You look dreadful!”
“Of course I look dreadful!” she snapped. “The normal flow of my psychic aura has been disrupted-badly disrupted! Instead of blue, the color of calm and serenity, my entire calava has gone bright magenta!
And it’s all the fault of that bitch across the street!
That high-box bitch!”
Mr. Gaunt made peculiar soothing gestures which never quite touched any part of Lenore Potter’s body. “What bitch is that, Mrs.
Potter?” he asked, knowing perfectly well.
“Bonsaint, of course! Bonsaint! That nasty lying Stephanie Bonsaint! My aura has never been magenta before, Mr. Gaunt! Deep pink a few times, yes, and once, after I was almost run down in the street by a drunk in Oxford, I think it might have turned red for a few minutes, but it has never been magenta! I simply cannot live like this!”
“Of course not,” Mr. Gaunt soothed. “No one could expect you to, my dear.”
His eyes finally captured hers. This was not easy with Mrs.
Potter’s gaze darting around in such a distracted manner, but he did finally manage. And when he did, Lenore calmed almost at once.
Looking into Mr. Gaunt’s eyes, she discovered, was almost like looking into her own aura when she had been doing all her exercises, eating the right foods (bean-sprouts and tofu, mostly), and maintaining the surfaces of her calava with at least an hour of meditation when she arose in the morning and again before she went to bed at night. His eyes were the faded, serene blue of desert skies.
“Come,” he said. “Over here.” He led her to the short row of three high-backed plush velvet chairs where so many citizens of Castle Rock had sat over the last week. And when she was seated, Mr. Gaunt invited: “Tell me all about it.”
“She’s always hated me,” Lenore said. “She’s always thought that her husband hasn’t risen in the Firm as fast as she wanted because my husband kept him back. And that I put him up to it. She is a woman with a small mind and a big bosom and a dirty-gray aura.
You know the type.”
“Indeed,” Mr. Gaunt said.
“But I never knew how much she hated me until this morning!”
Lenore Potter was growing agitated again in spite of Mr. Gaunt’s settling influence. “I got up and my flowerbeds were absolutely ruined! Ruined! Everything that was lovely yesterday is dying today!
Everything which was soothing to the aura and nourishing to the calava has been murdered! By that bitch! By that fucking Bonsaint BITCH!”
Lenore’s hands closed into fists, hiding the elegantly manicured nails. The fists drummed on the carved arms of the chair.
“Chrysanthemums, cimicifuga, asters, marigolds… that bitch came over in the night and tore them all out of the ground! Threw them everywhere! Do you know where my ornamental cabbages are this morning, Mr. Gaunt?”
“No-where?” he asked her tenderly, still making those stroking motions just above her body.
He actually had a good idea of where they were, and he knew beyond a shadow of a doubt who was responsible for the calavadestroying mess: Melissa Clutterbuck. Lenore Potter did not suspect Deputy Clutterbuck’s wife because she didn’t know Deputy Clutterbuck’s wife-nor did Melissa Clutterbuck know Lenore, except to say hello to on the street. There had been no malice on Melissa’s part (except, of course, Mr. Gaunt thought, for the normal malicious pleasure anyone feels when tearing hell out of someone else’s much-beloved possessions). She had torn up Lenore Potter’s flowerbeds in partial payment for a set of Limoges china. When you got right down to the bottom of the thing, it was strictly business.
Enjoyable, yes, Mr. Gaunt thought, but whoever said that business always had to be a drag?
“My flowers are in the street!” Lenore shouted. “In the middle of Castle View! She didn’t miss a trick! Even the African daisies are gone! All gone! All… gone!”
“Did you see her?”
“I didn’t need to see her! She’s the only one who hates me enough to do something like that. And the flowerbeds are full of the marks of her high heels. I swear that little trollop wears her heels even to bed.
“Oh Mr. Gaunt,” she wailed, “every time I close my eyes everything goes all purple! What am I going to do?”
Mr. Gaunt said nothing for a moment. He only looked at her, fixing her with his eyes until she grew calm and distant.
“Is that better?” he asked finally.
“Yes!” she replied in a faint, relieved voice. “I believe I can see the blue again…”
“But you’re too upset to even think about shopping.”
“Yes.
“Considering what that bitch did to you.”
“Yes…”
“She ought to pay.”
“Yes.”
“If she ever tries anything like that again, she will pay.”
“Yes!”
“I may have just the thing. Sit right there, Mrs. Potter. I’ll be back in a l’iffy- In the meantime, think blue thoughts.”
“Blue,” she agreed dreamily.
When Mr. Gaunt returned, he put one of the automatic pistols Ace had brought back from Cambridge into Lenore Potter’s hands.
It was fully loaded and gleamed a greasy blue-black under the display lights.
Lenore raised the gun to eye level. She looked at it with deep pleasure and even deeper relief “Now, I would never urge anyone to shoot anyone else,” Mr.
Gaunt said. “Not without a very good reason, at least. But you sound like a woman who might have a very good reason, Mrs. Potter.
Not the flowers-we both know they are not the important thing. Flowers are replaceable. But your karma… your calava… well, what else do we-any of us- really have?” And he laughed deprecatingly.
“Nothing,” she agreed, and pointed the automatic at the wall.
“Pow. Pow, pow, pow. That’s for you, you envying little roundheels trollop. I hope your husband ends up town garbage collector. It’s what he deserves. It’s what you both deserve.”
“You see that little lever there, Mrs. Potter?” He pointed it out to her.
“Yes, I see it.”
“That’s the safety catch. If the bitch should come over again, trying to do more damage, you’d want to push that first. Do you understand?”
“Oh yes,” Lenore said in her sleeper’s voice. “I understand perfectly. Ka-pow.”
“No one would blame you. After all, a woman has to protect her property. A woman has to protect her karma. The Bonsaint creature probably won’t come again, but if she does.
He looked at her meaningfully.
“If she does, it will be for the last time.” Lenore raised the short barrel of the automatic to her lips and kissed it softly.
Now put that in your purse,” Mr. Gaunt said, “and get on home.
Why, for all you know, she could be in your yard right now.
In fact, she could be in your house.”
Lenore looked alarmed at this. Thin threads of sinister purple began to twist and twine through her blue aura. She got up, stuffing the automatic into her purse. Mr. Gaunt looked away from her and she blinked her eyes rapidly several times as soon as he did.
“I’m sorry, but I’ll have to look at Howdy Doody another time, Mr.
Gaunt. I think I’d better go home. For all I know, that Bonsaint woman could be in my yard right now, while I’m here. She might even be in my house!”
“What a terrible idea,” Mr. Gaunt said.
“Yes, but property is a responsibility-it must be protected. We have to face these things, Mr. Gaunt. How much do I owe you for the… the…” But she could not remember exactly what it was he had sold her, although she was sure she would very soon now.
She gestured vaguely at her purse instead.
“No charge to you. Those are on special today. Think of it as…” His smile widened. “… as a free get-acquainted gift.”
“Thank you,” Lenore said. “I feel ever so much better.”
“As always,” said Mr. Gaunt with a little bow, “I am glad to have been of service.”
8
Norris Ridgewick was not fishing.
Norris Ridgewick was looking in Hugh Priest’s bedroom window.
Hugh lay on his bed in a loose heap, snoring at the ceiling. He wore only a pair of pee-stained boxer shorts. Clutched in his big, knuckly hands was a matted piece of fur. Norris couldn’t be sureHugh’s hands were very big and the window was very dirty-but he thought it was an old moth-eaten fox-tail. It didn’t matter what it was, anyway; what mattered was that Hugh was asleep.
Norris walked back down the lawn to where his personal car stood parked behind Hugh’s Buick in the driveway. He opened the passenger door and leaned in. His fishing reel was sitting on the floor. The Bazun rod was in the back seat-he found he felt better, safer, if he kept it with him.
It was still unused. The truth was just this simple: he was afraid to use it. He had taken it out on Castle Lake yesterday, all fitted up and ready to go… and
