“Zak was at the store when I found my card. Maybe he went home and told his uncle. But even so, why would Charlie care about Lilah? He doesn’t even know her.” He paused and stared at Tom. “Does he?”
“Yes, he does,” said Tom. “And considering how tight Charlie is with Big Zak and your friend Zak Junior, Charlie probably has them primed to report back to him with any mention of the Lost Girl. Even something as apparently innocent as her picture on a Zombie Card. I can imagine it gave Charlie quite a start to learn that my little brother found a picture of Lilah in his Zombie Cards.” He glanced down at the body, then cocked his head to listen. “The rain’s almost stopped. Listen, Benny. I want to leave at first light, and I want you to go with me.”
“Leave? For where?”
“For the Rot and Ruin, kiddo.”
“But … why?”
“Because we have to save the Lost Girl from Charlie Pink-eye and the Motor City Hammer,” said Tom. “And just pray that we’re not already too late.”
28
BUT THE NIGHT WAS NOT DONE WITH THE IMURA BROTHERS.
First they had to remove the artist’s body from the house and turn it over to the town watch. Two men came with a horse-drawn cart to remove the body, accompanied by Captain Strunk, who looked haggard and worn from the night’s activities. Once upon a time Strunk had been an acting teacher and director, but during the madness of First Night, he’d stepped up and organized the defense of a school that was attacked by zombies during a late rehearsal of a new play. The students held out for three weeks against the dead, always hoping that help would arrive. It never did, but eventually the zoms outside were drawn off by other distractions—people fleeing, animals trying to escape the small town in which the school was set. When there were fewer than a dozen of the dead in the schoolyard, Strunk dressed his kids in heavy coats and choir gowns; armed them with golf clubs, hockey sticks, and baseball bats from the gym; and led his makeshift army out of the danger zone. Of the thirty-seven kids and four other adults who left the building with him, twenty-eight kids and two adults were still alive and uninfected by the time they discovered another group of refugees who were bound for a fenced-in settlement in central California. Strunk helped organize the town’s defenses and served as its first mayor, and now he commanded the fence patrols and the town watch. And although he and Tom agreed on many things, Strunk had no inclination to expand the town or reclaim the world. He was haunted by those kids he had not been able to save.
Strunk watched as the artist’s body was loaded onto the cart by a cluster of deputies, and he listened to Tom’s account of what happened. Mayor Kirsch came out of his house next door and joined them.
“And you think this was Charlie and the Hammer?” Strunk asked, running his fingers though his thick, curly gray hair.
“Yeah, Keith, I do.”
Mayor Kirsch sighed. “I don’t know, Tom. You’ve got nothing but circumstantial evidence, and pretty thin evidence at that. Guesswork isn’t the same as proof.”
“I know,” said Tom. “But the pieces fit as far as I’m concerned.”
“What do you expect me to do?” asked Strunk.
“How about arresting them?” said Benny.
“And charge them with what?”
“Murder. Torture. How much do they have to do before you’ll do something?”
“Hush, Ben,” cautioned Tom. To the others he said, “I know you can’t do much based on my say-so, but I have to do something.”
“Whoa now, Tom, let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” the mayor said quickly.
“Don’t worry, Randy, I’m not going to do anything in town. Not without proof.”
“We have to do something!” Benny said, and then realized he was yelling. He dropped his voice to an urgent whisper. “Tom, we have to do something. You said—”
“I know what I said, kiddo. Go inside and get washed up. Try to get some sleep.”
“Sleep? Sleep? What are the chances that I’m ever going to be able to sleep again?”
“Try,” said Tom.