No Country for Old Men(7)

He parked at the gate and got out and opened it and drove through and got out and closed it again and stood listening to the silence. Then he got back in the truck and drove south on the ranch road.





He kept the truck in two wheel drive and drove in second gear. The light of the unrisen moon before him spread out along the dark placard hills like scrimlights in a theatre. Turning below where he'd parked that morning onto what may have been an old wagonroad that bore eastward across Harkle's land. When the moon did rise it sat swollen and pale and ill formed among the hills to light up all the land about and he turned off the headlights of the truck.





A half hour on he parked and walked out along the crest of a rise and stood looking over the country to the east and to the south. The moon up. A blue world. Visible shadows of clouds crossing the floodplain. Hurrying on the slopes. He sat in the scabrock with his boots crossed before him. No coyotes. Nothing. For a Mexican dopedealer. Yeah. Well. Everbody is somethin.





When he got back to the truck he left the trace and steered by the moon. He crossed under a volcanic headland at the upper end of the valley and turned south again. He had a good memory for country. He was crossing terrain he'd scouted from the ridge earlier that day and he stopped again and got out to listen. When he came back to the truck he pried the plastic cover from the domelight and took the bulb out and put it in the ashtray. He sat with the flashlight and studied the map again. When next he stopped he just shut off the engine and sat with the window down. He sat there for a long time.





He parked the truck a half mile above the upper end of the caldera and got the plastic jug of water out of the floor and put the flashlight in his hip pocket. Then he took the .45 off the seat and shut the door quietly with his thumb on the latchbutton and turned and set off toward the trucks.





They were as he'd left them, hunkered down on their shot-out tires. He approached with the .45 cocked in his hand. Dead quiet. Could be because of the moon. His own shadow was more company than he would have liked. Ugly feeling out here. A trespasser. Among the dead. Dont get weird on me, he said. You aint one of em. Not yet.





The door of the Bronco was open. When he saw that he dropped to one knee. He set the waterjug on the ground. You dumb-ass, he said. Here you are. Too dumb to live.





He turned slowly, skylighting the country. The only thing he could hear was his heart. He made his way to the truck and crouched by the open door. The man had fallen sideways over the console. Still trussed in the shoulderbelt. Fresh blood everywhere. Moss took the flashlight from his pocket and shrouded the lens in his fist and turned it on. He'd been shot through the head. No lobos. No leones. He shone the hooded light into the cargo space behind the seats. Everything gone. He switched off the light and stood. He walked out slowly to where the other bodies lay. The shotgun was gone. The moon was already a quarter ways up. All but day bright. He felt like something in a jar.





He was half way back up the caldera to his truck when something made him stop. He crouched, holding the cocked pistol across his knee. He could see the truck in the moonlight at the top of the rise. He looked off to one side of it to see it the better. There was someone standing beside it. Then they were gone. There is no description of a fool, he said, that you fail to satisfy. Now you're goin to die.





He shoved the .45 into the back of his belt and set off at a trot for the lava ridge. In the distance he heard a truck start. Lights came on at the top of the rise. He began to run.





By the time he got to the rocks the truck was halfway down the caldera, the lights bobbing over the bad ground. He looked for something to hide behind. No time. He lay face down with his head between his forearms in the grass and waited. Either they'd seen him or they hadnt. He waited. The truck went by. When it was gone he rose and began to clamber up the slope.





Halfway up he stopped and stood sucking air and trying to listen. The lights were somewhere below him. He couldnt see them. He climbed on. After a while he could see the dark shapes of the vehicles down there. Then the truck came back up the caldera with the lights off.





He lay flattened against the rocks. A spotlight went skittering over the lava and back again. The truck slowed. He could hear the engine idling. The slow lope of the cam. Big block engine. The spotlight swept over the rocks again. It's all right, he said. You need to be put out of your misery. Be the best thing for everbody.





The engine revved slightly and idled down again. Deep guttural tone to the exhaust. Cam and headers and God knows what else. After a while it moved on in the dark.





When he got to the crest of the ridge he crouched and took the .45 out of his belt and uncocked it and put it back again and looked out to the north and to the east. No sign of the truck.