Abra was vaguely aware of Emma putting her book aside and asking if she wanted to go out in the backyard for awhile, but most of her was with Dan: seeing through his eyes, feeling his hands and feet on the controls of The Helen Rivington's little engine, tasting the ham sandwich he ate and the lemonade he chased it down with. When Dan spoke to her father, it was actually Abra speaking. As for Dr. John? He was riding at the very back of the train, and consequently there was no Dr. John. Just the two of them in the cab, a little father-and-daughter bonding in the wake of the bad news about Momo, cozy as could be.
Occasionally her thoughts turned to the woman in the hat, the one who had hurt the baseball boy until he died and then licked up his blood with her deformed and craving mouth. Abra couldn't help it, but wasn't sure it mattered. If she were being touched by Barry's mind, her fear of Rose wouldn't surprise him, would it?
She had an idea she couldn't have fooled the True Knot's locator if he had been healthy, but Barry was extremely sick. He didn't know she knew Rose's name. It hadn't even occurred to him to wonder why a girl who wouldn't be eligible for a driver's license until 2015 was piloting the Teenytown train through the woods west of Frazier. If it had, he probably would have assumed the train didn't really need a driver.
Because he thinks it's a toy.
"--Scrabble?"
"Hmmm?" She looked around at Emma, at first not even sure where they were. Then she saw she was holding a basketball. Okay, the backyard. They were playing HORSE.
"I asked if you wanted to play Scrabble with me and my mom, because this is totally boring."
"You're winning, right?"
"Duh! All three games. Are you here at all?"
"Sorry, I'm just worried about my momo. Scrabble sounds good." It sounded great, in fact. Emma and her mom were the slowest Scrabble players in the known universe, and would have shit large bricks if anyone had suggested playing with a timer. This would give Abra plenty of opportunity to continue minimizing her presence here. Barry was sick but he wasn't dead, and if he got wise to the fact that Abra was performing a kind of telepathic ventriloquism, the results could be very bad. He might figure out where she really was.
Not much longer. Pretty soon they'll all come together. God, please let it go okay.
While Emma cleared the crap off the table in the downstairs rec room and Mrs. Deane set up the board, Abra excused herself to use the toilet. She did need to go, but first she made a quick detour into the living room and peeked out the bow window. Billy's truck was parked across the street. He saw the curtains twitch and flashed her a thumbs-up. Abra returned the gesture. Then the small part of her that was here went to the bathroom while the rest of her sat in the cab of The Helen Rivington.
We'll eat our picnic, pick up our trash, watch the sunset, and then we'll go back.
(eat our picnic, pick up our trash, watch the sunset, and then)
Something unpleasant and unexpected broke into her thoughts, and hard enough to snap her head back. A man and two women. The man had an eagle on his back, and both women had tramp stamps. Abra could see the tattoos because they were having naked sex beside a pool while stupid old disco music played. The women were letting out a lot of fake moans. What in hell had she stumbled across?
The shock of what those people were doing destroyed her delicate balancing act, and for a moment Abra was all in one place, all here. Cautiously, she looked again, and saw the people by the pool were all blurry. Not real. Almost ghostie people. And why? Because Barry was almost a ghostie person himself and had no interest in watching people have sex by the--
Those people aren't by a pool, they're on TV.
Did Barry the Chink know she was watching him watch some porno TV show? Him and the others? Abra wasn't sure, but she didn't think so. They had taken the possibility into account, though. Oh, yes. If she was there, they were trying to shock her into going away, or into revealing herself, or both.
"Abra?" Emma called. "We're ready to play!"
We're playing already, and it's a much bigger game than Scrabble.
She had to get her balance back, and quickly. Never mind the porno TV with the crappy disco music. She was in the little train. She was driving the little train. It was her special treat. She was having fun.
We're going to eat, we're going to pick up our trash, we're going to watch the sunset, and then we're going to go back. I'm afraid of the woman in the hat but not too afraid, because I'm not home, I'm going to Cloud Gap with my dad.
"Abra! Did you fall in?"
"Coming!" she called. "Just want to wash my hands!"
I'm with my dad. I'm with my dad, and that's all.
Looking at herself in the mirror, Abra whispered, "Hold that thought."
3
Jimmy Numbers was behind the wheel when they pulled into the Bretton Woods rest stop, which was quite close to Anniston, the town where the troublesome girl lived. Only she wasn't there. According to Barry, she was in a town called Frazier, a little further southeast. On a picnic with her dad. Making herself scarce. Much good it would do her.
Snake inserted the first video in the DVD player. It was called Kenny's Poolside Adventure. "If the kid's watching this, she's gonna get an education," she said, and pushed PLAY.
Nut was sitting beside Barry and feeding him more juice . . . when he could, that was. Barry had begun to cycle for real. He had little interest in juice and none at all in the poolside menage a trois. He only looked at the screen because those were their orders. Each time he came back to his solid form, he groaned louder.
"Crow," he said. "Get with me, Daddy."
Crow was beside him in an instant, elbowing Walnut aside.
"Lean close," Barry whispered, and--after one uneasy moment--Crow did as he was asked.
Barry opened his mouth, but the next cycle started before he could speak. His skin turned milky, then thinned to transparency. Crow could see his teeth locked together, the sockets that held his pain-filled eyes, and--worst of all--the shadowy crenellations of his brain. He waited, holding a hand that was no longer a hand but only a nestle of bones. Somewhere, at a great distance, that twanky disco music went on and on. Crow thought, They must be on drugs. You couldn't fuck to music like that unless you were.
Slowly, slowly, Barry the Chink grew dense again. This time he screamed as he came back. Sweat stood out on his brow. So did the red spots, now so bright they looked like beads of blood.
He wet his lips and said, "Listen to me."
Crow listened.
4
Dan did his best to empty his mind so Abra could fill it. He had driven the Riv out to Cloud Gap often enough for it to be almost automatic, and John was riding back by the caboose with the guns (two automatic pistols and Billy's deer rifle). Out of sight, out of mind. Or almost. You couldn't completely lose yourself even while you were asleep, but Abra's presence was large enough to be a little scary. Dan thought if she stayed inside his head long enough, and kept broadcasting at her current power, he would soon be shopping for snappy sandals and matching accessories. Not to mention mooning over the groovy boys who made up the band 'Round Here.
It helped that she had insisted--at the last minute--that he take Hoppy, her old stuffed rabbit. "It will give me something to focus on," she had said, all of them unaware that a not-quite-human gentleman whose rube name was Barry Smith would have understood perfectly. He had learned the trick from Grampa Flick, and used it many times.
It also helped that Dave Stone kept up a constant stream of family stories, many of which Abra had never heard before. And still, Dan wasn't convinced any of this would have worked if the one in charge of finding her hadn't been sick.
"Can't the others do this location thing?" he had asked her.
"The lady in the hat could, even from halfway across the country, but she's staying out of it." That unsettling smile had once more curved Abra's lips and exposed the tips of her teeth. It made her look far older than her years. "Rose is scared of me."
Ab
ra's presence in Dan's head wasn't constant. Every now and then he would feel her leave as she went the other way, reaching out--oh so carefully--to the one who had been foolish enough to slip Bradley Trevor's baseball glove on his hand. She said they had stopped in a town called Starbridge (Dan was pretty sure she meant Sturbridge) and left the turnpike there, moving along the secondary roads toward the bright blip of her consciousness. Later on they had stopped at a roadside cafe for lunch, not hurrying, making the final leg of the trip last. They knew where she was going now, and were perfectly willing to let her get there, because Cloud Gap was isolated. They thought she was making their job easier, and that was fine, but this was delicate work, a kind of telepathic laser surgery.
There had been one unsettling moment when a pornographic image filled Dan's mind--some kind of group sex by a pool--but it had been gone almost at once. He supposed he had gotten a peek into her undermind, where--if you believed Dr. Freud--all sorts of primal images lurked. This was an assumption he would come to regret, although never to blame himself for; he had taught himself not to snoop into people's most private things.
Dan held the Riv's steering-yoke with one hand. The other was on the mangy stuffed bunny in his lap. Deep woods, now starting to flame with serious color, flowed by on both sides. In the right-hand seat--the so-called conductor's seat--Dave rambled on, telling his daughter family stories and dancing at least one family skeleton out of the closet.
"When your mom called yesterday morning, she told me there's a trunk stored in the basement of Momo's building. It's marked Alessandra. You know who that is, don't you?"
"Gramma Sandy," Dan said. Christ, even his voice sounded higher. Younger.
"Right you are. Now here's something you might not know, and if that's the case, you didn't hear it from me. Right?"
"No, Daddy." Dan felt his lips curve up as, some miles away, Abra smiled down at her current collection of Scrabble tiles: S P O N D L A.
"Your Gramma Sandy graduated from SUNY Albany--the State University of New York--and was doing her student teaching at a prep school, okay? Vermont, Massachusetts, or New Hampshire, I forget which. Halfway through her eight weeks, she up and quit. But she hung around for awhile, maybe picking up some part-time work, waitressing or something, for sure going to a lot of concerts and parties. She was . . ."
5
(a good-time girl)
That made Abra think of the three sex maniacs by the pool, smooching and gobbling to oldtime disco music. Uck. Some people had very strange ideas of what was a good time.
"Abra?" That was Mrs. Deane. "It's your turn, honey."
If she had to keep this up for long, she'd have a nervous breakdown. It would have been so much easier at home, by herself. She had even floated the idea to her father, but he wouldn't hear of it. Not even with Mr. Freeman watching over her.
She used a U on the board to make POUND.
"Thanks, Abba-Doofus, I was going there," Emma said. She turned the board and began to study it with beady-eyed final-exam concentration that would go on for another five minutes, at least. Maybe even ten. Then she would make something totally lame, like RAP or PAD.
Abra returned to the Riv. What her father was saying was sort of interesting, although she knew more about it than he thought she did.
(Abby? Are you)
6
"Abby? Are you listening?"
"Sure," Dan said. I just had to take a little time-out to play a word. "This is interesting."
"Anyway, Momo was living in Manhattan at that time, and when Alessandra came to see her that June, she was pregnant."
"Pregnant with Mom?"
"That's right, Abba-Doo."
"So Mom was born out of wedlock?"
Total surprise, and maybe the tiniest bit overdone. Dan, in the peculiar position of both participating and eavesdropping on the discussion, now realized something he found touching and sweetly comic: Abra knew perfectly well that her mother was illegitimate. Lucy had told her the year before. What Abra was doing now, strange but true, was protecting her father's innocence.
"That's right, honey. But it's no crime. Sometimes people get . . . I don't know . . . confused. Family trees can grow strange branches, and there's no reason for you not to know that."
"Gramma Sandy died a couple of months after Mom was born, right? In a car wreck."
"That's right. Momo was babysitting Lucy for the afternoon, and ended up raising her. That's the reason they're so close, and why Momo getting old and sick has been so hard on your mom."
"Who was the man who got Gramma Sandy pregnant? Did she ever say?"
"Tell you what," Dave said, "that's an interesting question. If Alessandra ever told, Momo kept it to herself." He pointed ahead, at the lane cutting through the woods. "Look, honey, almost there!"
They were passing a sign reading CLOUD GAP PICNIC AREA, 2 MI.
7
Crow's party made a brief stop in Anniston to gas up the Winnebago, but on lower Main Street, at least a mile from Richland Court. As they left town--Snake now at the wheel and an epic called Swinging Sorority Sisters on the DVD player--Barry called Jimmy Numbers to his bed.
"You guys got to step it up a notch," Barry said. "They're almost there. It's a place called Cloud Gap. Did I tell you that?"
"Yeah, you did." Jimmy almost patted Barry's hand, then thought better of it.
"They'll be spreading their picnic in no time. That's when you should take them, while they're sat down and eating."
"We'll get it done," Jimmy promised. "And in time to twist enough steam out of her to help you. Rose can't object to that."
"She never would," Barry agreed, "but it's too late for me. Maybe not for you, though."
"Huh?"
"Look at your arms."
Jimmy did, and saw the first spots blooming on the soft white skin below his elbows. Red death. His mouth went dry at the sight of them.
"Oh Christ, here I go," Barry moaned, and suddenly his clothes were collapsing in on a body that was no longer there. Jimmy saw him swallow . . . and then his throat was gone.
"Move," Nut said. "Let me at him."
"Yeah? What are you going to do? He's cooked."
Jimmy went up front and dropped into the passenger seat, which Crow had vacated. "Take Route 14-A around Frazier," he said. "That's quicker than going through the downtown. You'll connect with the Saco River Road--"
Snake tapped the GPS. "I got all that programmed. You think I'm blind or just stupid?"
Jimmy barely heard her. All he knew was that he could not die. He was too young to die, especially with all the incredible computer developments just over the horizon. And the thought of cycling, the crushing pain every time he came back . . .
No. No. Absolutely not. Impossible.
Late-afternoon light slanted in through the 'Bago's big front windows. Beautiful autumn sunlight. Fall was Jimmy's favorite season, and he intended to still be alive and traveling with the True Knot when it came around again. And again. And again. Luckily, he was with the right bunch to get this done. Crow Daddy was brave, resourceful, and cunning. The True had been in tough spots before. He would bring them through this one.
"Watch for the sign pointing to the Cloud Gap picnic area. Don't miss it. Barry says they're almost there."
"Jimmy, you're giving me a headache," Snake said. "Go sit down. We'll be there in an hour, maybe less."
"Goose it," Jimmy Numbers said.
Snakebite Andi grinned and did so.
They were just turning onto the Saco River Road when Barry the Chink cycled out, leaving only his clothes. They were still warm from the fever that had baked him.
8
(Barry's dead)
There was no horror in this thought when it reached Dan. Nor even an ounce of compassion. Only satisfaction. Abra Stone might look like an ordinary American girl, prettier than some and brighter than most, but when you got below the surface--and not that far below, either--there was a young Viking woman with a fierce a
nd bloodthirsty soul. Dan thought it was a shame that she'd never had brothers and sisters. She would have protected them with her life.
Dan dropped the Riv into its lowest gear as the train came out of the deep woods and ran along a fenced drop. Below them, the Saco shone bright gold in the declining sun. The woods, sloping steeply down to the water on both sides, were a bonfire of orange, red, yellow, and purple. Above them, the puffy clouds drifting by seemed almost close enough to touch.
He pulled up to the sign reading CLOUD GAP STATION in a chuff of airbrakes, then turned the diesel off. For a moment he had no idea what to say, but Abra said it for him, using his mouth. "Thanks for letting me drive, Daddy. Now let's have our plunder." In the Deane rec room, Abra had just made this word. "Our picnic, I mean."
"I can't believe you're hungry after all you ate on the train," Dave teased.
"I am, though. Aren't you glad I'm not anorexic?"
"Yes," Dave said. "Actually, I am."
Dan saw John Dalton from the corner of his eye, crossing the picnic area clearing, head down, feet noiseless on the thick pine duff. He was carrying a pistol in one hand and Billy Freeman's rifle in the other. Trees bordered a parking lot for motor traffic; after a single look back, John disappeared into them. During summer, the little lot and all the picnic tables would have been full. On this weekday afternoon in late September, Cloud Gap was dead empty except for them.
Dave looked at Dan. Dan nodded. Abra's father--an agnostic by inclination but a Catholic by association--made the sign of the cross in the air and then followed John into the woods.
"It's so beautiful here, Daddy," Dan said. His invisible passenger was now talking to Hoppy, because Hoppy was the only one left. Dan set the lumpy, balding, one-eyed rabbit on one of the picnic tables, then went back to the first passenger car for the wicker picnic basket. "That's okay," he said to the empty clearing, "I can get it, Dad."