Cry for the Strangers Page 0,91

you I would have. We’d better get going though, or the movers are going to dump our stuff in the street. Whalen’ll lead us out there, just to make sure the place is all right.”

As if on cue, Harney Whalen emerged from the police station and stared balefully at the three of them. When he spoke his words were obviously directed at Jeff.

“I thought you’d be on your way by now.”

“I’m not going anywhere,” Jeff said softly. “Not till I find out what happened to my brother.”

Whalen’s tongue worked at his left cheek as he thought it over. “Still staying at the hotel?” he asked finally.

“He’ll be staying with us,” Elaine said flatly, as if to end the discussion.

“That so?” Whalen said. “Well, I guess it’s none of my business, is it. You want to follow me?”

“Sure,” Brad replied. He turned and signaled the movers, who were lounging against the fender of their truck half a block away. They ground their cigarettes out and climbed into the cab. “We’ll be right behind you,” Brad called to Whalen, who was already in his police car. Whalen’s hand, black-gloved, waved an acknowledgment, but he didn’t speak. Instead he simply started his engine and pulled away from the curb, his face expressionless as he passed them. The Randalls, with Jeff Horton, followed. Behind them, the moving truck closed the gap.

Harney Whalen drove the black-and-white slowly and kept his eyes steadily on the road. But he was driving automatically, guiding the car almost by instinct. His mind was in turmoil.

Jeff Horton wasn’t going to go home.

Instead he was going to stay in Clark’s Harbor, stirring up trouble.

And the Randalls. Where had they come from? He searched his mind, trying to remember having signed a lease.

His mind was blank. He remembered showing them the house, but as for a lease—nothing. Absolutely nothing.

More trouble.

Harney Whalen didn’t like trouble. He wondered what he should do about it.

And he wondered why strangers kept coming to Clark’s Harbor. It had never been a good place for strangers.

Never had been, and never would be.

20

The procession made an odd spectacle as it moved out of Clark’s Harbor, the black-and-white police car leading the way with Harney Whalen at the wheel, his eyes fixed firmly on the road in front of him, an odd look on his face: a look that would have told anyone who happened to see it that Whalen’s mind was far away. Behind him were the Randalls, with Jeff Horton in the back seat. Elaine made sporadic attempts at conversation, but all three of them were preoccupied with their own thoughts, and they soon fell silent. The small moving truck brought up the rear.

It’s almost like some bizarre funeral cortege, Elaine was thinking. She glanced out the side window of the car and saw several people standing on the sidewalk, having left whatever they had been doing to watch the newcomers make their arrival. Their faces seemed to Elaine to be impassive, as if the arrival of the Randalls would have no effect on them whatsoever—something to be observed that would not change their lives. And yet, as she absorbed their strange impassivity, Elaine began to feel as if there was something else, some fear that they were trying to cover up. She glanced quickly at Brad, but he was concentrating on the road, unaware of the watching faces on the sidewalks. Then they turned up Harbor Road, leaving the village behind.

The procession headed north on the highway, passed Glen Palmer’s gallery, and quickly disappeared around the bend that would take them close to the coastline. Harney Whalen increased his speed, and the car and truck behind him accelerated. They were cruising at the speed limit when Whalen suddenly noticed the two children in the road ahead. For a few seconds he kept up his speed, bearing down on Robby and Missy Palmer, the car hurtling forward straight toward them. Whalen felt himself freeze at the wheel, unable to move. Then, as the gap between himself and the children quickly closed, he forced his right foot off the accelerator, hit the brake, swerved, and leaned on the horn.

Missy scrambled off the pavement into the ditch almost before the sound of the horn split the air. But Robby remained in the road, turning slowly to stare at the oncoming car as if he didn’t recognize that he was in danger.

“Robby!” Missy screamed. And then the horn was followed by the shrieking of tires being ripped loose from their grip