Pet Sematary - Stephen King [146]
In his mind Jud again saw Lester Morgans bull Hanratty, his eyes rimmed with red, charging at everything in sight, everything that moved. Charging at trees when the wind jigged the leaves. Before Lester gave up and called it off, every tree in Hanrattys fenced meadow was gored with his brainless fury and his horns were splintered and his head was bleeding. When Lester put Hanratty down, Lester had been sick with dread-the way Jud himself was right now.
He drank beer and smoked. Daylight faded. He did not put on the light. Gradually the tip of his cigarette became a small red pip in the darkness. He sat and drank beer and watched Louis Creeds driveway. He believed that when Louis came home from wherever he was, he would go over and have a little talk with him. Make sure Louis wasnt planning to do anything he shouldnt.
And still he felt the soft tug of whatever it was, whatever sick power it was that inhabited that devils place, reaching down from its bluff of rotted stone where all those cairns had been built.
Stay out of this, you. Stay out of it or youre going to be very, very sorry.
Ignoring it as best he could, Jud sat and smoked and drank beer. And waited.
47
While Jud Crandall was sitting in the ladderbacked rocker and watching for him out of his bay window, Louis was eating a big tasteless dinner in the Howard Johnsons dining room.
The food was plentiful and dull-exactly what his body seemed to want. Outside it had grown dark. The headlights of the passing cars probed like fingers. He shoveled the food in. A steak. A baked potato. A side dish of beans which were a bright green nature had never intended. A wedge of apple pie with a scoop of ice cream on top of it melting into a soft drool. He ate at a corner table, watching people come and go, wondering if he might not see someone he knew. In a vague way, he rather hoped that would happen. It would lead to questions-wheres Rachel, what are you doing here, hows it going? -and perhaps the questions would lead to complications, and maybe complications were what he really wanted. A way out.
And as a matter of fact, a couple that he did know came in just as he was finishing his apple pie and his second cup of coffee. Rob Grinnell, a Bangor doctor, and his pretty wife Barbara. He waited for them to see him, sitting here in the corner at his table for one, but the hostess led them to the booths on the far side of the room, and Louis lost sight of them entirely except for an occasional glimpse of Grinnells prematurely graying hair.
The waitress brought Louis his check. He signed for it, jotting his room number under his signature, and left by the side door.
Outside the wind had risen to near-gale force. It was a steady droning presence, making the electrical wires hum oddly. He could see no stars but had a sense of clouds rushing past overhead at high speed. Louis stood on the walk for a moment, hands in pockets, face tilted into that wind. Then he turned back and went up to his room and turned on the television. It was too early to do anything serious, and that nightwind was too full of possibilities. It made him nervous.
He watched four hours of TV, eight back-to-back half-hour comedy programs. He realized it had been a very long time since he had watched so much TV in a steady, uninterrupted stream. He thought that all the female leads on the sitcoms were what he and his friends had called cockteasers back in high school.
In Chicago, Dory Goldman was wailing, Fly back? Honey, why do you want to fly back? You just got here!
In Ludlow, Jud Crandall sat by his bay window,