The Midnight Tour

where it split in two for a short distance, and even a couple of detours that led to dead-ends.

He could jump me so easily.

Slowing down, she jogged around a curve. Up ahead was another spinning red light.

No sign of Clyde.

She slowed to a quick walk.

What’s he up to? she wondered. Planning to make his getaway through Agnes’s house?

Feeling a strange mixture of longing and dread, Sandy realized that she would very likely be encountering Agnes within the next few minutes.

The woman had once been her best friend, her only friend, almost like a mother—more like a sister, maybe. Sandy hadn’t seen her since the summer of 1980, the day before Marlon Slade showed up at the trailer and ruined everything.

Though she had eventually come back to town in search of Eric, she’d eagerly looked forward to a reunion with Agnes.

Her first day back, she’d gone to the door of the Kutch house, knocked, called out, “Agnes, it’s me. Sandy. How are you? I’m back in town. I want to see you.” But there’d been no response from inside the house.

The next day, she’d tried again.

Still, no response.

After two weeks of secret visits, knocking and identifying herself, she’d finally gotten an answer from the other side of the door.

“Go away,” the voice had said.

“Agnes? It’s me, Sandy. You remember me, don’t you?”

“I remember.” Agnes sounded sour about it.

“I want us to be friends again.”

“Get lost.”

“Agnes? What’s wrong?”

“Got no use for you. Run off with the child. He was OURS. You hadn’t got no RIGHT!”

“I bad to leave. We where... ”

“Don’t wanta hear no excuses. Get lost. Go kill yourself.”

After that, Sandy had made no more attempts to contact Agnes.

Maybe Clyde and I can finish this in the tunnel, she thought. Before he gets all the way across to Agnes’s place.

She must really hate me.

I don’t want to see her.

But maybe if we meet face to face...

“Wait up!” someone called from behind Sandy.

She looked back. Two geeky-looking teenaged boys were hurrying along behind her. Following them was a husky young woman in a flannel shirt and jeans. The woman’s face was bleeding.

“Go back,” Sandy said.

“We wanta help you,” said the taller kid.

His chubby friend stared at her and nodded.

“He killed my husband!” blurted the woman.

Two more people rushed into view behind her. A slim, dapper man in a bloody camel sweater and a dazed- looking woman who was clinging to his hand. “Is this a way out?” asked the man.

“No, it’s not,” Sandy said. “Go back to the cellar. All of you. You’re interfering with police business.”

“You a cop?” asked the tall kid.

“I don’t see no badge,” said the chubby one, leering at her breasts.

“Want my sweatahirt?” asked the tall one. He started pulling it up.

“Go!” Sandy shouted. Then she whirled away from them and ran deeper into the tunnel.

To make up for the delay, she picked up her pace. Arms pumping, legs flying out, she ran as fast as she could—too fast for the bends in the tunnel.

If he’s waiting for me around one of these...

She dodged a dirt wall, lurched around a curve, bumped a wall with her shoulder.

And came out of the curve to find a section ahead that was as straight as a school hallway. This was the place, Sandy realized, where the tunnel passed underneath Front Street.

It was awash in scarlet from still another spinning light.

She spotted Clyde in the distance, a human head atop the body of a beast.

Running away for all he was worth.

Fifty, sixty feet away and moving fast.

Sandy lurched to a halt and raised her pistol. “POLICE!” she shouted. “STOP OR I’LL SHOOT!”

Twisting halfway around, Clyde looked back at her. Then he gasped out, “Don’t!” He raised his arms high, slowed down, turned until he was facing Sandy, and halted completely.

“Keep your hands up,” Sandy ordered. “Don’t move.” Right arm straight out, pistol aimed at his chest, she walked toward him.

“I give,” he gasped. “You got me.”

From behind Sandy came sounds of footfalls on the dirt floor. Then she heard quick, labored breathing.

She didn’t look back.

She walked straight toward Clyde. “Get down on your knees,” she said.

“Yes, ma’am.”

As he sank to his knees, someone behind Sandy said, “Whoa!”

Another voice said, “Duuuude!”

“Shoot his ass!”

She didn’t look back, kept walking toward Clyde.

“You got him!” a woman blurted.

Still fifteen or twenty feet from Clyde, Sandy halted.

Keeping her pistol aimed at him, she spoke sharply. “I told you people to go back to the cellar. Now do what I say.”

“We wanta help,” said a kid.

“Is there any assistance we can give you?” asked an adult male voice. She supposed it belonged to the man in the bloody sweater.

“Thanks, but no. I want you all to leave. Go back to the cellar immediately.”

“Don’t!” Clyde blurted. “Don’t go! She’s gonna kill me! She’s gonna shoot me down in cold blood!”

“Is that true?” asked the man.

“Do it,” urged one of the teenagers.

“Kill his ass,” said the other.

“Maybe we’d better stay,” said a woman. Probably the man’s wife.

“GET THE HELL OUT OF HERE! NOW!”

“Don’t go! Please!”

Sandy heard someone rushing up behind her.

“Look out!” a kid warned.

She looked back. The chubby gal who’d lost her husband was lurching toward her, reaching out. “Gimme that!” the gal blurted. “I’ll kill him.”

“Nobody’s going to kill...”

“Oh, my God!” someone cried out.

“Shit!”.

“Look out!”