FrostLine by Justin Scott Page B

I’ll catch you later.”
    I headed across the fields, and through the woods, up a steep incline, half hoping Mr. Butler would have driven off before I got there. But no such luck. The Farmall was right where I’d seen it. DaNang was stretched out in its shade. Mr. Butler sat smiling like an old Indian watching settlers’ wagons burn.
    â€œWhat the hell happened?” he asked cheerfully.
    I caught my breath. From Butler’s field the devastation looked spectacular, the lake bed raw brown, the land below it scoured by the escaping water.
    â€œWhat happened?”
    My courage fled. I looked past him, unable to speak the words that would change his life.
    Behind this crest, which looked down on King’s place, Butler’s farm spread up a gentle rise. If on that mud-gray March day with Dicky I’d seen why farmers move to the city, this glorious August afternoon was the image of why they stayed.
    Mr. Butler’s hayfields rippled orange-gold in the wind. The trees that traced centuries-old stone walls between the fields shimmered deep green. Maples in the distance puddled shade on the house. The house was far away, but it looked like they had painted it. And the main barn as well.
    â€œYou painted the barn?”
    â€œYeah, Dicky really got into it. Now he’s doing the house.”
    I hadn’t expected this and it made it worse.
    Mr. Butler was watching me, mildly puzzled.
    The next pasture over was dotted white. It looked like Scotland. “I didn’t know you raised sheep.”
    â€œYeah, we was supposed to sell the lambs, but I kept ’em. They eat that field down of bushes and weeds. And DaNang likes ’em, don’t you, DaNang? Hey, you—sheep your buddies?… So what’s happenin’, Ben?”
    â€œLooks like Dicky blew up King’s dam.”
    â€œDicky? Dicky don’t know shit about explosives.”
    Based on the evidence, he certainly didn’t.
    â€œMr. Butler, I’m afraid—”
    He looked at me sharply. “Why you blamin’ Dicky? He don’t know dynamite. He don’t know blasting caps. He don’t know timers.”
    â€œI’m sorry, Mr. Butler. He blew himself up.”
    â€œThat’s impossible.”
    â€œIt must have gone off early.”
    â€œBut I’m telling you, Dicky don’t know to set a charge.”
    I shut up. There was nothing else to say. Finally he said, “You telling me you saw Dicky dead?”
    â€œI’m sorry.”
    â€œOh, Christ.” He fumbled for the starter. The tractor clattered.
    â€œDon’t go down there, Mr. Butler.”
    â€œMy boy—”
    â€œYou don’t want to see it, sir. You really don’t.”
    He jerked his head sharply toward the sky. I thought I’d somehow convinced him not to go down. But then I heard what he had heard, a dull thud-thud. His eyes got wild. “Jesus Christ, what’s happening—”
    His muscles bunched and he seemed about to dive under the tractor. “Just a helicopter, Mr. Butler. See?” I pointed out the dot coming from the northeast.
    He squinted, saw something about it that put him at ease, and sat back, rocking on the tractor seat, squeezing his arms around his body. His gaze returned to the mud where Dicky lay scattered. DaNang started whining. Mr. Butler reached down to rough his ears.
    The helicopter clattered onto the lawn beside the former lake. From where we watched we could see markings top and sides, big white letters, ATF. Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, the federal bomb squad. Mr. Butler cast dull eyes on the agents tumbling out in yellow windbreakers. He didn’t seem to notice the second helicopter, marked FBI, which buzzed in swiftly from the west, spilling men and women who set up a perimeter and forced King’s guests further from the explosion site than Ollie had. But when a third swooped in, an evil-looking, unmarked gunship, he muttered,