Cul-de-Sac (29 page)

“All right.”

When Elizabeth began slipping, Camel boosted her higher in his arms, his fingers slipping off the tarp to scrape loose a chunk of crisped flesh that felt like soft warm pork barbecue. He had to will himself not to drop her in disgust.

He carried Elizabeth outside and then around to Eddie’s Fairlane
placing her as carefully as he could into the backseat, keeping the tarp around her, Camel thinking the interior is going to be ruined now, Eddie will never get this smell out. He looked down at hazel eyes watching him from somewhere far away.

Camel got in the driver’s side and slid behind the wheel, started the engine, snapped the lap belt closed, looked back at what had once been Elizabeth Rockwell, then took off.

He was going too fast when he got to the two-lane county highway, braking hard and making a sliding right turn that nearly clipped one of the brick pillars. The hospital waited another fifteen, twenty miles away, Camel almost sure she would die of shock before he got her there but he also felt obligated to try … Parker Gray had died while Camel, in typical cold logic, knelt beside him waiting for the inevitable, this time he was going to race the inevitable to a hospital.

The highway wound through a forest, Camel driving as fast as he could and still stay on the road, glancing in the rearview mirror and Jesus Christ there she was, RIGHT THERE … Elizabeth’s face leaning over the seat back right there at Camel’s shoulder, he wondered how in God’s name did she find the strength to sit up … the fire had transformed that face into a horror mask, blackened with little left of her lips or nose, most of that gray blond hair burned off, ears only remnant folds of charred flesh, her teeth grinning white. Camel might’ve survived the shock of having that fright-face suddenly at his shoulder but when he saw her eyes he jerked away from Elizabeth and lost control of the car … because while her head was held rigidly forward, as if she was leaning to see out the windshield, her eyes were straining to the left, bulging from the sockets to find him, to plead with him, as if those undamaged eyes desperately wanted Camel’s help getting out of that ruined face.

The Fairlane was fishtailing while Camel worked the brakes to slow down without going into a completely uncontrolled skid. These maneuvers were only partly successful because while he did manage to get almost stopped, at the last moment the car veered off and hit a tree dead center … with sufficient impact to rocket
Elizabeth over the front seat and into the windshield, which instantly spider-webbed into a thousand cracks but did not break out … Camel’s lap belt limiting him to hitting his face against the steering wheel.

Pinpoints of light exploded in front of his eyes and he kept saying, “Jesus.” Not taking the name in vain but saying, “Jesus, Jesus” as a prayer, the most earnest he’d ever prayed … and continued praying as he got out of the car, went around to the passenger side, propped Elizabeth in the front seat, and retrieved the canvas tarp to put over her.

She had remained dead silent until now when she said, “Oh.” Camel thought he should offer a reassuring word, none came to mind.

Elizabeth held a hand toward him, he didn’t know what she wanted, wasn’t sure she knew either. He tried to push her hand back so he could close the door but she kept reaching for him, finally he grabbed her wrist and forced it inside … his palm coming away wet with serum.

Wiping that hand on his pants Camel walked to the front of the car, bumper bent in a wide-mouth U around the tree. Steaming green antifreeze bleeding onto the ground told Camel the radiator had taken a crippling hit but, amazingly, the car started. He reversed onto the road and took off again.

A mile later the temperature gauge had pegged itself way over past
H
, these small-block V-8s notorious for running hot even with a good radiator, engine’s heat coming through the fire wall to roast his legs, Camel wondering how it must have felt on hers.

No choice but to throttle on full bore waiting any moment now for the engine to seize but the old Ford motored its heart out delivering Camel and his damaged cargo right to the hospital’s emergency room entrance.

He looked at Elizabeth and again wanted to say something but she was beyond words.

Running to the hospital’s double glass doors, he encountered two orderlies just exiting.

“What happened to you?” one of them asked with a casualness
that Camel found maddening. “Somebody Joe Louis your ass, didn’t they?”

He had no idea what the orderly meant, Camel hadn’t yet felt pain from his nose, broken on the steering wheel in the crash, and was unaware of blood creeking down his face.

The orderlies each took an arm.

He pried their hands off.

“You on something buddy?” one of them asked. “What’ve you been taking?”

He looked at their faces, they appeared to be concerned for him but wary too, expecting Camel to turn violent at any moment. He knew what he had to say … there’s a severely burned woman out in the car.

When they tried again to get Camel inside he settled for raising his right arm and pointing at the car.

They saw the busted windshield on the passenger side.

“Someone in there?” one of them asked.

He nodded.

“Worse shape than you?”

Camel nodded again, closing his eyes with the relief of finally being understood.

They grabbed a gurney and ran to the car, Camel following. When the first orderly opened the door Elizabeth started to fall out and the second orderly had to reach down and grab her. When he saw what he had in his hands, he said, “Jesus.”

Camel thought yeah I know that prayer.

They got Elizabeth on the gurney and rushed her inside, Camel arriving at the treatment room just behind a doctor, young guy with orange-red hair that stuck high all over his head like a comic wig, who lifted the tarp and mumbled, “Jesus.”

Everybody praying tonight.

Quickly recovering his composure the doctor began giving orders to the nurses, yelling for the orderlies to put through for a helicopter because the best he could do was stabilize the patient for a flight to the nearest burn center.

As the nurses assembled equipment Elizabeth turned her head
and found Camel. She unbent one burned arm and reached for him as she’d done after the crash. The doctor turned and looked at Camel. Nurses staring too. Everyone still for a moment as if frozen in a living tableau … then just as abruptly all their animation returned, the emergency room once again filled with clatter and activity as the nurses brought in IV drips and hypos, sponges and sterile wraps, the doctor nudging Camel aside and telling him, “Go across the hall to the other treatment room, I’ll get someone to take a look at you as soon as we can.”

“I’m fine,” Camel said just before doing a most astonishing thing, the first time he’d ever done it in a long life full of all possible opportunities and provocations: he fainted.

When the electricity in Cul-De-Sac went out Jake Kempis pulled a flashlight from his utility belt and it worked just fine … but he wished he had an even bigger one, an even brighter one.

The man he and Camel had shot was not dead, Growler had regained consciousness to scream at Kempis who went over and tried to figure out if he should do something for the guy, take him to a hospital or at least try to stop the bleeding from the bullet wounds or what.

“Hey look at this,” Growler said indicating the front of his trousers. He wasn’t wearing a shirt and Kempis could see enough of the tattoo to know what was being depicted. “Better let me loose or the ol’ debil get you nigger.”

Jeez, Kempis thought, right away with the
nigger
 … assholes like this were so goddamn predictable. Kempis turned and walked down the corridor, no longer feeling guilty about leaving the bastard cuffed to a radiator … while Growler called after him, “Ol’ debil live in dese walls, you listen, you hear him scratching to get out.”

It was while Jake was searching for a stairway that the electricity went out and he started second-guessing himself about how he placed the cuffs on Growler … maybe he didn’t tighten them
sufficiently, maybe the bastard got loose and turned off the electricity.

Coming around to the front of the building Kempis saw the double doors to the outside and thought about leaving … but he’d promised Camel he’d find Annie and Kempis intended to keep that promise.

What’s to worry about anyway, he had the flashlight in his left hand and he was well armed, the .38 revolver he’d used to shoot Growler was in Kempis’s right hand and the 9mm Camel had dropped to the floor was tucked in Kempis’s belt … but he wished for even more guns, even bigger ones.

Jake turned toward the stairway.

Mrs. Milton was supposed to be in a corner room on the second level, Kempis almost to the first step when he heard a noise behind him, like something hard tapping along on the wood floors, almost as if an animal was following him, its nails clicking on the floor … it could’ve been hooves but most likely it was Kempis’s imagination. He turned, shined his light, saw nothing, and headed once more for the stairs … there it was again.

“Mrs. Milton?”

No answer.

He wanted to be a state trooper, all his life Jake Kempis had been a ballsy guy, very little frightened him … but now he wished for even more courage, even bigger balls.

Camel awoke with a start, a muscle twitch like when you’re coming out of a dream about stepping off a cliff. He was in a hospital room, lying on a bed but atop the covers and dressed except for his shoes which had been removed and his sports coat which was on a nearby chair. Camel’s first thought was of Annie … she’s okay, Kempis has already taken her to The Ground Floor. Then he thought of Elizabeth Rockwell and wondered if she’d made it.

The only injury to himself that he was aware of initially was the one to his pride, the embarrassment of having fainted, but when Camel sat up he got reminded of everything else that hurt … burns high on his chest and above the belt-line, his stomach still sore from where he’d been sucker-punched by McCleany, his right bicep aching where the golf ball had hit, and most especially his nose, swollen and bandaged as if doctors had grafted an eggplant onto his face.

Adrenaline and a focused concentration had masked these various injuries while Camel dealt with everything that happened at Cul-De-Sac, with getting Elizabeth to the hospital, but now as he swung around to sit on the edge of the bed he felt each individual source of pain.

His shoes were there on the floor, Camel slipping off the bed
and sitting in the chair to put them on. How long had he been out, were Kempis and Annie waiting for him at The Ground Floor … had Kempis already notified the state police about Parker Gray’s death?

I’m going to get nailed for that, Camel thought. Even if it eventually comes out that Gray helped frame Growler for the murder seven years ago, that’s not going to let me off the hook for killing Gray. It’ll look like I did it because he pushed to have me arrested for shooting Paul Milton, like I did it for revenge.

Camel closed his eyes and put his head back to think. Gray was the first man he’d killed without wanting to, the first man he’d killed who didn’t need killing … and Camel felt sick to his soul. But he didn’t intend to go to prison over it, Camel would repent on his own schedule.

When a young nurse walked by the room’s open doorway and saw Camel sitting in the chair, she backed up, looked again, and came into the room flashing a big white smile, “How you feeling?”

He opened his eyes and said he felt fine.

She kept smiling, nice teeth like Annie’s.

“How long have I been out?”

She checked her watch and shrugged. “Ten minutes?”

She had to be kidding. Camel said, “You got to be kidding.”

She shook her pretty head and hit that toothy smile again … Camel liked looking at her.

“Always darkest before the dawn,” she said, apropos of what, he wasn’t sure. She felt his pulse, placed a cool hand on his fevered brow, Camel understanding then why rich old men bequeath everything to their nurses. This one’s name tag said she was Crystal Packard, Camel figured her at barely twenty.

“We di’n’t even take off your clothes,” she informed him. “Just your shoes so they wouldn’ dirty up the bed. But we di’n’t put you in a hospital gown and all … doctor said you’d be coming around in a few minutes. He was right, huh? He fixed your nose. I di’n’t hear if it was broken or not but you’ll have two black eyes I’m sure.”

Camel asked about Elizabeth Rockwell.

“You’ll have to talk with doctor.” Like many in the health profession Crystal consistently dropped articles when referring to doctors … the way other people drop articles when referring to God.

“Are you saying you don’t know whether she made it or not … or you don’t want to tell me?”

“Was she your wife?”

“
Was
? She’s dead?”

Crystal had a little bobbed nose and small brown eyes, over-dyed blond hair arranged in a short, perky style … when she tried to force this button-cute face into a somber expression the result came across as an exaggerated pout. “I could get you some counseling.”

“What?”

“Counseling. You want some?” she asked, as if offering ice water.

“No.” Camel stood and put on his sports coat.

She told him he couldn’t leave just yet.

“Why not?”

“Doctor has to say it’s okay.”

“I haven’t been admitted, I don’t have to be discharged.”

“I think you better wait right here,” she insisted, turning on low nonmarking heels and walking out of the room, Camel watching her go. The word “pneumatic” came to mind.

And then right behind pneumatic … Elizabeth Rockwell came to mind. He had always harbored a private dread of being burned and seeing it happen to Elizabeth was like experiencing a childhood nightmare, unable to wake up and make it stop. Checking the scorches on his chest and above his belt-line he saw they were no worse than bad sunburns, then he touched his face again, the bandaged nose felt both numb
and
painful if that was possible. He had an axe-in-the-skull headache … and knowledge of more to come.