11/22/63

When the latest throe had passed, I took the giant bottle of Kaopectate out of the paper bag and chugged three long swallows. My stomach heaved. I fought it back into place. When I was sure the first dose was going to stay down, I slugged another one, belched, and slowly screwed the cap back into place. On the wall to my left, someone had drawn a penis and testicles. The testicles were split open, and blood was gushing from them. Below this charming image, the artist had written: HENRY CASTONGUAY NEXT TIME YOU FUCK MY WIFE THIS IS WHAT YOU GET.

I closed my eyes, and when I did, I saw the startled patron who had watched my charge to the bathroom. But was he a patron? There had been nothing on his table; he had just been sitting there. With my eyes closed, I could see that face clearly. It was one I knew.

When I went back into the bar, Ferlin Husky had replaced Conway Twitty, and No Suspenders was gone. I went to the bartender and said, “There was a guy sitting over there when I came in. Who was it?”

He looked up from his puzzle. “I didn’t see no one.”

I took out my wallet, removed a five, and put it on the bar beside a Narragansett coaster. “The name.”

He held a brief silent dialogue with himself, glanced at the tip jar beside the one holding pickled eggs, saw nothing inside but one lonely dime, and made the five disappear. “That was Bill Turcotte.”

The name meant nothing to me. The empty table might mean nothing, either, but on the other hand…

I put Honest Abe’s twin brother on the bar. “Did he come in here to watch me?” If the answer to that was yes, it meant he had been following me. Maybe not just today, either. But why?

The bartender pushed the five back. “All I know is what he usually comes in for is beer and a lot of it.”

“Then why did he leave without having one?”

“Maybe he looked in his wallet and didn’t see nothing but his liberry card. Do I look like fuckin Bridey Murphy? Now that you’ve stunk up my bathroom, why don’t you either order something or leave?”

“It was stinking just fine before I got there, my friend.”

Not much of an exit line, but the best I could do under the circumstances. I went out and stood on the sidewalk, looking for Turcotte. There was no sign of him, but Norbert Keene was standing in the window of his drugstore, hands clasped behind his back, watching me. His smile was gone.

8

At five-twenty that afternoon, I parked my Sunliner in the lot adjacent to the Witcham Street Baptist Church. It had plenty of company; according to the signboard, there was a 5:00 P.M. AA meeting at this particular church. In the Ford’s trunk were all the possessions I’d collected during my seven weeks as a resident of what I had come to think of as the Peculiar Little City. The only indispensable items were in the Lord Buxton briefcase Al had given me: his notes, my notes, and the remaining cash. Thank God I’d kept most of it in portable form.

Beside me on the seat was a paper bag containing my bottle of Kaopectate — now three-quarters empty — and the continence pants. Thankfully, I didn’t think I was going to need those. My stomach and bowels seemed to have settled, and the shakes had left my hands. There were half a dozen Payday candybars in the glove compartment lying on top of my Police Special. I added these items to the bag. Later, when I was in position between the garage and the hedge at 202 Wyemore Lane, I’d load the gun and stuff it into my belt. Like a cheap gunsel in the kind of B pictures that played The Strand.

There was one other item in the glove compartment: an issue of TV Guide with Fred Astaire and Barrie Chase on the cover. For probably the dozenth time since I’d bought the magazine at the newsstand on upper Main Street, I turned to the Friday listings.

8 PM, Channel 2: The New Adventures of Ellery Queen, George Nader, Les Tremayne. “So Rich, So Lovely, So Dead.” A conniving stockbroker (Whit Bissell) stalks a wealthy heiress (Eva Gabor) as Ellery and his father investigate.

I put it into the bag with the other stuff — mostly for good luck — then got out, locked my car, and set out for Wyemore Lane. I passed a few mommies and daddies trick-or-treating with children too young to be out on their own. Carved pumpkins grinned cheerfully from many stoops, and a couple of stuffed straw-hat-wearing dummies stared at me blankly.

I walked down Wyemore Lane in the middle of the sidewalk as if I had every right to be there. When a father approached, holding the hand of a little girl wearing dangly gypsy earrings, mom’s bright red lipstick, and big black plastic ears clapped over a curly-haired wig, I tipped my hat to Dad and bent down to the child, who was carrying a paper bag of her own.

“Who are you, honey?”

“Annette Foonijello,” she said. “She’s the prettiest Mouseketeer.”

“And you’re just as pretty,” I told her. “Now what do you say?”

She looked puzzled, so her father leaned over and whispered in her ear. She brightened into a smile. “Trigger-treat!”