the opposite lane. The road ahead had blind curves and
he didn’t try to pass until the truck had crossed the ridge.
He waited until it started around a left curve on the
downgrade, then, seeing that the way was clear, pressed
down on the accelerator pedal and steered his car into
the eastbound lane. He waited until he could see the
truck front in his rearview mirror before he turned back
into the proper lane.
Mann looked across the countryside ahead. There
were ranges of mountains as far as he could see and, all
around him, rolling green hills. He whistled softly as the
car sped down the winding grade, its tires making crisp
sounds on the pavement.
At the bottom of the hill, he crossed a concrete bridge
and, glancing to the right, saw a dry streambed strewn
with rocks and gravel. As the car moved off the bridge, he
saw a trailer park set back from the highway to his right.
How can anyone live out here? he thought. His shifting
gaze caught sight of a pet cemetery ahead and he smiled.
Maybe those people in the trailers wanted to be close to
the graves of their dogs and cats.
The highway ahead was straight now. Mann drifted
into a reverie, the sunlight on his arm and lap. He
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wondered what Ruth was doing. The kids, of course,
were in school and would be for hours yet. Maybe Ruth
was shopping; Thursday was the day she usually went.
Mann visualized her in the supermarket, putting various
items into the basket cart. He wished he were with her
instead of starting on another sales trip. Hours of driving
yet before he’d reach San Francisco. Three days of hotel
sleeping and restaurant eating, hoped-for contacts and
likely disappointments. He sighed; then, reaching out
impulsively, he switched on the radio. He revolved the
tuning knob until he found a station playing soft, innocuous music. He hummed along with it, eyes almost out of focus on the road ahead.
He started as the truck roared past him on the left,
causing his car to shudder slightly. He watched the truck
and trailer cut in abruptly for the westbound lane and
frowned as he had to brake to maintain a safe distance
behind it. What’s with you? he thought.
He eyed the truck with cursory disapproval. It was a
huge gasoline tanker pulling a tank trailer, each of them
having six pairs of wheels. He could see that it was
not a new rig but was dented and in need of renovation, its tanks painted a cheap-looking silvery color.
Mann wondered if the driver had done the painting
himself. His gaze shifted from the word fla m m a ble
printed across the back of the trailer tank, red letters
on a white background, to the parallel reflector lines
painted in red across the bottom of the tank to the massive rubber flaps swaying behind the rear tires, then back up again. The reflector lines looked as though
they’d been clumsily applied with a stencil. The driver must be an independent trucker, he decided, and not too affluent a one, from the looks of his outfit. He
glanced at the trailer’s license plate. It was a California
issue.
Mann checked his speedometer. He was holding
steady at 55 miles an hour, as he invariably did when he
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drove without thinking on the open highway. The truck
driver must have done a good 70 to pass him so quickly.
That seemed a little odd. Weren’t truck drivers supposed
to be a cautious lot?
He grimaced at the smell of the truck’s exhaust and
looked at the vertical pipe to the left of the cab. It was
spewing smoke, which clouded darkly back across the
trailer. Christ, he thought. With all the furor about air
pollution, why do they keep allowing that sort of thing
on the highways?
He scowled at the constant fumes. They’d make him
nauseated in a little while, he knew. He couldn’t lag back
here like this. Either he slowed down or he passed the
truck again. He didn’t have the time to slow down. He’d
gotten a late start. Keeping it at 55 all the way, he’d just
about make his afternoon appointment. No, he’d have to
pass.
Depressing the gas pedal, he eased his car toward the
opposite lane. No sign of anything ahead. Traffic on this
route seemed almost nonexistent today. He pushed
down harder on the accelerator and steered all the way
into the eastbound lane.
As he passed the truck, he glanced at it. The cab was
too high for him to see into. All he caught sight of was the
back of the truck driver’s left hand on the steering wheel.
It was darkly tanned and square-looking, with large
veins knotted on its surface.
When Mann could see the truck reflected in the
rearview mirror, he pulled back over to the proper lane
and looked ahead again.
He glanced at the rearview mirror in surprise as
the truck driver gave him an extended horn blast. What
was that? he wondered; a greeting or a curse? He
grunted with amusement, glancing at the mirror as he
drove. The front fenders of the truck were a dingy purple color, the paint faded and chipped; another amateurish job. All he could see was the lower portion of
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the truck; the rest was cut off by the top of his rear
window.
To Mann’s right, now, was a slope of shalelike earth
with patches of scrub grass growing on it. His gaze
jumped to the clapboard house on top of the slope. The
television aerial on its roof was sagging at an angle of less
than 40 degrees. Must give great reception, he thought.
He looked to the front again, glancing aside abruptly
at a sign printed in jagged block letters on a piece of
plywood: n ig h t c r a w l e r s— ba it. What the hell is a night
crawler? he wondered. It sounded like some monster in a
low-grade Hollywood thriller.
The unexpected roar of the truck motor made his gaze
jump to the rearview mirror. Instantly, his startled look
jumped to the side mirror. By God, the guy was passing
him again. Mann turned his head to scowl at the
leviathan form as it drifted by. He tried to see into the
cab but couldn’t because of its height. What’s with him,
anyway? he wondered. What the hell are we having
here, a contest? See which vehicle can stay ahead the
longest?
He thought of speeding up to stay ahead but changed
his mind. When the truck and trailer started back into the westbound lane, he let up on the pedal, voicing a newly incredulous sound as he saw that if he hadn’t slowed down, he would have been prematurely
cut off again. Jesus Christ, he thought. What’s with this
guy?
His scowl deepened as the odor of the truck’s exhaust
reached his nostrils again. Irritably, he cranked up the
window on his left. Damn it, was he going to have to
breathe that crap all the way to San Francisco? He
couldn’t afford to slow down. He had to meet Forbes at a<
br />
quarter after three and that was that.
He looked ahead. At least there was no traffic complicating matters. Mann pressed down on the accelerator pedal, drawing close behind the truck. When the highway
curved enough to the left to give him a completely open
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view of the route ahead, he jarred down on the pedal,
steering out into the opposite lane.
The truck edged over, blocking his way.
For several moments, all Mann could do was stare at it
in blank confusion. Then, with a startled noise, he
braked, returning to the proper lane. The truck moved
back in front of him.
Mann could not allow himself to accept what apparently had taken place. It had to be a coincidence. The truck driver couldn’t have blocked his way on purpose.
He waited for more than a minute, then flicked down the
turn-indicator lever to make his intentions perfectly
clear and, depressing the accelerator pedal, steered again
into the eastbound lane.
Immediately, the truck shifted, barring his way.
“Jesus Christ!" Mann was astounded. This was unbelievable. He’d never seen such a thing in twenty-six years of driving. He returned to the westbound lane, shaking
his head as the truck swung back in front of him.
He eased up on the gas pedal, falling back to avoid the
truck’s exhaust. Now what? he wondered. He still had to
make San Francisco on schedule. Why in God’s name
hadn’t he gone a little out of his way in the beginning, so
he could have traveled by freeway? This damned highway was two lanes all the way.
Impulsively, he sped into the eastbound lane again.
To his surprise, the truck driver did not pull over. Instead, the driver stuck his left arm out and waved him on. Mann started pushing down on the accelerator.
Suddenly, he let up on the pedal with a gasp and
jerked the steering wheel around, raking back behind
the truck so quickly that his car began to fishtail. He
was fighting to control its zigzag whipping when a blue
convertible shot by him in the opposite lane. Mann
caught a momentary vision of the man inside it glaring
at him.
The car came under his control again. Mann was
sucking breath in through his mouth. His heart was
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pounding almost painfully. My God! he thought. He
wanted me to hit that car head-on. The realization
stunned him. True, he should have seen to it himself that
the road ahead was clear, that was his failure. But to
wave him on . . . Mann felt appalled and sickened. Boy,
oh, boy, oh, boy, he thought. This was really one for the
books. That son of a bitch had meant for not only him to
be killed but a totally uninvolved passerby as well. The
idea seemed beyond his comprehension. On a California
highway on a Thursday morning? Why?
Mann tried to calm himself and rationalize the incident. Maybe it’s the heat, he thought. Maybe the truck driver had a tension headache or an upset stomach;
maybe both. Maybe he’d had a fight with his wife. Maybe
she’d failed to put out last night. Mann tried in vain to
smile. There could be any number of reasons. Reaching
out, he twisted off the radio. The cheerful music irritated
him.
He drove behind the truck for several minutes, his face
a mask of animosity. As the exhaust fumes started
putting his stomach on edge, he suddenly forced down
the heel of his right hand on the horn bar and held it
there. Seeing that the route ahead was clear, he pushed in
the accelerator pedal all the way and steered into the
opposite lane.
The movement of his car was paralleled immediately
by the truck. Mann stayed in place, right hand jammed
down on the horn bar. Get out of the way, you son of a
bitch! he thought. He felt the muscles of his jaw hardening until they ached. There was a twisting in his stomach.
“Damn!” He pulled back quickly to the proper lane,
shuddering with fury. “You miserable son of a bitch,” he
muttered, glaring at the truck as it was shifted back in
front of him. What the hell is wrong with you? I pass
your goddamn rig a couple of times and you go flying off
the deep end? Are you nuts or something? Mann nodded
tensely. Yes, he thought; he is. No other explanation.
He wondered what Ruth would think of all this, how
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she’d react. Probably, she’d start to honk the horn and
would keep on honking it, assuming that, eventually, it
would attract the attention of a policeman. He looked
around with a scowl. Just where in hell were the policemen out here, anyway? He made a scoffing noise. What policemen? Here in the boondocks? They probably had a
sheriff on horseback, for Christ’s sake.
He wondered suddenly if he could fool the truck driver
by passing on the right. Edging his car toward the
shoulder, he peered ahead. No chance. There wasn’t
room enough. The truck driver could shove him through
that wire fence if he wanted to. Mann shivered. And he’d
want to, sure as hell, he thought.
Driving where he was, he grew conscious of the debris
lying beside the highway: beer cans, candy wrappers,
ice-cream containers, newspaper sections browned and
rotted by the weather, a f o r sa le sign tom in half. Keep
America beautiful, he thought sardonically. He passed a
boulder with the name w il l ja sp e r painted on it in white.
Who the hell is Will Jasper? he wondered. What would
he think of this situation?
Unexpectedly, the car began to bounce. For several
anxious moments, Mann thought that one of his tires
had gone flat. Then he noticed that the paving along this
section of highway consisted of pitted slabs with gaps
between them. He saw the truck and trailer jolting up
and down and thought: I hope it shakes your brains
loose. As the truck veered into a sharp left curve, he
caught a fleeting glimpse of the driver’s face in the cab’s
side mirror. There was not enough time to establish his
appearance.
“Ah,” he said. A long, steep hill was looming up
ahead. The truck would have to climb it slowly. There
would doubtless be an opportunity to pass somewhere
on the grade. Mann pressed down on the accelerator
pedal, drawing as close behind the truck as safety would
allow.
Halfway up the slope, Mann saw a turnout for the
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eastbound lane with no oncoming traffic anywhere in
sight. Flooring the accelerator pedal, he shot into the
opposite lane. The slow-moving truck began to angle out
in front of him. Face stiffening, Mann steered his speeding car across the highway edge and curved it sharply on the turnout. Clouds of dust went billowing up behind his
car, making him lose sight of the truck. His tires buzzed
and crackled on the dirt, then, suddenly, were humming
on the pavement once again.
He glanced at the rearview mirror and a barking laugh
erupted from his throat. He’d
only meant to pass. The
dust had been an unexpected bonus. Let the bastard get
a sniff of something rotten-smelling in his nose for a
change! he thought. He honked the horn elatedly, a
mocking rhythm of bleats. Screw you, Jack!
He swept across the summit of the hill. A striking vista
lay ahead: sunlit hills and flatland, a corridor of dark
trees, quadrangles of cleared-off acreage and bright-green
vegetable patches; far off, in the distance, a mammoth
water tower. Mann felt stirred by the panoramic sight.
Lovely, he thought. Reaching out, he turned the radio
back on and started humming cheerfully with the music.
Seven minutes later, he passed a billboard advertising
c h u c k ’s c a f e . N o thanks, Chuck, he thought. He glanced
at a gray house nestled in a hollow. Was that a cemetery
in its front yard or a group of plaster statuary for sale?
Hearing the noise behind him, Mann looked at the
rearview mirror and felt himself go cold with fear.
The truck was hurtling down the hill, pursuing him.
His mouth fell open and he threw a glance at the
speedometer. He was doing more than 60! On a curving
downgrade, that was not at all a safe speed to be driving.
Yet the truck must be exceeding that by a considerable
margin, it was closing the distance between them so
rapidly. Mann swallowed, leaning to the right as he
steered his car around a sharp curve. Is the man insane?
he thought.
His gaze jumped forward searchingly. He saw a turnoff
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half a mile ahead and decided that he’d use it. In the
rearview mirror, the huge square radiator grille was all
he could see now. He stamped down on the gas pedal and
his tires screeched unnervingly as he wheeled around
another curve, thinking that, surely, the truck would
have to slow down here.
He groaned as it rounded the curve with ease, only the
sway of its tanks revealing the outward pressure of the
turn. Mann bit trembling lips together as he whipped his
car around another curve. A straight descent now. He
depressed the pedal farther, glanced at the speedometer.
Almost 70 miles an hour! He wasn’t used to driving this
fast!
In agony, he saw the turnoff shoot by on his right. He
couldn’t have left the highway at this speed, anyway; he’d
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