The Long Walk

Ray Garraty turned his canteen over his head, leaning back until his neck popped. It had only just warmed up enough so you could no longer see your breath, and the water was frigid, driving back the constant drowsiness a little.

He looked his traveling companions over. McVries had a heavy scrub of beard now, as black as his hair. Collie Parker looked haggard but tougher than ever. Baker seemed almost ethereal. Scramm was not so flushed, but he was coughing steadily-a deep, thundering cough that reminded Garraty of himself, long ago. He had had pneumonia when he was five.

The night had passed in a dream-sequence of odd names on the reflectorized overhead signs. Veazie. Bangor. Hermon. Hampden. Winterport. The soldiers had made only two kills, and Garraty was beginning to accept the truth of Parker’s cracker anthology.

And now bright daylight had come again. The little protective groups had reformed, Walkers joking about beards but not about feet… never about feet. Garraty had felt several small blisters break on his right heel during the night, but the soft, absorbent sock had buffered the raw flesh somewhat. Now they had just passed a sign that read AUGUSTA 48 PORTLAND 117.

“It’s further than you said,” Pearson told him reproachfully. He was horribly haggard, his hair hanging lifelessly about his cheeks.

“I’m not a walking roadmap,” Garraty said.

“Still… it’s your state.”

“Tough.”

“Yeah, I suppose so.” There was no rancor in Pearson’s tired voice. “Boy, I’d never do this again in a hundred thousand years.”

“You should live so long.”

“Yeah.” Pearson’s voice dropped. “I’ve made up my mind, though. If I get so tired and I can’t go on, I’m gonna tun over there and dive into the crowd. They won’t dare shoot. Maybe I can get away.”

“It’d be like hitting a trampoline,” Garraty said. “They’ll bounce you right back onto the pavement so they can watch you bleed. Don’t you remember Percy?”

“Percy wasn’t thinkin’. Just trying to walk off into the woods. They beat the dog out of Percy, all right.” He looked curiously at Garraty. “Aren’t you tired, Ray?”

“Shit, no.” Garraty flapped his thin arms with mock grandeur. “I’m coasting, couldn’t you tell?”

“I’m in bad shape,” Pearson said, and licked his lips. “I’m havin’ a hard job just thinking straight. And my legs feel like they got harpoons in them all the way up to-”

McVries came up behind them. “Scramm’s dying,” he said bluntly.

Garraty and Pearson said “Huh?” in unison.

“He’s got pneumonia,” McVries said.

Garraty nodded. “I was afraid it might be that.”

“You can hear his lungs five feet away. It sounds like somebody pumped the Gulf Stream through them. If it gets hot again today, he’ll just burn up.”

“Poor bastard,” Pearson said, and the tone of relief in his voice was both unconscious and unmistakable. “He could have taken us all, I think. And he’s married. What’s his wife gonna do?”

“What can she do?” Garraty asked.

They were walking fairly close to the crowd, no longer noticing the outstretched hands that strove to touch them-you got to know your distance after fingernails had taken skin off your arm once or twice. A small boy whined that he wanted to go home.

“I’ve been talking to everybody,” McVries said. “Well, just about everybody. I think the winner should do something for her.”

“Like what?” Garraty asked.

“That’ll have to be between the winner and Scramm’s wife. And if the bastard welshes, we can all come back and haunt him.”

“Okay,” Pearson said. “What’s to lose? Ray?”

“All right. Sure. Have you talked to Gary Barkovitch?”

“That prick? He wouldn’t give his mother artificial respiration if she was drowning.”

“I’ll talk to him,” Garraty said.

“You won’t get anywhere.”

“Just the same. I’ll do it now.”

“Ray, why don’t you talk to Stebbins, too? You seem to be the only one he talks to.”

Garraty snorted. “I can tell you what he’ll say in advance.”

“No?”

“He’ll say why. And by the time he gets done, I won’t have any idea.”

“Skip him then.”

“Can’t.” Garraty began angling toward the small, slumped figure of Barkovitch. “He’s the only guy that still thinks he’s going to win.”

Barkovitch was in a doze. With his eyes nearly closed and the faint peachfuzz that coated his olive cheeks, he looked like a put-upon and badly used teddy bear. He had either lost his rainhat or thrown it away.

“Barkovitch.”

Barkovitch snapped awake. “Wassamatter? Whozat? Garraty?”

“Yes. Listen, Scramm’s dying.”

“Who? Oh, right. Beaver-brains over there. Good for him.”

“He’s got pneumonia. He probably won’t last until noon.”

Barkovitch looked slowly around at Garraty with his bright black shoebutton eyes. Yes, he looked remarkably like some destructive child’s teddy bear this morning. “Look at you there with your big earnest face hanging out, Garraty. What’s your pitch?”

“Well, if you didn’t know, he’s married, and-”

Barkovitch’s eyes widened until it seemed they were in danger of falling out.

“Married? MARRIED? ARE YOU TELLING ME THAT NUMBSKULL IS-