Beneath her photo, on the left, was a shot of a good looking young man-Dave, I presumed from Bill’s story-and beneath that, a photo of another nice looking young fella. Bob, of course. Neither looked happy.
On the right hand side were pictures that I surmised had been taken shortly thereafter of the same two. One was a down shot of Dave with has face against the floor, turned slightly to the side so that I could see his tongue hanging out and his teeth biting through it. His eyes bulged. His ass was pasty white, except for where blood was splashed on it from the knife in his rectum. He had a leg lifted, the sole of his bare foot pointing up. The other foot still wore a shoe.
The right hand side photo of Bob showed him with his genitals in his mouth, blood splashed beneath his nose like a red mustache.
The last four photographs, also taken with the Polaroid were: Left-a pale, dark-haired looker of a girl. Right-a dark-haired mess of a girl. Those two would be Carrie.
Beneath those: Left-an astonishing blond beauty alive and not happy. Right-same beauty, only dead, with an expression that indicated she knew it would end up this way, and so what?
I closed the book and sat and thought.
“Look,” I said, “first thing is you need to relax some. Take a shower.”
“A shower? That’s your advice? Take a fucking shower? We’re talking about murders here. Murders I’m pinned for, and you want me to take a shower. I don’t want a shower.”
“You stink.”
“I don’t care if I stink. A shower isn’t going to solve my problems, Uncle Hank.”
“No, but you got to perk up a little. Make it a hot one so it’ll relax your muscles. Run it hard against the back of your neck and your lower spine.”
“A shower. That’s great. Take a shower. Want me to wash my hair?”‹ [myt a h/p›
“Why not? Doing it with bar soap won’t hurt you. While you’re doing that, I’ll get you a hamburger. You’re bound to be hungrier than you think. I get back we’ll talk some more.”
· · ·
I drove over to a Quickie-Mart and bought a large two-liter bottle of Coke, a razor and blades, a toothbrush and toothpaste.
By the time I came out of the store, the sky had lost its blueness and turned grey and cold as a tin roof. The air was nippier, and I could smell a hint of rain.
I drove through the drive-thru of a hamburger joint and ordered a large hamburger and fries. That just about depleted the money Beverly had allowed in my wallet.
I raced back to the motel and hammered on the door and Bill let me in. He was wearing a towel and had his wet hair pushed straight back. He looked a smidgen less tense.
I put the supplies on the table, and gave him the food. He sat on the bed and ate the hamburger while I went down to the ice machine and scraped what ice there was into the room bucket. I thought the ice looked suspicious in color, but not so much I didn’t figure on letting Bill use it. I went back with the bucket and filled a questionable looking glass with ice and poured him some Coke. By the time I did that, he was finished with the burger. He drank the Coke rapidly, and I filled his glass again.
“Listen now,” I said. “I’m going back to the house. I’ll come back later with some clothes, a little money, a few odds and ends. I’ll bring you some more food and some coffee.”
“Any ideas yet, Uncle Hank?”
“My instinct is to tell the police, tell them what you’ve told me. I don’t care how you feel the frame looks. You tell it the way you told me, and no matter how the evidence is presented, I think you got a better than average chance. I’ll see you get a good lawyer. I’ll do everything I can.”
“I don’t know, Uncle Hank. It looks bad. I start talking about a fat man and a stinky guy with a cobra painted on his head killing the Doc and the Disaster Club, who’s gonna buy that? I mean, that sounds like some comic book shit. Know what I’m saying?”
“Well, I’ve thought about it from that angle too. I swing from one feeling to another, but I figure whatever I decide it’ll come down to you going to the police. So, you can get ready for that. But before we go, we got to get our game plan together. For now, I’m going to see if there’s anything on the news about this, anything in the papers tomorrow.”
“All right.”
“I’ll be back after while. I’ll bring you some clothes. Mine’ll be big on you, but you can get by.”
“I appreciate it, Uncle Hank. Really.”
“Watch some TV. Jack off. Take another shower. Whatever, but relax. Sleep if you can. You didn’t kill anyone, Bill. You never had any intention of killing anyone. Your biggest crime is you’re a dumb asshole.”
“Beverly’s going to [’atch some love this,” Bill said.
“I might not tell her everything right off. We’ll ease into this one.”
I got the photo album off the table. “I’m going to take this with me. You don’t need to look at it anymore.”
I started for the door, paused. “I don’t know if I’m being melodramatic or what, but you lock this door behind me. And don’t go anywhere.”
“You don’t need to tell me that,” Bill said. Then: “Uncle Hank?”
“Yeah?”
“Thanks.”
“I haven’t done anything yet.”
“I love you. I’m not just saying it. I’m not trying to con you or nothing.”
“I love you too, you moronic little shit. Now shut up and lock up.”
“Sure.”
“Uncle Hank?”
“Yeah?”
“Would you get me some cigarettes?”
6
I started out with home in mind, but didn’t keep thinking that way. It was like I didn’t know what I was doing, least not on a conscious level. I begin to feel the way Bill said he had felt. Driven. Not really wanting to do what I was doing, but doing it anyway.
The direction I took wasn’t even near home. I live east and I went west, right on out of Imperial City, out into the country.
The trees thickened and the roads narrowed. It had started to drizzle and the wind had picked up. Oak and maple and sweetgum leaves blew across my path so thick it was like a colorful snow storm. The wet ones stuck to my windshield, and I turned on my wipers to bat them away, but that only bunched them up.
I drove until I came to the blacktop I had been looking for all along, went down it until it broke into an unpaved road that wound its way into the depths of the east Texas woods.
I cruised along for a short ways until the trees grew thick enough to drape over the road and wind their limbs together. I went along that way for a while, then pulled over to the side of the road underneath a massive oak. I sat for a moment with my hands on the wheel, letting the lint inside my head spin around, then I looked at the photo album lying on the seat beside me and felt a chill jump up my spine and spread to the base of my skull.
I got out of the truck and didn’t slam the door. I walked around front and got hold of the leaves bunched on the windshield and removed them, even as more swirled out of the woods and twisted over the truck and planted themselves on the glass.
I pulled my collar up against the wind and drizzle and leaned on the bumper of the truck. About a hundred yards in front of me the trees were less thick and there was a partial clearing. In the center of the clearing was an ugly double-wide mobile home with a shiny aluminum skirt that went all the way aroun ^’atal cd the bottom, except for a large gap beside and underneath a set of black iron steps that led up to the front door. Jutting out of the opening at an angle to the steps was the rusty handle of a lawn mower.
Arnold’s place.
The home had once been brown, but was now grey with weathering and age and the little flagstone walk out front of it had dried weeds sticking up on either side of the stones. Underneath a carport/shed that had been built against the home was a dirty white Dodge pickup and a hooded barbecue grill that looked well used.