The Regulators - Stephen King [21]
He had, but it didn't much matter, under the circumstances. He looked through the E-Z Stop's door and saw Peter Jackson and the retired vet from up the street, approaching his lawn with a large piece of blue plastic. It was obvious that they meant to cover the body. Collie started toward the door, meaning to tell them to stand the hell clear, that was an evidence scene they were getting ready to screw around with, and then the thunder rolled again — the loudest blast so far, loud enough to make Cynthia cry out in surprise.
Fuck, he thought. Let them go ahead. It's going to rain, anyhow.
Yes, maybe that would be best. The rain would very likely come before the cops got here (Collie didn't even hear any sirens yet), and that would play hell with any hypothetical forensics. So, better to cover it . . . but he still had a dismaying feeling of events racing out of his control. And even that, he realized, was an illusion: nothing about the situation had ever been in his control to start with. He was, basically, just another citizen of Poplar Street. Not that that didn't have its merits; if he fucked up the procedure, they couldn't very well put it in his jacket, could they?
He opened the door, stepped out, and cupped his hands around his mouth so as to be heard above the rising wind. 'Peter! Mr Jackson!'
Jackson looked over, face set, expecting to be told to quit what he was doing.
'Don't touch the body!' he called. 'Do not touch the body! Just kind of shake that thing down over him like it was a bedspread! Have you got that?'
'Yes!' Peter called. The vet was also nodding.
'There are some cement blocks in my garage, stacked up by the back wall!' Collie yelled. 'The door's unlocked! Get them and use them to weight down the tarp so it won't blow away!' They were both nodding now, and Collie felt a little better.
We can stretch it to cover his bike, as well!' the old man called. 'Should we?'
'Yes!' he called back, then had another idea. 'There's a piece of plastic in the garage, too — in the corner. You can use it to cover the dog, if you don't mind carrying some more blocks.'
Jackson flashed him a thumb-and-forefinger circle, then the two of them started for the garage, leaving the tarp behind. Collie hoped they would get it spread and anchored before the wind strengthened enough to blow it away. He went back inside to ask Cynthia if there was a store phone — there had to be, of course — and saw she had already put it on the counter for him.
'Thanks.'
He picked it up, heard the dial-tone, tapped four numbers, then had to stop and shake his head and laugh at himself.
'What's wrong?' the hippie-type asked.
'Nothing.' If he told the guy he'd just dialled the first four numbers of his old squadroom — like a retired horse clip-clopping back to the old firebarn — he wouldn't understand. He tapped the cutoff button and dialled 911 instead.
The phone rang once in his ear . . . and it did ring, as if he had called a residence. Collie frowned. What you got when you dialled 911 — unless they had changed it since the days when listening to the recordings had been part of his job — was a high toneless bleep sound.
Well, they did change it, that's all, he thought. Made it a little more user-friendly.
It started to ring again and then was picked up. Only instead of getting the 911 robot, telling him what button to press for what emergency, he got soft, wet, snuffly breathing. What the hell — ?
'Hello?'
'Trick or treat,' a voice responded. A young voice and somehow eerie. Eerie enough to send a scamper of gooseflesh up his back. 'Smell my feet, give me something good to eat. If you don't, I don't care, you can smell my underwear.' This was followed by a high, adenoidal giggle.
'Who is this?'
'Don't call here no more, partner,' the voice said. 'Tak!'
The click in his ear was deafening, so deafening the girl heard it, too, and screamed. Not the phone, he thought.