Page 138 of The Reformatory

“That explains it all, doesn’t it?” Marian said. “With all the filthy, immoral things he’s done, no wonder he’s half-crazy with ghost stories.”

“He told me to find Robert Stephens. That’s his ‘haint catcher,’ or whatever nonsense.”

“Where is Robert? Is he all right?”

“I don’t know, Marian, but I saw him covered in Vaseline, carrying a bag on his back. I was so busy worrying about what I’d seen in the shed, I didn’t think twice. But now that I look back on it… he might be running away.”

VIII THE HUNT

38

5:25 p.m.

The whole world was summer corn plants. When Robert strayed away from the fence to try to avoid being spotted as he ran, he lost his bearings and thrashed through the stalks in a panic, like the time he almost drowned after jumping from the Misery Swamp dock and Gloria reached down to save him. He wasted valuable time trying to veer back toward the fence rather than running straight ahead in what he guessed was the direction of the promised woods, but even tracking the position of the low-hanging sun couldn’t keep him from getting lost and tangled in the endless green field. He wished he had a compass to guide him north. When he found the fence again, he was too close. A loud argument between two white boys on the other side reminded him to duck low. He hoped they wouldn’t hear his ragged breathing.

And he was sure he heard dogs. Every few steps he stopped running to listen past his heart’s roar to be sure the hounds weren’t chasing him. Usually the barking was only in his imagination; once, the yapping dog he heard from the road behind him sounded far too small to be a tracker, but he started running faster to be sure. But the quicker he ran, the more he lost track of the columns of corn, panic coursing through his body like lashes from Haddock’s whip. How could he make it through the woods if he couldn’t even find his way in the cornfield?

Haddock was probably chasing him by now, releasing the dogs from their kennel. Soon Robert was crying from the horror of what he’d done and the hopelessness of trying to run. His legs buckled and he tumbled down, skinning both of his knees white in the fall. The haint jar landed so hard that he was afraid he’d broken it, so he rifled quickly through the satchel to be sure it was intact. It was all there: the slightly wrinkled drawing of Redbone, the tied pack of photos, the jar of ash. Nothing was broken or lost, except maybe him.

“Blue!” he called out to the sky. “You here? Which way do I go?”

A crow cawed from above. Robert looked up: a single crow he hadn’t noticed before circled him like a buzzard waiting on him to die. If not for what Blue had told him, Robert would have thought it was bad luck and shooed the big crow away. He couldn’t stop imagining the crows gathered near the slaughtered hog the last time he’d been with Redbone.

“Is that you?” Robert called. He expected the crow to land near him and take a human form, but instead it flew ahead… and then circled back, a shadow passing over him. Almost like an ordinary crow, but not quite. The crow was trying to lead him. It was Blue! Or seemed to be. Crows had always looked ugly and fearful to Robert, but this one had jet-black feathers that shined in the sun, and it struck him that crows had always been lovely. This one was, anyway.

That was enough to get Robert back on his feet and dry his eyes. Robert followed the soaring crow toward the woods.

The longer Fenton Haddock waited for someone to find Robert Stephens to take care of his newest haint problem, the more he was convinced something was badly, badly wrong. The certainty was an itch in his brain, the voice of his younger self—his less disciplined self—that whispered his worst thoughts to him. You let them get the best of you, the voice said. They’re all making a fool of you. You should’ve let these burn too.

His staff had blocked off the cafeteria door because it was so smoky inside, so dozens of waiting boys were sitting in the grass, organized by dormitory, waiting for sandwiches the kitchen crew was working on from folding tables hastily set up against the wall. Boone said no one else had been hurt in the fire, but Boone was calling off names from his ledger just the same, getting a head count. No boy ever missed dinner unless he was up to no good.

And Robert Stephens was still nowhere in sight. Haddock watched for Stephens as every new boy streamed toward the cafeteria, but he did not come.

Crutcher had gone looking for Stephens at the dormitory, but Haddock didn’t trust Crutcher to the task alone, so he’d sent a couple of other dorm masters out to drive around the campus and look for Stephens too. Boone said he hadn’t given him a pass to the white side of the campus, so he shouldn’t have been so hard to find—unless he didn’t want to be found. Had Stephens taken advantage of the excitement to try to disappear? The voice inside him posed an even more alarming question: Did Stephens set the fire somehow so he could run? What if a haint hadn’t set it at all? The plan seemed cunning and far-fetched for a boy of twelve, but Haddock couldn’t let go of it easily. The thought made him so nervous that he patted his back pocket for his billfold to find the spare cigarette and matchbook he kept hidden in the folds.

The cigarette was crumpled and stale, but he never kept fresh ones because he didn’t like the way cigarettes made him cough at night, no matter what the doctors in the radio ads promised about the new filters. His parents had smoked and then coughed themselves to death by the time they were sixty, so doctors be damned. But a jolt of nicotine cleared his mind, so from time to time Haddock allowed himself one spare so he could get enough of what he needed but not enough to like it. The cigarette was so deformed that he could barely light it, but it finally took.

Haddock had almost slid his billfold back in his pocket when he remembered his ritual of checking the zippered change compartment where he kept his spare desk key. His main key was snug on the ring strung to his belt, where he touched it at least a dozen times a day, but he checked on his spare only when he used his billfold.

The compartment was empty. His spare desk key was gone.

Haddock’s lips pulled apart so fast that the cigarette fell to the grass. Haddock tried to slow his quickening heart by quizzing himself calmly on when he might have last used the key; no more than a couple of days could have passed since he’d seen it. Had he left it on his dresser at home? Spilled it out with the change he’d put in the change jar on his kitchen counter? Had his wife been rifling through his wallet and pulled it aside without knowing what it was? He’d slapped her more than once for touching his things, so he doubted she would have the nerve. But it was possible—wasn’t it? Because where else—

The smoky smell that clung to his clothes and hair answered his question. If a haint had started the fire, couldn’t a haint also have stolen his key? Kendall Sweeting had already pulled his photos out of his drawer more than once, before Boone laid his trap. What if…?

“Shit,” Haddock said, all calm stripped from his mind. The day’s events felt inextricably linked in such an obvious way that Haddock didn’t need to hear the voice in his head say, He’s made a damn fool of you. And you better do something about it.

Haddock ran for his truck, which was still parked near the kitchen door. He gestured for Boone, who put down his clipboard and stopped his roll call. Haddock was in a hurry, so Boone hurried too. Haddock wished he had ten men like him.

“I don’t think any of this is an accident,” Haddock said as he drove across the grass to the field that led to the administration building, the truck going so fast that even Boone looked uneasy. “I need to check something in my office… then we’re gonna find Robert Stephens ourselves.”

“I would’ve seen Stephens by the kitchen,” Boone said, not yet understanding, but Haddock didn’t have time to broaden his thinking. No, Stephens probably had not set the fire; in fact, he’d been smart enough to steer clear of the kitchen altogether. But that didn’t mean he hadn’t had anything to do with it—that he hadn’t helped coordinate it in some fashion. Haddock had ordered Cleo to kill Redbone to break Stephens and motivate him to trap haints without lies or disobedience—but what if Stephens really was like his daddy at his core? What if he made plans instead of getting scared? Stephens was only twelve, but Haddock had learned not to underestimate children the same way he knew never to underestimate Negroes.

He hoped he hadn’t underestimated this one.

Doris stood up behind her desk, startled, when Haddock and Boone came bursting in from outside. The woman he’d been scheduled to interview as a schoolteacher was also in the lobby, her mouth in a surprised O at the sight of them. Business as usual in Haddock’s office.

No accusations or repulsion in their eyes. No sign of the sheriff. No photographs in view. “Is everything all right?” Doris finally said.