The man stood over him. A few years older than he, tall, sandy hair, a few days’ growth of beard, blue jeans and a denim shirt, cowboy boots.
Sean coughed grass out of his mouth. “What…” He spat. “What do you want with her?”
“Who the hell are you?” the man said. “Why do you care about her?”
“She’s…do you know who she is?” Sean said.
“Do you?” the man said.
Sean started to sit up, then the man’s boot connected with his ribs. Sean grunted and rolled over, and the man kicked him again. Before he landed a third kick, Sean tried to grab his leg, but the man backed off.
He heard another voice, not the booted man: “Leave him. We’re done.”
The booted man grunted in reply, but sent one more sharp kick to Sean’s abdomen. Then he moved away quickly, footsteps receding toward the river. Sean rolled over and retched into the grass, tasting all the whiskey he’d drunk.
He lay there for a long time, listening to the river and all the damned birds singing on all sides of him. He heard a car door slam, an engine start.
He raised himself up, his ribs stinging. He felt up and down his chest. Probably bruised but not broken. He took a few deep breaths-hard, but not too painful. Encouraging.
Sean slowly got to his feet, remembering the man’s words.
Do you?
What the hell did that mean? What kind of game were these people playing?
Leave him. We’re done.
By that time, they hadn’t seemed interested in Daryn. They’d been dealing with him, with Sean.
Leave him. We’re done.
Slowly, painfully, Sean began the climb back up toward the highway.
15
THE TOWN OF MULHALL, OKLAHOMA, EMBODIED history in a rougher, harder-edged way than Guthrie. If Guthrie was a shining example of urban renewal, Mulhall was a slice of rural America at its most real. Poverty coexisted with strong community ties; resilience took a seat right next to the despair that pervaded so many of America’s small towns. Not all of Mulhall’s history was over a century old, either-on May 3, 1999, most of the town had been wiped out by one of the more than sixty tornadoes that struck the state in a single day.
Now, more than half a decade later, Daryn could still see evidence of what had happened here-dead trees and mangled brush by the side of the road. She’d only been to the Coalition house once before, and Franklin Sanborn, who was a history buff, had explained Mulhall’s history to her. It was part of the reason he’d chosen Mulhall as the place to give birth to the Coalition.
Mulhall is the struggle of real people to survive, Sanborn had said. Mulhall is what the ruling classes have forgotten. From the natives to the cattlemen to the laborers who have to find work in the cities, to the desperation that gave way to hope after the storms destroyed the town-Mulhall is real.
The irony wasn’t lost on Daryn. In order to get at what was real, to get the ruling classes-people like her father-to pay attention, they’d had to construct a series of elaborate lies. Daryn had read once that the road to truth was paved with lies. She’d learned the lesson many times over by now.
“Real,” she muttered, without realizing she’d spoken aloud.
“What?” Sean said, half-turning to her.
Daryn shook her head. “Nothing.”
“It sounded like you said ‘real.’ Real was those guys back at the bridge. That’s twice in a very short time.”
Daryn swallowed. “They’re threatened. We’re pushing the envelope of society, and someone up the line is threatened by that.”
Sean said no more, grimacing behind the wheel. She looked at the scratches on his face. She’d already seen the bruises the man’s boots had left on his abdomen. Daryn closed her eyes, trying to shut it all out.
Britt squeezed her hand inquiringly. Daryn gave her what she hoped was a reassuring glance, then turned toward the front again.
Very little moved in the streets of Mulhall. There were a couple of brick Victorian-style buildings, including an old bank that had most recently housed a restaurant, now shuttered. There were a few frame houses along the main drag. Up the hill to the right was a gleaming new school, seeming so out of place that it looked like it had been placed here by mistake. But it was part of the history, having been rebuilt after the deadly tornado.
It took all of two minutes to travel the entire length of the town. Then Daryn pointed to a gravel road just north of the city limits. Sean turned left and drove another half mile between barbed wire fences. Daryn pointed again, and Sean made another left onto a driveway that was simply two deep ruts split by a line of grass. A hundred yards back from the road was a small, unremarkable white two-story frame house. It was neither well kept nor in noticeable disrepair. There was greenery around it, but not much. A chain-link fence surrounded it. Two pickup trucks and a dark four-door-with Oklahoma, Texas, and New Mexico plates, respectively-were parked in the clearing outside the fence.
Two men appeared at the door to the house-big, burly men in jeans, boots, and button-down shirts. They flanked the door and then Franklin Sanborn strode out onto the small porch.
Daryn almost laughed, despite the tension of what had happened a few miles back down the road. Sanborn himself was almost as forgettable in appearance as the house, as the black sedan he drove: his hair that held just a few gray threads; his eyes a light chocolate brown; his complexion was medium. He was right around six feet tall, weight proportionate, not a hard body but not flabby. Sometimes he wore glasses. Sometimes he didn’t. He was no one to be remembered.
Remember The Cause, he liked to say. Don’t remember me.
That was part of the reason Daryn believed in him. He wasn’t some messianic egomaniac like David Koresh, or an introverted, antisocial genius like Ted Kaczynski. He wasn’t some deprived little boy trying to get the world’s attention. He had a true social and political agenda, and a genius for planning.
Daryn and Britt got out of the Jeep, and Britt immediately reached for Daryn’s hand again as soon as they were outside. Sean got out more slowly, gingerly feeling his ribs. He looked around, then took out his duffel bag, which held his clothes and the extras he’d bought for Daryn.
Sanborn stepped forward. “Welcome,” he said. “Glad you made it out here.”
Even his voice was unremarkable. No discernible accent or regionalism. His English was so perfect that Daryn had often wondered if it might not be his first language, but he’d studied it and mastered general American dialect to perfection. He was fairly soft-spoken, and Daryn had never heard him raise his voice. He’d never needed to.
The two burly men stayed where they were, but Sanborn stepped off the porch and came out to the gate. He swung it open. “Come on in.”
Daryn leaned up to peck his cheek as she passed him. “Franklin, you remember my friend Britt.”
“Of course I do.” Sanborn turned and gave Britt his full attention. “Britt is part of the reason we exist.”
Britt nodded, casting her eyes down as if unworthy. She held even more tightly to Daryn’s hand.
“And this is my new friend Michael,” Daryn said.
Sanborn moved toward Sean, his hand extended. They shook. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Michael,” Sanborn said. “Welcome to the home of the Coalition. I’m Franklin Sanborn. I help to sort of facilitate things around here.”
“He’s much too modest,” Daryn said, looking over her shoulder at Sean. “He leads us.”