The Bachman Books

'Decker?'

'I'm here.'

'Listen, that stray shot that came through the window wasn't intentional. One of the men from Lewiston-'

'Let's not even bother, Frank,' I said. 'You're embarrassing me and you're embarrassing these people down here, who saw what happened. If you've got any integrity at all, and I'm sure you do, you're probably embarrassing yourself.'

Pause. Maybe he was collecting his temper. 'Okay. What do you want?'

'Not much. Everybody comes out at one o'clock this afternoon. In exactly'-I checked the wall clock-'fifty-seven minutes by the clock down here. Without a scratch. I guarantee it. '

'Why not now?'

I looked at them. The air felt heavy and nearly solemn, as if between us we had written a contract in someone's blood.

I said carefully, 'We have a final piece of business down here. We have to finish getting it on.'

'What is it?'

'It doesn't concern you. But we all know what it is.' There wasn't a pair of eyes that showed uncertainty. They knew, all right, and that was good, because it would save time and effort. I felt very tired.

'Now, listen carefully, Philbrick, so we have no misunderstanding, while I describe the last act of this little comedy. In about three minutes, someone is going to pull down all the shades in here.'

'No way they are, Decker.' He sounded very tough.

I let the air whistle through my teeth. What an amazing man he was. No wonder he screwed up all his drive- safely spiels. 'When are you going to get it through your head that I'm in charge?' I asked him. 'Someone is going to pull the shades, Philbrick, and it won't be me. So if you shoot someone, you can pin your badge to your ass and kiss them both good-bye. '

Nothing.

'Silence gives consent,' I said, trying to sound merry. I didn't feel merry. 'I'm not going to be able to see what you're doing either, but don't get any clever ideas. If you do, some of these people are going to get hurt. If you sit until one, everything will be fine again and you'll be the big brave policeman everybody knows you are. Now, how 'bout it?'

He paused for a long time. 'I'm damned if you sound crazy,' he said finally.

'How about it?'

'How do I know you're not going to change your mind, Decker? What if you want to try for two o'clock? Or three?'

'How about it?' I asked inexorably.

Another pause. 'All right. But if you hurt any of those kids . . .'

'You'll take away my Junior Achiever card. I know. Go away, Frank.'

I could feel him wanting to say something warm, wonderful, and witty, something that would summarize his position for the ages, something like: Fuck off, Decker, or: Cram it up y'ass, Decker; but he didn't quite dare. There were, after all, young girls down here. 'One o'clock,' he repeated. The intercom went dead. A moment later he was walking across the grass.

'What nasty little masturbation fantasies have you got lined up now, Charlie?' Ted asked, still grinning.

'Why don't you just cool it, Ted?' Harmon Jackson asked remotely.

'Who will volunteer to close the shades?' I asked. Several hands went up. I pointed to Melvin Thomas and said, 'Do it slowly. They're probably nervous.'

Melvin did it slowly. With the canvas shades pulled all the way down to the sills, the room took on a half- dreamlike drabness. Lackluster shadows clustered in the comers like bats that hadn't been getting enough to eat. I didn't like it. The shadows made me feel very jumpy indeed.

I pointed to Tanis Gannon, who sat in the row of seats closest to the door. 'Will you favor us with the lights?'

She smiled shyly, like a deb, and went to the light switches. A moment later we had cold fluorescents, which were not much better than the shadows. I wished for the sun and the sight of blue sky, but said nothing. There was nothing to say. Tanis went back to her seat and smoothed her skirt carefully behind her thighs as she sat down.

'To use Ted's adequate phrase,' I said, 'there is only one masturbation fantasy left before we get down to business-or two halves of one whole, if you want to look at it that way. That is the story of Mr. Carlson, our late teacher of chemistry and physics, the story that good old Tom Denver managed to keep out of the papers but which, as the saying goes, remains in our hearts.

'And how my father and I got it on following my suspension.'

I looked at them, feeling a dull, horrid ache in the back of my skull. Somewhere it had all slipped out of my hands. I was reminded of Mickey Mouse as the sorcerer's apprentice in the old Disney cartoon Fantasia. I had brought all the brooms to life, but now where was the kindly old magician to say abracadabra backwards and make them go back to sleep?

Stupid, stupid.

Pictures whirled in front of my eyes, hundreds of them, fragments from dreams, fragments from reality. It was impossible to separate one from the other. Lunacy is when you can't see the seams where they stitched the world together anymore. I supposed there was still a chance that I might wake up in my bed, safe and still at least half- sane, the black, irrevocable step not taken (or at least not yet), with all the characters of this particular nightmare