The Siege (18 page)

Dale heaved a shuddering sigh and sank back against his chair. He took a sip of beer, but it was warm and flat.

Winfield’s right
, he thought.
Let it drop for Christ’s sake! Go to the funeral. Bury Larry. Then take Angie back to Thomaston and try to go on living!

“Will you show me where the accident happened?” Dale asked, even though his better judgment was telling him to shut up, order another beer and lighten up.
Let it drop!

Winfield regarded him silently for a moment, trying to fathom him. Since his initial meeting with Dale this morning until now, he still couldn’t quite nail him down. He didn’t think Dale was hiding anything. He certainly didn’t suspect Dale was the pyromaniac mentioned in the telex; but he had a driven quality about him. It was a pushiness that just wouldn’t quit. In spite of that, though, Winfield genuinely liked this guy. If only he would let all this nonsense about seeing Larry’s body drop!

“I don’t really have time to do something like that,” Winfield said after a moment’s consideration. What he wanted to say was that, as the policeman on the scene, he didn’t think he had the right to start poking around. The accident report had been filed, the death certificate was filled out and right after the gravediggers shoveled in a few scoops of dirt, that would be that.

“Could you at least tell me where it happened? I’d like to go out there by myself,” Dale said. “I want to see where it happened.”

“No problem,” Winfield said. He would have been surprised if Dale hadn’t asked that question. “Head south on 2A. About four miles out of town there’s a bend in the road, a sharp right. Around here, it’s called Casey’s Curve.”

“Why’s that?”

“On the side of the road is a large boulder. The high school kids spraypainted it with all sorts of shit. My favorite’s the big skull and crossbones. Anyway, back in the Sixties, during a blizzard, a school bus driver named Henry Casey drove the basketball team from Houlton straight into that rock one night heading for a game in Mattawamkeag. Seventeen kids and the driver died instantly. Quite a few of the others were hurtin’ troopers for a long time.”

“If I’m not mistaken,” Dale said, “that’s one of the stretches of roads Larry was surveying. The state was going to improve that road.”

“It’s a killer, all right,” Winfield said. “Casey isn’t the only one to make an acquaintance with that boulder.”

“Kind of ironic, though, don’t you think?” Dale said. “Larry is killed on the same road he’s checking out so there won’t be as many accidents.”

Winfield snorted and signaled for two more beers. The waitress nodded and went to the tap to fill the mugs.

“As I was saying, Larry didn’t quite make the turn. His car glanced off the boulder and overturned several times. You can see where it went into the woods. Plowed quite a path through the brush.”

Dale looked up when the waitress came over and put the beers on the table. “You all done with this?” she asked as she picked up the paper plate with the remains of the pizza.

Winfield nodded and watched her as she walked away without another word, carrying the plates and their empty beer mugs.

“You don’t suspect that Larry had been drinking or anything, do you?” Dale asked. “I know he didn’t do any drugs.”

Winfield was shaking his head. “No. They did an autopsy, and there was no alcohol or drugs found in his blood. ’S far as we could determine, it was a simple case of the turn coming up too fast. He was driving late at night, and maybe wasn’t as alert as he should have been. He just didn’t react in time.”

“Jesus,” Dale said, sipping from his fresh beer.

“Hey!” Winfield suddenly shouted. He stood up and waved his arm over his head. Dale looked and saw a young woman standing in the doorway. She was casually dressed in a plaid shirt and faded jeans. Her eyes were lively and bright and they got even brighter when she saw who was waving to her.

“A good friend of mine,” Winfield said to Dale. “I haven’t seen her in years.” Then Winfield shouted, “Hey! Donna. Com’ on over!” His smile widened as the woman started toward their table. Dale watched the men stop their pool game long enough to check her out, giving each other little nudges.

“How you doing, Jeff?” the woman said. She gave Winfield a quick hug and a kiss on the cheek. Her smile exposed a row of wide teeth, and Dale noticed that, up close, her blue eyes looked warm and friendly.

“Have a seat. Have a seat,” Winfield said as he sat back down and scooted over to make room for her at the table. “I heard you were back in town and figured it was just a matter of time before I saw you.”

“I knew I’d find you here if you were off duty,” the woman said. She followed with a laugh that immediately enchanted Dale.

“Dale Harmon,” Winfield said, holding his hands up in the air, “I’d like you to meet one of my best friends and secret lover,” he said with a wink. “Donna LaPierre. Donna, this is Dale.”

“Pleased to meet you,” Donna said, nodding her head slightly and then taking a long, steady look at Dale. The look made him uncomfortable.

“Same here,” Dale said. His hand circled his beer glass while his thumb rubbed away the condensation. He found it difficult to make eye contact with Donna because he wondered if Winfield had really meant it about her being his “secret lover.” Probably not, he figured, because of the age difference. What business was it of his anyway?

“So,” Donna said, once she was settled in her seat and lit a cigarette, “What in God’s name brings you to a town like Dyer, Mr. Harmon? I still have family and friends—”

“And lovers,” Winfield added, chuckling like a lecher.

Donna shook her head, making it obvious Winfield was making a joke. “Right. And lovers. What’s your excuse, Mr. Harmon?”

“Call me Dale.”

“All right, Dale. What are you doing in a backwater town like Dyer if you don’t mind my asking.” She rolled the tip of her cigarette in the ashtray; then, after studying it for a second, she ground it out, her face wrinkling with distaste.

“Actually,” Dale said, feeling his fingers tighten on the beer glass, “I came here for the funeral of a friend of mine, Larry Cole.”

Donna’s smile melted, and her eyes dropped. “Oh, yeah. Wasn’t that horrible?”

“Hey, let’s not get all bummed out, okay? It’s great to see you,” Winfield said, trying desperately to lighten the mood at the table. But for the rest of the evening, while the three of them drank at Kellerman’s, things were never the same after Dale mentioned his reason for coming to Dyer.

V

I
t took Tasha longer than she thought it should to make her way back to where Hocker was supposed to be waiting. By the time she got there, she was covered with scratches and bruises from stomping through the woods. Her hair was a tangled mess, and some thorns had ripped a hole in her shorts. The bag of groceries was ripped, spilling everything onto the ground for a second time, but by using the front of her shirt as a temporary basket, she had made it back just as the sun was setting. She wasn’t sure if she was happy or pissed to see that Hocker wasn’t anywhere around.

“It goddamn figures,” she hissed as she knelt down and let the groceries tumble to the ground. Everything was dented and squished, but edible except for the store-bought bread. But what could you expect from a loaf of bread that could be squeezed into a ball the size of a marble?

She found Hocker’s backpack where he had stowed it and took the time to divide the food up and portion it out, making sure to put the heavier cans into Hocker’s pack. Then, brushing her knees, she stood up and looked around.

The woods were silent, perhaps a bit too silent, she thought as she scanned as far as she could see in the fading light. This late in the season, there weren’t many insects chirring in the dusk. The only sound was a low, gusty wind that rattled the dead and dying leaves on the ground and the branches overhead. Tasha shivered, then opened her backpack, took out her sweater and put it on.

“Hock?” she called out, more whisper than shout.

The wind moaned, sending a spray of leaves swirling like a flurry of bats against the pale sky. Off to the east, the fat, round face of a nearly full moon was crosshatched by the tree branches that looked like scars across the golden disk.

“Hey! Hocker!” she called, a bit louder as she began pacing back and forth in the small clearing.

She tried not to let herself think what she was thinking, but she couldn’t keep the thoughts at bay.
The cops got him
, her mind whispered, and the gusting wind seemed almost to laugh. After what happened downtown, they came looking for her and found Hocker.
They’ve hauled him off to jail, and right now they’re running a check on him and finding out about the stolen truck, and the old man…

“Oh, shit,” she hissed, pacing faster and rubbing her hands over her shoulders to fight the chill. “Oh,
shit
!”

Of course, she wasn’t worried about what had happened to Hocker so much as she wondered what the hell she was going to do! She realized she didn’t have the slightest idea how to build a campfire. And even if she did, it was already too dark to collect enough wood and get the tent pitched. So what was she going to do, sleep out under the stars? Alone? She wished that she had stayed in town, leaving Hocker on his own. She wondered why she kept coming back to him. It plain didn’t make sense!

“Come on, you prick!” Tasha hissed as she stamped her feet on the ground. “Where the fuck are you?”

“Right here,” said a voice, so suddenly she couldn’t even tell from which direction it came. She wheeled around and raised her fists high for protection. The darkening woods filled with a deep, rumbling laughter. Tasha felt pressure build in her bladder. She wasn’t even sure that it was Hocker.

“Who’s there?” she yelled. Her voice echoed back. “I’m warning you. I’ve got a gun!”

The laughter came again in a swelling wave, then it abruptly stopped. The bushes behind her rustled and a figure stepped out into the clearing.

“You asshole!” she yelled as soon as she recognized who it was. “What the hell are you doing sneaking up on me like that?”

Hocker raised a wad of spit from his throat and shot it off into the woods. “I ain’t sneaking up on you, you jerk,” he said. “And I heard what you called me:
come on, you prick!
Nice talk for a girl!”

“I was getting scared,” Tasha said, letting her voice trail off into a whine. “And I… I had a little trouble in town.”

Hocker rummaged through the backpacks and was emptying the food she had carefully stocked away. He grunted and rammed the canned goods back into the packs.

“The grub looks like you used it for a football,” he said angrily.

“That was part of the trouble I had,” Tasha said, looking down at the ground. “I had a run-in with the cops.”

She was surprised that he didn’t freak out right away. His first response was simply to raise another ball of spit, and this one he sent flying in her direction. It plopped on the ground in front of her.

“You’re shittin’ me,” he said, slowly rising from a crouch and taking a step toward her. In the dusk, she could see his fists clench tightly at his sides.

“I’m not,” she answered. “A cop chased me down this alleyway. I kicked him in the balls to get away. And I made sure it looked like I was heading south. If they decide to come after us, they’ll start looking in the wrong direction.”

Hocker snorted. “Good thinking. But it was pretty damned stupid to get caught in the first place.”

“He saw me and started following me. I did what I had to do to get away. First thing in the morning, we’ve gotta get as far away from here as we can.”

Hocker shook his head viciously. “No way! Not yet. I found a place where we can hole up for a while.”

It was Tasha’s turn to shake her head. “No way! That cop would recognize me in a second. There’s no way I wanna be arrested for assaulting a police officer.”

“That’s the least of our fuckin’ worries,” Hocker said. “But wait’ll you see this place. It’s a farmhouse! You’re gonna love it! Come on, follow me. I’ll show you where it is now.”

“In the dark?” Tasha said, not willing to budge an inch. “We’ll never find our way back here.”

Hocker went over to the packs, grabbed Tasha’s, and slung it at her. It slammed into her ankles, sending a jolt of pain up to her knees. He hoisted his onto his back and said, “Come on, then. For tonight, we’ll sleep in the woods out behind the house to make sure no one lives there. We’ll take up occupancy tomorrow morning.”

Tasha shook her head as she bent over and picked up the pack. “Is it far?” she asked, knowing that, once his mind was made up, there was no way to get him to change it. “I’ve been walking all goddamned afternoon. My legs are useless.”

“Over the river and through the woods,” Hocker sang, his voice flat and off-key. He turned the words into a whistle as he started off into the darkened forest. His heavy footsteps rustled leaves and snapped branches as he went.

Tasha knew she’d spend the night alone if she hesitated, so she lit out after him. His shrill whistle led her on through the darkness. Branches slapped her in the face and pulled at her jacket sleeves as she went, but she knew it was useless to complain.