Randall's aim is better. He nails Mel Searles square in the forehead. Mel goes down like a bag of mail.
There is a pause, a moment of indrawn breath. Think of a car teetering on two wheels, deciding whether or not to go over. See Rose jTwitchell looking around, bewildered and frightened, not sure what's happening, let alone what: to do about it. See Anson put his arm around her waist. Listen to Georgia Roux howl through her hanging mouth, her cries weirdly like the sound the wind makes slipping across the waxed string of a tin-can mooseblower. Blood pours over her lacerated tongue as she hollers. See the reinforcements.Toby Whelan and Rupert Libby (he's Piper's cousin, though she doesn't brag on the connection) are first to arrive on the scene. They survey it... then hang back. Next comes Linda Everett. She's on foot with another part-time cop, Marty Arsenault, puffing along in her wake. She starts to push through the crowd, but Marty - who didn't even put on his uniform this morning, just rolled out of bed and slipped into an old pair of bluejeans - grabs her by the shoulder. Linda almost breaks away from him, then thinks of her daughters. Ashamed of her own cowardice, she allows Marty to lead her over to where Rupe and Toby are watching developments. Of these four, only Rupe is wearing a gun this morning, and would he shoot? Balls he would; he can see his own wife in that crowd, holding hands with her mother (the mother-in-law Rupe wouldn't have minded shooting). See Julia arrive just behind Linda and Marty, gasping for breath but already grabbing her camera dropping the lenscap in her hurry to start shooting. See Frank DeLesseps kneel down beside Mel just in time to avoid another rock, which whizzes over his head and shatters a hole in one of the supermarket doors.
Then...
Then someone yells. Who will never be known, not even the sex of the shouter will ever be agreed upon, although most think a woman, and Rose will tell Anson later she's almost sure it was Lissa jamieson.
'GET THEM!'
Someone else bellows 'GROCERIES!' and the crowd surges forward.
Freddy Denton fires his pistol once, into the air. Then he lowers it, in his panic about to empty it into the crowd. Before he can, someone wrests it from his hand. He goes down, shouting in pain. Then the toe of a big old farmer's boot - Alden Dinsmore's - connects with his temple.The lights don't go completely out for Officer Denton, but they dim considerably, and by the time they come back up to bright, the Great Supermarket Riot is over.
Blood seeps through the bandage on Carter Thibodeau's shoulder and small rosettes are blooming on his blue shirt, but he is - for the time being, at least - unaware of the pain. He makes no attempt to run. He sets his feet and unloads on the first person to come into range. This happens to be Charles 'Stubby' Norman, who runs the antique shop on the 117 edge of town. Stubby drops, clutching his spouting mouth.
'Get back, you f**ks!' Carter snarls. 'Back, you sons of bitches! No looting! Get back!'
Marta Edmunds, Rusty s babysitter, tries to help Stubby, and gets a Frank DeLesseps fist to the cheekbone for her pains. She staggers, holding the side of her face and looking unbelievingly at the young man who has just hit her... and is then knocked flat, with Stubby beneath her, by a wave of charging would-be shoppers.
Carter and Frank start punching at them, but they land only three blows before they are distracted by a weird, ululating scream. It's the town librarian, her hair hanging around her usually mild face. She's pushing a line of shopping carts, and she might be screaming banza^. Frank leaps out of her way, but the carts take care of Carter, sending him flying. He waves his arms, trying to stay up, and might actually manage to do so, except for Georgia's feet. He trips over them, lands on his back, and is trampled. He rolls over on his stomach, laces his hands over his head, and waits for it to be over.
Julia Shumway clicks and clicks and clicks. Perhaps the pictures will reveal the faces of people she knows, but she sees only strangers in the viewfinder. A mob.
Rupe Libby draws his sidearm and fires four shots into the air. The gunfire rolls off into the warm morning, flat and declamatory, a line of auditory exclamation points. Toby Whelan dives back into the car, bumping his head and knocking off his cap (CHESTER'S MILL DEPUTY on the front in yellow). He snatches the bullhorn off the back seat, puts it to his lips, and shouts: 'STOP WHAT YOU'RE DOING! BACK OFF! POLICE! STOP! THAT IS AN ORDER!'
Julia snaps him.