"So, after a couple of years of being almost alone here, I decided to take myself off to Salem, where maybe I'd find some people who hadn't heard what the preacher Whitney was saying. And one day, I'm talking to this man in a feed store, and I'm telling him about my valley, my sweet valley, and how he should come look at it for himself, and suddenly he digs out a silver dollar and slaps it on the counter and says to me: Show me. And I say to him: It's quite a ways from here. And he puts his hand on my leg, and starts to pull up my skirt and he says: No, it's real near.
"Then I realized what he was talking about, and I called him every kind of name under the sun and I took myself off in a high old fury. But as I was walking home, I got to thinking about what he'd said, and I thought maybe the best way to bring men to my valley was first to bring women-"
"Clever," said Raul.
"Men don't always follow religion. they don't always follow common sense. But women, they follow. Women they'll suffer every kind of privation for. This has been proved, over and over." She tapped Harry on the shoulder. "You've been stupid for women, have you not?"
"It's been known," said Harry. "So, you see, I had my method. I knew how I would bring men to fill up my valley. And once they were there, they'd start to build my daddy's dream city for me."
"I get the theory of it," Raul said. "But how did it work?"
"Well, my father had been given a cross, by a man called Buddenbaum-"
"Buddenbaum?" Harry said. "It can't be the same man-"
"You've heard of him?" "Heard of him? I shot him this afternoon."
"Dead?"
"No. He was very much alive when I saw him last. But like I said, it can't be the same Buddenbaum."
"Oh I think it could," Maeve said. "And if it is@h, if it is-I have some questions I want that bastard to answer."
Larry Glodoski and his soldiers had staggered out of Hamrick's Bar feeling ready to take on anything that crossed their path. they had guns, they had God, and they could all whistle Sousa: What more did an army need?
The civilian population was not so sanguine, however. A lot of people-particularly the tourists@ad decided that whatever was happening on the mountain, they'd prefer to see it on tomorrow's news than experience it in the flesh, and they were beating a hasty and disorderly retreat. More than once, as the men made their way down Main Street, they had to step aside to let a carload of vacationers careen by.
"Cowards!" Waits yelled after one such vehicle had almost mounted the sidewalk to avoid them.
"Let them go," Glodosid slurred. "We don't need bystanders. They'll only get in the way."
"You know what?" Reidlinger said, seeing a sobbing woman bundling her kids into a RV, "I'm going to have to leave you guys to it. I'm sorry Larry, but I got kids at home, and if anything happened to them-2'
Giodoski gave him the fish-eye. "Okay," he said. "So what are you waiting for?" Reidlinger started to apologize again, but Glodoski cut him short. "Just go," he said. "We don't need you." Reidlinger made a shamefaced departure. "Anybody else want to go, while the going's goodt' Larry asked.
Alstead cleared his throat, and said, "You know, Larry, we've all of us got responsibilities. I mean, maybe we're better leaving this to the authorities."
"Are you deserting too?" Giodoski wanted to know.
"No, Larry, I'm just saying@'
Bosley interrupted him. "Well now he said, and inted down the block at the two people coming in their direction. He knew and despised them both. The woman for r foul mouth, the youth at her side for his sodomitic ways.
"These two are dangerous," he said. "They're accomplices of Buddenbaum's."
"There's not two of them," Bill Waits observed, "there's three. Lundy's carrying a baby." "Stealing children now," said Bosley. "How low will they stoop?"
"Wasn't she the one at the crossroads?" Larry said.
"She was."
"Gentleman, we've got work to do," Larry declared, stepping past Bosley.
"I'll front this. You just keep your eyes open."
Tesia and Seth had seen the quartet by now, and were crossing the street to avoid them. Giodoski stepped off the sidewalk to intercept them, demanding as he approached, "Whose kid is that?" His inquiry was ignored. "I'm not going to ask again," he said. "Whose baby have you got there?"
"It's none of your damn business," Tesia said. "What are you going to do with it?" Bosley said, his voice shrill.
"Shut up, Bosley," Larry said.
"They're going to murder it!"
"You heard him, Bosley," said Tesia. "Shut the fuck UP."
Now Bosley overtook Larry, pulling out his gun as he did so. "Put the baby down," he squealed.
"I said I'd deal with this," Giodoski snapped.
Bosley ignored him. He strode on towards Tesia, leveling his gun at her as he did so.
"Jesus," Tesla said. "Haven't you got anything better to do?" She jabbed her finger in the direction of the Heights. "There's something coming down that mountain, and you don't want to be here when it arrives."
As if to punctuate her warning, the streetlamps began to flicker, and then went out. There were cries of alarm from all directions. "Do we run?" Seth murmured to Tesia.
"We can't risk it," she said. "Not with Amy."
A few lights came back on again, but they were dim and fitful. Bosley, meanwhile, had stepped in to claim the baby from Seth's arms.
"You've got no right to do this," Seth protested.
"You're a cocksucker, Lundy," Alstead said. "Fhat gives us all the right we need."
Bosley had a grip on the baby now, but Seth refused to relinquish her.
"Alstead!" Bosley hollered, "give me a hand here."
Alstead didn't need a second invitation. He came around the back of Seth, and grabbed hold of his arms. Larry, mean-' while, had taken out his own gun and had it leveled at Tesla, to keep her from intervening.
"What's going on up there?" he said to her, nodding in the direction of the Heights.
"I don't know. But I do know we're all in deep shit when it gets here. If you want to do some good why don't you evacuate the people who need help, instead of baby snatching?"
"She's got a point, Larry," said Waits. "there's a lot of old folks-2'
"We'll get to them!" Glodoski blustered. "I got it all planned."
Amy began bawling now, as Bosley wrested her from Seth's arms. "She's missing your tits, Lundy," Alstead leered, reaching out to paw his captive's chest.
Seth responded by jabbing his elbow in Alstead's belly, hard enough to drive the wind from him. Cursing, Alstead spun Seth around and punched him in the face, twice, ffi= times, solid blows to nose and mouth. Seth stumbled backwards, his legs betraying him, and fell to the ground. Alstead moved in to kick the youth, but Waits held him back.
"C'mon. Enough!"
"Little cocksucker!"
"Leave him alone, for Christ's sake!" Waits hollered. "We didn't come out here to beat up kids. Larry-?"
Giodoski glanced over at Waits, and as he did so Tesla ducked beneath his arm and flew at him, intending to disarm him. She failed. There was a brief, ragged struggle@e gun twice discharged into the air@fore he caught her a backhanded blow. She reeled before it.
Waits, meanwhile, was hauling the bloodied Seth to his feet, while yelling at Alstead to keep his distance, and Bosley was fumbling for his own -uii, which he'd pocketed before snatching the child.
"Tesla-" Seth hollered, "1.)ok out!"
She shook the blotches from in front of her eyes in time to see not one but two weapons being leveled at her.