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  “Hurry up!” he shouted.

  Duke scratched his head over the fallen boy, whose own head was gone from the jaw up. A few cerebral arteries hung like scraps from what was left of the ruptured cranial vault. “Can’t we leave the dude?” Duke asked. “Seems silly to drive around with a dead fella.”

  Erik jumped in the van and started it up. “Duke, how many times do I have to tell you? When we leave bodies, we leave clues. If the cops find a body, they’ll ID it, run the name through MVA, and then they’ll know what we’re driving. Drag ’em both in here and let’s get going!”

  Duke complied, hauling the kid to the van by overall straps. He paused to chuckle. “That’s the third head I blowed off since we been out. Think that’s some sort of record? Three blowed off heads in a day?”

  “Come on!”

  Duke dumped the boy in back, then dragged over the unconscious girl and did the same. He slammed the rear doors closed.

  Erik backed the van up, shifted, and took off down the road. He headed south.

  «« — »»

  Eleven minutes later, two Luntville units and a state police pursuit car, heading south on Governor Bridge road, slammed on their brakes in succession, just past the old truss bridge by the fishing dell. They’d all seen it at once, the rear end of a patrol car sticking out of the woods. The car bore the stencil along the back fender: 208.

  At first it looked like it might’ve crashed. This prospect pleased one of the officers very much. His name was Lawrence Mulligan, chief of the Luntville Police Department. Yes, it looked like they’d been driving too fast over the bridge, lost control, and plowed into the woods. Aw, please, God, let it be so. Let ’em be sittin’ in front with their heads busted open.

  But God, today, would not be so obliging to Chief Lawrence Mulligan.

  The three cops approached the still vehicle with their weapons drawn. The state cop had an AR 15A2, which he kept trained on unit 208’s back window. A Luntville PFC edged in toward the passenger side, while Chief Mulligan squeezed through trees toward the driver’s side.

  “Careful, Chief,” warned the PFC. “They might still be in there.”

  Please still be in there, Chief Mulligan fairly prayed. It was a misguided prayer to begin with. One does not generally pray with a 10mm Colt automatic in one’s hand. Nevertheless, Chief Mulligan prayed again, aloud this time: “Aw, please, please still be in there.”

  The eloped mental patients were not in there.

  All that remained to reward Chief Mulligan for his efforts was a quick note scribbled on the back of a standard traffic complaint and citation form.

  The note read: Shag my balls, Chief.

  —

  Chapter 9

  The vast forest belt rose toward the county’s northern line.

  They cruised down long, straight two lane hardtops, passing endless tracts of newly tilled soil. The air was filled with fecund scents, which seemed alien to Ann. She was used to smog. The hour and a half drive seemed to transpose worlds. Ann had almost forgotten what the country was like.

  Some vacation, she thought.

  Melanie sat quietly in the back, reading Kafka. Martin drove. Ann could imagine his reservations. It was never easy for him. He would always be a city person to her parents, a cosmopolite. Strangers in a strange land, she mused. But wasn’t the same true of her? She’d been born and raised out here, a product of the same sensibilities, but she’d turned her back on those sensibilities without thinking twice. It was a transposition of worlds, one of which she felt no part.

  “Is Grandpa going to die?” Melanie asked.

  Ann couldn’t fathom a response. Melanie was old enough now that she needed to be leveled with. It had been easy when she was younger; the innocence of children could be taken advantage of when life turned grim. Where’s Daddy? she’d asked when Mark had left. He had to go away for a while, was all Ann needed to say. He’ll be back sometime. As Melanie grew older, she put the pieces together herself. But this?

  “He had a stroke,” Martin said. “Sometimes strokes can be very serious, and sometimes they’re not. We’ll have to wait and see.”

  Martin always had answers for the unanswerable.

  The last neck of the drive took them down State Route 154, the county’s only main line to the web of tiny townships which rimmed the northern belt. Oddly, there seemed to be a lot of police out today, when ordinarily she wouldn’t see any. She saw cars from Luntville, Crick City, Tylersville, Waynesville. She couldn’t figure what all these cars would be doing so far out of their jurisdictions. Lockwood had its own department too, one of the smallest. They only had two full time cops, Chief Bard and some kid named Byron, and one car, which was another oddity. Lockwood’s small population did not generate much in the way of municipal funds, yet the town council insisted on a police department, and no one objected. It was Ann’s mother who headed the town council, an elected post. No one had ever run against her, and that, too, seemed strange. “Lockwood is crime free,” Ann had once observed. “That’s why we must have a police department,” her mother had replied. “To keep it that way. You’ll find out all about crime once you get to the big city.”

  Everything her mother said seemed to possess some level of insult. Ann couldn’t remember her ever being different.

  “What’s this?” Martin queried, slowing down.

  “Prepare to stop,” read signs propped up on the shoulder. Stubs of road flares had burned down. Roadblock, Ann instinctively thought. But it wasn’t a drunk trap. State police pursuit cars sat facing each way at the point, their motors running. Cops of various townships stood alertly along the shoulder and examined each vehicle which slowed before the point. Many had the thumb snaps of their holsters open, others openly grasped shotguns.

  Melanie leaned between them as Martin pulled up to the point. The vehicle ahead of them was being searched.

  “This doesn’t look right,” Martin said, and lit a cigarette.

  Police to either side stared into their car as they waited. One’s gun hand hovered over his holster.

  “Today must be National Terrorize Citizens Day,” Ann said. “I hope they don’t think they’re going to search our car.”

  “Don’t start a fuss,” Martin advised. “We’ll just cooperate and be on our way that much sooner.”

  Cooperate, my ass, Ann thought. This isn’t Iran.

  They waved the pickup through. Martin pulled up.

  “Is there a problem?” he asked.

  A short, portly cop leaned over their window, his hand on the butt of his service pistol. “Sorry about the inconvenience. We need to look things over real quick.”

  “What you need to took at first,” Ann suggested, “is the state annotated code. Check Chapter VII, paragraph 7:1, ‘Predispositions Pursuant to Unlawful Vehicular Search.’ You also might want to take a look at the Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution. Ever heard of it?”

  The cop squinted. He was bald, with a short mustache that looked like a brush in a gun cleaning kit. “I know you, don’t I?” he questioned. “Yeah, you’re Josh Slavik’s daughter, right? The lawyer?”

  Great, she thought. She recognized him now—Chief Bard. What the hell is Bard doing running roadblocks ten miles out of Lockwood? “Hello, Chief Bard,” she said.

  “Well, I’ll be,” he replied, smiling.

  “We’ve just come up from the city,” Martin offered.

  “Oh, yeah, I guess on account of Josh,” Bard realized.

  “Have you seen him?” Ann asked.

  “Well, no, but your mom told me it was a stroke, they think. Happened real sudden. I see your mom quite a bit.”

  Of course he did; she ran the town council, which ran the police. “What’s with the roadblock?” she asked next.

  Bard’s frown seemed to shrivel his face. “Couple of crazies escaped the state hospital yesterday. Bastards moved so fast they got through our net. We’re checking everybody coming in and out just to be on the safe side. O
ne of them’s from Lockwood, but you probably don’t remember him; he came along several years after you moved. Erik Tharp.”

  Erik. Tharp. It was a name she slightly recalled. She remembered her mother telling her about it years ago. A drifter, a substance abuser. Something about him burying bodies off the town limits. Several of the bodies had been children, babies.

  “Trouble is, like I said,” Bard went on, “they moved real quick and changed cars a couple of times before we could get a fix on them. We just missed nailing them earlier today. Damn shame too. They killed a cop.”

  Christ, Ann thought. No wonder every cop in the area is out.

  “Well, you all go on now,” Bard bid. “Give your mom my regards. I’ll be stopping by later to see how Josh is doing.”

  “Thanks, Chief.” Ann waved.

  Martin pulled through the point. “How do you know him?” he asked.

  “I don’t, really. My mom hired him when the old chief died. That was years after I moved out of Lockwood. I talked to him a few times in the past when I’d come home to visit my parents. He keeps a low profile. Not much use for a police department in Lockwood.”

  “Until today,” Melanie suggested. “Escaped lunatics!”

  «« — »»

  Ann thought of a lot of things when they entered town. None of them were good. Lockwood was a splotch, a bad meld of memory: her frustrated childhood, social isolation, her mother’s dominance and her father’s passivity. Her past felt like a shadow she was about to reenter. She felt suddenly sullen.

  The town looked equally sullen. It looked deserted. Martin idled the Mustang down Pickman Avenue, Lockwood’s main drag. Almost everything here had been built a hundred years ago, refurbished since. A little brick fire station, the police station alongside. A general store, a diner called Joe’s. Most of the economy here was agricultural; the men either worked the vast corn and soybean fields to the south, marketed farm supplies, or serviced tractors. Lockwood had always seemed to do better than the surrounding townships. There was no poverty and, hence, no drugs and no crime. It was almost idyllic.

  Almost, Ann thought. Lockwood was isolated, remote. At times it seemed untouched by the modem world, and that’s the way everyone wanted it. There was a curfew for minors, and town ordinances against package liquor sales. The only place a person could get a drink in this town was a dusty little tavern called the Crossroads. Kids had a dress code for school. More ordinances prohibited late night convenience stores, bowling alleys, arcades, and the like. “As a community, we must strive to resist debilitating attractions for our youth,” her mother had proposed before the town council years and years ago. Motels were prohibited too. Outsiders were not encouraged to visit.

  “What’s the matter?” Martin asked.

  Ann’s thoughts had been adrift. “Just…thinking,” she answered. Did she blame her parents for her constrained childhood, or the town itself? Lockwood seemed to emanate repression. Here it was, early afternoon, and the town looked dead. Kids should be out playing, housewives should be out shopping. There should be traffic, activity, etc., typical things of any small town. But there was none of that here.

  “Where is everybody?” Melanie asked. “Aren’t the kids here on spring break too?”

  “In Lockwood?” Martin chuckled. “Who knows? They probably have a town ordinance now against children.”

  “It’s not that bad,” Ann said. “Just different.”

  “Yeah, different. I’m surprised we haven’t passed a horse and buggy.”

  The end of Pickman Avenue formed the large town square. Here was the old, steepled white church that Ann had never attended, and the town hall. Beyond that, all that could be seen was the vast rise of the forest belt, which kept the town dark till mid-afternoon.

  “Oh, yeah, and there’s probably an ordinance against sunlight too,” Martin said. “This place has always been creepy, but never like this.”

  Martin was right. They hadn’t seen a single person yet.

  He turned left onto Lockhaven Road. The residential section extended from here past the old middle school. The town possessed fewer than five hundred people; dark, narrow streets led past modest homes, mostly one floor, which all seemed to be white with dark trim, and big trees in the yards. More trees lined the streets, adding to the queer darkness. The entire town seemed to brood.

  “Which one is it?” Martin asked.

  “Turn here,” she instructed. It had been so long even Ann wasn’t sure. The narrow road seemed to rise. “Ah, here,” Martin said. He turned onto Blake Court and stopped.

  “Jesus.”

  The long cul de sac was filled with cars.

  “Looks like half the town’s here,” Melanie said.

  They’re all at the house, Ann thought without knowing why. But what would bring so many people here?

  A long driveway led to the Slavik house. It was the largest house in town, large and gabled on a big lot full of trees. Very little of the house’s original brick could be seen, covered by sheets of crawling ivy.

  Martin pulled up next to her parents’ old Fleetwood and parked. He sat a minute, peering out, and stubbed his cigarette in the ashtray.

  “This is bizarre,” he said.

  Melanie leaned forward. “Mom, how come—”

  “I don’t know, honey,” she said, but she was thinking, Maybe Dad’s already died. What else could explain the crowd of vehicles?

  The cast of Martin’s face indicated he had similar thoughts. Instead, he just said, “Let’s go.”

  Walking up, Ann thought the rest of the town must be jealous. The house was old but well kept. The spacious yard and topiary were meticulously maintained. Ann knew her father had never made lots of money working farmland, and her mother accepted no pay for running the town council. The town had incorporated itself years ago; the farmland to the south was not privately but collectively owned, which was common in these parts. The profits were shared, yet Ann couldn’t imagine that they were significant. How did this town maintain itself? Moreover, how did her parents? All towns had their share of poor and wealthy. Everybody here seemed to be the same, save for the Slaviks.

  The silence weighed her down. They approached the house, saying nothing, and ludicrously paused at the porticoed front door. Nothing could be heard within, yet she saw subtle movements past the narrow windows. Like people standing around.

  Like a funeral reception, she had to think.

  Her hand locked in midair. That door knocker always rasped her eye—a small oval of dull, old brass in the shape of a face. But the face was bereft of features, save for two, wide empty eyes. There was no mouth, no nose, no jawline really—just the eyes.

  That’s what bothered her—it always had. The eyes, though ominous, seemed somehow to welcome her.

  «« — »»

  “I’m sure you’ve all heard about it by now,” Dr. Greene supposed. He sat at his big ugly gray metal desk, eating a Chunky. He had very short blond hair and was built like a fireplug, which never quite helped him look the part. He was chief of Psychiatric Services at the state mental hospital. A welter of psychiatric paraphernalia filled his office: Smith, Klein, and French calendars, Stelazine paperweights, a desk set advertising Lily pharmaceuticals. He drank juice out of a Haldol coffee cup and wrote with a pen that read “Xanax (alprazolam) 0.5mg tabs. Use it first!” He got all the stuff free from drug reps. These guys were like car salesmen, hyping themselves over the competition. Large orders often promised paid vacations. Dr. Greene didn’t want vacations in return for providing drugs that frequently turned human beings into docile dayroom potatoes. But he did like the pens and coffee cups. “Serious elopement yesterday,” he said.

  Dr. Harold sat down. “How many?”

  “Two.”

  “Not bad.”

  “Not good,” Greene countered. “They killed two people before they even got off the grounds. Today they killed a municipal cop.”

  “What are their profiles?”

  Dr
. Harold, though a successful private practitioner, did free consulting and in patient profile evaluation on the side. Many private doctors did this as a gesture of professional goodwill. The state hospitals were overcrowded and understaffed, some to the breaking point. Dr. Harold offered his services a few hours per week to allow state staff to tend to more essential duties.

  Greene took another bite of his Chunky. “First we got Richard ‘Duke’ Belluxi. Thirty five years old, I.Q. 113. Stage sociopath. They got him on a rapo fifteen years ago, but we know he did a lot more. We Amytaled the son of a bitch and figure he killed at least half a dozen people in his late teens, all sexually motivated. LH levels out the roof, this guy would fuck a brick wall if there was a hole in it. He did about ten years here before we gave him a roam status.”

  “Why isn’t he in prison?”

  Greene laughed without smiling. “He Gansered his way in. Made up a detailed delusion and stuck to it, then started doing the word salad for the court. You know how the judges are in this state. The guy raped a sixteen year old girl and cut off her arms for kicks, and the judge makes Belluxi look like the victim. Tell that to the girl—she lived. Anyway, we were stuck with him. A decade went by and he never caused much trouble, just mouthing off, a few confrontations with some techs. ACLU lawyer said he was going to sue the hospital if we didn’t give Belluxi some GB status. Said we were violating the guy’s rights. The way I see it his rights went out the window when he chopped off that girl’s arms, but you know how that is. Bet those grapeheads would sing a different tune if it was their daughters that Belluxi was cutting up.”

  “Like Kojak says: ‘The system stinks, baby, but there ain’t a better one.’”

  “Sure.”