As Tritia had promised, they ate lunch in the outdoor patio of the small Mexican restaurant, listening to the burble of the creek. Their view was limited by the trees and the courtyard, but they could still see hills of red rock, the color made more brilliant in contrast with the green foliage.
It was a relaxing lunch, and for a moment Doug was almost able to forget about the mail, to forget about everything that had happened recently in Willis.
Then a blue-suited postal carrier, brown bag slung over his shoulder, stopped off and handed a stack of envelopes to the girl behind the cash register. The mailman smiled at the girl, seemingly normal and friendly, but for Doug the mood was spoiled, and as he ate his chilirelleno , he watched the mailman make the rounds of all the shops.
The trip home was uneventful. Billy slept in the back seat while he and Trish stared out at the passing scenery and listened to an old Emerson, Lake &
Palmer tape. They passed the green sign that announced the Willis town limit a little after four, and Doug drove past Henry's Garage and the Ponderosa Realty office, but just beyond the Texaco station, the road was blocked by two police cars with flashing lights. A single policeman stood next to each car, along with a crowd of motorists who had not been allowed to pass the barrier. Several local residents milled around nearby. Doug saw at the edge of the crowd the brown uniform of a member of the sheriffs posse.
Hepulled'to a stop in back of a battered jeep and told Trish and Billy to wait in the car as he got out to investigate. As he approached the makeshift blockade, he realized that one of the policemen was Mike Trenton. He strode up to the young cop. 'Mike, what happened?'
'Please stay back, Mr.Albin . We can't let you through.'
'What happened?'
'BenStockley went crazy. He took a pistol into the bank about an hour ago and started shooting.'
'Oh my God,' Doug breathed: 'Was anyone hurt?'
The police officer's face was pale, tense. 'Fourteen people are dead, Mr.
Albin.'
23
The murders made national news. All three of Phoenix's network affiliates sent vans and reporters to Willis, and their stories were picked up for the national nightly newscasts. Channel 12 seemed to have the best coverage, and before going to bed Doug watched again as the cameraman's telephoto lens caught the white flash ofStockley's gun behind the smoked bank window at the precise moment that the editor killed himself. The suicide had happened live during the five-o'clock broadcast, and even the reporter had stopped talking as the sound of the shot echoed with a grim finality. Doug had known then thatStockley was dead, that he was not merely wounded or injured, and he'd watched with increasingly blurred vision as the remaining hostages ran out of the building and the police swarmed in.
By the time the commercial came on, he was openly crying.
He andStockley had not exactly been friends, but they were closer than acquaintances, and the man's death had affected him strongly. He had respected the editor. And he had liked him. It was strange watching it all on TV, seeing places he knew and people he knew in such a distanced and depersonalized form, and somehow it made him feel more depressed.
In an update, over a shot ofStockley's covered body being wheeled across the bank parking lot to an ambulance, the anchor said that a series of letters had been found in the editor's desk that police believed would give them a clue as to why he had suddenly gone on the killing rampage.
_Letters_.
Doug shut off the television and walked down the hall to the bedroom, where Trish was already asleep and snoring.
_Letters_.
The connection was so damn obvious that even that doltish police chief would have to see the pattern. But, no, he remembered seeing news coverage of similar events, friends and neighbors uniformly repeating how they couldn't believe the kind, considerate, normal person they knew could have committed such horrible acts. The man who suddenly went crazy and murdered innocent bystanders was becoming a regular feature of the nightly news; there was nothing really unusual about it anymore.
Of course, Doug himself was one of those people who could not imagine how Stockleycould have done such a horrible thing. He had no doubt that the mailman was at the bottom of this, behind it all, but try as he might, he could not imagine anything written in a letter that could so completely send 'a person around the bend, that could make an ostensibly sane man start killing innocent individuals. Much as he hated to admit it, much as it hurt him to admit it, there probably had been something wrong withStockley to begin with, some breaking point, some button the mailman had known how and when to push.
There was something even more frightening about that, for just as it was said that everyone had a price, everyone probably also had a breaking point.
Maybe he'd been wrong before. Maybe the mailman hadn't killed Ronda and Bernie Rogers. Maybe they'd killed themselves because the mailman had known exactly what to do to set them off, to push them over the edge. Maybe the mailman knew what that point was for all of them, for everyone in Willis. For himself.
For Tritia .
For Billy.
It was long after midnight when Doug finally fell asleep, and his dreams were filled with white faces and red hair and envelopes.
The next day was hotter than usual; the sky clear, without a trace of cloud to offer the earth temporary shade from the hellish sun.Hobie dropped by just before lunch, dressed in his lifeguard uniform, though it was Wednesday and the pool was closed for cleaning. He came up on the porch, accepted Doug's offer of iced tea. He seemed distracted and ill at ease, unable to concentrate. Doug talked to him about the murders, but though his friend nodded in all the right places, even volunteering an occasional comment or opinion, he seemed not to be listening, the conversation going in one ear and out the other.
FacingHobie , Doug noticed food stains on the black swimming trunks, and this close he saw that his friend's T-shirt was wrinkled and not as white as it should have been, as though he had been wearing it for days, sleeping in it.
Even Tritia must have noticed something odd aboutHobie , for she was not as hostile to him as she usually was. Indeed, as the three of them ate Italian sandwiches on the porch, she seemed downright sympathetic toward him, going out of her way to bring him into the conversation, and for the first time that day he relaxed a little, though he was by no means his usual talkative overbearing self. After lunch, Tritia returned indoors, and the two men remained on the porch. 'So, whatever happened with your books?'Hobie asked, belching loudly.
'Ever get an official no from the district?'
Doug nodded. 'I sent them a letter back, though, complaining.'
'What'd they say?'
'Nothing.' Doug smiled wryly. 'I guess their reply got lost in the mail.'
'Willard Young. Shit, he's nothing but a dick with feet.'
'Wrong side of the body. I'd call him an asshole.'
'That too.'
They were silent for a moment. From inside came the muffled clink of china as Tritia washed their plates.
'Something's happening in this town,'Hobie said finally. His voice was low, serious, totally unlike his usual loud bluster, and Doug realized that for the first time he was hearing the sound of fear in his friend's voice.
The emotion had to be transferable, he thought, for he could feel the cold prickling of peach-fuzz hair on his own arms and neck. 'What is it?' he asked, keeping his voice neutral.
'You know damn well what it is.'Hobie looked at him. 'The mailman.'
Doug leaned back in his chair. 'I just wanted to hear you say it.'
Hobielicked his lips, ran a hand through his already tousled hair. 'I've been getting letters from my brother,' he said.
