Chapter 4

Such AN experience isn't easy to forget, AND Jimmy didn't forget it as he rode through the most part of the next day.

He went through three towns before he stopped at a roadside tavern for a sandwich and some beer. The place was just a joint, one story, white, with a green tar shingle roof, but by the time he came upon it he was so fatigued it looked like a small oasis.

The tap room was paneled in unfinished knotty pine. The bartender looked at him but didn't ask for a draft card when Jimmy ordered a tall glass of Ballantine from the tap.

The beer was cold and good after the hot dusty road and he quaffed it down almost in one draw. There were no other customers in the place, and the bartender, a balding portly man in his late forties, seemed in a mood to talk. He did, after he saw that Jimmy was staying for a refill.

"That's a nice bike you got there, kid."

Jimmy resented the "kid" bit, but he smiled pleasantly and said "Thanks. It's a Harley Davidson."

"Yeah?" the bartender said, wiping his sweating dome with a big dirty white handkerchief. "You must be in one of them motorcycle clubs, huh?"

Jimmy shook his head. He didn't especially want to talk to this guy, but he also thought it might look funny if he didn't. They might have an A. P. B. out on the murder already, if the State Police had discovered the corpse, and someone might stop here later and ask if the innkeeper had noticed any suspiciously acting customers.

"No?" the bartender said, for some reason looking relieved.

"No. I'm just going downstate to visit my aunt."

"Oh, I see. Well, that's good. I'm glad to hear that, in fact. You look like a nice cleancut kid-that's what I said to myself when you walked in; he looks like a real nice cleancut kid. But with the black leather jacket and all you never know. I thought maybe you was in one of them motorcycle gangs-the hoodlums, you know."

"Oh, no sir."

"Yeah, I see you ain't got no skull and crossbones on the back. Here, have this one on me." He took Jimmy's glass and drew another one, setting it before Jimmy with a flourish.

"Those gangs," he said, wagging his head knowingly. "They ought to be kept off the road. Nothing but criminals, they are. Not that every kid who has a bike is bad-lookit you-but when they band up like that you have to fear for your life when you near them coming! Me, I say they ought to bust them all up, throw the scum in jail and teach 'em a lesson."

"Yeah, maybe you're right," Jimmy said. "Can I get a sandwich here?"

"That you can, boy; that you can. Sausage, meat loaf, liverwurst, roast beef...."

"I'll take a roast beef on rye."

"Mustard?"

"Catsup."

"Coming up."

The bartender went to make the sandwich and Jimmy sat on the wooden stool, sipping his third beer. He was beginning to relax now, and, relaxing, he felt for the first time how tired he was. But it was a rather pleasant kind of tiredness, and the beer tasted good, and as he went over things he began to feel a little more cheerful.

For one thing, he couldn't see any way they could connect him with the crime that had been committed back in that abandoned old cemetery. He had been really scared, but now, in the light of day, it all seemed something like a bad dream, to be forgotten as quickly as possible.

After all, it wasn't as if he were really connected with it. It had just been an accident that he happened to be there. And besides, maybe she hadn't really been dead. It was hard to think of a beautiful young girl like that as being dead. But then, the whole thing had been hard to believe.

No; he thought; as far as he could see he was in the clear and there was no way they could touch him. Reporting the crime to the police would only have involved him, maybe put him under suspicion. They would see him as a footloose teenage hot-roder wandering around looking for trouble and there would be a lot of questions and finally his parents getting involved in it, and that would be the end of his plans for a swinging summer. He had worked and saved too long for this to have it ruined at the outset. And the cops would catch those college guys anyway, if they had really killed her.

So thinking, he ate his sandwich and finished his beer in silence while the bartender served some construction workers who had come into the place.

He paid for the sandwich. "Is there a filling station near here?" he asked the bartender before leaving.

"About a mile down the road, boy; can't miss it,"

"Thanks. See you."

"Good luck, boy. Be careful with that thing now."

Jimmy nodded and left the place.

The Harley was almost out of gas by the time he reached the filling station. It was just an old beaten-up looking place with one rusted orange pump outside, and at first Jimmy thought it was deserted. He parked the motorcycle in front and got off to check. One thing was sure; he needed gas right away. He had no idea when the next station might be, and there was only enough gas in the tank for a couple more miles.

He found no one inside the office in the shack. Just a dusty room with a desk and a chair and cans of motor oil stacked around the walls.

"Hello!" he called, cupping his hands to his face.

No answer.

He had to have gas. Tired as he was, he might not even get to the next station if there was one. A place by the side of the road to sack out in was in order, but first he had to gas the Harley. He went back outside to the pump to see if it was locked.

It wasn't. He removed the cap from the belly tank of the motorcycle, wound the pump and stuck the nozzle in and began filling it up, figuring to leave the money for the sale on the desk inside when he was finished.

It was almost filled when he heard a voice behind him.

"Hi," the voice said. "What you doing?"

It was a girl's voice and it belonged to a pale freckled blue-eyed straw-haired young thing of about fourteen, wearing faded blue jeans and a man's khaki work shirt that was much too big for her. The tails hung out and the sleeves were rolled up and the top three buttons undone. Her hair, bleached colorless, was held by a blue band of ribbon and it hung down behind as far as her shoulder blades. She was a very slim young thing with wild eyes, but rather pretty in a tomboyish way. Like somebody's kid sister who liked to climb trees and play at boys' games.

She wore no shoes. Her bare dirty feet shuffled in the dust as Jimmy looked at her, surprised at her sudden appearance.

"I'm getting gas," he explained. "Isn't anyone watching this station?"

"I'm watching it. You owe me two dollars and seventy-nine cents for that. You got money?"

"Sure. I couldn't find anyone around and I needed the gas, so I helped myself. But I was going to pay."

"That's all right then. I was out back of the shed chopping some wood for the stove. Ma went to town for the day and I'm taking care of everything."

Jimmy couldn't help snickering. "You are, huh?" he said, hanging up the pump hose.

"Sure. Don't you think I can? I can grease a car, too, and change tires and adjust carburetors and...."

"Okay, okay," Jimmy laughed; "I believe you honey. Only, doesn't your old man do those things?"

She made a wry face. "I don't have any. 'Least, not since I can remember. Just me and Ma is all. But I can do anything a man can do and do it better."

Jimmy got three bills out of his wallet and handed them to her. He followed her inside to get his change, curious about this funny little girl.

She made change on the ancient crank-handle cash register and handed it to him.

"That's a nice looking motorcycle you got there," she said enthusiastically. "Would you take me for a ride on it?"

"I don't think I better," he laughed. "You might lose customers. Besides, I'm dead tired from traveling ail day, kid. Got to find me a nice quiet place to sleep."

"Why not sleep here then? There's a bed in back and I won t charge you anything for it."

Jimmy was surprised by the offer. "But your mother...."

"She don't come back till the next day when she goes into town. She's got a boy friend there, sleeps with him. Thinks I don't know, but I watched one time when he was out here and stayed overnight. I don't like him. But I like you-you're real cute. Why don't you stay if you need sleep? Better than laying out in some old field and having a farmer chase after you with a pitchfork."

It was a funny image and he couldn't help laughing, both at that and at the way she talked about her mother and her mother's boy friend. A real fresh kid, part wild, he guessed-but he sort of liked her open, friendly manner.

And he was dead tired.

"Okay," he said quickly. "For a couple of hours anyway. Till it gets dark."

"You like riding at night?"

"Sure."

"I bet that's fun. Well, put your motorcycle around back in case somebody comes and gets nosy. The bedroom's right in there."

Just the mention of a bed made Jimmy realize how tired he actually was. He hadn't had any real sleep in almost forty hours; just a wink or two, and it would be good to lie in a real sack.

Very good.

Feeling slightly drugged, he wheeled the cycle around back of the shack and reentered it through the back screen door.

The place wasn't much to look at-a tiny kitchen, a smaller living room and two closet-sized bedrooms. The furniture was all old and decrepit, giving off a musty odor, but the place wasn't too badly kept for all that.

He went into the nearest bedroom, not caring whose it was, took off his jacket and boots and lay down on the sagging cot-like bed. To his drugged body it felt like the height of comfort; much better than the hard ground he had been contemplating, and through the open window he could smell the breeze and hear birds singing. This was real country, he thought, and then he promptly drifted off to sleep. A deep dark dreamless sleep known only to the really tired.

Much later, he awakened from it gradually. The sound of crickets in full chorus came through the screen, bringing him out of it, but in the netherland between sleep and wakefulness he had a dream that seemed very real. His eyes were open, it seemed, but he had no idea where he was and no control over his limbs. The screech of the crickets rose up to a din.

Suddenly he was back in the cemetery.

He groaned, tried to move, to yell, his throat working furiously, but no sound seemed to come out-only a strangled senseless babble. He began to struggle on the bed. trying desperately to wake himself up.

But then a cool hand touched his forehead and a voice spoke to him:

"What's the matter? Are you having a bad dream?"

Slowly his eyes re-focused on the room, strange now in the semi-darkness, but he remembered where he was at least, and the hand, rubbing his chest and stomach under his tee shirt, had a warm reassuring feel to it.

Dimly he made out the girl, seated in shadow on the edge of the bed next to him.

He let out a long sigh of relief.

"God! Yeah, it was a real bad one. I'm okay now though. What time is it?"

"Half-past eleven. I was sleeping in the other room myself when you started yelling, so I come in to see what was the matter with you. You slept like a baby all evening."

"Umm. Thanks. I didn't know it was so late. I guess I better be going."

"Don't hurry," she said softly, pulling up his shirt and continued to rub with her delicate bird-like hand. "You have a dream like that, it must mean the witches got into your craw. Now you got to make sure they're gone before you get up from bed or else they'll follow you wherever you go."

Her tone of voice was so serious it made Jimmy laugh.

"I don't believe in witches, kid."

"My name's Cindy and I'm almost fifteen," she replied tardy, giving him a sharp little pinch. "So don't you go talking down at me! And even if you don't believe in witches you ought to be more careful. You never know."

Jimmy grinned in the darkness, reaching over the bed for his jacket, which had some cigarettes in the pocket. This nutty little girl was one of the funniest he had ever met, he thought, but it wouldn't do any harm to smoke a cigarette before he took off. At least she had been nice to him, very hospitable.

He stuck a cigarette in his mouth and started to light it when she stopped him with her hand, "Let me have one too."

"Do you smoke?"

"Of course! I'm fifteen, ain't I?"

"That's right; I forgot," Jimmy laughed, and held the pack out to her. She took one and put it between her lips, and then he struck a match to light it with.

Suddenly he sat up with surprise.

"Hey! You don't have any clothes on!" The flame of the match had revealed what he couldn't see before in the shadowy darkness: she was completely naked from head to toe.

"Are you going to light me or ain't you?" she said, ignoring his exclamation.

He lit her cigarette and then his hand, shaking the match out quickly afterward and dropping it to the floor.

"Don't see why a girl has to wear anything in this weather," she said then. "Ain't you ever seen a naked girl before?"

"Sure," Jimmy said, puffing on his weed and laying back on the bed again, but still looking at her. His eyes, accustomed now to the trickly light, traveled over her pert body, the white skin and hard little beginning breasts. She saw him looking at her but didn't move.

What a funny little witch, Jimmy thought, amused by her innocent display. When she made fifteen, she wouldn't be anything like Myra was, but she was cute as hell in her own slim boyish way.

And bold as hell.

"Can I lie down next to you?" she said, moving on the bed.

Jimmy moved over and let her lie down next to him. She snuggled close, putting her head on his shoulder. He was surprised to find that he didn't mind at all. It made him feel protective toward her, like she was his kid sister or something.

They smoked for a while in silence, only the night sounds coming through the screen and an occasional car going by on the highway to disturb them. Her slim body was like a little warm bird nesting against him.

A little yellow bird.

"What's your name?" she whispered.

"Jimmy."'

"That's a nice name. I had a boy friend once named Jimmy."

"No kidding."

"Uh-huh. He was real nice, but then he moved away. Where you going, Jimmy?"

"South. All over."

"I wish I was going with you."

He didn't say anything to that. The way she was snuggling up to him and running her hand over his bare skin above the slacks was causing a change in him.

It was getting difficult to think of her as a kid sister.

Very difficult.

He leaned over her and stubbed his cigarette out on the ash tray on a stand near the bed, and as he was doing so she suddenly wrapped her arms around him and began kissing his chest.

"Hey!"

"Put mine out too, Jimmy," she said, handing her cigarette to him. He took it and ground it in the tray, leaning across her again, and this time she went much further than kisses.

Her hand slipped quickly under his belt. She tickled.

"You're crazy!" he gasped. "What are you trying to do, damn it!"

"I knew you liked me," she giggled.

"You're just a kid," he said shakily. "Hell, you don't even know what you're doing!"

"Don't I? Why don't you take off your clothes and see?"

"No," he said firmly. "I've got to go." But she was undoing his clothes for him. A catch, a button-and her hand was driving him crazy.

Wild.

This was too much for him to resist. He lay back and let her work, and pretty soon she was kneeling in the darkness, tugging his pants down.

And then his shorts.

And touching him. Her hands were like the feathered wings of a small bird, fluttering and brushing, tickling and touching, caressing and exploring.

He knew he was eager with excitement, but a stab of conscience made him speak.

"God Cindy-you shouldn't do things like this with boys. This's bad."

"Why?"

"You just teases them and make them want to do bad things to you, things you shouldn't do till you get a little older."

This time it was she who laughed.

"You're funny," she said. "Don't you think I've done that before?"

Aroused, excited and excitedly curious, he craned his head up to look at her.

"You have? When?"

"Oh, ages ago. When I was eleven, if you mean the first time. Ma used to have a real mean boy friend and one night he came out here all whiskeyed up, when I was alone."

"God," Jimmy said, excited. "What did he do?"

"Well, first he beat me. He grabbed me by the hair and dragged me out to the shed and beat me with this big thick belt he used to wear, something like yours. I was scared something awful."

Jimmy was held in a double suspense of physical excitement and vivid mental pictures which flashed through his brain as she told her story.

"And then?"

"Well, then he made me take all my clothes off while he turned the gas lantern up real bright so he could watch. Oh, I don't like to talk about that though."

"Tell me," Jimmy urged. "I want to hear the rest of that, Cindy honey I"

"All right, but I don't see why. That was just plain awful, all dark and everything, and when he got his for miles I guess, at least no one came so I guess no one heard. When I finished undressing he made me sit on a milking stool and watch him undress. He was awful, all dark and everything, and when he got his clothes off he looked so scary to me I thought I'd die if he touched me.

"I tried to run then, scared as I was to even move, but he caught me and threw me down so hard I saw stars in the back of my head. Even so, I was ready to run again the first chance I got, and I think he must have known that because he picked me up and threw me on the work bench-we used to have a work bench out there with tools and all, most of them rusted and going to pieces.

"But there was this vise that still worked and he used that on me."

"Used that on you?" Jimmy said, barely able to speak with the excitement she was causing in him. "How?"

"Put my arm in, he did, and turned it up so tight he like to bust it, the rotten jerk. I didn't get rid of that bruise for a good month and couldn't even milk the cow for even longer than that. Boy, was Ma mad when she found out what happened!

"Anyway, he had me like that and I couldn't move and the pain was terrible; I just screamed and screamed till I thought my lungs was going to explode. But they didn't."

"What happened then?"

"I don't know. I went out, I think, because everything went red and then black and when I opened my eyes again he was hurting me something awful. I don't know how long that lasted because everything went black again. And when I woke up he was gone and Ma was standing there, crying and carrying on something awful. My arm was all numb and the workbench was all upset, and when she helped me get up I could hardly walk. I was real sick for a long time and had to stay in bed."

"Did the police get him?"

"No; Ma said not to say anything or he might come back some day and kill us both. He was from some kind of army hospital I think and she was afraid they'd just put him in again and then he'd get out and come back and kill us both. She told me something was wrong with his head, he had a piece of metal in it from a bomb or something. But she said not to worry, he wouldn't be back again and I'd get better after awhile. She was real nice to me, took care of me and didn't have any boy friends for a long time after that. Only now she does again, two or three of them I think. They're not so bad except for Frank, the one she went to see today when he called her up on the phone. He looks at me like he'd like to do like that other one did. Only he's not crazy, I don't think."

"But what if he came back some night and tried?" Jimmy said, amazed by the whole story.

She answered that question very quickly by reaching down at the foot of the bed for something Jimmy couldn't quite make out in the darkness.

But when she brought it up and put it to his stomach he saw and felt what it was.

A double-barreled, sawed-off shotgun.

"Ma said if anyone comes around and tries to get fresh to use this on him," Cindy said. "That's why I brought it with me in here when you started yelling, in case you turned out to be crazy or something. See?"

"But I'm not!" Jimmy nearly screamed.

She laughed, easing the pressure of the gun.

"I know that. But if you don't do what I say for you to do, I might just make a mistake and think different. You wouldn't want me to do that, would you?"

"God no!"

"Then you better do what I say."

"Sure. Just say what."

"Sleep with me."

"Sure, anything. Only put that damn thing down, for God's sake!"

She did. She put it down by the side of the bed, within her reach but out of his. Then she began leaning over him and kissing him again.

Jimmy closed his eyes and let her, breathing easier now. She was crazy; there was no doubt about that but as long as he did what she wanted he would get off without a load of buckshot.

She had cooled his excitement with the shotgun but she was artful and clever and pretty soon she had him stimulated all over again, nearly as much as before, when she had been telling the story of her life to him.

A wild story.

And a wild mountain girl. Unbelievable.

But he saw now how he could get even with her for the little trick she had played on him with the gun.

She was getting excited now too; excited as hell, kissing him and rubbing her soft-hard downy body against his.

It wasn't long before he was ready.

Her little breasts were like hard green apples just about to ripen and her mouth tasted like spring water and wild mint. He kissed her and stroked her little bumps; he teased her with his hands and with his lips, and then she was ready.

"Oh! Oh, oh, oh!"

But he didn't begin right away. Excited as her wiry little body made him, he wanted a taste of revenge. He caught the shotgun by the barrel and brought it up to his hands, pointing it at her chest.

"Now," he panted, "how do you like being threatened with a gun, damn you!"

To his amazement, she simply laughed.

"I don't mind;" she whispered, "as long as there ain't nothing in it-and there ain't a damn thing in that old blunderbuss!"

Her words stung him to the quick. In a fury he heaved the gun at the window, but it missed, colliding with the wall and clattering noisily to the floor.

"Damn you!" he said, and slapped her across the face, but she was still laughing.

And finally, he was laughing with her. Hell, the joke was on him-he had let himself be fooled by a fourteen-year-old mountain girl!

The joke was on him, but pretty soon neither of them were laughing.

Her little body was like a hard tight flame, moving in ten different directions at once, and he began to enjoy her in earnest.

She was like wildfire.

Dynamite.

Eighty pounds of TNT, rolled up into a tight, pretty little package, and a real swinger. She swung with him, making a difficult job enjoyable, and the cot springs began squeaking louder than the crickets outside.

Louder and louder.

Louder still.

And then the bed seemed to leap into the air and the wails came crashing down around them as stars burst out of their orbits and fell down through the night, down to where they lay in a tangled heap of naked limbs.

The night was peaceful then. Again he could hear the crickets, against the softly ululating backdrop of her child-like breathing, like the dip and swell of waves slushing over a sandbar.

But it was time to go. She said nothing and he didn't even know if she was awake; the room was silent. He got up and began to put on his clothes.

Dressed, he took one last look at her before he crossed the threshold of her bedroom. She was lying perfectly still, her child's body recumbent with arms folded across her tiny breasts.

He damn near tripped over the forgotten shotgun as he started to tiptoe out of the room. Stooping, a grin on his face as he scooped the weapon up, he thought about how she had tricked him and laughed softly to himself.

She was something all right. A nervy little broad who wasn't afraid of anything and knew how to get what she wanted. She'd do all right, Cindy would.

Just for the hell of it, he put the gun to his shoulder and aimed it at the window, squeezing the trigger.

The room was filled with a bright flash and boom and the screen plus most of the window frame went flying in shreds of metal and wood out into the night. Jim fell over backward through the doorway and Cindy sat bolt upright and screamed.

For the next five minutes Jimmy used every curse word he could think of, plus a few he invented on the spur of the moment. Then he got up, dropping the discharged weapon noisily. Without further words he stalked out the back screen door, slamming it after him, and went to the Harley and jumped on.

Less than a minute later, he was roaring off down the moonlit highway, feeling like he had had a couple of years taken off his life.

He rode most of that night, loving the cool of the wind against his face. When he had time to think about it, everything that had happened back at the filling station became riotously funny. He began to laugh so hard the tears were streaming down his face and he had to wipe them away with the sleeve of his jacket.

Funny.

Hilarious.

A real scream, no matter how you looked at it. She had tricked him, got the best of him not only once, but twice in a row.

And he had gotten the best of her, too. That made everything worthwhile, and he could laugh. He imagined himself telling the story just as it had happened to the guys back in Coram. Hell, they probably wouldn't believe him. They'd probably think he'd made the whole thing up, so maybe he wouldn't tell them after all.

But then, they wouldn't believe that other tale either, the one about the cemetery. Even he didn't quite believe that that incident had actually happened. Already it seemed remote, unreal.

Only the road ahead was real. He was just starting on his journey, he realized. Amazing things had happened to him already, but he hadn't even been anywhere yet.

At a fork in the road, he veered right, knowing the secondary road would eventually take him down along the coast, where there were miles and miles of deserted beach, good places to camp and cook out for a guy alone on the road. Not that he was tired yet and couldn't go many miles before he camped, but when the dawn broke, as it was sure to in a few hours, it might be nice to take a refreshing swim in the ocean.

Very nice.

Dreaming of it, his headlight burrowing a long bright tunnel into the thick night ahead, he loafed the Harley along at a mere fifty-five or sixty. It was mostly a long sweep downhill, and pretty soon he was going along the flat, riding like a noisy wind at near sea level. His mind was lulled by the sound of his smoothly running engine and the muted roar of the surf to his right.

But then his dreams were invaded by another sound; a sound like a swarm of angry hornets buzzing in back of him.

Turning, he looked over his shoulder and saw them swooping down the grade he had just descended: ten, maybe twenty of them, coming on fast, their swaying headlights like white eyes pursuing him in the night.

It took him several seconds to realize that the swarm of approaching fireflies was actually a motorcycle pack, coming on hard.

He gunned the Harley, but by then it was too late. They were surrounding him, forcing him off the road.