spilled out a steady flood of golden oldies, and today all of them seemed to be instrumentals - 'Rebel Rouser', 'Wild Weekend', 'Telstar', Sandy Nelson's jungle-driven 'Teen Beat', and 'Rumble' by Line Wray, the greatest of them all. His back nagged, but in a low key. The flurry intensified briefly to a dark grey cloud of snow. He popped on his headlights, and just as quickly the snow tapered off and the clouds broke, spilling through bars of remote and coldly beautiful late-afternoon winter sun.
He cruised.
He came out of his thoughts which now were that Repperton had maybe come to a perfectly fitting end after all - and was shocked to realize that it was nearly quarter of six, and dark. Gino's Pizza was coming up on the left, the little green neon shamrocks shimmering in the dark. Arnie pulled over to the kerb and got out. He started to cross the street, then realized he had left his keys in Christine's ignition.
He leaned in to get them . . . and suddenly the smell assaulted him, the smell Leigh had told him about, the smell he had denied.
It was here now, as if it had come out when he left the car - a high, rotten, meaty smell that made his eyes water and his throat close. He snatched the keys and stood back, trembling, looking at Christine with something like horror.
Arnie, there was a smell. A horrible, rotten smell . . . you know what I'm talking about.
No, I don't have the slightest idea . . . you're imagining things.
But if she was, so was he.
Arnie turned suddenly and ran across the street to Gino's as if the devil was on his tail.
Inside, he ordered a pizza he didn't really want, changed some quarters for dimes, and slipped into the telephone booth beside the juke. It was thumping some current tune Arnie had not heard before.
He called home first. His father answered, his voice oddly toneless - Arnie had never heard Michael's voice quite that way before, and his unease deepened. His father sounded like Mr Slawson. This Thursday afternoon and evening were taking on the maroon tones of nightmare. Beyond the glass walls of the booth, strange faces drifted dreamily past, like untethered balloons on which someone had crudely drawn human faces, God at work with a Magic Marker.
Shitters,he thought disjointedly. All a bunch of shitters.
'Hello, Dad,' he said uncertainly. 'Look, I - uh, I kind of lost track of the time here, I'm sorry.'
'That's all right,' Michael said. His voice was almost a drone, and Arnie felt his unease deepen into something like fright. 'Where are you, the garage?'
'No - uh, Gino's. Gino's Pizza. Dad, are you okay? You sound funny.'
'I'm fine,' Michael said. 'Just scraped your dinner down the garbage disposal, your mother's upstairs crying again, and you're having a pizza. I'm fine. Enjoying your car, Arnie?'
Arnie's throat worked, but no sound came out.
'Dad,' he managed finally, 'I don't think that's very fair.'
'I don't think I'm very interested anymore in what you think is fair and what you don't think is fair,' Michael said. 'You had some justification for your behaviour at first, perhaps. But in the last month or so you've turned into someone I don't understand at all, and something is going on that I understand even less. Your mother doesn't understand it either, but she senses it, and it's hurting her very badly. I know she brought part of the hurt on herself, but I doubt if that changes the quality of the pain.'
'Dad, I just lost track of the time!' Arnie cried. 'Stop making such a big thing out of it!'
'Were you driving around?'
'Yes, but - '
'I notice that's when it usually happens, Michael said. 'Will you be home tonight?'
'Yes, early,' Arnie said. He wet his lips. 'I just want to go by the garage, I have some information Will asked me to get while I was in Philly
'I'm not very interested in that either, pardon me,' Michael said. His voice was still polite, chillingly disconnected.
'Oh,' Arnie said in a very small voice. He was very scared now, almost trembling.
'Arnie?'
'What?' Arnie nearly whispered.
'What is going on?'
'I don't know what you mean.'
'Please. That detective came by to see me at my office. He was after Regina, as well. He upset her very badly. I don't think he meant to, but - '
'What was it this time?' Arnie asked' fiercely. 'That fucker, what was it this time? I'll - '