashing in the ferns and leaves that the dogs were tearing the boy apart.

Then one of the dogs made a sound between a yelp and a scream and ran back towards us. The thing in the red dress was up now and running, far away in the trees.

I could see that it was chasing the other dogs .

Away from the party.

They vanished from sight.

The remaining dog was running towards us, trailing its leash behind it and shivering and crying pathetically. While the rest of us just stared, Lester went to the dog.

“Mustard?” he said, though how he recognized it I did not know.

The dog’s face was covered with blood, its own blood. Its nose had been bitten off, and one eye was out. It sat on its haunches and scooted away from Lester, trying to wag its tail and crying, bobbing its ruined head. Lester knelt to the dog and moved his hands around impotently, wanting to help it but afraid to touch it, just saying “Goodmustardgoodmustardgoodmustard” in a hopeless paternoster.

“Do it, boy,” the elder Gordeau said.

But Lester knelt there, wringing his hands.

So Old Man Gordeau shot the dog.

“Just let me see that goddamned thing again,” Saul said, whiteknuckling his rifle. “Just let me see it.”

He would get his wish.

WE TRUDGED FORWARD, following the tracks of the boy and dogs as best we could. Blood showed on the lighter leaves near the boy’s bare footprint, but soon gave out. Odd drops of blood had fallen here and there, and Lester would have other men stand at them, then rotate forward so the line of travel could be established.

Soon they came to a dip in the land with pooled blood and more torn and stamped-down grass and fallen leaves, and then the dog’s tracks stopped altogether.

Lester found other human tracks, larger ones, in a patch of bare soil and on lichen-covered rock nearby.

He groaned and tears formed at his eyes as he scouted the scene.

“Them dogs is dead,” he said, “and someone come up and took em. They went off that way, but the boy kept on ahead. Which do we follow?”

“That damn boy,” Saul said.

Buster nodded, and we kept on.

WE KEPT ON much too late.

The first stone hit just after dusk.

The sky was smoky purple above the canopy of trees, and then the canopy gave out as the posse entered a small clearing. The waxing moon was trying to shine behind thin clouds. I suspected Lester was wondering whether to tell everyone that he had lost the trail, and he pulled out a plug of tobacco, stirring his finger around in it to get the last crumbs.

He was putting the pinch in his cheek when he saw something flash just in front of his nose, making him start and inhale.

The stone caught Charley Wade hard and he went “Ah!” and bent over double, cupping his free hand over his ear and holding his revolver awkwardly in front of him. Lester spasmed and coughed while the rest of us crouched and shouted and pointed our guns in all directions. Still coughing, Lester pointed his rifle from the hip and shot blind into the trees.

Another stone bounced off my shoulder and then Buster ducked a third one that hit the doctor square in the teeth. He jerked and shot his .32 at the trees even though his shot wasn’t clear. Buster shouted God-DAMNIT while more stones fell and more men shot.

Saul broke right and scampered towards cover; I went with him, as did Buster and most of the rest. Arthur Noble ran off left, followed by Lawton Butler, who held on to the back of Arthur’s overalls.

Saul got small behind a tree and sighted down his rifle, waiting. I crouched behind him, then realized Charley was still bent over in the clearing, getting hit again, saying “Ah!” I ran out and grabbed Charley’s hand, catching a rock that felt like it might have broken my collarbone, and I yanked Charley back into the trees. Charley lurched and fell, slinging his gun into the trees and out of sight. The doctor covered his head ineffectively with his hands and ran for the gun, but a stone hit him so hard in the cheek he turned right back around and took cover again.

He shot his own gun dry and I shot once at what turned out to be a dead tree.

Yelling and shooting off left.

Panic.

Buster said, “Red dress!” and shot, then slipped and fell against me. A stone had grazed his head.

Buster’s hand on my white shirt left a bloody print.

Lester, still coughing, was about to shoot another bullet, but his daddy grabbed the barrel and pointed it down, saying, “Stop shootin til you can see somethin.”

I saw one, a Negro woman with wild hair, and I shot twice at her before she ducked behind a tree. Her stone just missed Saul’s head, and Saul turned his rifle towards where it had come from. When she broke cover, she ran so fast I barely saw her. Saul’s shot rang my better ear, and the woman fell.

Everything got quiet after that.

I put my gun away.

“Goddamnit,” Buster said again.

No more stones came.

The woods seemed to exhale.

Lawton Butler stumbled across the clearing, holding his head. Bleeding. “Arthur’s dead,” he said quietly.

Then he said it again.

DR. MCELROY WIPED his hands on his pants.

“I’ve seen cancer as big as a catcher’s mitt. I’ve seen a woman with a fishhook in her eye. But I never thought I’d live to see a man stoned to death.”

“Like in the Good Book,” Lester said.

“Sometimes I wonder how good a book can be that’s full of such as this.”

Arthur Noble lay where he had been trying to cover his head. He had run out of bullets just before Lawton had been hit hard enough to lose consciousness. The pile of stones lay all around him.

“When I come to, it was all over,” Lawton said. “I ain’t made for this. I’m sorry.”

But the doctor was still staring at Arthur, who might have looked like he was about to sing, except that his jaw was wrong.

Buster said, “Doc McElroy.”

He looked at Buster now where Buster was holding a handkerchief to his side, just above his belt.

“I did that,” the doctor said.

“No hard feelins. Just tell me if it’s bad.”

“Don’t take this the wrong way, but it just hit fat.”

Buster smiled a little at that.

“Put whiskey to it if you got some. When we get back, I’ll go in looking for shirt.”

“You should put something on that face, too. You’re a mess.”

Dr. McElroy pulled out his brass cigarette case and squinted at it, but it was too dark to see his reflection now.

“When we get home,” he said. “If we get home.”

SAUL HAD STAYED watching where he’d shot the woman, worried, perhaps, that she might get up again or that one of them might come back for her. Now Buster said, “Let’s have a look,” and we all went forward.