Drowned Hopes Part 40

She listened, but other than the rush of rain she couldn't hear a thing. Shouldn't they be back by now? Or soon, anyway?

In any event, she was absolutely wide awake. No chance to get back to sleep, not right away. Climbing out of bed, she found her robe in the dark, put it on, and stepped out to the hall, faintly illuminated by an ankle-height night light plugged into an outlet near the head of the stairs. She looked over the rail, but the downstairs was completely dark. She was about to start down when she noticed the line of light under the door of Andy and Wally's room.

Was Wally still up? May crossed the hall and knocked softly on the door. "Wally? You awake?"

There were sc.r.a.ping, rustling noises within, and then the door opened and there was Wally, as short and round and moist as ever, and fully dressed. Blinking wetly up at May, he said, "Are they back?"

"No. I just woke up, I thought I'd have a gla.s.s of warm milk. Want some?"

Wally smiled. "Gee," he said, "that sounds..." He looked around, at a loss for a simile. "That sounds like this house," he decided. "Gosh, I would I'd like some warm milk, Miss May, thank you. I'll just switch off the computer, and I'll be right down."

He plays with that computer too much, May thought as she descended to the ground floor, switching on lights along the way. Then she thought, well, it could be worse. Then she thought: Wait. I'm not his mother.

It is this house. It's changing us. If we stay here much longer, we'll start buying one another birthday cards.

Before putting the milk on to warm, May opened the back door and looked out at the yard. Rain was steady, unrelenting, falling straight down through a world without wind. This isn't going to let up for days and days, she thought. The poor guys. I hope everybody's okay.

Two mugs full of gently steaming milk were on the kitchen table when Wally came into the room, his wet smile gleaming in the overhead fluorescent light. "This is really nice, Miss May," he said, and sat across from her to cup both hands around the mug. "I was just thinking," he said, "how really nice this all is, everybody living together here like this. It's almost like we're a family."

"I was just thinking something like that, too," May told him.

"I'll miss it when it's over," Wally said.

May sipped milk in lieu of responding, and they sat in fairly companionable-but not familial, dammit-silence for a few minutes, until all at once Murch's Mom walked in, wearing big gray furry slippers, a ratty long robe, and a lot of green curlers in her hair. Squinting balefully in the light, she said, "I thought they were back."

"Not yet," May said.

"We're just waiting here," Wally told her happily. "We're having warm milk."

"Oh, that's what it is."

"I could warm you some," May offered.

"You'd waste it, then," Murch's Mom told her, and marched across the room to the refrigerator, where she got out a can of beer, popped the top, and took a deep swig. Wiping her mouth on the sleeve of her robe, turning to the table, she said, "Raining."

"I hope everybody's okay," May said.

"Rain never hurt anybody," Murch's Mom decided. "A little water's good for you." She came over and sat at the table between them, saying, "Might as well stay up till they get back."

May watched Wally watching Murch's Mom drink beer. She knew Wally was loving that, loved the two of them with their warm milk and the crotchety aunt-that would be Murch's Mom's role in the affiliation Wally was constructing-with her beer. If he says like a family, May promised herself, I'll pour bourbon into this milk. A lot of bourbon.

However, he didn't.

"I never did much like rain," Tiny said.

"Good for covering your tracks," Tom said.

Tiny wrung water out of his eyebrows. "What tracks?"

"When the dogs are after you."

Tiny was feeling the need to put his hands around something and squeeze. "Been on this job too long," he muttered.

"-h-"

Tiny frowned, making a lot of water cascade down his face. Wiping it away, he said, "You hear something?"

"The motor, you mean? No."

"Not the motor," Tiny told him. "Sounded like a voice."

"-hehhh-"

"You won't hear any voice," Tom said, "all you'll hear is-"

"Shut up," Tiny requested.

"What was that?"

Tiny was in no mood. "This ground's wet, Tom," he said. "Maybe I'll sit on you for a while."

"Well, we're all getting testy," Tom told him, forgiving him.

Tiny said, "Just be quiet, while I listen to this voice."

"Joan of Arc," Tom commented, sotto voce, but then he was quiet, and Tiny listened, and heard no voice.

Was it something he'd made up? Was it just something the rain did? But it had sounded like a voice out there in the water somewhere.

At last, restless and uneasy, Tiny lumbered to his feet and plodded down the soggy bank to the water's edge, listening, not even caring that Tom was behind him.

"-eye-"

By G.o.d, that is a voice. "Hey!" Tiny yelled.

"-eye?-"

"Over here!" Tiny yelled, and saw a dim light out there on the water.

Tom had come down to stand beside him at the lip of the reservoir. At this moment, neither was being wary of the other. Tom said, "What the h.e.l.l is that out there?"

"The boogie man."

"No, it isn't," Tom said. "I'm the boogie man."

"Tiny!"

"Over this way!" Tiny shouted, and the light out there bobbled and disappeared.

Tom said, "Which one is it?"

"Couldn't tell. His voice was full of water."

Splas.h.i.+ng sounded out there, and then the voice called again: "Tiny! Where are you?"

"Over here! Come this way! Can you hear me! Hey, here I am! We're both here! Can you-"

"They're here," Tom said quietly.

They were. Andy Kelp and Doug Berry came stumbling and wading out of the reservoir, still in their full diving gear. Berry said, gasping, "I thought we'd never find the right place."

"Where's the boat?" Tiny asked him. "Where's Dortmunder?"

Kelp and Berry stood panting in front of him. Berry said, "We were hoping he was here."

Driving around all night, and in the rain. Stan didn't mind driving usually-he was a driver, after all-but on tiny country roads, at night, in the rain, with no other traffic, nothing to look at or think about, no pa.s.senger in the vehicle, not even a destination, just driving aimlessly around until everybody else was finished work, that could get old. Very old.

Finally. Finally. Finally, at quarter to five in the ayem, when Stan made yet another pa.s.s by the bridge over Gulkill Creek, Andy Kelp appeared at the side of the road and gave him the high sign, and Stan pulled to a stop just past the bridge.

Sliding over to the right side of the seat, he opened the pa.s.senger door, stuck his head out in the rain, and watched Tiny and the others come up out of the woods and climb into the rear of the slat-sided truck. Too bad it didn't have a roof back there. He called back, "How'd it go?"

Andy came squidging forward through the rain. "Well, yes and no," he said. "Good news and bad news, like they say."

"You found the money?"

"That's the good news," Andy agreed. "It's still down there, but we got it dug up and we got a rope on it."

"Great," Stan said. "So that's the good news; you found the money. What's the bad news?"

"We lost John."

From the instant she saw Stan's face, May knew. She didn't know exactly what she knew, but she knew she knew. That much she knew; that she knew.

"Now, we're not giving up hope," was the first thing Stan said, when shortly after sunup he walked into the kitchen where May and Wally and Murch's Mom were still sitting around, bleary-eyed and weaving but unwilling to go to sleep before the word came. And now the word was this.

May said, "Stan? Not giving up hope about what?"

"Well, about John," Stan said.

His Mom said, "Stanley, tell us this second."

"Well, what happened, as I understand it-"

"This second!"

"The boat sank. John was the only one in it. n.o.body knows where he is."

May leaped to her feet, spilling cold milk. "At the bottom of the reservoir!" she cried. "That's where he is!"

"Well, no," Stan told her. "At least, that's not the theory we're working on. See, there was this line stretched across the reservoir over the railroad track, up by the top of the water, and that's where John was, so the theory is, he held on to that line and followed it to the sh.o.r.e on one side or the other, and got out before Andy and Doug could catch up with him. So now Andy and Doug are going in along the railroad line from the road on one side, and Tiny and Tom are going in from the other side. And I come back to tell you."

"I'm going there!" May said.

"We'll all go," Murch's Mom said.

"Sure!" Wally cried, jumping up, eyes agleam.

"It's raining, May," Stan pointed out.

"I just hope it's raining where John is," May told him.

Of course, Bob couldn't drive a car yet, not just yet. Of course, he understood that completely, in fact, everybody understood that completely, and that's why Kenny the boss had said he'd drive Bob back and forth from now on, that is, just until Bob was ready to drive a car again. Kenny always drove Chuck anyway, because Kenny and Chuck lived right near each other over in Dudson Falls, and Kenny said it wasn't really out of the way much at all, and he didn't mind anyway, and in fact everything was perfectly fine about picking Bob up from his house in Dudson Center where he lived with that girl, whatsername, the one he was married to, and then dropping him off there again every morning after work. And Chuck said, "Hey, good idea. That's easy, man." So that's what was going to happen.

Bob was filing the Ws, taking his time, feeling the texture of each sheet of paper, enjoying the even rows of words across all the sheets of paper-look at all those letters, making up all those words, filling up all those pieces of paper-and he was all the way to the Ws when Kenny came by and said, "Hey, there, buddy, how you doin, pal, everything okay, Bob? Good, that's good. Listen, it's almost six and-"

BEEP.

Kenny jumped back, then nodded at Bob's watch, laughing nervously as he said, "Time for another pill, huh?"

"Oh, yes," Bob said. "We don't know what would happen to me, Dr. Panchick and me, we don't know what would happen to me if I didn't take my pills."

"You take a lot of them, huh?"

"Well, we're going to taper off," Bob explained. "But not yet," he said, and went away to the bathroom for water and took his pill.

When he came back out to the office, it was after six o'clock and everybody was ready to go. "Here I am," Bob said, smiling happily at all these nice fellas, really liking how they all were just good pals together, working together, having all these nice times together. "All ready, Kenny," he said, and just beamed.

The crew went out to their cars, their usual exchanges of low humor with the day crew m.u.f.fled a bit by the presence of this ethereal creature among them. Bob didn't notice any of that; he was noticing how pretty the rain was. When he looked up at the sky, raindrops fell on his eyeb.a.l.l.s and made him blink. Nice!

"Ready, Bob?"

"Oh, sure, Kenny, here I come."

Chuck was in the pa.s.senger seat in front, so Bob got in the backseat with the naked man on the floor. "h.e.l.lo," he said.

The naked man on the floor-well, he wasn't completely naked, he was wearing underpants and one sock-wasn't as happy as Bob's friends. In fact, he glared at Bob and shook his fist, and then he put his finger to his lips and pointed at himself with his other hand and emphatically shook his head.

Well, gee, all right. The naked man didn't want Bob to talk about him being there. Well, gee, that's okay. With the pill he'd just swallowed now stamping out every little brushfire of fear or excitement or panic in his entire neural network, Bob said, "Okay."

Kenny was just then getting into the car, slipping in behind the wheel. Pausing before putting the key in the ignition, he looked in the rearview mirror at Bob and said, "What's that, Bob?"

Giggling, Chuck said, "He's talking to his imaginary playmate back there."

Kenny gave Chuck a warning look. "Watch that."

But the naked man on the floor was nodding emphatically, pointing now in the direction of Chuck. So that was the true explanation after all. "That's right," Bob said placidly. "I'm talking to my imaginary playmate."

Kenny and Chuck exchanged another glance, Kenny exasperated and feeling his responsibility, Chuck guilty but vastly amused. Kenny shook his head, and irritably watched himself insert the key in the ignition. "Get well soon," he muttered.