The Santaroga Barrier (22 page)

Read The Santaroga Barrier Online

Authors: Frank Herbert

BOOK: The Santaroga Barrier
8.09Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
“They can't be all that unhappy about leaving,” Dasein said. “Otherwise you clever people would've found another solution.”
“Hmmph!” Piaget snorted. “You didn't even do your homework for the people who hired you.” He sighed. “I'll tell you, Gilbert. The draft rejects most of our young men—severe allergy reaction to a diet which doesn't include periodic administration of Jaspers. They can only get that here. The approximately six percent of our young people who go out do so as a duty to the valley. We don't want to call down the federal wrath on us. We have a political accommodation with the state, but we're not large enough to apply the same technique nationally.”
They've already decided about me,
Dasein thought.
They don't care what they tell me.
The realization brought a tight sensation of fear in the pit of his stomach.
He rounded a corner and came parallel with the river. Ahead stood the clump of willows and the long, down-sweeping curve to the bridge. Dasein recalled his projection of evil onto the river, stepped on the throttle to get this place behind him. The truck entered the curve. The road was banked nicely. The bridge came into view. There was a yellow truck parked off the road at the far side, men standing behind it drinking out of metal cups.
“Look out!” Piaget shouted.
In that instant, Dasein saw the reason for the truck—a gaping
hole in the center of the bridge where the planks had been removed. That was a county work crew and they'd opened at least a ten foot hole in the bridge.
The truck sped some forty feet during the moment it took Dasein to realize his peril.
Now, he could see a two-by-four stretched across each end of the bridge, yellow warning flags tied at their centers.
Dasein gripped the steering wheel. His mind shifted into a speed of computation he had never before experienced. The effect was to slow the external passage of time. The truck seemed to come almost to a stop while he reviewed the possibilities—
Hit the brakes?
No. Brakes and tires were old. At this speed, the truck would skid onto the bridge and into the hole.
Swerve off the road?
No. The river waited on both sides—a deep cut in the earth to swallow them.
Aim for a bridge abutment to stop the truck?
Not at this speed and without seat belts.
Hit the throttle to increase speed?
That was a possibility. There was the temporary barrier to break through, but that was only a two-by-four. The bridge rose in a slight arc up and over the river. The hole had been opened in the center. Given enough speed, the truck could leap the hole.
Dasein jammed the throttle to the floorboards. The old truck leaped ahead. There came a sharp cracking sound as they smashed through the barrier. Planks clattered beneath the wheels. There came a breathless instant of flying, a spring-crushing lurch as they landed across the hole, the “crack” of the far barrier.
He hit the brakes, came to a screeching stop opposite the workmen. Time resumed its normal pace as Dasein stared out at the crew—five men, faces pale, mouths agape.
“For the love of heaven!” Piaget gasped. “Do you always take chances like that?”
“Was there any other way to get us out of that mess?” Dasein asked. He lifted his right hand, stared at it. The hand was trembling.
Piaget reflected a moment, then: “You took what was probably the only way out … but if you hadn't been driving so damn' fast on a blind …”
“I will make you a bet,” Dasein said. “I'll bet the work on that bridge wasn't necessary, that it was either a mistake or some sort of make-work.”
Dasein reached for his door handle, had to grope twice to get it in his hand, then found it took a conscious surge of effort to open the door. He stepped out, found his knees rubbery. He stood a moment, took several deep breaths, then moved around to the front of the truck.
Both headlights were smashed and there was a deep dent stretching across both fenders and the grill.
Dasein turned his attention to the workmen. One, a stocky, dark-haired man in a plaid shirt and dungarees stood a step ahead of the others. Dasein focused on the man, said: “Why wasn't there a warning sign back there around the corner?”
“Good God, man!” the fellow said. His face reddened. “Nobody comes down that road this time of day.”
Dasein walked down the road toward a pile of planks, dirt and oil on them testifying that they'd been taken from the bridge. They looked to be three-by-twelve redwood. He lifted the end of one, turned it over—no cracks or checks. It gave off the sharp sound of an unbroken board when he dropped it back to the pile.
He turned to see the workman he'd addressed approaching. Piaget was several paces behind the man.
“When did you get the order to do this work?” Dasein asked.
“Huh?” The man stopped, stared at Dasein with a puzzled frown.
“When did you get orders to repair this bridge?” Dasein asked.
“Well … we decided to come up here about an hour ago. What the hell difference does it make? You've smashed the …”
“You decided?” Dasein asked. “Aren't you assigned to jobs?”
“I'm the road crew foreman in this valley, mister. I decide, not that it's any of your business.”
Piaget came to a stop beside the man, said: “Dr. Dasein, this is Josh Marden, Captain Marden's nephew.”
“Nepotism begins at home, I see,” Dasein said, his tone elaborately polite. “Well, Mr. Marden, or may I call you Josh?”
“Now, you look here, Dr. Das …”
“Josh, then,” Dasein said, still in that tone of calm politeness. “I'm very curious, Josh. These appear to be perfectly sound planks. Why'd you decide to replace them?”
“What the hell diff …”
“Tell him, Josh,” Piaget said. “I confess to a certain curiosity of my own.”
Marden looked at Piaget, back to Dasein. “Well … we inspected the bridge … We make regular inspections. We just decided to do a little preventive maintenance, put in new planks here and use the old ones on a bridge that doesn't get as much traffic. There's nothing unusual about …”
“Is there any
urgent
road work in this valley?” Dasein asked. “Is there some job you put off to come to this …”
“Now, look here, Mister!” Marden took a step toward Dasein. “You've no call to …”
“What about the Old Mill Road?” Piaget asked. “Are those pot holes still on the curve by the ditch?”
“Now, look, Doc,” Marden said, whirling toward Piaget. “Not you, too. We decided …”
“Easy does it, Josh,” Piaget said. “I'm just curious. What about the Old Mill Road?”
“Aw, Doc. It was such a nice day and the …”
“So that work still has to be done,” Piaget said.
“I win the bet,” Dasein said. He headed back toward his truck.
Piaget fell into step beside him.
“Hey!” Marden shouted. “You've broken county property and those boards you landed on are probably …”
Dasein cut him off without turning. “You'd better get that bridge repaired before somebody else has trouble here.”
He slid behind the wheel of his truck, slammed the door. Reaction was setting in now: his whole body felt tense with anger.
Piaget climbed in beside him. The truck rattled as he closed his door. “Will it still run?” he asked.
“Accident!” Dasein said.
Piaget remained silent.
Dasein put the truck in gear, eased it up to a steady thirty-five miles an hour. The rear-view mirror showed him the crew already at work on the bridge, one of their number with a warning flag trudging back around the blind corner.
“Now, they send out a flagman,” Dasein said.
A corner cut off the view in the mirror. Dasein concentrated on driving. The truck had developed new rattles and a front-end shimmy.
“They
have
to be accidents,” Piaget said. “There's no other explanation.”
A stop sign came into view ahead. Dasein stopped for the main highway. It was empty of traffic. He turned right toward town. Piaget's protestations deserved no answer, he thought, and he gave no answer.
They entered the outskirts of town. There was Scheler's station on the left. Dasein pulled in behind the station, drove back to the large shed-roofed metal building labeled “Garage.”
“What're you doing here?” Piaget asked. “This machine isn't worth …”
“I want it repaired sufficiently to get me out of Santaroga,” Dasein said.
The garage doors were open. Dasein nosed the truck inside, stopped, climbed out. There was a steady sound of work all around—clanging of metal, machinery humming. Lines of cars had been angled toward benches down both sides of the garage. Lights glared down on the benches.
A stocky, dark-skinned man in stained white coveralls came from the back of the garage, stopped in front of the truck.
“What the devil did you hit?” he asked.
Dasein recognized one of the quartet from the card game at the Inn—Scheler himself.
“Doctor Piaget here will tell you all about it,” Dasein said. “I want some headlights put on this thing and you might have a look at the steering.”
“Why don't you junk it?” Scheler asked.
The truck door slammed and Piaget came up on the right. “Can you fix it, Sam?” he asked.
“Sure, but it isn't worth it.”
“Do it anyway and put it on my bill. I don't want our friend here to think we're trying to trap him in the valley.”
“If you say so, Doc.”
Scheler turned around, shouted: “Bill! Take that Lincoln off the rack and put this truck on. I'll write up a ticket.”
A young man in greasy blue coveralls came around from the left bends where he had been hidden by a Lincoln Continental lifted halfway up on a hoist. The young man had Scheler's build and dark skin, the same set of face and eyes: bright blue and alert.
“My son, Bill,” Scheler said. “He'll take care of it for you.”
Dasein felt a twinge of warning fear, backed against the side of his truck. The garage around him had taken on the same feeling of concentrated malevolence he had sensed in the river.
Scheler started through the space between the Lincoln and an old Studebaker truck, called over his shoulder: “If you'll sign the ticket over here, Dr. Dasein, we'll get right at it.”
Dasein took two steps after him, hesitated. He felt the garage closing in around him.
“We can walk to the clinic from here,” Piaget said. “Sam will call when your rig's ready.”
Dasein took another step, stopped, glanced back. Young Bill Scheler was right behind him. The sense of menace was a pounding drumbeat in Dasein's head. He saw Bill reach out a friendly hand to guide him between the cars. There was no doubt of the innocent intention of that hand, the smiling face behind it, but Dasein saw the hand as the embodiment of danger. With an inarticulate cry, Dasein sprang aside.
The young mechanic, caught off balance with nothing ahead of his thrusting arm, lurched forward, stumbled, fell. As he fell, the hoist with the Lincoln on it came crashing down. It rocked twice, subsided. Bill Scheler lay halfway under it. One of his legs twitched, was still.
A pool of red began to flow from beneath the car.
Piaget dashed past him shouting for Scheler to raise the hoist.
A compressor began thumping somewhere in the background.
The Lincoln jerked, began to rise. It exposed a body, its head smashed beyond recognition by one of the hoist's arms.
Dasein whirled away, ran out of the garage and was sick.
That could've been me,
he thought.
That was meant for me.
He grew aware of a great bustle of activity, the sound of a siren in the distance.
Two mechanics emerged from the garage with a pale-faced, staggering Sam Scheler between them.
It was his son
, Dasein thought. He felt that this was of the deepest significance, but his shocked mind gave no explanation for that feeling.
He heard one of the mechanics with Scheler say: “It was an accident, Sam. Nothing you could do.”
They went into the station with him.
A siren began giving voice in the distance. Its wailing grew louder. Dasein backed off to the edge of the station's parking area, stood against a low fence.
His truck, nosed into the garage, lurched into motion, was swallowed by the building.

Other books

Horseman of the Shadows by Bradford Scott
Bad Press by Maureen Carter
The Innocent Moon by Henry Williamson
Ice Cracker II by Lindsay Buroker
Lover's Roulette by E. L. Todd
Ojbect by Viola Grace
Son of Thunder by Libby Bishop
The Hidden Twin by Adi Rule