The Collection

material of her body. When the bottle was empty, he put it aside and rocked the baby slowly in his arms, humming.

'Honey?'

He looked over toward the bed. Cindy was sitting up, smiling, holding her arms out to him. 'Let me have her,' she said gently.

Marc handed the baby to his wife. She expertly held the small rag doll to her shoulder. Only a single slice of moon­light reached the bed, but it cut across the baby's cheese­cloth face, and Marc saw the corners of her red gash mouth creep slowly upward. 'Look,' he said. 'Anne's smiling.'

Cindy nodded. 'She's happy,' she said.

And the baby's legs slowly started to kick.

Paperwork

It has always seemed to me that small towns on the so-called blue highways, those dying communities on old state routes that were bypassed when the interstates were built, have more than their share of windblown trash. Even in towns that are virtually deserted, there are always newspapers and notebook paper and candy wrappers and receipts caught on barbed wire fences, bunched against curbs, plastered on the lower edges of abandoned buildings.

Where do all these papers come from?

And what if their presence isn't as innocent as we travelers think it is?

Wind buffeted the car as they drove through the desert. Josh could feel it as he held tightly to the steering wheel, though it was not visible in the unmoving branches of the desert plants. There were no other cars on the highway, and he was not sure whether he should pull over and wait out the wind or try to continue on. He was not good at this automotive kind of crap and he usually relied on others around him to determine his behavior in these situations. The car swerved a little to the left as an especially obnoxious gust of wind pushed against the Blazer, and his grip tightened on the I wheel. He didn't want to end up overturned on the side off the road-particularly not on this desolate stretch of highway-but he didn't want to stop either. They were late as it was and wouldn't get to Tucson until well after the hotel's check-in time.

As if reading his thoughts, Lydia turned down the cassette player and turned toward him. 'Shouldn't we pull over?' she asked. 'That wind's kind of strong out there.'

He shook his head. 'It's not that bad.'

They drove for a few moments in silence. There had been a lot of silence on the trip; not relaxed, comfortable silence but tense, awkward silence. Josh had wanted many times to talk to Lydia, to really talk, to recapture that close cama­raderie they had once shared, but he had not known how to do it, had not known what to say. He felt that same need to communicate now, but once again his desires and words did not match. 'We have to get gas at the next town,' he said lamely. 'We're almost out.'

Lydia said nothing but turned up the cassette player again, as if in answer, and stared out the side window away from him.

Fifteen minutes later they reached a town. The tiny green and white sign read: Clark. Population 1298. Founded 1943.

Like most of the small desert communities they'd passed through since leaving California, Clark was dirty and run-down, little more than a collection of cafes, gas stations, and storefronts stretching along the sides of the highway, with a few shabby homes and trailers behind them to give the town depth.

Josh pulled into the first gas station he saw, a Texaco. The station looked abandoned. Where the paint on the building wasn't peeling, there were large spots of blackened soot or rot. The windows of the office were so covered with dust and grime that it was impossible to see inside, and small dunes of paper trash had collected on the windward side of the old pumps, but the prices on the swinging metal sign were current, and the open garage door indicated that the station was still in operation.

There were no full- or self-service islands, just two lone pumps, and Josh drove across the length of rubber cable which activated the station's bell, pulling to a stop in front of the unleaded pump.

The wind was blowing strong. Josh looked toward the buildmg. The man who emerged from the office peered first around the edge of the opaque window before stepping nervously outside. He was wearing an old Texaco uniform, with pocket patches that carried the promises of two slogans ago, and he wiped his hands compulsively on a greasy red rag. His face was thin and dark, topped by a gray crew cut, and though his features were unreadable from a distance, as he drew closer Josh could see that the man was terrified.

Such naked fear triggered some sympathetic reaction, within Josh, and his first instinct was to take off and get the hell out of there. The man would not be frightened for no reason; there was probably a gunman in the office holding hostages, or a bomb planted near one of the pumps. But Josh knew that his reaction was stupid, and he got out of the car and stretched, bending his knees and raising his arms after the long drive, before moving forward. He nodded politely at the attendant. 'Hi.'

The man said nothing, but his eyes shifted back and forth across the length of the highway, on constant surveillance. He grabbed the nozzle of the pump before Josh could reach it, and with trembling hands lifted the catch.

'I'll get that,' Josh said.

'No, I'll get it.' The man's voice was old and cracked, whispery with age, and there was a tremor in it.

Josh unscrewed the gas cap, and the attendant inserted the nozzle.

'Get out of here fast,' the old man whispered. 'While you can. While they let you.'

Josh frowned. He glanced instinctively back at Lydia in f the front seat. 'What?'

The attendant's eyes widened as he looked over Josh's shoulder. 'Here comes one now!'

Josh turned to look but saw only the empty street, dust, and gum wrappers blowing across the sidewalk, propelled by the wind. He turned back. A stray scrap of Kleenex blew against the attendant's leg, the wadded piece of white tissue clinging to his sock, and the man suddenly leaped backward, screaming. The nozzle dropped from his hand, falling to the cement, and a trickle of gas spilled out before stopping.

The Kleenex was dislodged from the man's foot as he leaped about, and it went skittering along the ground to­ward the open garage door, but the attendant did not stop screaming. He continued to jump up and down in a panic dance, arms flailing wildly, scuffed workboots scraping hard against the ground.

Josh backed up slowly until he was at the door of the car, and he quickly got in, locking the door.

'Let's get out of here,' Lydia said. She was staring out the window at the gas station attendant, her face pale.

Josh nodded, putting the key in the ignition. The atten­dant pounded on the window. 'I'll send you the money we owe!' Josh yelled through the closed glass.

'The papers!' the man screamed.

Josh turned the key in the ignition, pumped the gas pedal, and the engine caught. The attendant was still pounding crazily on the window, and Josh pulled away slowly, afraid of running over the old man's feet. The attendant did not fol­low them across the asphalt as he'd expected, however. In­stead, he ran immediately back toward the office, where he slammed shut the door.

Josh looked over at Lydia. 'What the hell was that all about?'

'Let's just get out of here.'

He nodded. 'It's a Texaco station. I'll write to Texaco, tell them what happened, send them the money. It's only a buck or so. We'll find another gas station.'

They headed slowly down the highway through town, past a closed movie theater, past an empty store. The wind, which until now had been constant, suddenly increased in power, and the heavy cloud of dust which accompanied it obscured the road like brown fog. They could hear the tiny static scratching of dirt granules on the glass of the wind­shield. Josh turned on the headlights and dropped his speed from thirty to twenty and then to ten. 'I hope it's not going to scratch up the paint job,' he said.

They were moving against the wind, and he could feel the Blazer strain against the pressure. The buildings were dark shapes silhouetted against the dim sun. As they moved closer to the edge of town, the dust cloud abated a little, though the wind continued to blow strong. A sheet of news­paper flew up against the windshield, flattening in front of Josh's face. He could not see at all, and he braked to a halt, hoping to dislodge the paper, but it remained plastered on the glass. He opened the door, got out and pulled it off, crumpling it up and letting it fly.