One Year After: A Novel Page 10

  “All right, Mr. Matherson—or is it Doc or Professor?”

  “Cut the shit. Just John. Hell, I walked into your ambush. So what do I call you?”

  Burnett leaned back and laughed. “There’s a crazy coot up over the mountains in Tennessee who insists he be called Your Holiness. Down in Haywood County, an ex-preacher is saying he is Christ reborn in this time of troubles. I bet there are a thousand nutcases with a thousand names.”

  He smiled, and John could not help but smile as well in reply. The coffee and food had settled down in his stomach, and he was beginning to feel somewhat better. He also sensed that if Burnett was talking like this, the prospect of an unpleasant ending had diminished.

  “I actually rather liked the stories I read about that Mongol guy, Genghis, after seeing a movie about him and a weird high school teacher who went over to where the guy lived and kept talking about riding with the Mongols and drinking fermented horse milk. But if I named myself after him, people would think I was into Star Trek movies. Thought as well about using Napoleon, but everyone who ever called themselves Napoleon is definitely a nut job.”

  “So Forrest then?” John asked.

  “Yeah, for the moment, that’s okay with me, but out there, it’s sir, if you get my drift.”

  “Okay.”

  “I assume you want the third alternative—that I let you go or trade you for something.”

  “Who wouldn’t? I want to live the same as you.”

  “So then, damn you, why do you and others like you keep hunting us?” There was a flash of anger from Burnett as he spoke.

  John looked at him quizzically, shook his head, and then regretted the action since the dizziness set back in. “What the hell do you mean?”

  “You sent a punitive expedition over Mount Mitchell last fall before the snow set in—killed three of my people in an ambush.”

  “Now wait a minute,” John replied, his temper rising up. “You and yours have been harassing us all along the north slope of the mountains ever since the shit hit the fan two years ago. Folks killed, food stolen. What am I supposed to do? Just sit back and let you rob us?”

  “Half the time, it was most likely someone else doing that. We picked off a couple of dozen of that Posse gang that fled up this way after you kicked their asses. Whoever is killing each other, do you know how barren it is up here? Over on your side of the mountains, you got good crop and grazing lands. After everything went to hell, you had barriers up on the road, and unless someone was a damn doctor or you took a liking to them—like that hot nurse I heard you married—it was move along and get the hell out of town.”

  He had nothing to say for a moment to that. It was mostly true. Makala, though, an “outsider,” had at least been in the town when the EMP hit. But the way Burnett spoke of her as “that hot nurse” ticked him off.

  “Insult me, but don’t insult my wife,” John snapped. “She was in the town that day it happened—a nurse from a cardiology unit—and she saved a helluva lot of lives afterwards, me being one of them. So back off on that, Forrest.”

  Burnett nodded. “Okay. My apologies.”

  That was something about the culture of this region that John always admired coming from New Jersey. Contrary to stereotypes, there were aspects of Southern culture that nearly all observed. One was respect for women, something that too many called sexist but John saw as just basic, decent politeness. Burnett had crossed a line regarding another man’s wife and had immediately pulled back. It raised his opinion of him a few notches.

  “It was survival, Forrest. If we took in everyone who came up through the pass after everything went to hell—and yes, over the mountains too—we’d have been feeding ten times as many, and everyone would have died within two months. I got forced into the position. I didn’t like it, but I had to make decisions that were tough, and if I didn’t, no one would have lived. And I’ll bet you would have done the same and most likely did and are still making those decisions.”

  “Yeah, well, the same with us here.”

  “Didn’t give you the right to raid us as you do.”

  “That granny woman who looked at your head used to be a nurse at Memorial Mission in Asheville,” Burnett replied as if shifting the subject to safer ground. “I got people up here with me, the same as you, before everything went sour. Mostly working folks born in these mountains, unlike the rich bastards that started to flood into Asheville, too many of them trust-fund brats playing at being hippies and jacking the price of a few acres of land through the roof because they liked the view. Then they turn around and wanted taxes raised for their pet projects and pushed us out. Oh, we were good enough to do the hard labor when things were good, but the day after the power died, it was get the hell out and stay out.

  “George, who damn near killed you … his family has lived up here for near on to two hundred years. A damn good carpenter. Most of his family starved to death by the first winter, then one of your trigger-happy shooters killed his older brother in that ambush last fall. You’re lucky he didn’t blow your head off.”

  “Maybe he wants to castrate me in front of everybody,” John retorted angrily.

  “Don’t joke. You ain’t far from the truth. He sees it as payback.”

  John fell silent.

  “Point is, we are trying to survive, same as you. We might look like a ragged lot, no fancy civility like you got down in Black Mountain and that college where I heard you were a professor before all of this. Difference was that a lot of those up here were of tougher stuff and refused to conveniently die off. Up here, folks still had a handle on a lot of the old ways. Oh, we were quaint for the tourists from Atlanta driving through along the parkway or coming up here once a year to buy Christmas trees. That was actually our biggest cash crop back then, other than weed. Ever think how many folks are buying Christmas trees now or making a living on farmland that was played out generations ago?”

  John did not reply, sensing the wisdom to not interrupt.

  “So how do we survive, when every town like yours sealed itself off? Too many folks for too little good land, and within several months, the forests hunted out so completely I ain’t had a taste of venison in over a year, and someone bringing in a greasy possum was a reason to celebrate.”

  John did not say anything or reveal that after the cup of coffee and the long hours of being either tied or handcuffed to the bed, he was about to explode.

  Burnett, sensing his distress, pulled out a key, unclipped the cuff around John’s ankle, and motioned to the door, which John gratefully headed for.

  “John.”

  He looked back.

  Burnett was casually holding his .45. “Nice gun, John. Hate to shoot you with it if you try to run. It would spoil George’s day, me killing you rather than him getting to.”

  Even if the temptation to run had been there, as John staggered off to the edge of the tree line, he knew it would be hopeless. Whoever these reivers were, there were certainly a hell of a lot of them around, and they knew the ground far better than he could ever hope to figure out. The clearing around the mountain crossroads was an encampment, a hodgepodge of old RVs and pickup trucks with canopies rigged over the rear bed. Some fires were burning—over one of them, a pig was speared and being turned over the fire, most likely one of Stepps’ spring sucklings. There were nearly as many children as adults, a ragged lot most of them, just like the children in Black Mountain the winter after the Day, hanging about whenever someone had managed to snag some game. The scent of it wafted out into the street.

  Finished with his task, John slowly walked back to the hut they had put him in. Burnett nodded, uncocking the semiautomatic and holstering it, the holster John had been wearing just hours before.

  “You ever shoot a man before everything went bad?” Burnett asked as John sat back down.

  “I never fired a shot at someone with intent to kill until I had to execute that kid who stole drugs from the nursing home. I think it best not to ask what yo
u went through in Afghanistan.”

  “Something like that,” Burnett replied calmly.

  “Look, let’s cut the crap with this working-class sergeant from the mountains versus a colonel who you think had a silver spoon up his butt. I didn’t grow up in the mountains, but I sure as hell grew up in a tough place in New Jersey, so I know the game. If you hate my guts for that, so be it. All of us are in a world of shit now, so what is it you want from me if you decide not to kill me? Or is this just some head game for your entertainment before you string me up or blow my brains out?”

  Burnett nodded and stood up after several minutes of silence.

  “My wife, well, she left me the year after I came back from the war minus an arm, an eye, and half my mind. Had a son—heard they’re dead, along with the bastard she hooked up with … killed or executed.” He hesitated. “They were living down in Charlotte. I heard long afterwards they fell in with that Posse.”

  John lowered his head. “Merciful God,” he whispered.

  “Maybe you or one of yours was the ones that shot her. I don’t give a good damn about the bum she hooked up with—I hope someone did kill him, slowly. But still, she was once my wife, and my boy was with her. You shoot any kids with that group, John Matherson? He’d have been twelve.”

  John looked up at Burnett. “No, we didn’t shoot any kids that day. If any were still traveling with them, they were left behind before the fight and scattered afterwards. If she was with them, Forrest, you know what I had to do. They were literally cannibals, and that was beyond the pale of any civilized society, or at least the civilization we’re trying to rebuild.”

  Burnett was silent just looking down at him as if weighing the life-or-death decision.

  “What would you have done?” John finally snapped back. “If you had taken any prisoners from that group of cannibal barbarians, what would you have done?”

  “Are you pleading with me, Matherson?”

  “Hell no,” he snapped back. “Whatever you’re going to do will most likely happen no matter what I say.”

  “You shoot my people for snatching a few pigs.”

  “And again, in this mad world, you’re doing the same—killing mine. Maybe one of my closest friends is dead because of what happened a few hours ago. And if he is, you know all bets with me are off if you let me go.”

  Burnett started for the door and then looked back. “A helluva shitty world we’ve been handed, Matherson. Makes Afghanistan look like paradise. It’s what America is sinking into now, Colonel. Think about it. America, the new Afghanistan.”

  “Was that what we fought for over there?” John asked. “Is that what we’re fighting to prevent now?”

  Burnett smiled, and for a moment, there was that frightful two-thousand-yard stare. “You’ll have my decision regarding what to do with you at sundown,” he snapped as he slammed the door shut and locked it.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  DAY 735

  “There’s the flag of truce,” Burnett whispered. “Now remember, the slightest wrong move, and everyone is wasted.”

  Things were still slightly blurry, the lingering aftereffects of the concussion.

  “My people honor their word. I’m more worried about yours.”

  They were sitting in an old Polaris four-wheel-drive off-road vehicle that had been upgraded with an attempt at some armor across the front to protect the engine. John and Burnett sat in the backseat, a couple of the reivers—heavily armed men—up front. A half dozen other vehicles of Burnett’s had stopped a quarter mile back above the north shore of the reservoir and with professional skill spread out on foot to either flank. John did worry now that maybe the entire thing was a setup, an ambush to wipe out some of his best before putting a bullet in his head.

  It was good at least to be back out in the open after three days locked up in the fetid cabin. He got twice-daily visits from Maggie, who advised him to just stay in bed and let the concussion heal, and the food had actually been rather good—indulgent, even, given that it was pork stolen from the Stepp family, and rather than saving or rationing it, the group had been gorging themselves on it as if there were no concern for tomorrow. Only problem was chewing it, between the sore jaw on one side from getting slugged and the bad tooth on the other side. Maggie actually took a look at it and offered to “pop that little ole thing out,” but he adamantly refused.

  Burnett had dropped in a few times, conversations short and a bit taunting that the group was still debating his fate—implying that execution was still an option—but John knew that was just a sham to see how he’d react. Why waste precious food on a doomed prisoner?

  Then this morning, they had blindfolded him and led him out of the hut he was quartered in. He could hear the crowd gathered around to watch some jeering, and for a moment, his heart sank. Without comment from Burnett, he was shoved into the backseat of the Polaris, and the expedition left the encampment.

  He said nothing, but there was definitely a wave of relief. Execution would have been a public affair. They were most certainly not just driving off into the woods for a private shooting. He could sense they were going back up over the Mount Mitchell range. It was a tedious, hammering, head-splitting climb of a couple of hours and then an equally jolting drive back down what must have been a fire road through the forest until coming to a stop, and Burnett unfastened the blindfold.

  “So you’re letting me go.”

  “Trading you.” Burnett chuckled. “Your weight in salt. We got plenty of ammo and food, but salt is getting hard to find.”

  John took that in, not really feeling humiliated. A long time ago, trading prisoners for salt had been a practiced norm. Weight in silver also? For Burnett’s group, salt was more valuable than silver. Salt meant preserved food. Silver was to those living in a barter world just metal—though Doc Wagner was experimenting with grinding pure silver into a formula for antibiotics—but salt could preserve hundreds of pounds of meat and was a dire necessity of diet, especially in the heat of summer.

  There was a long stretch of straightaway ahead paralleling the left shore of the reservoir—the same place where he had been ambushed—and in the distance, John could see his people deploying out.

  “The negotiated agreement was twenty on each side as escorts, salt to be left in the road. But I suspect your people got a lot more hidden to the flanks.”

  “Same with yours,” John said, looking back at the assortment of vehicles.

  He could sense the tension. Though confined in the squalid cabin during his stay with the reivers, he could easily hear the conversations and arguments, George indeed arguing it would bring prestige to them if they strung John up and then sent his body back as a warning.

  “So why didn’t you kill me?” John asked.

  “I have a hankering for salt,” Burnett replied, “and this is the easiest way to get it.”

  “It’s more than that,” John replied, and he actually forced a smile. “The real reason.”

  Burnett sat back, asking the two escorts who were sitting up front—one of them George—to get out and go up the other road and signal when everything was clear. They were not happy with the assignment but followed his orders.

  “Let’s talk,” Burnett announced, and then he did something remarkable for John. He pulled out a pack of cigarettes—merciful God, they were actually Dunhills—opened the pack, lit one up, and offered it to John, who was nearly trembling at the sight of them. He finally shook his head.

  “I heard you were quite the smoker,” Burnett said.

  “You seem to know a lot about me.”

  “I had a few people in with you for a while.”

  John gazed longingly at the cigarettes but then remembered the day he quit. Once an addict, always an addict, he thought. And if I have one now, I’ll be begging for more, giving this man the advantage.

  He shook his head in refusal, though he did breathe in deeply as the smoke curled around him.

  Burnett shrugged at his refusal
and stuffed the pack into his battle jacket tunic.

  “This is about more than me being traded for salt,” John said.

  “Yup. Ball is in your court, Matherson. So start talking. I can still change my mind and blow your brains out here in front of those people of yours, toss your body out, and boogie back over the mountain.”

  “You want a war? Because that will trigger it.”

  “My camp is mobile; you saw that. I can be twenty miles away before nightfall. You and yours are stuck in one place, and we’ll just keep pecking away at you. I have all the advantages of mobile offense over static defense, and you know it. And you don’t have the manpower to send an army up over my mountains; we know far better than your people. We’ll run you ragged, wear you down, and just keep picking you off.”

  “So you are telling me you hold all the cards.”

  Burnett smiled. “Most of them. If you throw in with this new government in Asheville, you just might have more, but word is half your strength is getting drafted off, making you even more vulnerable.”

  “So back to the original question,” John said. “Why the trade? It’s about more than salt.”

  Burnett shrugged. “You tell me.”

  “You want a truce?” John replied.

  “A trade in our favor, I’d prefer to call it.”

  “I don’t give away favors without a quid pro quo,” John snapped. “And besides, I said it the first day and will say it again now just so everything is perfectly clear. If I find out my friend Maury was killed by your people—especially that psycho of yours, George—it becomes personal for me, mayor of the town or not. You’ll have a personal vendetta on your hands.”

  “Ballsy talk for someone I could still shoot now,” Burnett said, and he actually smiled and then nodded. “Your friend is okay. My negotiator checked on that.”