streets eight miles east of here has become a driveway leading up a
shallow hill, and on moonlit summer nights it glimmers like
something out of an Alfred Noyes poem. At the top of the hill
stands an angular, handsome barn-board structure with
reflectorized windows, a stable that is actually a garage, and a
satellite dish tilted at the stars. A waggish reporter from the Derry
News once called it the House that Gore Built ... not meaning the
vice president of the United States. Richard Kinnell simply called
it home, and he parked in front of it that night with a sense of
weary satisfaction. He felt as if he had lived through a week's
worth of time since getting up in the Boston Harbor hotel that
morning at nine o'clock.
No more yard sales, he thought, looking up at the moon. No more
yard sales ever.
I "Amen," he said, and started toward the house. He probably
should stick the car in the garage, but the hell with it. What he
wanted right now was a drink, a light meal - something
microwaveable - and then sleep. Preferably the kind without
dreams. He couldn't wait to put this day behind him.
He stuck his key in the lock, turned it, and punched 3817 to silence
the warning bleep from the burglar alarm panel. He turned on the
front hall light, stepped through the door, pushed it shut behind
him, began to turn, saw what was on the wall where his collection
of framed book covers had been just two days ago, and screamed.
In his head he screamed. Nothing actually came out of his mouth
but a harsh exhalation of air. He heard a thump and a tuneless little
jingle as his keys fell out of his relaxing hand and dropped to the
carpet between his feet.
The Road Virus Heads North was no longer in the puckerbrush
behind the Gray turnpike service area.
It was mounted on his entry wall.
It had changed yet again. The car was now parked in the driveway
of the yard sale yard. The goods were still spread out
everywhereglassware and furniture and ceramic knickknacks
(Scottie dogs smoking pipes, bare-assed toddlers, winking fish),
but now they gleamed beneath the light of the same skullface
moon that rode in the sky above Kinnell's house. The TV was still
there, too, and it was still on, casting its own pallid radiance onto
the grass, and what lay in front of it, next to an overturned lawn
chair. Judy Diment was on her back, and she was no longer all
there. After a moment, Kinnell saw the rest. It was on the ironing
board, dead eyes glowing like fifty-cent pieces in the moonlight.
The Grand Am's taillights were a blur of red-pink watercolor paint.
It was Kinnell's first look at the car's back deck. Written across it
in Old English letters were three words: THE ROAD VIRUS.
Makes perfect sense, Kinnell thought numbly. Not him, his car.
Except for a guy like this, there's probably not much difference.
"This isn't happening," he whispered, except it was. Maybe it
wouldn't have happened to someone a little less open to such
things, but it was happening. And as he stared at the painting he
found himself remembering the little sign on Judy Diment's card
table. ALL SALES CASH, it had said (although she had taken his
check, only adding his driver's license ID number for safety's
sake). And it had said something else, too.
ALL SALES FINAL.
Kinnell walked past the picture and into the living room. He felt
like a stranger inside his own body, and he sensed part of his mind
groping for the trowel he had used earlier. He seemed to have
misplaced it.
He turned on the TV, then the Toshiba satellite tuner which sat on
top of it. He turned to V-14, and all the time he could feel the
picture out there in the hall, pushing at the back of his head. The
picture that had somehow beaten him here.
"Must have known a shortcut," Kinnell said, and laughed.
He hadn't been able to see much of the blond in this version of the
picture, but there had been a blur behind the wheel which Kinnell
assumed had been him. The Road Virus had finished his business
in Rosewood. It was time to move north. Next stop
He brought a heavy steel door down on that thought, cutting it off
before he could see all of it. "After all, I could still be imagining all
this," he told the empty living room. Instead of comforting him, the
hoarse, shaky quality of his voice frightened him even more. "This
could be ... But he couldn't finish. All that came to him was an old
song, belted out in the pseudo-hip style of some early '50s Sinatra
done: This could be the start of something BIG ...
The tune oozing from the TV's stereo speakers wasn't Sinatra but
Paul Simon, arranged for strings. The white computer type on the
blue screen said WELCOME TO NEW ENGLAND NEWSWIRE.
There were ordering instructions below this, but Kinnell didn't
have to read them; he was a Newswire junkie and knew the drill by
heart. He dialed, punched in his Mastercard number, then 508.
"You have ordered Newswire for [slight pause] central and
northem Massachusetts," the robot voice said. "Thank you very m-
-"
Kinnell dropped the phone back into the cradle and stood looking
at the New England Newswire logo, snapping his fingers
nervously. "Come on," he said. "Come on, come on."
The screen flickered then, and the blue background became green.
Words began scrolling up, something about a house fire in
Taunton. This was followed by the latest on a dog-racing scandal,
then tonight's weather - clear and mild. Kinnell was starting to
relax, starting to wonder if he'd really seen what he thought he'd
seen on the entryway wall or if it had been a bit of travel-induced
fugue, when the TV beeped shrilly and the words BREAKING
NEWS appeared. He stood watching the caps scroll up.
NENphAUG19/8:40P A ROSEWOOD WOMAN HAS BEEN
BRUTALLY MURDER-ED WHILE DOING A FAVOR FOR AN
ABSENT FRIEND. 38-YEAR-OLD JUDITH DIMENT WAS
SAVAGELY HACKED TO DEATH ON THE LAWN OF HER
NEIGHBOR'S HOUSE, WHERE SHE HAD BEEN
CONDUCTING A YARD SALE. NO SCREAMS WERE
HEARD AND MRS. DIMENT WAS NOT FOUND UNTIL
EIGHT O'CLOCK, WHEN A NEIGHBOR ACROSS THE
STREET CAME OVER TO COMPLAIN ABOUT LOUD
TELEVISION NOISE. THE NEIGHBOR, DAVID GRAVES,
SAID THAT MRS. DIMENT HAD BEEN DECAPITATED.
"HER HEAD WAS ON THE IRONING BOARD," HE SAID. "IT
WAS THE MOST AWFUL THING I'VE EVER SEEN IN MY
LIFE." GRAVES SAID HE HEARD NO SIGNS OF A
STRUGGLE, ONLY THE TV AND, SHORTLY BEFORE
FINDING THE BODY, A LOUD CAR, POSSIBLY EQUIPPED
WITH A GLASSPACK MUFFLER, ACCELERATING AWAY
FROM THE VICINITY ALONG ROUTE ONE. SPECULATION
THAT THIS VEHICLE MAY HAVE BELONGED TO THE
KILLER
Except that wasn't speculation; that was a simple fact.
Breathing hard, not quite panting, Kinnell hurried back into the
entryway. The picture was still there, but it had changed once
more. Now it showed two glaring white circles - headlights - with<
br />
the dark shape of the car hulking behind them.
He's on the move again, Kinnell thought, and Aunt Trudy was on
top of his mind now - sweet Aunt Trudy, who always knew who
had been naughty and who had been nice. Aunt Trudy, who lived
in Wells, no more than forty miles from Rosewood.
"God, please God, please send him by the coast road," Kinnell
said, reaching for the picture. Was it his imagination or were the
headlights farther apart now, as if the car were actually moving
before his eyes ... but stealthily, the way the minute hand moved on
a Pocket watch? "Send him by the coast road, please."
He tore the picture off the wall and ran back into the living room
with it. The screen was in place before the fireplace, of course; it
would be at least two months before a fire was wanted in here.
Kinnell batted it aside and threw the painting in, breaking the glass
fronting-which he had already broken once, at the Gray service
area - against the firedogs. Then he pelted for the kitchen,
wondering what he would do if this didn't work either.
It has to, he thought. It will because it has to, and that's A there is
to it.
He opened the kitchen cabinets and pawed through them, spilling
the oatmeal, spilling a canister of salt, spilling the vinegar. The
bottle broken open on the counter and assaulted his nose and eyes
with the high stink.
Not there. What he wanted wasn't there.
He raced into the pantry, looked behind the door - nothing but a
plastic bucket and an 0 Cedar - and then on the shelf by the dryer.
There it was, next to the briquettes.
Lighter fluid.
He grabbed it and ran back, glancing at the telephone on the
kitchen wall as he hurried by. He wanted to stop, wanted to call
Aunt Trudy. Credibility wasn't an issue with her; if her favorite
nephew called and told her to get out of the house, to get out light
now, she would do it ... but what if the blond kid followed her?
Chased her?
And he would. Kinnell knew he would.
He hurried across the living room and stopped in front of the
fireplace.
"Jesus," he whispered. "Jesus, no."
The picture beneath the splintered glass no longer showed
oncoming headlights. Now it showed the Grand Am on a sharply
curving piece of road that could only be an exit ramp. Moonlight
shone like liquid satin on the car's dark flank. In the background
was a water tower, and the words on it were easily readable in the
moonlight. KEEP MAINE GREEN, they said. BRING MONEY.
Kinnell didn't hit the picture with the first squeeze of lighter fluid;
his hands were shaking badly and the aromatic liquid simply ran
down the unbroken part of the glass, blurring the Road Virus's
back deck. He took a deep breath, aimed, then squeezed again.
This time the lighter fluid squirted in through the jagged hole made
by one of the firedogs and ran down the picture, cutting through
the paint, making it run, turning a Goodyear Wide Oval into a
sooty teardrop.
Kinnell took one of the ornamental matches from the jar on the
mantel, struck it on the hearth, and poked it in through the hole in
the glass. The painting caught at once, fire billowing up and down
across the Grand Am and the water tower. The remaining glass in
the frame turned black, then broke outward in a shower of flaming
pieces. Kinnell crunched them under his sneakers, putting them out
before they could set the rug on fire.
He went to the phone and punched in Aunt Trudy's number,
unaware that he was crying. On the third ring, his aunt's answering
machine picked up. "Hello," Aunt Trudy said, "I know it
encourages the burglars to say things like this, but I've gone up to
Kennebunk to watch the new Harrison Ford movie. If you intend to
break in, please don't take my china pigs. If you want to leave a
message, do so at the beep."
Kinnell waited, then, keeping his voice as steady as possible, he
said:
"It's Richie, Aunt Trudy. Call me when you get back, okay? No
matter how late."
He hung up, looked at the TV, then dialed Newswire again, this
time punching in the Maine area code. While the computers on the
other end processed his order, he went back and used a poker to jab
at the blackened, twisted thing in the fireplace. The stench was
ghastly - it made the spilled vinegar smell like a flower patch in
comparison-but Kinnell found he didn't mind. The picture was
entirely gone, reduced to ash, and that made it worthwhile.
Mat if it comes back again?
"It won't," he said, putting the poker back and returning to the TV.
"I'm sure it won't."
But every time the news scroll started to recycle, he got up to
check. The picture was just ashes on the hearth ... and there was no
word of elderly women being murdered in the Wells-Saco-
Kennebunk area of the state. Kinnell kept watching, almost
expecting to see A GRAND AM MOVING AT HIGH SPEED
CRASHED INTO A KENNEBUNK MOVIE THEATER
TONIGHT, KILLING AT LEAST TEN, but nothing of the sort
showed up.
At a quarter of eleven the telephone rang. Kinnell snatched it up.
"Hello?"
"It's Trudy, dear. Are you all right?"
"Yes, fine."
"You don't sound fine," she said. "Your voice sounds trembly and
funny. What's wrong? What is it?" And then, chilling him but not
really surprising him: "It's that picture you were so pleased with,
isn't it? That goddamned picture!"
It calmed him somehow, that she should guess so much ... and, of
course, there was the relief of knowing she was safe.
"Well, maybe," he said. "I had the heebie-jeebies all the way back
here, so I burned it. In the fireplace."
She's going to find out about Judy Diment, you know, a voice
inside warned. She doesn't have a twenty-thousand-dollar satellite
hookup, but she does subscribe to the Union-Leader and this'll be
on the front page. She'll put two and two together. She's far from
stupid.
Yes, that was undoubtedly true, but further explanations could wait
until the morning, when he might be a little less freaked ... when he
might've found a way to think about the Road Virus without losing
his mind ... and when he'd begun to be sure it was really over.
"Good!" she said emphatically. "You ought to scatter the ashes,
too!" She paused, and when she spoke again, her voice was lower.
"You were worried about me, weren't you? Because you showed it
to me.
"A little, yes."
"But you feel better now?"
He leaned back and closed his eyes. It was true, he did. "Uh-huh.
How was the movie?"
"Good. Harrison Ford looks wonderful in a uniform. Now, if he'd
just get rid of that little bump on his chin . . ."
"Good night, Aunt Trudy. We'll talk tomorrow."
"Will we?"
"Yes," he said. "I think so."
He hung up, went over to the fireplace again, and stirred the ashes
with the poker. He could see a scrap of fender and a
ragged little
flap of road, but that was it. Fire was what it had needed all along,
apparently. Wasn't that how you usually killed supernatural
emissaries of evil? Of course it was. He'd used it a few times
himself, most notably in The Departing, his haunted train station
novel.
"Yes, indeed," he said. "Bum, baby, bum."
He thought about getting the drink he'd promised himself, then
remembered the spilled bottle of vinegar (which by now would
probably be soaking into the spilled oatmeal-what a thought). He
decided he would simply go on upstairs instead. In a book-one by
Richard Kinnell, for instance - sleep would be out of the question
after the sort of thing which had just happened to him.
In real life, he thought he might sleep just fine.
He actually dozed off in the shower, leaning against the back wall
with his hair full of shampoo and the water beating on his chest.
He was at the yard sale again, and the TV standing on the paper
ashtrays was broadcasting Judy Diment. Her head was back on, but
Kinnell could see the medical examiner's primitive industrial stitch
work; it circled her throat like a grisly necklace. "Now this New
England Newswire update," she said, and Kinnell, who had always
been a vivid dreamer, could actually see the stitches on her neck
stretch and relax as she spoke. "Bobby Hastings took all his
paintings and burned them, including yours, Mr. Kinnell ... and it
is yours, as I'm sure you know. All sales are final, you saw the
sign. Why, you just ought to be glad I took your check."
Burned all his paintings, yes, of course he did, Kinnell thought in
his watery dream. He couldn't stand what was happening to him,
that's what the note said, and when you get to that point in the
festivities, you don't pause to see if you want to except one special
piece of work from the bonfire. It's just that you got something
special into The Road Virus Heads North, didn't you, Bobby? And
probably completely by accident. You were talented, I could see
that right away, but talent has nothing to do with what's going on
in that picture.
"Some things are just good at survival," Judy Diment said on the
TV. "They keep coming back no matter how hard you try to get rid
of them. They keep coming back like viruses."
Kinnell reached out and changed the channel, but apparently there
was nothing on all the way around the dial except for The Judy
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