Greg Iles - The Devils Punchbowl
I guess. I cant think right anymore. I'm sick. My legs infected.
Caitlin remembers this from the note. Shed forgotten it, assuming that Linda had got medical care by now. Do you have fever?
I'm burning up. But thats not the worst part.
Whats the matter?
Hes been doing it to me. Quinn.
Doing it?
Raping me. He started last night. Hes done it so much that I'm getting a UTI. It hurts so bad when I have to pee, and I shiver all over afterward.
Did you tell Quinn that?
He gave me some pills he said would help. Antibiotics. Theyre for dogs, I think, but he said its all the same. But they're not helping. If it gets any worse, I don't know what I'll do. I stopped drinking water so I won't have to pee.
You cant do that, Linda. You have to drink. Youll die if you don't.
I'm going to die anyway. Theyll never let me out of here alive. Hes going to use me till hes tired of me, then feed me to the dogs. He told me.
Fear and outrage rush through Caitlin in a flood. That's not going to happen. Listen to me, Linda. Were getting out of here!
How? Does anybody know where you are?
Caitlin doesn't want to admit the truth, but she cant bring herself to lie. No.
Then how are we going to get out? Theres dogs outside this kennel. Bulldogs and something else too. Big dogs. They don't even leave men to guard me most of the time. They don't have to. Its twenty feet to the fence. Even if you could get out of here, theyd tear you to pieces before you got to it.
Is that what this building is? A kennel?
Uh-huh. Youre in a regular room like an office. But the rest of its just two lines of fenced stalls with an aisle between. Theres cats in one stall down by the door. That's it.
That helps. The more I know, the better chance we have. I'll think of something. You just drink your water and try to stay strong. Maybe the antibiotics will start to work. I know the bladder infection hurts. I've had those myself. But you listen to me, girl. We are
getting out of here.
Do you hear me?
Yes.
Say it, Linda.
Were getting out.
Say it like you believe it.
I'm sorry. My throat hurts. Did they put a collar on you?
What?
A dog collar.
No.
Theyve got a dog collar on me, and its chained to a post. He only takes it off when he does it to me.
Jesus Christ.
If youre going to do something, please do it quick.
Caitlin thinks frantically. Are we by ourselves now? Did they really leave?
I think so.
I'm sure I can get these bars off the window.
No! Dont do that! Youll draw the dogs. They could jump through that window if they tried.
Okay, okay, I won't. Caitlin looks around her cell again, then lifts her gaze to the cheap tin roof. What about the roof? Do you
care if I try to get part of that open? Then I could get up on top and see whats out there.
After a brief silence, Linda says, I guess thats okay. Just don't fall off.
Caitlin flexes her hands, then takes hold of the window bars at shoulder height. With a mighty effort, she leans back and starts walking her feet up the wall, first to chest level, then past the window.
Skinning the cat,
they called it when she was a kid. Surprised she can still manage the maneuver, she keeps stretching and extending until her bare feet reach the edge of the low-lying ceiling, then begins kicking. By the fourth kick shes put a dent in the tin, but soon she has to unwind and drop back to the floor, panting and rubbing her hands. Shes not sure how long she can keep it up, but shes pretty sure a roofing nail has started to lift out of the two-by-four at the top of the wall.
CHAPTER
48
Today will be Annies first day back at St. Stephens, and she seems a little uncertain as we coast down the long drive of the school. I'm not exactly at peace myself. Despite my cease-fire agreement with Jonathan Sands, I've warned the headmaster and security guard to be on the lookout for strangers on the campus, and not to be shy about calling 911 if they see any. Chief Logan has prepped the dispatcher to send two squad cars to St. Stephens with sirens blaring if theres even a hint of trouble.
Are you all right? I ask, glancing over to the passenger seat. You seem quiet.
I had another dream.
What about? I ask, easing the car right, toward the middle school.
Caitlin again.
I glance at Annie, but she keeps her eyes focused forward. Was it bad or good?
Bad.
Will you tell me what it was?
Her face tightens with indecision, but then she says, I dreamed Mom was alive again.
This surprises me, since Annie was only four when Sarah died and has few clear memories of her. What happened in it?
I don't want to say. It was creepy.
Everybody has creepy dreams sometimes.
Well, we went to visit Moms grave, like weve done before, but Mom was
with
us. And the thing is the creepy thing
Its all right, baby.
Caitlin
was the one who was gone. In Moms grave. And Mom was with us, looking down at the stone.
Sensing that Annie is really disturbed, I pull onto the grassy shoulder of the driveway and put the Saab in park. Cars loaded with children glide past, then slow and empty their charges at the door of the middle school.
Maybe you dreamed that because of the talk we had last night. What do you think?
I don't know. Its just that the last time I dreamed about Caitlin, me and Gram ended up having to hide out of town.
I pat her knee, then squeeze it reassuringly. That didn't have anything to do with your dream. That was something to do with my work.
She looks skeptically at me for a while. Did you talk to her about what we said last night?
A little bit. Were going to talk some more today, I think.
You think? Or you know?
Were not sure yet. Sometimes big things like this take a little time to work out.
She looks down at the glove box and nods with quick assertiveness, as though she knows her voice will crack if she speaks while looking at me. Did you tell her I wanted her to be my mom?
Did you want me to?
Did you?
I sigh in resignation, knowing she can outlast me at this game. No. I didn't.
Good. I'm worried it might scare her.
No, no. Why would you think that?
Well, shes going to want her own babies and stuff. She may not want to think of herself as my mom.
Annies fear of rejection brings tears to my eyes. I squeeze her hand. I'll tell you a secret. I think Caitlins always wanted to be your mom.
Annie looks up at me and blinks three times, her eyes wide and vulnerable. Really?
Shes tried to do all the things Mom would have done, if shed lived. I think Caitlin worries that youll think shes trying to take Moms place.
Annies mouth falls open. But I don't think that!
As perceptive as she is sometimes, it surprises me that Annie doesn't see the relationship of her dream to whats happening in our lives. Well, thats the hard part about these kinds of situations. People are scared to say what they really feel, and sometimes they wait too long to do it.
Have you done that? Waited too long?
I don't know. I don't think so. I think were going to get everything worked out.
Looking up, I see no more cars at the door. One of the teachers looks up the hill at us and gives a friendly wave.
Youre going to be late, baby.
She takes my hand and squeezes it. It doesn't matter, Dad.
No. I guess it doesn't.
Lets go, she says brightly, as though everything has been resolved. Like Gram says, One way or another, everythings going to be fine.
I laugh and drive down to the door of the school. Annie leans over and kisses my cheek, then lifts her backpack from the floor. When I start to speak, she presses her finger to my lips.
You don't have to tell me not to worry, or not to talk about any of this. I know how things work.
With that, she smiles, gets out, and disappears through the door of the school I loved as a child, the school that made me what I am, the school that my daughter will soon be leaving forever.
CHAPTER
49
Caitlin hunches naked on the balls of her bloody feet, listening to Lindas chain rattle. She can tell by the sound that the chain is heavy, the kind with big, bright links that farmers use to tie tractors to flatbed trailers. Some people, Caitlin knows now, use them to strengthen fighting dogs, by making them drag the chains around every minute of their lives, as Linda must do now. Linda sleeps fitfully in her fever, moving frequently, shifting the dog collar that holds her to the chain.
Caitlin has not slept. She feels as though shes awakened in some nightmare version of
The Count of Monte Cristo,
but instead of solitude as her curse, she must endure the cries of a woman who has suffered thirty hours of rape and abuse, while being powerless to help her. Caitlin doesn't intend to stay that way. She knows a lot more about her situation than she did when she arrived last night, and she doesn't believe their plight hopeless, as Linda so clearly does.
Being betrayed by her former pastor seems to have cracked the foundation of Lindas religious faith. Caitlin senses that her will to live is fragile, her injuries and infections no doubt aggravating the situation.
From long and careful questioning of Linda during the night, Caitlin believes they're not far from Natchez. Yesterday, Seamus Quinn visited the kennel building that is their prison three separate
times, with only a few hours between each visit. Caitlin is sure he must be driving back and forth to Natchez between the bouts of rape.
What interests her more is that Quinn has told Jonathan Sands that Linda is already dead. Quinn was apparently supposed to kill her on the night Ben Li died, but by a brave leap from the boat, Linda saved herself. Quinn found her again by quietly putting out the word among hard-luck gamblers that all debts would be forgiven if someone could deliver Linda Church to him. Quinns ploy paid off, and hes apparently kept her alive because he always coveted his masters favorite mistress.
That Quinn would lie to his boss about something so important might offer a chance to drive a wedge between the two men, but the more frightening aspect of this lie is that Quinn must mean to kill Linda soon, so that Sands will never know he failed in his first effortor risked letting Caitlin hear what shes already heard. This, Caitlin knows, is the worst indicator of her own likely future. For if they mean to let her live, why would they allow her to see or hear what theyve done to Linda Church? Her best hope is that some disconnect between Sands and Quinn has resulted in this scenario. Otherwise, she has only one chance: escape.
During the night, Caitlin kicked at the kennels tin roof for two hours, off and on, taking breaks before repeating the skin-the-cat move required to get her feet up to where the tin meets the wall. Her feet were bruised and bleeding after ten minutes, and the pit bulls outside went crazy while she did it, but no humans appeared. Quinn apparently believes that the dogs alone are sufficient to prevent an escape.
After she got a section of tin pried up, she learned why. The kennel building is surrounded by a heavy Cyclone fence eight feet high, set back twenty feet on all sides, and hidden from the air by a huge shed, like those that house machine shops. The metal struts that support its roof are twenty feet above her head. If she had a rope, she might be able to reach one of the rafters, but she doesn't know if theres rope in the kennel. Even if there is, and she could climb hand over hand to the struts, Linda would not be able to follow.
According to Linda, the kennel building is forty paces long and hardly more than a glorified doghouse. They placed Caitlin in the
structures only room with four walls, other than a locked storeroom that occupies one end of the building. The remainder of the kennels interior consists of two rows of empty dog stalls partitioned by heavy Cyclone fencing, with a central aisle running between them. The first stall on the right, past the entry door, holds several live cats to be used as training bait. Despite Lindas fevered state of mind, all this conforms to what Caitlin remembers from her hooded journey down the central aisle.
Using this knowledge, she reconnoitered the entire roof, looking for a weak spot where she might drop down into another part of the kennel. Everywhere she went, the dogs followed, looking up with the obsessive fascination that only real hunger can bring. The pit bulls have narrow waists and massive chests, like those of steroid-addicted bodybuilders. The musculature of a couple of them actually looks human in the chest and forelegs area. Still, she thinks, based on the Internet reading shes done on dogfighting, these are probably not true fighting dogs. If they were, they wouldn't be left to run loose in the same yard; theyd be chained far enough away from each other not to do any damage. Instead they're probably guard or protection dogs, which can be controlled by commands, at least by the proper person. What puzzles Caitlin is what happened when she was brought through the yard to the kennel last night. The dogs werent ordered away by command. She remembers Quinn telling a man to use bait if you have to to get them away from the gate. This makes her think the pit bulls might just be a pack of dogs they use for training purposes, kept hungry to intimidate Lindaand now herinto staying put.
