“Jared, we’re almost finished with this thing. I need you there tomorrow night.”
“I haven’t had a night off in a long while,” Jared whined.
“I’m a young man. I’ve got my needs, for Chrissakes!” He winced, knowing what was coming next.
“Do not take the Lord’s name in vain, young man. This is your father we are avenging, in case you’ve forgotten.”
“He wasn’t my father for very long, was he?” Jared said, and again winced, waiting for the explosion. But the old man didn’t say anything.
That was almost worse.
“Look,” Jared said, rushing to fill that ominous silence.
“It’s just one night. Why don’t we leave it all alone, let the place cool off. Let my trap do its job. Go in on Sunday instead, during the day. Change the pattern, screw this guy up, whoever he is.”
“Because, for one thing, we’re close to finishing. There should be enough copper. The sooner the truck is pressurized, the sooner I can get out of there. And for another, I’ve got to feed our prisoner.”
Jared formed a quick image of Lynn’s taut body.
“Shit, she’s in pretty good shape. She’ll survive.”
“And how would you know that, Jared?”
“I just mean, one night ain’t gonna kill her,” Jared said quickly.
“Look, I promised this woman I’d go see her, all right? I’m a man, damn it. I’ve got needs.”
There was an angry silence on the line.
“You’ve got a short circuit between your brain and your dick is what you’ve got,” Browne said.
“Well, go on, you ungrateful pup. I’ll do this thing without you. Go hump your slut. I hope her husband comes home with a shotgun and catches the both of you.”
Browne slammed the phone in Jared’s ear. Jared put the handset back on up on the wall, sighed, and finished his beer. Hell with him, he thought.
He’ll get over it. He’ll want me back when we catch whoever the hell has been racking around out there. Old man is half-crazy anyway. He felt a surge of resentment. The old man loved the memory of dead William a whole lot more than he loved Jared. He wondered why. Must have something to do with the way everything turned to shit for him
after William left. The cancer. The closing of the arsenal. That shit with his pension. He shook his head. Screw it. It was almost over anyway.
He dropped down into the ratty old recliner and popped the television on. Three fat women in miniskirts were wrestling across a stage while a talk-show host watched with mock alarm and the audience screamed for blood. He smiled as he wondered what kinds of things might be down in that tunnel. The old man himself had probably sent thousands of gallons down there during all those years he’d been working there. Bet there’s some regular mutant shit down there by now.
He settled back to watch the fun, when the lights cut out and the television went black.
“What the fuck?” he muttered into the sudden silence, getting up out of his chair. Then he realized he could see, because the orange security light on the power pole was still on. That meant that the power company had not dropped the load. He squinted out the kitchen windows, but there was nothing moving out there in his yard. Or in the dog pen, he realized. He squinted harder but could see no sign of his dogs. Was that pen door shut? They might all three be in their igloos, but usually one was stretched out on the concrete. He tried a light switch in the kitchen, but nothing happened.
He went to the junk drawer by the sink, resurrected a flashlight, and went outside. He checked the power box, where the overhead wires came down to his meter. There was no sign of trouble. Then he called to his dogs, to see if they were stirring. There was no reaction, so he walked over to the pen and found the door slightly ajar. This time, he swore out loud: “How the hell did this happen?” He listened for the sound of baying and rooing in the distance, but the only dog he heard was that little yapper belonging to that crazy old deaf woman who lived a mile down the county road. He was sure he had latched up this gate after feeding them.
He was sure of it. Then he remembered the sounds he had heard the other night, and he hurried back into the trailer to get a gun. If somebody was out here fucking around, he wanted to be ready for the bastard.
He went back into the bedroom, got the .45 out of the bedside table, checked to make sure it was ready to go, and then went into the tiny utility closet to check the power panel. He cycled all the circuit breakers, but nothing happened; the trailer remained dark. Then he distinctly heard the sound of footsteps crunching outside. He backed carefully out of the utility closet, which was in the hallway leading from the living room-kitchen area back to the bedroom, and squatted
down in the doorway of the trailer’s second bathroom. The footsteps stopped. It sounded like the bastard was outside, right at the back of the trailer. Amazingly, the next sound he heard was that of a Zippo-type cigarette lighter cap being flipped back and the flame ignited. Bold as brass: The guy was lighting up a goddamned cigarette! Which meant at least one hand was occupied.
Jared stood up and moved swiftly down the hallway to the edge of the kitchen, where he popped his head quickly around the corner for a look and then withdrew it. Nothing but the orange glow of the security light in the window; no silhouettes.
He waited. He was beginning to perspire, and his sweat smelled a lot like beer. Maybe he should call his grandfather. The phone was in the kitchen. He would have to go into the kitchen to reach it, but he knew the trailer’s squeaky floors would give him away if he tried that. The next sound caught his breath right up in his throat: a shotgun being racked, again, somewhere out behind the trailer. He immediately got down on the floor, really sweating now. What the fuck is this? Then footsteps crunching again, but getting quieter, as if the guy was circling the trailer.
After hearing the shotgun, Jared was afraid even to put his head up.
Sumbitch had let his dogs loose so he’d be free to walk around out there. Shit!
Get to the fucking phone, a voice in his head told him. Call the old man. Hell, call 9 II! He crept around the corner of the entrance to the kitchen, trying to keep the floor from creaking, and reached carefully for the phone, listening very hard for sounds from outside. It was just out of reach. He grabbed a magazine off the table, rolled it up, and then used it to tip the phone off its wall jack, catching it just before it could clatter onto the floor. Then he hit the red button on the handset and heard the welcome sound of ringing. He felt a wave of relief.
“Nine one one. What is your emergency?” a male voice asked.
“Guy’s outside my trailer,” he whispered as loudly as he dared.
“Bastard’s got a gun, I need some help out here.”
“Sir? I can’t hear you, sir? Give me the address please and state the nature of your emergency.” The voice sounded unnaturally loud, and he squeezed the earpiece to his head to keep the noise down.
“I need a deputy!” he said.
“There’s a guy with a fuckin’ shotgun outside my trailer. One three eight County Line Road.”
“Gee, that’s too bad,” the voice said, and then, to Jared’s horror, there came the booming laugh of a fun-house scary monster. The huge sound reverberated in his ear as he swore and dropped the handset on
the floor like a hot potato. The laughter went on, loud, very loud, as he backed away from the phone, waving the .45 around him, like cops did in the movies, until he was back in the hallway again, down on all fours, scrunching backward like a baby toward his bedroom.
Then a sound. Behind him. Something behind him.
He whirled around, and there was an enormous figure all in black looming over him. It was wearing a hideous mask, and there were bright round mirrors where the eyes should have been. Jared gasped but didn’t hesitate. He brought the .45 up and fired, but all that came out was the pop of a primer. Then from the figure came the loudest sound he had ever heard, a roar, a lion’s heart-grabbing, ear-pounding roar. The sound was so loud that Jared dropped the useless gun, clapped his hands to his ears, and scooted backward, nailing his way back into the living room, rounding the hallway corner on his hand and knees, scuttling toward the front door, which he never used, the bottom of his jeans warm and wet. There was a nightmarish scramble to get the door unlocked and open as a second roar came down the hallway, louder than the first. He screamed and then tumbled through the doorway, right into a tangle of wet, rubbery strands. It felt like a huge spiderweb. He fought furiously to get away from it, but the more he fought, the tighter it enveloped him, until he could do little more than twitch, and then the horrible mirror-eyed figure was filling the doorway and pointing something at him, something shiny and bright. He knew he shouldn’t look at it, but he couldn’t help it. There was an incredibly bright flash of purple light and he was just gone.