The tree-lined driveway sloping down to the house was a pool of shadows, and the house itself was dark. The gennie had given up the ghost weeks ago. Sunset had subsided to a dull purple bruise. He plodded onto the porch and put Gandalf down to open the door. ‘Go on, boy,’ he said. Gandalf struggled to rise, then subsided.
Just as Robinson was bending to pick him up again, Gandalf made another effort. This time he lunged over the doorsill and collapsed on his side in the entryway, panting. On the wall above the dog were at least two dozen photographs featuring people Robinson loved, all now deceased. He could no longer even dial Diana’s and Ellen’s phones and listen to their recorded voices. His own phone had died shortly after the generator, but even before that, all cell service had ceased.
He got a bottle of Poland Spring water from the pantry, filled Gandalf’s bowl, then put down a scoop of kibble. Gandalf drank some water but wouldn’t eat. When Robinson squatted to scratch the dog’s belly, fur came out in bundles.
It’s happening so fast, he thought. This morning he was fine.
Robinson went out to the lean-to behind the house with a flashlight. On the lake, a loon cried – just one. The motorcycle was under a tarp. He pulled the canvas off and shone the beam along the bike’s gleaming body. It was a 2014 Fat Bob, several years old now, but low mileage; his days of riding four and five thousand miles between May and October were behind him. Yet the Bob was still his dream ride, even though his dreams were mostly where he’d ridden it over the last couple of years. Air-cooled. Twin cam. Six-speed. Almost seventeen hundred ccs. And the sound it made! Only Harleys had that sound, like summer thunder. When you came up next to a Chevy at a stoplight, the cager inside was apt to lock his doors.
Robinson skidded a palm along the handlebars, then hoisted his leg over and sat in the saddle with his feet on the pegs. Diana had become increasingly insistent that he sell it, and when he did ride, she reminded him again and again that Vermont had a helmet law for a reason … unlike the idiots in New Hampshire and Maine. Now he could ride it without a helmet if he wanted to. There was no Diana to nag him, and no County Mounties to pull him over. He could ride it buckass naked, if he wanted to.
‘Although I’d have to mind the tailpipes when I got off,’ he said, and laughed. He went inside without putting the tarp back on the Harley. Gandalf was lying on the bed of blankets Robinson had made for him, nose on one of his front paws. His kibble was untouched.
‘Better eat up,’ Robinson said, giving Gandalf’s head a stroke. ‘You’ll feel better.’
The next morning there was a red stain on the blankets around Gandalf’s hindquarters, and although he tried, he couldn’t make it to his feet. After he gave up the second time, Robinson carried him outside, where Gandalf first lay on the grass, then managed to get up enough to squat. What came out of him was a gush of bloody stool. Gandalf crawled away from it as if ashamed, then lay down, looking at Robinson mournfully.
This time when Robinson picked him up, Gandalf cried out in pain. He bared his teeth but did not bite. Robinson carried him into the house and put him down on his blanket bed. He looked at his hands when he straightened up and saw they were coated with fur. When he dusted his palms together, the fur floated away like milkweed.
‘You’ll be okay,’ he told Gandalf. ‘Just a little upset stomach. Must have gotten one of those goddam chipmunks when I wasn’t looking. Stay there and rest up. I’m sure you’ll be feeling more like yourself by the time I get back.’
There was still half a tank of gas in the Silverado, more than enough for a sixty-mile roundtrip to Bennington. Robinson decided to go down to Woodland Acres first and see if Timlin wanted anything.
His last neighbor was sitting on the porch of Veronica in his rocker. He was extremely pale, and there were purple pouches under his eyes. When Robinson told him about Gandalf, Timlin nodded. ‘I was up most of the night, running to the toilet. We must have caught the same bug.’ He smiled to show it was a joke, although not a very funny one.
No, he said, there was nothing he wanted in Bennington, but perhaps Robinson would stop by on his way back. ‘I’ve got something you might want,’ he said.
The drive to Bennington was slower than Robinson expected, because the highway was littered with abandoned cars. It was close to noon by the time he pulled into the front lot of Kingdom Harley-Davidson. The show windows had been broken and all the display models were gone, but there were plenty of bikes out back. These had been rendered theft-proof with steel cables sheathed in plastic and sturdy bike locks.
That was fine with Robinson; he only wanted to steal a battery. The Fat Bob he settled on was a year or two newer than his, but the battery looked the same. He fetched his toolbox from the bed of his pickup and checked the battery with his Impact (the tester had been a gift from his daughter two birthdays back), and got a green light. He removed the battery, went into the showroom, and found a selection of maps. Using the most detailed one to suss out the back roads, he made it back to the lake by three o’clock.
He saw a great many dead animals, including an extremely large moose lying beside the cement block steps of someone’s trailer home. On the trailer’s crabgrassy lawn, a hand-painted sign had been posted, only two words: HEAVEN SOON.
The porch of Veronica was deserted, but when Robinson knocked on the door, Timlin called for him to come in. He was sitting in the ostentatiously rustic living room, paler than ever. In one hand he held an oversize linen napkin. It was spotted with blood. On the coffee table in front of him were three items: a picture book titled The Beauty of Vermont, a hypodermic needle filled with yellow fluid, and a revolver.
‘I’m glad you came,’ Timlin said. ‘I didn’t want to leave without telling you goodbye.’
Robinson recognized the absurdity of the first response that came to mind – Let’s not be hasty – and stayed silent.
‘I’ve lost half a dozen teeth,’ Timlin said, ‘but that’s not the major problem. In the last twelve hours or so, I seem to have expelled most of my intestines. The eerie thing is how little it hurts. The hemorrhoids I was afflicted with in my fifties were worse. The pain will come – I’ve read enough to know that – but I don’t intend to stick around long enough to experience it in full flower. Did you get the battery you wanted?’
‘Yes,’ Robinson said, and sat down heavily. ‘Jesus, Howard, I’m so fucking sorry.’
‘Much appreciated. And you? How do you feel?’
‘Physically? Fine.’ Although this was no longer completely true. Several red patches that didn’t look like sunburn were blooming on his forearms, and there was another on his chest, above the right nipple. They itched. Also … his breakfast was staying down, but his stomach seemed far from happy with it.
Timlin leaned forward and tapped the hypo. ‘Demerol. I was going to inject myself, then look at pictures of Vermont until … until. But I’ve changed my mind. The gun will be fine, I think. You take the hypo.’
‘I’m not quite ready.’
‘Not for you, for the dog. He doesn’t deserve to suffer. It wasn’t dogs that built the bombs, after all.’
‘I think maybe he just ate a chipmunk,’ Robinson said feebly.
‘We both know that’s not it. Even if it was, the dead animals are so full of radiation it might as well have been a cobalt capsule. It’s a wonder he’s survived as long as he has. Be grateful for the time you’ve had with him. A little bit of grace. That’s what a good dog is, you know. A little bit of grace.’