as the first wound was inflicted, tried to scream, but only gurgled as his mouth filled with blood. He resisted, briefly and ineffectually.
After checking on Danny in the next room to be sure he had not awakened, Janet wrapped Vince’s body in the bloodstained bed sheets. She tied the shroud in place at his ankles and neck with clothesline, dragged him through the house, out of the kitchen door, and across the backyard.
The high moon grew alternately dim and bright as clouds like galleons sailed eastward across the sky, but Janet was not concerned about being seen. The shacksalong that stretch of the state route were widely spaced, and no lights glowed in either of the two nearest homes.
Driven by the grim understanding that the police could take her from Danny as surely as Vince might have done, she hauled the corpse to the end of the property and out into the night desert, which stretched unpopulated to the far mountains. She struggled between mesquite shrubs and still-rooted tumbleweeds, across soft sand in some places and hard tables of shale in others.
When the cold face of the moon shone, it revealed a hostile landscape of stark shadows and sharp alabaster shapes. In one of the deeper shadows—an arroyo carved by centuries of flash floods—Janet abandoned the corpse.
She stripped the sheets off the body and buried those, but she didn’t dig a grave for the cadaver itself because she hoped that night scavengers and vultures would pick the bones clean quicker if it was left exposed. Once the denizens of the desert had chewed and pecked the soft pads of Vince’s fingers, once the sun and the carrion eaters got done with him, his identity might be deduced only by dental records. Since Vince had rarely seen a dentist, and never the same one twice, there were no records for the police to consult. With luck, the corpse would go undiscovered until the next rainy season, when the withered remains would be washed miles and miles away, tumbled and broken and mixed up with piles of other refuse, until they had essentially disappeared.
That night Janet packed what little they owned and drove away in the old Dodge with Danny. She was not even sure where she was going until she had crossed the state line and driven all the way to Orange County. That
had
to be her final destination because she couldn’t afford to spend more money on gasoline just to get farther away from the dead man in the desert.
No one back in Tucson would wonder what had happened to Vince. He was a shiftless drifter, after all. Cutting loose and moving on was a way of life to him.
But Janet was deathly afraid to apply for welfare or any form of assistance. They might ask her where her husband was, and she didn’t trust her ability to lie convincingly.
Besides, in spite of carrion-eaters and the dehydrating ferocity of the Arizona sun, maybe someone had stumbled across Vince’s body before it had become unidentifiable. If his widow and son surfaced in California, seeking government aid, perhaps connections would be made deep in a computer, prompting an alert social worker to call the cops. Considering her tendency to succumb to anyone who exerted authority over her—a deeply ingrained trait that had been only slightly ameliorated by the murder of her husband—Janet had little chance of undergoing police scrutiny without incriminating herself.
Then they would take Danny away from her.
She could not allow that.
Would
not.
On the streets, homeless but for the rusted and rattling Dodge, Janet Marco discovered that she had a talent for survival. She was not stupid; she had just never before had the freedom to exercise her wits. From a society whose refuse could feed a significant portion of the Third World, she clawed a degree of precarious security, feeding herself and her son with recourse to a charity kitchen for the fewest possible meals.
She learned that fear, in which she had long been steeped, did not have to immobilize her. It could also
After checking on Danny in the next room to be sure he had not awakened, Janet wrapped Vince’s body in the bloodstained bed sheets. She tied the shroud in place at his ankles and neck with clothesline, dragged him through the house, out of the kitchen door, and across the backyard.
The high moon grew alternately dim and bright as clouds like galleons sailed eastward across the sky, but Janet was not concerned about being seen. The shacksalong that stretch of the state route were widely spaced, and no lights glowed in either of the two nearest homes.
Driven by the grim understanding that the police could take her from Danny as surely as Vince might have done, she hauled the corpse to the end of the property and out into the night desert, which stretched unpopulated to the far mountains. She struggled between mesquite shrubs and still-rooted tumbleweeds, across soft sand in some places and hard tables of shale in others.
When the cold face of the moon shone, it revealed a hostile landscape of stark shadows and sharp alabaster shapes. In one of the deeper shadows—an arroyo carved by centuries of flash floods—Janet abandoned the corpse.
She stripped the sheets off the body and buried those, but she didn’t dig a grave for the cadaver itself because she hoped that night scavengers and vultures would pick the bones clean quicker if it was left exposed. Once the denizens of the desert had chewed and pecked the soft pads of Vince’s fingers, once the sun and the carrion eaters got done with him, his identity might be deduced only by dental records. Since Vince had rarely seen a dentist, and never the same one twice, there were no records for the police to consult. With luck, the corpse would go undiscovered until the next rainy season, when the withered remains would be washed miles and miles away, tumbled and broken and mixed up with piles of other refuse, until they had essentially disappeared.
That night Janet packed what little they owned and drove away in the old Dodge with Danny. She was not even sure where she was going until she had crossed the state line and driven all the way to Orange County. That
had
to be her final destination because she couldn’t afford to spend more money on gasoline just to get farther away from the dead man in the desert.
No one back in Tucson would wonder what had happened to Vince. He was a shiftless drifter, after all. Cutting loose and moving on was a way of life to him.
But Janet was deathly afraid to apply for welfare or any form of assistance. They might ask her where her husband was, and she didn’t trust her ability to lie convincingly.
Besides, in spite of carrion-eaters and the dehydrating ferocity of the Arizona sun, maybe someone had stumbled across Vince’s body before it had become unidentifiable. If his widow and son surfaced in California, seeking government aid, perhaps connections would be made deep in a computer, prompting an alert social worker to call the cops. Considering her tendency to succumb to anyone who exerted authority over her—a deeply ingrained trait that had been only slightly ameliorated by the murder of her husband—Janet had little chance of undergoing police scrutiny without incriminating herself.
Then they would take Danny away from her.
She could not allow that.
Would
not.
On the streets, homeless but for the rusted and rattling Dodge, Janet Marco discovered that she had a talent for survival. She was not stupid; she had just never before had the freedom to exercise her wits. From a society whose refuse could feed a significant portion of the Third World, she clawed a degree of precarious security, feeding herself and her son with recourse to a charity kitchen for the fewest possible meals.
She learned that fear, in which she had long been steeped, did not have to immobilize her. It could also
Similar Books
