Needful Things - Stephen King [163]
Mr. Gaunt's smile, sunny and resplendent, burst forth once again.
"Very good," he said. He came toward Everett, who observed with horror that Mr. Gaunt apparently meant to put an arm around him.
Everett moved hastily backward. In this way, Mr. Gaunt maneuvered him back to the front door an,d opened it.
"Enjoy that pipe," he said. "Did I tell you that it once belonged to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, creator of the great Sherlock Holmes?"
"No!" Everett Frankel exclaimed.
"Of course I didn't," Mr. Gaunt said, grinning. "That would have been a lie and I never lie in matters of business, Dr.
Frankel. Don't forget your little errand."
"I won't."
"Then I'll wish you a good day."
"Same to Y-" But Everett was talking to no one. The door with its drawn shade had already been closed behind him.
He looked at it for a moment, then walked slowly back to his Plymouth. If he had been asked for an exact account of what he had said to Mr. Gaunt and what Mr. Gaunt had said to him, he would have made a poor job of it, because he couldn't exactly remember. He felt like a man who has been given a whiff of light anaesthetic.
Once he was sitting behind the wheel again, the first thing Everett did was unlock the glove compartment, put the envelope with Lovey written on the front in, and take the pipe out. One thing he did remember was Mr. Gaunt's teasing him, saying that A. Conan Doyle had once owned the pipe. And he had almost believed him.
How silly! You only had to put it in your mouth and clamp your teeth on the stem to know better. The original owner of this pipe had been Hermann Goring.
Everett Frankel started his car and drove slowly out of town.
And on his way to the Burgmeyer farm, he had to pull over to the side of the road only twice to admire how much that pipe improved his looks.
4
Albert Gendron kept his dental offices in the Castle Building, a graceless brick structure which stood across the street from the town's Municipal Building and the squat cement pillbox that housed the Castle County Water District. The Castle Building had thrown its shadow over Castle Stream and the Tin Bridge since 1924, and housed three of the county's five lawyers, an optometrist, an audiologist, several independent realtors, a credit consultant, a onewoman answering service, and a framing shop. The half dozen other offices in the building were currently vacant.
Albert, who had been one of Our Lady of Serene Waters' stalwarts since the days of old Father O'Neal, was getting on now, his once-black hair turning salt-and-pepper, his broad shoulders sloping in a way they never had in his young days, but he was still a man of imposing size-at six feet, seven inches tall and two hundred and eighty pounds, he was the biggest man in town, if not the entire county.
He climbed the narrow staircase to the fourth and top floor slowly, stopping on the landings to catch his breath before going on up, mindful of the heart-murmur Dr. Van Allen said he now had.
Halfway up the final flight, he saw a sheet of paper taped to the frosted glass panel of his office door, obscuring the lettering which read ALBERT GENDRON D.D.S.
He was able to read the salutation on this note while he was still five steps from the top, and his heart began to pound harder, murmur or no murmur. Only it wasn't exertion causing it to kick up its heels; it was rage.
LISTEN UP YOU MACKEREL-SNAPPER! was printed at the top of the sheet in bright red Magic Marker.
Albert pulled the note from the door and read it quickly. He breathed through his nose as he did so-harsh, snorting exhalations that made him sound like a bull about to charge.
LISTEN UP YOU MACKEREL-SNAPPER!
We have tried to reason with you-"Let him hear who hath understanding"-but it has been no use. YOU ARE SET ON YOUR COURSE OF DAMNATION AND BY THEIR WORKS SHALT YOU KNOW THEM. We have put up with your Popish idolatry and even with your licentious worship of the Babylon Whore. But now you have gone too far.
THERE WILL BE NO DICING WITH THE DEVIL IN CASTLE ROCK!
Decent Christians