Edgar looked towards the front of the store, and saw two police hats bobbing towards him behind one of the rows of shelves. Round the corner by the dog-food came Officer Marowitz, and his partner Officer Trent. They were big, weatherbeaten local patrolmen, and Edgar knew them well.
'Hi, Mr. Paston,' said Marowitz. He had a broad, swarthy face and a drooping mustache. 'Looks like you got Shark trouble.'
'Witty,' sneered one of the kids.
Marowitz ignored him. 'McManus,' he snapped. 'Have you been bothering my friend Mr. Paston?'
McManus grinned a foxy grin. 'Mr. Paston here says I'm a thief. I drank some beer in the store, and he says I stole it. Look, I got my money all ready to pay, and he says I stole it.'
Marowitz sniffed. 'Do you want to bring a charge, Mr. Paston?'
McManus said, 'I didn't steal it, man. The money's here. I was thirsty, and I opened a couple of cans, that's all.'
'You shut your mouth, McManus. Do you want to bring a charge, Mr. Paston?' Marowitz repeated.
Edgar Paston bit his lip, and then sighed. 'I guess not. Just get them out of here.'
Marowitz shrugged. 'It's up to you, Mr. Paston. If you want to bring a charge, you can do so.'
Edgar shook his head. 'For a few mouthfuls of beer, it isn't worth it. But if there's any more trouble, McManus, I know your face and I'm going to have the law on your tail so fast you won't know what's hit you.'
McManus grinned, and saluted. 'Jawohl, mein Fuhrer,' he mocked.
Marowitz closed his notebook. 'All right, you guys — scram. Next time you won't be so lucky.'
Giggling and larking about, McManus and his gang shuffled out of the store, and then amused themselves for a few minutes by pressing their faces against the glass of the window, pulling grotesque faces.
'They're only kids,' said Marowitz. 'Weren't you the same when you were a kid, Mr. Paston?'
Edgar looked up at him. 'No,' he said quietly. 'I wasn't.'
Marowitz grinned. 'Well, don't you worry. Different strokes for different folks. You have to remember these kids have got nothing to do in the evening around here. There's no dance halls, no movies, and most of them are banned from the hamburger joints. It's natural they're going to raise a little hell.'
Edgar picked up the beer-cans that were strewn on the floor, and went to fetch a damp doth to wipe up the mess. 'You wouldn't happen to have one of those cans of beer going spare, would you?' Marowitz asked.
Edgar stared at him. Marowitz said, grinning, 'It gets kind of dry, patrolling around all evening.'
Edgar reached into the refrigerator and took out a six-pack of Old Milwaukee. He handed it over, and said flatly, 'That's one dollar and eighty-five cents. You can pay at the desk.'
Marowitz took the pack without a word. He muttered to Trent, 'Come on, we got more friendly places to visit,' and walked out. Just by the cash desk, he banged his money down in front of Gerry, and called out loudly, 'Support your local police department!'
Edgar watched them drive away, and then went out into the car park to fetch the rest of his canned peaches. The night was growing cooler now, and there was a soft wind from the east. A couple of trucks bellowed past on their way to Jersey City, and one or two cars, but mostly the roads were empty and silent.
He didn't realize what had happened at first. But when he reached into the back of the car, he noticed how low down it seemed to be. He frowned, and looked around the side. All four tires had been slashed into black ribbons, and the Mercury was resting on its wheel hubs.
Edgar stood there for a while, feeling utter frustration and despair. Then he slammed the tailgate angrily shut, locked it, and walked back to the supermarket.
Gerry was just counting up the day's takings. 'What's wrong, Mr. Paston?' he asked.
'Someone slashed my tires. I'll have to take the pick-up. Let's get this place closed down for the night, and leave it at that.'
'Do you think it was Shark McManus?'
'Is that what they call him? Shark?'
'I guess it was after Jaws. He's a kind of a wild kid.'
Edgar almost laughed. 'Wild? He's a goddamned maniac. I mean, what kind of a person goes around stealing beer and slashing tires? What the hell's it all for?'
Gerry shrugged. 'I don't know, Mr. Paston. I guess they get kind of frustrated.'
'Oh yeah? Well, I wish they wouldn't take their half-baked frustrations out on me.'
He went to check the cold shelves and the meat, to make sure that everything was kept at the right temperature for overnight storage. Then he swept up the rubbish, while Gerry restocked some of the canned goods. He did everything quickly and superficially, because he wanted to get home. He could always get up early and dean the place more thoroughly tomorrow.
He was almost finished when he thought he heard a tap on the store window. He looked up, frowning. There was another tap, louder. Then, right in front of his eyes, the huge plate-glass window smashed, and half-a- hundred-weight of glass dropped to the sidewalk with a shattering, pealing sound.
Edgar ran to the front of the store and stared out into the night. It was silent, and dark. The wind blew fitfully into the store, making price tags flap on the shelves. He crunched across the sea of broken glass, still staring, still searching.
In the distance, he thought he heard someone laugh. It could have been a dog barking, or a car starting up. But the sound of it was enough to make him shiver.
Three
Miami was always quiet in the small hours of the morning, but tonight that silence seemed to be sultry and threatening. As Dr. Leonard Petrie drove through echoing and deserted streets, he sensed in the air the beginning of something new and frightening and strange. Two or three cars and an ambulance passed him as he drove downtown. Out on the expressway, lines of traffic still shuttled backwards and forwards from the airport, and trucks and cars still traveled up and down US, heading north for Fort Lauderdale or south for the Keys. It could have been any night of any year in Miami. The radio was playing country music from Nashville, and the hotels along the Beach glittered with light.
Dr. Petrie swung the Lincoln left on West Flagler and 17th. For the first time, he saw the spreading effects of the plague. There were four or five bodies lying on the sidewalk, sprawled-out and motionless in the light of a store window. They looked as if they were fast asleep. He drew the Lincoln into the kerb, and got out to take a look. It was a family. A father — middle-aged, with a small moustache; a middle-aged mother; and two small boys, aged about eight and ten. It was so unbelievably odd to see them here, on this warm and normal night, lying dead and pale on the sidewalk, that Dr. Petrie was moved to prod the father's body with his toe, to see if he were sleeping.
The father's hand slipped across his silent chest, and rested on the concrete.
A police-car came cruising up 17th in the opposite direction, and Dr. Petrie quickly stepped across the sidewalk to flag it down.
The cop was wearing orange sunglasses, even though it was night-time, and a handkerchief over his mouth, bandit-style.
'I'm a doctor,' Petrie said. 'I came around the block and saw those people. They're all dead, I'm afraid. I guess it's the plague.'
The patrolman nodded. 'We're getting cases all over. Six or seven cops down with it already. Okay, doctor, I'll call headquarters and notify them about the dead people. Between you and me, though, I don't think they got enough ambulances to cope. It won't be long before it's garbage trucks.'
'Garbage trucks?' said Dr. Petrie. He was appalled. He looked back across the street, and the family was lying there, pale and still. The children must have died first, and the mother and father died while trying to nurse them. 'You mean — '
The cop said, 'They don't have enough ambulances, doctor. It's either that, or we leave them to rot in the streets.'
Dr. Petrie rubbed his face tiredly. 'Have you seen many like this?' he asked the cop.
