Nelson DeMille - Spencerville

Terry picked up the wall phone and said, "Hello?"

Keith could tell by the expression on her face that it wasn't her kids calling to say hello.

Terry looked at the three of them as she listened, then said into the phone, "No, Cliff, I haven't seen her."

Annie took Keith's hand, as though, he thought, just her husband's presence on the telephone made her uneasy.

Terry said into the phone, "No, she was here yesterday morning and stayed for lunch. I stopped by your place after church today, and I saw her... No, she didn't mention she was going anywhere... Well, she did say she had a lot of food shopping to do... No, I don't know why she didn't do it yesterday..." Terry stuck her tongue out at the mouthpiece, and, despite the situation, everyone smiled.

Terry said, "How would I know if her car phone is working?" Terry listened, then, to everyone's surprise, she said, "Look, Cliff, why don't you stop checking up on my sister? I'm tired of..." She listened, then said, "Cliff, go to hell." She hung up and said, "That felt good." She looked at Keith, Annie, and Larry and said, "Well, you know who that was."

Larry asked his wife, "Did he cuss you?"

"Sort of."

Larry frowned.

Annie said to Larry, "You don't have to consider him your brother-in-law any longer."

Larry nodded, and Keith could only imagine what those sweet words meant to him. Keith asked Terry, "Where was he calling from?"

"He said he was home. Got home earlier than he thought."

"How did he sound?"

She shrugged. "Same. Annoyed."

Annie commented, "He's finally got something to be annoyed about."

Keith glanced at the kitchen clock and saw it was seven forty-five P.M., and Cliff Baxter was in Spencerville, missing his wife. They didn't have much time now. He said, "All right, we should head out."

They all went outside and again said their good-byes, but this time with some sense of urgency.

Within a minute, they were in the Blazer, backing out of the driveway and waving, the teddy bear sitting between them.

Five minutes before, Keith would have given himself and Annie very good odds of getting away without mishap. Now the odds had dropped to about fifty-fifty, and that wasn't a gamble he normally took.

County Road 6 was straight and flat, and there was very little traffic on a Sunday night, so Keith kept his high beams on and pushed the Blazer up to seventy miles per hour.

Annie asked, "Is everything all right? Don't humor me."

Keith replied, "I didn't want to worry your sister."

"Everything is not all right."

"Well, the question is — how long will it take Cliff to figure it out? Maybe you can answer that question."

She thought a moment, then replied, "It's nearly eight o'clock, and I've never been out this late without him knowing exactly where I was."

Keith didn't reply.

She said, "I guess we really needed that running start."

"Takes the fun out of it."

She looked at him and saw he was smiling, so she smiled, too, but both of them knew it wasn't funny. Finally, he said, "Fun aside, this is more risk than you had to take, and I'm responsible for that. If I could get you to my farm without being seen, I'd do it and tell you to go home tonight."

"No. Even if I could, I wouldn't. I'm with you, and I'm never going back there again. And you're not responsible for me saying yes tonight. Okay?"

"Okay."

They continued east and left Chatham County, crossing into Dawson County. Keith asked her, "What will your trusting spouse do next?"

"You mean Peter, Peter, the pumpkin eater? Well, he'll call my car phone every two minutes — that's why he was so generous about having Baxter Motors install it. In between those calls, he'll call my parents, relatives, and friends, including Pastor and Mrs. Schenk, for instance. He's absolutely shameless when it comes to tracking me down, and he's not very subtle when he gets people on the phone."

Keith smiled and said, "They must all think you fool around."

"No, they think he's nuts." She added, "He thinks he's embarrassing me and punishing me for not checking in with him every time I go somewhere. But he makes a fool of himself."

"Better yet, it takes time to make those calls... what order is Terry on the list?"

"Usually second, after my parents. So he's got about a dozen more calls to make."

Keith nodded.

Annie smiled. "Terry finally did it." She mimicked Terry's deeper voice and said, "Cliff, go to hell." She laughed. "That will put him into a rage for about half an hour. He doesn't like women who back-talk him."

"Who does?"

"You do. And you love to give it right back. But you're not mean — you're funny." She added, "You still make me laugh." She put her hand on his cheek and gave him a pinch.

He smiled. They were making good time, and he figured that Interstate 75 was about ten more miles.

She picked up the teddy bear and put it on his lap. "Do you remember this?"

He glanced at the brown and white stuffed animal. "State fair," he guessed.

"County fair."

"Right."

"Shooting gallery. You were very good. Do you still like to shoot?"

"No. I think I got it out of my system."

"I can imagine."

She asked him, "Are you armed?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"Well, I don't intend to have a shootout with the police."

"But what if it's him?"

"We're not going through his little kingdom."

"He'd go anywhere, Keith, if he was looking for us."

"Well, are you armed?"

She didn't reply immediately, then said, "I was yesterday morning. Tonight was sort of a surprise."

He thought a moment, then asked her, "Would you have used it?"

"If he tried to stop us from being together, I would."

"Well... I would, too. To tell you the truth, I might have brought my pistol, but it's missing. I think your husband burglarized my house."

"What? You mean he went into your house?"

"I can't be certain it was him, but he's on a real short list of suspects." He added, "We don't need a gun. We'll be fine."

"All right..."

He glanced at her and said, "About two months ago, about the time I arrived, there was a firearm incident at your house, in the early morning hours. Do you want to tell me about that?"

She put her head down and stared at the floor a long time, then replied, "No, I don't."

"Okay."

"I will... but not now."

"Fine."

"How did you know?"

"It's a small town."

"People talk about the Baxters, don't they?"

"You know they do. You're always the saint. He's always Satan."

"And you're my guardian angel."

"Thank you. I'll try." He still needed more information, and he asked her, "What will he do after he harasses everyone with phone calls? Would he call his own police force?"

"He might... that's a last resort. But he's done it. What he's probably doing now is cruising in his police car, looking for my car — motels first, as if I'm going to use a local motel to have an affair. Then, at the same time, he'll be calling everyone he can think of. When he gets frustrated enough, he'll call headquarters — he wouldn't stop in because he doesn't want to face his own men with some idiotic story about being worried about me having an accident or something. I mean, I think the hospital, or the EMS, or his own police might notify him if I had an accident. He's such an idiot, and his men know it."

Keith observed, "You seem to know his modus operandi fairly well."

"After all these years, I think I do. There used to be an older sergeant on the force, a real good friend to me, and he'd tell me about Cliff's craziness. Cliff got rid of him and all the good old guys as soon as he could. Did you notice that most of those guys were young? Cliff handpicked each one. He told me once that it was like training dogs — get them young, hand-feed them, make them afraid of you, and loyal only to you." She added, "He said it was the same with wives."