“In 1966, everything changed. Frank got a visit from a casualty team. Frank Junior had been killed. At a place called the Rockpile.”

“I’ve heard about that.”

“Not the real story, you ain’t. The government said young Frank had charged straight into machine-gun fire to save four members of his squad. He got hit getting the second guy, but he kept going back out. The fourth time he ran out there, the gun chewed him to pieces. There was talk of a Medal of Honor. In the end they gave him a posthumous Silver Star.”

Billy actually had heard all this before.

“You’d think Frank would be able to handle something like that,” Snake said, “as much war as he’d seen. But he started drinking, and he didn’t stop. He could always hold his liquor, but he was drinking enough to kill most men. Enough to put himself out every night. Then the letter came.”

“What letter? About the medal?”

“No. A letter from Frank Junior. He’d mailed it before he died. It had got delayed somehow, but it finally came.”

“What did it say?

Snake sighed and took another pull from Billy’s bottle. “Basically, Frank Junior told his daddy that he had no intention of coming back home. Junior was messed up in his head, he said; he always had been, but he’d never had the nerve to talk about it. But once he got to Vietnam, and saw war up close, he just didn’t care anymore.”

“Because of Granddaddy Elam?”

Snake nodded. “He told Frank that Elam had been messing with him since he was a little boy. The old bastard done everything imaginable to him, and he’d threatened to kill us all if Junior told his mama or daddy about it. And Elam was so damn crazy, that poor boy believed it.”

“Jesus, Pop.”

“Junior had made up his mind he was gonna push it in battle until he found some peace. He said he was gonna give the gooks all the hurt he could until his own hurt stopped.” Snake nodded once. “And that’s what he did.”

Billy sat blinking in horror, not knowing what to say.

“Something busted in Frank when he read that letter,” Snake said. “He blamed himself, see? And I blamed myself. Because I was scared as hell the same thing had happened to you.”

“It didn’t. At least I don’t think it did.”

“I know. I made it my business to find out.”

“How’d you do that?”

Snake dug in his pants pocket and brought out a bent cigarette, which he lit with an old silver lighter. He blew out a long stream of blue smoke, then began speaking softly.

“Elam was preaching in East Texas when that letter came, but he was due home in a couple of days. I started checking on Frank every few hours, worried he might kill himself or something. But the day Elam was due back, I went over and found my brother a changed man. Frank was sober as a judge. He told me we were gonna talk to Elam. He told me to get a few of the boys together. Glenn, Sonny, a couple more, and have ’em at his house about dark.

“Elam got home about eight. Me and Frank went by his house and went in without knocking. Frank told Daddy we had an operation set up. We was gonna lynch a nigger that night. Well, old Elam was always up for that kind of party, so he came right along.

“We came out here to Valhalla and got in two boats. Then we headed to the Bone Tree. Elam was drinking moonshine from a clear jug. I still remember that, the jug in the moonlight. When we got to the tree, I climbed out with a rope, and Frank got out with a toolbox. Just as we got to the opening in the big tree, Elam stopped drinking long enough to holler, ‘Where’s the nigger, boys?’” Snake shook his head, a strange smile on his face. “I’ll never forget what happened next. Frank finally looked old Elam in the eye, and he said, ‘You’re the nigger tonight, Daddy.’”

An electric chill raced up Billy’s spine. “Jesus Christ . . .”

“Frank knocked the old man down to the ground, then squatted over him and told him about Junior’s letter. Elam tried to deny it, but what the hell could he say? Me and Frank had been through the very same thing with him, till we got big enough to push him off.”

“What did you do?”

“I didn’t have to do much. Frank had gone off the rails, boy. It was like we was back in the Pacific. He told Elam he’d betrayed his family and his vows to God both. And for that, he was gonna get a special punishment. Then he tied Daddy’s hands, dragged him inside that hollow tree, and hung him upside down by his feet. After Elam’d been hanging awhile, with his face all red and about to bust, Frank nailed him to the wood in there. He had some ten-penny nails in his toolbox, and he did old Elam just like the Romans done Jesus. Crucified him upside down, you see? He’d seen something like that in a book once. He said that was the only fitting punishment for a preacher who done what Daddy had.”

“I saw those bones,” Billy said. “The only time I ever went there. You remember? You told me they were some nigger’s bones.”

“Well, they ain’t. After Elam rotted, Frank wired ’em together and put ’em back up so nobody would ever forget what happens to somebody who betrays the group. But I didn’t want you knowin’ who it was, if I could help it.”

“Does Forrest know about this?”

“He knows,” Snake said. “Hell, he’s been to that Bone Tree more than any of us. But I didn’t finish the story. That night, while Daddy was hanging in the tree, we made a fire outside it and sat talking, mostly about Frank Junior, but also about some of the things Elam had done to us as boys. To Mama, of course. Elam hollered till he lost his voice: first threatening us with fire and damnation, then begging for forgiveness. He begged for water, too, but Frank would just throw swamp water on him now and then to keep him awake I stopped going in with him after the first couple of times. Elam died just after dawn.”

Billy looked longingly at the bourbon bottle in his father’s hand, but he knew he’d had enough.

“The thing is,” Snake said, “killing Elam didn’t really help Frank get over his boy. He still blamed himself. From 1966 till the day he died in ’68, he was drunk. I think they only kept him on at Triton out of pity, because of Junior being a war hero. Dr. Cage even tried to get Frank to take a year off, but he wouldn’t listen. Frank was drunk the day that forklift dropped the pallet on him.”

“You’re sure Elam molested Forrest the way he had Frank Junior?”

Snake nodded. “He confessed it to Frank before he died.”

“Goddamn.”

“Forrest puts on a good front, Billy, but deep down, he’s got that demon in him. And you don’t want to hitch yourself to that.”

Billy didn’t know what to say. He couldn’t tell his father what Forrest had said to him earlier. Snake might do something truly crazy. So he just said, “Thanks for protecting me from that, Daddy.”

Snake grunted as if in protest. “I wish I could take credit for it. But I can’t. It was just dumb luck, like I said. You were lucky being born last.”

Billy rubbed his jaw and tried to swallow. His tongue felt like a forty-year-old shag carpet. “You’re right about that. And I get what you’re saying about not hitching myself to Forrest. Is that what you came in to tell me?”

“Most of it.” Snake leaned back in his chair. “But I also need something from you.”

Billy nodded warily. “What do you need?”

“Forrest’s got us walking blind into the Concordia sheriff’s department tomorrow. And for all we know, Walker Dennis has enough evidence to jail us the minute we cross the threshold.”

“I hear you.”

“We can’t go in blind like that. I need an ace up my sleeve. Insurance.”

“What do you have in mind?”

Snake sat up again, then flexed his hands like a man about to take control of some machine. “I need to know where Dr. Cage is. I know the Black Team went to get him. That’s the only reason that chopper would have lit out of here like that. Don’t waste time telling me you don’t know where they went, ’cause I know you do.”