THREE.

This headline from the June 12 edition of the Galveston News: RIPPER KILLS AND RAPES SIXTH

FOUR.

June 15 "I've been watching her."

"She look good?"

"Oh yeah. You know her. She's from the high school."

"Yeah?"

"A teacher, Mrs. Jones. Teaches some sociology and history."

"Oh yeah, I know her, all right. What a piece.

But she knows us."

"So? You, me, Stone and Loony are the Rapist Ripper, remember? There's the ripper part too."

"Yeah, right. Of course. When?"

"Tonight."

"We're doing them kind of close, aren't we, Clyde?"

"You trying to work with the full moon or something?"

"No, just worried about the cops some."

"Say, Brian, if we do them months apart and they can't catch us, what makes you think they can catch us any better if we do one a day?"

"Yeah, guess you're right."

"You know I'm right. Tonight then?"

"Right. Tonight."

FIVE.

June 15, 7:45 P.M.

"Did you palm that bishop?"

"s.h.i.t! Caught me."

"Tsk, tsk. If you're going to cheat at chess, Eva, you're going to have to do better than that."

Eva held up her left hand. "Does that mean I have to give back the p.a.w.n too, Beck?" She opened her hand. A white, plastic p.a.w.n lay in the center, with the bishop.

"You s.h.i.t. How long ago did you do that?"

"Back when you took my rook. It just didn't seem right, you mopping up the board and me not getting anything."

"If you'd quit trying to play the pieces like checkers, you'd do better."

"Then let's play checkers."

"No way. You're too good at that, and I don't palm checkers half as well as you do chess pieces, bad as that is."

"Unfair, you won't play my game."

"My apartment, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah."

"Still unfair."

"Put the bishop and the p.a.w.n back, Eva. Not there-where they belong."

"Happy?"

"Uh-huh, checkmate."

"Good, I'm glad to have it over with."

"Another drink?"

"No, I'm driving."

"Yeah, couple of teas and you go all to pieces."

"Not kidding, Beck, caffeine eats me up. Tears apart what brain I got left."

"Okay, I'll have another."

"Oh, what the h.e.l.l, I'll live dangerously. Make it two sugars and don't hold back on the lemon."

Becky rose, went to the little kitchenette.

"You know, Beck, it's sort of fun to get away from the guys for a while. I love my old jacka.s.s, but it sure is good not to hear him bray for a bit."

"It's fine unless you have to stay by yourself for a couple days. Did you say two sugars?"

"Right, two. True enough. I'm going home to my jacka.s.s, but yours won't be around. Say, you want me to call Dean and tell him I'm staying over?"

"No, you've got to go to work in the morning. Me, I'm free as a bird."

"Lucky you."

"Yeah, lucky me. We took the summer off just like we could afford it. I probably should have taught summer cla.s.ses, Monty too. Our bank account is taking the summer off too."

"Well, Monty's getting paid for that thing he went to in Houston, isn't he?

Whatever the h.e.l.l it is."

"A conference for sociologists. Bunch of speakers on juvenile problems, stuff like that."

"Why didn't you go? Your field too."

"Didn't want to. You know, Eva, I've got a confession. I want to quit teaching."

"Be a housewife?"

"Not hardly."

"Good, you haven't got enough practice. This place looks horrible."

"Wrong. The panty hose on the shower rod is avant-garde decoration. You're just not with it."

"That the case? Hey, are you having to grow and cure the tea leaves over there?"

"No, but I am boiling them. It's the way tea's made. Would you like a couple tea bags to suck on while you wait?"

"No, but the part about the bags reminds me of an incredibly filthy joke, but I'll refrain."

"Thank G.o.d for small favors."

"You still haven't told me why you want to quit teaching. I was trying to be discreet and not too nosey because I thought you were going to work it into the conversation."

"I don't know . . . just don't enjoy it that much lately. Seems like to me the kids just don't give a d.a.m.n. And there are some that are just creeps; they scare me. When I was a kid the whole idea of scaring a teacher would never have entered my mind, wouldn't have believed it possible. To me teachers were G.o.ds of a sort, those who give thee information.

But now . . . sometimes just looking at my students, at their eyes, gives me the creeps."

"Makes you wonder if all the nasty stuff in our food these days is causing mothers to give birth to a race of evil mutants, huh? Makes me think of this movie I saw once where a whole village of children were somehow affected in the womb, and they all grew up with super powers and stuff, scared the s.h.i.t out of the adults."

"Well, they don't have to have weird powers to frighten me, they do quite nicely without them- some of them. Lot of good kids too. I'm just hard-pressed to think of one at the moment."

Eva laughed.

"But it's not just that," Becky continued. "I just need a change. Nothing new is happening in my life. I'm not unhappy. Monty and I are fine. I'm just bored with what I do is all."

"I sort of know what you mean . . . We've come a long way from when we were going to save the world, haven't we, Beck?"

"You said lemon?"

"Yes."

"Yeah, we've come a long way. Wish I could be as idealistic as I used to be, as Monty is.

He truly believes in his fellowman, that man is basically good, and that if you could just get enough people to listen they'd try to be good and kind to one another, and the world would change and be a wonderful place to live."

"Sounds like a Disney movie. Do you believe that?"

"No."

"Good, It's a crock of s.h.i.t." Becky brought the tea over, sat back down. "He was telling me that if there was a shortage of food, a sudden thing where the grocery stores were emptying out, that there would be a bit of rioting, some chaos, but that most would reason and try to hold together, and they'd make an effort to see that everyone was fed and taken care of. So on and so on."

"Now we're talking Bambi picture. Maybe at one time it might have been that way, I mean to some degree. But man is a meat-eating beast, and I think if you tried to stand in front of a bunch of hungry, crazed folks you'd wind up with shoe prints on your head, and maybe end up half-eaten."

"So do I. I'm even beginning to think those Survivalists aren't that crazy. I mean, I used to look at them like they were kooks. But I'm not so sure anymore."

"Monty is naive . . . But he is a good-looking rascal. How'd you end up with him and I ended up with old, ugly Dean?"

"He's not ugly."

"Beck."

"Okay, he's kind of ugly, but he's sweet."

Eva laughed.

"And you ended up with him because you loved him."

"Yeah, I guess. And you know what? I still do. You know what else?"

"What?"

"If we can be that crazy about our husbands after all these years, guess that goes to show there's some love in the human race. No Bambi picture here, but maybe that proves something."

"Know what you mean." Becky lifted her tea gla.s.s. "To our husbands and our marriages, and the betterment of the world."

They toasted, drank.

A hot June wind gnawed at the windows and rattled the front door.