Rommie staggered to the side of the road and sat on a rock, bellowing with laughter. Joe and Norrie collapsed on the road itself, rolling around like chickens taking a dustbath.
“Walking home, every one of you,” Rusty said, but he was smiling as he climbed (not without difficulty) back into the van.
Ahead of him, the purple light flashed out like a beacon.
14
Henry Morrison left the PD when the raucous, locker-room-at halftime banter of the new recruits finally became too much to bear. It was going wrong, all of it. He supposed he’d known that even before Thibodeau, the thug who was now guarding Selectman Rennie, showed up with a signed order to can Jackie Wetting-ton—a fine officer and an even finer woman.
Henry regarded this as the first move in what would probably be a comprehensive effort to remove the older officers, the ones Rennie would see as Duke Perkins partisans, from the force. He himself would be next. Freddy Denton and Rupert Libby would probably stay; Rupe was a moderate asshole, Denton severe. Linda Everett would go. Probably Stacey Moggin, too. Then, except for that dim-bulb Lauren Conree, the Chester’s Mill PD would be an all-boys’ club again.
He cruised slowly down Main Street, which was almost entirely empty—like a ghost-town street in a Western. Sloppy Sam Verdreaux was sitting under the marquee of the Globe, and that bottle between his knees probably did not contain Pepsi-Cola, but Henry didn’t stop. Let the old sot have his tipple.
Johnny and Carrie Carver were boarding up the front windows of the Gas & Grocery. They were both wearing the blue armbands that had started to pop up all over town. They gave Henry the creeps.
He wished he’d taken the slot on the Orono police when it had been offered the previous year. It wasn’t a step up careerwise, and he knew college kids could be shits to deal with when drunk or stoned, but the money was better, and Frieda said the Orono schools were top-of-the-line.
In the end, though, Duke had persuaded him to stay by promising to ram through a five-grand raise at the next town meeting, and by telling Henry—in absolute confidence—that he was going to fire Peter Randolph if Randolph wouldn’t retire voluntarily. “You’d move up to APC, and that’s another ten grand a year,” Duke had said. “When I retire, you can move all the way up to the top job, if you want to. The alternative, of course, is driving UMO kids with puke drying on their pants back to their dorms. Think ’er over.”
It had sounded good to him, it had sounded good (well…
He turned onto Prestile Street and saw Junior standing outside the yellow police tape strung around the McCain house. Junior was wearing pajama pants and slippers and nothing else. He was swaying noticeably, and Henry’s first thought was that Junior and Sloppy Sam had a lot in common today.
His second thought was of—and for—the PD. He might not be a part of it for much longer, but he was now, and one of Duke Perkins’s firmest rules had been
He pulled unit Three to the curb and went to where Junior was rocking back and forth. “Hey, Junes, let’s get you back to the station, pour some coffee into you and…”
Alarmed as well as disgusted—no one must see this, Duke would spin in his grave—Henry reached out and grasped Junior’s shoulder. “Come on, son. You’re making a spectacle of yourself.”
“They were my goolfreds,” Junior said without turning. He rocked faster. His face—what Henry could see of it—was dreamy and rapt. “I shilled them so I could fill them. No gooby. French.” He laughed, then spat. Or tried to. A thick white string hung down from his chin, swinging like a pendulum.
“That’s enough. I’m taking you home.”
This time Junior turned, and Henry saw he wasn’t drunk. His left eye was bright red. Its pupil was too big. The left side of his mouth was pulled down, exposing some of his teeth. That frozen glare made Henry think momentarily of
Junior didn’t need to go to the station for coffee, and he didn’t need to go home to sleep it off. Junior needed to go to the hospital.
“Come on, kid,” he said. “Walk.”
At first, Junior seemed willing enough. Henry escorted him most of the way to the car before Junior stopped again. “They smelled alike and I liked it,” he said. “Horry horry horry, the snow is about to start.”
“Right, absolutely.” Henry had hoped to get Junior around the hood of the cruiser and into the front seat, but now this seemed impractical. The rear would have to do, even though the backseats of their cruisers usually smelled pretty fragrant. Junior looked back over his shoulder at the McCain house, and an expression of longing came over his partially frozen face.
“Goolfreds!” Junior cried. “Extendable! No gooby, French! All French, you fum-nuck!” He stuck out his tongue and flapped it rapidly against his lips. The noise was similar to the one Roadrunner makes before speeding away from Wile E. Coyote in a cloud of dust. Then he laughed and started back to the house.
“No, Junior,” Henry said, and grabbed him by the waistband of his pajama pants. “We have to—”
Junior wheeled around with surprising speed. No laughter now; his face was a twitching cat’s cradle of hate and rage. He rushed at Henry, flailing his fists. He stuck out his tongue and bit it with his champing teeth. He was gobbling in some strange language that seemed to have no vowels.
Henry did the only thing he could think of: stood aside. Junior plunged past him and began to hammer punches at the jackpot lights on top of the cruiser, smashing one of them and lacerating his knuckles. Now people were coming out of their houses to see what was happening.
One foot slipped off the curb and into the gutter. He staggered but kept his feet. There was blood as well as spit hanging from his chin now; both hands were badly cut and dripping.
Henry drove him to the hospital, using lights and siren. What he didn’t do was think about the last things Junior had said, things that almost made sense. He wouldn’t go there.
He had problems enough.
15
Rusty drove slowly up Black Ridge, looking frequently at the Geiger counter, which was now roaring like an AM radio set between stations. The needle rose from +400 to the +1K mark. Rusty was betting it would be swung all the way over to the +4K post by the time he topped the ridge. He knew this couldn’t be good news—his “radiation suit” was makeshift at best—but he kept going, reminding himself that rads were cumulative; if he moved fast, he wouldn’t pick up a lethal dose.
He turned on the radio, got the Mighty Clouds of Joy on WCIK, and immediately turned it off again. Sweat
