Evelyn had to get out of here right then. “I need some fresh air,” she said to Evan.
His mouth dropped open an instant before he caught himself and tried to look wise and in control. It was adorable. This had every chance of being several hours of true love, an inoculation that could last the entire winter.
“I got a car,” he said.
“I’ll bet you do, Evan.”
It was a perfect old Cadillac Coupe de Ville, astonishingly spacious. The foot of snow on the windshield seemed to cast its own pale light on the interior. She unexpectedly began asking herself what she was doing here, with things rather going around and love somewhat less easy to reference. Evan no longer seemed afraid of her, and she was not sure she liked that. The idea of a sudden new Evan was not in the cards. The stillness of his gaze struck her as predatory. “Like the car?”
She watched him to see if anything in his expression might help her answer his question. “I do like it, Evan. It feels big, almost like a boat.”
Evan weighed his words, his face barely moving as he spoke. “I like it because it don’t have an electronic ignition.”
Evelyn felt challenged to understand Evan’s remark.
“I’m afraid I don’t know anything about those electric things.”
“Well, you ought to know about that one.” Evan seemed riveted.
“It’s too late now,” she said, thinking to add, “to learn auto mechanics,” but she was unwilling to chance anything clever. She had to see where this was going since the unblinking face of the newly confident Evan now made her want to get out of the car. She thought she’d better humor him. “Perhaps you could fill me in on this ignition business, in your own words, of course.”
“You know about the New World Order?” He was unzipping his fly.
She frowned at this behavior, and he stopped. “Is it like the United Nations?” she asked hopefully. Oh boy, she thought, here come the black helicopters.
“It’s way worse.”
“Uh, in what way, Evan?”
“They want to turn us into slaves.” He was matter-of-fact about this.
“You don’t say. But Evan, what about the auto mechanics you promised to explain?” Everything seemed to have gone to his eyes. She had a fleeting thought that if she were suicidal, this would be her man. “Didn’t you promise?”
Evan watched and waited her out.
“The New World Order is gonna use satellites to turn off all the electronic ignitions. They’re gonna enslave all the white males who own recent-model cars.” Evelyn widened her eyes to suggest that she hadn’t realized this automotive feature was available. “Then they plan to use Gurkhas to round us up and put us in concentration camps located in Kansas. It’s common knowledge.”
Kansas? Evelyn remembered that was where her calves were going.
“But Evan, why do they want to do this to… white males?” She was thinking about what great instincts she had, heading for the parking lot with this turkey.
Finally Evan’s face moved: he smiled. He had something to share with Evelyn. He told her very evenly, “They want to subject us to maritime law.”
Evelyn had to admit that even she didn’t even see that one coming. Still, she was reluctant to ask picky questions like, Isn’t that the law of the sea? Instead, she said, “Evan, I’m going back inside to dance. This is my reward for a long day. When I dance, I don’t think about these larger issues.”
His hand encircled her wrist, gently at first. “You don’t even like the band.”
“That’s true. But it’s still more or less music.”
“You pretended you wanted to spend the night with me.” She saw two couples angling through the parked cars toward the entrance, hunched up against the latest dusting of snow. One of the men gazed lovingly at his companion, a rosy cheeked brunette. As Evelyn pulled her arm back, Evan tightened his grip and looked as if he was about to accuse her of treason. “Admit you like it nasty.”
“No, Evan, I do not admit I ‘like it nasty.’ But Evan, one thing I do great is scream. Know what I mean? I can get you into the clink even without maritime law. So let go of my arm or you’re going to be one of those white males headed for slavery in Kansas. I know Gurkhas in high places.”
The grip did loosen. Evelyn was surprised by his compliance. She opened her door, snow falling into her lap. The interior light flashed over Evan. His role as spotter of megatrends bent on the elimination of his kind was evaporating fast, leaving a disoriented hayseed. Evelyn was now in control of the situation but didn’t feel the time for compassion had quite arrived. “Evan, you need a new car.” Evan flinched at these words.
“Have a look around,” she said. “Take a chance. Buy one with that funny ignition. You’ll be in the same boat with the rest of us. And now this old single gal is going to vote with her feet.” The snow blowing into the Cadillac seemed to emphasize his forlorn state, and nearly obliterated the view of the bar, which no longer seemed a haven. She stopped instead and turned to her car.
The engine started, but the wipers seemed overwhelmed by the snow. And now, she thought, for some drunk driving. She pulled onto the highway, heading northwest — toward what? The Missouri River? Maybe a cozy bar a thousand feet lower? Asylum? Maybe no snow, and a chance to reconfirm the existence of sky behind this ominous cover of white. Sometimes these squalls came in so low you could push toward White Sulphur Springs and be under the stars inside twenty minutes. Though it was rarely necessary more than once a year, you could drink all night with strangers.
She found herself driving on a dirt road through frozen wheat stubble at about the time the dashboard clock showed two a.m. Now every bar was closed. She mused upon the dreadful events that seemed to pile up after closing time on winter nights: schnapps in to-go cups, jumper cables, brutal groping and slurred affections, horrible radio music that was suddenly “great.” Every new season bore something macabre on the wind, with people clubbed, pushed out of cars, people murdered. Not everyone could handle last call when they were already facing winter. Nor lonely escapes on empty roads and lost highways.
Evelyn drove at a steady pace as the wind changed the shapes of snow in her headlights. A deer stepped onto the road from the barrow pit, its eyes bright as platinum. She hit the brakes and the car simply shifted its angle and traveled in a frictionless drift toward the deer that stepped out of the way, its amazed face showing briefly in her window as she slid past and off the road into the ditch. The engine quit. Everything she’d been watching was swallowed by darkness. The engine ticked and cooled in the quiet.
She had no trouble restarting the engine, but the headlights wavered as though losing electricity. When she put the car in gear, the drive wheel spun so freely it failed to disturb the stillness of the vehicle. And when she opened the door to get out, it collided with the side of the ditch bank. She opened the opposite door and the wind ripped it out of her hands, snow whirling inside wildly until she pulled it shut. In her fear she tried the radio, finding only a station on which someone was ranting. She turned it off.
But the motor ran, the heater ran, and there was a reassuring vibration in the car, a feeling, like life, that seemed to hold the piling snow at bay. She held her hand up to the rearview mirror and felt that hope was confirmed by its reflection. There was no food in the glovebox, just the owner’s manual and, somehow, an old issue of The Watch Tower. There was enough gas to run till sunup. Things could be worse. She felt an odd need to seem to be occupied. The radio, again, was no help, no more than a steady hiss, and when she shut it off, the knob came loose in her hand: she put it in the glovebox with the Jehovah’s Witness tract, quite formally promising herself not to let this get to her. Instead, she elected to concern herself with whether Bill had fed Cree, Jailbait, Scram, Lady Luck and Crackerjack. Of course he had. He’d made a small pile of alfalfa away from the other horses, because Crackerjack was timid, and then had piled the cob and rolled oats in the middle. After tiptoeing up to dine, Crackerjack would watch all around himself between mouthfuls and, once the food was finished, would paw at the ground with his speckled right foot to make certain he hadn’t missed a single flake. It wasn’t cold enough to freeze the creek, so there was as yet no need to spud a hole in the ice for the horses to drink. But the cows, that was another story. She knew they were searching everywhere in the storm for their calves; they would search for days and never find them. Each cow believed that just one small further effort, one more step, and her calf would appear. Evelyn looked down at herself, half curled up on the seat in her little black dress and the black coat in which she’d wound herself: she looked like a calf herself. She tried to smile at this thought. Perhaps she could sleep.