Stone Cross (Arliss Cutter #2) - Marc Cameron Page 0,43

turned up her nose and gave an understanding nod. “That is exactly what pruno smells like.”

Natalie beat the side of her head softly against the window while she spoke. “It’s a real problem. I’d say most of the violent crime is directly related to home brew. And many of the students I deal with in SPED suffer from fetal alcohol syndrome.”

“You make the whole village sound horrible,” Paisley said.

“Oh, it’s far from horrible,” Natalie said. “But there are some horrible situations. Like I said, to leave out those issues would be dishonest.”

“Aren’t the troopers doing anything about the crime?” Paisley asked. “It’s a little place. It can’t be that difficult.”

Natalie laughed derisively, then apologized. “People here are no different from people anywhere else. They are smart and vibrant and rich in culture. They get plenty of missionaries who think they need to be rescued.”

“But they do need rescuing?” Markham said, a little too smugly for Cutter’s way of thinking.

“Everyone needs rescuing, Judge,” Natalie said. “Like all of us, though, they have to be the ones to rescue themselves.”

“Do you think we’re in danger?” Ms. Paisley said. “Of getting mugged, I mean.”

“No,” Natalie said. “At least not any more than you would be in Anchorage.”

“Not saying much, these days,” Lola said.

“Stone Cross has wonderful people,” Natalie said. “And a handful of assholes, just like everywhere else in the world. Don’t get me wrong though. I love it. I wouldn’t be living in an apartment with a couch that smells like cat pee and a grime ring around the tub that looks like it was sandblasted in, if I didn’t . . .” Her voice trailed off and she sat up straighter in her seat, as if steeling herself for something. “We’re about there.”

Cutter pressed his forehead against the window. He saw nothing but fog.

“How do you know where we are?” Paisley asked. “The rest of us can’t even see the ground.”

“It sounds weird,” Natalie said, “because I’m a science nerd, but you build up a sort of radar out here. You just know when you’re getting close to home.”

The village of Stone Cross ghosted into view just then, as if to illustrate her point. A dozen aluminum boats sat along the riverbank, looking sad and abandoned out of the water. They were tumped this way and that as if they’d been deposited by a receding flood. Rough clapboard houses ran along the river for about two hundred yards, then up five short, muddy side streets, like sparse and uneven teeth on an old comb. A gray-white church lay at the eastern point of the southernmost tooth. Stone Cross K-12 was at the opposite end of town, where the main street ran along the river. The school was easily the largest structure in town and had an outdoor basketball court as well as playground equipment.

The three-thousand-foot gravel runway was located almost a mile out, past the dump, farther from the bank of fog that ran along the river. A parade of ATVs was already heading out of town as they flew over. Some of them pulled plywood trailers.

“Welcoming committee,” Earl said into his headset as he banked the airplane to the left on final approach. “Hondas should be there by the time we land.”

“Those are green,” Judge Markham said, face against the window. “I expect they’re some model of a Polaris. Honda ATVs are usually red. That yellow one is probably a Can-Am.”

Earl half turned, before focusing again on landing the aircraft. “Do a lot of four-wheeling, do we, Judge?”

“A fair amount with the grandchildren,” Markham said, sounding pleasant enough.

“Well,” Earl said, “in the bush, Honda is a generic for every kind of ATV. It’s like when you order a Coke in Texas and it could be Dr Pepper or Sprite.”

“Noted,” Markham said, nodding slowly. If he was offended, he didn’t show it.

The plane settled in, the discomforting blare of the stall warning pouring through the cabin as the pilot used throttle and angle to bleed off the speed necessary to make the airplane stop flying. They glided just a few feet off the runway before touching down with little more than a bump. Clouds of snow blew by the windows. The stall warning horn fell silent. Earl rolled to a wide gravel apron at the very end, then gunned the throttle to turn the airplane around before taxiing back to the line of waiting ATVs. Cutter noticed that he turned again so he was facing slightly downhill, probably to keep from