It took a few minutes, but Mike forced himself up. Stepping over William, he started for the stairs, his elbow brushing the wound, blood streaming down the outside of his leg. He left a scarlet footprint on the bottom stair. A few steps up, he almost lost consciousness. He pressed his bloodstained knuckles against the wall for balance and then sat.
He whited out for a minute, drifting back to Shady Lane. Charles Dubronski waited in the darkness, thick bully head protruding on his stout neck, except this time he was leering not at Shep but at Mike. Stay the fuck down, runt. Stay down.
Somehow Mike was at the top of the stairs, stumbling into the wreckage of a kitchen, shocked to see daylight streaming through the dusty windows. The smell of grease clogged his throat. Every surface was littered with rotting fruit, pots, and pill bottles – so many pill bottles. But no Dodge. The house felt empty, and the walls threw off an old-lady vibe. Peeling floral wallpaper. Old pictures in rose-colored porcelain frames. A posy of fake flowers, dust caking the gingham bow. Mike tilted into the table, sending sheets of paper airborne and knocking over a stack of old newspapers. His Batphone was on the table, dissected; clearly, given how they’d questioned him, they hadn’t been able to retrieve whatever data they were looking for. He swung his leaden head around, searching for another phone. The charger at the outlet was empty, and Mike remembered Dodge slipping the phone into his pocket. Panting, Mike leaned on the counter, coming face-to-face with a fax machine perched atop a cracked microwave.
It had no telephone function, but the piece of paper in the feeder had Mike’s Social Security number and another of those crazy codes – FST14U. He clutched the page, his fingers leaving bloody smears. There was another page behind, also waiting to fax, with another Social Security number – probably Hank’s – and another code, 6D8BUG. In sofar as he could think anymore, Mike thought, So that’s it.
William’s moans climbed up the stairs, but there was no way he’d make it up and out. As Mike turned to go, he spotted among the mess of papers on the table the big gray envelope Two-Hawks had given him. Its contents had been pulled halfway out, bringing the stack of photocopied ledger pages into view. He told himself to pick it up, and a minute later he listened. He staggered across the corroding tile of the foyer and out into the vivid white day. A vast field of weeds, hilltop wind roaring across his ears, and on the other side of the hilltop, a wrecking yard from which issued a blacksmithlike clanging over the low drone of machinery.
He lost his footing on the porch stairs and had to hug the banister, worried that his intestines were going to spill onto the rust-colored dirt. But then he was balancing cautiously, tightrope-walking across to the laid-open gate of the wrecking yard. His throat and nose still burned, salt-tinged wetness stinging the abraded flesh. He spit a mixture of blood and lighter fluid. The weight of the envelope tugging at his left hand reminded him, every instant, of the knife gash in his side.
The walk was interminable, the wind rising to a maritime whistle. Purple spots appeared across the sky. The glare of the sun turned into a five-pointed star. The banging continued – metal on metal – and as the mechanical drone grew louder, Mike pegged it as a big diesel engine of some sort.
He passed into the yard, tasting the rust in the air, and followed the clang clang clang through two rows of crushed cars stacked higher than the fence. He came into a clearing, one arm numb at his side, his legs wobbling.
A giant electromagnetic crane loomed ahead, the enormous circular magnet up on the boom still swinging from recent activity. But the cab was empty, the door ajar. A battered, rusting station wagon waited below the hoist, an ant beneath a raised boot. Its old-fashioned black-and-yellow license plate was barely holding on: FST14U – the code paired with Mike’s Social Security number on the fax back in the kitchen. Staring at the plate, Mike blanked out, the heat rising from the earth through the soles of his shoes. But a fresh clanging broke him from his trance.
He oriented toward the sound, which came from an ancient, top-loading automobile crusher – a cross between a giant Dumpster and a bear trap. A fat cable ran across the dirt, connecting the two machines so that one man could work the yard by himself, operating the crusher from the cab of the crane. In the crusher Dodge’s massive bowed shoulders reared up into view. He was hammering away with his ball peen, trying to dislodge a piece of shrapnel from the metal jaws.
Mike stood frozen, no more than twenty yards away. But given the rattle of the crane’s engine and the pounding of the hammer, Dodge was oblivious. He stopped swinging, evidently satisfied with his progress, and stooped, disappearing from view beneath the high wall of the crusher. A moment later he heaved back into sight, Hank’s wrapped body tilted across a shoulder. He readjusted the corpse, letting it slide down and away. Then he stood with his hands on his hips, catching his breath and regarding his handiwork.
Mike threw the gray envelope through the open rear window of the station wagon for safekeeping, the pages coming free and scattering across the backseat. He stumbled around the tailgate, crossing the faded set of tire tracks pressed into the loose dirt, and staggered right past Dodge, heading for the crane. His side was warm, so warm, and his left shoe squished with each step. He fought not to scream as he hoisted himself up into the high cab, his wound tearing open a bit more. His shirt, matted to his side, felt dense and heavy. The rumbling of the cab was agony.
From the higher vantage, he could see down into the crusher and piece together what had happened. With the crane Dodge had hoisted the car – a ’68 Bug as the license plate proclaimed – into the crusher, but the machine had jammed, popping the vehicle onto a tilt and jogging the body half out a smashed window. Dodge had climbed in to fix the snag and slide the body back into the car.
Mike reached for the control, popping the clear plastic lid over the wide red button. Down below, Dodge finally turned, hip-deep in the huge bucket of the crusher, his legs lost in the snarl of the partially crumpled front wheel well. Their eyes met across twenty yards of dust-filled sunshine.
Mike pushed the button.
The hydraulic crushing cylinders hummed to life, the contraption beginning to clench. Like a dumb animal, Dodge moved deliberately and without panic toward the edge, trying to climb out. But then he stiffened, and it was clear that the jagged metal had folded in on him. With his flat gaze fixed on Mike, he started his descent without whimper or complaint, descending until only one hand remained in sight, lifted as if for a life preserver. It quivered once and vanished slowly into the metal crush.
Pressing a hand to the wound in his side, Mike slumped forward over the controls, his vision spotting. It occurred to him how very nice it would be to go to sleep. His blinks grew longer.
A faint movement registered through the black-and-white speckling before his eyes, and he blinked several times, squinting through the cab window.
William.
His left leg trailed lifelessly behind him, the screwdriver still jammed through the side of his wilted knee, but he was tugging himself forward with his forearms, making herky-jerky progress, like some awful stop-action film. His face scraped along the ground, his mouth and nose powdered with dirt.
Mike stared for maybe a full minute in disbelief. William belly-crawled, arm over arm, past the rows of smashed cars and into the clearing. He paused now and again to catch his breath, his head wriggling on the yoke of his shoulders.