free hit counters
Chapter 54
"Maybe we ought try and go back to the motel," Sherwin suggested, pulling in his thumb and turning around as the car flew past. He was bleeding from the elbow and knee, and his whole body ached. His skin felt like it was on fire.
"No way, baby," Lenny said. He'd lost his glasses somewhere back in the swamp, and was even worse off than Sherwin. He was past swatting at mosquitoes; it didn't help any more. "You heard what those two said. If they caught us again . . ."
"It was a thought."
"Fuck your thoughts, fuck that town, and fuck Jenny Easton. My job isn't worth going back there, and there's nothing in our luggage worth it, either." Lenny stumbled a little on some irregularity in the gravel alongside the state road, far to the south of where they'd
been stopped a couple hours before. "We were lucky we got out of that swamp alive." He heard another vehicle approaching, and turned around to stick out his thumb. If they could get to the next town, then maybe they could rent a car. Thank god he still had his wallet.
The approaching vehicle was a dirty, battered old blue pickup truck, and it was slowing. Both Lenny and Sherwin's heart skipped a beat; they might live, after all.
The truck stopped next to them. From inside, a man's voice called, "Where you boys headin'?"
"Trying to get to the next town, or to the Camden airport," Lenny replied.
"Waal, hop in," the man said. "I blowed me a transfer case, and I gotta go down to Camden to get me another. Ain't too far from the airport."
Lenny was first into the cab of the truck, with Sherwin hot on his tail. The driver was a tall, thin man in his thirties, with disheveled sandy hair, wearing a greasy, dirty t-shirt and greasy, ripped jeans. He had grease stains here and there, as well, and it looked like he'd
just crawled from under some oily machinery. "God, we really appreciate this," Lenny said. "We'll make it worth your while."
"What the hell happened to you two?" the driver said, pulling back out onto the highway.
"God, are all the cops around here like that?" Sherwin asked over the blaring country music on the radio.
"Like what?" the driver asked.
"We got stopped for speeding," Lenny explained, unable to come up with much of a better story in his condition.
"One of them cops a big guy, and the other one bigger, walks with a limp?"
"Yeah," Sherwin said. "Why the hell they aren't in a zoo someplace is beyond me."
The driver of the pickup smiled. "Sounds like you done run into Harold and LeRoy. What'd they do, take you about six-eight miles up the two-rut south of the lake, dump you out, and let the bugs see if they can eat ya before you can find your way out? You musta been
speedin' pretty good. Usually, they only do that to drunks."
"I'd have sworn it was twenty miles," Lenny said.
"Naw, if'n it'd been twenty miles you wouldn'ta been gettin' outta there," the driver said, smiling. "They only do that to people that they don't like. Some deer hunters found a coupla skeletons back out that far one time. They said they musta been lost, but everybody
knowed that Harold and LeRoy musta really been pissed."
"They acted pretty pissed as it was," Sherwin said.
"There's pissed, and there's really pissed," the driver said. "I `spect if'n they saw you again, they'd be really pissed."
"How the hell can you live with cops like that?"
"You don't let `em catch you drivin' drunk," the driver smiled. "Ain't been too many people tried it a second time. Keeps things nice and quiet. You boys from around here?"
"Los Angeles," Lenny admitted. "We intend to get back there as quick as we can and not ever leave town again."
"Now, Los Angeles, I don't know how I'd fancy that," the driver smiled. "All the traffic, all the niggers. Best to have Harold and LeRoy a-keepin' things quiet. By the way, the name's Slim. What you boys doin' here, anyway?"
"We were trying to get some film of Jenny Easton," Sherwin said, without thinking.
"Know who you mean," Slim smiled. "That ain't her real name. You musta not told Harold and LeRoy that."
"Why do you say that?"
"Waal, it was `fore my time," the driver said, spitting out the open window of the truck. "But you know that real big cop? The one that walks with a little limp? Well, he and her daddy usta play football together, back in the fifties, and one day they got into a fight real
bad, over some girl, I guess. Well, anyway, her daddy kicked the livin' shit out of Harold. The only man ever done that. Made `em the best of friends. If he'da knowed that, they'da drug you so far out in the swamp the skeeters woulda sucked you dry by nightfall. Some say
those two skeletons was some film crew, lookin' for Jenny, but me, I think maybe they was just drug dealers."
"Much of that around here?" Lenny asked, trying to change the subject a little.
Slim shook his head. "Wouldn't expect there would be, if Harold and LeRoy found out about it. They's lotsa folks'd call them up in a minute if they heard about somethin' like that."
"What do people do for a living around here?" Lenny asked, still trying to get away from the increasingly depressing subject of the two cops.
"Oh, cut pulp, like me, work in the mill, draw welfare, like that," Slim explained. "Ain't a lot of money here, but it's home."
"How do you work out in the woods with all the mosquitos?" Sherwin asked. "My god, I thought they were going to kill us."
"Oh, you grow up here, you don't notice `em too much, unless they're real bad. You go back in the woods in the day, they ain't real bad. You boys is just lucky they didn't drop you out there at nightfall. They do get a little bad sometimes, then."
"There were clouds of them," Sherwin said, unable to let the experience go. "God, I could hardly see. They were even trying to bite my eyes. We were running as hard as we could go, and they were still all over us."
"Well, you don't go out in the woods, even durin' the day, without you wear a wool shirt and pants," Slim explained. "It does get a mite uncomfortable on a day like today, so I was kind of glad I had me some work to do on the loader. When it gets to be blackfly season,
some people don't even go to work, but we're through the worst of the flys, now. Damn blackfly bite is worse than a mosquito bite; they even bother me some."
"It wasn't that bad in town," Lenny commented.
"They spray in town," Slim explained. "Does keep `em down pretty good. You know you ain't supposed to spray DDT no more? Some goddamn environmentalist sold those bastards in Congress on that, but don't make no matter, cause there's this old boy, works for
the city, knows how to make his own. Kinda sorry they do. If they didn't spray, then we wouldn't have all these goddamn summer people."
"Does it get cold here in the winter?" Sherwin asked.
"Yeah, a little," Slim drawled. "Maybe forty-fifty below, but it's a dry cold, you don't notice it much, `ecpt on the days it gets real cold. Harold and LeRoy catch someone drivin' drunk then, they best have a lot of antifreeze in them, `cause you can get real cold walkin'
back to town without a coat."
"I don't intend to find out," Lenny said. "There isn't enough money in Hollywood for me to go back there again."
"Me either," Sherwin agreed.
It was a long drive down to the airport at Camden, but Lenny and Sherwin were very glad indeed that Slim had taken pity on them. At the airport, they took him inside the terminal, and while Lenny and Sherwin poured beer down to cool off and rehydrate, Slim agreed
to let them buy him a coke. Fortunately, a plane was leaving in only a few minutes for Chicago, and they were able to get tickets. Slim went with them to the departure lounge. "Slim, I'm damn glad we met you," Lenny said, reaching for his wallet. "Here's something for
your trouble." He handed Slim a couple of hundred-dollar bills.
"Aw, shucks," Slim said. "T'wern't nothin'. You keep that."
"Keep it, hell," Lenny said. "You saved our lives. It's the least we can do."
"Well, all right," Slim said. "I guess I can."
Lenny and Sherwin were happy to collapse into the seat of the jet. "Thank God, back to the real world," Lenny said.
"Glad he came along," Sherwin agreed. "God, I wonder how people can live like that."
"I don't know about you," Lenny said, "But I don't intend to find out."
Back in the airport parking lot, "Slim" stood leaning on the pickup truck, watching the plane taxi out to the runway, a big grin on his face. As the plane started to take off, he looked at his watch, and figured that if he hurried, he could get the pickup back to the guy he'd
borrowed it from, get cleaned up, and still make it back in time to see Kirsten and Susan before visiting hours were over with. Even so, there were a couple of loose ends to clean up. "God," he thought to himself, "Jennifer thinks she can act . . ."
