cleared a little-not much, but enough for him to realize there was really just one answer to her question.
"We go up," he said.
Blink." and the flames shooting over the grove of spruces went from orange to green. The hungry crackling sound became muffled, like the sound of firecrackers going off inside a closed box. Still holding Lois's hand, Ralph led her around the front bumper of the State Police car which had been left as a roadblock.
The newly arrived police-cars were pulling up behind the roadblock. Men in blue uniforms came spilling out of them almost before they had stopped. Several were carrying riot guns and most were wearing puffy black vests. One of them sprinted through Ralph like a gust of warm wind before he could dodge aside: a young man named David Wilbert who thought his wife might be having an affair with her boss at the real-estate office where she worked as a secretary. The question of his wife had taken a back seat (at least temporarily) to David Wilbert's almost overpowering need to pee, however, and to the constant, frightened chant that wove through his thoughts like a snake: ["You won't disgrace yourself, you won't disgrace yourself, you won't, you won't, you won't."] "PicKERiNG!" the amplified voice bellowed, and Ralph found he could actually taste the words in his mouth, like small silver pellets.
(YOUR FRIENDS ARE DEAD, PICKERING! THROW DOW,N YOUR WEAPON AND STEP OUT INTO THE YARD! LET US SAVE THE WOMEN."
"Ralph and Lois rounded the corner, unseen by the men running all around them, and came to a tangle of police-cars parked at the place where the road became a driveway lined on both sides by pretty planter-boxes filled with bright flowers.
The woman's touch that means so much, Ralph thought.
The driveway opened into the dooryard of a rambling white farmhouse at least seventy years old. It was three storeys high, with two wings and a long porch which ran the length of the building and commanded a fabulous view toward the west, where dim blue mountains rose in the mid-morning light. This house with its peaceful view had once housed the Barrett family and their apple business and had more recently housed dozens of battered, frightened women, but one look was enough to tell Ralph that it would house no one at all come this time tomorrow morning. The south wing was in flames, and that side of the porch was catching; tongues of fire poked out the windows and licked lasciviously along the eaves, sending shingles floating upward in fiery scraps. He saw a wicker rocking chair burning at the far end of the porch. A half-knitted scarf lay over one of the rocker's arms; the needles dangling from it glowed white-hot.
Somewhere a wind-chime was tinkling a mad repetitive melody.
A dead woman in green fatigues and a flak-jacket sprawled headdown on the porch steps, glaring at the sky through the bloodsmeared lenses of her glasses. There was dirt in her hair, a pistol in her hand, and a ragged black hole in her midsection. A man lay draped over the railing at the north end of the porch with one booted foot propped on the lawn-glider. He was also wearing fatigues and a flak-jacket. An assault-rifle with a banana clip sticking out of it lay in a flowerbed below him. Blood ran down his fingers and dripped from his nails. To Ralph's heightened eye, the drops looked black and dead.
Felton, he thought. If the police are still yelling at Charlie Pickering-if Pickering's inside-then that must be Frank Felton.
And what about Susan Day? Ed's down the coast somewhere-Lois seemed sure of that, and I think she's' right-but what if Susan Day's in there? Jesus, is that possible?
He supposed it was, but the possibilities didn't matter-not now.
Helen and Natalie were almost certainly in there, along with God knew how many other helpless, terrorized women, and that did matter.
There was the sound of breaking glass from inside the house, followed by a soft explosion-almost a gasp. Ralph saw new flames jump up behind the panes of the front door.
Molotov cocktails, he thought. Charlie Pickering_finally got a chance to throw a few. How wonderful for him.
Ralph didn't know how many cops were crouched behind the cars parked at the head of the driveway-it looked like at least thirty-but he picked out the two who had busted Ed Deepneau at once.
Chris Nell was crouched behind the front tire of the Derry police car closest to the house, and