Myrtle nods, but the tears drop from her eyes, landing on her cheeks like pearls.
“We’ll find him,” I tell her. “He’s around here somewhere.”
The crush of leaves and breaking sticks scampers toward us in the dark, the approach of an unknown entity. I go rigid, every muscle preparing to fight, my mind bracing itself for whatever horror emerges from the trees. Beside me, Myrtle crouches, a bobcat ready to pounce. She has fed, at least. It is the last thought I have before the brush parts.
Something barrels in our direction, coat slick with night, the flap of ears audible, the beat of paws.
It’s Bart. And he’s alone.
IT’S UNUSUALLY COLDtonight, well into the thirties but not yet freezing. A howl of wind beats through the tree limbs, causing me to hug my arms to my chest. Ahead of us, Bart keeps tearing off into the hobblebush, littering the ground with scarlet berries,and Myrtle has to call after him. I strain in the dark to see, worried we’ll overlook Ed somehow, despite the moonlight. If we don’t find him soon, hypothermia could set in. I watched him leave the café this morning in nothing but his shirtsleeves.
“Ed!” I call out, fingers freezing as I cup them around my mouth. The ensuing silence hangs like a curse.
“Damn dog,” I hear Myrtle grumble as she tries to keep up with Bart, who is leading us—we hope—down the most direct, if not the clearest, path to his owner.
“What’s he doing way out here?” I ask her, stumbling over a tree root but catching myself.
“Who knows,” she bellows. “Foolish old man. Can’t tell the difference between a bullfrog and a rattlesnake.”
“He said something about clearing tree limbs around the property.” I fist my hands together in front of my mouth, blowing on them.
“Must have been gathering them for firewood,” she says, trudging forward. “No other need to worry about deadwood this far in. Half of it’s too wet anyway. I’ve told him that a million times.”
Bart picks up speed, darting to the left, refusing to loop back when Myrtle calls him. “Ed! Can you hear me?” she shouts this time, her voice pitching lower than my own. “We must be close.”
A soft moan sounds nearby, like the earth is sighing beneath our weight, and Myrtle thrashes toward it, knocking branches out of her way until suddenly Bart is there, nose down, tail wagging, a pathetic whine filtering from his snout.
Beneath him, Ed lies prone in a spread of fallen leaves and pine needles, his face barely clear of the ground, one eye swollen shut. Myrtle is on her knees in an instant, hands fluttering above his back, his skull, his arm. The ground is wet, seeping through my jeans as I kneel beside her. I think the darkness across her palms is dirt until I realize the damp around Ed is blood.
“Ed! What’s happened to ya? It’s Myrtle. Talk to me. How long have you been out here?” She presses her face low by his so she can hear his replies. He responds with great effort, struggling to form even a word.
“Moose,” she barks, sitting up. “He says a cow trampled him. Never even knew she was there. Must have had a calf nearby.”
I think I should feel relief, that a flood of oxytocin should cascade through my body at the wordmoose,which to my mind must be better thanbearormountain lion.So, I can’t understand when my jaw clenches and my nostrils flare, fingers curling into fists I want to beat on the ground. “Will he be okay?”
“We need to turn him over.” She grips his shoulder, only touching the cloth. “We’re gonna turn you over now, Ed!” she shouts at him.
His words are thick, pouring from his mouth like molasses, barely audible. She leans down to hear. When she sits up, tears slip conspicuously down her cheeks. She swats my hand away. “Can’t do it,” she explains, wiping at her nose with the back of her hand. “Says his back is broken.Again.”
An owl calls with a hooting purr, invisible in the canopy, like a warning from God.
“We need an ambulance. The paramedics can secure him,” I tell her. “I’ll call nine-one-one and wait at the café for EMS to arrive. You stay with him.” I straggle to my feet, but she clasps my hand. Her eyes squeeze together, ringing out tears, and her head shakes from side to side. When she opens them to look at me, they are huge like the moon.
“There isn’t time. His lung is punctured—that’s why he looks so gray—and he’s lost too much blood. We’ll lose him before they can get him to a hospital.”
My jaw drops, mouth gaping with uncertainty. “I don’t understand. What are we supposed to do?”
Her grip is so strong on my hand that my thumb feels like it might separate at the joint. “There isn’t time,” she repeats. “We can’tsavehim. You understand?”
“No.” I would slap her if I thought it might make a difference. The weight of what she’s considering drops like an anvil in my lap. “Not that.”
Beside us, Ed moans again, and it is not soft but rigid with pain. It is only then I register that he is hurting. His injuries blaze across my understanding at once, like scattered embers. The punctured lung. The gash across the back of his head. The crack in his skull. The arm bent wrong. The back shattered once again. Contusions pepper his insides like mold. He’s had two teeth knocked out, and his right leg is broken in two places. He’s been out here a long time—too long—Bart afraid to leave him. He’s dehydrated. His core body temperature is dropping. And he’s lost a lot of blood.
She’s right. In the time it will take me to find my way back to the motel, where there’s cell service, call an ambulance, wait for them to arrive from the nearest town with a hospital, and then pick my way back here with the paramedics, he will have succumbed to oxygen deprivation, hypothermia, or simply bled out.
I find her eyes in the dark. They are childlike, pleading, wretched. “Your mark,” I whisper.
She nods slowly. This is what her cycle was preparing her for. Not an incestophile—a mercy killing. Not a stranger—a friend. Not a murder—a release from misery. She bends low and listens as he mumbles to her, nodding, whispering back, shushing him. Her fingers hover over his cheek and hair, the hand she’d like to take in hers. When she rises, she says, “He’s begging us to shoot him.”
