Cal being alone in his office when Cy came in shooting, we were there."
"Gage, listen to me." She brought their hands together between them, looked over the joining directly into his eyes. "You're asking yourself, you're wondering if being there makes you to blame for what happened. You know in your heart, in your head-you know after twenty-one years of fighting this what's to blame."
" Cal 's alive. I know that matters to me more-"
"This isn't about more, or about less."
"He-the old man-it's the first time in my life I remember him stepping up for me. It's hard knowing it might be the last."
Standing in the June sunshine, as the scream of another ambulance hacked through the air, her heart broke for him. "We could look now, look at your father, if that would help you."
"No." He laid his cheek on the top of her head. "We'll wait."
HE THOUGHT IT WOULD BE HOURS. THE WAITING and the wondering and second-guessing that went with it. But Gage had barely reached the waiting room when a doctor in surgical scrubs came in. Gage knew as soon as their eyes met. He saw death in them. Inside his belly something twisted viciously, like a clenched fist jerking once, hard. Then it let go, and what was left behind was numb.
"Mr. Turner."
Gage rose, waved his friends back. He walked out to listen to the doctor tell him the old man was dead.
HE'D BURY THE OLD MAN BESIDE HIS WIFE AND daughter. That Gage could do. He wasn't having any damn viewing, or what he thought of as the after-graveside buffet. Short, simple, done. He let Cal handle the arrangements for a graveside service as long as it was brief. God knew Cal knew Bill Turner better than he did. Certainly the Bill Turner who died on the operating table.
He retrieved his father's one good suit from the apartment and delivered it to the funeral home. He ordered the headstone, paid for it and the other expenses in cash.
At some point, he supposed, he'd need to clean out the apartment, donate everything to Goodwill or the Salvation Army. Something. Or, as the odds were Cal would be making arrangements for his own graveside service before much longer, Gage figured he could leave that little chore to Cal and Fox.
They lied to the police, which wouldn't keep Gage from sleeping at night. With Jim Hawkins's help, they'd tampered with evidence. Cy remembered nothing, and Gage figured if the old man had to die, that shouldn't be for nothing either.
He came out of the funeral home, telling himself he'd done all he could. And he saw Frannie Hawkins standing beside his car.
"Cybil said you'd be here. I didn't want to come in, to intrude."
"You've never intruded."
She put her arms around him-one good, hard hug. "I'm sorry. I know how things were between you and Bill, but I'm sorry."
"I am, too. I'm just not sure what that covers."
"However things were, however he was, in the past, in the end he did everything he could to protect you-and my boy, and Fox. And in the end, you've done exactly the right thing for them, for the Hollow, and for Bill."
"I'm laying the rap for his own death on him."
"You're saving a good man, an innocent man from a murder charge and prison." Frannie's face radiated compassion. "It wasn't Cy who shot Cal or Bill-and we know that. It isn't Cy who should spend, potentially, the rest of his life behind bars, leave his wife alone, his kids and grandkids."
"No. We talked about that. The old man's not in a position to put his two cents in, so..."
"Then you should understand Bill considered Cy a friend, and it was mutual. After Bill quit drinking, Cy was one of the ones who'd sit around with him, drinking coffee or Cokes. I want you to know I feel absolutely certain this is what Bill would want you to do. As far as anyone knows, Bill came in with the gun, God knows why because none of us do, and when Cy and the rest of you tried to stop him, there was an accident. Bill wouldn't want Cy punished for what was beyond his control. And nothing can hurt Bill now. You know what happened, what Bill did in the end. It doesn't matter what anyone else knows."
It helped hearing it, helped rub dull the sharper edges of guilt. "I can't feel-the grief, the anger. I can't feel it."
"If and when you