"But you will."
Two magnetized steel strips had been mounted on the wall near the microwave. Most of the knives which had hung from these strips had been knocked loose by the rock Brian had pegged into the RadarRange; they lay on the counter in a pick-up-sticks jumble.
Wilma picked out the longest, a lcngsford carving knife with a white bone handle, and slowly ran her wounded palm along the side of the blade, smearing the cutting edge with blood.
"I'm going to teach you everything you need to know."
Holding the knife in her fist, Wilma strode across the living room, crunching glass from the broken window and the TV picturetube under the low heels of her black for-church shoes. She went out the door without closing it and cut across her lawn in the direction of Ford Street.
15
At the same time Wilma was selecting a knife from the clutter of them on the counter, Nettle Cobb was pulling a meat-cleaver from one of her kitchen drawers. She knew it was sharp, because Bill Fullerton down at the barber shop had put an edge on it for her less than a month ago.
Nettle turned and walked slowly down the hallway toward her front door. She stopped and knelt for a moment beside Raider, her poor little dog who had never done anything to anyone.
"I warned her," she said softly as she stroked Raider's fur. "I warned her, I gave that crazy Polish woman every chance. I gave her every chance in the world. My dear little doggy. You wait for me.
You wait, because I'll be with you soon."
She got up and went out of her house, bothering with the door no more than Wilma had bothered with hers. Security had ceased to interest Nettle. She stood on the stoop for a moment, taking deep breaths, then cut across her lawn in the direction of Willow Street.
16
Danforth Keeton ran into his study and ripped open the closet door. He crawled all the way to the back. For a terrible moment he thought the game was gone, that the goddam intruding persecuting motherfucker Deputy Sheriff had taken it, and his future along with it.
Then his hands fell upon the box and he tore back the lid. The tin race-track was still there. And the envelope was still tucked beneath it. He bent it back and forth, listening to the bills crackle inside, and then replaced it.
He hurried to the window, looking out for Myrtle. She mustn't see the pink slips. He had to take them all down before Myrtle got back, and how many were there? A hundred? He looked around his study and saw them stuck up everywhere. A thousand? Yes, maybe. Maybe a thousand. Even two thousand did not seem entirely out of the question.
Well, if she got here before he was done cleaning up, she would just have to wait on the step, because he wasn't going to let her in until every one of these goddamned persecuting things was burning in the kitchen woodstove. Every... damned... one.
He snatched the slip dangling from the light-fixture. The tape stuck to his cheek and he pawed it away with a little squeal of anger.
On this one, a single word glared up from the line reserved for
OTHER VIOLATION(S):
EMBEZZLEMENT
He ran to the reading lamp by his easy chair. Snatched up the slip taped to the shade.
OTHER VIOLATION(S):
MISAPPROPRIATION OF TOWN FUNDS
The TV:
HORSE-FUCKING The glass of his Lions Club Good Citizenship Award, mounted above the fireplace: CORNHOLING YOUR MOTHER The kitchen door: COMPULSIVE MONEY-CHUCKING AT LEWISTON RACEWAY The door to the garage: PSYCHOTIC GARBAGE-HEAD PARANOIA He gathered them up as fast as he could, eyes wide and bulging from his fleshy face, his thinning hair standing up in wild disarray.
He was soon panting and coughing, and an ugly reddish-purple color began to overspread his cheeks. He looked like a fat child with a grown-up's face on some strange, desperately important treasure hunt.
He pulled one from the front of the china closet: STEALING FROM THE TOWN PENSION FUND TO PLAY THE PONIES Keeton hurried into his study with a pile of slips clutched in his right hand, strands of tape flying back from his fist, and began to pluck up more of the slips. The ones in here all stuck to a single subject, and with horrible accuracy: EMBEZZLEMENT.
THEFT.
STEALING.
EMBEZZLEMENT.
FRAUD.
MISAPPROPRIATION. BAD STEWARDSHIP. EMBEZZLEMENT. That word most of all, glaring, shouting, accusing:
OTHER VIOLATION(S): EMBEZZLEMENT.
He thought he heard something outside and ran to the window again.
Maybe it was Myrtle. Maybe it was Norris Ridgewick, come by to gloat and laugh. If so, Keeton would get his gun and shoot him. But not in the head. No. In the head would be too good, too quick, for scum like Ridgewick. Keeton would guthole him, and leave him to scream himself to death on the lawn.
But it was only the Garsons' Scout, trundling down the View toward town. Scott Garson was the town's most important banker.