After Midnight

“I guess so.”

“You’re kind of quiet. Worrying about lunatics?”

“Sure am.”

“Well, I think we’ll be perfectly safe as long as we stay in the car. We really shouldn’t need to get out, I don’t think.”

“Maybe not,” I agreed. “Depending on Tony.”

“With any luck, we’ll find him walking along the roadside before we even have to go into the woods.”

“I sure hope so,” I said.

But I didn’t really think it stood much chance of happening.

We were nearly to the town limits when Judy said, “Uh-oh.”

“What?”

“Here comes your lunatic, now.”

“Very funny.” Twisting sideways, I looked out the rear window and saw a pair of headlights in the distance.

“Man,” Judy said, “he’s really barreling down on us.”

“Just drive normal,” I told her. “Don’t speed up or anything. It might be a cop.”

“That’d be fine by me.”

The car bore down on us, full speed.

“What the hell is he doing?” Judy blurted.

The headbeams surged in through the windows and glared off our rearview mirror.

“God!” Judy cried out. “He’s going to ram us!”

But he didn’t.

At the last instant, the car swerved to our left.

It started to roar past us, then slowed enough to match our speed.

It wasn’t a cop car.

Cops don’t drive Cadillacs. Not in Chester, they don’t. Not in any town I’ve ever heard of. This thing looked like a giant old gas-gulping monster that belonged in a junk yard, not on the road. A real old clunker, but its engine sounded hot.

As it tooled along beside us, the guys checked us out.

Two of them.

Judy gave them a glance, then turned her face straight forward.

I was leaning toward the dashboard so I could look past her. I had a lousy view of the driver, but the one in the passenger seat looked like a tough guy. He stared back at us. He looked all of about eighteen years old and had a crew cut. A cig dangled off his lips. He wasn’t wearing a shirt.

“Real charming,” Judy said quietly, as if addressing the windshield.

“Don’t do anything. Don’t even look at them.” As I gave that advice, I settled back into my seat and stopped looking at them myself.

A few seconds later, the car sped past us and swerved into our lane, barely missing our front bumper. Judy hit the brakes. As I was thrown forward, she flung an arm across my chest. Her arm didn’t stop me, but my hands did. I slammed them against the dashboard.

The Cadillac pulled away from us.

“You okay?” Judy asked.

“Yeah. Thanks.”

“Bastards,” she muttered.

We were moving along at a crawl.

The Cadillac kept going, gaining speed, and soon vanished around a bend in the road.

Judy gave us a little gas. As we picked up speed, she took a deep breath. Then she said, “Maybe you’d better put on your seatbelt.”

“Not me.”

“Huh?”

“I don’t use them. I’ll take my chances with the windshield.”

“Yeah?” She gave me a look, but there wasn’t enough light in the car to see whether she was smiling, smirking, frowning, or something else. “I’ll keep mine on,” she said. “Safety first.”

“No faith in your own driving?” I asked.

She laughed.

We glided around the bend. Ahead of us, the road was dark except for the moonlight. No sign of the Cadillac.

“You think they’re gone?” Judy asked.

“Looks that way,” I said. “But things aren’t always how they look.”

“I guess they were just fooling around.”

“Looks that way.”

“Could’ve gotten ugly. Maybe this wasn’t such a hot idea, after all.”

“What?” I asked.

“Coming out to look for Tony. I mean, what if those two guys had gotten serious?”

“Do you want to call it off and go back?”

She didn’t answer for a few seconds. Then she said, “I guess if they’d meant to nail us, they would’ve done it.”

“Probably.”

“Probably just wanted to give us a thrill.”

“As long as they don’t show up again,” I said, “we might as well keep going. We’re more than halfway there.”

“Gone past the point of no return?”

“Yep.”

“Gotta keep going, then.”

“You and me, babe.”

She turned her head toward me. Again, I couldn’t see her expression. She said, “Can you imagine what a couple of guys like that might do if they got their hands on Tony?”

“On Tony?”

“Yeah.”

“Wouldn’t be pretty.”

“I’d like to be there to see it,” Judy said.

“Whoa! What kind of talk is that? We’re on a mission to rescue the guy!”

“That doesn’t mean I wish him a full and rewarding life of health and happiness. Not after what he did to me. And to you, for that matter. It’d be sort of neat to see him really get creamed by a couple of punks.”

“I did a pretty good job on him,” I said.

“But just think what a couple of punks like that might do.”

“You shock me, Judy. I am truly shocked.”

“Sure you are.”

“Now, give me a clue. Why exactly are we driving out here to rescue him?”

“Good question.”

“Maybe we should turn back.”

“Nah,” she said. “Can’t.”

“Why not?”

“It’s my fault he’s out here tonight. I’m the one who made him nuts. He wasn’t a bad guy before I made him crazy. It’s my fault he beat me up, and it’s my fault he attacked you.”

“That’s ridiculous.”