Raft of Stars Andrew Graff (free biff chip and kipper ebooks txt) 📖

Cal opened his hands in frustration. He was at a loss.

“That’s a real important question right now, Sheriff. How fast?”

Cal gave up. He’d have to get used to it when he quit police work, he reminded himself. “I don’t know. Water’s high. Maybe two, three miles per hour.”

Teddy nodded. “Let’s go with three to be safe.”

“Ted, you gotta let me know what you’re thinking.”

“Less than one hundred miles north of here, the river drops through the Ironsford Gorge. I know a hundred miles sounds like a long ways off, but if they drift the whole time—”

“How bad’s the gorge?” Cal asked. He knew it existed, but he’d never seen it. Most of the land belonged to the National Guard armory. They used it for training. Trespassing teenagers used it for beer parties.

“It’s a half mile of river canyon that drops a quarter mile in that same length. It’s all ledge rock and falls. I don’t think the boys know it’s there. If they go in, they die.”

Cal tapped his fingers together. “If they drift, we have about thirty hours.”

Teddy nodded. “We gotta move.”

Cal looked reluctantly at his mare. He cringed to think of placing his tailbone back in that saddle, his socked foot in the stirrup. The horse eyed him in the moonlight, hateful.

“We’ll be moving slower than they will at first,” said Teddy, “but we can make up time in the daylight. We don’t stop.”

Cal stepped over his attempted fire. He was thankful, at least, to leave that failure behind. “Lead on,” he said.

Twelve

FISH STIRRED TO THE SOUND OF BIRDS. THE FIRST THING HE SAW when he opened his eyes was the limb of a birch tree, moving overhead through a purple sky. In its branches, finches and chickadees preened their feathers and flitted and sang. Fish blinked and took a deep breath and smelled river, and then heard it lapping against the logs of the raft. He sat up from the wet pile of rope where he’d slept. He was chilled, damp.

“Hey,” whispered Bread.

Bread sat cross-legged near the edge of the raft, just aft of the wicker railing. He was turning something small and metallic over in his hands, looking out at the riverbank where the white trunks of birch trees reached over the water from hedges of cedar. River grass and cattails drifted past. The river was narrow here, maybe thirty yards at its widest. Fish closed his eyes and stretched his arms overhead, wrapped his flannel more tightly around himself, and walked tentatively to where Bread sat. Fish bounced his weight on the edge of the raft once or twice. It was a stable craft.

“I’m surprised the raft didn’t get hung up during the night,” Fish said.

“It did,” said Bread. “I pushed us off a sandbar a while ago.”

Fish noticed his friend’s jeans were wet up to the hips.

“Why didn’t you wake me up? I would have helped.”

“You were snoring,” Bread said, and tried to smile. His face looked pale beneath his matted hair. Fish squatted down next to him.

“Bread?” he asked. “You slept at all?”

“A little,” he said, and he fidgeted a bit, opened his hand to look in it, and closed it again.

“We’re out of food, I guess,” said Fish, trying to see if he could cheer him. “We’re poachers now.” Maybe it was the quiet of the woods, the cold air and dark cedars, but Fish felt something too, some kind of darkness. With the busyness of boatbuilding completed, they now just drifted through a silent forest. Fish looked up at the orange and purple sky. The sun would rise over the trees soon, and then Bread would perk up. Darkness would lift.

Bread forced a grin, swallowed it, and nodded. He bit his lip and looked out at the trees.

“Fish,” he said, and then tears fell from his eyes as if they’d been dammed there. A whole river let loose. Bread wiped his face with his shirtsleeve, but more tears came. Fish leaned forward, then waited a moment, and he saw what Bread held in his hand. It was an empty brass shell casing, the Magnum cartridge that killed his father.

Bread’s face twisted up, and his body shook when he tried to speak. His voice came out in a squeal. “My dad,” he said, and shook some more. “I’m all alone.”

Fish moved toward him and patted his back, but that felt wrong, so he put his arms around him instead. What else could he do? It was the first time he’d ever hugged his friend, but Bread leaned into it and accepted it, and Fish was glad he did it. Bread felt heavy in his arms, limp, and he sobbed and sobbed, and Fish felt his shirt get wet from it all. Fish remembered how he wept when he lost his dad. It didn’t come right away. It waited. But when it came he had his mom, and she knew what to say, knew something to say. Fish didn’t. So he just held his shuddering friend in a stiff embrace and looked out at the dark trees. The woods and river, so quiet a moment ago, were filled now with Bread’s sobbing. It sounded eerie out here in the wild, louder, sadder somehow. It went on for a long time, and then it stopped. Bread wiped his mottled face.

“Sorry,” he said.

Fish shook his head. He knew. Then he said what his grandpa had told him in the parking lot of that church. “Just because he’s not with us doesn’t mean you don’t have him. You have a father.”

Bread’s eyes widened in pain, and Fish figured he’d said the wrong thing. In Bread’s face flashed guilt and fear, even anger, all balled into one frown. The tears welled up, but this time Bread choked them back with great effort.

“I don’t want him with me, Fish. I’m glad he’s dead. I prayed he’d die.” The tears broke loose again. “And I know what that means about me, how bad I am.”

Fish sat