paint on the trunks of the trees now pressing in close to the tracks, and there were pools of it in some of the sunken dips between the old rads-places where crossties had once been, Ralph supposed.
["We're getting close to where he lives, Ralph."] ["Yes. "I ["If he comes back and finds us in his place, what will we do?"] Ralph shrugged. He didn't know, and wasn't sure he cared. Let the forces that were moving them around like pawns on a chessboard-the ones Mr. C. and Mr.
L. had called the Higher Purpose-worry about that. If Atropos showed up, Ralph would try to yank out the little bald bugger's tongue and strangle him with it.
And if that upset somebody's applecart, too goddam bad. He couldn't take responsibility for grand plans and Long-Time business; his job now was to watch out for Lois, who was at risk, and try to stop the carnage that was going to occur not far from here in just a few hours. And who knew? He might even find a little extra time along the way which he could use to try and protect his own partially rejuvenated hide. This was the stuff he had to do, and if the nasty little fuck got in Ralph's way, one of them was going down. If that didn't fit in with the big boys' plans, tough titty.
Lois was picking most of this up from his aura-he could read that in her own when she touched his arm and he turned to look at her.
["What does that mean, Ralph? That you'll try to kill him if he gets in our way?"] He considered this, then nodded.
["Yeah-that's exactly what it means."] She thought about it, then nodded.
["Ralph?" He looked at her, eyebrows raised.
["If it needs to be done, I'll help you do it."] He was absurdly touched by this... and at pains to hide the rest of his thinking from her: that the only reason she was still with him at all was so that he could keep a protective eye on her. That thought led him back toward her earrings, but he pushed the image of them away, not wanting her to see-or even suspect-them in his aura.
Lois's thoughts, meanwhile, had gone on in a different, marginally safer, direction. without meeting him, he'll know some["Even if we get in and out one was there, won't he? He'll probably know who it was, too."] Ralph couldn't deny it, but didn't see that it mattered much; their options had been narrowed to just this one, at least temporarily.
They would take it a step at a time and just keep hoping that when the sun came up tomorrow morning, they would be around to see it.
Although, given a choice, I'd probably opt to sleep in, Ralph thought, and a small, wistful grin touched the corners of his mouth.
God, it feels like years since I slept in. His mind flashed from there to Carolyn's favorite saying, the one about how it was a long walk back to Eden. It seemed to him right now that Eden might simply be sleeping until noon... or maybe a little past.
He took Lois's hand and they started forward along Atropos's trail again.
Forty feet east of the Cyclone fence marking the edge of the airport, the rusty tracks petered out. Atropos's trail pushed on, however, although not for long; Ralph was quite sure he could see the spot where it ended, and the image of the two of them roped to the spokes of a big wheel recurred. If he was right, Atropos's den was only a stone's throw from where Ed had run into the fat man with the barrels of fertilizer in the back of his pickup truck.
The wind gusted, bringing them a sick, rotten smell from close by, and, from a little farther away, the voice of Faye Chapin, haranguing someone on his favorite subject: "... what I always say!
Mali-jongg is like chess, chess is like life, so if you can play either of those games-" The wind dropped again. Ralph could still hear Faye's voice if he strained his ears, but he had lost the individual words. That was all right, though; he had heard the lecture often enough to know pretty much how it went.
["Ralph, that stink is awful! It's him, isn't it?"] He nodded, but didn't think Lois saw him. She held his hand tightly in hers, looking straight ahead with wide eyes. The splotchy track which had begun at the doors