“And in your dream, tomorrow is the day?”
“That’s right. So I’d feel better if you were two steps removed from the future you saw in your nightmare.”
I glanced toward the back of the house. Still no bodachs had ventured after us. I think they have no effect on this world.
Nevertheless, taking no chances with the girls’ lives, I lowered my voice further. “Step one—don’t go to the movies or the Grille tomorrow. Step two—don’t stay here, either.”
Stormy asked, “How far away does your sister live?”
“Two blocks. Over on Maricopa Lane.”
I said, “I’ll come by in the morning, between nine and ten o’clock, with the photo I promised. I’ll take you and the girls to your sister’s.”
“You don’t have to do that, Odd. We can get there ourselves.”
“No. I want to take you. It’s necessary.”
I needed to be certain that no bodachs followed Viola and her daughters.
Lowering my voice to a whisper, I said, “Don’t tell Levanna and Nicolina what you’re going to do. And don’t call your sister to say you’re coming. You could be overheard.”
Viola surveyed the living room, worried but also astonished. “Who could hear?”
By necessity, I was mysterious: “Certain…forces.” If the bodachs overheard her planning to move the kids to her sister’s house, Viola might not have taken two safe steps away from her dreamed-of fate, after all, but only one. “Do you really believe, like you said, that I know about all that’s Otherly and Beyond?”
She nodded. “Yes. I believe that.”
Her eyes were so wide with wonder that they scared me, for they reminded me of the staring eyes of corpses.
“Then trust me on this, Viola. Get some sleep if you can. I’ll come around in the morning. By tomorrow night, this’ll have been all just a nightmare, nothing prophetic about it.”
I didn’t feel as confident as I sounded, but I smiled and kissed her on the cheek.
She hugged me and then hugged Stormy. “I don’t feel so alone anymore.”
Lacking an oscillating fan, the night outside was hotter than the warm air in the little house.
The moon had slowly ascended toward the higher stars, shedding its yellow veils to reveal its true silver face. A face as hard as a clock, and merciless.
TWENTY-SEVEN
LITTLE MORE THAN AN HOUR BEFORE MIDNIGHT, worried about a new day that might bring children in the line of gunfire, I parked the Mustang behind the Pico Mundo Grille.
When I doused the headlights and switched off the engine, Stormy said, “Will you ever leave this town?”
“I sure hope I’m not one of those who insists on hanging around after he’s dead, like poor Tom Jedd out there at Tire World.”
“I meant will you ever leave it while you’re alive.”
“Just the idea gives me hives on the brain.”
“Why?”
“It’s big out there.”
“Not all of it is big. Lots of towns are smaller and quieter than Pico Mundo.”
“I guess what I mean is…everything out there would be new. I like what I know. Considering everything else I have to deal with…I can’t at the same time handle a lot of new stuff. New street names, new architecture, new smells, all new people…”
“I’ve always thought it would be nice to live in the mountains.”
“New weather.” I shook my head. “I don’t need new weather.”
“Anyway,” she said, “I didn’t mean leave town permanently. Just for a day or two. We could drive to Vegas.”
“That’s your idea of a smaller, quieter place? I’ll bet that’s a place with thousands of dead people who won’t move on.”
“Why?”
“People who lost everything they owned at the craps tables, the roulette wheels, then went back to their rooms and blew their brains out.” I shivered. “Suicides always hang around after they’re dead. They’re afraid to move on.”
“You have a melodramatic view of Las Vegas, odd one. The average hotel maid doesn’t turn up a dozen suicides every morning.”
“Bunch of guys murdered by the mob, their bodies dumped in the fresh concrete footings of new hotels. You can bet your ass they have unfinished business and plenty of postmortem rage. Besides, I don’t gamble.”
“That doesn’t sound like the grandson of Pearl Sugars.”
“She did her best to turn me into a card hustler, but I’m afraid I disappointed her.”
“She taught you poker, didn’t she?”
“Yeah. We used to play for pennies.”
“Even just for pennies is gambling.”
“Not when I played with Granny Sugars.”
“She let you win? That’s sweet.”
“She wanted me to travel the Southwest poker circuit with her. Grandma said, ‘Odd, I’m going to grow old on the road, not in a rocking chair on some damn retirement-home porch with a gaggle of farting old ladies, and I’m going to die facedown in my cards in the middle of a game, not of boredom at a tea dance for toothless retirees trying to cha-cha in their walkers.’”
“On the road,” Stormy said, “would have been too much new.”
“Every day, new and more new.” I sighed. “But we sure would have had fun. She wanted me along to share the laughs…and if she died in the middle of a particularly rough game, she wanted me to be sure the other players didn’t split her bankroll and leave her carcass in the desert as a coyote buffet.”
“I understand why you didn’t go on the road, but why don’t you gamble?”
“Because even if Granny Sugars didn’t play sloppy to give me an edge, I almost always won anyway.”
“You mean because of your…gift?”
“Yeah.”
“You could see what cards were coming?”
“No. Nothing that dramatic. I just have a feeling for when my hand is stronger than those of other players and when it’s not. The feeling proves to be right nine times out of ten.”
“That’s a huge advantage at cards.”
“It’s the same with black jack, any card game.”
“So it’s not really gambling.”
“Not really. It’s just…harvesting cash.”
Stormy understood at once why I’d given up cards. “It would be pretty much the same as stealing.”
“I don’t need money that bad,” I said. “And I never will as long as people want to eat what’s been fried on a griddle.”
“Or as long as they have feet.”
“Yeah. Assuming I make the move into shoe retailing.”
“I said Vegas not because I want to gamble,” she explained.
“It’s a long way to go for an all-you-can-eat buffet.”
“I said Vegas because we could be there in maybe three hours, and the wedding chapels are open around the clock. No blood tests required. We could be married by dawn.”
My heart did one of those funny gyrations that only Stormy can make it do. “Wow. That’s almost enough to give me the nerve to travel.”
“Only almost, huh?”
“We can have our blood tests tomorrow morning, get a marriage license Thursday, get hitched by Saturday. And our friends can be there. I want our friends there, don’t you?”
“Yes. But I want married more.”
I kissed her and said, “After all the hesitation, why the sudden rush?”
Because we had sat for a while in that unlighted alley, our eyes were thoroughly dark-adapted. Otherwise I would not have fully recognized the depth of concern in her face, her eyes; in fact, she seemed to be gripped not by mere anxiety but by a quiet terror.
“Hey, hey,” I assured her, “everything’s going to be all right.”
Her voice didn’t quaver. She’s too tough for easy tears. But in the softness of her speech, I could hear a haunted woman: “Ever since we were sitting on the edge of the koi pond and that man came along the promenade…”
When her voice trail
ed away, I said, “Fungus Man.”
“Yeah. That creepy sonofabitch. Ever since I saw him…I’ve been scared for you. I mean, I’m always scared for you, Oddie, but I don’t usually make anything of it because the last thing you need, on top of everything else on your mind, is a weepy dame always nagging you to be careful.”
“‘Weepy dame’?”