He thought longingly about the cool, dark cave, about how the timeless limestone walls would swallow up whatever agonized sounds his particular brand of pleasure might wring from his captives. In that dusky cave, with the added luxury of total isolation, no one would interrupt him or interfere with the process. There, once and for all. .
Carlisle had tried explaining that same thing to Gary Ladd years before, the morning after their little debacle, but the man had been hysterical when he learned the girl was dead, astounded that things had got so far out of hand while he slept.
Even then, things would have been fine if Ladd hadn’t lost his nerve and gone back later to move the body so she could have a proper burial. The fool dumped her in a water hole, for God’s sake, thinking people would be stupid enough to believe she had drowned. With the rope burns around her neck and her nipple bitten off? What the hell kind of dumb-ass idea was that? And then, a week later, if Carlisle hadn’t stopped him, Ladd would have gone to town and confessed for both of them, taking his tell-tale manuscript with him. Thanks a lot, buddy, but no thanks.
Carlisle shivered at the tantalizing memory, letting his imagination travel back to the cave, remembering that long-ago desert night and the girl. Despite her objections, he had coaxed her into that huge and immensely silent place. He had started a small fire-for light he had told her-but light wasn’t all the fire was for, not at all. He had other plans for those burning twigs and coals.
To begin with, she had liked being tied up, giggling drunkenly as he bound her, thinking it nothing but some kind of kinky game. Gradually, as she learned the terrible truth, her tipsy laughter changed, first to fear and then to terror and dread as the tenor of the night changed around her. Carlisle hadn’t much liked her screaming when it finally came to that. Screaming showed a certain lack of delicacy and finesse on his part. He much preferred the small, animal-like whimpers of pain and the begging. God, how her begging had excited him! Even though it was in a language he didn’t speak, he had understood her well enough. He hadn’t stopped when she asked him to, of course, but he had understood.
And all the while that jackass of a Gary Ladd was dead drunk in the pickup. When he did wake up finally, after the fun and games were all over, Carlisle managed to convince Gary that he, too, had been an active participant in all that had gone before, that being too drunk to remember was no excuse.
“But she’s dead,” Ladd had protested, as though he couldn’t quite believe it. Of course she was dead. Carlisle had always intended that she would be, that was the whole idea, wasn’t it? But Gary Ladd was far too cowardly to value or take advantage of what he was learning, and he hadn’t been smart enough to keep his mouth shut, either.
Carlisle shook himself out of what was almost a stupor and found he was sitting on the floor in front of Diana Ladd’s couch. Both the boy and the old woman were tied up, although he didn’t remember finishing the job. They were both watching him with strange expressions on their faces. Had he blacked out for a moment or what?
These episodes were beginning to bother him. It had happened several times of late, and it scared the shit out of him. Was he losing his mind? He’d come back to himself feeling as though he’d been asleep when he knew he hadn’t been. Sometimes only seconds would have passed, sometimes whole minutes.
He inspected the knots. They were properly tied, but he had no recollection of doing it. Somehow it seemed as though his body and his mind functioned independently. He’d have to watch that. It could be dangerous, especially in enemy territory.
“Who are you?” the boy demanded.
Carlisle looked hard at the child, recognizing some of Gary Ladd’s features, but the boy had a certain toughness that had been totally lacking in his father.
“Well, son,” Carlisle said in a kind tone that belied his words, “you can just think of me as retribution personified, a walking, talking Eye-for-an-Eye.”
Davy Ladd frowned at the unfamiliar words, but he didn’t back off. “What does that mean?”
Andrew Carlisle laughed, giving the boy credit for raw nerve. “It means that the sins of the fathers are visited on the sons, just like the Good Book says. It also means that if you don’t do every single goddamned thing I say, then I use my trusty knife, and you and your mother and this old lady here are all dead meat. Do you understand that?”
Davy nodded.
The room was quiet for a moment when suddenly, sitting there, looking him directly in the eye, the old lady began what sounded like a mournful, almost whispered chant in a language Carlisle didn’t recognize. He glowered at her. “Shut up!” he ordered.
She stopped. “I’m praying,” she said, speaking calmly. “I’m asking I’itoi to help us.”
That made him laugh, even though he didn’t like the way she looked at him. “You go right ahead, then. If you think some kind of Indian mumbo-jumbo is going to fix all this, then be my guest. But I wouldn’t count on it, old woman. Not at all.”
“Why did you do it?” she asked.
“Do what?”
“Why did you kill my granddaughter?”
Prosecutors and lawyers and police tend to limp around questions like that. Carlisle wasn’t accustomed to such a direct approach. It caught him momentarily off guard.
“Because I felt like it,” he said with a grin. “That’s all the reason I needed.”
A while later, Coyote followed the trail to where Cottontail was sitting. “Brother, you tricked me back there, and now I really am going to eat you up.”
“Please,” said Cottontail, “don’t eat me yet. I don’t want to die until I have seen a jig dancer one last time. Do this for me and then you may eat to your heart’s content.”
“All right,” said Coyote. “What do you want me to do?”
“Come with me over here,” said Cottontail. “First I will plaster your eyes shut with pitch. Then, when your eyes are shut, you will hear firecrackers popping. When that happens, you must dance and shout. When the dance is over, then you may eat me.”
So Cottontail plastered Coyote’s eyes shut with pitch, then he led him into a cane field. When Coyote was in the middle of the field, Cottontail set fire to it. Soon the cane started crackling and popping. Coyote thought these were the firecrackers Cottontail had told him about, so he began to dance and shout. Soon he began to feel the heat, but he thought he was hot because he was dancing so hard. At last, though, the fire reached him, and burned him up.
And that, my friend, is the story of the second time Cottontail tricked Coyote.
From the sound and cadence of that softly crooned chant, someone listening might have thought Rita Antone was giving voice to some ancient traditional Papago lullaby. It included the requisite number of repetitions, the proper rhythm, but it was really a war chant, and the words were entirely new:
“Do not look at me, little Olhoni.
Do not look at me when I sing to you
So this man will not know we are speaking
So this evil man will think he is winning.
“Do not look at me
When I sing, little Olhoni,
But listen to what I say.
This man is evil.
This man is the enemy.
This man is ohb.
Do not let this frighten you.