It

the idea of poisoning Mike Hanlon’s dog Mr Chips), and Butch would reheat a mess of them the next night. On Tuesdays and Wednesdays Henry would take a Tupperware box full of them to school. By Thursday or Friday, neither Henry or his father could eat any more. The house’s two bedrooms would smell of stale farts in spite of the open windows. Butch would take the remains and mix them into the other slops and feed them to Bip and Bop, the Bowerses’ two pigs. Rena would like as not show up the following Sunday with another steaming pail, and the cycle would start all over again.
That morning Henry had put up an enormous quantity of leftover beans, and the four of them had eaten the whole lot at noon, sitting out on the playground in the shade of a big old elm. They had eaten until they were nearly bursting.
It had been Patrick who suggested they go down to the dump, which would be fairly quiet in the middle of a working-day summer afternoon. By the time they arrived, the beans were doing their work quite nicely.
4
Little by little, Beverly got herself under control again. She knew she had to get out; beating a retreat was ultimately less dangerous than hanging around. They were absorbed in what they were doing, and even if worse came to worst, she could get a head-start (and in the back of her mind she had also decided that, if worst came to terrible, a few shots from the Bullseye might discourage them).
She was about to begin creeping away when Victor said, ‘I gotta go, Henry. My dad wants me to help him pick com this afternoon.’
‘Oh shit,’ Henry said. ‘He’ll live.’
‘No, he’s mad at me. Because of what happened the other day.’
‘Fuck him if he can’t take a joke.’
Beverly listened more closely now, suspecting it might be the scuffle which had ended with Eddie’s broken arm that they were talking about.
‘No, I gotta go.’
‘I think his ass hurts,’ Patrick said.
‘Watch your mouth, fuckface,’ Victor said. ‘It might grow on you.’
‘I got to go too,’ Belch said.
‘Your father want you to pick corn?’ Henry asked angrily. This was what might have passed for a jest in Henry’s mind; Belch’s father was dead.
‘No. But I got a job delivering the Weekly Shopper. I gotta do that tonight.’
‘What’s this Weekly Shopper crap?’ Henry asked, now sounding upset as well as angry.
‘It’s a job,’ Belch said with ponderous patience. ‘I make money. ‘
Henry made a disgusted sound, and Beverly risked another peek around the car. Victor and Belch were standing, buckling their belts. Henry and Patrick were still squatting with their pants down. The lighter glinted in Henry’s hand.
‘You’re not chickening out, are you?’ Henry asked Patrick.
‘Nope,’ Patrick said.
‘You don’t have to pick corn or go do some pussy job?’
‘Nope,’ Patrick said again.
‘Well,’ Belch said uncertainly, ‘see you around, Henry.’
‘Sure,’ Henry said, and spat near one of Belch’s clodhopping workshoes.
Vie and Belch started off together toward the two rows of wrecked cars . . . toward the Studebaker behind which Beverly was crouching. At first she could only cringe, frozen with fear like a rabbit. Then she slid around the left side of the Studebaker and backed down the gap between it and the battered, doorless Ford next to it. For a moment she paused, looking from side to side, hearing them approach. She hesitated, her mouth cottony-dry, her back itchy with sweat; a part of her mind was numbly wondering how she’d look-in a cast like Eddie’s, with the Losers’ names signed on it. Then she dived into the Ford on the passenger sid e. She curled up on the filthy floormat, making herself as small as possible. It was boiling hot inside the junked-out Ford, and it smelled so thickly of dust, rotting upholstery, and elderly rat-crap that she had to struggle grimly to keep from sneezing or coughing. She heard Belch and Victor pass close by, talking in low voices. Then they were gone.
She sneezed three times, quickly and quietly, into her cupped hands.
She supposed she could go now, if she was careful. The best way to do it would be to shift over to the driver’s side of the Ford, sneak back to the aisle, and then just do a fade. She believed she could manage it, but the shock of almost being discovered had robbed her of her courage, at least for the time being. She felt safer here in the Ford. And maybe, now that Victor and Belch had gone, the other two would also go soon. Then she could go back to the clubhouse. She had lost all interest in target-shooting.
Also, she had to pee.
Come on, she thought. Come on, hurry up and go, hurry up and go, puh-LEEZE!