Carved in Bone

in the woods be booby-trapped with shotguns and copperheads? This lush, blue-green foliage waving in the breeze was the linchpin of Cooke County’s underground economy.
    While we were still a hundred yards away, Waylon gave a piercing whistle. A deep baying emanated from the hut, and a rickety screen door screeched open and then slapped shut. Loping toward us on legs nearly as long as mine was a huge red hound, lop-eared and goofy-looking. The beast charged up to Waylon and reared up like a stallion, then placed immense paws on his shoulders. He stood eye to eye with Waylon and licked him square on the mouth. Waylon laughed, making no effort to dodge the dog’s slobbery tongue.
    After he’d had his fill of kissing, the dog dropped to all fours and trotted over to sniff my crotch. Luckily, the smell didn’t inspire him to French-kiss me. “Best keep him and your girlfriend apart,” I said. “One of them’s liable to get jealous.”
    Waylon thumped the dog’s rib cage. “This here’s my buddy . Hard to believe it now, but a year ago, he could fit in the palm of my hand. Not much of a coon hound, turns out, but he’s a real sweet dog, ain’t you, Duke?” As if in answer, Duke slobbered happily on Waylon’s palm.
    The door screeched again, and a skinny, stunted echo of Waylon slouched toward us. “Hey, Vernon,” Waylon called. “I got the Doc here with me. He’s that genius bone detective I was telling you about.”
    Vernon nodded hello. I nodded back. “You’uns ain’t just come from a chicken fight, is you?” Vernon snickered at his own humor, and I shot Waylon a baleful look.
    Waylon fished a wallet from somewhere. “Here’s two hunnerd. I thought I’d be a little flusher, but I didn’t make out as well last Sunday as I planned.”
    That was my fault, I realized—if I hadn’t collapsed at the cockfight, Waylon could have stayed longer and wagered more.
    Vernon took the money and shook Waylon’s hand. “I ’preciate you. I hate to ask, but we’re still having a bad time with Ralph. He’s my least-un,” he explained to me. “He’s pale as a ghost, he won’t eat, and he’s got blood in his pee and his shit—’scuse my language, Doc. Waylon, he don’t look good at all. We’re afraid he ain’t gonna make it.”
    With good cause, I thought—it sounded like the child might have leukemia, but I hesitated to bring up the subject. Maybe I could talk about it with Waylon later.
    Waylon clapped Vern on the shoulder, then folded him in a bear hug, almost completely enveloping the smaller man. A muffled sob issued from the vicinity of the big man’s chest. “It’s gone be all right,” Waylon said. “Y’all just hang in there; everthing’s gone be all right. Listen, I got to get the Doc over to Jim’s.”
    In the distance, I became aware of the staccato thudding of a helicopter heading our way. Waylon’s head snapped up. “Shit, let’s go, Doc,” he said. “We got to be out of sight before that chopper sets down.”
    He bounded off the trail and scampered behind a tangle of fallen pines. I followed as quickly as I could, hoping we weren’t venturing into a different zone of booby traps. I heard a rustle behind us, and looked back to see Duke, the hound, following us.
    Once we were hidden, Waylon’s hand resting on Duke’s collar, we dared a look back toward Vernon’s hut. A sleek, black-and-gold Bell JetRanger settled into the edge of the clearing amid a whirlwind of leaves and dust. On the helicopter’s side was a five-pointed star and the words “Cooke County Sheriff.” As the turbine engine spooled down, Orbin Kitchings emerged from the cockpit and strode toward Vernon, utterly unconcerned about the rotor still freewheeling above his head.
    Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Waylon fiddling silently with something, but I paid it no heed until my nostrils caught a familiar and dreadful aroma: he had opened a can of Copenhagen, and I was directly downwind. I fought back the urge to gag, forcing myself to focus on the figures arguing in the clearing. As the noise from the engine and the prop died, I began to make out their conversation. “But that’s all I got,” said Vernon, his voice high and tight. “I ain’t playin’ games, that’s ever cent I have in this world. My boy’s been sick and I ain’t got no money till this crop comes in. Just come back then.”
    Orbin spat. “Shit, Vernon, it ain’t worth my time and fuel to come out here for this. I told you