Time Out of Joint (13 page)

I’m not entering any brightly lit places. I’m not starting conversations with people I don’t know. There are no genuine strangers when it comes to me; everybody knows me. They’re either a friend or an enemy....

A friend, he thought. Who? Where? My sister? My brother-in-law? Neighbors? I trust them as much as I do anybody. But not enough.

So here I am.

He continued driving. No more neon lights came into view. The land, on both sides of the highway, lay dark and lifeless. Traffic had thinned out. Only an occasional headlight flashed at him from the oncoming traffic beyond the dividing strip.

Lonely.

Glancing down, he noticed that the truck had a radio mounted on the dashboard. He recognized the slide-rule dial. The two knobs.

If I turn it on, I’ll hear them talking about me.

He reached out his hand, hesitated, and then turned the radio on. The radio began to hum. Gradually the tubes warmed; sounds, mostly static, faded in. He fiddled with the volume as he drove.

"... afterwards," a voice said squeakily.

"... not," another voice said.

"... my best."

"... okay." A series of pops.

They’re calling back and forth, Ragle said to himself. The air-waves filled with alarm. Ragle Gumm eluded us! Ragle Gumm escaped!

The voice squeaked, "... more experienced."

Ragle thought, Next time send a more experienced team. Bunch of amateurs.

"... might as well ... no further..."

Might as well give up, Ragle filled in. No further use in tracking him. He’s too shrewd. Too wily.

The voice squeaked, "... Schulmann says."

That would be Commander Schulmann, Ragle said to himself. The Supreme Commander with headquarters in Geneva. Mapping the top-level secret strategy to synchronize world-wide military movements so they converge on this pick-up truck. Fleets of warships steaming toward me. Atomic cannon. The usual works.

The squeaking voice became too nerve-racking; he shut the radio off. Like mice. Yammering mice squeaking back and forth ... it made his flesh crawl.

According to the odometer he had gone about twenty miles. A long distance. No town. No lights. Not even traffic, now. Only the road ahead, the dividing strip to his left. The pavement showing in his headlights.

Darkness, a flatness of fields. Up above, stars.

Not even farmhouses? Signs?

God, he thought. What would happen if I broke down out here? Where am I? Anywhere?

Maybe I’m not moving. Caught in a between-place. Wheels of the pick-up truck spinning in gravel ... spinning uselessly, forever. The illusion of motion. Motor noise, wheel noise, headlights on pavement. But immobility.

And yet, he felt too uneasy to stop the truck. To get out and search around. The hell with that, he thought. At least he was safe here in the truck. Something around him. Shell of metal. Dashboard before him, seat under him. Dials, wheel, foot-pedals, knobs.

Better than the emptiness outside.

And then, far off to the right, he saw a light. And, a little later, a sign flashed in his headlights. The marker indicating an intersection. Road traveling off right and left.

Slowing, he made a right turn onto the road.

Broken, narrow pavement loomed up in his lights. The truck bounced and swayed; he slowed down. An abandoned road. Unmaintained. The front wheels of the truck dropped into a trough; he shifted into second gear and came almost to a stop. Almost broke an axle. With care he drove forward. The road twisted and began to rise.

Hills and dense growth around him, now. A tree branch under his wheels; he heard it splinter. Once a white furred creature scuttled frantically. He swerved to avoid it and the truck-wheels spun in dirt. Terrified, he wrenched the wheel. Nightmare of a few moments before ... stuck and spinning, sinking down in the loose, crumbly soil.

Shifting into low gear, he let the truck climb the awfully steep hill. Now the pavement had turned to packed dirt. Deep troughs, from previous vehicles. Something brushed the top of the truck; he ducked involuntarily. His headlights flashed into foliage, streaming off the road as the truck pointed toward the edge of a descent. Then the road veered sharply to the left; he forced the wheel to turn. Again the road appeared, hemmed in by shrubbery that had crept out onto it. The road became narrower; he pushed down on the brake as the truck lurched over a pothole.

On the next turn the truck missed the edge of the road. Both right wheels spun into the underbrush; the truck spun about and he slammed down on the brakes, killing the motor. The truck leaned. He felt himself sliding away from the wheel; clutching with his hands he managed to grasp the door handle. The truck lifted, groaned, and then came to rest, half turned over.

That’s all of that, he thought to himself.

After a few moments he was able to open the door and step out.

The headlights glared from the trees and bushes. Sky above. Tht road almost lost as it climbed still farther up. Turning, Ragle looked back down. Far below he could see the line of lights, the highway. But no town. No settlement. The edge of the hill cut the lights off, sheared them away.

He began to walk up the road, going more by touch than sight. When his right foot struck foliage he directed himself left. The radar beam, he said to himself. Keep on course, or go off headfirst.

In the foliage various things rustled. He heard them depart at the sound of his approach. Harmless, he thought. Or they wouldn’t be getting away as fast as possible.

Suddenly he missed his footing; stumbling, he managed to right himself. The road had leveled out. Wheezing, he halted. He had reached the top of the hill.

To his right, the light glowed. A house, set back from the rood. A ranch house. Evidently occupied. Light coming from windows.

He walked toward it, up a dirt trail to a fence. Feeling with his hands he discovered a gate. At great length he slid the gate back. The trail, two deep ruts, led on toward the house. At last, after falling a number of times, he crashed against stone steps.

The house. He had got to it.

Arms extended, he climbed the steps to the porch. His hands groped about until his fingers closed over an old-fashioned bell.

He rang the bell and stood waiting, gasping for breath, shivering in the night cold.

The door opened and a drab, brown-haired, middle-aged woman looked out at him. She wore tan slacks and a checkered red and brown shirt and work shoes with high, buttoned tops. Mrs. Keitelbein, his mind said. It’s she. But it wasn’t. He stared at her and she stared back.

"Yes?" she said. Behind her, in the living room, someone else, a man, peered past her at him. "What do you want?" she said.

Ragle said, "My car broke down."

"Oh, come in," the woman said. She held the door wide for him. "Are you injured? You’re alone?" She stepped out onto the porch to see if there was anyone else.

"Just me," he said. Bird’s-eye maple furniture ... a low chair, table, long bench with a portable typewriter on it. A fireplace. Wide boards, beams overhead. "Nice," he said, going toward the fireplace.

A man, holding an open book. "You can use our phone," the man said. "How far did you have to walk?"

"Not too far," he said. The man had a bland, ample face, as smooth as a boy’s. He appeared to be much younger than the woman, her son perhaps. Like Walter Keitelbein, he thought. Striking resemblance. For a moment ...

"You’re lucky to find us," the woman said. "We’re the only house up on the hill that’s occupied. Everyone else is away until summer."

"I see," he said.

"We’re year-round," the young man said.

The woman said, "I’m Mrs. Kesselman. And this is my son."

Ragle stared at the two of them.

"What’s the matter?" Mrs. Kesselman said.

"I—thought I recognized the name," Ragle said. What did it imply? But the woman definitely was not Mrs. Keitelbein. And the young man was not Walter. So the fact that they resembled one another meant nothing.

"What were you doing out this way?" Mrs. Kesselman asked. "This is such a godforsaken mound of earth when everyone’s away. I know it may sound paradoxical for me to say that since we live up here."

Ragle said, "I was looking for a friend."

That seemed to satisfy the Kesselmans. They both nodded.

"My car left the road and turned over on one of those spiral curves," Ragle said.

"Oh dear," Mrs. Kesselman said. "How distressing. Did it slide off the road? Down into the gully?"

"No," he said. "But it’ll have to be towed back up. I’d be afraid to get back into it. It might slip and go further down."

"By all means stay out of it," Mrs. Kesselman said. "There have been instances of cars sliding off the edge and going all the way to the bottom. Do you want to telephone your friend and tell him you’re all right?"

Ragle said, "I don’t know his number."

"Can’t you look it up in the book?" the young Mr. Kesselman asked.

"I don’t know his name," Ragle said. "Or even if it’s a man." Or, he thought, even if he or she exists.

The Kesselmans smiled at him trustingly. Supposing, of course, that what he meant was not as cryptic as it sounded.

"Would you like to call a tow truck?" Mrs. Kesselman said. But her son spoke up.

"Nobody’ll send a tow truck up here at night," he said. "We’ve had that out with the different garages. They won’t budge."

"That’s true," Mrs. Kesselman said. "Oh dear. This is a problem. We’ve always dreaded this happening to us. But it never has. Of course we know the road so well, after so many years."

The younger Kesselman said, "I’d be glad to drive you to your friend’s place, if you have any idea where it is. Or I could drive you back down to the highway, or into town." He glanced at his mother and she nodded in agreement.

"That’s very kind of you," Ragle said. But he did not want to leave; he placed himself at the fireplace, warming himself and enjoying the peacefulness of the room. It seemed to him to be in some respects the most civilized house he had been in that he could remember. The prints on the walls. The lack of clutter. No useless bric-a-brac. And everything arranged with taste, the books, the furniture, the drapes ... it satisfied his strong innate sense of order. His awareness of pattern. There exists a real esthetic balance here, he decided. That’s why it’s so restful.

Mrs. Kesselman waited for him to do or say something. When he continued to stand at the fireplace she said, "Would you like something to drink?"

"Yes," he said. "Thanks."

"I’ll see what there is," Mrs. Kesselman said. "Excuse me." She departed from the room. Her son remained.

"Kind of cold out," her son said.

"Yes," Ragle said.

Awkwardly, the young man stuck out his hand. "My name’s Garret," he said. They shook hands. "I’m in the interior decorating field."

That explained the taste shown in the room. "This looks very nice," Ragle said.

"What line are you in?" Garret Kesselman asked.

"I’m involved in newspaper work," Ragle said.

"Oh, I’ll be darned," Garret said. "No kidding. That must be a fascinating business. When I was in school I took a couple of years of journalism."

Mrs. Kesselman returned with a tray on which were three small glasses and an unusual-shaped bottle. "Tennessee sour-mash whiskey," she said, setting the tray down on the glass-topped coffee table. "From the oldest distillery in the country. Jack Daniel’s black label."

"I never heard of it," Ragle said, "but it sounds wonderful."

"It’s excellent whiskey," Garret said, handing Ragle a glass of the stuff. "Something like Canadian whiskey."

"I’m a beer drinker, usually," Ragle said. He tasted the sour-mash whiskey and it seemed all right. "Fine," he said.

The three of them said nothing, then.

"It seems a bad time to be driving around looking for someone," Mrs. Kesselman said, when Ragle had finished his glass of whiskey and was pouring himself a second. "Most people tackle this hill during the daylight hours." She seated herself facing him. Her son perched on the arm of the couch.

Ragle said, "I had a quarrel with my wife and I couldn’t stand it any more. I had to get out."

"How unfortunate," Mrs. Kesselman said.

"I didn’t even stop to pack my clothes," Ragle said. "No objective in mind, just getting away. Then I remembered this friend and I thought I might be able to hole up with him for a while, until I got my bearings. Haven’t seen him in years. He probably moved away a long time ago. It’s lousy when a marriage breaks up. Like the end of the world."

"Yes," Mrs. Kesselman agreed.

Ragle said, "How about letting me stay here tonight?"

They glanced at each other. Embarrassed, they both started to answer at once. The gist of it was no.

"I have to stay somewhere," Ragle said. He reached into his coat pocket and rooted about for his wallet. Getting it out he opened it up and counted his money. "I’ve got a couple hundred dollars on me," he said. "I can pay you according to the inconvenience it causes you. Money for inconvenience."

Mrs. Kesselman said, "Let us have a chance to talk it over." Arising, she motioned to her son. The two of them disappeared into the other room; the door shut after them.

I’ve got to stay here, Ragle said to himself. He poured himself another glass of the sour-mash whiskey and walked back to the fireplace with it, to stand in the warmth.

That pick-up truck, he thought to himself. With its radio. It must have belonged to them; otherwise it wouldn’t have had a radio. The boy at the Standard Station ... he represented them.

Proof, Ragle said to himself. The radio is proof. It’s not in my mind. It’s a fact.

By their fruits, ye shall know them, he thought. And their fruits are that they communicate by radio.

The door opened. Mrs. Kesselman and her son returned. "We’ve talked it over," she said, sitting down on the couch across from Ragle. Her son stood by her, looking grave. "It’s obvious to us that you’re in distress. We’ll allow you to stay, seeing that you are clearly in some unfortunate situation. But we want you to be honest with us, and we don’t feel you have. There’s more to your situation than you’ve told us so far."