Needful Things (66 page)

Slopey raised his head a little and looked fearfully through the hanging fringe of his red hair at Leland Gaunt.

“The time has come for you to finish paying for it.”

“Oh!” An expression of vast relief filled Slopey's face. “Is
that
all you wanted me for? I thought maybe . . .” But
he either couldn't or didn't dare finish. He hadn't been sure
what
Mr. Gaunt had wanted.

“Yes. Do you remember who you promised to play a trick on?”

“Sure. Coach Pratt.”

“Right. There are two parts to this prank—you have to put something somewhere, plus you have to tell Coach Pratt something. And if you follow directions exactly, the teapot will be yours forever.”

“Can I talk like this, too?” Slopey asked eagerly. “Can I talk without stuttering forever”, too?”

Mr. Gaunt sighed regretfully. “I'm afraid you'll go back to the way you were as soon as you leave my shop, Slopey. I believe I
do
have an anti-stuttering device somewhere in stock, but—”

“Please! Please, Mr. Gaunt! I'll do anything! I'll do
anything
to
anyone!
I
hate
to stutter!”

“I know you would, but that's just the problem, don't you see? I am rapidly running out of pranks which need to be played; my dance-card, you might say, is nearly full. So you couldn't pay me.”

Slopey hesitated a long time before speaking again. When he did, his voice was low and diffident. “Couldn't you . . . I mean, do you ever just . . .
give
things away, Mr. Gaunt?”

Leland Gaunt's face grew deeply sorrowful. “Oh, Slopey! How often I've thought of it, and with such
longing!
There is a deep, untapped well of charity in my heart. But . . .”

“But?”

“It just wouldn't be business,” Mr. Gaunt finished. He favored Slopey with a compassionate smile . . . but his eyes sparkled so wolfishly that Slopey took a step backward. “You understand, don't you?”

“Uh . . . yeah! Sure!”

“Besides,” Mr. Gaunt went on, “the next few hours are crucial to me. Once things really get rolling, they can rarely be stopped . . . but for the time being, I must make prudence my watchword. If you suddenly stopped stuttering, it might raise questions. That would be bad. The Sheriff is already asking questions he has no business asking.” His face darkened momentarily, and then his ugly, charming,
jostling smile burst forth again. “But I intend to take care of him, Slopey. Ah, yes.”

“Sheriff Pangborn, you mean?”

“Yes—Sheriff Pangborn, that's what I mean to say.” Mr. Gaunt raised his first two fingers and once again drew them down in front of Slopey Dodd's face, from forehead to chin. “But we never talked about him, did we?”

“Talked about
who?”
Slopey asked, bewildered.

“Exactly.”

Leland Gaunt was wearing a jacket of dark-gray suede today, and from one of its pockets he produced a black leather wallet. He held it out to Slopey, who took it gingerly, being careful not to touch Mr. Gaunt's fingers.

“You know Coach Pratt's car, don't you?”

“The Mustang? Sure.”

“Put this in it. Under the passenger seat, with just a corner sticking out. Go to the high school right now—it wants to be there before the last bell. Do you understand?”

“Yes.”

“Then you're to wait until he comes out. And when he does . . .”

Mr. Gaunt went on speaking in a low murmur, and Slopey looked up at him, jaw slack, eyes dazed, nodding every once in a while.

Slopey Dodd left a few minutes later with John LaPointe's wallet tucked into his shirt.

Nettie lay in a plain gray casket which Polly Chalmers had paid for. Alan had asked her to let him help share the expense, and she'd refused in that simple but final way he had come to know, respect, and accept. The coffin stood on steel runners above a plot in Homeland Cemetery near the area where Polly's people were buried. The mound of earth next to it was covered with a carpet of bright green artificial grass which sparkled feverishly in the hot sunlight. That fake grass never failed to make Alan shudder. There was something obscene about it, something hideous. He liked it even less than the morticians' practice of first rouging the dead and then dolling them up in their finest clothes so they looked as if they were bound for a big business meeting in Boston instead of a long season of decay amid the roots and the worms.

Reverend Tom Killingworth, the Methodist minister who conducted twice-weekly services at Juniper Hill and who had known Nettie well, performed the service at Polly's request. The homily was brief but warm, full of reference to the Nettie Cobb this man had known, a woman who had been slowly and bravely coming out of the shadows of insanity, a woman who had taken the courageous decision to try to treat once more with the world which had hurt her so badly.

“When I was growing up,” Tom Killingworth said, “my mother kept a plaque with a lovely Irish saying on it in her sewing room. It said ‘May you be in heaven half an
hour before the devil knows you're dead.' Nettie Cobb had a hard life, in many ways a sad life, but in spite of that I do not believe she and the devil ever had much to do with each other. In spite of her terrible, untimely death, my heart believes that it is to heaven she has gone, and that the devil still hasn't gotten the news.” Killingworth raised his arms in the traditional gesture of benediction. “Let us pray.”

From the far side of the hill, where Wilma Jerzyck was being buried at the same time, came the sound of many voices rising and falling in response to Father John Brigham. Over there, cars were lined up from the burial site all the way to the cemetery's east gate; they had come for Peter Jerzyck, the living, if not for his dead wife. Over here there were only five mourners: Polly, Alan, Rosalie Drake, old Lenny Partridge (who went to all funerals on general principles, so long as it wasn't one of the Pope's army getting buried), and Norris Ridgewick. Norris looked pale and distracted. Fish must not have been biting, Alan thought.

“May the Lord bless you and keep your memories of Nettie Cobb fresh and green in your hearts,” Killingworth said, and beside Alan, Polly began to cry again. He put an arm around her and she moved against him gratefully, her hand finding his and twining in it tightly. “May the Lord lift up His face upon you; may He shower His grace upon you; may He cheer your souls and give you peace. Amen.”

The day was even hotter than Columbus Day had been, and when Alan raised his head, darts of bright sunlight bounced off the casket-rails and into his eyes. He wiped his free hand across his forehead, where a solid summer sweat had broken. Polly fumbled in her purse for a fresh Kleenex and wiped her streaming eyes with it.

“Honey, are you all right?” Alan asked.

“Yes . . . but I have to cry for her, Alan. Poor Nettie. Poor, poor Nettie. Why did this happen?
Why?”
And she began to sob again.

Alan, who wondered exactly the same thing, gathered her into his arms. Over her shoulder he saw Norris wandering away toward where the cars belonging to Nettie's mourners were huddled, looking like a man who either doesn't know
where he is going or who isn't quite awake. Alan frowned. Then Rosalie Drake approached Norris, said something to him, and Norris gave her a hug.

Alan thought, He knew her, too—he's just sad, that's all. You're jumping at an almighty lot of shadows these days—maybe the real question here is what's the matter with you?

Then Killingworth was there and Polly was turning to thank him, getting herself under control. Killingworth held out his hands. With guarded amazement Alan watched the fearless way Polly allowed her own hand to be swallowed up in the minister's larger ones. He could not remember ever seeing Polly offer one of her hands so freely and unthoughtfully.

She's not just a little better; she's a
lot
better. What in the hell happened?

On the other side of the hill, Father John Brigham's nasal, rather irritating voice proclaimed: “Peace be with you.”

“And with you,” the mourners replied
en masse.

Alan looked at the plain gray casket beside that hideous swath of fake green grass and thought, Peace be with you, Nettie. Now and at last, peace be with you.

As the twin funerals at Homeland were winding up, Eddie Warburton was parking in front of Polly's house. He slipped from his car—not a nice new car like the one that honky bastard down at the Sunoco had wrecked, just transportation—and looked cautiously both ways. Everything seemed fine; the street was dozing through what might have been an afternoon in early August.

Eddie hurried up Polly's walk, fumbling an official-looking envelope out of his shirt as he went. Mr. Gaunt had called him only ten minutes ago, telling him it was time to finish paying for his medallion, and here he was . . . of course. Mr. Gaunt was the sort of guy who, when he said frog, you jumped.

Eddie climbed the three steps to Polly's porch. A hot
little gust of breeze stirred the windchimes above the door, making them jingle softly together. It was the most civilized sound imaginable, but Eddie jumped slightly anyway. He took another look around, saw no one, then looked down at the envelope again. Addressed to “Ms. Patricia Chalmers”—pretty hoity-toity! Eddie hadn't the slightest idea that Polly's real first name was Patricia, nor did he care. His job was to do this little trick and then get the hell out of here.

He dropped the letter into the mail-slot. It fluttered down and landed on top of the other mail: two catalogues and a cable-TV brochure. Just a business-length envelope with Polly's name and address centered below the metered mail stamp in the upper right corner and the return address in the upper left:

San Francisco Department of Child Welfare

666 Geary Street

San Francisco, California 94112

“What is it?” Alan asked as he and Polly walked slowly down the hill toward Alan's station wagon. He had hoped to pass at least a word with Norris, but Norris had already gotten into his VW and taken off. Back to the lake for a little more fishing before the sun went down, probably.

Polly looked up at him, still red-eyed and too pale, but smiling tentatively. “What is what?”

“Your hands. What's made them all better? It's like magic.”

“Yes,” she said, and held them out before her, splay-fingered, so they could both look at them. “It is, isn't it?” Her smile was a little more natural now.

Her fingers were still twisted, still crooked, and the joints were still bunched, but the acute swelling which had been there Friday night was almost completely gone.

“Come on, lady. Give.”

“I'm not sure I want to tell you,” she said. “I'm a little embarrassed, actually.”

They stopped and waved at Rosalie as she drove by in her old blue Toyota.

“Come on,” Alan said. “ 'Fess up.”

“Well,” she said, “I guess it was just a matter of finally meeting the right doctor.” Slow color was rising in her cheeks.

“Who's that?”

“Dr. Gaunt,” she said with a nervous little laugh. “Dr. Leland Gaunt.”

“Gaunt!”
He looked at her in surprise. “What does he have to do with your hands?”

“Drive me down to his shop and I'll tell you on the way.”

Five minutes later (one of the nicest things about living in Castle Rock, Alan sometimes thought, was that almost everything was only five minutes away), he swung into one of the slant spaces in front of Needful Things. There was a sign in the window, one Alan had seen before:

TUESDAYS AND THURSDAYS BY APPOINTMENT ONLY.

It suddenly occurred to Alan—who hadn't thought about this aspect of the new store at all until now—that closed except “by appointment” was one fuck of a strange way to run a small-town business.

“Alan?” Polly asked hesitantly. “You look mad.”

“I'm not mad,” he said. “What in the world do I have to be mad about? The truth is, I don't know
how
I feel. I guess—” He uttered a short laugh, shook his head, and started again. “I guess I'm what Todd used to call ‘gabberflasted.' Quack remedies? It just doesn't seem like you, Pol.”

Her lips tightened at once, and there was a warning in her eyes when she turned to look at him. “ ‘Quack' isn't the word I'd have used. Quack is for ducks and . . . and prayer-wheels from the ads in the back of
Inside View.
‘Quack' is the wrong word to use if a thing works, Alan. Do you think I'm wrong?”

He opened his mouth—to say what, he wasn't sure—but she went on before he could say anything.

“Look at this.” She held her hands out in the sunshine flooding through the windshield, then opened them and closed them effortlessly several times.

“All right. Poor choice of words. What I—”

“Yes, I'd say so. A very poor choice.”

“I'm sorry.”

She turned all the way around to face him then, sitting where Annie had so often sat, sitting in what had once been the Pangborn family car. Why haven't I traded this thing yet? Alan wondered. What am I—crazy?

Polly placed her hands gently over Alan's. “Oh, this is starting to feel really uncomfortable—we
never
argue, and I'm not going to start now. I buried a good companion today. I'm not going to have a fight with my boyfriend, as well.”

A slow grin lit his face. “That what I am? Your boyfriend?”

“Well . . . you're my
friend.
Can I at least say that?”

He hugged her, a little astonished at how close they had come to having harsh words. And not because she felt worse; because she felt
better.
“Honey, you can say anything you want. I love you a bunch.”