It was coming from farther up the inlet, somewhere back in the mangrove trees. Paul twisted his face in a grimace of disgust and said, “What is that?”
“Dunno,” Arlen said, but he was facing into the wind and thinking that he knew very well indeed.
“You mean you don’t smell that stench?”
“I can smell it.”
“It’s awful. You ever smelled anything so awful, Arlen?”
“A time or two.”
They got back to work then, and the sun moved west and shone down on the inlet, unbroken by cloud. The smell intensified—a fetid, rotting stink. Arlen saw vultures coming and going from a spot in the marsh grass just up the creek from them, maybe three hundred yards away. They flicked through the trees as silent shadows, but there were many of them.
“Something died back there,” Paul said. “Wonder what it was.”
Who, Arlen thought. You wonder who it was.
Of course, it could be an animal. One of the boars they had out in these woods. Or perhaps someone’s hound had gotten loose and found its way down to the inlet and ran afoul of a snake. There were any number of possibilities.
An hour passed before Paul went up to the inn and came back with a rake in his hand, a thing with a mean-looking array of wide metal tines.
“The hell you think you’re doing?” Arlen said.
“We better check that out. Arlen, it smells like death.”
“Could be an animal.”
“Could be.” Paul gave him a long, steady look, and Arlen sighed and swore under his breath and dropped his saw to the ground, gathered an ax.
“All right. We’ll have a look.”
It was remarkable how fast the beach gave way to forest in this part of the state. Or to jungle, rather. It was more like that than any forest Arlen had ever known, choked with thick green undergrowth and snarling vines and soil that squished under your boots. They picked their way through the mud and the brush until they were walking beneath the trees—scrub pine nearest the dock and mangroves farther inland. The woods were a litter of torn leaves and branches, and it seemed half the trees had been sheared or uprooted completely during the hurricane. The vultures ahead of them watched their approach and flapped their wings, creating an eerie background as they walked deeper into the shadows.
“Go on,” Arlen shouted at the birds. “Go on!” He reached out and grabbed hold of a large banyan leaf and gave it a vigorous shake. A few of the birds took to the air then, but others stayed. Arlen could see now that the object of the scavenging was actually down in the water, which was why the vultures were perched in the trees instead of clustered around the find; they had to make quick passes and snatches with their beaks because the carcass was floating and they weren’t waterbirds. Just death birds.
“Arlen,” Paul said, “that looks like…”
“Yeah,” Arlen said.
The carcass was on their side of the creek but still thirty feet away and mostly underwater. Even from here, though, a stretch of fabric was visible. It was covered with mud and water, but even so you could see that it was a pale yellow.
“Give me that rake,” Arlen said, and the words didn’t come easily. Paul traded him the rake for the ax, and Arlen ran his tongue over dry lips and then stepped forward. The boy hung back, watching. Arlen had his eyes locked on the floating object and didn’t see the snake in his path until he’d nearly stepped on it. There was a flourish of motion that froze him with one foot hanging in the air, and then the water parted almost soundlessly and the snake slid off. Arlen stared after it for a moment and then continued on.
When he got closer, he yelled again and banged the rake through the leaves and sent the remaining vultures into the air. They didn’t go far, though. Only to a tree on the opposite side of the creek, where they could monitor their prize.
He knew by then what he’d suspected since the wind shifted and began to carry the smell to them. The vultures and the fish and the heat had combined to do dastardly things to this remnant of human life, and when he stood over the body he felt his stomach clench and had to take a quick glance at the treetops to steady himself. The stench was hideous, and he’d pulled his shirt up over his nose with the hand that didn’t hold the rake.
She floated upside down, and he could see one hand just beneath the surface of the water, some of the flesh picked clean, bone remaining. He remembered the way she’d traced his palm with her fingers.
It’s happened now, hasn’t it? she’d said, watching his face after her own had gone from flesh to bone in the darkness. He’s told them. It’s done.
Arlen had let her go. He’d seen death on her and he’d let her go and now her remains floated in the marsh, picked upon by forest creatures and vultures. Yes, there’d been armed men inside, but he’d let her go, he’d let them take her.