I assured the biddy that I would personally investigate the matter and that the Advocate would do whatever it could to keep the citizens and streets of Pomo safe, and hung up before she could fill my ear with any more bullshit. After which I fired a fresh gasper and administered a little more hangover medicine to the Kent insides. Shakier than usual, this A.M. I’d applied so much salve to the old wounds last night that I hadn’t even the haziest memory of where I’d gone after staggering out of Gunderson’s. Last clear image: Storm with her hand on Bigfoot’s thigh, crooning her old black magic into his hairy ear. Woke up this morning on the couch in my living room, my head bulging with the percussive beat of a Pomo Indian ceremonial drum. A hell of a toot, all right. But I’d had provocation. Yes, indeed. Didn’t I always?
When the salve began to work its restorative powers, I tucked the bottle into the desk-drawer cranny and leaned back in my chair and closed my eyes. The poisonous Mrs. Wilson’s voice echoed faintly in my mind. Her alleged child molester was, of course, Storm’s last conquest, the beast who’d wandered in out of the cold. On the hunt for nine-year-old brats after a glorious night of fooking with the Whore of Pomo? Not too bloody likely.
An interesting theory, though. The lumbering hulk with the Frankenstein phiz, an actual monster in monster’s disguise? Nice irony there. And what would dear Storm say if she learned that the hands that had groped her fair body were, in fact, bloody claws? Would she be horrified? Sickened enough to change her profligate ways? Kent should live so long. Still, it’d be a cunning little joke on her, would it not? Give her a twinge or two—let her feel what she made me feel. A joy to see her face when she received a different kind of prick than she was used to …
An idea began to form in the aching cells and ganglia behind my eyes. I’d promised the biddy the Advocate would take up cudgels on behalf of Pomo public safety; well, then, why not do just that? An article written in the usual hard-hitting Kent style: yellow journalism at its most inflammatory. Nothing slanderous; no direct mention of the horse-hung beast, no specific allusion to child molestation or other such nefarious acts. But just enough neatly and thinly veiled references to “strangers in our midst,” “drifters of frightening mien and presence,” “possible influx into our fair town of the more base criminal element,” etc., so that Storm would know exactly who had inspired the piece. Know, and wonder. And then along would come Kent with his little prick: “I hate to tell you this, Storm, but there’s a possibility your latest bed partner is, in fact, the worst sort of vicious pervert …”
Well, Kent? Do you really want to sink that low?
Does a Sasquatch crap in the woods? Did the old man sink into the depths of the Monongahela?
Ah, but timing was the key. The piece had to run in today’s issue in order for it to have the desired impact. Could it still be done?
I took a squint at the wall clock. Ten past ten. The main-section deadline was eight A.M., and the press run usually begins at ten sharp. Today, however, the schedule was off; the Advocate’s presses are old and cranky, in spirit not unlike the rag’s crusading editor, and they’d been down when Kent staggered into the building a little over an hour ago. Joe Peterson, the pressroom foreman, thought he’d have them ready and rolling by ten, but that estimate obviously had been off by at least ten minutes. The entire building rumbles and rattles when the big Goss press begins its iron-throated roar, and the place had been mercifully quiet unto the present moment.
I got on the horn to the pressroom. Joe was still working on the bugger; his assistant said he thought he’d have it ready to do by ten-thirty. I told him to tell Joe to hold the press run, that new photographic plates would have to be made of page one and page eight. Hot editorial to be substituted for one of the existing news stories, I said; I was working on it now. He grumbled some but he didn’t argue. Kent’s word is law in the bowels of the Pomo Advocate, if nowhere else. Besides, did anyone in this godforsaken county really give a flying fook if Friday’s No-Star Final was a couple of hours late being printed and delivered?
On one corner of my desk were placement dummies for each of the pages in the main news section. I hauled over page one for a quick scan. The usual boring crap; I could dump the entire lot, with the possible exception of the news item on a three-car pileup that had put a local walnut grower out of his misery. I settled on the longest piece, a dull rehash of facts on the upcoming sewer bond issue and its various pros and cons, poorly concocted by Jay Dietrich, the Advocate’s young Jimmy Olsen. Twenty column inches, twelve on the front page and the rest on page eight. Kent, a chip off the old cliché of fast-copy newspaper hacks, could knock off twenty column inches in half an hour without breaking a sweat. Twenty-five minutes or less if the immediate reward was another slug of old Doc Beefeater.
All systems go. ’Twas ordained that Pa Kent’s boy have his fun with Storm and the Incredible Hulk, else circumstances wouldn’t have conspired to make it possible. No es verdad?
I fired up the trusty Compaq and set to work. Words flowed from the first sentence; Kent hadn’t been this sharp and persuasive, this coherent, in many a moon. Did I feel even a moment’s guilt or reluctance? I did not. Hell, I might actually be performing a public service here. For all I knew, Storm’s latest conquest really was a monster in monster’s guise.
Madeline Pearce
I SAW JORDAN today.
Well, no, that’s not true. It wasn’t Jordan. But he does look like Jordan, the resemblance is quite striking—
No. Stop it now. He doesn’t look anything like Jordan. He’s a large man, that’s all, in the same way Jordan was large. And he startled me, appearing so suddenly from behind the marble obelisk that marks our family plot. The sun was in my eyes—
Yes, and for just a second I thought he was Jordan. I truly did. But only for a moment. Only long enough to say, “Oh! Jordan!”
He stopped and looked at me, and, of course, I realized then that he wasn’t really anyone I’d ever known. A large, homely stranger with pale eyes—no, nothing at all like Jordan. Jordan was so handsome, the handsomest man I’ve ever seen, especially when he was wearing his uniform. Is it any wonder I fell in love with him that summer?
“My name isn’t Jordan,” he said.
“Oh, I know,” I said. “But when you stepped out so suddenly, why, for a moment I thought you were.”
“I didn’t mean to startle you.”
“You didn’t, really. That’s ours, you know.”
“Yours?”
“The Pearce family plot. My father and mother are buried there. And my brother, Tom, and my sister Pauline, and both their spouses. Alice’s husband, too. Alice is my older sister. She and I are the only Pearces left now.” I smiled at him. “My name is Madeline, but everyone calls me Maddie.”
“How are you, Maddie?”
“Oh, I’m fine. I don’t believe I’ve ever seen you before. Are you visiting relatives here, too?”
“In Pomo, you mean?”
“No, here. Does your family have a plot in Cypress Hill?”
“I don’t have a family,” he said. He sounded sad, and I felt sorry for him. Everyone should have a family.
“Visiting a friend, then?” I asked.
“No. I like cemeteries, is all.”
“So do I. So lovely and peaceful with all the shade trees and flowers.”
“It was more peaceful when I first got here.”
“It was? How is that possible?”
“Nobody around. Not that I mind your company.”
“That’s nice of you, young man. I don’t mind yours, either.”
He laughed. His laugh was a bit like Jordan’s, too, deep-chested and robust. “This part’s pretty old,” he said. “Can’t read the names on some of the stones and markers.”
“I find that sad, don’t you?”
“Yeah. I do.”
“Cypress Hill is more than a century old, you know.” I found myself smiling at him again. Such a nice young man. “Even older than me.”<
br />
“You’re not so old, Maddie.”
“Seventy-nine.”
“Is that right? I’d have said nine or ten years younger.”
“Well. You’re very gallant.”
“Me?” His laugh, this time, had a different pitch. “You’re the first person who ever called me that.”
“Well, I hope I’m not the last.”
“I hope so, too. But I’ll bet you are. First and last.”
“I come here every week to visit my family,” I told him. “Usually Alice drives me, but she had a doctor’s appointment today. A neighbor brought me; she’s waiting in the car. She wants me to come and live with her.”
“Your neighbor?”
“No, my sister. Alice. She thinks I’d be better off, because I’m getting on, but I’m not sure I would be. I can’t make up my mind. I’ve lived alone such a long time.”
“Widow?”
“Oh, no. I’ve never been married. Once I nearly was, but … God has His reasons.”
“Was it Jordan you almost married?”
“Yes, it was. How did you know?”
“What kept it from happening?”
“He went away. He was a soldier, and he went away to Korea. He promised he’d come back and we’d be married, but he never did.”
“Killed over there?”
“I don’t believe so, no. Someone would have sent word if he’d been killed. For years I was certain he’d come and things would be the same as they were before he went away. But he didn’t.” I sighed and looked past him at the sky. Most of the clouds were gone; it was going to be a lovely day. “It was all such a long time ago, Jordan.”
“I’m not Jordan. My name is John.”
“John. You know, John, you don’t look anything like him. Except for a moment, when I first saw you.”
He didn’t speak for quite some time, and then when he did he said the oddest thing.
“I’ll tell you something, Maddie,” he said. “If this were fifty years ago and I were Jordan, I’d have kept the promise he made. I’d’ve come back and married you. Then you wouldn’t have had to live alone all those years.”
We parted after that, but on the way home I thought about him and the odd thing he’d said. He isn’t Jordan, he’s nothing at all like Jordan except for his robust laugh, but I don’t know how I could have thought he was homely and that his eyes were strange. Actually, he was rather good-looking. Not nearly as handsome as Jordan, of course, but in his own way quite an attractive young man.
I told all of this to Alice when she called after her doctor’s appointment. “Oh, Maddie,” she said, “I think it’s time you came to live with me. Honestly, it’s time.”
I’ve made up my mind. I think so, too.
Earle Banner
I CAME HOME from Stan’s Auto Body fifteen minutes early, and Lori wasn’t there. No sign of her, no note, nothing fixed in the kitchen even though I’d told her I might be home for lunch. Testing her, and she’d flunked again. How stupid does she think I am?
Wouldn’t be surprised if she was out screwing that big bastard she was pawing in the Northlake last night. Two of ’em laughing together like they were old pals, her with her hand on his arm, and everybody in the place looking and whispering. Her and him whispering before that … making plans for today? Son of a bitch wanders into town and she’s all over him like a bad rash. She likes ’em big, big all over. Big horse with a cock to match. Just right for a cheating little mare in heat.
Sometimes, Christ, I think I oughta just shoot her. Let her have one in the head with my .38, put her out of her misery. That movie I seen once, the one about the dance contest back in the thirties, guy who wrote that had it right. They shoot horses, don’t they?
Lying to me, all the time lying. Wasn’t what it looked like, Earle. Nothing between me and him or anybody else, Earle. Why won’t you believe me, Earle. Lies. Lies and horseshit. Why do I keep letting her do it to me? I don’t love her no more. Good lay, but the world’s full of good lays. Why don’t I walk? I oughta walk. Oughta’ve smashed her lying mouth again last night and then walked, but no, I let her whine and plead me right out of it. Don’t hit me, Earle, you promised you wouldn’t hit me anymore. Like it’s my fault. Like I’m the one playing around all the time. Once in a while, sure, a man don’t let a chance for some strange tail pass him by when it wiggles right up and begs for it. Storm Carey—oh, yeah! Gave that high-and-mighty bitch what she was begging for. Somebody oughta give her what else she’s begging for, smash her high-and-mighty mouth for her. Women. Lousy, lying bitches. Better not hit me anymore, Earle, I won’t stand for you hitting me anymore. Yeah? But I’m supposed to stand for her spreading her legs for every big bastard comes along. Well, I had enough, too. Man can only take so much—
Here she comes. Damn little Jap car of hers sounds like a washing machine, hear it coming half a mile away. I hate that crappy Jap car. Why the hell wouldn’t she listen to me and buy American like I told her? Push that friggin’ car off a cliff someday. Yeah, and maybe with her in it.
I went into the living room and stood there so she’d see me soon as she walked in. She almost dropped the grocery sack she was carrying. Her eyes got wide and scared. Good. I liked that. I liked it just fine.
“Earle,” she said.
“Didn’t expect to see me, did you?”
“Well, you said you might be home for lunch—”
“But you took a chance I wouldn’t be.”
“A chance? I don’t know what—”
“You know what, all right. You know what.”
“Earle, please don’t be mad.”
“How was it, baby? Huh?”
“How was what? Safeway? That’s where I’ve been, I had to pick up a few things—”
“I know what you picked up. That big, ugly bastard and his horse cock, that’s what you went out and picked up.”
“Oh God! I swear I was at Safeway. Go down and ask Sally Smith, she was my checker, she’ll tell you—”
“Lie to me, you mean. All you bitches lie for each other. You think I don’t know how it is?”
“I’ve never cheated on you, Earle. Never, not even once. Listen to me, honey, please—”
“I’m through listening, you damn cheap little whore.”
“Stop it! Stop it!”
I stopped it, all right. I stopped it with my fist smack in her lying mouth.
George Petrie
THE WAY OUT occurred to me right after lunch. At least that was when I was first conscious of it. It may have been there all along, planted days ago or even longer, hidden and growing under all the pressures piling up and rotting inside my head like a compost heap. Taking seed and finally poking up like a little green shoot into the light.
When I saw it I was thinking again about the stranger, John Faith. I hadn’t thought about much else all day, hadn’t done much work. Every time the doors opened I expected it to be him. He hadn’t showed yet, but he didn’t have to walk in waving a gun during business hours. He could be cleverer than that. Usually I arrive each morning half an hour before Fred and Arlene, enter through the rear door from the parking lot; it wouldn’t be difficult for Faith to find that out, lie in wait for me some morning. Or worse, come right to the house and take me hostage there. Either way, he could force me to let him into the bank, empty the vault when the time lock released, shut me inside, and be long gone by the time anyone found me.
Did he have any idea how much cash we keep on hand for a small-town bank? Quite a lot. Must be around $200,000 in the vault right now. Some of the bills are marked, and we keep a record of the serial numbers; we also have one of those indelible red-dye packets. But if Faith is a professional thief, he’ll know ways to avoid traps like that. All that money, $200,000 in cash—his to spend, free and clear.
Unless somebody else took it first.
And there it was, the way out: Unless I took it first.
The idea is absolutely terrifying. But it also excites me. Dang
erous … yet not any more so than taking the seven thousand. And not any more frightening than the prison sentence I’m already facing. It’s my one and only chance at escape, freedom, the brass ring. No more Ramona, no more Pomo, no more worries. And $200,000 in tax-free, spendable cash!
But if I did dare to take it, where would I go? You can travel anywhere in the world on that much money, to someplace that doesn’t have an extradition treaty with the U.S. All you need is a passport. And I don’t have one. Forever dreaming of far-off, exotic places, but I’d never been to any of them, couldn’t afford it on my salary. I’ve never been anywhere. Forty-seven years old, lived my entire life in this town, never been any farther from it than Las Vegas.
I can’t take the chance on waiting anywhere near the three or four weeks it takes for a passport application to be processed. And even if I could, even if I was able to leave the country myself, how would I get the money out? Airport security at both ends, no matter what the destination; carry-on and checked baggage inspection on international flights because of the terrorism threat. And I couldn’t risk entrusting that much cash to the mails or one of the air-freight companies. If I had enough time I could convert it to bearer bonds or arrange for a wire transfer … Christ, what’s the use in thinking about what can’t be done? If I’m going to take the money, it has to be right away, before something happens or I lose what little nerve I have. Tonight, Friday night. Before I close the vault and set the time lock for nine-thirty Monday morning. Give me two and a half days to get far away from Pomo—
To where, damnit? Where can I go in this country that the FBI wouldn’t be able to track me down, sooner or later?
A Wasteland of Strangers Page 8