Jack turned on the ignition. He smiled. Music poured out of the car speakers with the slightest turn of the tuning knob.
"This is great," he said. "I didn't know there were so many stations to listen to."
Amelia's brow furrowed. "I didn't either," she said. She touched Jack on the shoulder. "I'll be back shortly. Don't leave the car, okay?"
"Okay," Jack said.
The men's department clerk for Bergdorf Goodman's was thinking about his evening meal. Chicken divan would be nice, he decided. Or veal marsella. He was hungry. His stomach growled. He put his hand on it and whispered, "Quiet, there," because he was afraid it would embarrass him.
His name was Clive. He was thirty-seven years old, had never been married, lived with a parakeet he had named "My Friend" and both his parents were dead, which was fine with him because they had been a chore to have around, always after him to "get married," "have a relationship," "make something of yourself other than as someone who sells ties."
But he did more than sell ties, of course. He sold all sorts of men's clothing. Quality clothing. Clothing that would last. Clothing that said something important about the wearer. Oh, we are more than just our inner selves, aren't we? he maintained. We cannot run around naked, as appealing as that might be to some. We have to put on the appearance of taste and quality, because that is the way the world judges us.
Clive himself was very well dressed. He spent half of his salary on his clothes.
He wasn't aware that Sydney was following him. Not because Sydney was particularly skillful at following people. He wasn't. It was not in his nature to be covert. His kind of murder was certainly not covert. Clive wasn't aware of Sydney because Clive was so self-involved. If there were other people on the street, it was of little consequence to him unless they made it difficult for him to pass. If that happened, he merely lowered his head a little—as if to use it like a battering ram—and said firmly, "Excuse me! Let me by!" It usually worked.
Sydney wasn't aware of Clive's self-involvement. He couldn't have cared less if Clive turned around, saw him and guessed what was in his head. Indeed, Sydney would have liked that. It would have made the chase, and the kill, much more interesting. But right now, what most interested Sydney was doing away with this toad who had offended him. Quickly. But painfully.
Clive turned toward Fifth Avenue. He was looking for a cab. He never took the subway or the buses. Too smelly. Only lower-class people used subways and buses.
He saw a cab with its VACANT sign up and raised his hand to hail it.
A huge, meaty hand grabbed his wrist. He gasped. What was this? Someone had the temerity to accost him on a crowded city street. . . .
He felt another meaty hand around his throat.
He heard, "My God, look at what that man is doing!"
And, "Hey, you, stop that!"
He felt his windpipe collapse. He gasped for air.
He heard, "He killed that man!"
"Yeah," came the reply. "C'mon. Our dinner reservations are for six-fifteen."
Clive crumpled to the pavement and gasped for air that wouldn't come.
His stomach churned. Christ, he was going to throw up. What an indignity! The vomit came, but stopped halfway up his throat, unable to pass his collapsed windpipe.
Water surrounded him. A sandy beach lay ahead and he trudged toward it.
An angry-looking man in olive-green Speedos stood at the shore. "Go away!" he screamed. "You can't stay here!"
Chapter Twenty-five
Amelia couldn't find the two picnickers. She hoped they had merely wandered off, still in search of a sandy beach, but knew in her heart that that was not what had happened to them.
She also couldn't find Barrow, Freely's boyfriend. She had put him in with Mrs. Alexander—after some protest from the woman, which surprised Amelia—but now Mrs. Alexander had no idea where Barrow was. "You know, dear," she said—it was the first time that Mrs. Alexander had called her "dear" and Amelia didn't know what she thought of it—"when I last saw him, he was very ... still. And I can tell you this too—he wasn't all there."
"Wasn't all there?"
"That's right. He wasn't much more than his chest and legs—and his head, of course, and parts of his arms. I asked him what was wrong, but he couldn't speak, apparently. It's such a shame." Her tone was light and casual. She might as well have been talking about a recipe that hadn't turned out right.
"And where was he then?" Amelia asked.
"In the back bedroom, where you told me to put him, dear. I went there to ask him to leave. I don't like him. None of us likes these people."
"You were going to ask him to leave?" Amelia was shocked. Where had Mrs. Alexander gotten the idea that she could do something like that?
"Yes, dear. He's not one of us, is he?"
"Us?"
"Us, yes." She grinned as if she were bursting to tell a secret.
"And you're saying that you went back there, to tell him to leave, and ..."
"And he wasn't all there. That's right. And now I think he's not there at all. Like the Cheshire Cat." Another secretive grin. Broader, but with an added touch of malice. "Now, I think that, poof, he's gone. Like all these intruders will be!"
So, unable to locate Barrow, Amelia found Sydney's other victim—the well-dressed man named Morgan—coaxed Freely out of Viola Pennypacker's house, after much effort and cajoling, and piled the two of them into the backseat of Harry's monster Buick. She argued for a few minutes with Jack about the radio: Amelia wanted it off, Jack insisted that it stay on. Amelia lost the argument, only because she didn't want to waste any more time.
"There's nothing to worry about," she told them all, as she put the Buick in gear and roared off down the village's main street, toward what she was convinced were its boundaries.
Meanwhile, Clive stood a hundred feet out in Silver Lake, unable to move because Leonard was shaking his fist and unloading an incredible volley of curses and threats at him.
The latest storm was over, the ocean and sky were calm and Harry's black fedora lay in the bottom of the boat. He reached over to retrieve it. It wouldn't budge. "Dammit!" he said. "I liked that hat."
"Conjure up a new one," Sam told him.
"I think I did all the conjuring I was allowed back in Silver Lake, Sam."
"Too bad."
"How about you?" Harry said.
"I didn't know I could conjure. Maybe I really couldn't. Shit, what did I know? One minute I'm walking down a nice tree-lined street in Boston and the next minute I'm fifty feet in the air, rammed by a big, fat mother of a Lincoln. Then, wham, I'm ten years old again—"
"Ten years old?"
"Uh-huh. I died. Then I was ten years old, playing cowboys and Indians. It was a great time in my life and I guess I was being allowed to relive it."
"Nothing like that happened to me," Harry said. It was clear from his tone that he felt cheated.
Sam said, "If you're asking me to explain why it didn't happen to you…."
"No, I'm not. I'm sorry. I think there were mitigating factors. I think the fact that I died with a lot of ... baggage in tow—"
"Your wife?"
"My feelings for her. Yes. I don't think we had the best of relationships. I wasn't aware of it at the time. I am now." He sighed.
"My condolences," Sam said.
"Yeah, sure," Harry said. "But, you know, as bad as it was, as combative as it was, I think she loved me. I know I loved her. Hell, I still do."
"Let me tell you what I think," Sam said. "I think that if you manage to go back over to the other side, then I'll be dragged along on your coattails."
Harry didn't know if he liked the ham-handed way that Sam had changed the topic of conversation. He shrugged. "It's a theory. I mean, I dragged you to Silver Lake, didn't I?"
"Apparently."
"But that still doesn't give us any idea how I'm going to go over. It reminds me of something Barbara used to say: 'If we had ham, we could have ham and ch
eese. If we had cheese.' "
"And now that we're tossing clichés around, how about this one: 'The later it gets, the later it gets.' "
"Meaning?"
"Meaning that each time we have one of these little storms, you're bound to become less and less fearful. And I think we've agreed that that's our ticket to the other side. Your fear."
Harry thought about this and nodded sullenly. "You're right." He shook his head. "Sam, I think we're stuck here. Goddammit, I think we're stuck here."
Sam smiled. Not if I can help it! he told himself.
Kennedy Whelan was getting sick of being a homicide detective. Nearly thirty years at it and what did he have to show for his trouble? A few dismal possessions and an army of the dead pleading with him to find their murderers. Because not every killer is brought to justice, of course. The man who merely decides—for whatever twisted reason—to off a stranger one rainy night leaves almost no trail at all.
And the contract killer is usually thorough at covering his ass. The only homicides that had a reasonable expectation of being solved were those that resulted from family disputes. Wife shoots husband. Husband strangles wife. Son kills mother, father, sister. Good, clean, straightforward murders. And justifiable sometimes too. Who could blame a wife for slicing up an errant, abusive husband, for instance? There was little fulfillment in bringing those people to justice.
As he bent over Clive's body, he said to his partner, Ian, "His damn throat is crushed. Jesus." In all his years asa homicide detective, Whelan had seen few murder victims with their throats crushed. It took a massive effort to crush the fibrous cartilage that comprised the windpipe.
"I saw it happen," Whelan heard. He looked. A blond woman in her early twenties, dressed in blue jeans and red T-shirt, stood nearby.
"Did you?" Whelan asked.
She nodded enthusiastically. "He"—she pointed stiffly at Clive—"didn't have no chance at all. Poor snot."
Whelan stared at her a moment. This was too good to be true—a witness to a street killing. "And your name is?"
"Jimmy"
"Jimmy what?"
"Jimmy Dean."
Whelan smiled. "I assume that's your stage name?" She shook her head and frowned, asif offended. "It ain't no stage name. It's my real name."
"Jimmy Dean. Okay, tell me what you saw, Jimmy."
"I saw it happen. I told you."
"Yes, I know. But what I'd like you to do is describe the killer for me. Can you do that?"
She nodded. "Sure. He was big. And he was bald."
"And?"
"I can't tell you nothing else. He was big and bald. You're lookin' at a big bald guy chokin' some little snot, how much are you gonna see?"
Whelan frowned, took a cigar out of his pocket, put it back. Maybe he'd really think seriously about quitting.
"Tell me what you're afraid of," Sam said.
"You mean, besides the water?" Harry said. He thought a moment, then went on, "Tidal waves. They're very high on my fear list, though I've never seen one. Just the idea of all that raw power. . ." He shuddered, then continued. "But I guess that doesn't count, does it? Tidal waves are made of water." A moment's silence. "Dying painfully is high on my list too. But that probably doesn't count anymore either." He looked confusedly at Sam. "Why do you ask?"
"Just to make conversation," Sam told him. It was a lie.
"Oh," Harry said.
"So, go ahead. Tidal waves, painful death. What else?"
"I don't know. Being blind. That's a common fear, isn't it?"
"I think so."
"But I don't mean simply being unable to see. That's bad enough. No, what really scares me is being in a place that's strange, a place I've never been before, and being blind. Reaching out to touch what's around me and not knowing what the hell it is I'm touching."
"I understand," Sam said glumly.
"Something wrong?"
"Not really. I just thought… never mind. Anything else? Another fear? People who leer? People who sneer?"
"Huh? Why are you rhyming?"
Sam was surprised. "Am I? I wasn't aware of it. I'm sorry, there's certainly no glory ... in rhyming. It's a habit I slip into from time to time. I like to rhyme." He took a deep breath. "Fears. Any other fears?"
Harry stared at him a moment, then said, "Uh-huh. Being ingested."
"Ingested. You mean eaten?"
"Yeah. Being chomped down on by a shark or a crocodile, and then being eaten. And it doesn't matter if that first bite does you in either. What really matters is that you—the sum of God's powers, the pinnacle of the creative forces in the universe, a thing with a soul, and emotions, and family, and feelings and thoughts about the future—are going to end up inside some other creature's intestines. You're going to become crocodile shit!"
Sam shuddered. "Jesus, I see what you mean. It's enough to make me turn green." It was the truth.
"And thanks a hell of a lot for making me talk about it," Harry said. "What I really need out here is to be discussing my deepest fears."
"Yes," Sam said, smiling secretively, "I know."
Getting the Job Done
Chapter Twenty-six
"Do you know where we're going?" Jack South asked.
But Amelia hadn't heard him above the loud rock music blaring from the Buick's twelve-speaker sound system. She reached over, turned the radio down and asked him to repeat himself.
"Where are we going?" he said again.
"Yes," Morgan asked from the backseat. "Where are we going?"
Freely stayed quiet.
They had just passed Chelmsford Road—which Amelia had never heard of and was sure wasn't one of her creations—and they were surrounded by fields of tall grass and sunflowers. The road had suddenly become narrow and rutted, and they were being bounced around like marshmallows.
"This is very pretty," Jack South said.
"I think we're going east," Amelia said.
The strangled voice of Freely said from the backseat, "She doesn't know where the piss we're going."
Morgan asked, "How the hell can you tell which direction we're traveling in if there's no sun?"
"Sure there's a sun," Jack South told him. "Look at it out there. Sunlight."
"Idiot!" Morgan hissed. "When I say there's no sun, I don't mean there's no sunlight, I mean there's no sun!"
Jack opened his window, craned his head out, looked around. "You're right. There's no sun. Where's the fucking sun?"
Amelia turned the radio back on to divert Jack's attention.
Freely croaked from the backseat, "There's no sun because we're all dead, Jack. Some of us are more dead than others, of course."
Jack looked around at her. "Did you say something about being dead?"
"For Christ's sake, isn't it obvious? Look at me!"
"I am, I am! And?"
Amelia brought the car to a stop at a crossroads. Straight ahead, the road narrowed further and she could see that it ended not far off. To the left, it widened. To the right, there was more of the same narrow, rutted road. They were still surrounded by fields of tall grass and sunflowers.
She took a left.
How easy was this going to be? Sam wondered.
"Lost in thought?" Harry asked.
"Yes," Sam answered.
"About what?"
Sam grinned a little, then answered, "Possibilities."
"What sorts of possibilities?"
"All sorts. I think there are probably billions... no, trillions of possibilities."
Harry smiled. "There are probably as many possibilities as there are combinations of molecules and electrons."
"Sure," Sam said. "At least that many." An indefinable speck on the horizon—or what passed for the horizon, here—caught his attention. He smiled quickly—so, his idea was working!—and focused on it.
Harry craned his head around. "Do you see something?"
"I don't know. I think so," Sam answered tentatively.
"Yes," Harry said. "I
do too. What do you think it is? Maybe it's a ship." This seemed to cheer him.
"It doesn't look like a ship," Sam said.
"How can you tell at this distance?" Harry countered.
The speck on the horizon grew slowly as they watched. It took on a shape—bulbous, like a weather balloon—and a color—black. A black, bulbous thing against the blue-green horizon.
"I think it's a ship," Harry declared happily. "I think that we've crossed over—Lord knows how—and that's a ship and it's going to . . . rescue us."
"Rescue us?"
Harry grimaced. "Yes, I suppose that does sound ludicrous, doesn't it?"
"Harry, I'm sorry, but I don't think it's a ship."
"What else could it be?"
They both watched as the thing drew closer to the little rowboat, until, at last, it became clear to Harry that Sam was right.
"It's not a ship," he said glumly.
Sam agreed.
"For Christ's sake…." His voice was edging in on panic. The thing had closed to within a mile or so of the little rowboat and he could see that it was huge, bulbous, black and wild-eyed. It moved leadenly and inexorably toward them over the calm water. "For Christ's sake, Sam, look at that thing! My God, it's alive!"
"Where did it come from?" Sam asked, though he knew only too well.
Harry was astonished. "Who gives a shit where it came from? For God's sake, row!" He reached frantically for the oars. Sam reached too, got them first and began to row hard.
Harry looked back at the huge, wild-eyed creature bearing down on them.
The thing's mouth opened.
Harry screamed.
Sam screamed—if only for effect—and thought, That's close enough, because the thing was only a stone's throw away and it towered over the little boat like a black tidal wave, its gummy mouth—and apparently endless rows of pointed teeth—opened wide.
Harry screamed again.
That's far enough! Sam thought. Why in the hell wasn't it following his directions? He had created it, after all. He had conjured it up, because what was more mortal than fear?
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