Backtracker (70 page)

"
He knows I
'
m a killer, and he
'
ll go to the police. He won
'
t know what
you
know, won
'
t understand, so he won
'
t want to let me get away with what I
'
ve done.

"
I don
'
t
want
him to know what you know, either, so please don
'
t tell him,
"
Larry punched urgently.
"
It won
'
t do any good to tell him. He probably won
'
t believe you...and if he hears the truth, it might somehow ruin things, screw up all the work I
'
ve done to give him another chance.

"
I really do need your help, you see. That
'
s why I
'
ve told you all this. Now that Billy knows at least some of what I
'
ve done, I need someone he trusts...someone
I
trust...to keep my secret and do what
'
s best for him.

"
I need you to let me get out of here without trying to stop me. I need you to convince Billy not to go to the cops, at least not right away. I need you to buy me some time, just a little more
time
, so I can finish my work.

"
I know this all may be pretty hard for you to accept,
"
nodded Larry.
"
It
'
s all pretty unbelievable. Here I am, telling you that I
'
m your best friend aged another twenty years, that I
'
ve come back in time and killed people to change the past. If I was in your shoes, I know
I
'
d
have trouble accepting that.

"
Still, after the things I told you before, the things only
Billy
could know...things he
'
d never tell anyone...I hope you believe that I am who I
say
I am.

"
If you absolutely can
'
t believe me...well, that
'
s okay too, I guess. If that
'
s how you feel, I can live with that...but I still hope you
'
ll help me.

"
Think about it,
"
Larry said gravely, staring up at Dave with dark and serious eyes.
"
Even if you don
'
t believe me, can you afford to take the chance that I
'
m not telling the truth? You may
think
I
'
m lying, but can you be totally sure that I am?

"
Maybe I
'
m some kind of crazed killer, just telling you these things so that I can get away...or maybe I
'
m telling you the truth. Maybe I
am
Billy. Maybe I
have
come back to put things right.

"
If I
am
being straight with you, and you interfere with the last of my work, maybe you
'
ll sentence your friend to death all over again. Even though I
'
ve arranged things so Billy should be all right, even though I
'
ve gotten rid of the girl and Kimmel and Martin and the rest, if I don
'
t kill the killer who set up Billy, maybe that guy
'
ll get Billy again. Maybe Billy will somehow fall into the same pattern as before and end up on Death Row.

"
If that happens, it
'
ll be your
fault
,
"
declared Larry, pointing a finger at Dave.
"
You
'
ll be responsible for ruining your best friend
'
s life!

"
Can you take the
chance
,
Dave? Can you
risk
putting him through the same hell
I
'
ve
been through?

"
Maybe I
'
m lying...but if I
'
m
not
,
do you
dare
try to stop me, Dave? Will you be able to live with the consequences if I
'
m telling you the truth?
"

For a moment, Larry paused, kept his steely gaze fastened on Dave. The air was still; there was no sound anywhere nearby
-
not the twittering of birds, not the rustle of branches in the wind.

"
What I
'
ve tried to do,
"
Larry continued then, his voice a bit softer.
"
I think I
'
ve been successful.
Things are already different than they were for me, the way they were the first time around.

"
The girl who would
'
ve trapped Billy is gone. So is the guy who would
'
ve stolen his true love.

"
Ernie will stay at Billy
'
s side, and Tom Martin won
'
t be able to take away Billy
'
s job.

"
I killed that kid before he could grow up to be the narc who would
'
ve sent Billy to jail. I
'
ve covered almost all the bases.

"
I guess I
'
ve created a whole new history. Nothing will be the same as I remember it...and believe me, that
'
s great. I
'
ve spared Billy all the pain I
'
ve had to live with, given him a clean slate.

"
He
'
ll never become like me,
"
Larry said tightly, shaking his head.
"
He
'
ll never have to kill to save himself.

"
What will happen to me in the end, I don
'
t know.
"
Larry hesitated, turned his gaze away from Dave, looked over the opposite rim of the cleft.
"
Maybe I
'
ll just be left in this time to live with what I
'
ve done. Maybe that
'
ll be my punishment
-
to wander around, knowing that the people I care about are right here, but I can never go back to them.

"
Maybe, once I
'
m done with my work, I
'
ll be sent back to the time where I belong, and my life will have been different and I
'
ll be happy.

"
Maybe I
'
ll just...I don
'
t know. Maybe that
'
ll be it for me.

"
Anyway, it doesn
'
t matter what happens to me. All I care about is
him
.
"
Stepping back and to the side, Larry pointed at Billy, the silent form in the dirt and shadows.
"
He
'
s
what
'
s important, understand?

"
I
'
m asking you
,
I
'
m
begging
you: don
'
t interfere! Don
'
t try to stop me! Whether or not you believe me, please give
him
a chance!

"
Whether or not you approve of what I
'
m
doing, please let me
finish
.
Don
'
t let all my work, all those
lives
, have been wasted!

"
I can
'
t ask you to do it for
me
, because you don
'
t even recognize me for who I really am...but I
'
ll ask you to do it for
him
, for
Billy
,
for your best friend!

"
Please
,
"
pressed Larry Smith, his voice full of desperation.
"
I
'
m at your
mercy
!
It
'
s all up to
you
now!

"
Will you please give me the
time
I need to save him?
"

*****

Chapter
31

A light breeze sifted through the trench, slipped across Dave
'
s forehead like a cool cloth.

"
Go,
"
he'd
said.
"
Just go.
"

Kneeling in the dirt, he again pressed his fingers to Billy
'
s throat, felt for his pulse. The beat was still there, the strong, steady rhythm just under the skin.

Alive; Billy Bristol was alive. About that, at least, Larry
hadn
'
t
lied.

Billy was still unconscious,
hadn
'
t
stirred since Dave had descended into the cleft...but he was alive. Poised at his side, Dave could see his chest rise and fall with the action of breath.

Alive.

Larry
hadn
'
t
killed Billy; that much was a relief, anyway. That much was certain, perhaps the only certainty.

They were alone in the trench now, Dave and Billy. Just a few minutes before, Larry had climbed out, crossed the mound and disappeared into the woods;
he'd
waited for permission to leave, and when Dave had given it,
he'd
departed.

"
Go,
"
Dave had told him.
"
Just go.
"

"
Thank you,
"
Larry had said graciously.
"
Thank you for this chance.
"

As always, Larry had been mystifying to the last.
He'd
beseeched Dave for his permission to go, but Dave
didn
'
t
know why
he'd
done so. Certainly, Dave could do nothing to stop him,
couldn
'
t
stand against his superior strength.

"
Go,
"
Dave had said nervously, straining to keep himself from shaking.
"
Just go.
"

"
Remember,
"
Larry had called back to him on his way to the woods.
"
Don
'
t tell Billy what I told you! Don
'
t let him go to the cops for a day, at least!

"
It
'
s all up to you now
!
"
Larry had shouted as he hurried toward the trees.
"
You
'
ve got to save him! For God
'
s sake, don
'
t let him down! Don
'
t let him die!
"

There had been great urgency in Larry
'
s voice as
he'd
fired those words;
he'd
tried to plant a sense of personal responsibility which would encourage Dave
'
s cooperation. Though the extent of his cooperation had yet to be determined, Dave certainly did feel responsible now.

Dave felt responsible for everything.

"
It
'
s all up to you now
!
"
Larry had said, and that much, anyway, was a fact. That much stood out in Dave
'
s beclouded brain; that much blazed like a distress flare over a stormy, dark sea.

It was all up to him.

If Larry
'
s story was a lie, and Dave took action
-
if he went to the cops or in some other way intervened
-
he might be able to save a life, maybe many lives. If Larry was just a killer on a rampage, Dave could ensure that his spree went no further.

If Larry
'
s story was a lie, and Dave took no action, he might doom a host of victims to death at the hands of a madman.

If Larry
'
s story was true, and Dave took action, Billy Bristol
'
s life might be ruined. As Larry had warned, Dave could eliminate his best friend
'
s last shot at happiness, even buy him a ticket to the electric chair.

If Larry
'
s story was true, and Dave took no action, he might win Billy a bright future which he was otherwise fated to be denied.

It was as simple as that. Truth or lie; action or no action.

It was all up to him.

There
was nothing
simple about it.

Dave closed his eyes tightly and tipped his face toward the sky. The breeze feathered over his features but
couldn
'
t
smooth the grimace locked into place there.

Too much; it was just too much for him. Too much had happened too fast.

Remembering the day
'
s events, Dave was startled by the amazing twists which
he'd
experienced in a very short time. Everything had been flipped upside
-
down, jumbled into bizarre new configurations in a matter of hours.

Too much had happened too fast. Dave
didn
'
t
feel that he could deal with it, with any of it; he was dangerously overloaded, far past the point of acceptable pressure and craziness. Had the flurry of events and changes been spread over a week
'
s time, he would have had great difficulty adjusting to it...but compressed into a morning and afternoon, the storms had blasted him into a state of shellshock from which he
didn
'
t
think he could recover.

The problem was,
he
had
to recover,
had
to pull himself together and decide what to do...or what not to do. Billy might come around at any moment, and by the time he awakened, Dave would have to know what course he would follow.
He had
to resolve a problem more complex and critical than any that
he'd
ever faced before, and
he had
to handle it immediately, and it was just too much.

Dave wished that he could be free of the new weight upon him. He wished that
he'd
never left the house that morning, that he and Billy had never gone in search of Larry. He wished that
he'd
never met Larry in the first place, had never witnessed his fantastic feats, had never begun the investigation which had led to such horrifying turns.

Dave wished that he could turn back the clock as Larry claimed to be able to do, start over and change his course...but that, at least as far as he knew, was impossible. For Dave, for now, there could be no going back.

Timidly, he opened his eyes to the bright, pale sky, squinted up from the crack in the stone as if he were a cave
-
dweller unaccustomed to the light. A tremendous yawn seized him, forcing the eyes shut again, triggering a huge inhalation and a long, groaning release.

After another yawn, he shifted from his knees, settled back to sit in the dirt. For the first time since
he'd
spotted the faceless kid, he felt the potent ache of exhaustion; he remembered just how long
he'd
gone without sleep, felt the full drag of the weariness which had been repressed by the adrenaline of fear.

He yawned again, had to blink hard to clear the mist from his eyes. Staring at his friend, he wondered how much longer Billy would stay unconscious, how much time remained for the forging of a decision. He
didn
'
t
think that there was much time left; Billy had been out for close to an hour already.

Sighing, Dave let his head sag back against the stone, continued to watch his still and silent comrade. Billy
'
s eyes were closed, his mouth was open, his wavy switch of hair mussed and seasoned with dirt. His arms were spread from his sides, palms up; one leg was stretched straight, the other bowed over a tumble of rocks. The only damage that Dave could see was in Billy
'
s clothes; the neck of his blue sweatshirt was ripped at the middle, and there was a hole in one knee of his jeans.

As he watched his friend, Dave searched for some resemblance to Larry Smith, some feature that might suggest that Billy and Larry were one and the same. If Dave had heretofore overlooked some similarity, if he could distinguish it now, it might support the veracity of Larry
'
s story.

Staring intently, Dave analyzed Billy
'
s facial structure, examined it more carefully than he ever had. He could see no reflection of Larry, no hint of the killer.

Billy
'
s features were elfin; they matched his childlike, mischievous personality but in no way implied a connection to Larry. The nose was too thin, too narrow at the base; the mouth
wasn
'
t
wide enough, the ears not big enough; the chin was too sharp, the jawline too clean and angular; the color of the hair was about right, but Dave
couldn
'
t
imagine the unruly flip of it mowed to a Larry Smith
crew
-
cut
.

There was certainly no surface resemblance. Closing his eyes, Dave tried to envision what Billy might look like in twenty years, tried to extrapolate a likely result based on his current appearance. Despite his best efforts, he
couldn
'
t
picture Billy as a middle
-
aged man; not only could he not imagine Billy becoming Larry, but he
couldn
'
t
imagine him being any older than he was at that moment. Billy was just too familiar, too
young
in every way for Dave to conjure a vision of him at a more advanced age.

Dave looked at his friend, closed his eyes, then looked again, hoping for a different impression. It was no good; no matter what he did, he
couldn
'
t
see any similarities between Billy and Larry,
couldn
'
t
imagine Billy in his forties, Billy becoming Larry Smith. It was possible, he supposed, that Billy could change dramatically over the years, metamorphose so completely as to become unrecognizable; it was possible that he could add weight and muscle to his wiry frame, lose the thinness and definition of his features, broaden and realign to Larry
'
s meatier dimensions. Still, Dave could only think of those possibilities in the abstract,
couldn
'
t
frame them with any kind of clarity in his mind.
He'd
sought some physical evidence to support Larry
'
s claims, something to guide his decision...but there
was nothing
.

When it came down to it, the only thing that Dave had to go on was what Larry had told him. Without the benefit of concrete proof, he would have to make his judgment on the basis of what
he'd
heard.

Had Larry lied, or had he told the truth?

Dave
'
s first instinct was to reject Larry
'
s presentation as an outright sham. It all seemed too unbelievable, too fantastic and contrived. Though Dave had been willing to accept that Larry was psychic, that he could foretell the future, he found it hard t
o believe that Larry had come
from the future. Precognition, at least, seemed possible; Dave had heard of people who seemed to possess such an ability. On the other hand, time travel struck Dave as an impossibility; it took a far greater leap of faith to believe in time travel than it took to believe in precognition, even for someone with as active an imagination as Dave.

The new story explained all the amazing events with which Larry had been involved...but the other story, the psychic story, had done the same. The time travel tale was no more convincing in illuminating Larry
'
s actions than the psychic fable had been. The only substantial difference between the two stories was Larry
'
s new admission that he was a killer...but that confession had been irrelevant in light of the discovery of the faceless kid.

In describing his tale of tragedy and murder, Larry had projected great sincerity, plenty of emotion.
He'd
seemed genuinely touched, had expressed the appropriate feelings for each phase of the narrative...and yet,
he'd
done no less in relating the previous story. Given his expertise in delivering falsehoods, his latest performance
couldn
'
t
be seen as any kind of validation.