Sleep with the Fishes (17 page)

A huge steel sphinx on wheels, the locomotive and a mile of freight cars quaked around the bend just as the LTD, trundling over the wood ties, reached a stone’s throw from Pennsylvania. And just when Sid thought he was going to dodge the bullet, he took his eyes from the rearview mirror. The bend that the train was coming around was in Pennsylvania, dead ahead.

The gap was closing fast.

Sid stomped both feet on the brake.

“Drop the tape in the boat and we’ll save you,” Russ urged Price, who seemed on the verge of delirium as he dangled above.

Reverend Jim swooped out from under the railroad bridge and landed on Price’s back. He made a clucking, chuckling sound and pecked at Price’s ear.

“Jim!” Russ yelled at the bird. “No! Go away!”

Price groped at his ear. “My earring!”

The diamond gripped in his beak, the bird hopped off Price’s back and glided away toward shore.

“Hey, Russ.” Lloyd pointed toward the LTD on the bridge above. “What’s Sid stopping for?”

Russ followed Lloyd’s finger and saw the shadow of the LTD backing up. Price started spinning downward rapidly.

As if it wasn’t hard enough driving backward fast in a Wal-Mart parking lot, it was nearly impossible on railroad tracks.

Sid’s arms cramped as they tried to hold the steering wheel straight, and his vision was so violently jarred that he couldn’t make out the train rolling toward him from the other end of the trestle. But he felt it.

Just as Lloyd was getting a hand on Price’s windbreaker, the LTD clunkered overhead, and Price and the motor shot back up into the air with a protracted wheeze.

Russ paled. From Pennsylvania, a huge, dark shadow drew across the river. There was the sound of a thousand fingernails drawn across a blackboard, sparks cascading from the trestle, and braking train wheels above.

Russ throttled up to get clear of the impending catastrophe. His boat lunged upriver, and Lloyd fell back over his seat to the floor.

When the train was five feet away, Sid was able to make it out clearly enough. And when the locomotive’s front rammed into the LTD’s hood, there was a millisecond where Sid looked up and saw the engineer. He was wagging his head. “Not a chance,” he seemed to be saying.

Sid cut the steering wheel—hard. And for a sweet, brief moment, the jarring, the vibration, the squealing metal, and the locomotive were gone. The moment lingered, as such moments of truth often do, long enough for Sid to flip back through all the red shoes to the very first ones pounding a Chevy window on a steamy nighttime Passaic River bulkhead.

Russ and Lloyd shook splashes of water from their arms and eyes, staring back slack-jawed at the calamity.

The LTD stood on its trunk end in some rocks at the rapids’ edge, water up to the driver’s door, sparks and splash raining down from above. The train was still thundering overhead when they motored up to the car. Only the frayed end of a rope still hung where Price and Jenny’s motor used to be.

Lloyd grabbed hold of the LTD’s fender when they pulled alongside, and the car groaned, tipping farther backward.

“Don’t!” Russ shouted.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry!” Lloyd yelped.

Russ nudged the boat up close to the car, and Lloyd tried to lean into the driver’s window. He quickly withdrew.

“Can’t.” Lloyd flapped his arms in frustration. “Can’t get the angle on him. Too heavy, and with my back…And what if the car falls over?”

“Here, take the throttle.”

They switched places, and Russ was soon assessing the situation through the open driver’s window.

Blood was splattered on the fractured windshield and on Sid’s face, which was held out of the water by the headrest. His eyes were partially open, and one hand pawed at the water indifferently.

“Sid! Sid, c’mon! Wake up! Gotta get outta there.” Russ slapped him on an outstretched arm, then tugged his wrist.

Sid’s eyes goggled a moment, and he gurgled.

“Sid!” Russ screamed.

Jerking his head forward, Sid let it splash back onto the headrest. He groaned, and his eyes rolled at Russ.

“Id was me dat…” he slurred, then smiled like a drunkard. “Y’still owe me, Russ.”

“Sid! C’mon! Snap outta it!” Russ implored.

Pawing the air a moment, Sid groped the steering wheel in a vain attempt at pushing himself toward Russ.

“Y’owe me, Russ.” He groaned. “You was in that wreck, an’ I grabbed your, your…” Sid made a gun out of his hand and pointed it at Russ.

“Sid!” Russ had ahold of Sid’s sleeve, and he pulled. The LTD groaned, twisting toward him. He could hear the trunk grinding into the river bottom. But the car stopped.

“Get me outta here,” Sid pleaded, his eyes unable to focus, his hands slapping at the steering wheel.

“Russ,” Lloyd shouted, “get the hell away from that car. It’s going to go!”

The train overhead finally lumbered to a stop.

“Bring me right up to the car. I’ll grab him, then I’ll tell you when to back away.”

Russ leaned far enough in to grab Sid by the collar.

“Russ, y’owe me, dammit, d’int y’understand.” Sid’s bloodshot eyes rolled aimlessly. “I pulled you from that wreck. The car was burning, you were, were…”

“Burning? The car…you mean in Connecticut?” Russ grabbed Sid by the collar, but not necessarily to save him.

Sid seemed to focus for a moment, at least with one eye.

“I pulled you away,” he rasped, grinning.
“O.K., Evel Knievel, just keep your eyes and your mouth shut, and I’ll save your sorry ass, you got that?”

With a trembling lip, Russ glared hard at the bloodied face, the grin.

“Why? Why?”

Sid laughed, or coughed.

“She was a witness, Russ. She saw Fest whack Ristocelli…”

“So you killed Sandra?” Russ tightened his grip on Sid’s collar and shook him. “Then why did you save me? Why didn’t you let me die too?”

“Hurry, Russ!” Lloyd begged.

Sid started pushing at the steering wheel, but Russ pushed him back. Sid’s eyes turned to slits as he tried to force his eyes to focus, his delirium waning.

“Fest put the fix on the steering box, I just followed to make sure the job was done, that’s all. I maya killed a lot of people, Russ, but…” Sid smiled, and it was neither a grin nor a sneer. It was just a gentle smile of humility. “But sometimes even I can, y’know, I feel sorry for people.” Sid tried to shrug. “Y’owe me that.”

“Owe you?”

Without warning, the river pushed the car backward. This time it didn’t stop.

If Russ had had the time to make a decision, he might well have let go of Sid’s collar.

The LTD rolled as it went, the driver’s window turning upward. Lloyd steered the boat away from the falling car, and Sid slipped right out of the car into the river.

Even then Russ considered letting Sid go. But he didn’t.

Leaving his
Karmann Ghia parked above at the guide rail, Omer Phillips had picked his way down the steep embankment to the river’s edge. For some time, he just stood watch on a rock, opera glasses pointed upstream. Eventually, he folded the glasses away and readied the life preserver.

A discus throw put the preserver out just far enough. Omer tied off his end to a tree stump and let the victim beach himself.

The washing-machine effect of the rapids had scoured the mud from Price’s face, hair, and clothes, but it was clear that a bout in the ring with “The Moose” had taken its toll. Exhausted, bashed, wheezing, and wild-eyed, Price was Wile E. Coyote after a bad day chasing the Road Runner. He lay in the shallows among the rocks, clinging to the rope absently.

“Hello, Mr. Price. Glad to see you could make it.”

The swimming vision of Omer, umbrella on tweed forearm, looked cheerily down.

“You…” Price wheezed, “you took the tape.”

“That’s right. I was trying to help you.”

“Help?” Price rasped.

“See where all this tape business has gotten you?”

Price got a smile going on one side of his face, and he patted the rectangular bulge in his windbreaker.

“It’s not over…yet. I held on to the tape…all the way, rolling underwater, a big…
big
rock.” Price almost passed out from the thought, but he coughed up some water and shook his brain awake. “I held on to…the tape.”

“Admirable. But I’m afraid the tape is no good to you now.” A glint of sun winked off Omer’s eye and blinded Price. He held a hand over his eyes.

“It’ll dry.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

When Price lowered his hand, he saw Omer holding another tape. Omer addressed the question in Price’s eyes.

“I’ll give you this tape, for that tape.”

Consternation knit Price’s brow.

“You see, Mr. Price, this tape is of your wife and a man dressed as a cow engaged in a sexual liaison. Very entertaining. If you don’t give me your tape, I’ll see to it that certain acquaintances in, shall we say, the lower echelons of the pornography industry release it. In fact, the tape is so entertaining that I shouldn’t wonder that all your fellow troopers might enjoy a copy for their personal libraries.”

Price clearly didn’t understand. Omer knew he wouldn’t, so he handed down a stack of still shots featuring Debbie and the cow.

Price’s pupils shrank to pinholes.

“Dammit, officer,
can’t you see the man’s incapacitated? He’s been in a wreck, he has a concussion, contusions, broken bones, and a sprained neck. You heard the nurse. He needs rest.”

Sid kept his eyes shut, feigning sleep, while Lachfurst was in the hallway reading the cops the riot act. There was some minor protestation.

“Your questions can wait until the man’s had a chance to recover his senses, can’t they? So come back tomorrow. He’ll be here. You have my guarantee.”

Footsteps shuffled off down the hall. Lachfurst came in and stood over Sid for a while. Whether he was staring at Sid or reading a magazine, Sid hadn’t a clue. But a nurse came in, rolled Sid on his side, and jabbed something up his rectum. Talk about a pro. His eyes bulged, but he didn’t make a peep.

“Nurse, are the results of the scan in yet? How’s the man’s brain?” Lachfurst zipped up his jacket.

She tapped a finger on Sid’s hip as she awaited the result of the thermometer.

“You’ll have to talk to the doctor about that, but I think it turned out he’s O.K.”

“Capital. I’ll go locate the doc.”

The nurse extracted the thermometer and left.

Sid lay still, listening to footsteps and whispers in the hall. When he finally figured the coast was clear, he opened one eye.

Jenny stood next to his bed, grinning.

“How ya doin’, flyboy?”

He cleared his throat and spoke in a hoarse whisper.

“Just for your, you know, future reference and whatnot, the train comes from Pennsylvania, not from New York.”

“Sorry ’bout that.” Jenny winced. “Tell ya what. Let’s just call it even, O.K.? Ya don’t owe me anything.”

Sid shook his head as best he could. He wore a neck brace and had numerous small sutures on his bruised forehead and nose. The gray at his temples seemed more so.

“No dice. You owe me, Trout Lady. Dinner.”

“Great.” Jenny produced a pizza box, pulled a slice out, and offered him a bite.

“This isn’t exactly what I had in mind.” Sid chomped at the pie.

“Don’t forget, I maya got my boat back, and I maya fished out my motor, but, Sid, this hasn’t exactly been a shad fest for me neither.” Jenny took a bite of the slice and pulled a beer from her bomber jacket.

“Hey, I’m the one laid up in a hospital. Been layin’ here for hours fakin’ sleep. Didn’t wanna talk to the cops until I had what the story was. What’d you guys tell ’em?”

“Just that some guy stole my boat, and that we came up with this kinda harebrained idea to drive onto the tracks and lasso the rascal.” Jenny poured some beer into a sipping cup. “Never did find the guy. He maya drowned. But how about ya tell me the real story, Sid. What was all this crap about?” She put the straw up to Sid’s lips.

Sid’s slurping was interrupted by a gentle knock at the door. A tweeded man with an umbrella edged into the room.

“I do apologize for the intrusion, Mr. Bifulco, really.” Omer approached, hat in hand. “I just thought you might want this.” He held aloft a ziplock bag containing a badly melted SUPER*PROCAM tape. He set it next to the flowers on the table.

“After today’s trials and adventures, I thought this would surely set your mind at ease.” Omer beamed at the couple. “I took the liberty of heating it to the point of destruction.”

Sid squinted, at the tape first, then the stranger.

“Do I, uh, know you?”

“I don’t think so. How are things with Mr. Smonig? Well, I hope? Friendly? I’d heard he’d had an accident. Some faulty steering. But I trust he is steered clear of trouble now? I hope so. I think you’ve both had enough of that, as it were.”

Sid ran a tongue along his teeth, still squinting.

“Yeah, well, Smonig’s just great, and I think you could say he’s got all his steering problems worked out. Nothing to worry about there.”

“Ahem, fellahs, don’t mind me, but what the hell are ya talking about?” Jenny had about as much intrigue as she could take. Her arms were folded and her foot was tapping.

Omer doffed his crusher, tipped it to the lady, and bowed out.

“Sid, who was that character? I think I’ve been just a little too damned easy on your privacy, that’s what. Ya tell me right now, Sid: What is all this shit about? Either that or you’re gonna owe me. And boy, do I mean owe me.” Jenny rubbed her palms together greedily.

Sid eyed the ziplock with the tape in it.

“It was all about that.”

“Is that what you guys were after? What was on that tape?” Jenny poked it with a finger.

Sid cocked an eye at Jenny and fleetingly reflected as to how Fest had had nothing to do with putting the jinx on Sandra’s steering box.

“I think it’s what they call, uh…” He snapped his fingers. “Pathetic Justice.”