Free Rivers: A Novel by Michael Farris Smith Page B

been here. Damn cut the gas line. And took the spark plug.”
    Aggie said grab it anyway and they each took an end and loaded it onto the trailer hitched on to the Jeep. The boy and the girl went inside and searched through what they had left on the first run, taking anything that might matter but mostly happy about the clothes. The girl went into the bedroom and she stood in front of the dresses, looking through them as if spending a leisurely day in a department store. The men came in and began taking the furniture out of the bedrooms and they called for the boy to help them. Piece by piece the nightstands and dressers and mattresses were taken out and loaded onto the trailer.
    “I didn’t know there was nobody down here still living this good,” Aggie said as he carried out a set of bed rails.
    “Me neither,” said Joe. “He ain’t no more, though. What you reckon he’s doing?”
    “He might be sitting out there behind a tree somewhere with his sight on the back of your head.”
    “Evan said they got all the guns. Didn’t you?”
    “Think so.”
    “Think? Better goddamn well know.”
    “Don’t worry,” said Aggie. “If he was sitting behind a tree with something to shoot we’d be shot.”
    They went back to work. Around the back of the house, Joe noticed the foundation and the wet, discolored pile of lumber. He called out to Aggie and Aggie came around.
    “Looks like we got a winner for most ambitious resident,” Aggie said.
    They kept on and soon the house was emptied and Evan called out to Mariposa to come on. She was lingering in the bedroom, had picked five dresses, and they were folded and stuck into her overcoat. She came out of the front door and said, “Go see if that horse is still back there.”
    “That horse is long gone,” said Joe. “But there’s a cellar back around there, about two feet of water in it. Got some shelves, though. A bunch of saws and nail guns and stuff.”
    “That’s gonna do a lot of good,” Aggie said. “Leave that stuff. We know where to find it if we change our minds.”
    “All right,” Joe said. He turned to Mariposa. “You and Evan sit back there on top of the stuff to keep it from bouncing off.”
    “I ain’t sitting back there,” she said.
    He reached over and slapped her hard across the face and told her to shut her goddamn mouth and get back there. One of the dresses fell out of her coat and onto the ground and the man said, “Where the hell you think you going? To the ball, Cinderella?”
    The two men laughed and Evan picked it up for her and looked to see if she was okay but she pushed him back and walked to the trailer and climbed up on top of the mattresses. Evan followed her and sat beside her and Mariposa glared at the two men. Aggie got behind the wheel and Joe said he was gonna walk through one more time. Inside, he passed through each room, checking for anything they had missed that might be of use or value, but the place had been stripped of its offering. In the kitchen he found a note on the counter that none of them had noticed. He picked it up and read. Didn’t laugh but smiled an uncomfortable smile. He folded the note and walked out and got in the passenger side of the Jeep.
    “This is a good old place,” Aggie said as he settled behind the steering wheel. He cranked the Jeep and then Joe handed the note over to him.
    “What’s that?”
    “Looks like their friend left us a little note.”
    The older man unfolded it, read it, then huffed and gave it back.
    “What you think?”
    Aggie paused. Pursed his lips and put the Jeep into first gear. “Don’t think nothing,” he said. “Too much of that’ll get you killed down here. You should know that by now.”
    The gray of day was beginning to fade and thunder that had been far off now rumbled more closely and Aggie said the digging would have to wait until tomorrow. The Jeep moved off the concrete slab and out into the backyard and circled the house, the tires spinning some and