He shook his head. For a split second, he looked—worried? The expression disappeared before Beckie was sure she saw it. "Not me," he said. "I deny everything. They say it in school back home, that's all."
"Oh," Beckie said again. She didn't have any particular reason not to believe him. She wasn't sure she did, though. He brought it out too pat—maybe that was what bothered her. And she couldn't imagine that kids in a place like Fredericksburg, a place that was Nowhere with a capital N, could some up with something so neat all by themselves. Maybe she wasn't giving them enough credit. Maybe .. . but she didn't think so.
"Do you know where the closest doctor lives, just in case?" Justin asked. "I don't think there's one here, and I don't think there's one in Palestine, either."
"If I were a doctor, I wouldn't live in a place like this," Beckie said. Justin nodded, and this time she had no trouble believing he really agreed with her. She went on, "I bet I know where the nearest doctor is." He raised an eyebrow. She told him: "Parkersburg."
He winced. "I bet you're right. If the disease shows up there, they'll be busy enough so they won't want to come out here, too."
"I know," Beckie said. "But look on the bright side. Even if they did come out, how much could they do?"
"Is that the bright side?" Justin asked. "If it is, what's the dark side?"
We all die. Beckie wished that hadn't gone through her head. She didn't want to say it. Saying things made them seem realer. She knew that was foolish, which didn't make it any less true. So she said, "Something worse," and let it go at that.
She watched Justin as he nodded. Watching him, listening to him, made her want to scratch her head. She knew what she wanted to ask him: something like, Where are you really from? Everybody else she'd met in Virginia made her feel as if she'd stepped back in time here, as if California were years and years ahead of this place. Maybe that was right, maybe it was wrong, but it was how she felt.
With Justin, it was different. It was as if he thought she was the one who was out of it. He didn't make a big deal out of that, but she felt it was true. And she wanted to know why.
Was it just that he was stuck up? With some people, she would have said yes right away. But he didn't act like that. He went out of his way not to act like that, as a matter of fact. He wanted to fit in as well as he could. It was as if he couldn't help thinking the way he thought, even if he didn't mean to show it.
Since she didn't want to ask him about himself and why he thought the way he did, she decided to ask about what he'd said instead. That seemed less likely to spook him. "I do like that thing about mushrooms," she told him. "What else do they say at your school?"
He turned red. She might have thought she wouldn't make him nervous, but she turned out to be wrong. "I don't know," he mumbled. "We talk, that's all."
"I can't believe it," Beckie said. "I bet that line will go all over the continent. Has it been on TV here?"
"I've never noticed it," Justin answered.
"Only goes to show that TV writers don't listen to people," Beckie said. For some reason, that made Justin turn red all over again. She went on, "What are some of your favorite shows?"
"I don't watch a whole lot," he said. "News and sports, mostly." He yawned. "Boring, right?"
He sounded as if he wanted to be boring, as if he hoped it would be boring. But Beckie said, "I like football, too. I like rounders, but 1 like football better."
"Oh, yeah?" Justin said. Now Beckie knew exactly what he was thinking. Guys always had trouble believing it when they found a girl who was interested in sports.
"Yeah," Beckie said. "Which kind of football do you like better, rugby or association?"
"Uh, rugby," Justin answered, now sounding like somebody who was in over his head. But Beckie hadn't expected anything else. They played games where you could throw the ball more in the eastern states than they did in California.
"We play association most of the time in California," Beckie said. "Some of our sides go down to the Mexican states and take on their best clubs. We win a lot of the time, too."
"That's ... impressive," Justin said. "Uh, I think maybe I ought to go in now. See if the laundry's dry." He almost fled into the house.
The laundry wasn't dry. Mr. Brooks and Mr. Snodgrass sat hunched over a chessboard. Mr. Brooks pushed a pawn. Mr. Snodgrass said, "You'll pay for that."
Justin looked at them in what seemed like real dismay. Beckie said, "Hey, I've got a rounders question for you, since you live on the East Coast. Was George Herman really as good as people say he was?"
"Uh . .." Justin blinked. Beckie would have sworn he'd never heard of George Herman. But if you paid any attention to sports, that was impossible . . . wasn't it?
Mr. Snodgrass looked up from his game. "He wasn't as good as that, Rebecca—he was better," he said. "He could hit a ball farther than any man who's played the game since, even if he is a hundred and fifty years dead. That season he had stomach trouble, the Highlanders finished next to last. And he really did aim his club out toward the sign, like people say, and then smack the ball over it."
"Oh, my. The called shot," Mr. Brooks murmured. So he knew something about George Herman, too.
"I've heard that," Beckie said. "Is it really true? Is there video to prove it? I've never seen any in California."
"Well, I don't reckon I have, either." Mr. Snodgrass sounded as if he didn't want to admit it. "But everybody says it's so."
Beckie started to laugh. Everybody else looked at her— everybody except Gran. That only made it funnier, as far as she was concerned. They say was an article of faith with her grandmother. They said this, that, and the other thing. Gran never quite knew who they were, but they said it, and she believed it, no matter how dumb it was.
"George Herman must have been one ruthless player, all right." Now Justin sounded like somebody trying to make up for lost time.
Mr. Snodgrass nodded politely. As for Mr. Brooks . . . Mr. Brooks turned red and wheezed and choked, for all the world as if he was trying so hard not to laugh that he was hurting himself. Beckie wanted to scratch her head. Justin hadn't made a joke— or not one she got, anyway.
In the laundry room, the drier beeped to show the clothes in it were finally done. Mr. Brooks went in and loaded them into a duffel bag. He said, "We can pick up the game tomorrow, Ted, if that's all right with you."
"I suppose," Mr. Snodgrass said. "You just want to wait a spell before you see what I'm going to do to you, that's all."
"In your dreams," Mr. Brooks said sweetly. They both laughed.
After Mr. Brooks and Justin left, Beckie said, "I'd swear Justin never heard of George Herman."
"How could you not have?" Mr. Snodgrass said. "It's like not hearing of Stephen Douglas or Franklin Delano Truman. You'd have to come from Mars not to."
"Mars," Beckie echoed. "A couple of things he said make me wonder if he's from even farther away than that."
Justin kicked at a pebble on the sidewalk as he and Mr. Brooks walked back to the motel with their clean laundry. "Well, I blew it again," he said, angry at himself. "Who'd figure that a girl would like sports? I mean really like sports, so she knows more about 'em than most guys do."
"Life is full of surprises," Mr. Brooks said, which didn't make Justin feel any better.
He kicked at another pebble. "She made me look like a jerk. She made me sound like a jerk," he said. "People I never heard of—but I'm supposed to, if I'm a proper fan."
"Ruthless," Mr. Brooks muttered. "I ought to punt you for that, except it's the wrong game."
They turned the corner onto State Route 14, then both stopped in their tracks. Red lights flashing, an ambulance was parked in front of the diner across from the motel. Justin's stomach did a slow lurch, the way it would have when an intercontinental shuttle went weightless.