Dreamcatcher(167)

'Ennie! Ennie! Ennie!'

The tall, pale stranger in the doorway threw himself into Henry's arms with all of Duddie's old extravagance, knocking him backward on the snowy step not by force of his weight  -  he was as light as milkweed fluff  -  but simply because Henry was unprepared for the assault. If Owen hadn't steadied him, he and Duddits would have gone tumbling into the snow.

'Ennie! Ennie!'

Laughing. Crying. Covering him with those big old Duddits smackeroos. Deep in the storehouse of his memory, Beaver Clarendon whispered, If you guys tell anybody he did that . . . And Jonesy: Yeah, yeah, you'll never chum with us again, ya f**kin wank. It was Duddits, all right, kissing Henry's byrus-speckled cheeks . . . but the pallor on Duddits's cheeks, what was that? He was so thin  -  no, beyond thin, gaunt  -  and what was that? The blood in his nostrils, the smell drifting off his skin . . . not the smell that had been coming from Becky Shue, not the smell of the overgrown cabin, but a deathly smell just the same.

And here was Roberta, standing in the hall beside a photo?graph of Duddits and Alfie at the Derry Days carnival, riding the carousel, dwarfing their wild-eyed plastic horses and laugh?ing.

Didn't go to Alfie's funeral, but sent a card, Henry thought, and loathed himself

She was wringing her hands together, her eyes full of tears, and although she had put on weight at breast and hip, although her hair was now almost entirely gray, it was her, she was still she, but Duddits . . . oh boy, Duddits . . .

Henry looked at her, his arms wrapped around the old friend who was still crying his name. He patted at Duddits's shoulder blade. It felt insubstantial beneath his palm, as fragile as the bone in a bird's wing.

'Roberta,' he said. 'Roberta, my God! What's wrong with him?'

'ALL,' she said, and managed a wan smile. 'Sounds like a laundry detergent, doesn't it? It stands for acute lymphocytic leukemia. He was diagnosed nine months ago, and by then curing him was no longer an option. All we've been doing since then is fighting the clock.'

'Ennie!' Duddits exclaimed. The old goofy smile illuminated his gray and tired face. 'Ay ih, iffun-nay!'

'That's right,' Henry said, and began to cry. 'Same shit, differ?ent day.'

'I know why you're here,' she said, 'but don't. Please, Henry.

I'm begging you. Don't take my boy away from me. He's dying.'

9

Kurtz was about to ask Perlmutter for an update on Underhill and his new friend  -  Henry was the new friend's name, Henry Devlin  -  when Pearly let out a long, ululating scream, his face turned up to the roof of the Humvee. Kurtz had helped a woman have a baby in Nicaragua (and they always call us the bad guys, he thought sentimentally), and this scream reminded him of hers, heard on the shores of the beautiful La Juvena River.

'Hold on, Pearly!' Kurtz cried. 'Hold on, buck! Deep breaths, now!'

'Fuck you!' Pearly screamed. 'Look what you got me into, you dirty cunt! FUCK YOU!'

Kurtz did not hold this against him. Women said terrible things in childbirth, and while Pearly was definitely one of the fellas, Kurtz had an idea that he was going through something as close to childbirth as any man had ever experienced. He knew it might be wise to put Perlmutter out of his misery -

'You better not,' Pearly groaned. Tears of pain were rolling down his red-bearded cheeks. 'You better not, you lizard-skin old f**k.'

'Don't you worry, laddie, Kurtz soothed, and patted Perlmutter's shivering shoulder. From ahead of them came the steady clanking rumble of the plow Kurtz had persuaded to break trail for them (as gray light began to creep back into the world, their speed had risen to a giddy thirty-five miles an hour). The plow's taillights glowed like dirty red stars.

Kurtz leaned forward, looking at Perlmutter with bright-eyed interest. It was very cold in the back seat of the Humvee because of the broken window, but for the moment Kurtz didn't notice this. The front of Pearly's coat was swelling outward like a balloon, and Kurtz once more drew his nine-millimeter,

'Boss, if he pops - '

Before Freddy could finish, Perlmutter produced a deafening fart. The stench was immediate and enormous, but Pearly appeared not to notice. His head lolled back against the seat, his eyes half-?lidded, his expression one of sublime relief

'Oh my f**kin GRANDMOTHER!' Freddy cried, and cranked his window all the way down despite the draft already coursing through the vehicle.

Fascinated, Kurtz watched Perlmutter's distended belly deflate. Not yet, then. Not yet and probably just as well. It was possible that the thing growing inside Perlmutter's works might come in handy. Not likely, but possible. All things served the Lord, said the Scripture, and that might include the shit-weasels.

'Hold on, soldier,' Kurtz said, patting Pearly's shoulder with one hand and putting the nine on the seat beside him with the other. 'You just hold on and think about the Lord.'

'Fuck the Lord,' Perlmutter said sullenly, and Kurtz was mildly amazed. He never would have dreamed Perlmutter could have so much profanity in him.

Ahead of them, the plow's taillights flashed bright and pulled over to the right side of the road.

'Oh-oh,' Kurtz said.

'What should I do, boss?'

'Pull right in behind him,' Kurtz said. He spoke cheerfully, but picked the nine-millimeter up off the seat again. 'We'll see what our new friend wants.' Although he believed he knew. 'Freddy, what do you hear from our old friends? Are you picking them up?'