I swam to the boat, pushed Medwell over onto his face in the bottom and climbed up into the stern.
As I steered in toward the dock Harry reached over and pulled the wallet out of Medwell’s hip pocket. I caught him by the scruff of the neck as he started toward the house.
He turned, vicious as a weasel. “Don’t think you’re getting any more money out of this, Lawson. He promised. I didn’t. Get your hand off me.”
I could crack his spine in my hands. I wanted to. He saw it on my face. He made wet sounds with his mouth and put his spread hands against my chest.
I hit him and caught him before he went into the water. I couldn’t find the blonde girl. He was beginning to stir by the time I had the bodies loaded. I hit him again and threw him in the station wagon with the bodies.
All the fine long years of work.
I drove to the village, to the trooper station on the far side and parked. I went in and told them everything and gave them the four hundred. I knew I had waited too long to turn back.
They kept me four days and let me go — without my license.
The sun is bright and hot. I’ve unbuttoned my shirt to the waist. Belle has talked me into finishing the work on the canoe. She won’t listen to me when I tell her it’s pointless. She has some crazy idea that all my regular customers would petition the Conservation Department about my license.
I tell her that we’re outcasts. We should move on. She has a blind, immovable faith in our friends and neighbors. I looked up a moment ago. There’s a half dozen of them coming up the road. They won’t come in. They just want to look at the ex-convict. Have a good look, friends. I won’t even look up.
But why should Belle sing at a time like this — unless they were coming as friends? She must be right. I’m one of them again, for good.