believed what he was saying, but he knew it must sound hollow to the
cop. “I happen to love life. I don’t need drugs. I can make myself
happy without them.”
Ackridge watched him closely for a moment, then leaned back in his
chair, crossed his heavy arms on his chest. “You want to know why I’m
asking all these questions?”
Alex did not respond, for he was not sure whether or not he wanted to
know.
“I’ll tell you,” Ackridge said. “I’ve got two theories about this story
of yours-about the man in the Automover. First one is-none of it
happened. You hallucinated it all. Could be. Could be like that. If
you were really high on something, maybe LSD, you could have given
yourself a real bad spook.”
The thing to do, now, was just to listen. Don’t argue. just let him go
on and, hopefully, get out of here as soon as possible. Still, Alex
could not help saying, “What about the side of my car? The paint’s
gone. The body is all torn up. My door won’t open “I’m not saying that
is imaginary,” Ackridge told him. “But it could be that you side-swiped
a retaining wall or an outcropping of rock-anything.”
“Ask Colin,” Doyle said.
“The boy in the car,’ Your-brother-inlaw? ”
“Yes.”
“How old is he?”
“Eleven.”
Ackridge shook his burly head. “He’s too young for me to touch.
And he’d probably just say anything he supposed you wanted him to say.”
Alex cleared his throat, which was tight and dry. “Search the car. You
won’t find any drugs. ”
“Well,” Ackridge said, purposely emphasizing his drawl, “let me tell you
my other theory before you go getting your dander up. I think it’s a
better one, anyway. Know what it is?”
“No.”
“I think maybe you were tooling along in that big black car of yours,
playing king of the road, and you passed some local boy who was driving
the only broken-down old pickup he could afford.” Ackridge smiled
again, and this time it was a genuine smile. “He probably looked at you
with your loud clothes and long hair and effeminate ways, and he
wondered why you could have the big car while he had to settle for the
truck. And, naturally, the more he thought on it, the madder he got.
So he caught up with you and held a little duel on the highway. Couldn’t
of hurt his old wreck. You were the only one with something fancy to
lose.”
“Why would I tell you it was an Automover? Why would I make up an
elaborate story about a cross-country pursuit?” Doyle asked, barely
able to control his anger but painfully aware that any expression of it
would land him in jail, or worse.
“That’s easy.”
“I’d like to hear it.”
Ackridge stood up and pushed his chair back, walked over and stood by
the flag, his hands clasped behind his back. “You figured that I might
not go after a local boy, that I’d favor one of ours over someone like
you. So you made up this other thing to get me onto the case.
Once I’d gone on record, started a full investigation, I couldn’t have
backed out of it so easily when I learned the real story.”
“That is far-fetched,” Doyle said. “And you know it.”
“Sounds reasonable to me.”
Alex got to his feet, his damp hands fisted at his sides. Once it had
been easy for him to take this kind of abuse and crawl away without
another thought. But now, with the changes that had taken place in him
during the last couple of days, excessive humility was not his best
suit. “Then you aren’t going to help us?”
Ackridge looked at him with real hatred now. For the first time there
was genuine malice in his voice. “I’m not a man you can call a pig one
day-then run to for help the next.”
“I’ve never called any policeman a pig,” Alex said.
But the cop was not listening. He appeared to be looking straight
through Doyle when he said, “For fifteen years or better, this country’s
been like a sick man. It’s been absolutely delirious, staggering around