"Did he come up to her afterwards?"
"There you go again, all the time asking about her. I'm the one had the little jerk hanging on me like he was drowning and was going to take me down with him."
" 'Course I'm most concerned about you, honey."
"Yeah. Of course."
"I was just asking in case he hangs around and bothers you again."
"I don't know if he saw her afterwards or not. I went around the other side of the tent so I didn't have to watch her on her goddamned box.
You'll have to ask her your own self."
He turned away from her roughly, but a moment later he spoke again in the darkness.
"What was that you just done?"
"What you mean?"
"What was that thing you just done to me?"
Rae was quiet for a moment and Tommy knew she was blushing.
"It's called the butterfly," she said. She paused. "Did you like it?"
"Interesting," he said.
At first Rae didn't know how he meant it, but then he put his arms around her when he fell asleep, which was a thing he almost never did.
There was a pounding on the trailer door around three o'clock in the morning and Tommy bolted out of bed to answer it. A long, lean, evil-looking man stood there in cowboy boots and a Stetson that appeared to be as stiff as plywood. Tommy blinked once and waited, but he knew who the man was.
"You Reverend Tommy R. Walker?" the man asked.
Tommy stepped outside and pulled the door shut so that Rae would not overhear. He was wearing silk boxers at Rae had bought for him recently and he sported a sleeper's erection but he was too excited to see his visitor to worry about it.
"I am," Tommy said.
"I'm Harold Kershaw," the man said, removing his hat out of respect.
"God bless you, boy, I know you are. And not a moment too soon, neither."
Aural awoke from a troubled dream in which a man she had never seen before was showing her his life on film.
She was strapped in a chair and whenever the man experienced pain in his life, Aural was administered a shock just as painful. When she awoke, her mind still clouded by the dream, she heard voices outside the trailer that she shared with the female members of the Apostolics. The voices were speaking in the hushed tones of conspirators, the kinds of whispers that seem to carry even louder than regular speech on the night air.
One of the men was the Reverend Tommy, and she wondered what he was doing catting around outside her window in the middle of the night but when she heard the second voice, she knew. The second man didn't even speak, it was more of a prolonged grunt of assent, but she recognized it and it galvanized her into action.
Aural bolted the door, then yanked on her jeans and boots and squirmed out the window on the other side of the trailer. She didn't bother with her purse or any belongings because she knew there wasn't time. Bent over, she scuttled in the darkness towards the cars parked on the strip of asphalt adjoining the vacant lot where they would erect the tent in the morning. She was within a few yards of the cars when she heard the sound of heavy boots kicking at the trailer door.
A body took shape beside one of the cars, stepping towards her. Aural swerved aside but the shape spoke.
"Miss Aural? It's me."
Aural squinted at the man in the darkness. She didn't know him.
"From the meeting tonight?" he continued. "You said you'd talk to me afterwards?"
"Not now, hon. This ain't exactly an appropriate time." Aural tried to step around him but he moved in front of her. Behind her, the Apostolics were sending up a frightened squawk and she could hear the door crashing in. Harold Kershaw was into the chicken coop, but the hen he was after had flown.
"You-all come back when it's light," Aural said, thinking by then she'd be all the way to Maine if she could manage it. "I'll talk to you then."
"I can help you now," the man said, and he opened his car door.
'Bless your heart," she said, dipping into the car, "but we best go right away." She glanced at the trailer and saw Harold Kershaw's ugly face peering out of the window that she had used as an exit.
"That's what I had in mind," the man said. He ran around the car to the driver's side, then fussed with something instead of opening the door.:'Come on, " Aural said.
'Going as fast as I can," the man said. "I wasn't quite ready for you."
Aural kept her eye on the trailer, expecting Harold to come running at any minute, so she gave only scant attention to the man who was still fussing on the outside of the car. He came around the back to her side again..
"What's taking you so long?" she demanded, still not looking at him fully.
"Ready now. Mustn't go off half-cocked," the man said.. "Don't want any mistakes, now, do we?"
Harold came thundering around the side of the trailer, pausing for only half a second to get his bearings, then headed straight for the cars with his heavy-footed lope.
"I can't wait," Aural said, turning to get out, but the man opened her door at the same time and grabbed her hand in his. Distracted as she was, she wasn't aware that he was handcuffing her until the metal clamps were already on her wrists, and when she opened her mouth to speak he slapped a piece of tape across it.
"Fast service, no waiting," he said, giggling. He slammed the door and ran to the driver's side. Aural reached her cuffed hands to open the door but found that there was no handle on the inside. Well, damn, she thought. Who would have dreamed that Harold Kershaw was bright enough to hire an accomplice? She watched Harold pounding inexorably towards them, but then, when he was within a few yards, amazingly, the man started the car and drove away. Harold pounded the car's trunk once with his fist, but that was as close as he got. Aural squirmed to watch him recede in the back window, then turned to take a good look at the driver for the first time.
He glanced at her as he spoke, keeping most of his attention on the road.
"I was wondering how I was going to get you alone," he said. "I knew I didn't dare come into that trailer full of women. You can't be overeager, you have to restrain yourself and be careful, no matter what, otherwise… well, you just have to be careful. But you learn that. You naturally get better as you go along. Anyway, I was thinking and thinking, how am I going to do this safely when all of a sudden, there you were. Do you think Jesus sent you to me? I believe maybe he did, I believe he watches over me. Of course, I'm sure he watches over you, too, given your line of work, I mean. I'm certain that you have a good relationship with your Lord, don't you, Miss Aural? Well, that means Jesus wanted us to get together for your sake as well as mine. I think that means we're going to have a real good time together, don't you? I know I will.
Together, we're going to be fulfilling your destiny.
That's a nice thought, isn't it? You're only a part of my destiny, of course, but I am yours. I'm what Jesus has in mind for you… I'll make it real good for you, I promise you that. Ooh, but it's been a long time. I got such an awful lot to make up for."
He turned away from the road again and smiled broadly at her.
"This going to befun, hon," he said. When he giggled, Aural lmew that she was in terrible trouble.
"Good thing you're so petite," Swann said. "This is a very tight squeeze." He paused to catch his breath. The rope around his waist bit into his skin and he wriggled back towards her to ease up on the tension. Aural was zippered into a leather sack designed to encase golf bags and a full set of clubs for shipping, and the rope was tied around her feet. He had carefully selected the leather be cause it would slide better than the nylon sacks and it offered a measure of cushioning. Swann had added to the protection by slipping two pillows under her head before beginning to drag her. He didn't want her to get a bump and fall unconscious. The whole thing was that she knew what was happening to her.