Dan Simmons - Hard as Nails

"I want… to know…" panted Kurtz. "Did you… shoot… Peg O'Toole? Were you part of that?"

The Dodger's mouth stayed open and silent as he strained up against the nails. It seemed like he was trying to breathe.

"Who do you take your orders from?" said Kurtz. "I know it wasn't the Major."

The Dodger's clown mouth opened and closed like a fish's. He was trying to speak. Kurtz leaned over, listening.

"I… learned… something," gasped the Dodger, voice almost inaudible, tone almost conversational. The merry-go-round music switched from "Farmer in the Dell" to "Three Blind Mice."

Kurtz leaned and listened. Blood and sweat from his chin and torn neck dripped onto the white face.

"Always… go… for… the… head… shot," said the Dodger and started laughing and screaming. The noise came up out of the open, straining mouth like a black stink from hell. And it kept coming. The Dodger was laughing hysterically, his screams and laughs echoing back from the hillside and funhouse.

Kurtz was suddenly very, very tired. "Yeah," he said softly. "You're right." He leaned forward again, into the geyser of screams and laughter and stench, lifted the heavy nail gun, aimed the muzzle into that dark, braying maw, and fired three times.

When Kurtz knocked softly on Gail DeMarco's outside door a little after three A.M., he expected the wait and then the slowly opening door, Gail's concerned face over the security chain, but the.44 Magnum aimed at his face was a surprise.

"Joe!" said Arlene and lowered the gun. She and Gail opened the door and Kurtz staggered inside. He tried to remove his shredded peacoat, but it took the women's help to get it off.

"Oh, Joe," said Arlene.

"I couldn't get the damned vest off," said Kurtz, sagging against the counter.

Arlene and Gail undid the straps and Velcro connections. The thick SWAT vest that had saved his life fell heavily to the tile floor.

"Come near the sink light," said Gail. "Lift your head."

Kurtz did the best he could. The girl, Aysha, came into the kitchen. She was wearing one of Arlene's old bathrobes. It was much too large for her and made her look even more like a child.

"Please stand to one side," said Aysha. It was a nurse's tone of command.

"I'll get a first aid kit," said Gail. She hurried out of the kitchen and Kurtz could hear her telling Rachel to go back to bed and to keep the door to her room closed.

"I think I'd better sit down," said Kurtz. He collapsed into one of the chairs at the Formica table.

The next few minutes were a blur—Gail and Aysha both doing nurse things to him, swabbing the cut on his upper shoulder and neck, cutting off his sweater. I'm going through sweaters like Kleenex , he thought dully as they poked and prodded him.

The ride back from Neola had seemed longer than usual. Three times he'd bad to pull over to the side of the road to throw up. His back had hurt so much that he couldn't put his weight back against the plush seat of the Buick, so he'd driven like an old man, hunched forward over the wheel. His throat and shoulder had kept dripping blood, but never so violently that he was worried.

"The bullet must have hit the upper edge of your vest and careened upward, nicking your neck and catching the skin of your cheek," said Gail. "Another millimeter to the right and it would have taken out your jugular. You would have bled out in seconds."

"Huh," said Kurtz. He kept hearing the goddamned carnival music echoing in his skull. That and the chug-chug of the train. And the laughter. He'd shut off the generator near the shack, which had stopped the Ferris wheel and merry-go-round and shut off the lights. But he hadn't had the energy to climb the hill, jump aboard the train, and untape the throttle lever.

Leave that to the Neola cleanup crew , he thought. They'll be busy the next few days .

"Joe, did you hear me?" said Arlene.

"What?"

"We need to get you in the shower to get the caked blood off so we can see the bruises and cuts better."

"All right."

The next few minutes were as surreal as the rest of his week—three women pushing him, undressing him, half holding him up, turning him as he stood naked in the shower spray. And this Aysha was pretty cute. No erections allowed , thought Kurtz. Not now . Everyone was in the little bathroom except Rachel.

There was no fear of an erection when the hot shower spray hit the bruises on his back.

"Oh," said Kurtz, coming fully awake. "Ouch."

He caught sight of his back in the steamy mirror—a solid line of bruises connecting both shoulder blades and a bloody slash up near his collarbone. New scar .

"We need to sew this shoulder up," said Gail DeMarco. "Actually, we should drive you to the hospital."

"No hospital," he said firmly, but he thought, I don't know why not. Everyone I know is in the hospital .

They had him sit on the closed toilet while Aysha sewed him up. There'd been a quick consultation, and evidently they decided she had the most experience. Kurtz felt the needle slide in and out, but it was no big deal. He looked at the fuzzy pink toilet cover and tried to concentrate.

"Did the police call tonight?" he asked. "Kemper?"

"No," said Arlene. "Not yet."

"They will. They'll hunt for me, then for you… then somebody'll find out that Gail's your sister and call here."

"Not tonight," said Gail as Aysha finished the sewing. The two nurses applied a bandage and taped it in place.

"No," agreed Kurtz. "Not tonight." He realized that he was still naked. The fuzzy toilet cover felt soft under his butt.

Gail came in with a pair of men's pajamas, still in a wrapper. "These should fit," she said. "It was a Christmas present I never got to give Alan, and he was about your size."

The three women wandered off to the living room while Kurtz struggled into the pajamas. He knew he had more he had to do tonight, but he couldn't quite remember what it was. Every time he closed his eyes, he saw the Dodger's face and open mouth. The trick, he discovered, was to button the pajamas without letting the cotton touch his back or neck. He couldn't quite master it.

He felt better by the time he joined the three in the hole living room. Aysha gestured toward the opened sleeper sofa and its tangle of pillows and blankets. "You sleep here, Mr. Kurtz. I sleep with your daughter."

Kurtz could only stare at the woman.

"Gail leaves around seven-thirty," said Arlene. "What time do you want to get going, Joe?"

Kurtz looked at his watch. He couldn't quite focus on medial.

"Seven?" he said. That would give him a full three and a half hours.

"Go to sleep, Joe," said Arlene, leading him to the opened bed.

For the second time that night, Kurtz fell face forward. This time he did not rise.

Kurtz drove the Pinto behind Gail DeMarco's little Toyota in the morning and, thanks to her intercession, was in the ICU when Rigby King woke up.

"Joe. What's up?"

"Not much," said Kurtz. "What's new with you?"

"Can't think of anything," said Rigby. "Except I love this Darvocet morphiney stuff they put in the IV drip. And I don't think that I can pretend to be asleep much longer today—Paul Kemper won't buy it And he wants your ass."

"Why?" said Kurtz. "Didn't you tell them you couldn't remember who shot you?"

"Yeah," sighed Rigby. "But the problem with saying that you don't remember who did something is that you can't say that you do remember who didn't do something. If you follow my drift."

"More or less," said Kurtz. He had to sit forward on the upright hospital chair next to her bed, making sure the back of it didn't touch his back. He'd slept on his stomach during the time he did sleep. "Feeling the drugs. Rig?"