Acts of Nature - By Jonathon King Page 0,69

crowbar to the doorjamb, gouging with a sharp edge at the outside of the frame, maybe figuring like a cheap thief he could bust a hole and then reach through and simply turn the lock button from the other side. The other two stood and watched, waiting like dutiful, anxious apprentices for the foreman to sic them to task.

“Know what the problem is with people like you, Mr. Freeman, who come out here in the Glades to take what you want whether it’s the fish or the game or even the fresh water for yourselves and leave nothin’ but garbage and trash behind?” Buck said while he pried at a corner.

I did not answer, sure that he would do so for me.

“Y’all think you’re entitled, you know? You think that just because this is open country and it don’t look like what you have in the cities on the coast, that it’s free and clear to just take and do what you want with. Build what you want in it. Come out here and piss in it and then go on home.

“You know, my daddy and his daddy before him spent lifetimes living out here, taking what was natural and right and working their asses off and they didn’t do it for riches, Mr. Freeman. They done it for survival and they done it for their families and really all they ever wanted was to be left alone and left to it.”

The one called Wayne shifted his weight; the axe was now in his hand, hanging by his side like he was itching to do damage with it. The other one, Marcus, was still sneaking looks at Sherry, who was silent now but I kept watching her, the rise and fall of her chest, and it was slight but steady. Both of the boys looked bored, scratching at their dirty necks like they’d heard this speech before and had little interest in it. It was getting dimmer in the room, the light now slanting through the doorway that they’d left open, the window to the east gone dark in shadow.

I had held my tongue but decided to take a chance.

“I don’t disagree with you, Buck,” I said, purposely using his first name, and it caused a flicker in his eyes. “I know a man, actually someone I would call a friend, who lived the same kind of life your own family did. I’ve heard him talk the same way many times. The name is Brown. Nate Brown. Maybe you’ve heard of him?”

The use of Brown’s name caused all three to stop moving. They may have even stopped breathing for a second. The boys looked at each other. Buck stood stock-still, staring at the end of the crowbar.

“Go on outside,” Buck finally barked. “Find a damn window to get through or somethin’.” The boys picked up the tools from the floor and left.

Buck set the crowbar aside and bent down on his haunches to look me in the face, sitting on his heels in the way of farmers and country folks who work the dirt but refuse to sit in it. He adjusted the .45 in his belt, the grip exposed and handy.

“So, Mr. Freeman. You heard about the legend of Mr. Brown from some drunk fisherman or somethin’ and now you say you know him and me? Is that it?”

I’d actually met Nate Brown during my first year in my shack. I had found the body of a child on my river who had been one of a string of abductions and murders of children from suburban homes. Brown had helped me to find the madman responsible and remove that stain from those he considered his people. I admired the old guy and his quiet ethics. But this man was nothing like him.

“I said I know Nate. I never said I know you, Mr. Morris. I said I’d heard Nate talk about the same things you just did but I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t run into Nate Brown out here looting other people’s properties after a storm just for leftovers.”

Buck’s eyes took on an internal look, glassed over like he was seeing something in his own head that needed to be studied. The anger I expected didn’t come. Or the denial.

“If you know Nate Brown, Mr. Freeman, then you know he is a man who did what he had to do in his time. And it wasn’t all legal then neither. The Gladesmen do what they have to do.”

“Buck,” I