The Night Parade(51)

“You think the president’s dead.”

“I do. Much of his cabinet, too. And Congress. Not that they’ve ever been too lively, you ask me. But everyone’s been real quiet the past few months.”

“Then who’s running the country?”

“That,” said Turk, holding up one finger, “is a very good question, Dave. A very good question, indeed.”

“What about the statements that have been coming from the CDC?”

“I suppose there’s always someone around to give a statement.”

David thought of the roadblock near that elementary school, the soldiers in the biohazard suits with the assault rifles. Someone was certainly giving them orders.

Not to mention the people out there looking for Ellie and me, David thought. They’ve got their orders, too.

Once again, Turk craned his head around and looked at David. There was a smoothness to his face now, an expression akin to empathy. “Whatever you and that girl are running from, friend, you’re most likely safe as milk. Ain’t no one got the time or even the wherewithal to hunt down a father and his kid at the moment.” Turk shrugged as he added, “Unless, of course, that ain’t really your kid. But we already covered that, now, didn’t we?”

“Yes,” David said. “We did.”

“Then you’re just a daddy-o chillin’ on the patio.” Turk raised his can of Bud in a lazy salute before emptying its contents into his mouth.

You’re wrong, my friend. What if my daughter is so goddamn important they can’t not look for her? And thinking this made him think of the other thing, of Ellie’s newfound ability, and what that might mean. It seemed impossible to believe someone could be exclusively blessed with both immunity to Wanderer’s Folly and also possess the ability to do what she could do—to regulate her father’s mood, was the clearest way he could define it for himself. It went beyond coincidence, which meant there was a connection there. She was immune because of her ability . . . or she had the ability because she was immune ...

Turk snapped his fingers. “You zoning out on me, bud? I boring you?”

“Sorry, no. Was just thinking. You mentioned the Internet earlier. Are you still connected?”

“Yeah. There’s a desktop off the living room. Long as we keep paying the bills, they keep the service active.”

“How long will you be able to keep that up?” He knew this was treading close to their previous conversation about packing up and getting out of town, but Turk had mentioned over dinner that he had lost his job with the county’s sanitation department, so David wondered how much extra money they actually had squirreled away.

“Long as I can,” Turk said. “Got a generator out in the toolshed. I figure once the power goes out—whether they cut the service or everyone working at the plant keels over dead, whichever happens first—I’ll hook that up. After that . . . well . . . I guess God will have to provide. You need to get online?”

“Is that okay?”

“Fine by me. Ask Pauline to boot it up for you. I’m not much of a PC jockey myself. And don’t go lookin’ at no dirty pictures.” Turk winked at him. He pronounced it pitchers.

David entered the kitchen just as Pauline returned from upstairs with the food tray. She wore a haggard expression, and there was a thread of bright red blood high up on her cheekbone where she had apparently been scratched by something. It wasn’t until that moment that the true horror of the situation dawned upon David—the daily maintenance of that brain-sick child up there, his mind mostly gone to rubble, his brain slowly rupturing, poisoned by madness—and he felt a sudden bolt of sadness for this tired-looking woman.

“Turk said I could use your computer?”

She set the tray on the counter. “Sure thing. Follow me.”

It was an ancient PC filmed in dust, resting on a clapboard desktop in a tiny corner room. There was a single window that looked out on the neighbor’s house and a bookshelf overrun by model cars. What dominated the room, however, was a three-foot crucifix hanging on the wall, the face of the miniature Jesus contorted in agony, His eyes rolled partway back to portray what looked to David like insanity. David had never been a religious person, but since Wanderer’s Folly, it seemed many folks—including Turk and his brood—had found religion. Many zealots even believed they were in the throes of the Second Coming. Ordinarily such talk would have reduced David to grins and snide comments, but he found that the eyes of that plaster Jesus, which seemed to follow him around the room, gave him a chill. Judging by the look on His face, forgiveness is probably the furthest thing from His mind, David thought. Those are the eyes of a lunatic driven crazy by torture, a man reduced to a feral monster by a whole different kind of madness.

“Neat cars,” he said, opting to address the models on the shelf instead of the crucifix.

“The boys did those.” Pauline sat at the desk and turned on the computer.

“That’s impressive.”

“Bronwyn helped. My sister. She’s got an eye for projects.”

“Oh.” There was nothing else he could say, assuming the worst had befallen Bronwyn.

“Oh, she ain’t dead,” Pauline said, apparently able to read his thoughts. “She’s out with the others.”