mechanically munching a burger as he headed west. The coffee was hot and black.
Passing through Gore he noticed headlights behind him. Not too dose, but glued there. How long had that guy been back there? A cop clocking him? Well, he wasn’t speeding, not on a night like this.
The road was a twisty two-lane and empty. Almost no traffic. That was one of the charms of coining up here. The glare of his headlights illuminated the black trunks of wet, naked trees as he cranked the wheel back and forth around the switchbacks up the mountain. The sign at the top said: “Welcome to Wild, Wonderful West Virginia.” And the radio reception would go on the other side of the signl Sure enough, on the second curve down the music faded to static. He switched off the radio. The headlights were still in the rear-view mirror.
At the foot of the mountain he went through the village of Ca- pon Bridge. Almost there, just a few more miles. He checked the mirror as they went by a sodium light on a pole by the little Texaco station, which was dark and deserted at this hour of the evening. It was some kind of pickup with a huge steel bumper welded to the front. Not too new. Mid-seventies maybe.
Impossible to make out the color- Then a camper passed him headed east and, curious, he glanced in the mirror again. The guy behind — blue, I think. Maybe blue.
Leaving the village the road began to climb and he was again in switchbacks at twenty-five miles per hour. The glare of the head- lights from the pickup behind him swept across the mirror going into and coming out of every curve, and he squinted. He turned the mirror so the lights wouldn’t blind him. Should’ve got the day- night mirror, he told himself, but he had saved twenty bucks pass- ing on that option.
Above the noise of his engine he could hear the rhythmic slap- slap of the wipers and the protests of his tires on the wet macadam.
He was almost at the top of this low mountain. He would build a fire in the fireplace when he reached the cabin in a few minutes. Maybe a shot of Irish whiskey while the fire was driving out the chill. Tomorrow he would —
He could hear the engine of the pickup behind roaring and the headlights spotlighted his dash and windshield. He squinted. What was that damn fool doing? Did he want to pass? We’re right at that overlook—
The truck behind smashed into his rear bumper and pushed him. Strong fought the wheel. His vehicle was accelerating. He applied the brakes. Wheel lock-up. He released the brakes and jammed the throttle down. He was trying to steer but the wheels wouldn’t bite on the slick pavement. Goddamn — the car was going across the road, straight for the overlook pulloutt
In the gravel the car skidded sideways and Strong glanced over his shoulder, straight into the pickup’s headlights. Then he felt the lurch as the pickup slammed on its brakes.
Panicked, he looked forward but saw nothing, still blinded from the headlights’ glare. He felt the car’s nose go down, then it began to roll, over and over and over.
The motion stopped suddenly with a terrific, smashing impact.
When he came out of his daze he was in darkness and the engine was silent. There was a little light, but it seemed to come from above and behind, from the road. Jesus… Something black and wet beside him. A tree trunk, where the passenger seat used to be.
The car was half wrapped around a tree. He had gone down over the edge and rolled several times and smashed into a tree. That asshole in the pickup… trying to kill him.
He wasn’t hurt too bad. Thank God for seat belts. Blood on his face, minute pieces of glass everywhere. He was still groggy. What’s that smell? Gasoline! A leak. He fumbled for the seat-belt release.
Someone was beside him, reaching in through the smashed win- dow- “Hey—“
He was being splashed with something wet “What—” Gas! It was gas! “Please, you gotta—“
Out of the comer of his eye he saw the lighted match come floating through the broken window. The roar of the gasoline ignit- ing was the last sound he heard.
2
The airplanes were shiny and brilliant in their bright colors of red, yellow and blue. They hung in the window suspended on wires, frozen in flight, the spring sun- light firing the wings and fuselages and emphasizing the sleek perfection of their forms. -
Jake Grafton stood on the sidewalk and stared. He examined each one carefully, letting his eyes roam from tail to prop to gull- Hke wingtip. After a moment he pushed the door open and went into the warm shop, out of the weak sunshine and the cool breeze coming off the ocean.
As he stood and gazed at another dozen or so planes banging from the ceiling, the shop proprietor behind the glass counter laid aside his newspaper and cleared his throat. “Good morning.”
“Hi.” Jake glanced at the man. He was balding and bearlike and perched on a stool. “You’ve got some nice airplanes here.”
“Sure do. You have a son interested in radio control?”
Jake let his eyes find the swooping, soaring forms above his head. “No,” he said thoughtfully. “Just looking.”
The proprietor began turning the pages of his newspaper as Jake moved deeper into the shop. He wandered slowly, examining the counter displays, fingering balsa from a wire bin, scanning the rack of X-actokmves and miniature drills, looking at the rows and rows of boxes with airplanes and cars on the covers that stood on shelves behind the counter. Finally, back at the door, he muttered his thanks to the shopkeeper and went out onto the sidewalk.
The sea breeze was brisk this morning and tangy with salt. Not many people on the street. This Delaware beach town lived on tourists and summer was a long way off. At least the sun was out after a week of low, scuddy clouds and intermittent drizzle. Stand- ing there, Jake could faintly hear the gulls crying as they soared above the beach and boardwalk a half block away. He looked again at the airplanes in the window, then went back into the shop.
“Sell me an airplane,” he said as the proprietor looked up from his newspaper.
“Delighted to. Which one you want?”
Jake scanned the planes hanging from the ceiling. He began to examine them critically.
“You ever build an RC plane before?”
“Build? You mean I can’t buy one already made?”
“Not any of these, you can’t. My son built all these years ago, before he went to the air force. They’re his.”
“Build one,” Jake said softly, weighing it He hadn’t figured on that. Oh well, the decision was already made. Now he wanted a plane. “Let me see what you have.”
Forty minutes later, with a yellow credit card invoice for $349.52 tucked into bis wallet, Jake Grafton left the hobby store carrying two large sacks and walked the block to his car. He walked purposefully, quickly. For the first time in months he had a task ahead that would be worth doing.
Fifteen minutes later he parked the car in the sand-and-crushed- seashell parking area in front of his house. He could hear the faint ringing of the telephone as he climbed the steps to the little wooden porch. He unlocked the front door, sat one of the paper sacks on the floor and strode across the living room for the phone on the wall by the kitchen table. The ringing stopped just as he reached for the receiver. He went back to the car for the other sack.
The airplane on the tid of the box looked gorgeous, mouth- wateringly gorgeous, but inside the box was sheet after sheet of raw balsa wood. At least the aircraft parts were impressed, stamped, into the wood. All you would have to do was pick them out and maybe trim the pieces. The instruction booklet looked devilishly complicated, with photos and line drawings. Jake studied the pic- tures. After a bit he began laying out the balsa pieces from the box on the kitchen table, referring frequently to the pictures in the booklet. When the box was empty he surveyed the mess and rubbed his temples. This was going to be a big job, even bigger than he thought.
He put coffee and water in the brewer and was waiting for the Pyrex pot to fill when the phone rang again. “Hello.”
“Jake. How are you feeling this morning?” Callie, his wife, called twice a day to check on him, even though
