“Oh yeah,” John Craig remembered. “So did I.”
“Hurry up. We need to get moving. We’ve already been in one place way too damn long.”
* * *
John Craig van der Ploeg had his right hand on Dick Canidy’s left shoulder. Canidy had his left hand on John Craig’s right shoulder.
“Inside foot first . . . and go!” Canidy said, and stepped forward with his left.
John Craig, putting weight on Canidy’s shoulder, swung out his right boot. As he eased pressure onto the hurt foot, he grunted with pain.
“Good?” Canidy said.
“Just keep going.”
They took another step. John Craig immediately fell forward.
Canidy tried to catch them before they both went down. He failed.
They were lying on the ground when Canidy heard John Craig moan—and then chuckle.
“That hurt,” John Craig said, then chuckled again. “But that was pretty damn ridiculous.”
Canidy couldn’t help himself. He chuckled, too.
Then he said, “What the hell else can go wrong?”
“Don’t ask,” John Craig said. “With my luck anything is possible.”
Then they both chuckled, and that turned into hearty laughter.
After a moment, they composed themselves.
They got up, shakily.
“Okay,” Canidy said once they had regained their balance, “let’s try it again . . . and go!”
* * *
Progress over the uneven ground was slow. Finding a comfortable rhythm seemed impossible, even as they quietly counted out a cadence—“One . . . two . . . three . . . four . . . and one . . . two . . . three . . . four . . .”
They pressed on, more or less stumbling forward, and almost a half hour later came to the narrow road. They turned to follow it downhill. The smooth surface made finding a rhythm a little easier. They were making better time despite John Craig moaning that the pain was becoming worse.
They heard a dog barking ahead.
Then John Craig suddenly exclaimed: “Damn it! Stop! I need to stop!”
They shuffled to the side of the road.
“It just hurts too much,” John Craig said. “Just leave me.”
He moaned as he collapsed under a squat tree.
Now what? Canidy thought, and inhaled deeply.
He noticed that the tree had a strong, familiar smell. He reached up to one of the limbs, felt an equally familiar shape growing there, and plucked it.
Lemon, he thought, then remembered the landmarks he had marked on his map. This is part of that citrus farm.