FIVE

They worked their way through a labyrinth of swamps, always moving to the west, navigating as best they could by the position of the sun. He liked the swamps because the water was free of debris in places. Occasionally they hit a fast-moving current of brown water, thick with mud and filled with debris: a rocking chair, plastic containers, an occasional dead body. The currents formed rivers within the swamps. Byron thought the currents were from breaks in the main levee along the Mississippi. Stephen recalled the Swamp Hog on the radio saying that. Another indication that what he said was reliable.

He would not have thought he would get used to dead bodies floating around, but he had. He could tell Angela had too. Sometime he wanted to talk with Angela about his father’s warning, to see what she thought he meant. But he felt uncomfortable doing that with Byron around. Mostly he had a view of Byron’s back, his T-shirt stained with mud, as he sat there on lookout for a clear path.

He was still being careful with Byron, making sure he always had the Saiga in his hands and that Byron did not start hanging around the place where the guns were stowed. Stephen liked him in the bow, where he had a good view of Bryon’s back and the man could not keep track of what he was doing. Byron was not a big man. He was nervous and twitchy.

Byron yearned for a cigarette.

“If I just had me a smoke,” he kept saying.

The second night on the airboat Byron showed no signs of going to sleep. Angela immediately went off to sleep. He offered to stand his share of the watches, but Stephen refused. Byron acquiesced.

“You’re the captain,” he said.

Stephen was surprised he did not argue or protest.

“I don’t feel much like sleeping,” Byron said.

“Angela and I’ll stand the watches.”

“She’s a good-looking girl.”

“I know that.”

“Maybe you do. Boys like you sometimes don’t appreciate girls the way they should.”

“I appreciate her. She’s a good driver.”

“Well, ain’t you the cool one.”

Stephen said nothing and pretended to be concerned with adjusting the sling on the Saiga.

Byron crawled under the netting. After only a few minutes, he sat up and threw it off.

“I ain’t sleepy.”

“Then don’t sleep.”

Stephen gripped the stock of the Saiga tightly and felt the reassuring weight of the magazine full of shells. He would not sleep until Byron slept.

“I wish I had me a smoke,” Byron said.

“You could swim to New Orleans for one,” Stephen said.

“I appreciate you pulling me out of that tree, but you’re being mighty unfriendly. I’m just trying to do my share.”

“The best thing you could do would be to go to sleep.”

Byron sprayed more mosquito repellent about his head.

“Want me to spray you?” he asked.

“No, thanks,” Stephen said.

“You been thinking about your mama?”

Stephen said nothing.

“She’s got them mercenaries taking care of her,” Bryon continued. “Pretty lady and her mercenaries.”

“How do you know she’s pretty?” Stephen asked.

“I expect she is. She ain’t an ugly woman, is she?”

“No.”

“See, I was right. A boy like you should be paying more attention to what I say.”

“I’ve been listening.”

“I’ll bet yawl have a safe in that house.”

“There’s no safe. Just paintings and furniture. It doesn’t matter. It’s underwater.”

“I’d have my money in gold. Wherever she is, she’s got mercenaries to guard her gold.”

“She has no gold.”

Then for a long time Byron was silent as if he were actually contemplating having gold to put in a safe. He lay stretched out on the deck. Stephen wondered if he had dropped off to sleep. Stephen was having a hard time staying awake himself. But then Byron stirred and sat up again.

Stephen had just about made up his mind not to sleep at all this night.

“These mosquitoes are not so bad,” Stephen said.

“They’re bad enough,” Byron said.

He woke Angela for her watch. Byron yawned.

“Maybe I am sleepy,” he said.

He crawled back under the netting.

Stephen gave Angela the Saiga.

“I…,” she began.

He expected she was going to tell him again that she knew nothing about guns.

“Just hold it across your lap,” he whispered in her ear. “Keep your fingers off the trigger. He wakes up or starts to move around, you wake me. Don’t wait until he comes out from under that mosquito net.”

She said she understood. He crawled under the netting.

In the morning he found himself standing watch and listening to Byron talk about his life as a bartender. Angela was asleep under the netting. Stephen thought he had gotten enough sleep to get himself through the day.

They were forced to move in a more northerly direction by a stiff current to the west that swept through an impenetrable tangle of underbrush. Logs and trash were caught up in the lower limbs of the trees. It was a dangerous place. He planned to get above the levee break and then, he hoped, with parts of the levee in sight, follow it down to Baton Rouge. There he would search for information about his mother. If it turned out she was still in New Orleans, they would go there. There was also no sign of Interstate 55. It seemed to him they had come far enough west to have crossed it.

They had learned from the radio that Baton Rouge was untouched by the flood. The new levees there were holding. New Orleans had been abandoned.

“Your mama is high and dry with her mercenaries someplace,” Byron had said. “Keeping them paintings dry. I’ll bet they ain’t used to guarding paintings. Won’t she be surprised when she sees you.”

“I expect she will,” Stephen said.

Up ahead he spotted the tops of pine trees through the cypresses. That meant high ground ahead.

Bryon was elated.

“I gonna get myself to the Smokey Mountains,” he said. “I don’t care if I never see the ocean or the Mississippi River again.”

Stephen wondered if he had been listening to the Swamp Hog. Maybe going to Baton Rouge was not a good idea. As they moved toward it, the water would be deeper and the currents perhaps unmanageable. It was hard to decide which way to proceed. Perhaps they could get to Natchez or Jackson, some place on high ground the flood had not touched, and find out about his mother’s whereabouts. It seemed to him that the National Guard might know.

Angela worked the airboat through the cypresses. She had become an expert driver in just a few days. Then ahead of them he saw smoke. Somebody was on the ridge.

Since he did not know exactly what they were going to find on the ridge, he elected to proceed cautiously. He decided to arm Bryon and Angela. After he learned from Bryon that he was familiar with rifles, he gave him an AK-47. He gave one to Angela too but with an empty magazine. It had been a mistake not to give her at least one shooting lesson. But just having the rifle in her hands would make people think she knew how to shoot.

“I know you don’t trust me,” Bryon said. “I can’t say I blame you. But you’ll see. I ain’t forgotten how you took me out of that tree.”

They heard people shouting to them. As Angela worked the boat through the trees, the ridge rose above them. Then they saw a group of people standing by the water. A johnboat was pulled up on the bank. It was a family: a man, a woman and two children. The man had a shotgun slung over his shoulder.

“Watch that shotgun,” he said to Bryon.

“He tries anything and he’s a dead man,” Bryon said.

“What’s the matter with you,” Angela said. “Can’t you see it’s a family?”

The people were dirty and desperate-looking. The children looked frightened.

“Could you spare some water?” the man asked. “My children are mighty thirsty.”

“There’s water all around you,” Byron said.

“Drinking that swamp water has made us sick,” the man said.

“You should walk to a road,” Stephen said.

“We can’t,” the woman said. “There’s water all around.”

“Then go to the next ridge,” Angela said.

“We’re out of gas,” the man said. “I’m afraid to pole or paddle. There’s some tricky currents out in the swamp.”

Angela gave the man a canteen. He handed it to his wife who gave it to the children. They took great gulps from it until the woman took it away from them.

“My stomach hurts,” the boy, who looked like he was eight or nine years old, said.

“Mine too,” the girl said.

She was somewhat younger.

The woman flopped down and started to cry, her head between her knees. Her shoulders heaved as she sobbed.

The man, after taking a few careful sips from the canteen, told them how he stayed behind to protect the convenience store he owned. It was on high ground that had never been flooded. Then someone stole their boat, leaving them stranded. The boat pulled up on the bank belonged to his neighbor, now dead.

“Heart attack, I think,” the man said.

He explained how the man had come to him for food. As he was getting out of the boat, he collapsed. Then the rising water had driven them out of the store. The family headed north, looking for high ground.

“You sure you didn’t murder your neighbor?” Byron asked.

The man’s face turned red. “I’ve never harmed another person,” he said.

“But you do agree that boat wouldn’t hold another person?” Byron said.

“Yes, but Dexter was dead,” the woman said. “We couldn’t carry his body around. I’d appreciate it if you’d stop that sort of talk. You’re scaring my children.”

Stephen told the man he would give him some gas and water and rice and beans.

“Keep heading north,” he said. “That’s what we’re going to do.”

He took their gas can from their boat and climbed back into the airboat to fill it from one of the containers. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Byron moving along the bank. As he turned to see what Byron was up to, automatic rifle fire erupted, the sound rising up and overwhelming everything, making it difficult for him move or think clearly. Angela began to scream. He grabbed the Saiga but slipped and fell backward. Then he struggled to his feet and brought up the shotgun. He intended to catch Byron before he reloaded.

But Byron still had his back to him. He had dropped the empty magazine and was slipping a fresh one into the rifle. The man and his wife and children, alive and hopeful only moments ago, lay sprawled about in grotesque poses. He had a momentary impulse to will them back alive. If he had kept the rifle out of Byron’s hands, they would be alive. If he had left Byron in the tree, they would be alive.

Byron turned to him and grinned.

“They won’t be needing anything now,” he said. “We’ve got nothing to spare.”

Angela was still screaming and had fallen to her knees. He wondered if she had taken a bullet.

“Hush up, girl,” Byron said. “You’ll see worse before this is over.”

Byron was holding the rifle with one hand over his shoulder. Stephen stepped off the bow of the airboat onto the bank. He brought up the shotgun.

“No, don’t,” Angela screamed.

As she moved toward him, he sidestepped away from her, not wanting his field of fire encumbered.

“Don’t!” she said. “Please!”

“Put the rifle down,” he said. “I won’t ask you again.”

Byron bent over and set the rifle on the ground.

“Now step away from it,” he said.

Byron backed off a few paces.

“More,” he said.

Byron moved far enough away to satisfy him.

“Thank you,” Angela said. “Thank you.”

“We didn’t have food and water for them too,” Byron said.

Stephen could tell from the way he said it that he believed he had made a perfectly logical and rational decision.

“You murdered them for no reason,” Angela said. “No reason.”

Stephen told Angela to go pick up the rifle and to be careful because the safety was likely to be off, the selector switch still set on automatic.

After she retrieved the rifle, he told her to put it in the airboat with the barrel pointing toward the swamp. She did the same with the man’s shotgun. He directed Byron to step away a few more yards. Stephen slung his shotgun. While watching him over his shoulder, he pushed the airboat out into the water. He knelt in the bow and told Angela to start the engine.

“Hey, wait,” Byron said. “What about me?”

“Don’t remind me you’re alive,” he said.

“What were those people to you?” Byron said.

“They were people,” he said.

The engine started, and Angela swung the airboat out into open water. Byron ran up the edge of the water and was screaming something at them, his face all contorted, but Stephen could not make out a word because of the noise of the engine and the propeller.

They went up the side of the ridge, their backs to Byron. Then the ridge swung to the north, and Stephen knew that even if he turned to look in Byron’s direction, he would be unable to see him.

The land continued to rise with pine-covered ridges interspersed with cypress swamps. Finally they found their way blocked by a ridge, and after following it for miles to the east, he realized that moving north was not a good idea. Perhaps they should just take their chance with more water and tricky currents. When they hit a creek that flowed to the west, he directed Angela to turn into it. He thought it would be better to try to reach Baton Rouge than to press on north. Late in the afternoon he had her run the boat out of the creek and into a cypress swamp.

They ate and sat in the boat and waited for it to turn dark so they could sleep.

“Why did he kill those people?” she asked.

He liked it that she, a grown woman, was asking him, a boy, a question like that.

“I don’t know,” he said. “I guess because he could.”

“You should’ve killed him,” she said.

He reminded her she was against his doing that and asked her why she changed her mind.

“He gets a chance, he’ll kill another family,” she said.

He imagined she was thinking of her parents, but he did not say anything.

Then they had a discussion about killing people who are likely to kill innocent people for no particular reason.

“Doing that is another side of anarchy,” he said. “But he sure deserved it.”

“But you didn’t. Why did you pay any attention to me?”

“You sure ask hard questions.”

He considered why he had not filled Byron full of buckshot. He thought of the men who killed his father and of the one he let escape. He wondered if he should tell her about that and then he did.

“I’ve killed enough people,” he said. “Let somebody else come along and kill him. I don’t want to start deciding who’ll live and who’ll die.”

“I could’ve killed him,” she said. “I just didn’t know it at the time.”

He told her about his father’s observations on the effects of killing and how he did not understand.

“Do you now?” she asked.

“Not really,” he said. “Do you?”

“I’m not sure. I think I could kill a hundred Byron Williams and still love the rest of the world.” She paused and looked off into the darkness. “Do you think those people your mother hired have had to shoot anyone?”

“I wouldn’t be surprised.”

“If somebody tried to steal a painting or a fine piece of furniture.”

“Or some water or food. All that stuff could be sitting in the house, underwater. Maybe the only thing they could save was themselves.”

Byron had called them mercenaries. Stephen supposed that was as good a name for them as any. He wondered if there were four or five of them or just one. By now they could have removed his mother from New Orleans.

“They’d be happy to pull the trigger on somebody,” he said.

That was an expression he had heard his father use.

He remembered he needed to teach her to shoot. One problem with that was everyone for miles around would hear the sound. It was something he would do in the morning. He also decided they would not stand watches. She was exhausted and so was he. Both of them could use a good night’s sleep. He wondered if she regretted not having the opportunity to pray over the dead family. One thing for sure, if Byron had killed Angela and him, he would not be doing any praying.

“I’m so tired,” she said.

They went to sleep. He wrapped his arms around the Saiga.

“Good night,” he said.

But she did not reply. She was already asleep. He lay awake for some time, listening to the sounds of the swamp: splashes, night-birds, the rustle of the breeze in the cypresses. There was absolutely no sound to indicate the presence of people. He liked that. His opinion of human beings had been in steep decline, and the experience with Byron took it to the bottom.

He considered getting up and listening to the radio. But he felt too tired to move and too anxious to sleep. Perhaps it was a mistake not to have set a watch. He shifted the Saiga a little to one side, feeling the satisfactory and comforting weight of the box magazine. He smelled the stink of his unwashed body. He told himself over and over they were safe in the darkness of the swamp. Finally he calmed down enough to feel safe closing his eyes. He hoped the sleep that awaited him would be deep and uninterrupted.