Bent Road - Lori Roy [9]
A smaller boy steps forward, tossing back his head to get the hair out of his eyes. “Yeah, it’s the Murray place,” he says before Daniel can answer. “Saw them hauling off Mrs. Murray’s stuff.”
“She died in that house, you know,” another of the younger boys says. With his elbow, he nudges the brother next to him. “About six years ago. They found her dead, slumped over the radiator. Cooked up real good.”
The oldest-looking boy shoves his brother. “Shut up. She was just old.”
Daniel jams his hands in his pockets and steps into the shade so his hair won’t sparkle. Behind him, the boy leaning against the barn pulls the fuzzy seeds off a giant foxtail, holds them between two fingers and blows them away.
“Sure she was old, but that ain’t what killed her,” the same younger boy says. “It was one of them crazy guys from Clark City. You know about Clark City, right?”
“Never heard of it,” Daniel says as he digs a hole in the ground with the toe of his left shoe, wearing off the shine Mama made him buff on before they left the house.
“That’s where they lock up crazy folks,” the tallest boy says. He leans against a tree and gestures with his head off to the left. “It’s a town about twenty miles southwest of here. Happens a few times a year. One of them gets out and heads this way. Should probably lock up your house. But mostly they’re just looking for food. Mostly.”
Behind Daniel, the screened door opens and slams shut with a bang. Evie steps onto the porch.
“One just escaped,” one of the smaller boys says, nudging the same brother again. “Seen it in yesterday’s paper. Say his name is Jack Mayer. Has a taste for boys. Don’t know the difference between his wife and kid’s hind end.”
The tallest brother kicks a cloud of dust at the smaller boy. “No paper said nothing about hind ends.”
“No,” the boy says. “But it did say Jack Mayer couldn’t be found because his skin is black as night. Said he’s as good as invisible when the sun sets.”
Walking up behind Daniel and standing next to him, Evie flips her braids over her shoulders, crosses her arms and stares up at the new boys. Back near the barn, the boy sitting by himself uses both hands to push off the ground and walks toward them.
“Anyone see that fellow around here?” Daniel asks. “Any of you see him?”
“Got one,” shouts a different boy as he walks out of a shed a few yards beyond the barn. This one, who is five, maybe six years old, has a kitten cupped in his hands. He walks over to the hole that the boys were digging when Daniel first walked up.
“You got to watch this,” one of the brothers says, ignoring Daniel’s question.
The boy who was sitting near the barn has almost reached them. Up close, his head seems too large for his body, as if his neck can’t quite hold it up, and both legs bow to the right. He has the same dark hair but his is cut high off his forehead.
“Come on,” the crippled boy says. “These guys are stupid.”
The youngest boy is still fussing with the hole and the kitten, patting down the dirt like he is planting a tomato. An older brother walks toward the hole with a weed whip.
Following the boy across the drive, Daniel tucks Evie under one arm and presses her face into his side, holding tight so she can’t squirm away. The boy walks with an awkward rhythm—step, step, pause, step, step, pause—as if he has to think about each set of steps before he takes them. Reaching Dad’s truck, the crippled boy throws open the passenger side door and Daniel shoves Evie inside.
Up on the porch, Dad walks out of the house, followed by a large man who must be Mr. Bucher, although he seems too big to have a son as small and broken as this boy. The two men shake hands and Dad walks down the steps, his hat tucked under his arm.
“Thanks,” Daniel says to the boy and climbs in after Evie. “See you around?”
The boy nods and limps toward the house. “Lock your windows,” he says. “Doors, too. Just in case.”
From over near the barn, someone calls out, “Fore.”
Ray must feel it, too, Ruth thinks as they pull away from Arthur’s new