"You late for somethin?" Turcotte asked. "Got a f.u.c.kin train to catch?"
"You were going to tell me something funny."
"Oh. Yeah. They was singin the school song! How do you like that?"
In my mind"s eye I could see eight or ten beefy half-dressed boys churning across the field, eager to do a little post-practice hitting, and singing Hail Derry Tigers, we hold your banner high. It was sort of funny.
Turcotte saw my grin and answered with one of his own. It was strained but genuine. "The footballies baffed a couple of those guys around pretty good. Not Frankie Dunning, though; that yellabelly saw they was gonna be outnumbered and run into the woods. Chazzy was layin on the ground, holdin his arm. It was broke. Could have been a lot worse, though. They woulda put him in the hospital. One of the footballies looks at him layin there and kinda toes at him-the way you might toe a cow patty you almost stepped in-and he says, "We ran all the way out here to save a jewboy"s bacon?" And a bunch of em laughed, because it was kind of a joke, you see. Jewboy? Bacon?" He peered at me through clumps of his Brylcreem-shiny hair.
"I get it," I said.
""Aw, who gives a f.u.c.k," another of em says. "I got to kick some a.s.s and that"s good enough for me." They went on back, and I helped ole Chaz up the ravine. I even walked home with im, because I thought he might faint or somethin. I was scared Frankie and his friends might come back-he was, too-but I stuck with him. f.u.c.k if I know just why. You should have seen the house he lived in-a f.u.c.kin palace. That hockshop business must really pay. When we got there, he thanked me. Meant it, too. He was just about bawlin. I says, "Don"t mention it, I just didn"t like seeing six-on-one." Which was true. But you know what they say about Jews: they never forget a debt or a favor."
"Which you called in to find out what I was doing."
"I had a pretty good idea what you were doin, chum. I just wanted to make sure. Chaz told me to leave it alone-he said he thought you were a nice guy-but when it comes to Frankie Dunning, I don"t leave it alone. n.o.body messes with Frankie Dunning but me. He"s mine."
He winced and went back to rubbing his chest. And this time the penny dropped.
"Turcotte-is it your stomach?"
"Naw, chest. Feels all tight."
That didn"t sound good, and the thought that went through my mind was now he"s in the nylon stocking, too.
"Sit down before you fall down." I started toward him. He pulled the gun. The skin between my nipples-where the bullet would go-began to itch madly. I could have disarmed him, I thought. I really could have. But no, I had to hear the story. I had to know.
"You sit down, brother. Unlax, as they say in the funnypages."
"If you"re having a heart attack-"
"I ain"t havin no f.u.c.kin heart attack. Now sit down."
I sat and looked up at him as he leaned against the garage. His lips had gone a bluish shade I did not a.s.sociate with good health.
"What do you want with him?" Turcotte asked. "That"s what I want to know. That"s what I got to know, before I can decide what to do with you."
I thought carefully about how to answer this. As if my life depended on it. Maybe it did. I didn"t think Turcotte had outright murder in him, no matter what he thought, or Frank Dunning would have been planted next to his parents a long time ago. But Turcotte had my gun, and he was a sick man. He might pull the trigger by accident. Whatever force there was that wanted things to stay the same might even help him do it.
If I told him just the right way-leaving out the crazy stuff, in other words-he might believe it. Because of what he believed already. What he knew in his heart.
"He"s going to do it again."
He started to ask what I meant, then didn"t have to. His eyes widened. "You mean . . . her?" He looked toward the hedge. Until then, I hadn"t even been sure he knew what was beyond it.
"Not just her."
"One of the kids, too?"
"Not one, all. He"s out drinking right now, Turcotte. Working himself into another of his blind rages. You know all about those, don"t you? Only this time there won"t be any covering up afterward. He doesn"t care, either. This has been building ever since his last binge, when Doris finally got tired of being knocked around. She showed him the door, did you know that?"
"Everybody knows. He"s livin in a roomin house over on Charity."
"He"s been trying to get back into her good graces, but the charming act doesn"t work on her anymore. She wants a divorce, and since he finally understands he can"t talk her out of it, he"s going to give her one with a hammer. Then he"s going to divorce his kids the same way."
He frowned at me. Bayonet in one hand, gun in the other. A hard wind would blow you away, his sister had told him all those years ago, but I didn"t think it would take much more than a breeze tonight. "How could you know that?"
"I don"t have time to explain, but I know, all right. I"m here to stop it. So give me back my gun and let me do it. For your sister. For your nephew. And because I think down deep, you"re a pretty nice guy." This was bulls.h.i.t, but if you"re going to lay it on, my father used to say, you might as well lay it on thick. "Why else would you have stopped Dunning and his friends from beating Chaz Frati half to death?"
He was thinking. I could almost hear the wheels turning and the cogs clicking. Then a light went on in his eyes. Perhaps it was only the last remains of the sunset, but to me it looked like the candles that would now be flickering inside of jack-o"-lanterns all over town. He began to smile. What he said next could only have come from a man who was mentally ill . . . or who had lived too long in Derry . . . or both.
"Gonna go after em, is he? Okay, let im."
"What?"
He pointed the .38 at me. "Sit back down, Amberson. Take a load off."
I reluctantly settled back. It was now past 7:00 P.M. and he was turning into a shadow-man. "Mr. Turcotte-Bill-I know you don"t feel good, so maybe you don"t fully understand the situation. There"s a woman and four little kids in there. The little girl is only seven, for G.o.d"s sake."
"My nephew was a lot younger"n that." Turcotte spoke weightily, a man articulating a great truth that explains everything. And justifies it, as well. "I"m too sick to take im on, and you ain"t got the guts. I can see that just lookin at you."
I thought he was wrong about that. He might have been right about Jake Epping of Lisbon Falls, but that fellow had changed. "Why not let me try? What harm to you?"
"Because even if you killed his a.s.s, it wouldn"t be enough. I just figured that out. It come to me like-" He snapped his fingers. "Like out of thin air."
"You"re not making sense."
"That"s because you ain"t had twenty years of seeing men like Tony and Phil Tracker treat him like King s.h.i.t. Twenty years of seeing women bat their eyes at him like he was Frank Sinatra. He"s been drivin a Pontiac while I worked my a.s.s off in about six different mills for minimum wage, suckin fabric fibers down my throat until I can"t hardly get up in the morning." Hand at his chest. Rubbing and rubbing. His face a pale smear in the backyard gloom of 202 Wyemore. "Killin"s too good for that c.u.n.twipe. What he needs is forty years or so in the Shank, where if he drops the soap in the shower, he won"t f.u.c.kin dare to bend over and pick it up. Where the only booze he gets"ll be prune squeeze." His voice dropped. "And you know what else?"
"What?" I felt cold all over.
"When he sobers up, he"ll miss em. He"ll be sorry he did it. He"ll wish he could take it back." Now almost whispering-a hoa.r.s.e and phlegmy sound. It"s how the irretrievably mad must talk to themselves late at night in places like Juniper Hill, when their meds wear off. "Maybe he wun"t regret the wife s"much, but the kiddies, sure." He laughed, then grimaced as if it hurt him. "You"re probably fulla s.h.i.t, but you know what? I hope you"re not. We"ll wait and see."
"Turcotte, those kids are innocent."
"So was Clara. So was little Mikey." His shadow-shoulders went up and down in a shrug. "f.u.c.k em."
"You don"t mean th-"
"Shut up. We"ll wait."
10.
There were glow-in-the-dark hands on the watch Al had given me, and I watched with horror and resignation as the long hand moved down toward the bottom of the dial, then started up once more. Twenty-five minutes until the start of The New Adventures of Ellery Queen. Then twenty. Then fifteen. I tried to talk to him and he told me to shut up. He kept rubbing his chest, only stopping long enough to take his cigarettes from his breast pocket.
"Oh, that"s a good idea," I said. "That"ll help your heart a lot."
"Put a sock in it."
He stuck the bayonet in the gravel behind the garage and lit his cigarette with a battered Zippo. In the momentary flicker of flame, I saw sweat running down his cheeks, even though the night was chilly. His eyes seemed to have receded into their sockets, making his face look like a skull. He sucked in smoke, coughed it out. His thin body shook, but the gun remained steady. Pointed at my chest. Overhead, the stars were out. It was now ten of eight. How far along had Ellery Queen been when Dunning arrived? Harry"s theme hadn"t said, but I was guessing not long. There was no school tomorrow, but Doris Dunning still wouldn"t want seven-year-old Ellen out much later than ten, even if she was with Tugga and Harry.
Five minutes of eight.
And suddenly an idea occurred to me. It had the clarity of undisputed truth, and I spoke while it was still bright.
"You chickens.h.i.t."
"What?" He straightened as if he"d been goosed.
"You heard me." I mimicked him. ""n.o.body messes with Frankie Dunning but me. He"s mine." You"ve been telling yourself that for twenty years, haven"t you? And you haven"t messed with him yet."
"I told you to shut up."
"h.e.l.l, twenty-two! You didn"t mess with him when he went after Chaz Frati, either, did you? You ran away like a little girl and got the football players."
"There was six of em!"
"Sure, but Dunning"s been on his own plenty of times since, and you haven"t even put a banana peel down on the sidewalk and hoped he"d slip on it. You"re a chickens.h.i.t coward, Turcotte. Hiding over here like a rabbit in a hole."
"Shut up!"
"Telling yourself some bulls.h.i.t about how seeing him in prison would be the best revenge, so you don"t have to face the fact-"
"Shut up!"
"-that you"re a nutless wonder who"s let his sister"s murderer walk around free for over twenty years-"
"I"m warning you!" He c.o.c.ked the revolver"s hammer.
I thumped the middle of my chest. "Go on. Do it. Everybody"ll hear the shot, the police will come, Dunning"ll see the ruckus and turn right around, and you"ll be the one in Shawshank. I bet they got a mill there, too. You can work in it for a nickel an hour instead of a buck-twenty. Only you"ll like that, because you won"t have to try and explain to yourself why you just stood by all those years. If your sister was alive, she"d spit on y-"
He thrust the gun forward, meaning to press the muzzle against my chest, and stumbled on his own d.a.m.n bayonet. I batted the pistol aside with the back of my hand and it went off. The bullet must have gone into the ground less than an inch from my leg, because a little spray of stones struck my pants. I grabbed the gun and pointed it at him, ready to shoot if he made the slightest move to grab the fallen bayonet.
What he did was slump against the garage wall. Now both hands were plastered over the left side of his chest, and he was making a low gagging sound.
Somewhere not too far away-on Kossuth, not Wyemore-a man bellowed: "Fun"s fun, you kids, but one more cherry bomb and I"m calling the cops! A word to the wise!"
I let out my breath. Turcotte was letting his out as well, but in hitching gasps. The gagging sounds continued as he slid down the side of the garage and sprawled on the gravel. I took the bayonet, considered putting it in my belt, and decided I"d only gash my leg with it when I pushed through the hedge: the past hard at work, trying to stop me. I hucked it into the dark yard instead, and heard a low clunk as it hit something. Maybe the side of the YOUR POOCH BELONGS HERE doghouse.
"Ambulance," Turcotte croaked. His eyes gleamed with what might have been tears. "Please, Amberson. Hurts bad."
Ambulance. Good idea. And here"s something hilarious. I"d been in Derry-in 1958-for almost two months, but I still plunged my hand into my right front pants pocket, where I always kept my cell phone when I wasn"t wearing a sport coat. My fingers found nothing there but some change and the keys to the Sunliner.
"Sorry, Turcotte. You were born in the wrong era for instant rescue."
"What?"
According to the Bulova, The New Adventures of Ellery Queen was now being telecast to a waiting America. "Tough it out," I said, and shoved through the hedge, the hand not holding the gun raised to protect my eyes from the stiff, raking branches.
11.
I tripped over the sandbox in the middle of the Dunning backyard, fell full length, and found myself face-to-face with a blank-eyed doll wearing a tiara and nothing else. The revolver flew out of my hand. I went searching for it on my hands and knees, thinking I would never find it; this was the obdurate past"s final trick. A small one, compared to raging stomach flu and Bill Turcotte, but a good one. Then, just as I spotted it lying at the edge of a trapezoidal length of light thrown by the kitchen window, I heard a car coming down Kossuth Street. It was moving far faster than any reasonable driver would have dared to travel on a street that was no doubt full of children wearing masks and carrying trick-or-treat bags. I knew who it was even before it screeched to a stop.
Inside 379, Doris Dunning was sitting on the couch with Troy while Ellen pranced around in her Indian princess costume, wild to get going. Troy had just told her that he would help eat the candy when she, Tugga, and Harry came back. Ellen was replying, "No, you won"t, dress up and get your own." Everybody would laugh at that, even Harry, who was in the bathroom taking a last-minute whiz. Because Ellen was a real Lucille Ball who could make anybody laugh.
I s.n.a.t.c.hed at the gun. It slipped through my sweat-slick fingers and landed in the gra.s.s again. My shin was howling where I"d barked it on the side of the sandbox. On the other side of the house, a car door slammed and rapid footsteps rattled on concrete. I remember thinking, Bar the door, Mom, that"s not just your bad-tempered husband; that"s Derry itself coming up the walk.
I grabbed the gun, staggered upright, stumbled over my own stupid feet, almost went down again, found my balance, and ran for the back door. The cellar bulkhead was in my path. I detoured around it, convinced that if I put my weight on it, it would give way. The air itself seemed to have turned syrupy, as if it were also trying to slow me down.
Even if it kills me, I thought. Even if it kills me and Oswald goes through with it and millions die. Even then. Because this is now. This is them.
The back door would be locked. I was so sure of this that I almost tumbled off the stoop when the k.n.o.b turned and it swung outward. I stepped into a kitchen that still smelled of the pot roast Mrs. Dunning had cooked in her Hotpoint. The sink was stacked with dishes. There was a gravy boat on the counter; beside it, a platter of cold noodles. From the TV came a trembling violin soundtrack-what Christy used to call "murder music." Very fitting. Lying on the counter was the rubber Frankenstein mask Tugga meant to wear when he went out trick-or-treating. Next to it was a paper swag-bag with TUGGA"S CANDY DO NOT TOUCH printed on the side in black crayon.
In his theme, Harry had quoted his mother as saying, "Get out of here with that thing, you"re not suppose to be here." What I heard her actually say as I ran across the linoleum toward the arch between the kitchen and the living room was, "Frank? What are you doing here?" Her voice began to rise. "What"s that? Why have you . . . get out of here!"
Then she screamed.
12.
As I came through the arch, a child said: "Who are you? Why is my mom yelling? Is my daddy here?"
I turned my head and saw ten-year-old Harry Dunning standing in the door of a small water closet in the far corner of the kitchen. He was dressed in buckskin and carrying his air rifle in one hand. With the other he was pulling at his fly. Then Doris Dunning screamed again. The other two boys were yelling. There was a thud-a heavy, sickening sound-and the scream was cut off.
"No, Daddy, don"t, you"re HURRRTING her!" Ellen shrieked.