And on your tombstone they would write something like HARRY JONES, CASTLE CORNERS, MAINE (Originally from Omaha, Nebraska).
Most of the tourists were headed toward 302, where they would turn east to Naples or west toward Bridgton, Fryeburg, and North Conway, New Hampshire, with its alpine slides, cut-rate amusement parks, and tax-free restaurants. Donna and Tad were not going up to the 302 junction.
Although their home overlooked downtown Castle Rock and its picturebook Town Common, woods had closed in on both sides of the road before they were five miles from their own front door. These woods drew back occasionally—a little—to show a lot with a house or a trailer in it, and as they went farther out, the houses were more often of the type that her father had called “shanty Irish.” The sun still shone brightly down and there was a good four hours of daylight left, but the emptiness made her feel uneasy again. It was not so bad here, on 117, but once they left the main road—
Their turnoff was marked with a sign saying MAPLE SUGAR ROAD in faded, almost unreadable letters. It had been splintered considerably by kids banging away with .22s and bird-shot. This road was two-lane blacktop, bumpy and frost-heaved. It wound past two or three nice houses, two or three not-so-nice houses, and one old and shabby RoadKing trailer sitting on a crumbling concrete foundation. There was a yardful of weeds in front of the trailer. Donna could see cheap-looking plastic toys in the weeds. A sign nailed askew to a tree at the head of the driveway read FREE KITTEN’S. A potbellied kid of maybe two stood in the driveway, his sopping Pamper hanging below his tiny penis. His mouth hung open and he was picking his nose with one finger and his navel with another. Looking at him, Donna felt a helpless chill of gooseflesh.
Stop it! For Christ’s sake, what’s wrong with you?
The woods closed in around them again. An old ’68 Ford Fairlane with a lot of rust-red primer paint on the hood and around the headlights passed them going the other way. A young kid with a lot of hair was slouched nonchalantly behind the wheel. He wasn’t wearing a shirt. The Fairlane was doing maybe eighty. Donna winced. It was the only traffic they saw.
The Maple Sugar Road climbed steadily, and when they passed the occasional field or large garden they were afforded a stunning view of western Maine toward Bridgton and Fryeburg. Long Lake glittered in the farthest distance like the sapphire pendant of a fabulously rich woman.
They were climbing another long slope up one of these eroded hills (as advertised, the sides of the road were now lined with dusty, heat-drooping maples) when the Pinto began to buck and jolt again. Donna’s breath clogged in her throat and she thought, Oh come on, oh come on, come on, you cruddy little car, come on!
Tad shifted uneasily in the passenger bucket and held onto his Snoopy lunchbox a little tighter.
She began to tap the accelerator lightly, her mind repeating the same words over and over like an inarticulate prayer: come on, come on, come on.
“Mommy? Is it—”
“Hush, Tad.”
The jerking grew worse. She pressed the gas pedal harder in frustration—and the Pinto squirted ahead, the engine smoothing out once more.
“Yay!” Tad said, so suddenly and loudly that she jumped.
“We’re not there yet, Tadder.”
A mile farther along they came to an intersection marked with another wooden sign, this one reading TOWN ROAD NO. 3. Donna turned in, feeling triumphant. As well as she remembered, Camber’s place was less than a mile and a half from here. If the Pinto gave up the ghost now, she and Tad could ankle it.
They passed a ramshackle house with a station wagon and a big old rusty white car in the driveway. In her rearview mirror, Donna noticed that the honeysuckle had really gone crazy on the side of the house that would catch most of the sun. A field opened up on their left after they passed the house, and the Pinto began to climb a long, steep hill.
Halfway up, the little car began to labor again. This time it was jerking harder than it ever had before.
“Will it get up, Mommy?”
“Yes,” she said grimly.
The Pinto’s speedometer needle dropped from forty to thirty. She dropped the transmission selector lever from drive into the lower range, thinking vaguely that it might help compression or something. Instead, the Pinto began to buck worse