17

Closely followed by Carrie, Fletch worked his way behind the trailers toward where they had parked the station wagon and truck.

Although having to go along the edge of the woods, in and out of them, he gave the place where he had left the sheriff as wide a berth as possible.

He had considered walking all the way around the opposite side of the encampment, but he feared his head, pounding at every footstep, his legs, still wobbly, could not take such a long hike.

He did not want to collapse again.

“FLETCH!”

“Ohhhh,” Fletch said in disappointment. There was a wire around his neck. It was being pulled taut against his throat from behind. He had thought he was going to succeed in getting Carrie safely out of the encampment.

While trying to get his fingertips under the wire at his throat, Fletch was flung around to his left.

In a blur, he saw Carrie sitting on the ground like a rag doll on a shop’s shelf. Her legs were pedaling to get herself up.

His ears flooded with a gurgling noise.

His eyes closed.

Suddenly, still moving sideways, he was falling freely.

On the ground, he sat up.

His fingers tore the wire from around his throat.

There was a dark bulk on the ground.

A slim figure stood over it.

Bending his knees, the young man crouched and put his hands out to the bulk. He turned the bulk over.

The heavyset man on the ground was totally inert.

“Jack?” Slowly Carrie was approaching the two figures, the big, heavy man on the ground, the slim, light man crouched over him.

As she reached them, she put her hand on the young man’s shoulder. “Jack …”

Fletch got up.

He went to them.

“Dead,” Carrie said. “Poor Francie.”

Still crouching, his hand on Sheriff Joe Rogers, with an ashen face Jack looked up into Fletch’s face.

Jack said to Fletch: “What do you know? I’ve killed a cop.”

TOGETHER, JACK, CARRIE, and Fletch continued to walk toward where the station wagon and farm truck were parked in the woods. Now they did not bother to keep to the shadows.

At first, they said nothing.

They had left the sheriffs body in the woods, well away from any natural path.

After a moment, Jack said: “I only hit him once.”

Fletch said, “I guess once was enough.”

Carrie was making sniffling noises as she walked.

As they approached the woods, a group of men Fletch had not seen at the bonfire came toward them. They were dragging something large and heavy on the ground.

It was the bull calf.

“Hey, Lieutenant!” one of them called to Jack. “You hungry?”

Fletch went to where the men stopped to rest. Dragging the bull calf by its hind legs and tail was tiring them.

They had shot the bull calf behind one ear. Executed it.

Fletch had not heard the shot over the music.

He looked back at Carrie, who had remained some paces away.

She was looking away in the moonlight. At her sides, her fists were clenched.

One of the men said, “We’re gonna have us some bar-b-que!”

In a low voice, Jack said to them, “I’ll be right back.”

He and Fletch continued.

Angrily, Carrie had walked into the woods ahead of them.

She screamed.

When Fletch got to her, she was slapping at a man’s legs dangling in the air. She had walked into them. The legs were swinging against her head and shoulders.

Fletch pulled her away from the dangling legs of the corpse.

He looked up.

He recognized the filthy apron.

“My God,” Jack said behind them. “They hung the cook!”