Stephen King - Dreamcatcher

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Stephen King

DREAMCATCHER

Hodder & Stoughton

Grateful acknowledgement is made for permission to reprint excerpts from the

following copyrighted material:

Roethke from Collected Poems of Theodore Roethke bv Theodore Roethke, used by

permission of Doubleday, a division of Random House, Inc.

in the United States, administered by Warner-Tamerlane Publishing Corp. All

rights o/b/o Ben Raleigh Music Co. in the United States administered bv Wise

Brothers Music LLC. All rights for the world excluding the United States

permission. Warner Brothers Publications U.S. Inc., Miami. FL 33014

"Sympathy For The Devil" words and music by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, ©

1968, renewed 1996. ABKCO Music Inc.

McElligots Pool by Dr. SEUSS™. Copyright by Dr. Seuss Enterprises L.P. 1947,

renewed 1975, reprinted by permission of Random House, Inc.

"I Am The Walrus" by John Lennon and Paul McCartney 1967 Sony/ATV Times, LLC.

All rights administered by Sony/ATV Music Publishing, 8 Music Square West,

Nashville, TN 37203.

permission of Petra Cabot.

First published in Great Britain in 2001 by Hodder and Stoughton

A division of Hodder Headline

The right of Stephen King to be identified as the Author

of the Work has been asserted by him in accordance with the

10 9 8 7 6 54 3 2

No part of this publication may be reproduced,

stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form

or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher,

nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than

that in which it is published and without a similar condition being

imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance

to real persons, living or dead is purely coincidental.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

King, Stephen, 1947-

Dreamcatcher

1. Horror tales

I. Title

813.5'4 [F]

Hardcover edition ISBN 0 340 77071 6

Trade paperback edition ISBN 0 340 79235 3

Typeset by Palimpsest Book Production Limited,

Polmont, Stirlngshire

Printed and bound in Great Britain by

Clays Ltd. St Ives plc

Hodder and Stoughton

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This is for Susan Moldow and Nan Graham

First, the News

From the East Oregonian, June 25, 1947

FIRE CONTROL OFFICER SPOTS 'FLYING SAUCERS'

Kenneth Arnold Reports 9 Disc-Shaped Objects

'Shiny, Silvery, Moved Incredibly Fast'

From the Roswell Daily Record, July 8th, 1947

AIR FORCE CAPTURES 'FLYING SAUCER' ON RANCH IN ROSWELL REGION

Intelligence Officers Recover Crashed Disc

From the Roswell Daily Record, July 9th, 1947

AIR FORCE DECLARES 'SAUCER' WEATHER BALLOON

From the Chicago Daily Tribune, August 1st, 1947

USAF SAYS 'CANNOT EXPLAIN' ARNOLD SIGHTING

850 Additional Sightings Since Original Report

From the Roswell Daily Record, October 19th, 1947

SO-CALLED 'SPACE WHEAT' A HOAX, ANGRY FARMER DECLARES

Andrew Hoxon Denies 'Saucer Connection'

Red-Tinged Wheat 'Nothing But A Prank,' He Insists

From the Courier Journal (Ky), January 8th, 1948

AIR FORCE CAPTAIN KILLED CHASING UFO

Mantell's Final Transmission: 'Metallic, Tremendous In Size'

Air Force Mum

From the Brazilian Nacional, March 12th, 1957

STRANGE RINGED CRAFT CRASHES IN MATO GROSSO!

2 WOMEN MENACED NEAR PONTO PORAN!

'We Heard Squealing Sounds From Within,' They Declare

From the Brazilian Nacional, March 12th, 1957

MATO GRASSO HORROR!

Reports of Gray Men with Huge Black Eyes

Scientists Scoff! Reports Persist!

VILLAGES IN TERROR!

From the Oklahoman, May 12th, 1965

STATE POLICEMAN FIRES AT UFO

Claims Saucer Was 40 Feet Above Highway 9

Tinker AFB Radar Confirms Sightings

From the Oklahoman, June 2nd, 1965

'ALIEN GROWTH'A HOAX,

FARM BUREAU REP DECLARES

'Red Weeds' Said To Be Work Of Spray-Gun, Teenagers

From the Portland (Me.) Press-Herald, September 14th, 1965

NEW HAMPSHIRE UFO SIGHTINGS MOUNT

Most Sightings in Exeter Area

Some Residents Express Fear of Alien Invasion

From the Manchester Union-Leader (N.H.), September 19th, 1965

ENORMOUS OBJECT SIGHTED NEAR EXETER

WAS OPTICAL ILLUSION

Air Force Investigators Refute State Police Sighting

Officer Cleland Adamant: 'I Know What I Saw'

From the Manchester Union-Leader (N.H.), September 30th, 1965

FOOD POISONING EPIDEMIC IN PLAISTOW

STILL UNEXPLAINED

Over 300 Affected, Most Recovering

FDA Officer Says May Have Been Contaminated Wells

From the Michigan Journal, October 9th, 1965

GERALD FORD CALLS FOR UFO INVESTIGATION

Republican House Leader Says 'Michigan Lights'

May Be Extraterrestrial In Origin

From the Los Angeles Times, November 19th, 1978

CALTECH SCIENTISTS REPORT SIGHTING HUGE

DISC-SHAPED OBJECT IN MOJAVE

Tickman: 'Was Surrounded by Small Bright Lights'

Morales: 'Saw Red Growth Like Angel Hair'

From the Los Angeles Times, November 24th, 1978

STATE POLICE, USAF INVESTIGATORS FIND NO

'ANGEL HAIR' AT MOJAVE SITE

Tickman and Morales Take, Pass, Lie Tests

Possibility of Hoax Discounted

From the New York Times, August 16th, 1980

'ALIEN ABDUCTEES' REMAIN CONVINCED

Psychologists Question Drawings Of So-Called 'Gray Men'

From the Wall Street Journal, February 9th, 1985

CARL SAGAN: 'NO, WE ARE NOT ALONE'

Prominent Scientist Reaffirms Belief In ETs

Says, 'Odds Of Intelligent Life Are Enormous'

From the Phoenix Sun, March 14th, 1997

HUGE UFO SIGHTED NEAR PRESCOTT

DOZENS DESCRIBE 'BOOMERANG-SHAPED' OBJECT

Switchboard At Luke AFB Deluged With Reports

From the Phoenix Sun, March 20th, 1997

'PHOENIX LIGHTS' REMAIN UNEXPLAINED

Photos Not Doctored, Expert Says

Air Force Investigators Mum

From the Paulden Weekley, (Ariz.), April 9th, 1997

FOOD POISONING OUTBREAK UNEXPLAINED

REPORTS OF 'RED GRASS' DISCOUNTED AS HOAX

From the Derry Daily News (Me.), May 15th, 2000

MYSTERY LIGHTS ONCE AGAIN REPORTED

IN JEFFERSON TRACT

Kineo Town Manager: 'I Don't Know What They

Are, But They Keep Coming Back'

SSDD

It became their motto, and Jonesy couldn't for the life of him remember which

of them started saying it first. Payback's a bitch, that was his. Fuck me

Freddy and half a dozen even more colorful obscenities originated with Beaver.

Henry was the one who taught them to say What goes around comes around, it was

the kind of Zen shit Henry liked, even when they were kids. SSDD, though; what

about SSDD? Whose brainstorm had that been?

Didn't matter. What mattered was that they believed the first half of it

when they were a quartet and all of it when they were five and then the second

half of it when they were a quartet again.

When it was just the four of them again, the days got darker. There were

more fuck-me-Freddy days. They knew it, but not why. They knew something was

wrong with them — different, at least — but not what. They knew they were

caught, but not exactly how. And all this long before the lights in the sky.

Before McCarthy and Becky Shue.

SSDD: Sometimes it's just what you say. And sometimes you believe in

nothing but the darkness. And then how do you go along?

1988: Even Beaver Gets the Blues

To say that Beaver's marriage didn't work would be like saying that the launch

of the Challenger space shuttle went a little bit wrong. Joe 'Beaver'

Clarendon and Laurie Sue Kenopensky make it through eight months and then

kapow, there goes my baby, somebody help me pick up the fuckin pieces.

The Beav is basically a happy guy, any of his hang-out buddies would tell

you that, but this is his dark time. He doesn't see any of his old friends

(the ones he thinks of as his real friends) except for the one week in

November when they are together every year, and last November he and Laurie

Sue had still been hanging on. By a thread, granted, but still hanging on. Now

he spends a lot of his time — too much, he knows — in the bars of Portland's

Old Port district, The Porthole and The Seaman's Club and The Free Street Pub.

He is drinking too much and smoking too much of the old rope-a-dope and come

most mornings he doesn't like to look at himself in the bathroom mirror; his

red-rimmed eyes skitter away from his reflection and he thinks I ought to quit

the clubs. Pretty soon I'm gonna have a problem the way Pete's got one. Jesus-

Christ-bananas.

Quit the clubs, quit the partying, good fuckin idea, and then he's back

again, kiss my bender and how ya doin. This Thursday it's the Free Street, and

damned if there isn't a beer in his hand, a joint in his pocket, and some old

instrumental, sounds a little bit like The Ventures, pouring from the juke. He

can't quite remember the name of this one, which was popular before his time.

Still, he knows it; he listens a lot to the Portland oldies station since he

got divorced. Oldies are soothing. A lot of the new stuff. . . Laurie Sue knew

and liked a lot of it, but Beaver doesn't get it.

The Free Street is mostly empty, maybe half a dozen guys at the bar and

another half a dozen shooting eightball in the back, Beaver and three of his

hang-out buddies in one of the booths, drinking draft Millers and cutting a

greasy deck of cards to see who pays for each round. What is that instrumental

with all the burbling guitars? 'Out of Limits'? 'Telstar'? Nah, there's a

synthesizer in 'Telstar' and no synth in this. And who gives a shit? The other

guys are talking about Jackson Browne, who played the Civic Center last night

and put on a kick-ass show, according to George Pelsen, who was there.

'I'll tell you something else that was kick-ass,' George says, looking at

them impressively. He raises his undershot chin, showing them all a red mark

on the side of his neck. 'You know what that is?'

'Hickey, ain't it?' Kent Astor asks, a bit timidly.

'You're fuckin-A,' George says. 'I was hanging around the stage door after

the show, me and a bunch of other guys, hopin to get Jackson's autograph. Or

maybe, I don't know, David Lindley. He's cool.'

Kent and Sean Robideau agree that Lindley is cool — not a guitar god, by

any means (Mark Knopfler of Dire Straits is a guitar god; and Angus Young of

AC/DC; and — of course — Clapton), but very cool just the same. Lindley has

great licks; he has awesome dreads, as well. All down to his shoulders.

Beaver doesn't join in the talk. All at once he wants to get out of here,

out of this stale going-nowhere bar, and cop some fresh air. He knows where

George is going with this, and it's all a lie.

Her name wasn't Chantay, you don't know what her name was, she blew right

past you like you weren't there, what would you be to a girl like her anyway,

just another working-class longhair in another working-class New England town,

into the band bus she went and out of your life. Your fuckin uninteresting

life. The Chantays is the name of the group we're listening to, not the Mar-

Kets or the BarKays but the Chantays, it's 'Pipeline' by the Chantays and that

thing on your neck isn't a hickey it's a razor burn.

He thinks this, then he hears crying. Not in the Free Street but in his

mind. Long-gone crying. It goes right into your head, that crying, goes in

like splinters of glass, and oh fuck, fuck me Freddy, somebody make him stop

crying.

I was the one who made him stop, Beaver thinks. That was me. I was the one

who made him stop. I took him in my arms and sang to him.

Meanwhile George Pelsen is telling them about how the stage door finally

opened, but it wasn't Jackson Browne who came out, not David Lindlev, either;

it was the trio of chick singers, one named Randi, one named Susi, and one

named Chantay. Yummy ladies, oh so tall and tasty.

'Man,' Sean says, rolling his eyes. He's a chubby little fellow whose

sexual exploits consist of occasional field-trips to Boston, where he eyes the

strippers at the Foxy Lady and the waitresses at Hooters. 'Oh man, fuckin

Chantay.' He makes jacking-off gestures in the air. At that, at least, Beav

thinks, he looks like a pro.

'So I started talkin to them . . . to her, mostly, Chantay, and I ast her

if she'd like to see some of the Portland night-life. So we . . .'

The Beav takes a toothpick from his pocket and slides it into his mouth,

timing the rest out. All at once the toothpick is just what he wants. Not the

beer in front of him, not the joint in his pocket, certainly not George

Pelsen's empty kahoot about how he and the mythical Chantay got it on in the

back of his pickup, thank God for that camper cap, when George's Ram is

rockin, don't come knockin.

It's all puff and blow, Beaver thinks, and suddenly he is desperately

depressed, more depressed than he has been since Laurie Sue packed her stuff

and moved back to her mother's. This is utterly unlike him, and suddenly the

only thing he wants is to get the fuck out of here, fill his lungs with the

cool, salt-tanged seaside air, and find a phone. He wants to do that and then

to call Jonesy or Henry, it doesn't matter which, either one will do; he wants

to say Hey man, what's going on and have one of them say back Oh, you know,

Beav, SSDD. No bounce, no play.

He gets up.

'Hey, man,' George says. Beaver went to Westbrook junior College with

George, and then he seemed cool enough, but juco was many long beers ago.

'Where you goin?'

'Take a leak,' Beaver says, rolling his toothpick from one side of his

mouth to the other.

'Well, you want to hurry your bad ass back, I'm just getting to the good

part,' George says, and Beaver thinks crotchless panties. Oh boy, today that

old weird vibe is strong, maybe it's the barometer or something.

Lowering his voice, George says, 'When I got her skirt up—'

'I know, she was wearin crotchless panties,' Beaver says. He registers the

look of surprise — alnost shock — in George's eyes but pays no attention. 'I

sure want to hear that part.'

He walks away, walks toward the men's room with its yellow-pink smell of

piss and disinfectant, walks past it, walks past the women's, walks past the

door with OFFICE on it, and escapes into the alley. The sky overhead is white

and rainy, but the air is good. So good. He breathes it in deep and thinks

again. No bounce no play. He grins a little.

He walks for ten minutes, just chewing toothpicks and clearing his head.

At some point, he can't remember exactly when, he tosses away the joint that

has been in his pocket. And then he calls Henry from the pay phone in Joe's

Smoke Shop, up by Monument Square. He's expecting the answering machine —

Henry is still in school — but Henry is actually there, he picks up on the

second ring.

'How you doing, man?' Beaver asks.

'Oh, you know,' Henry says. 'Same shit, different day. How about you,

Beav?'

Beav closes his eyes. For a moment everything is all right again; as right

as it can be in such a piss-ache world, anyway.

'About the same, buddy,' he replies. 'Just about the same.'

1993: Pete Helps a Lady in Distress

Pete sits behind his desk just off the showroom of Macdonald Motors in

Bridgton, twirling his keychain. The fob consists of four enameled blue

letters: NASA.

Dreams age faster than dreamers, that is a fact of life Pete has

discovered as the years pass. Yet the last ones often die surprisingly hard,

screaming in low, miserable voices at the back of the brain. It's been a long

time since Pete slept in a bedroom papered with pictures of Apollo and Saturn

rockets and astronauts and space-walks (EVAs, to those in the know) and space

capsules with their shields smoked and fused by the fabulous heat of re-entry

and LEMs and Voyagers and one photograph of a shiny disc over Interstate 80,

people standing in the breakdown lane and looking up with their hands

shielding their eyes, the photo's caption reading THIS OBJECT, PHOTOGRAPHED

NEAR ARVADA, COLORADO IN 1971, HAS NEVER BEEN EXPLAINED. IT IS A GENUINE UFO.

A long time.

Yet he still spent one of his two weeks of vacation this year in

Washington DC, where he went to the Smithsonian every day and spent nearly all

of his time wandering among the displays with a wondering grin on his face.

And most of that time he spent looking at the moon rocks and thinking, Those

rocks came from a place where the skies are always black and the silence is

everlasting. Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin took twenty kilograms of another

world and now here it is.

And here he is, sitting behind his desk on a day when he hasn't sold a

single car (people don't like to buy cars when it's raining, and it has been

drizzling in Pete's part of the world ever since first light), twirling his

NASA key-chain and looking up at the clock. Time moves slowly in the

afternoons, ever more slowly as the hour of five approaches. At five it will

be time for that first beer. Not before five; no way. You drank during the

day, maybe you had to look at how much you were drinking, because that's what

alcoholics did. But if you could wait . . . just twirl your keychain and wait

. . .

As well as that first beer of the day, Pete is waiting for November. Going

to Washington in April had been good, and the moon rocks had been stunning

(they still stun him, every time he thinks about them), but he had been alone.

Being alone wasn't so good. In November, when he takes his other week, he'll

be with Henry and Jonesy and the Beav. Then he'll allow himself to drink

during the day. When you're off in the woods, hunting with your friends, it's

all right to drink during the day. It's practically a tradition. It—

The door opens and a good-looking brunette comes in. About five-ten (and

Pete likes them tall), maybe thirty. She glances around at the showroom models

(the new Thunderbird, in dark burgundy, is the pick of the litter, although

the Explorer isn't bad), but not as if she has any interest in buying. Then

she spots Pete and walks toward him.

Pete gets up, dropping his NASA keychain on his desk-blotter, and meets

her at the door of his office. He's wearing his best professional smile by now

— two hundred watts, baby, you better believe it — and has his hand

outstretched. Her grip is cool and firm, but she's distracted, upset.

'This probably isn't going to work,' she says.

'Now, you never want to start that way with a car salesman,' Pete says.

'We love a challenge. I'm Pete Moore.'

'Hello,' she says, but doesn't give her name, which is Trish. 'I have an

appointment in Fryeburg in Just—' She glances at the clock which Pete watches

so closely during the slow afternoon hours. '—in just forty-five minutes. It's

with a client who wants to buy a house, and I think I have the right one,

there's a sizeable commission involved, and . . .' Her eyes are now brimming

with tears and she has to swallow to get rid of the thickness creeping into

her voice. ' . . . and I've lost my goddam keys! My goddam car keys!' She

opens her purse and rummages in it.

'But I have my registration . . . plus some other papers . . . there are

all sorts of numbers, and I thought maybe, just maybe you could make me a new

set and I could be on my way. This sale could make my year, Mr . . .' She has

forgotten. He isn't offended. Moore is almost as common as Smith or Jones.

Besides, she's upset. Losing your keys will do that. He's seen it a hundred

times.

'Moore. But I answer just as well to Pete.'

'Can you help me, Mr Moore? Or is there someone in the service department

who can?'

Old Johnny Damon's back there and he'd be happy to help her, but she

wouldn't make her appointment in Fryeburg, that's for sure.

'We can get you new car keys, but it's liable to take at least twenty-four

hours and maybe more like forty-eight,' he says.

She looks at him from her brimming eyes, which are a velvety brown, and

lets out a dismayed cry. 'Damn it! Damn it!'

An odd thought comes to Pete then: she looks like a girl he knew a long

time ago. Not well, they hadn't known her well, but well enough to save her

life. Josie Rinkenhauer, her name had been.

'I knew it!' Trish says, no longer trying to keep that husky thickness out

of her voice. 'Oh boy, I just knew it!' She turns away from him, now beginning

to cry in earnest.

Pete walks after her and takes her gently by the shoulder. 'Wait, Trish.

Wait just a minute.'

That's a slip, saying her name when she hasn't given it to him, but she's

too upset to realize they haven't been properly introduced, so it's okay.

'Where did you come from?' he asks. 'I mean, you're not from Bridgton, are

you?'

'No,' she says. 'Our office is in Westbrook. Dennison Real Estate. We're

the ones with the lighthouse?'

Pete nods as if this means something to him.

'I came from there. Only I stopped at the Bridgton Pharmacy for some

aspirin because I always get a headache before a big presentation . . . it's

the stress, and oh boy, it's pounding like a hammer now. . .'

Pete nods sympathetically. He knows about headaches. Of course most of his

are caused by beer rather than stress, but he knows about them, all right.

'I had some time to kill, so I also went into the little store next to the

pharmacy for a coffee . . . the caffeine, you know, when you have a headache

the caffeine can help . . .'

Pete nods again. Henry's the head shrinker, but as Pete has told him more

than once, you have to know a fair amount about how the human mind works in

order to succeed at selling. Now he's pleased to see that his new friend is

calming down a little. That's good. He has an idea he can help her, if she'll

let him. He can feel that little click wanting to happen. He likes that little

click. It's no big deal, it'll never make his fortune, but he likes it.

'And I also went across the street to Penny's. I bought a scarf. . .

because of the rain, you know. . . 'She touches her hair. 'Then I went back to

my car. . . and my son-of-a-damn-bitch keys were gone! I retraced my steps . .

. went backward from Renny's to the store to the pharmacy, and they're not

anywhere! And now I'm going to miss my appointment!'

Distress is creeping back into her voice. Her eyes go to the clock again.

Creeping for him; racing for her. That's the difference between people, Pete

reflects. One of them, anyway.

'Calm down,' he says. 'Calm down just a few seconds and listen to me.

We're going to walk back to the drugstore, you and I, and look for your car-

keys.'

'They're not there! I checked all the aisles, I looked on the shelf where

I got the aspirin, I asked the girl at the counter—'

'It won't hurt to check again,' he says. He's walking her toward the door

now, his hand pressed lightly against the small of her back, getting her to

walk with him. He likes the smell of her perfume and he likes her hair even

more, yes he does. And if it looks this pretty on a rainy day, how might it

look when the sun is out?

'My appointment—'

'You've still got forty minutes,' he says. 'With the summer tourists gone,

it only takes twenty to drive up to Fryeburg. We'll take ten minutes to try

and find your keys, and if we can't, I'll drive you myself.'

She peers at him doubtfully.

He looks past her, into one of the other offices. 'Dick!' he calls.

'Hey, Dickie M.!'

Dick Macdonald looks up from a clutter of invoices.

'Tell this lady I'm safe to drive her up to Fryeburg, should it come to

that.'

'Oh, he's safe enough, ma'am,' Dick says. 'Not a sex maniac or a fast

driver. He'll just try to sell you a new car.'

'I'm a tough sell, she says, smiling a little, 'but I guess you're on.

'Cover my phone, would you, Dick?' Pete asks.

'Oh yeah, that'll be a hardship. Weather like this, I'll be beatin the

customers off with a stick.'

Pete and the brunette — Trish — go out, cross the alley, and walk the

forty or so feet back to Main Street. The Bridgton Pharmacy is the second

building on their left. The drizzle has thickened; now it's almost rain. The

woman puts her new scarf up over her hair and glances at Pete, who's bare-

headed. 'You're getting all wet,' she says.

'I'm from upstate,' he says. 'We grow em tough up there.'

'You think you can find them, don't you?' she asks.

Pete shrugs. 'Maybe. I'm good at finding things. Always have been.'

'Do you know something 1 don't?' she asks.

No bounce, no play, he thinks. I know that much, ma'am.

'Nope,' he says. 'Not yet.'

They walk into the pharmacy, and the bell over the door jingles. The girl

behind the counter looks up from her magazine. At three-twenty on a rainy late

September afternoon, the pharmacy is deserted except for the three of them

down here and Mr Diller up behind the prescription counter.

'Hi, Pete,' the counter-girl says.

'Yo, Cathy, how's it going?'

'Oh, you know — slow.' She looks at the brunette. 'I'm sorry, ma'am, I

checked around again, but I didn't find them.'

'That's all right,' Trish says with a wan smile. 'This gentleman has

agreed to give me a ride to my appointment.'

'Well,' Cathy says, 'Pete's okay, but I don't think I'd go so far as to

call him a gentleman.'

'You want to watch what you say, darlin,' Pete tells her with a grin.

'There's a Rexall just down 302 in Naples.' Then he glances up at the clock.

Time has sped up for him, too. That's okay, that makes a nice change.

Pete looks back at Trish. 'You came here first. For the aspirin.'

'That's right. I got a bottle of Anacin. Then I had some time to kill,

so—'

'I know, you got a coffee next door at Christie's, then went across to

Renny's.'

'Yes.

'You didn't take your aspirin with hot coffee, did you?'

'No, I had a bottle of Poland water in my car.' She points out the window

at a green Taurus. 'I took them with some of that. But I checked the seat,

too, Mr . . . Pete. I also checked the ignition.' She gives him an impatient

look which says, I know what you're thinking: daffy woman.

'Just one more question,' he says. 'If I find your car-keys, would you go

out to dinner with me? I could meet you at The West Wharf. It's on the road

between here and—'

'I know The West Wharf,' she says, looking amused in spite of her

distress. At the counter, Cathy isn't even pretending to read her magazine.

This is better than Redbook, by far. 'How do you know I'm not married, or

something?'

'No wedding ring,' he replies promptly, although he hasn't even looked at

her hands yet, not closely, anyway. 'Besides, I was just talking about fried

clams, cole slaw, and strawberry shortcake, not a lifetime commitment.'

She looks at the clock. 'Pete . . . Mr Moore . . . I'm afraid that at this

minute I have absolutely no interest in flirting. If you want to give me a

ride, I would be very happy to have dinner with you. But—'

'That's good enough for me,' he says. 'But you'll be driving your own car,

I think, so I'll meet you. Would five-thirty be okay?'

'Yes, fine, but—'

'Okay.' Pete feels happy. That's good; happy is good. A lot of days these

last couple of years he hasn't felt within a holler of happy, and he doesn't

know why. Too many late and soggy nights cruising the bars along 302 between

here and North Conway? Okay, but is that all? Maybe not, but this isn't the

time to think about it. The lady has an appointment to keep. If she keeps it

and sells the house, who knows how lucky Pete Moore might get? And even if he

doesn't get lucky, he's going to be able to help her. He feels it.

'I'm going to do something a little weird now,' he says, 'but don't let it

worry you, okay? It's just a little trick, like putting your finger under your

nose to stop a sneeze or thumping your forehead when you're trying to remember

someone's name. Okay?'

'Sure, I guess,' she says, totally mystified.

Pete closes his eyes, raises one loosely fisted hand in front of his face,

then pops up his index finger. He begins to tick it back and forth in front of

him.

Trish looks at Cathy, the counter-girl. Cathy shrugs as if to say Who

knows?

'Mr Moore?' Trish sounds uneasy now. 'Mr Moore, maybe I just ought to—'

Pete opens his eyes, takes a deep breath, and drops his hand. He looks

past her, to the door.

'Okay,' he says. 'So you came in His eyes move as if watching her come in.

'And you went to the counter . . .' His eyes go there. 'You asked, probably,

"Which aisle's the aspirin in?" Something like that.'

'Yes, I—'

'Only you got something, too.' He can see it on the candy-rack, a bright

yellow mark something like a handprint. 'Snickers bar?'

'Mounds.' Her brown eyes are wide. 'How did you know that?'

'You got the candy, then you went up to get the aspirin. He's looking up

Aisle 2 now. 'After that you paid and went out . . . let's go outside a

minute. Seeya, Cathy.'

Cathy only nods, looking at him with wide eyes.

Pete walks outside, ignoring the tinkle of the bell, ignoring the rain,

which now really is rain. The yellow is on the sidewalk, but fading. The

rain's washing it away. Still, he can see it and it Pleases him to see it.

That feeling of click. Sweet. It's the line. It has been a long time since

he's seen it so clearly.

'Back to your car,' he says, talking to himself now. 'Back to take a

couple of your aspirin with your water . . .'

He crosses the sidewalk, slowly, to the Taurus. The woman walks behind

him, eyes more worried than ever now. Almost frightened.

'You opened the door. You've got your purse . . . your keys . . . your

aspirin . . . your candy . . . all this stuff . . . juggling it around from

hand to hand . . . and that's when . . .'

He bends, fishes in the water flowing along the gutter, hand in it all the

way up to the wrist, and brings something up. He gives it a magician's

flourish. Keys flash silver in the dull day.

' . . . you dropped your keys.'

She doesn't take them at first. She only gapes at him, as if he has

performed an act of witchcraft (warlock-craft, in his case, maybe) before her

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StephenKingDREAMCATCHERHodder&StoughtonGratefulacknowledgementismadeforpermissiontoreprintexcerptsfromthefollowingcopyrightedmaterial:"DyingMan"©1956bvAtlanticMonthlyCo.TheWaking©1953byTheodoreRoethkefromCollectedPoemsofTheodoreRoethkebvTheodoreRoethke,usedbypermissionofDoubleday,adivisionofRandomHo...

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Stephen King - Dreamcatcher

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