They got in the car, Larry behind the wheel. He cranked the engine, looked out the window at Pop's body. "We'll get 'em for you, fella."

Moses said, "You got to take this road a bit, then we'll do some turning later."

They pulled away from the flames and onto the road. Ted picked up the radio mike, called in the location of the fire and the body.

"Sound the trumpets," Larry said. "Here comes the G.o.dd.a.m.n cavalry. Look to your a.s.ses, black hats."

THIRTEEN.

"Oh, Monty, don't move. I've just about got it."

Becky had used wire cutters from the shed to cut the tip off the hook, and she was working the rusted thing out now. She tossed the hook fragment into the bar ashtray, poured alcohol on the wound.

"Just like the dream," Monty said. "And the TV . . . what I saw was part of the dream you told me."

"Couldn't be. On the TV?"

"I'm the one talking the loony talk now and you're telling me I'm crazy. We've got our roles changed around. I tell you though, I saw this car you told me about on TV. Did you see it or not?"

"I was just sitting here, watching Lucy, and suddenly I felt this thing in my head, like something wiggling, and then the next thing I know I'm looking at your b.l.o.o.d.y hand-"

"There's some sense to it," Monty said, interrupting. "If you're some kind of receiver . . .

and there's something sending out there, whatever sends these messages to you . . .

Maybe the TV picked them up, just like you picked them up-"

"Bounced through my head and into the TV?" Becky said without humor. "Old Beck, the satellite receiver."

"And maybe I was imagining it. The hand part had come true, so vivid, like the way you told me in your dream . . . You were in a trance when I came in, I glanced at the TV . . . maybe the channel had some kind of difficulty and another show was sticking in, that's why it was so fuzzy."

"Makes sense," Becky said. Then she laughed. "This is nuts. Now I'm the straight man, trying to make you realize you're hallucinating. I said if I were in your shoes I wouldn't do that." She paused for a long moment. "Monty, the dreams are real. Maybe you did see something on the set. Whatever, you did hurt your hand, like I said. Clyde hanged himself just as I dreamed. If those things came true, then the others will come true. The woman I saw-"

"Now hold on-"

"-was me, Monty. She was dead and hung up by her feet and it was me, I know it for sure."

"You don't know that."

"Yes, I do. The goblins-"

"There are no such things as goblins."

Becky smiled. "Back and forth," she said, "we change roles back and forth. There was no such thing as a person who could dream the future either, remember?"

Monty was silent for a moment, then; "Maybe these are warnings. If I had understood your dream was about a hook in the hand, and if I had believed your dream, I probably could have avoided the hook by not going fishing."

"And maybe you can't change the future. Maybe you wouldn't have known it was a hook even if you had believed. I couldn't tell it was. All I saw was the hand, the blood."

"Listen here. We're not going to submit to this, whatever it is."

"I'm going to die," she said softly. Her eyes seemed to glaze over.

He could see that she was on the edge of hysteria. In fact, he was on the edge of hysteria.

Calmly, he said: "If you lose your head, you just might. But if we keep calm, we can whip this. It may be nothing more than our imagination and we can laugh about it later."

"The dreams are not my imagination." Pushed the wrong b.u.t.ton, he thought.

"We're going to keep calm. Now, from the way you described the dream to me, there was the car, and there were trees and a lake. Whatever is supposed to happen will happen here-if there's anything to this. So, simple. We leave. Right now. Don't get anything, just come on and let's go."

"Monty . . ."

"Now. Let's go, come on. Try to recall everything you can about the dreams, as vividly as you can. Tell me as we drive. The more you can warn us against, the better chance we have avoiding it."

He took her arm, and as he led her out, he began to feel silly. It had crept up on him suddenly. The stuff he'd been rattling was crazy. Christ! He was going off his bean, going the way of Becky.

For a moment he thought of changing his mind, but he remembered the TV, the car.

Silly, G.o.dd.a.m.ned silly. How could it be on TV? That's the dumbest idea ever.

But the more he thought about that car, Becky's other dreams, the less he thought of going back to the cabin. In fact, they left so hurriedly they forgot to lock the door and they left the lights on.

FOURTEEN.

Dark now. The moon riding high in a cold, clear sky. The wind playing music in the tops of the pines. The '66 Chevy pushing shadows to flight with its bright headlights.

Monty cranked the Rabbit, backed it around, drove out to the road, headed for Minnanette.

The Highway Patrol car was blowing fast. Larry was grinning. Ted was gripping the seat.

Moses had his head down between his knees, saying, "G.o.d, Jesus, G.o.d."

Monty drove fast while Becky detailed the dream to him again. And then she stopped in midsentence, said: "That's it. That's it, Monty."

"What?" He glanced at her. She was pointing at the headlights coming toward them.

And suddenly Monty knew what she meant. In fact, it was the TV image: a dark car with lights zooming toward them.

"Hey!" Brian said as the Rabbit pa.s.sed them. "That's the c.u.n.t's car." He yanked the wheel.

Clay became dust and puffed up in a dark cloud, and the Chevy rolled out of the cloud and was in pursuit of the Rabbit before the dust began to settle.

Monty could see the lights in the rearview mirror, closing fast. He pushed so hard on the accelerator that needles of pain traveled up his leg. The Rabbit was rocking, knocking.

The Chevy was closing.

"I'm the one that cuts her heart out," Brian said.

The Highway Patrol car was closing, and soon they would be near the Rabbit.

Or would have.

But Larry didn't see the broken beer bottle fragments in the road. The car rolled over the gla.s.s and a tire blew. The car was doing seventy. It fishtailed and spun and the clay dust flew and the car made a complete circle, fishtailed again and went halfway off in a bar ditch.

Larry opened the door, stepped out into the dust, said, "d.a.m.n."

The Chevy was alongside the Rabbit, seeming to coast. Monty glanced to his left, saw the wild, moon-eyed Loony Tunes looking at him.

"Why?" Monty said aloud. "Why us?"

The Chevy eased over to them, b.u.mped the Rabbit ever so lightly. Monty could hear Loony laughing; the chuckles bounced along in the wind like living things.

Monty glanced at his dash lights. Something was going wild-the heat light was blinking like an airstrip landing lamp.

He glanced at the Chevy again. The guy on the pa.s.senger side had a gun-a shotgun, he was leveling it.

Monty slammed on the brakes, the car skidded. The Chevy shot past them like a bullet.

Becky went forward, hit the windshield. When she tumbled back from the blow there was blood on the gla.s.s. Monty glanced at her face. Her nose and lip were bleeding.

No time to worry now.

He jerked the Rabbit into reverse, backed in a short, sharp circle, floorboarded it back the way they had come.

Already the Chevy had turned around and its lights were filling the rearview mirror.

The patrol car had blown the left front tire. It was off in the ditch in such a way that the front tires were dangling, not quite touching ground.

Moses, who was bleeding from the nose and holding a handkerchief to the wound, said, "Now what?"

Ted stood with his hands on his hips, thinking.

"Jack it out?" Larry said.

"I don't think so ... What might work is to go ahead and change the tire, then push it off in the ditch."

"In the ditch?"

"Push it off until the wheels touch, then try driving it forward-"

"Into the ditch?"

"Sure as h.e.l.l aren't going to drive it backward, no traction. Might pull into the ditch and hard right along the edge. It gets narrow down there, -could possibly pull back on the road."

"Going to have to make an awful sharp turn before the trees ... if it comes out of the ditch."

"Got any better ideas? If so, I'm ready to listen."

"Nope."

"Then?"

"Let's change the tire and give it a try."

The Chevy was closing again, whipping around to the side of the Rabbit. Monty doubted the same trick would work twice, but perhaps another trick.

He whipped to the left, using the advantage of the small, maneuverable car to point the nose at the Chevy. The Rabbit hit the Chevy just behind the right fender and the momentum of Monty's whipping action carried the '66 to the left, toward the bar ditch.

Monty knew that if the driver reacted in time, could whip to the right soon enough, the weight of the car would be more than a match for the Rabbit.

But the Chevy's driver did not respond soon enough. The black car was at an angle, the rear end whirling around, and Monty was driving it straight for the ditch on the left-hand side.

Nearly there.

Come on, baby. Nearly there.

Just a bit more, Volkswagen, honey.

There!

The Chevy's left tire went off in the ditch, and Monty jerked the Rabbit back on the road.