"Take the car and go find a phone," Pemberton said, his voice tightening when a new wave of pain hit. "Call Bowden and tell him to fetch a doctor and get up here. Then go on to the camp and find Serena. She'll tell you what else to do."

Galloway did not reply at first. He instead stepped over to the tote sack and placed the hunting knife inside, used his fingers and thumb to slip the sack through his belt and make a knot. It was done so deftly as to appear one fluid motion.

"She already has," Galloway said, "told me what to do, I mean. Which is why I'll be leaving you here."

For a few moments Pemberton did not understand. His guts contracted with such force he grabbed his stomach, fingernails breaking the skin as if trying to dig out the pain's source. He shivered violently, and the pain lessened only to return again just as intensely. Pemberton felt lightheaded, almost ready to faint, and he wondered if that might be as much from the loss of blood as the venom.

"Must be that sandwich your Missus made special for you," Galloway said. "She mixed some rat poison into the mustard, then added some of that Paris Green to sweeten it. I asked her what if you tasted the poison, but she said men never noticed nothing that wasn't square in front of them. Guess she was right about that."

Galloway paused and wiped a dribble of tobacco juice from his chin. Pemberton felt blood inside his mouth and knew his gums bled. He spit out some of the blood so he could speak, but Galloway began talking again.

"She said to tell you she thought you the one man ever strong and pure enough to be her equaling, but you wanting that child alive showed the otherwise of that."

Pemberton closed his eyes a few moments and tried to focus through the pain. He tried to understand what Galloway was telling him, but it seemed too much. He tried to settle on one thing.

"How'd she find out?"

"Mama told her that day I was in Kingsport, but your missus didn't believe it. It was Sheriff McDowell set her straight. That day I went to visit him in the jail. He even told me the exact dollar amount you give him so she could check it against the ledgers and know he wasn't lying."

"Just you? He didn't tell Bowden?"

"Bowden run out the back door before I even got started good. He was out there vomiting. He didn't come back in till I was through."

"Telling about the child," Pemberton said. "McDowell thought it would save his life?"

"No," Galloway said, frowning slightly as he shook his head. "He knowed what the truth of it was the second I come in that cell. He knowed he was a dead man."

Pemberton looked into Galloway's eyes and knew he was seeing the same flat stare McDowell had seen.

"Did McDowell know where they are?"

"I believe he did," Galloway said, "at least where they went from Knoxville."

"But he didn't tell you?"

"I knowed McDowell wasn't going to offer up where they was. Oh, I whittled on him a good bit, enough to where any another man would have give up his own mama, but he wouldn't tell."

Galloway paused and scratched the end of his stump, became more reflective.

"He deserved better than he got, McDowell did. He lived and died by his own rights. If I had it to do over, I'd as lief have killed him quick."

Galloway took the wad of tobacco from his mouth and examined it a moment, threw it toward the mountain laurel. Pemberton squeezed his eyes shut. Words came harder now, the smooth glide of thought from brain to tongue ruptured. He formed a sentence and held it in his mind a few moments so it might clarify.

"Why'd he tell you about me helping him?"

"I'm of a mind he figured it'd be a way of getting at least one of you killed," Galloway said. "I reckon he was right about that."

Pemberton did not speak for a few moments. He thought of the child in the sheriff 's office and tried to recall something besides the intense brown eyes. He remembered the child's hair. It hadn't been blonde but dark like his own.

"So the child's safe."

"Mama says he is, him and the Harmon girl both, but that's all Mama can tell me. They's got so far away she can't get them in her mind no more. That trail's went colder than a well digger's ass."

Galloway paused and his countenance appeared almost wistful. He raised his nub and brushed a bead of sweat from his forehead. Galloway stepped closer and kneeled next to Pemberton. He took the hawkbill knife from his pocket and freed the blade with the same slow deliberateness he might undo a bow. The blade clicked as it locked into place.

"Your missus said she didn't want you suffering any more than you had to," Galloway said, "but I can't kill you quick after the way I done the sheriff. It'd lay too heavy on my conscience."

The hawkbill slashed down, cutting open Pemberton's front pant pocket and freeing the twenty-dollar gold piece. Galloway picked up the coin.

"I will take this though," he said, placing it in his pocket. "I figured I earned it."

"Is there a panther?" Pemberton asked.

"You'll know the truth of that in a few hours," Galloway said, and nodded toward the park. "That cat will come across the ridge there and to the left of that cliff hang. It'll smell your blood and soon enough come on down and have a visit."

Galloway lifted the tote sack and swung it over his shoulder. He headed across the meadow, moving in the same shambling manner as before. I'll remember that slow saunter, Pemberton told himself, I'll remember it the very moment I kill him. Galloway stopped and turned.

"One other thing she wanted me to tell you. Your coffin, she said to tell you she's going to order it special from Birmingham. Your missus said she owed you that."

In a few minutes Galloway entered the woods. Pemberton caught glimpses of him through the trees and then a short while later as Galloway followed the trail over the rise. Then he was gone.

Pemberton reached for the gold chain on his pocket watch. He tugged until the watch emerged. When the gold shell opened, two half-moons of glass fell to the ground, but the watch still worked. The hands were on the three and six. Pemberton followed the almost imperceptible drag of the minute hand moving across the watch face toward the seven. He watched the minute hand as intently as possible, thinking if he could see time pass it would somehow make a difference.

But the pain was too much to concentrate more than a few seconds. His whole leg was now swollen, the pain constant all the way to the hip. The leg muscles began to spasm, as if the limb were frantically trying to shake out the venom. Pemberton's stomach heaved and he was glad since that might expel some of the poison, but when he looked at the ground he saw what had come forth was blood. His ribs and ankle hurt as well, but they were afterthoughts, as was his thirst. He'd have to wait the poison out a few hours, let it ease enough to limp out of the gorge.

Pemberton turned so he could face west. He tried to think of something besides the pain. He studied the Smokies as they unfolded into Tennessee. How many millions of board feet of timber were in those mountains, Pemberton wondered. The nausea returned, and more blood brightened the ground when he vomited. His mouth tasted of copper, and he thought of veins of copper and stream beds of jewels inside the Smokies. He thought especially of Cade's Cove, where old-growth yellow poplars yet remained. The tune the workers sang about the big rock candy mountain came into his head and lingered a few moments before dissipating.

Pemberton passed out, and when the pain woke him the day waned. The sun leaned its shoulder into the ridge, and shadows sortied out from the woods into the meadow. Pemberton could smell the leg, its skin now fiery red from kneecap to toes. The limb was dying, would soon enough be black and festering. Pemberton knew he'd lose it, but that would be all right. He could spend his working day on horseback, as Serena did.