Part VI - On the Storm Chapter 1: Happy Herman's
The sun was coming up, into a pewter sky. The warning light on the BMW's gas gauge had begun blinking. Laura tried not to pay any attention to it - tried to will it begone - but the light kept snagging her eye.
"Low on gas," Didi said over the wind's scream.
The heater was purring merrily, warming their feet and legs while they froze from the waist up. The positive side of this, though, was that neither Laura nor Didi could be lulled to sleep with the cold and the wind singing them a banshee symphony. Didi kept her hands in her pockets, but every so often Laura had to unclench one hand from the steering wheel, flex the blood back into it, put it back where it was and do the same to the other. ahead of them, between fifty and sixty yards away, was the olive-green van, its left side scraped to the bare metal and the rear looking like a sledgehammer had been taken to it. Traffic had picked up on the interstate: more trucks, zooming past in defiance of the legal limit. Twenty minutes or so before, Laura had seen a patrol car speed past on the other side of the median, blue lights flashing. She wondered if the sight had given Mary Terror as much of a start as it had herself. Beyond Mary's van, the sky was still dark and ominous, as if night refused to recede from the shore of dawn.
"Gas is almost gone," Didi said. "Hear mei"
"I hear you. "
"Well, what're you going to doi Wait until we have to push the damned thingi"
Laura didn't answer. She really didn't know what she was going to do; this was a wing-it-by-the-seat situation. If she pulled into a gas station first, then Mary Terror might turn off I-94 at the nearest exit. If she waited much longer, the gas would give out and they'd be coasting. There was something darkly comedic about this, like a twisted Lucy and Ethel on the trail of a celebrity when Ricky went to Hollywood. Don Juan, she thought. Wasn't that the movie Ricky visited Hollywood to filmi Or was it Casanovai No, Don Juan. She was almost sure of it. That was the first sign of old age: forgetting details. Who was it that Lucy had gotten a booth next to at the Brown Derbyi William Holdeni Hadn't she spilled soup on his headi Or was it a salad instead of's -
The blare of an air horn behind her almost lifted Laura out of her seat and caused Didi to yelp like a dog. She jerked the wheel to the right, back into the lane she'd drifted out of, and the huge truck that was looming on her tail roared past like a snorting dinosaur.
"Screw you!" Didi shouted, and shot the truck's driver a bird.
Laura's heart began to pound.
Mary Terror was cutting her speed, and easing over toward an exit ramp that was about a quarter mile ahead.
Laura blinked, wasn't sure if she was walking on the paths of La-La Land again or not.
In the sky was an apparition. a symbol of high karma, as Mark Treggs might have said. Up on stilts on the roadside was a gigantic yellow Smiley Face, and a sign that said HaPPY HERMaN'S! GaS! FOOD! GROCERIES! NEXT EXIT!
Oh yes, Laura thought. That was where Mary Terror was going. Maybe she needed gas. Maybe she needed something to keep her awake. In any case, Happy Herman's Smiley Face was a beacon, drawing Mary Terror off the interstate like a hippie to a be-in.
"Where's she goingi" Didi said excitedly. "She's getting off!"
"I know. " Laura moved into the right lane. The exit ramp was coming up. Mary Terror took it, committing the van to a long curve to the right, and Laura cut the BMW's speed as she followed.
Happy Herman's was on the left. It was a yellow cinder-block combination grocery store, burger joint, and gas station, with full-serve and self-serve pumps. Big yellow Smiley Faces were painted on the windows. a couple of trucks were at the diesel pumps, and a station wagon with an Ohio tag was being fueled with self-serve premium unleaded. Mary Terror slid the van under a yellow plastic awning. as her front tires went over a rubber hose across the concrete, a shrill bell rang. She stopped at the full-serve pumps, her gas port lined up with the regular leaded hose. Then she sat there and watched in the sideview mirror as the BMW came in and went to the self-serve pumps thirty feet away. Laura Clayborne got out, the injured side of her face bruised and swollen and her hair windblown. Was there a gun in her handi Mary saw the woman start to walk toward the van, and then a man's wrinkled face appeared at the window. He tapped on the glass, and Mary quickly glanced in the rearview mirror at her own face to make sure she'd gotten all of Edward's blood off with her saliva and fingernails. Some blood remained at her hairline, but it would have to do. She cranked the window down. "Fill 'er upi" the man asked. He wore a yellow, grease-stained Happy Herman cap and he was chewing vigorously on a toothpick.
Mary nodded. The man moved away from the window, and Mary stared at Laura, who stood less than ten feet away. Her hands were empty; no gun. Behind her, Didi was fueling up the BMW. Laura took two steps closer, and stopped when Mary rested her arm on the window frame, the baby's blood-spattered white blanket over her hand and about three inches of the Colt's barrel showing.
The sight of the bloody white blanket transfixed Laura. She couldn't take her eyes off it, and she felt a hot surge of sickness rising in her throat. and then Mary's other arm came into view and there was David, alive and sucking on a pacifier. The Colt's barrel moved a few inches, taking aim in the direction of the baby's skull.
The gas pump's motor was humming, the numbers clicking higher.
Mary sensed the Happy Herman attendant returning before he got there. She slid her arm down beside her, the gun resting against her thigh. He peered in at her, his eye catching for a second or two on the baby. "Somebody don't like you," he told Mary.
"Whati"
He dug at a molar with the toothpick. "Got bullet holes in your van. Somebody don't like you. "
"I bought it at a government auction," she said, her expression blank. "It used to belong to a drug dealer. "
The man stared at her, his toothpick working. "Oh," he said. Then he sprayed the windshield with cleaning fluid and started to wash it with a squeegee as the gas kept flowing into the tank.
Laura Clayborne was no longer there.
She stood in the dank women's room, where there were no Smiley Faces and the only thing yellow was the toilet water. She glanced in the mirror and saw a fright mask. Then she hurriedly soaked paper towels in water from the sink and cleaned her blood-clogged nostrils. Touching her face sent electric jolts of pain through her cheekbones, but she had no time to be gentle. Her vision was hazed by tears when she finished. She crumpled the bloody towels, dropped them into the wastebasket, and then she relieved the pressure on her bladder. There was a dribble of blood between her legs, too, the stitches popped by Earl Van Diver's knee. When she was done, Laura went out into the cold again, and she saw Mary Terror carrying David into the grocery store, the shoulder bag over her arm and probably both guns in it.
The attendant had finished pumping the gas into the van. Laura walked to it and opened the driver's door. Mary Terror's smell, a heavy, animalish odor, lingered within. No keys in the ignition, of course. Laura reached under the dashboard and gripped a handful of wires. One good yank, and. . . and whati she asked herself. The situation wouldn't change. Maybe the van wouldn't start, but Mary would still have David, still have her guns, and still kill him as soon as the police arrived. What was the point of disabling the van if David would die as the resulti
She released the wires. "Damn it," she said quietly. She'd only waste her strength shouting.
She looked behind the van's front seats. In the back were suitcases and a couple of large paper sacks. Laura reached over and searched in them, finding such items as potato chip bags, cartons of doughnuts and cookies, a box of Pampers, and some baby formula as well as paper cups and a half-full plastic bottle of Pepsi. Traveling food, she thought. Groceries that Mary and Edward Fordyce had bought for their trip. also amid the clutter in the van's rear was a pillow and a blanket. She took the blanket and one of the sacks containing junk food, the cups, and the Pep
si. She left the diapers and the formula where they were. Something else caught her attention: a pacifier on the passenger seat. She picked it up, intending to keep it. It had her baby's saliva on it, and his aroma. But no, no: if David had no pacifier to ease his crying, the crying might snap Mary Terror's nerves, and then. . .
Laura put the pacifier down. It might have been the hardest thing she'd ever had to do.
Laura carried the booty to her car. and that was when she realized the gas portal was closed, the pump shut off, and Bedelia Morse was gone.
In the store, as Mary Terror paid for her gas, a box of No-Doz tablets, a jug of pure water, and a package of trash bags, she watched Laura raiding her van. Won't touch the engine or the tires, she thought. Bitch knows what would happen if she did.
"Is that alli" the woman behind the register asked.
"Yeah, I think -" She stopped. Beside the register was a glass bowl. On the glass bowl was written in black Magic Marker Don't Worry! Be Happy! In the bowl were hundreds of little yellow Smiley Face pins. She wouldn't have stopped at Happy Herman's but for the sign, and the feeling that she was invincible under its power. It had proved her right. Laura Clayborne couldn't touch her. "How much are thosei"
"Quarter apiece. "
"I'll take one," Mary said. "and one for my baby. " She pinned one on the light blue sweater she'd bought Drummer in New Jersey, and then she pinned the other on her own sweater, next to what she realized looked like dried oatmeal but were flecks of Edward's brain.
"Somebody get hurti" the woman asked when the bill had been paid. She was looking distastefully at the splotches of crimson on the blanket nestled around Drummer.
"Nosebleed. " The answer came fast and smooth. "I always get them in cold weather. "
She nodded, putting Mary's purchases into a sack. "Me, my ankles swell up. Look like a couple a' treetrunks walkin' around the house. They're swole up on me right now. "
"Sorry," Mary said.
"Means a storm on the way," the woman told her. "Weatherman says all hell's 'bout to break loose out west. "
"I believe it. Have a nice day. " Mary took the sack under one arm, cradling Drummer with the other, and she walked out of the store toward her van. She had to pee, but she didn't want to let the van out of her sight so she'd have to hold it until she was desperate. She put Drummer's bassinet on the passenger-side floorboard, and then she made a quick check of what Laura had taken. a sack of groceries and the blanket. No big deal, Mary decided as she put the new supplies and her shoulder bag in the back of the van. She took the Colt out of the bag and put it under the driver's seat. Then she popped the No-Doz open, swallowed two tablets with a drink of the bottled water, and slid behind the wheel. She put the key into the ignition, the engine starting with a throaty roar.
Then she looked over at the BMW, and Laura Clayborne standing beside it, staring at her.
She didn't like the woman's face. You're nothing but a lie, she remembered it saying.
Mary reached under her seat, gripped the Colt, and withdrew it. She cocked the pistol as she brought it up, and she aimed the barrel with a steady hand at Laura's heart.
Laura saw the gun's dull gleam. She inhaled a sharp breath that made the cold sting her nostrils. There was no time to move, and her body tensed for the shot.
The baby began to cry, wanting to be fed.
Mary caught sight of a car in the sideview mirror, pulling up to the pumps behind her. It wasn't just any car, it belonged to the Michigan highway patrol. She lowered the Colt, easing the hammer back into place. Then, without another glance at Laura, she drove away from the pumps and turned back onto the road that led to I-94's westbound lanes.
Laura was looking frantically for Didi. The woman wasn't anywhere in sight. She's left me, Laura thought. Gone back to the gray world of false faces and names. She couldn't wait any longer, Mary Terror was getting away. She got into the car, started the engine, and was about to pull away when a woman shouted, "Hey! Hey, you! Stop!"
The cashier had come outside and was hollering at her. The state trooper, a burly block of a man with a Smokey the Bear hat, devoted his full attention to the BMW. "You ain't paid for your gas!" the cashier shouted.
Oh shit, Laura thought. She put on the parking brake again and reached for her purse from the backseat, where she'd left it. Only her purse wasn't there. From the corner of her eye she saw the trooper walking toward her, and the cashier was coming, too, indignant that she'd had to venture out into the cold. The trooper was almost to the car, and Laura realized with a start that the Charter arms automatic was lying within sight on the floorboard. Where was the damned pursei all her money, her credit cards, her driver's license: gone.
Didi's work, she thought.
Laura just had time to slide the automatic up under the seat when the trooper looked in, hard-eyed under the Smokey the Bear rim. "Believe you owe some money," he said in a voice like a shovel digging gravel. "How much, anniei"
"Fourteen dollars, sixty-two cents!" the cashier said. "Tryin' to skip on me, Frank!"
"That so, ladyi"
"No! I've -" Claw your way out, she thought. Mary Terror was getting farther away! "I've got a friend around here somewhere. She took my purse. "
"Not much of a friend, then, huhi I guess that means you don't have a license, either. "
"It's in my purse. "
"I suspected so. " The trooper looked at the windshield, and Laura knew he was taking in the Go home carved there. Then he looked at her bruised cheek again, and after a few seconds of deliberation he said, "I believe you'd better step out of the car. "
There was no point in pleading. The trooper retreated a couple of paces, and his hand touched his hip near the big pearl-handled pistol in his black holster. My God! Laura thought. He thinks I might be dangerous! Laura cut the BMW's engine, opened the door, and got out.
"Walk to my car, please," the trooper said, a clipped command.
He would ask for her name next, Laura figured as she walked. He paused to take a look at her tag, memorizing the numbers, and then he followed behind her. "Georgia," he said. "You're a long way from home, aren't youi"
Laura didn't answer. "What's your namei" he asked.
If she made up a name, he'd know soon enough. One call on his radio to check the tag would tell him. Damn it to hell! Mary was getting away!
"Your name, pleasei"
There was no use in resisting. She said, "Laur -"
"What's going on, sisi"
The voice made Laura stop in her tracks. She looked to her left, at Didi Morse standing there with the purse over her shoulder and a bag with grease stains on it in her hand. "any troublei" Didi asked innocently.
The trooper gave her his hard glare. "Do you know this womani"
"Sure. She's my sister. What's the problemi"
"Tryin' to steal fourteen dollars and sixty-two cents worth of gas, that's what!" the cashier replied, her swollen ankles aching in the bitter cold and the breath pluming from her mouth.
"Oh, here's the money. I went over there and bought us some breakfast. " Didi nodded toward the burger-joint section of Happy Herman's, which had a sign announcing their trucker's breakfast special of sausage and biscuits. She took the wallet out, counted a ten, four ones, two quarters, and two dimes. "You can keep the change," she said as she offered the cashier her money.
"Listen, I'm sorry. " The woman brought up a nervous smile. "I saw her startin' to drive away, and I thought. . . well, it happens sometimes. " She took the cash.
"Oh, she was probably just moving the car. I had to go to the bathroom, and I guess she was coming to pick me up. "
"Sorry," the cashier said. "Frank, I feel like a real dumb-ass. You folks take it easy, now, and watch the weather. " She began walking back to the grocery store, shivering in the frigid wind.
"You ready to hit the roadi" Didi asked Laura brightly. "I got us some coffee and chow. "
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p; Laura saw the shine of fear deep down in Didi's eyes. You wanted to run, didn't youi Laura thought. "I'm ready," she said tersely.
"Hold on a minute. " The trooper planted himself between them and the car. "Lady, it might not be any of my business, but you look like somebody gave you a hell of a knock. "
a silence stretched. Then Didi filled it. "Somebody did. Her husband, if you want to know. "
"Her husbandi He did thati"
"My sister and her husband were visiting me from Georgia. He went crazy and punched her last night, and we're on the way to our mother's house in Illinois. Bastard took a hammer to her new car, broke the window out and cut up the windshield, too. "
"Jesus. " The hardness had vanished from the trooper's eyes. "Some men can really be shits, if you'll pardon my French. Maybe you ought to get to a doctor. "
"Our father's a doctor. In Joliet. "
If she weren't about to jump out of her skin, Laura might have smiled. Didi was good at this; she'd had a lot of practice.
"Mind if we go nowi" Didi asked.
The trooper scratched his jaw, and stared at the darkness in the west. Then he said, "all men ain't sonsabitches. Lemme give you a hand. " He walked to his car, opened the trunk, and brought out a tarpaulin of clear blue plastic. "Go in there and get some duct tape," he told Didi, and he motioned toward the grocery store. "It'll be back on the hardwares shelf. Tell annie to put it on Frank's tab. "
Didi gave Laura the breakfast bag and strode quickly away. Laura was fighting a scream; with every second, Mary Terror was getting farther away. Frank produced a penknife and began to cut out a fair-sized square of blue plastic. When Didi returned with the silver duct tape, Frank said, "Long way to Joliet from here. You ladies need to keep warm," and he opened the BMWs door, slid across the driver's seat under which the automatic pistol rested, and taped the plastic up over the window frame. He did a thorough job of it, adding strip after strip of the silver tape in a webbing pattern that fixed the plastic securely in place. Laura drank her coffee black and paced nervously as Frank finished the job, Didi looking on with interest. Then Frank came back out of the car, the duct tape reduced to about half its previous size. "There you go," he said. "Hope everything works out all right for you. "
"We hope so, too," Didi answered. She got into the car, and Laura was never so thankful in her life to get behind a steering wheel.
"Drive carefully!" Frank cautioned. He waved as the patched-up BMW pulled away, and he watched as it sped up and swerved onto I-94 West. Funny, he thought. The lady from Georgia had said her "friend" had her purse. Why hadn't she said "sister"i Well, sisters could be friends, couldn't theyi Still. . . it made him wonder. Was it worth a call in to get a vehicle ID or noti Should've checked her driver's license, he decided. He'd always been a sucker for a hard-luck story. Well, let them go. He was supposed to be looking for speeders, not giving grief to battered wives. He turned his back to the west, and went to get himself a cup of coffee.
"Fifteen minutes on us," Laura said as the speedometer's needle climbed past seventy. "That's what she's got. "
"Thirteen minutes," Didi corrected Laura, and she began to tear into a sausage and biscuit.
The BMW reached eighty. Laura was even passing the massive trucks. The wind flapped the plastic a little, but Frank had done a good job and the duct tape held. "Better hold it back," Didi said. "Getting stopped for a ticket won't help. "
Laura kept her speed where it was, on the high side of eighty. The car shuddered, its aerodynamics spoiled by the caved-in passenger door. Laura's gaze searched for an olive-green van in the gloomy light. "Why didn't you leave mei"
"I did. "
"You came back. Whyi"
"I saw him rousting you. I had your purse. I knew it was about to be over for you. "
"Soi Why didn't you just let him arrest me and you take offi"
Didi chewed on the tough sausage. She washed it down with a sip of hot coffee. "Where was I going to goi" she asked quietly.
The question lingered. To it there was no answer.
The BMW sped on, toward the steel-gray West while the sun rose in the East like a burning angel.