Hunter's Moon, Chuck Logan [i am reading a book TXT] 📗

Weary of it, Harry shook Karson by the shoulder. “So just how deep into his masculine feeling did you get?”

Karson pulled away. “I refuse to dignify that with an answer.” He relished Harry’s frustration. “There’s a dark side in all of us. We talked about that. The wild men in our dreams…there is always temptation.”

“You laid this shit on a confused sixteen-year-old? I should whip you through hell with barbed wire,” Harry said coldly.

“I tried to help him,” stated Karson.

“You don’t get it, do you? Chris wasn’t like you. You want 342 / CHUCK LOGAN

the war paint without the war. He picked up a gun,” Harry said.

Bud came between them and pushed Harry away. “Everybody calm down,” he ordered. Bud and Harry towered over Karson, their eyes drilling into him.

Karson cleared his throat. “Obviously I lost him to Emery when he decided to go hunting.”

Sadness gathered in the room, mushrooming, shutting off light.

Harry looked out the windows. Just the snow coming thicker.

Karson’s chin sagged to his chest “Tell me the story he wrote.

Maybe I can interpret it for you.”

“Fuck,” said Harry.

Bud fingered his strong chin and inspected his ragged fingernails.

“Tell him. I’m curious.”

“I’ve heard enough,” said Harry. He strode to the table, snatched the pistol, and shoved it in his waistband. “Bud, let’s get out of here.”

“C’mon, Harry,” Bud jerked his head, beckoning, “Tell it.”

Harry exhaled. “I don’t know. There’s this queer GI—”

“Gay,” corrected Karson.

“He has a crush on his officer. They get in this fight on a hill and everybody bugs out. Basically the guy stands his ground and dies saving everybody who ran away. There’s this drunk sergeant who comes back at the end and fights next to him. The description of the officer sounds a lot like Mitch Hakala.”

Karson’s fine features held a brittle edge of compassion. “Chris struggled with the warrior inside. There’s some things you should see right off. Bud, you were decorated in a hill fight. So was Emery.

Isn’t that true?”

“I don’t know about Emery.”

“I do,” Karson said with distaste. “Chris told me. And Emery was a sergeant.”

Harry watched the snow come faster against the windows. He was getting tired of Don Karson. Real tired, when he launched into pop psychology.

“Besides unrequited love, the other theme of the story is HUNTER’S MOON / 343

betrayal. Both of Chris’s heroes betrayed him. Emery couldn’t control Jesse and make the family whole. Bud, you threatened to turn him in for selling drugs. And the fact is”—Karson lowered his eyes—“you couldn’t control her, either. Chris took a desperate gamble to reunite his family with heroic death as the alternative.”

Bud looked to Harry and raised his eyebrows.

Harry shrugged. “Going down in the act of taking a shot at the last Maston confers martyr status in this fucked-up county. Least that’s what Emery’s mother, the local witch, suggested.”

Karson shook his head. “He committed suicide out there that day.”

Bud disagreed. “Too romantic, Don. You leave out the fact that he had a head full of PCP.”

“That, too,” said Karson sadly.

“You’re forgetting Becky,” said Harry. “She knows something.”

“Did she tell you that?” asked Bud.

Harry shook his head. “Not details.”

“Becky’s the smart one,” said Karson. “Maybe she’s hiding something or maybe it’s more obvious, maybe she’s just disassociating herself from the whole mess. She’s damaged, too. The human family can be a machine of torture.”

“Give me a fucking break,” Bud said scowling. “I’m tired of this hindsight soap opera about a bunch of wacko people jumbled up in trauma. We ought to put an end to this…suffering, don’t you think?”

Two shots cracked down the lake and Karson turned toward the sound. “Hunters,” he said hopefully.

“Only thing they’re hunting today is Larry Emery. I’ll call the sheriff’s office,” said Bud. He sighed, hefted the shotgun, went to the phone, dialed, and hunched over in conversation. Suddenly he spun around and shook with hysterical laughter. “They got him. Get this. They found him sleeping off a hang-over in the Historical Society. His mother came to the police to explain why he was late for work.”

344 / CHUCK LOGAN

Bud’s hilarity was infectious and created a giddy aura of amnesty between the three of them. “Poor Mike,” said Karson, grinning. “All those cops. Who’s going to pay all that overtime?”

Harry shook his head. “Emery’s still got a lot of explaining to do.

This isn’t over yet.”

Karson stood up. “I’d better get down there. He might need someone to talk to.”

Harry raised his eyebrows. Karson smiled sadly. “It’s my job.” He paused at the door. “You’re right, about the baggage. I shouldn’t have prejudged the man. And Harry, you can put that away now.”

He pointed at the pistol.

Bud stood at the windows and watched Don Karson’s station wagon accelerate down the driveway and pondered. “They’ll probably put Emery in drug-dependency treatment.” He giggled. “Nothing will be resolved. You’re right, you know. If I were found on this floor tomorrow morning with a bullet between my eyes, the legal system of Maston County would rule accidental death. Stray hunter’s bullet.” Bud mused softly, “And that bullet would have been fired at my grandfather before I was even born. Fuck ’em all. I guess we can’t really change people. I can’t change you. And I can’t change me. Maybe we should just be who the fuck we are, huh?”

“I have one last thing to do, file assault charges against that bastard Emery,” said Harry. “Then let’s get out of here.”

“Might as well. Too bad they canceled the court appointment.

That’s going to be something. When Jesse meets Linda.” He giggled again. “The daughter of Scarlett O’Hara meets the daughter of Gloria Steinhem.”

“You’re not giving her all that bread? After what’s happened?”

Bud grinned. “She’s probably sitting out in that trailer with Cox making lists of things she wants to buy. Her mad minute at Kmart.”

“Don’t sell Hakala short. She might downsize her figure once the grand jury cranks up,” said Harry.

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Bud regarded him through lidded eyes. “Good point. She took advantage of her kid’s death. And what did