Alligator Sam's Arc

Chapter 5 of 5

Sam stood still in the apron and listened. Two splashes. One to the north, weak and slow. One to the east, faster, closer. He could not tell which one had less time. If he ran north and the east one went under, the east one drowned. If he ran east and the north one stopped splashing, the north one was gone. He had one rope and two people. He cut back down the marked line at a run. Dale was at the road, folding the discarded vest over the tailgate of his truck. He looked up when Sam crashed through the reeds. "Two," Sam said. "Different directions. I can't pick." Dale did not argue. He dropped the vest and reached into the truck bed. He pulled out a coil of thick yellow rope, twice as long as Sam's, finished at both ends with clean wrapped tips. "Barn rope," he said. "I brought it for hauling. Both ends are good. Tie one to each of them and walk them out at the same time." Sam took it. Heavier than his own, but the fibers were tight and dry. He stuffed his own rope deeper in the front pocket and slung the new one across his chest. "I'll follow you in as far as the last stake," Dale said. "When you get them close, I'll pull." Sam ran east first, because east was louder. He found a woman clawing at a root, mud to her ribs. He fed one end of the yellow rope under her arms and knotted it. "Hold. Don't fight the mud. I'm coming back." He paid the rope out behind him as he moved north, stepping between hummocks. The coil shrank in his hand. He found the second one, a boy, only his shoulders and face above the water, eyes wide. Sam looped the other end under the boy's arms and cinched it. Now the rope ran taut between them through the reeds, a straight line with a person on each end. Sam stood at its middle and braced against a cypress. He pulled the boy's side first, short and steady. The mud gave. The boy slid free onto matted roots. Sam shifted his grip and pulled the woman's side. She came loose slower, but she came. Dale reached the last stake and took the woman's end. Together they walked both people down the red line to the road. Sam untied them at the truck. The boy was shaking. The woman sat on the ground and pressed her hands flat to the gravel like she needed to feel something hard. Sam coiled the yellow rope back over his shoulder. He turned toward the swamp and listened again. Wind in the cattails. A frog. Then, far off, a slow splash he had not heard before. "One more," he said, and started back in.