Weizak sighed. “Johnny, I could maybe give you a lie, but that would be no good. I didn’t ask you first because I was afraid you would say no. And I didn’t tell you I’d done it afterward because the sheriff laughed at me. When someone laughs at one of my suggestions, I assume, nuh, that the suggestion is not going to be taken.”
Johnny rubbed at one aching temple with his free hand and closed his eyes. “But why, Sam? You know how I feel about that. You were the one who told me to keep my head down and let it blow over. You told me that yourself.”
“It was the piece in the paper,” Sam said. “I said to myself, Johnny lives down that way. And I said to myself, five dead women. Five.” His voice was slow, halting, and embarrassed. It made Johnny feel much worse to hear Sam sounding like this. He wished he hadn’t called.
“Two of them teen-age girls. A young mother. A teacher of young children who loved Browning. All of it so corny, nuh? So corny I suppose they would never make a movie or a TV show out of it. But nonetheless true. It was the teacher I thought about most. Stuffed into a culvert like a bag of garbage ...”
“You had no damn right to bring me into your guilt fantasies,” Johnny said thickly.
“No, perhaps not.”
“No perhaps about it!”
“Johnny, are you all right? You sound ...”
“I’m fine!” Johnny shouted.
“You don’t sound fine.”
“I’ve got a shitter of a headache, is that so surprising? I wish to Christ you’d left this alone. When I told you about your mother you didn’t call her. Because you said ...”
“I said some things are better lost than found. But that is not always true, Johnny. This man, whoever he is, has a terribly disturbed personality. He may kill himself. I am sure that when he stopped for two years the police thought he had. But a manic-depressive sometimes has long level periods—it is called a ‘plateau of normality’—and then goes back to the same mood-swings. He may have killed himself after murdering that teacher last month. But if he hasn’t, what then? He may kill another one. Or two. Or four. Or ...”
“Stop it.”
Sam said, “Why did Sheriff Bannerman call you? What made him change his mind?”
“I don’t know. I suppose the voters are after him.”
“I’m sorry I called him, Johnny, and that this has upset you so. But even more I am sorry that I did not call you and tell you what I had done. I was wrong. God knows you have a right to live your life quietly.”
Hearing his own thoughts echoed did not make him feel better. Instead he felt more miserable and guilty than ever.
“All right,” he said. “That’s okay, Sam.”
“I’ll not say anything to anyone again. I suppose that is like putting a new lock on the barn door after a horse theft, but it’s all I can say. I was indiscreet. In a doctor, that’s bad.”
“All right,” Johnny said again. He felt helpless, and the slow embarrassment with which Sam spoke made it worse.
“I’ll see you soon?”
“I’ll be up in Cleaves next month to start teaching. I’ll drop by.”
“Good. Again, my sincere apologies, John.”
Stop saying that!
They said their good-byes and Johnny hung up, wishing he hadn’t called at all. Maybe he hadn’t wanted Sam to agree so readily that what he had done was wrong. Maybe what he had really wanted Sam to say was, Sure I called him. I wanted you to get off your ass and do something.
He wandered across to the window and looked out into the blowing darkness. Stuffed into a culvert like a bag of garbage.
God, how his head ached.
5
Herb got home half an hour later, took one look at Johnny’s white face and said, “Headache?”
“Yeah.”
“Bad?”
“Not too bad.”
“We want to watch the national news,” Herb said. “Glad I got home in time. Bunch of people from NBC were over in Castle Rock this afternoon, filming. That lady reporter you think is so pretty was there. Cassie Mackin.”
He blinked at the way Johnny turned on him. For a moment it seemed that Johnny’s face was all eyes, staring out at him and full of a nearly inhuman pain.
“Castle Rock? Another murder?”
“Yeah. They found a little girl on the town common this morning. Saddest damn thing you ever heard of. I guess she had a pass to go across the common to the library for some