Two weeks later

Clifton, Virginia

Earl Long steered his Ford F-150 up the service path to the estate, wet gravel crunching under the truck's tires. On the trailer behind him was the morning's third pallet of rock, which was considerable headway for having a work crew of one. The big new home came into view, a colonial monstrosity. It sat high on a manicured hill, framed by rows of freshly plugged chestnut and elm saplings. Long wasn't a landscaper, but he imagined the trees must have set the owners back two or three times the fifteen thousand they were blowing on his hundred-foot retaining wall. It would all look stately in about fifty years, he thought. Some people just pissed it away.

The job site was on the far side of the house, and Long kept to the service road as long as he could, not wanting to damage the new lawn that had to be soft after last night's rain. He spotted his lone employee at the base of the hill hauling an eighty-pound block of cut granite. Just as he'd been doing all summer.

Edmund Deadmarsh had answered the Craigslist ad back in June. Long had lost an entire crew overnight—deported to Honduras—and he'd hired Deadmarsh for the usual twelve bucks an hour, reckoning he'd still need two more replacements. On the first day the man had moved four tons of rock. Not only that, he'd put it down with a set and finish that was nearly a work of art. After a week, Long had bumped his new man up to fifteen an hour and pulled the ad. Deadmarsh had been showing up for three straight months now, working through the height of summer when crews rarely lasted more than three jobs. The man just kept going, day after sweltering day, never slowing or asking for help. It was almost as if he was punishing himself.

Long backed the truck into place and stepped down from the cab. He nodded at Deadmarsh and got one in return. Cranking the Bobcat, he pulled the pallet off the trailer and placed it as close as possible to the wall. Gotta give the man some kind of help, he thought. He parked the machine, then went back in his truck and began fiddling with invoices as he sipped his Starbucks. Soon, however, Long found himself watching Deadmarsh. It was the damnedest thing, the way the guy moved around a worksite. He was quick, but never rushed. Never slipped in the mud or lost his balance setting a stone into place. And the strangest thing of all—he did it in near silence. No huffing or grunting or shuffling over the ground. Only yesterday, a surprised Long had turned around to find Deadmarsh right behind him with a boulder in his arms. Never made a sound. The damnedest thing.

Long got out of the truck when his cup ran dry. "Looks good," he said, sidestepping down the embankment.

Deadmarsh slid a block into place, and asked, "Is the height what you wanted?"

"Looks about right. Did you measure it?"

"You took the measuring tape when you drove off for that last load."

Long fished into his pocket and felt the metal square. "Oh yeah, so I did." He took it out, pulled four feet from the reel, and set one end at the base of the wall. "Yep, right on."

Deadmarsh nodded, but there was no apparent satisfaction. He just turned for another stone.

"You're pretty darned good at this," Long said. "You been in the line of work long?"

Deadmarsh pulled a stone from the pallet and turned smoothly. "About three months."

Long grinned. "What'd you do before that?"

The stone slid perfectly into place. "Government work."

"Civil service?"

"Yeah. You could say that."

Long nodded. "My wife wanted me to get into that a few years back. I had a buddy who said he could hook me into a nice desk job with the county—building code administrator." He shook his head. "Couldn't do it though. You know, sitting in one of those damned cubicles all day."

Deadmarsh grabbed another block of granite and turned on the mud without the slightest waver. "Benefits might have been good," he said. "You've got two kids to look after."

"Yeah, that's what my wife said. But guys like us are born to work outside, right? Blue sky and green grass."

Deadmarsh said nothing. His T-shirt was soaked in sweat, clinging like a second skin. Long remembered thinking the man had been in good shape when he'd started—wouldn't have hired him otherwise—but after a summer spent humping granite slabs up and down hills he looked like a cruiserweight boxer. Thick, lean muscle, not an ounce of fat anywhere.

"So just what part of the government did you work for?" Long pressed.

Deadmarsh dropped another block into place, and turned to look at him. He seemed to think about it, then said, "The part that worked."

Long stared for a moment, then began to chuckle. "Ain't no such thing."

Deadmarsh's phone chirped, and they both looked toward his motorcycle. The phone rarely went off, but when it did Deadmarsh always dropped what he was doing and checked the call. He vaulted up over the wall and went to the bike, a big BMW that somehow didn't seem right to Long. He'd once asked Deadmarsh how he could afford a bike like that, and gotten the answer that his wife was a doctor. Long had nearly laughed out loud, thinking, Yeah, and that's why you're out here busting rock in ninety-degree heat.

Deadmarsh picked up the phone and checked the screen. He went very still, then typed a reply and waited. After less than a minute, he pocketed his phone and said, "I've got to go."

That was all. No explanation or timeframe. Without another word, he swung a leg over the BMW and reached for the key.

"Go? What do you mean, go?"

Deadmarsh said nothing.

"I need you back in an hour to finish this pallet. I told the irrigation guy we'd be done this afternoon."

"You'll have to do it." Deadmarsh cranked the engine and the big bike purred to life.

Incredulous, Long strode over and got in his face. He pointed to the pallet of rock. "You think I'm gonna haul that? To hell with you, mister! If you want your paycheck next week, you'd better be back by—"

"Look! I'm sorry to put you in a bind, but I quit. Keep the paycheck." Deadmarsh leaned the bike straight and kicked up the stand. He reached for a helmet that was hooked onto the back.

"Quit? Now hang on a minute!" Long reached out and grabbed the handlebar.

That was when it happened. A sharp pain in the back of his legs, as if a club had swept in just below his knees. Before he knew what was happening, Long was on his ass in the gravel and staring up at Deadmarsh.

Earl Long was a big man, and not unaccustomed to physical challenges. On and off the job he'd seen his share of confrontation, and usually with favorable results. At six-five, two-sixty, he had three inches and at least forty pounds on the man hovering over him. Even so, Long didn't move. There was something in the stare that kept him planted right where he was. He'd seen men full of hate and whiskey. Even craziness. This was none of those things. He was looking at eyes that were hard and impenetrable, like a steel-gray sky on the coldest winter day.

Long sat still.

The big bike jumped and a fountain of stone spewed behind, peppering his face. Long heard the engine wind up to the redline, then shift. It happened again, and again, until the motorcycle and its rider became a collective blur. Earl Long just sat on the ground and watched, and from that vantage point he predicted—quite correctly, as it turned out—that he would never see Edmund Deadmarsh again.

Copyright © 2014 by Ward Larsen