Eleanor (8 page)

Eleanor nodded and yawned.

“Mine's the white Peterbilt pulling a green trailer. It's got Texas plates.”

“I saw it coming in,” she said.

Elf-like, she hopped off the chair and skipped away.

The snow fell steadily, and three inches lay undisturbed on the parked trucks. Eleanor didn't relish the idea of going home in that weather. Then she remembered she had another stop to make before home. She sighed and remembered Russell's switchblade and stood in the leeward side of the truck.

A few minutes later she heard Dwight's footsteps crunching in the snow. He threw the door open, and Eleanor scurried inside. He followed in and pulled the door shut. The cab was warm. He switched on a light and pulled curtains across the back.

“Just push my stuff to one side,” Dwight said. “Just my dirties.”

Eleanor glanced at the clothes and made her selections; a flannel shirt, down vest, jeans, and new running shoes. She hoped they weren't expensive.

Eleanor climbed under the blanket as Dwight took a spare and draped it over himself in the front seat. He reclined the chair until it was nearly horizontal.

“Good night, Susie,” he said. “Tomorrow's Halloween. I'm sure you'll get lots of candy.”

“Thanks, Dwight, for everything. You've been so nice. Yes, tomorrow will be a great day.”

She waited silently, still as a tharn rabbit on the back bunk, until she heard Dwight snoring. Carefully, quietly, guiltily, she poked her head out from behind the curtain and surveyed the sleeping driver.

Trucks passed on the quiet wet roads, and their rumble shook the truck with a soothing vibration. She found Dwight's wallet tucked in a compartment between the seats. She carefully opened it and counted the cash. He had four-hundred-eighty dollars. She took three twenties, paused, then put one back and the others in her pocket. Then she replaced the wallet where she'd found it.

She collected her things and bundled them in her backpack. Then she crawled into the cab and knelt over Dwight. She hovered there a moment breathing in slow even breaths and imagining his family down in Texas without a father.

She leaned her face down to his and lowered her lips onto his forehead. Half asleep, he stirred. She held there for a moment, tasting his skin until she knew she had him.

His eyes opened in groggy surprise.

“Thanks, Dwight. For everything. But I gotta go. Be safe.”

“What? Who?” He rubbed his eyes in the gloom.

“You can have the bed now,” she said. He rubbed his face.

“Maybe I can help you more,” he said. “If you're in trouble. I can be handy.”

Halfway out the door, she stopped and leaned forward. She kissed Dwight again, this time for him.

CHAPTER TWELVE

T
he grocery store was deserted. The chain had required twenty-four-hour operation for a national publicity push and regretted it during these cold rural Wyoming nights. The store was decked out in orange and black streamers, pumpkins and straw scarecrows at the heads of the aisles. Bags of picked-over candy lay atop cardboard tables advertising bite-size Snickers and M&M's.

Eleanor wished she'd gone to the grocery store first, but until she had tasted the man, she wasn't sure she could go ahead, and she didn't want to waste the money if she failed.

With eighty-five dollars in her pocket, forty freshly stolen, Eleanor pushed a cart through Sherman's Grocery at four o'clock in the morning. She was the only customer. She thought there was only one employee. She'd smelled her when she came in. Karen Venn's Georgia perfume was a unique scent in Jamesford. It reminded Eleanor of cloves and daffodils. She almost left when she smelled it, but she was too far now to turn around.

She hadn't seen Karen Venn but feared she would. She paused and listened, and smelled and watched, and saw no sign of anyone else in the front. Someone drove a forklift in the back of the store in sudden spurts and hiccups. The smell of grease reached her nose, and she couldn't be sure who it was, but she suspected it was the manager.

Eleanor stared into the meat case for a long time. She gauged the caloric intake of each piece, its fat and muscle against its cost. She went with several hams. They were already cooked and on sale. She put four in her basket and worked out the cost. She'd have bought a fifth, but she hadn't enough. With the rest of the money, she bought cans of beans and SPAM. She'd have to heat those, but they'd work. Finally, she bought a cheap bottle of children's chewable vitamins. It was a trick she'd figured out last time in Nebraska.

She pushed her cart to the front of the store and went as quietly as she could to the self-check-out lane. She had a sudden hope of not actually seeing anyone in the store. It crossed her mind to just push the cart unpaid-for through the electric doors and disappear into the swirling snow. If she were somebody else, she might have risked that. There were cameras in the grocery store and tape recording machines tucked away in some corner she didn't know about. She'd seen enough TV to know that. She'd already done crimes today to a kind man, no need to risk herself unnecessarily doing more.

She passed the first ham over the scanner and it beeped in recognition. Eleanor thought the sound echoed off every wall in the store, past the bread aisle through the hanging plastic panels that led to the back, and out across Jamesford like a shot. She looked around to see if anyone was coming. She heard steps behind a side door and quickly passed two more hams across the glass before Karen Venn appeared.

She wore her grocery clerk outfit, complete with a button promising “Good Family Service & Good Family Prices.”

Eleanor rang up the last ham, stuffed them all into bags, and put them in her cart. A friendly, though mechanical, voice warned her that items had been taken from the bagging area and she should wait for assistance.

“Eleanor? Eleanor what are you doing here this late?” said David's mother, leaning across her cart and punching touchscreen buttons.

“Hi, Mrs. Venn, I mean Karen. I'm just doing a little shopping,” she said. She glanced into her cart. She'd concealed the hams in plastic bags. If Karen hadn't seen them before, she wouldn't see them now.

“It's pretty late, isn't it? Past curfew, or don't they have curfew in Jamesford anymore?”

“Oh, they do,” she said. “It's just that my mother's not feeling well. I had to wait until she fell asleep before I could go shopping. I gotta get home before she wakes up.”

“Oh,” she said. “I understand.”

Eleanor didn't know if she did, but she let the matter drop. Karen Venn finished ringing up the cans while Eleanor bagged them.

“You could work here in the summer,” Mrs. Venn said. “I bet they'd hire you as a bagger.”

“Maybe,” Eleanor said, handing her the two twenties from her pocket, “if my mother can spare me.”

Mrs. Venn slid the bills into a slot, and the machine gobbled them up. Another forty-three dollars remained. Eleanor took out her government assistance card and handed it to Karen. She took it, recognizing instantly what it was. Eleanor hadn't watched Mrs. Venn enough to tell if her small sigh was from surprise or disappointment. Either way, Eleanor felt a sudden stupid shame and couldn't look David's mother in the face. She'd been poor forever; why did it matter now?

“I gotta go,” Eleanor said, pushing the cart away. “I have a long way to walk.”

She knew she'd blown it the second she spoke. She was full of stupid things today. She was tired or scared or crazy, but all night she'd been pulling her foot out of her mouth.

“You're not walking home? In this weather?”

“It's not far,” Eleanor said, not stopping.

“Yes, it is,” Karen said. “Hold up.”

She uncradled a white telephone and punched in a number. After a dozen rings, the other end picked up in the back of the store. “Mr. Woods, I'm taking my break now. I'll be out of the store for fifteen minutes.”

Grudgingly the manager walked up to the counters. He was a large man, nearly three hundred pounds and not even six feet. His face was red from the exertion of the hike and he looked none-too-happy to be letting Karen Venn leave the store.

“Fifteen minutes,” he said. “If you get stuck in the snow and come back late, you've lost your job.”

Eleanor protested, but Karen walked with her to her car and opened the trunk for the groceries. Eleanor wouldn't let her touch them and loaded them all herself.

Karen drove the familiar roads to Eleanor's little house without directions. It meant something to her that David's mother remembered where she lived.

“That house is a treasure,” Karen said, squinting in the headlights. “I'm glad you still have it.”

“Just barely,” Eleanor said. “They raise the taxes every year. We can barely keep up.”

The house was unlit under a thick layer of snow. Eleanor jumped out of the car and opened the trunk. She took three hams at once to the front door. Karen followed behind with the last ham and the sack of canned goods.

“Thanks, Mrs. Venn,” she said.

“Karen,” she corrected her.

“Yes, Karen. You've been very kind. You go back to work now. Don't lose your job. Oh, and if you see him, will you tell David that my mom's really sick, and I'll be staying home with her tomorrow? Don't bother coming by either. I mean for trick-or-treating.”

“Okay,” she said and got back into her car. She waited until Eleanor had opened the door, brought in the groceries, and flashed the porch light before she drove away.

When she was gone, Eleanor went to the kitchen and set the coffee maker to automatically start brewing at seven o'clock. She wrote a note to Tabitha explaining that she had to go to school early today and not to wait up. “Don't turn on the porch light,” she added. “We don't have any candy to give out.”

She propped the note on the little table then quietly carried her groceries behind the house and into the flimsy aluminum shed. She would want for heat, but privacy was critical. She could let Tabitha know. She knew she'd have to tell her eventually, when it was done. But if her mother knew now, today, before it was done, she wouldn't allow it. And Eleanor had a plan.

She pulled the shed door shut, smacking her tongue against the roof of her mouth and tasting the trucker's flesh.

Halloween was cold but sunny. The storm that had dropped three inches of snow followed the highway east and across the plains. The sun broke out and, wherever it touched, melted the snow by afternoon. By evening, the sky was clear, the air cold, but the snow was only in the shadows.

An hour before dusk, the first trick-or-treaters left their houses. The later the hours went, the older the kids who'd be out. It was a school night, but kids would be kids and everyone knew the police would be busy chasing away toilet paperers and doorbell ditchers. Someone would fire a pistol at some point, a house would be egged, a trashcan set on fire. It happened every Halloween. If it was a good night, the shot would be in the air. If a bad one, the shot would be more level.

Dwight Lomas huddled under a streetlight by the mobile home park where the Venn's lived. He wore sneakers without socks, dirty pants, and an orange hunting vest over a flannel shirt. He stomped his feet and blew into his hands as if waiting for a ride. He watched the blue Dodge slowly pass the entrance gate three times.

At eight o'clock, the sun was long gone but the candy-
hungry children were far from satisfied. Kids who lived far off in the county were driven to town to trick-or-treat, and the town swelled to twice its normal size with greedy children. The tighter the houses stood together, the thicker the mobs of kids. The mobile homes were popular but didn't provide the candy haul the new Jacob's Ranch subdivision promised.

David and Wendy skipped out of the trailer park heading toward Jacob's Ranch. Dwight fell in behind them at a distance, keeping to the shadows, as quiet as his massive form could be.

They crossed the highway and followed First Street toward the throng of parked cars a mile down the road. Dwight pretended to admire some sculptures in a gallery window and let them get some distance on him. His long legs carried him swiftly, and David could only walk as fast as little Wendy would go, which was painfully slow.

Behind Dwight, the blue Dodge turned off the highway and toward Jacob's Ranch. Dwight followed.

He'd let them get too far ahead. The truck had passed the Venn's and stopped twenty yards up the road. Kids in masks spilled out of the truck like startled flies off roadkill. They rushed David and Wendy at a run. David herded his sister behind him and began a slow backward retreat.

Four kids in rubber horror masks caught up to him and blocked the road. David, shielding his sister, backed away the only direction now open to him, into the ditch between the gravel road and a barbed wire fence. The group closed on him. Wendy began to cry.

“Let's make this quick,” said one of them.

“Quick enough,” said another.

Dwight skidded into the throng between David and the masked boys.

Out of breath, Dwight said, “What the heck do you think you're doing?”

“Mind your own business, mister,” said Russell. He was behind a mummy mask with crudely enlarged eyeholes.

“Who the hell are you?” said Tanner Nelson, his stout frame unmistakable under the werewolf mask.

“I'm the guy who's going to teach you a lesson about fair play,” said Dwight calmly. He was strong and able. Adrenaline warmed his muscles, readied him for a fight.

“I don't know about this,” said Frankenstein.

“Stay out of this, mister,” said Russell. “That kid's got a lesson coming.”

“I know you, cowards,” Dwight said. “If you lay a hand on him, you'll regret it. In fact, you're going to regret even trying. Tonight. Who wants to be first?”

Dwight balled up his massive fists.

“You're a grown-up, and we're just kids,” said Tanner. “You're breaking the law.”

“Call a cop,” he said.

Russell defiantly walked up to Dwight, straight and tall, and stood inches from the man's chin.

“Screw you,” he said.

Dwight swatted him upside the head. It was a weak little slap, no kind of punch, but Dwight's weight and strength put the boy on the ground.

“David take Wens and go home,” ordered Dwight. “Now. Run!” They did. Dwight watched them reach the end of the road and turn around the corner toward home. When they were safe, he relaxed and balled up his fists again. He was strong. This was going to be easy.

Suddenly, Russell dove for Dwight's legs, but couldn't pull him down. Dwight kicked him in the belly, and the boy flew across the gravel on his face.

Frankenstein inched toward Finlay at the truck. Finlay watched but didn't move. He'd done his part providing the wheels. He wasn't up for another trip to the Honor Farm in Riverton.

Tanner pulled on Frankenstein's sleeve and stopped his withdrawal. Russell was back on his feet. He made a motion with his hand and the boys spread out around Dwight, circling him the way they had around David. Dwight tensed and waited.

“Get him!” yelled Russell.

The four boys leapt at Dwight like a pack of wolves on a bear. He spun and flailed his massive arms at the boys, sending one after another to the ground. He felt their fists pound on his back, reach for his face, even graze his chin once, but he was too large and too strong and too familiar with pack attacks to be caught so easily.

Finally, Russell got behind him and jumped on his back. He wrapped his arm around Dwight's neck and squeezed. If any of the other boys had been upright, it might have turned the battle, but they weren't. Dwight spun around and bucked. He caught Russell's arm, whipping him off him like a limp snake and throwing him across the road.

Behind a rubber hockey mask, one boy cried, “You got no call beating up kids.”

Dwight laughed. “I know all about you, you bullies. I've been told. I've been watching. I'll be here if you ever try anything again. Now you brats go home or I swear you'll regret it.”

Russell was on his feet again, crouched and ready to attack. He pulled off his mask to see better, and Dwight saw his twisted angry face. As the other boys took steps toward the waiting truck, Russell made a final dash at Dwight.

The big man sidestepped and made to trip the boy, planning on launching him into the ditch with a kick to the pants as he went by—good and hard. But he was caught short. Before he knew what had happened, Russell was behind him. The boy hadn't barreled into him as he'd expected. Instead he'd swerved at a tangent, reached out, and touched his side like an Indian counting coup. For a moment, Dwight had a new respect for Russell, but then he heard him shouting.