The Carrion Birds Read Online Free Page B

opened them
again in a slow blink. “Times have changed,” the old man said, blood on his lips
where he’d put them together to speak.
    “Times are the same, viejo, it’s just you that has
changed.”
    Burnham looked up and found a focus. Ray knew the
man recognized him, knew it just as surely as he knew his own face in the
mirror. They were kin in some strange way, connected by who they were and what
they did, and it was a sickening realization. Somehow through all this, years
before, Ray had thought perhaps their relationship would end just the way it was
now. There were no surprises and nothing to spare Ray from the future he had
imagined all those years before.
    Ray didn’t know how long the old man had been
working this area, but it was over now. From the pocket of his shirt Ray removed
his pack of antacids. Resting his weight on the one knee, he chewed at the
bitter pill while the old man lay dying on the ground.
    “Times have changed,” the man said again. “You
think they haven’t, but they have. You’re old enough. You should know it.”
    Ray didn’t want to be like this man, not at all. He
stood, trying to put some space between them, but watching the old man the whole
while. In his hand he held the shotgun loose in his palm, the chalk taste of the
antacid in his mouth. With one hand on the stock of the gun, he fished the spare
shells from his jeans pocket and began to load them into the belly.
    “All this used to be open country,” Burnham said.
“Just like you can still find some places down south. Now it’s all parceled up
and sold off and you can’t go anywhere without someone knowing.” Burnham leaned
his head to the left and spat blood into the dirt, then turned his head back up
so he could see Ray. The ball of shot that had caught him in the cheek looked
deep and dark as a well in the man’s face. “I used to ride all over this land
with my family, with my brother and my father, but that’s all gone now, you
understand?”
    The pool of blood beneath the man, an outline in
the dirt, was gradually expanding. His eyes drooped once, then again. Ray let
him speak, let him get it out. It was what Ray knew he’d want when the time came
for him, when he had his final say and tried to make right with the world. When
he tried to tell how he’d gotten down this path, and how he regretted it every
day, but didn’t know how to turn back.
    The old man coughed and blood erupted out the side
of his cheek. He leaned his head to the side and spat again. Then turned back
and fixed Ray like the conversation was ongoing and the man had merely paused to
allow Ray the chance to speak. “We used to rustle cattle when the land was open
and you could run them all the way down to Mexico and not see a soul.” His wet
eyes closed and then opened. “I suppose I put myself in this mess.” He paused
again, looking up at Ray. “I recognize you, you know? Gus’s kid. I always
wondered where you’d gone and I guess now I know. You still work for Memo, don’t
you?”
    “Yes.”
    “You know he’s playing crooked with all of us? I
worked for his father, too. A long time ago, before you even came around, but
Memo is something different. He doesn’t respect the old ways—doesn’t respect
anything anymore.” He stopped to gather his breath before going on again, pink
spittle showing in the corners of his mouth. “There used to be rules for this
sort of thing. Memo’s father knew them, but it’s not like it used to be, not
anymore.”
    “Is that why you went over?” Ray said. “Is that why
you started working for the southerners?” Ray stood there looking down. The
shotgun waiting and ready at his side. He knew this man, but it didn’t matter.
None of it did anymore. He would do the job no matter what the man said. It
didn’t matter.
    “Things have changed,” Burnham said. “Go on, I’m
ready. I’ve been ready a long time and just not known it. Go on now.”
    Ray raised the shotgun a few inches from