"One of them was surely feeling pretty frisky," Larry agreed, feeling a half-reluctant excitement building in his own stomach. "And to think I came right across Vermont."
"Stovington is north of Highway 9 by quite a ways," Nadine said absently, still looking up at the barn. "Still, they must be there by now. July second was two weeks ago today." Her eyes were alight. "Do you think there might be others at that plague center, Larry? There might be, don't you think? Since they know all about quarantines and sterile clothing? They would have been working on a cure, wouldn't they?"
"I don't know," Larry said cautiously.
"Of course they would," she said impatiently and a trifle wildly. Larry had never seen her so excited, not even when Joe performed his amazing feat of mimicry on the guitar. "I'll bet Harold and Frances have found dozens of people, maybe hundreds. We'll go right away. The quickest route - "
"Wait a minute," Larry said, taking her by the shoulder.
"What do you mean, wait? Do you realize - "
"I realize that sign's waited two weeks for us to come by, and this can wait a little longer. In the meantime, let's have some lunch. And ole Joe the Guitar-Picking Fool is falling asleep on his feet."
She glanced around. Joe was looking at the girlie magazine again, but he had started to nod and blink over it in a glassy way. There were circles under his eyes.
"You said he just got over an infection," Larry said. "And you've done a lot of hard traveling, too... not to mention Stalking the Blue-Eyed Guitar-Player."
"You're right... I never thought."
"All he needs is a good meal and a good nap."
"Of course. Joe, I'm sorry. I wasn't thinking."
Joe made a sleepy and mostly disinterested grunt.
Larry felt a lump of residual fear rise up in him at what he had to say next, but it ought to be said. If he didn't, Nadine would as soon as she had a chance to think... and besides, it was time, maybe, to find out if he had changed as much as he thought.
"Nadine, can you drive?"
"Drive? Do you mean do I have a license? Yes; but a car really isn't that practical with all the stalls in the road, is it? I mean - "
"I wasn't thinking about a car," he said, and the image of Rita riding pillion behind the mysterious black man (his mind's symbolic representation of death, he supposed) suddenly rose up behind his eyes, the two of them dark and pale, bearing down on him astride a monstrous Harley hog like weird horsemen of the apocalypse. The thought dried out the moisture in his mouth and made his temples pound, but when he went on, his voice was steady. If there was a break in it Nadine did not seem to notice. Oddly, it was Joe who looked up at him out of his half-doze, seeming to notice some change.
"I was thinking about motorbikes of some kind. We could make better time with less effort and walk them around any... well, any messes in the road. Like we walked our bikes around those town trucks back there."
Dawning excitement in her eyes. "Yes, we could do that. I've never driven one, but you could show me what to do, couldn't you?"
At the words I've never driven one, Larry's dread intensified. "Yes," he said. "But most of what I'd teach you would be to drive slowly until you get the hang of it. Very slowly. A motorcycle - even a little motorbike - doesn't forgive human error, and I can't take you to a doctor if you get wrecked up on the highway."
"Then that's what we'll do. We'll... Larry, were you riding a cycle before we came across you? You must have been, to make it up here from New York City so quickly."
"I ditched it," he said steadily. "I got nervous about riding alone."
"Well, you won't be alone anymore," Nadine said, almost gaily. She whirled to Joe. "We're going to Vermont, Joe! We're going to see some other people! Isn't it nice? Isn't it just great?"
Joe yawned.
Nadine said she was too excited to sleep but she would lie down with Joe until he was under. Larry rode into Ogunquit to look for a motorcycle dealership. There was none, but he thought that he had seen a cycle shop on their way out of Wells. He went back to tell Nadine and found them both asleep in the shade of the blue Ford where Joe had been perusing Gallery.
He lay down a little way from them but couldn't sleep. At last he crossed the highway and made his way through the knee-high timothy grass to the barn where the sign was painted. Thousands of grasshoppers jumped wildly to get out of his way as he walked toward them, and Larry thought: I'm their plague. I'm their dark man.
Near the barn's wide double doors he spotted two empty Pepsi cans and a crust of sandwich. In more normal times the gulls would have had the remains of sandwich long ago, but times had changed and the gulls were no doubt used to richer food. He toed the crust, then one of the cans.
Get these right down to the crime lab, Sergeant Briggs. I think our killer has finally made a mistake.
Right-o, Inspector Underwood. The day Scotland Yard decided to send you was a lucky day for Squinchly-on-the-Green.