Journal (24 page)

About
Petra now, she was a real trooper.  She never complained or made it difficult
for me to keep up with these people.  She was quiet, too, seldom saying anything
above a whisper.  I think maybe she’s lived this sort of life so long that
being quiet was as natural to her as walking.

Late
in the afternoon, we got our first chance to get past Nora and her partner.  (Tell
you what; I’m going to have to come up with a name to call the man with Nora,
so I don’t have to keep writing man, partner, companion, etc.  So how about High-Top? 
You know, for the shoes he was wearing, the high-top tennis shoes.  It’s just
going to make it easier to write this out, and easier for anyone who may read
this to keep track of who was doing what.)  Anyway, regarding our chance to get
past them, we had pretty much been stuck with following behind because, as I’ve
said, the only way to conceal our presence was to keep the ridgelines of the
hills between us.  Well, at the point I’m describing here, we encountered a
fairly well forested area and were able to move through it unobserved.  At the
time, I figured this, in turn, would allow us the chance to warn the people
Nora and High-Top were intent on killing.

Since
I didn’t really know where the people being tracked were, I figured that the
best thing I could do was to try to get ahead of them, find a safe place to
hide, and wait for them to come into view.  From that position, I’d first find
out if “they” and “them” meant Gabriel and Anna.  If not, I’d decide if I
wanted to chance a warning and, if so, how to do it.  At least that was my
plan.

So
that’s what we did or started out to do anyway.  I took Petra by her little
hand and moved as fast as I could south and parallel to the road below.  We did
this for about ten or fifteen minutes before I stopped at the edge of the trees
in a spot where I had a good view of about fifty yards of the road.

After
five minutes of waiting and not seeing them, I began to think we hadn’t gone
far enough and they were still south of us.  I decided to give it another
minute or so and, if they still hadn’t shown up, we’d move farther along and
try it again.  But all of a sudden I heard big booms, three of them in a row, a
shotgun, no mistake about that, and other shots, too.  The sounds were close by
and to our north.  My stomach twisted into a knot.  “Please don’t be them,” I
whispered to myself.  “Please, let it be someone else.”  I immediately
regretted saying such things out loud and looked to see if Petra had heard me. 
She was staring at me, eyes wide.  I swore — this time to myself.

After
re-reading the words I’ve just written, – those expressing my hope that it was
someone else being killed instead of Anna and Gabriel – it strikes me that they
are a terrible, terrible thing to say.  I mean who would wish for one person to
be dead so another would be alive?  How about wishing nobody dead?  Also, if
it’s not Anna and Gabriel out there taking a load of buckshot, that would bring
us all the way back around to the probability that they’re dead anyway; drowned
in the river.  What’s the point to make here?  I don’t think I even know.  Maybe
I’m just a little shocked at how my mind works sometimes.  I never used to
think this way.  Enough!  I’m just wasting time and paper.  Let’s move on.

We
started back toward the sounds of the gunfise people want you so bad?”

I
hadn’t even gone twenty yards when there were still more gunshots; a dozen
maybe.  They were a mixture, too, some shotgun and some something else.  A
bullet cracked and hit a tree somewhere to my right.  I didn’t think it was
close to me, but that didn’t mean the next one wouldn’t be.  I looked back at
Petra to make sure she was all right but couldn’t see her.  The trees blocked
my view.  As much as I wanted to see what was happening, who died, who lived, I
knew I had to go back to her.  I figured there was nothing I could do to change
what was happening or had happened down below, but I could protect Petra, so I ran back.

I’m
not sure if it was a conscious act on her part or she was just scared and
hiding, but I found her sitting with her back to a tree, arms wrapped around
her knees, exposing as little as possible to the direction of gun fire.  And that’s
where I stayed, also.  It seemed as safe a place as any until I could come up
with a better plan.

Five,
six, seven minutes went by, I don’t know, maybe it just seemed that long but
was less, and I heard a noise like someone was coming our way.  I stood up and
stepped around the tree to see if I could locate the source of the commotion
and came face to face with Nora.  She was standing about ten feet from me,
breathing hard with her lips pulled back and down almost into a snarl.  In her
right hand she held a large knife.

Before
she could take a step toward me, I pulled the empty pistol from my belt, quick
like, and pointed it at her.  Because it was a revolver, and she might at that
distance be able to see that it didn’t contain any live bullets, I pointed it
slightly down, more like in the area of her knees than her chest.  It must have
looked deadly enough because it definitely got her attention.  She stopped dead
still, staring but not with anything that can be described as fear on her face. 
Tough as shoe leather, that woman.

I
told her to just keep right on going, that whatever she was involved in had
nothing to do with me.  And of course I told her what I’d do, which I couldn’t
really do, if she had other ideas.  I should point out here, by way of
reminder, that she never saw me back at the farmhouse when Anna and Gabriel
escaped.  So as far as I knew, to her I was just some guy wandering around and
trying to stay out of trouble.

Why
that course of action?  Well, obviously empty pistols don’t kill, so couldn’t
do that …as much as I might like to.  I couldn’t bluff her into giving up, either,
because then what.  What would I do with her or to her?  Well, okay, I guess I
could have stabbed her to death.  But I can’t imagine what Petra would think
about that, killing a woman in such a bloody fashion, right in front of her.  It
would be loud and messy, to say the least.  Also, she was big, at least my
weight, and mean, meaner than me probably, so to try to stab her to death could
be quite the fight, which could also mean an injury to me.  So, chasing her off
;
panose-1:2 4 5 3 5 4 6 3 2 4tifseemed like the only choice at the time.

She
looked at me for a couple of seconds, and I could almost hear the wheels
turning inside that twisted brain of hers.  She must have made up her mind because
she sidestepped a couple of times, kind of circling around a little, and
started backing away north.  After she had taken a half a dozen steps backwards,
I lowered my pistol, pointing it at the ground.  After a dozen more, I put the
pistol back in my belt to make her feel more confident that her decision was
the right one, and, at that point, she gave me the middle finger salute and
took off running, weaving through the trees for protection.

Man,
was I mixed up.  I wondered what the heck had happened.  Maybe the hunters had
become the hunted.  Maybe Nora and High-Top, in all their sneaking around, had
snuck themselves right into an ambush; this one on them.  The prospect of that
made me happier than a dog with a soup bone.  But who lived and who died?

There
hadn’t been any shooting for a good ten minutes when Petra and I started, very
cautiously started, walking in the direction of the road.  Every few feet, I
stopped to listen and look until we gained the edge of the forest, maybe thirty
or forty yards from the road.

There
was a body on the ground — man, woman, Anna, Gabriel, I couldn’t tell.  It was
next to a pickup truck with a wood rack on it, surrounded by tall weeds.  The
vegetation and distance prevented me from getting a good, clear view.

It
looked like the truck itself had some holes in it from bullets striking at a
severe angle.  On the ground was a rifle or shotgun, could have been either one
because of the distance and because I could only really see the stock end.  I
sure wanted that weapon.  I needed that weapon.  I was desperate to know who
was lying there, probably dead, even though for some reason I just didn’t think
it was either Anna or Gabriel.  However, instead of going over there, I just
sat and watched for several minutes to make sure it wasn’t a trap.

At
some point, I don’t even remember how long I waited, I told Petra to stay in
the trees while I went down to have a look.  It was dangerous, but I didn’t see
I had much of a choice.

Before
getting there, I saw the shoes and knew right away the man down was High-Top. 
And once I stepped up to him, I could see he was all shot to hell and very,
very dead.  I didn’t waste any time thinking about how he must have hurt at the
end.  He got exactly what he was going to give, and I suppose I was glad for
any pain he suffered.

I
searched him right away and came up with a cartridge belt around his waist that
held nine, 12 gauge shotgun shells plus two more in his coat pocket.  I also
pocketed several empty shell casings on the ground on the off chance I might be
able to later reload them.  I finally grabbed up the shotgun, a pump, and
started back toward the trees feeling more confident about our chance of
survival, even though somewhere out there were the people who killed High-Top and
a lot of other killers, too.

I
walked not more than five steps back to safety when I heard my name called.  It
was Anna, rifle in hand, running toward me. am I doing this because deif

Of
all the lines I’ve so far written, there are none I wish more to fairly
describe my feelings than these, and none that will fail more miserably.  How
do I explain my lifted spirit?  What words give perspective to promise and future? 
Imagine being suddenly blinded and saddled with the prospect of not seeing the
blue of the sky, or the steam rising in the morning off a quiet pond, or the
smile on the face of your lover.  And now imagine your sight given back.  All
that you thought lost, returned, but reordered and better understood without
giving it a moment’s calculation.  That’s how I felt.

We
flung ourselves together, each thought lost to the other, in a crazy
celebration of dance, and song, and cheer, and kisses.  We circled around,
pressed tight, our knees bumping, our hands and arms trying to get a hold,
despite the baggage we shouldered, our lips mashed, our faces christened with
eager, shameless tears.  Never again apart, I promised.

All
this hugging and kissing and promising were interrupted when Petra threw
herself onto Anna crying.  Anna pulled away from me at that point, trailed her
free hand down my chest, handed me her rifle with the other, and kneeled down so
she could wrap Petra in her arms.  At that, all three of us were bawling like
the family of the bride at an Italian wedding.

It
strikes me now that this is how people should be — happy and loving one another,
not hating and killing one another.  If we could only just remember moments
like this, maybe things would be different.

But
this celebration came to an end, too.  It came to an end when another gunshot
was heard north of us.

She
told me it was probably Gabriel shooting my rifle.  Ah man, so caught up was I
in seeing Anna safe that I forgot all about Gabriel.  The realization of that
made me feel about two inches tall.  How could I do that?

She
explained that the dead man, High-Top, and Nora had tried to kill them, but she
and Gabriel knew they were coming and had been waiting.  They shot High-Top
dead, but Nora got away.  The gunshot was probably Gabriel just trying to finish
the work.  I decided that I’d wait to explain what we knew about Nora and High-Top. 
There’d be plenty of time for that.  Besides, Petra needed Anna’s attention and
someone, me, needed to check on Gabriel.

Another
thought pops into my head, out of sequence, excuse me for this.  What about the
young people like Gabriel?  All they remember is fear, and hate, and killing. 
How are they going to know there is a better life?  I’ll think some more about
that later.

I
set Anna’s rifle on the ground, topped off the shotgun with shells, and started
in Gabriel’s direction but kept looking back thinking how lucky I was to have
found her again.  Twice her eyes met mine and she smiled.  Just before being
out of earshot, I heard Petra say to Anna, “We’re going to a safe place where
there’ll be kids like me.”  Maybe, after we get past all this, we’ll be all right
after all.

Gabriel
saw me coming and gave me a big overhand wave and, when closer, a smile,se people want you so bad?”

“That
was Nora”, he said.  “Don’t think I hit her, though.”  Disappointment showed in
his face.

I
wanted to tell him to consider himself lucky.  Killing changes you.  But in
today’s terms, he’s a man and will have to choose his own way, so I bit my
tongue.  Besides, if not this time, he’ll more than likely, almost certainly,
become a life taker sooner than later.  I don’t think there will be any
avoiding it.  Gentle days no more.

I’m
going to step my narrative up a bit here because that’s what we were doing,
stepping things up.  It’s certainly the case that I was anxious to hear what
had happened to them since Petra and I went overboard, and I’m sure they felt
the same, but there was no time for that.  We had no idea how far away the
people who hunted us were, so we couldn’t afford to sit and chat.  We simply
had to get moving.  So as soon as Gabriel and I got back to Anna and Petra, we
culled our gear of everything unnecessary, redistributed what was left, and got
on the road with an eye to our rear.