The King of Clayfield - 01 (2 page)

The two remaining women wrestled around on the asphalt for a few seconds. The masked woman finally broke free, and stumbled over to another car—I presumed her own vehicle. Leaning
 
against it, she
 
started crying. Unlike the other woman, she didn’t have her purse or keys.

CHAPTER 2

The woman in the mask recovered quickly from her breakdown, and went around her car feeling under the fender wells and behind the bumpers. I figured she was looking for spare keys. The whole time,
 
she kept
 
an eye on Woman Three, who was now seated next to the ATM watching her.

The masked woman finished her sweep for keys with no luck then leaned on the car again in frustration. It was hard to tell exactly with the mask, but she looked like she was in her late 40s to early 50s. She was wearing a knee-length brown coat, black dress slacks, a red hat and matching red scarf.

I could hear a siren approaching, and she turned to look in the direction of the bank. An ambulance
 
sailed past
 
on North 7
th
. She waved both arms trying to attract their attention, but they didn’t slow down.

Woman Three jumped to her feet again, seemingly agitated either by the noise or by the masked woman’s movements, and began to shuffle toward her. The masked woman was still looking toward North 7
th
Street, and didn’t see Woman Three approaching.

This whole time, I had been watching through the window like it was a television program. I was still trying to process whether or not what I’d been watching was even real. A blue pickup truck came down North 7
th
going the wrong way, and the masked woman waved to them, too. Woman Three was getting closer. I don’t know why it took so long, but it suddenly hit me that I had to help her.

I ran out of the office, through the gallery, and out the back door of the building. I wasn’t really thinking at all, and I didn’t even feel the cold.
 
I know I was yelling, but I don’t think I was saying any words. Both women looked my direction. The masked woman screamed, seeing how close Woman Three was to her, and now seeing this newcomer coming at her with a broken broom handle. She ran around the car, putting it between her and us.

I wasn’t thinking. I don’t know why I did what I did or how I even managed to make myself do it, but when Woman Three noticed me, she came at me, and I hit her in the face with the broom handle. I kept hitting her. It was fear that was driving me, and I didn’t stop hitting her until the handle broke again, and she was in a heap at my feet.

I stood staring down at her, suddenly overcome with guilt for what I did. I dropped what was left of the broom next to her body. I caught movement out of the corner of my eye. The woman in the mask had discarded her other shoe and was running away, headed toward the fire station.

“No!” I shouted, “Stop! I was trying to help you!”

She kept going. I started to run after her, but I noticed a group of people
 
coming across the empty lot between North 6
th
and North 7
th
from the direction of City Hall. There was about ten of them, and they were moving funny.

The woman in the mask noticed them, too. She immediately turned and headed toward the back of the bank. I stood by the ATM wondering what I should do. The group noticed her and four of them broke away, picked up their pace and moved in her direction.

“No!” I yelled at her, “You can hide over here! In the museum!”
 
 
That attracted their attention, and they came toward me. Two more of the original group perked up when they heard me and came also.

There was no rear entrance to the bank. She stopped by the building and looked at me. I could tell she wasn’t sure about me.

“I’m not one of them!” I said. “Please!”

The group had just crossed North 7
th
Street. One of them tripped and fell over the curb, but the others didn’t stop.

She made up her mind that she’d rather deal with me than with them.

By the time we got inside the museum the group was at the ATM. She ran in first, and then I backed in, slammed the door shut and turned the deadbolt.
 
The was
 
no window in the back door, so I couldn’t see if they were still coming or, like the woman from
 
the wreck, had
 
moved on once the door was shut.

When I turned
 
toward the woman in the mask, she was
 
already
 
on the opposite side of the room. She had
 
picked up a tobacco stake from
 
one of the displays.

“Stay the hell away,” she said.

“It’s okay,” I said, hands raised, “I won’t hurt you.”

“No,” she said, “It ain’t okay. You could have it.”

Just then, there was a heavy thump against the door. The woman yelped a little then backed farther away from me and the door.

At the time, I was still oblivious.

“Have what?” I said. “What is going on?”

“You know, Canton B.”

I thought for a moment, and remembered the news reports to which I’d only given cursory attention.

“That flu that’s going around?” I asked.

“Ain’t no flu,” she said. “Haven’t you been watching
 
CNN at all?”

“No.”

“It’s bad,” she said, maintaining her defensive posture with the tobacco stick. “I need to use your phone. Where’s your phone?”

I pulled out my cell phone and offered it to her.

“You got some Lysol or something?” she said.

“Yeah, in the supply closet.”

“Spray the phone first,” she said.

“What?”

“Spray the damn phone! I need to use it.”

Up to that point, I was addled, but now I was pissed.

I put the phone back in my pocket.

“Go bum a phone from one of your friends outside, lady.”

I expected her to soften, but she didn’t.

“I don’t have time for this shit! In case you haven’t noticed, it’s the end of the world, asshole!”

There was scratching on the back door.

“Where’s the damn supply closet?” she said.

I stared at her a moment thinking how much she reminded me of my ex wife. They didn’t look alike and this woman was older, but they had the same personality. I seem to bring out the best in women.

“In the other room,” I said, “behind the
 
agricultural display.”

She
 
eased into the room housing our permanent collection without turning her back
 
to me. I continued to stand there pondering what she said
.

The end of the world
?

She came out of the supply closet with a can of generic disinfectant and a rag. She sprayed the rag and
 
pitched it toward me. It made it half the distance between us.

“I’m not trying to be rude,” she said, “Please just come get the rag, then put it over your nose and mouth.”

She seemed to know more about what was happening than I, so I did it.
 
The rag was damp with disinfectant, and the concentration of the fragrance was sickening.
 

“Here,” she said and tossed me the can. “Please, spray your phone. I need to call for help.”

“I already tried nine-one-one,” I said taking my phone from my pocket and spraying it.

”Not the cops,” she said. “They’re never any help. No, I’m calling my brother.

I stepped toward her with the phone, but she held up her stick.

“Just put it on the floor, if you don’t mind. You and I need to keep our distance…just in case.”

I shrugged, “Fine. Make your call; I’ll be in my office.”

I walked around her,
 
staying as far from her as possible
 
to make her feel at ease
 
and went into the office. I put the rag on my desk, and picked up the office phone. I dialed my mother’s number, but there was no answer.

Out the window, I could see the group that had chased us into the building were in the parking lot. Some were shuffling around, some were fighting. It reminded me of those animal
 
programs on TV showing activity in a pack of wolves. All ten were there–seven men and three women. Of the men, one was a city police officer. Three of the men were dressed like me in
 
long-sleeved
 
shirts and ties. The rest of the men were dressed casually. I recognized one of the casually-dressed men to be Stuart Wall, one of the city council members. Of the women, I knew two of them to be employees at the mayor’s office. None of them were wearing coats.

I could hear the woman in the gallery having a discussion on the phone, but I couldn’t tell what she was saying. I sat down at the computer and typed in the address for CNN.
 
 
 
 
This event was the
only
news. Every article and every video was about Canton B.
 
I clicked the play button on a video at random. It was shot in Knoxville, Tennessee. The city was burning. In another video from Little Rock, Arkansas, people tore at each other like wild animals. In another from a small town in South Carolina, the dead lay in the streets like a Matthew Brady battlefield photograph.

I pressed play on one more, and the masked woman stepped into the doorway of the office. She watched the monitor over my shoulder. In the clip, bridges were being blown up.

“They’re trying to contain it,” she said. “They’re bombing every bridge and ferry on the Mississippi and Ohio Rivers. The South is screwed.”

“What the hell?” I said to myself.

“My brother will be here in half an hour,” she said, “Here’s your phone.”

She put it on a shelf just inside the door then stepped out.

“What’s your name?” I asked.

”I’d rather not say,” she said, “things being what they are.”

“What are
 
things that you can’t give me your name?”

”Again, I’m not trying to be rude, but if I gave you my name, it might give you
 
a way to find out where I live. It’s the only safe place I know.”

“How could this happen?” I said, turning back to the monitor.

“Have you been in a cave or something?”

I looked up at her, and quickly reviewed the past few days in my head.

“Well,” I said, “let’s see…Today is Thursday. No visitors yesterday. We had
 
snow and ice
 
on Tuesday, and the museum is closed when the schools are closed.
 
I’m also closed
 
Sundays and Mondays. No one came in on Saturday….other than me, you are the only person to step foot in here since last Friday.”

“Hell,” she said, “Working here’s a friggin’ cake walk.”

I stared at her. She probably thought I was offended, but really I was thinking about how I could have been so
 
unaware of what had been happening.
 
I thought back. When
 
I wasn’t here, I was at home….

“When did this all start?”

“The craziness started in the U.S. on Monday down in Florida,” she said. “They stopped all air traffic after that, except for military. But it’s been spreading north anyway.”

I looked down and noticed her bare feet. One of them was bleeding a little.

“You okay?” I asked.

“Not really,” she said looking at her feet. “I knew better than to come into town today dressed like this, but we didn’t expect this shit to go down until Saturday at the earliest. It spread quicker than they said it would.”

“You need the first aid kit?”

“Yeah,” she said, “And shoes if you got them.”

“Can’t help you there,” I said trying to muster a smile.

“Please use the rag,” she said.

I put the rag over my face and went to the supply closet.

When I returned, she
 
had removed her coat and hat, pulled my chair out of the office and was
 
sitting in it examining her bleeding foot.

“It’s not
 
scraped much,” she said. “It’ll be fine, but it’ll be sore for a couple of days.”

I
 
stood away from her
 
and held out the kit and a wet towel. She took them.