..... The headlamps moved toward us thorough the foggy woods. I grabbed hold of Moon's arm, and I pulled him back into the reeds.
..... The headlamps belonged to an old pickup, which rolled out of the fog-hung pines and onto the crushed oystershell along the creek. It rattled and moaned as the tires crunched right past us. It brought with it the smell of exhaust fumes and burnt oil and beer.
..... The creek we were on was the Bonita, and me and Moon had been out stringing up a trot line. It was early summer and past midnight, and it should have been just me. Moon though had caught me slipping out and said he'd tell our Daddy if I didn't let him come along. Moon was pale and asthmatic and all of eleven. Come the end of June, I would be fourteen.
..... The truck came to a stop a dozen yards down, just beneath the old trestle bridge. I recognized it as the one that belonged to the Averys. Jimmy Avery, who wasn't but five or six years past me, sat atop the mounted tool box in back. When the truck stopped, he dropped off the side and went around to the tailgate. He flipped it down and reached a long, tattooed arm into the darkness of the bed. He grabbed hold of something back there and seemed to struggle with it. I saw then what it was.
..... Jimmy's Daddy and Junior Avery got out of the cab with beers in their hands. When Mr. Avery saw Jimmy was having some trouble, he dropped his beer in the grass and reached back in the cab for the gun rack. Jimmy waved him off. Junior went around back to help his brother and Mr. Avery raised open the top lid on the tool box. He took out a big length of tow rope done up in a thick, heavy coil.
..... "What're they up to, David?" whispered Moon.
..... "I think they're gonna string up a coon."
..... "A racoon?" he whispered. "What for?"
..... "No, dumbass," I said. "A nigger."
..... In case there was any doubt, Junior and Jimmy pulled a man out of the truck bed feet first. They slid him over the tailgate and let him drop with his full weight on his back on the oystershell. The man was black alright and missing a shoe, though that was the very least of his problems. His pants were muddy and torn, and his hands looked to be bound up behind him with tape. He had a burlap bag of some sort tied over his head, and the burlap was soaked through with blood.
..... They dragged him around the truck by the ankles, and the oystershell cut deep into his back and arms. His bloody t-shirt rode up behind him to the shoulders, but still, he was limp as a sack of cotton. He didn't make a sound.
..... "Oh, my god, David," whispered Moon. I felt his bony little fingers latch onto my upper arm. His narrow face had gone even paler than normal, and his dark-ringed eyes had all of a sudden grown too big for his head. "We got to get the Law."
..... "We're two miles from nowhere," I whispered.
..... "Then we got to do something ourselves."
..... "To hell with that, Dumbass," I said. "We just got to get on. They catch sight of us out here they'll kill us dead as that nigger himself."
..... Moon turned my arm loose. He gave me a disappointed look and made to move out of the reeds. I grabbed hold of his own arm, but he pulled away. I grabbed him in a headlock and he struggled, but hadn't near the strength to break loose. I put a hand over his mouth and pulled him toward the water.
..... I looked back to what was playing out under the bridge. Mr. Avery had tied one end of the tow rope to the truck's front bumper. He flung the other end toward the trestle. He got it over on the second try. Junior and Jimmy had pulled the bloody man around the far side of the truck by then, and I could no longer see him. They laughed and spoke in low, rough voices that echoed eerily in the fog. They kicked hard several times at something at their feet, and I had a good idea of what it was. After a bit of it, Junior unzipped his pants.
..... I turned away and moved for the water. I felt a sharp, stabbing pain in the fat part of my thumb. Goddamn Moon was biting my hand. I turned him loose and nearly yelled. I caught myself just in time. I didn't catch Moon. He tore away from me and broke out of the reeds. I grabbed for him once more, but he was already on the oystershell.