and running for it, and perhaps he would have done it if he had been driving Christine . . . but he wasn't. He saw Will Darnell telling him that if he got caught holding a bag, it was his bag. Most of all he saw Junkins, Junkins with his sharp brown eyes, and knew this was Junkins's doing.
He wished Rudolph Junkins was dead.
'Pull over, Chrysler! I'm not talking to hear my own voice! Pull over right now!'
Can't say anything, Arnie thought incoherently as he veered over into the breakdown lane. His balls were crawling, his stomach churning madly. He could see his own eyes in the rearview, wall-eyed with fear behind his glasses - not for him, though. Not for him. Christine. He was afraid for Christine. What they might do to Christine.
His panic-stricken mind spun up a kaleidoscope of jumbled images. College application forms with the words REJECTED - CONVICTED FELON stamped across them. Prison bars, blued steel. A judge bending down from a high bench, his face white and accusing. Big bull queers in a prison yard looking for fresh meat. Christine riding the conveyor into the car-crusher in the junkyard behind the garage.
And then, as he stopped the Chrysler and put it in park, the State Police car pulling in behind him (and another, appearing like magic, pulling in ahead of him), a thought came from nowhere, full of cold comfort: Christine can take care of herself.
Another thought came as the cops got out and came toward him, one holding a search warrant in his hand. It also seemed to come from nowhere, but it reverberated in Roland D. LeBay's raspy, old man's tones:
And she'll take care of you, boy. All you got to do is go on believing in her and she'll take care of you.
Arnie opened the car door and got out a moment before one of the cops could open it.
'Arnold Richard Cunningham? one of the cops asked. 'Yes, indeed,' Arnie said calmly. 'Was I speeding?'
'No, son,' one of the others said. 'But you are in a world of hurt, all the same.'
The first cop stepped forward as formally as a career Army officer. 'I have a duly executed document here permitting the search of this 1966 Chrysler Imperial in the name of the People of New York State and of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and of the United States of America. Further
'Well, that just about covers the motherfucking waterfront, doesn't it?' Arnie said. His back flared dully, and he jammed his hands against it.
The cop's eyes widened slightly at the old voice coming out of this kid, but then he went on.
'Further, to seize any contraband found in the course of this search in the name of the People of New York State and of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and of the United States of America.'
'Fine,' Arnie said. None of it seemed real. Blue lights flashed a confusion. People passing in their cars turned to look, but he found he had no desire to turn from them, to hide his face, and that was something of a relief.
'Give me the keys, kid,' one of the cops said.
'Why don't you just get them yourself, you shitter?' Arnie said.
'You're not helping yourself, kiddo,' the cop said, but he looked startled and a little fearful all the same; for a moment the kid's voice had deepened and roughened and he had sounded forty years older and a pretty tough customer - nothing like the skinny runt he saw before him at all.
He leaned in, got the keys, and three of the cops immediately headed for the boot. They know, Arnie thought, resigned. At least this had nothing to do with Junkins's obsession with Buddy Repperton and Moochie Welch and the others (at least not directly, he amended cautiously); this smelled like a well-planned and well-coordinated operation against Will's smuggling operations from Libertyville into New York and New England.
'Kid,' one of the cops said, 'would you like to answer some questions or make a statement? If you think you would, I'll read you the Miranda right now.'
'No,' Arnie said calmly. 'I don't have anything to say.'
'Things could go a lot easier with you.'
'That's coercion,' Arnie said, smiling a little. 'Watch out or you'll put a big fat hole in your own case.'
The cop flushed. 'If you want to be an asshole, that's your lookout.'
The Chrysler boot was open. They bad pulled out the spare tyre, the jack, and several boxes of small parts springs, nuts, bolts,