Under the Dome

head. “I slept, leave it at that.”

Big Jim also did not ask Who did you sleep with? He had other concerns than whom his son might be diddling; he was just glad the boy hadn’t been among the fellows who’d done their business with that nasty piece of trailer trash out on Motton Road. Doing business with that sort of girl was a good way to catch something and get sick.

He’s already sick, a voice in Big Jim’s head whispered. It might have been the fading voice of his wife. Just look at him.

That voice was probably right, but this morning he had greater concerns than Junior Rennie’s eating disorder, or whatever it was.

“I didn’t say go to bed. I want you on motor patrol, and I want you to do a job for me. Just stay away from Food City while you’re doing it. There’s going to be trouble there, I think.”

Junior’s eyes livened up. “What kind of trouble?”

Big Jim didn’t answer directly. “Can you find Sam Verdreaux?”

“Sure. He’ll be in that little shack out on God Creek Road. Ordinarily he’d be sleeping it off, but today he’s more apt to be shaking himself awake with the DTs.” Junior snickered at this image, then winced and went back to rubbing his temple. “You really think I’m the person to talk to him? He’s not my biggest fan right now. He’s probably even deleted me from his Facebook page.”

“I don’t understand.”

“It’s a joke, Dad. Forget it.”

“Do you think he’d warm up to you if you offered him three quarts of whiskey? And more later, if he does a good job?”

“That skanky old bastard would warm up to me if I offered him half a juice glass of Two-Buck Chuck.”

“You can get the whiskey from Brownie’s,” Big Jim said. In addition to cheapass groceries and beaver-books, Brownie’s was one of three agency liquor stores in The Mill, and the PD had keys to all three. Big Jim slid the key across the table. “Back door. Don’t let anyone see you going in.”

“What’s Sloppy Sam supposed to do for the booze?”

Big Jim explained. Junior listened impassively… except for his bloodshot eyes, which danced. He had only one more question: Would it work?

Big Jim nodded. “It will. I’m feeling it.”

Junior took another chomp on his beefstick and another swallow of his soda. “So’m I, Dad,” he said. “So’m I.”

7

When Junior was gone, Big Jim went into his study with his robe billowing grandly around him. He took his cell phone from the center drawer of his desk, where he kept it as much as possible. He thought they were Godless things that did nothing but encourage a lot of loose and useless talk—how many man-hours had been lost to useless gabble on these things? And what kind of nasty rays did they shoot into your head while you were gabbling?

Still, they could come in handy. He reckoned that Sam Verdreaux would do as Junior told him, but he also knew it would be foolish not to take out insurance.

He selected a number in the cell phone’s “hidden” directory, which could be accessed only via numeric code. The phone rang half a dozen times before it was picked up. “What?” the sire of the multitudinous Killian brood barked.

Big Jim winced and held the phone away from his ear for a second. When he put it back, he heard low clucking sounds in the background. “Are you in the chickenhouse, Rog?”

“Uh… yessir, Big Jim, I sure am. Chickens got to be fed, come hell or high water.” A 180-degree turn from irritation to respect. And Roger Killian ought to be respectful; Big Jim had made him a gosh-darn millionaire. If he was wasting what could have been a good life with no financial worries by still getting up at dawn to feed a bunch of chickens, that was God’s will. Roger was too dumb to stop. It was his heaven-sent nature, and would no doubt serve Big Jim well today.

And the town, he thought. It’s the town I’m doing this for. The good of the town.

“Roger, I’ve got a job for you and your three oldest sons.”

“Only got two t’home,” Roger said. In his thick Yankee accent, home came out hum. “Ricky and Randall are here, but Roland was in Oxford buying feed when the Christing Dome came down.” He paused and considered what he had just said. In the background, the chickens clucked. “Sorry about the profanity.”

“I’m sure God forgives you,” Big Jim said. “You and your two oldest, then. Can you get them to town by—” Big Jim calculated. It didn’t take long. When you were feeling it, few decisions did. “Say, nine o’clock, nine fifteen at the latest?”

“I’ll have to rouse em, but sure,” Roger said. “What are we doin? Bringin in some of the extra propa—”

“No,” Big Jim said, “and you hush about that, God love you. Just listen.”

Big Jim talked.

Roger Killian, God love him, listened.

In the background roughly eight hundred chickens clucked as they stuffed themselves with steroid-laced feed.

8

“What? What? Why? ”

Jack Cale was sitting at his desk in the cramped little Food City manager’s office. The desk was littered with inventory lists he and Ernie Calvert had finally completed at one in the morning, their hopes of finishing earlier dashed by the meteor shower. Now he swept them up—handwritten on long yellow legal-pad sheets—and shook them at Peter Randolph, who stood in the office doorway. The new Chief had dolled up in full uniform for this visit. “Look at these, Pete, before you do something foolish.”

“Sorry, Jack. Market’s closed. It’ll reopen on Thursday, as a food depot. Share and share alike. We’ll keep all the records, Food City Corp won’t lose a cent, I promise you—”

“That’s not the point, ” Jack nearly groaned. He was a baby-faced thirtysomething with a thatch of wiry red hair he was currently torturing with the hand not holding out the yellow sheets… which Peter Randolph showed no signs of taking.

“Here! Here! What in the name of jumped-up Jack Sprat Jesus are you talking about, Peter Randolph?”

Ernie Calvert came barreling up from the basement storage area. He was broad-bellied and red-faced, his gray hair mowed into the crewcut he’d worn all his life. He was wearing a green Food City duster.

“He wants to close the market!” Jack said.

“Why in God’s name would you want to do that, when there’s still plenty of food?” Ernie asked angrily. “Why would you want to go scaring people like that? They’ll be plenty scared in time, if this goes on. Whose dumb idea was this?”

“Selectmen voted,” Randolph said. “Any problems you have with the plan, take them up at the special town meeting on Thursday night. If this isn’t over by then, of course.”

“What plan?” Ernie shouted. “Are you telling me Andrea Grinnell was in favor of this? She knows better!”

“I understand she’s got the flu,” Randolph said. “Flat on her back. So Andy decided. Big Jim seconded the decision.” No one had told him to put it this way; no one had to. Randolph knew how Big Jim liked to do business.