Later, Kirwan would think about how it started, when he might have stopped it. What he could have done differently. But by then it didn’t matter.
He’d just crossed the Georgia-Florida line on I-95, running south, the lights of Jacksonville in the far distance ahead. Two a.m. and his eyes watery, his legs jumpy. The Volvo had nearly 300,000 miles on it, and its suspension was shot. Every pothole or patch of uneven blacktop jolted his spine.
Still, he felt himself drifting, eyelids heavy. He’d need to sleep soon but wanted to make it as far south as he could. The meeting at Marco Landscaping, to show them the new brick samples, was at ten a.m., and New Smyrna Beach was still about a hundred miles away. He’d give it another hour on the road, then find a motel.
He thought of Lois Pettimore, Marco’s accountant. She’d be at the meeting. The same perfume as always, her blouse open one button too deep, with a glimpse of black lace beneath. Sometimes in their office he’d notice her watching him, but he never knew how to respond. He’d look away, his face flushed, then flee as soon as he had their order sheets and contracts.
At the last meeting, two weeks ago, she’d handed him an invoice, let her nails brush the back of his wrist. He’d seen then that her wedding band was gone, only a faint white line left where it had been. He wondered if the imminent divorce she always managed to bring up in conversation had gone through.
His right front tire crossed onto the shoulder, hit gravel. The noise and vibration snapped him awake. He sat up straighter and steered back into his lane, the momentary burst of adrenaline clearing his mind. That was stupid, he thought, dangerous. Stay alert.
Powering down the window to let in the night air, he caught the rotten-egg-and-sulfur smell of the nearby swamp. Trees and wetlands on both sides of the highway here. Even at this hour, the air was warmer than when he’d stopped in Roanoke for dinner eight hours ago.
A car flew by in the far left lane, a blur of taillights as it passed. The speed limit for this stretch of interstate was seventy, and Kirwan kept the Volvo at a safe sixty-five, let the other vehicles pass him.
He turned on the radio, scanned stations. Somewhere south of Charleston, the all-news station he’d been listening to had dissolved into static. Now he got only snatches of rap, country music, preachers. Nothing coming in strong. Get that satellite radio set up, he thought. Do yourself a favor. Or at least get the CD player fixed.
He drove a thousand miles a week, and sometimes during thunderstorms he would pick up faraway AM stations, the signal bouncing off the clouds. Once, near Atlanta, he’d gotten a talk station out of Fort Wayne, Indiana, crystal-clear for a solid half hour before the storm passed.
No such luck tonight. More static; then, near the end of the dial, someone speaking rapid French. A Haitian station out of Miami. He switched over to FM, finally got a country tune he recognized. He left it there, settled back.
Sometimes at night, when the danger of falling asleep at the wheel was strongest, when he felt himself starting to dream, he’d turn off the headlights, the road going black in front of him. The jolt of adrenaline and panic that followed would wake him up, keep him going for another half hour. He’d leave the lights off for only a few seconds, but it was enough.
There was a guardrail on the right now, and the lane seemed to narrow. He signaled, even though there were no other cars around, started to move into the near left lane, heard the sharp bleat of a horn.
He jerked the Volvo back into the right lane, saw the single headlight to his left. A motorcycle had come out of the blind spot there. Had he missed it in the rearview? Had he even checked the mirror before changing lanes? He wasn’t sure.
He turned off the radio, wanted to call out Sorry, realized how stupid that would sound. He slowed, waited for the motorcycle to pass. Instead it came abreast of him, hung there. He could hear the rider shouting. Kirwan kept his eyes forward. He couldn’t make out the words, but his face grew hot.
He slowed to fifty-five, but the bike stayed with him. He looked then. It was a big Harley with extended front forks, black all around, dual silver exhausts. The rider had a beard and mustache, wore a leather jacket and jeans with a wallet chain. No helmet.
Kirwan faced front again. Don’t look. It’ll just aggravate the situation.
The biker was still shouting. Kirwan looked in the rearview, hoping to see a vehicle coming up from behind that would force the bike to speed up or pass him. Only darkness back there. They were alone on the road.
The yelling stopped. He chanced a look, saw the biker’s right hand leave the throttle and come up, middle finger extended. Kirwan shook his head, faced front again. Just go, he thought. I’m sorry about what happened, but it’s over now. Just go.
The bike surged past him, engine growling, went up two car lengths, and swept into his lane. His headlights lit the back of it, the pale-gray Georgia plate, and then the bike slowed and the Volvo was almost on top of it. Kirwan hit the brake, and the Volvo slewed to the right, the front fender inches from the guardrail. The boxed samples in the rear cargo area slid across the floor, bumped into the wall. He straightened the wheel, got centered in the lane once more. The biker twisted around in the headlights, grinning, gave him the finger again, then sped up.
Kirwan felt a rush of anger. Without thinking, he hit the gas, closed the space between them. The motorcycle glided easily back into the left lane, the rider gesturing to Kirwan as if inviting him to pass. When he didn’t, the rider looked at him, grinned, and shrugged. A tractor-trailer came up in the far left lane, rumbled past them, disappeared over the rise ahead.
Kirwan knew this part of 95—no exits for at least another few miles. He could pull over, hope the biker kept going, but there wasn’t much shoulder here. It would be dangerous to stop.
The biker slowed until they were even again, then pointed at him. Kirwan tried to ignore him, kept the speedometer at sixty. It was no use speeding up or slowing down. The motorcycle would stay with him. He just had to wait until the biker lost interest, sped off.
More shouting. He started to power up the window, saw the motorcycle ease ahead of him. The biker’s right arm flashed out, and something clicked against the windshield, flew off. Kirwan jerked his head back, saw the tiny chip in the glass. A coin, maybe. Something too small to do much damage, but enough to mark the glass, get his attention. The bike slowed, and they were side by side again. Kirwan turned to look at him then and saw the gun.
It was a dark automatic. The biker pointed it at him through the half-open window, not shouting now. The gun was steady.
Kirwan stood on the brake. The Volvo’s tires screamed, and its rear end slid to the left, the wagon going into a skid. He panicked, fought the wheel, and pumped the brake, trying to remember what he’d learned—turn in the direction of the skid. Don’t lock the brakes. The front end of the wagon swung from right to left and back again, headlights illuminating the guardrail, the trees beyond, the roadway, then the guardrail again. The sample boxes thudded into the back of the rear seat.
He steered onto the shoulder, gravel rattling against the undercarriage. He braked steadily, avoiding the guardrail, and the wagon came to a stop, bucked forward slightly, settled back, and was still.
A cloud of dust rose in his headlights. He jammed the console gearshift into park, gripped the wheel, tried to slow his breathing. His knuckles were white.
When the dust cleared, he saw the motorcycle. It had pulled onto the shoulder three car lengths ahead. The rider was looking back at him.
Kirwan felt the sharp stab of fear. He waited for the rider to get off, come back toward him, the gun out. For a moment, crazily, he considered shifting back into drive, hitting the gas, plowing into the bike. Decided that’s what he would do if the rider came at him with the gun. Could he do that? Run a man over, maybe kill him?
But the biker stayed where he was, boots on the gravel, balancing the bike under him. No sign of the gun. Kirwan wondered if he’d imagined it, if his fear and the night had colluded to make him see something that wasn’t there. Or had the gun just gone back into wherever he’d pulled it from? Maybe the biker had brought it out only to scare him, make him overreact and oversteer, wreck the Volvo on his own.
The biker watched him as if waiting to see what he would do. Kirwan didn’t move, kept his hands tight on the wheel. The biker grinned, faced forward again. He steered back onto the roadway, gave the Harley gas. His taillights climbed the rise and vanished.
Breathe, Kirwan told himself, breathe. His neck and shoulders were rigid. He could feel a vessel throb in his left temple. What now? Get off at the next exit, find a town, a police station, report what happened? Even if he did, he had no proof except the chip in the windshield, which could have come from a small rock, a piece of gravel. And the Harley had been moving fast. They’d never catch up with the biker, and what if they did? Down here, like as not, the gun would be legal—if there even was a gun. It would be Kirwan’s word against his. No witnesses.
His cell phone was in the console cup holder. He could call 911, give a description of the biker, have the dispatcher alert the highway patrol. But he’d already forgotten the plate number. A G, maybe an X after that, but that was all he had. And calling it in might mean more questions, a report, hours spent in a station house or trooper barracks. And if they caught the biker, Kirwan would have to face him again, the man who’d pointed a gun at him, nearly run him off the road.
Cars passed. When his breathing was back to normal, he powered the window shut, put on his blinker. He shifted into drive, waited until the road was clear, then steered into the lane, gave the Volvo gas.
He would have to get the alignment checked, the tires as well. The Volvo had lost its grip on the road for a moment, and that had frightened him almost as much as the gun—the sense of powerlessness, of being out of control. He’d find a garage in New Smyrna tomorrow, right after the meeting; he wouldn’t put it off. Get the windshield fixed too, before the chip turned into a crack.
Back up to sixty, keeping it steady there. Any cars that came up behind would pass him, give him space. And with every minute the biker would be farther ahead, farther away from him. Kirwan breathed in deep, then exhaled. He turned the radio back on, the same country station.
After a while he realized he had to urinate. He tried to ignore it at first, but the pressure in his bladder grew. He didn’t want to stop, wanted to keep going, make up the time he’d lost. But now there was a twinge of pain, and he knew he couldn’t wait until he found a motel.
There were exits ahead now, motels and mammoth gas stations right off the roadway, their signs raised on poles so they’d be seen from a distance. He took the exit for I-10. At the end of the ramp, signs pointed left and right, logos showing what gas and food were available in either direction, how far they were. It made no difference. The restaurants would be mostly fast-food joints, and some of them would be closed at this hour. If nothing else, he’d top off the tank at a gas station, find a restroom.
He turned right, the road here leading away from the highway. A mile ahead he saw the lights of a truck stop and diner, a Days Inn adjoining them. He thought about checking in, but it was too early still, and he was wired, wouldn’t sleep. He decided to keep driving for a bit longer before he found a place to stay. Then a quick breakfast in the morning and on to New Smyrna. He thought of Lois, her perfume.
He signaled, even though there was no one behind him, pulled into the diner lot. And there, parked alongside an idling tractor-trailer, was the Harley. Kirwan felt his stomach tighten, and for a moment he thought his bladder would let go. He pulled the Volvo beneath a tree on the edge of the lot, out of the light wash from the big pole lamps, killed the engine and headlights.
Half a dozen cars here, and just the one tractor-trailer. Through the big diner windows he could see people sitting at booths, two men at the counter beyond. No sign of the biker.
Was it the same motorcycle? He looked at it again, unsure now. It seemed to be black, like the other one, but that might be a trick of the light. It had the same extended front end, and he could see the Harley insignia on the gas tank, so that much was the same. But he couldn’t be sure.
Turn around. Get back on the road, then onto the highway. Find another diner or truck stop, another bathroom. Drive away.
Inside the diner, a door swung open, gave a glimpse of a white-tiled hallway, where the restrooms and trucker showers would be. The biker stepped out, went to the counter. He looked older in the bright interior lights, gray in his hair and beard. He spoke to the waitress there, his back to the window.
When he came out the front door, he was carrying a Styrofoam cup of coffee. He spit on the ground, looked around the lot.
Kirwan slid lower in his seat. The biker glanced in his direction, then away. He set the cup atop a metal trash can, put both hands on the small of his back and stretched, then reached inside the jacket. He’s going for the gun.
The hand came out with a pack of cigarettes. Kirwan wondered again if the gun had been his imagination, his fatigue, his fear.
The biker lit the cigarette with a plastic lighter, put the pack away, blew out smoke. He was standing in the direct light fall from the windows now, and Kirwan could see the glint of a diamond stud in his right ear. He hadn’t noticed that before. Was it even the same man?
The biker went over to the Harley, opened the right saddlebag. He crouched, looked inside, moved something around, fastened the flap again. He retrieved his coffee, walked around the bike as if checking for damage, the cup in his left hand.
He looked out at the road for a while, smoking and drinking coffee, then flicked the cigarette away. It landed sparking on the blacktop. Straddling the bike, he took a last pull at the cup, pitched it toward the trash can. It fell short, splashed on the sidewalk, sprayed coffee on the door of an SUV parked there. Then he rose in the seat, came down hard, kick-started the engine. It roared into life. The people inside the diner looked out. He sat back, revved the engine, still in neutral, as if enjoying the attention. The heavy throb of the exhaust seemed to fill the night.
He wheeled the Harley around toward the road. Would he go left, back to the lights of I-95? Or right and farther west into unbroken darkness? In that direction, I-10 would eventually take him to Tallahassee, Kirwan knew, but there was a lot of nothing between here and there, mostly sugarcane and swamp.
Kirwan started his engine. Drive away, he thought once more. You’ll never see him again. Your business, your life, is down the road. Places you need to be, people to see. Commitments and responsibilities.
Still, a sourness burned in his stomach. The biker had laughed about what he’d done, and now he was riding off as if nothing had happened. He’d laugh again when he told the story later of how he’d put the fear of death into a middle-aged man in a station wagon.
The Harley pulled out of the lot, back tire spraying gravel. He turned right, as Kirwan had somehow known he would.
Headlights off, Kirwan followed.
No lights on this stretch of road, no moon above, but the Harley was easy to follow. Twice cars coming in the opposite direction flashed their high beams at Kirwan, letting him know his lights were off. But the biker didn’t seem to notice. The Harley kept at a steady speed, didn’t try to race ahead, lose him. He doesn’t know I’m here.
He powered down the window, could hear the deep growl of the Harley’s engine. The swamp smell was strong, and a low mist hung over the roadway, was swept under the front tires as he drove. The urge to urinate was gone.
Houses started to pop up, most of them dark. Concrete and stucco, bare yards. The road began to run parallel to a canal, the Harley’s headlamp reflected in the water.
Past the houses and into tall sugarcane now. In the Harley’s headlamp, Kirwan caught glimpses of dirt roads that ran off the highway. The Harley slowed, as if the rider was watching for an upcoming turn. Kirwan slowed with it. He’s almost there, wherever he’s going. You’ll lose him. And maybe that’s a good thing.
An intersection ahead, with a blinking yellow light in all four directions. The Harley blew through it without slowing. Kirwan did the same. The road began to curve gradually to the right. Ahead, lit by a single pole light, a concrete bridge spanned the canal.
Pull over. Let him go. Put your headlights on, turn around. You’re in the middle of nowhere, and you’re losing time. Don’t be stupid.
The Harley slowed, rider and machine leaning to the right as they followed the curve of the road. Kirwan floored the gas pedal.
The Volvo leaped forward, faster than he’d expected, closed on the Harley in an instant. The bike had almost reached the bridge when the rider shifted in his seat, looked back, saw him for the first time. Kirwan hit the headlights, gave him the brights, barely thirty feet between them.
The biker was still turned in his seat when the Harley reached the bridge. Kirwan saw it as if in slow motion—the biker looking forward at the last moment, the bike coming in too sharp, the angle wrong. Then the front tire hit the abutment and the rider was catapulted into the darkness, the bike somersaulting after him, end over end, off the bridge and onto the ground below.
Kirwan’s foot moved from gas pedal to brake, stomped down hard. The Volvo shimmied as it had before, slewed to the right, the samples thumping into the seatback. The tires squealed, dug in, and the Volvo came to a shuddering stop just short of the bridge.
He reversed onto the shoulder, shifted into park, and listened. All he could hear over his engine noise was crickets. He switched on the hazards. Didn’t want another car to come speeding along, rear-end him in the darkness.
He got out, left the door ajar. There were bits of metal and broken glass on the bridge, a single skid mark. He walked up the shoulder, hazards clicking behind him, the headlights throwing his shadow long on the pavement.
At the bridge, he looked down. The ground sloped steeply to the edge of the canal. The bike was about fifteen feet away, had ripped a hole through the foliage. The rear tire was spinning slowly. From somewhere in the darkness came a moan.
He went back to the car, opened the glove box, took out the plastic flashlight, looked at the phone on the console.
Back at the bridge, he switched on the flashlight. The bright narrow beam leaped out, starkly lit the grass below. Torn-up earth down there. The bike had tumbled at least once before coming to rest in the trees.
He aimed the light toward it. It lay on its right side, the forks bent back and twisted, the front tire gone. The left saddlebag had been thrown open and its contents—clothes mostly—littered the grass. The air smelled of gasoline.
The moaning again. He picked his way carefully down the slope, shoes sinking in the damp earth. Playing the light along the edge of the canal, he followed the noise.
The biker lay on a wide flat stone below the bridge. He was on his left side, and there was blood on his face. Kirwan walked toward him, watching where he put his feet, not wanting to slip and fall.
The biker’s right boot was scraping uselessly against the stone. His left boot was missing, and the leg there was bent at a right angle away from his body. He’d dragged himself onto the rock, left a smear of dark blood and mud on the stone to mark his passage.
Kirwan shone the light in his face. The biker raised his right hand, let it fall. His left arm was trapped beneath him.
The gun. Watch for the gun.
He came closer. The biker was hyperventilating like a wounded animal, chest rising and falling. His left eye was swollen shut. He raised his arm again, weakly.
He doesn’t recognize me. Doesn’t know what happened.
Kirwan came closer, shone the light up and down the biker’s body, then around it. No gun.
“Help . . . help me.” The voice was a hoarse whisper. In the darkness, something splashed in the canal, swam away.
Kirwan squatted. “You don’t know who I am, do you?”
The biker tried to shift onto his back, gasped.
“Remember me?” Kirwan said.
He turned the flashlight toward himself, holding it low so the biker could see his face. The good eye narrowed into a squint. He shook his head.
A big leather wallet was on the ground a few feet away, had come free from its chain. Kirwan tucked the flashlight in his armpit, picked up the wallet, unsnapped and opened it. In one pocket were three hundred-dollar bills and six twenties. In another was a laminated Georgia driver’s license with the biker’s picture. His name was Miles Hanson, and he was sixty-one years old.
Hanson coughed, and Kirwan looked back at him. The biker raised his head, spit a blot of blood onto the stone. “Keep it, man . . . it’s all yours. Just help me.” The voice still weak.
Kirwan closed the wallet, set it on a rock.
“Hurry up, man. I think I got something broken inside.”
“My cell phone’s in the car. I’ll call 911.”
He started up the slope, then stopped, looked back down. Hanson was watching him. He saw the glimmer of the diamond stud, remembered the grin, the middle finger, the chip in the windshield.
He went back down the slope, set the flashlight in the grass.
“What are you doing?” Hanson said.
Kirwan crouched, gripped the back of the man’s leather jacket with both hands. Hanson swatted at him with his good arm, but there was nothing behind it. Kirwan took a breath, straightened up so as not to pull a muscle, then jerked the jacket up, pushed, and tumbled Hanson face-first into the canal.
Kirwan couldn’t tell how deep the water was. Hanson splashed once, went under. He floundered there, got his head above the surface for a moment, gulped air, then went under again.
Kirwan found a stone the size of a basketball beside the canal, lifted it high, then dropped it into the water where he’d last seen Hanson’s head. Water spattered his pants.
He dusted off his hands, picked up the flashlight, and shone it down into the water. Hanson was a shadow just below the surface, not moving. A dark red cloud bloomed in the stagnant water, then dissipated.
He stood there for a while, watching to make sure there were no bubbles. Then he went back to where he’d dropped the wallet, took out the bills, and folded them into his shirt pocket. He kicked the wallet into the canal, then stepped out onto the flat rock, unzipped, and urinated into the water, a long stream that caught the light from the bridge, the pressure in his bladder finally easing.
When he was done, he zipped up, walked back to where the bike lay. It ticked as it cooled in the night air. Strewn on the grass were a pair of jeans, dark T-shirts, a sleeveless denim jacket. An insignia on the back read WHISKEY JOKERS DAYTONA BEACH above an embroidered patch of a diving eagle, claws out.
He reached into the open saddlebag, rooted deeper through more clothes. And there, at the bottom of the bag in a flat pancake holster, was the gun.
He drew it out, looked at it. At some point, maybe at the diner, Hanson must have holstered it in the saddlebag. But this gun was a revolver, and the one he’d seen had been an automatic. Or had it? Was this a second gun?
He went around to the other side of the bike, stepping over torn foliage. Using a pair of T-shirts to protect his hands, he took hold of the frame. It was still warm. He grunted, lifted, vines pulling at the ruined front end. The bike rose and then fell on its other side. The gasoline smell grew stronger.
He got the flashlight, opened the other saddlebag. More clothes, a full carton of cigarettes—Marlboro Reds—and a lidded cardboard box about half the size of a hardback book. No gun.
He opened the box, saw tissue paper. He peeled it back and in the middle was a cheap cloth doll—a cartoonish Mexican with a sombrero and poncho playing guitar, his floppy hands sewn to the cloth instrument.
Was this what he’d been checking in the saddlebag? A gift for a child? Then Kirwan squeezed the doll, felt the unyielding lump inside.
He turned it over, lifted the cloth flap of the poncho. Stitches ran up the back of the doll, thick ones, a darker color than the material. He tucked the flashlight under his arm again, pulled at the stitches until they were loose. The back of the doll came apart at the seam, revealing more tissue paper packed around a metal cigar tube. He unscrewed the top of the tube and pulled out a tightly rolled plastic bag. He poked a finger in, teased out part of the clear bag. Inside was a thick off-white powder, caked and compressed.
He pushed it back into the tube, screwed on the top. He put the tube in his pants pocket and tossed the doll out into the water.
He picked up the holstered gun, walked back up the slope to the Volvo, the road still empty in both directions. The yellow light blinked in the distance. The Volvo’s hazards clicked, insects flittering in the headlights. A breeze came through, moved the sugarcane on the other side of the road.
He opened the Volvo’s tailgate, pushed aside the sample boxes to get at the spare-tire compartment. He lifted the panel, pried up the spare, and put the tube and gun under it, then let the tire drop back into place. He closed the panel, shut the tailgate.
Back behind the wheel, he put away the flashlight, shut the glove box, gave a last look at the cell phone.
He reversed onto the road, swung a U-turn, headed back the way he’d come. He was calm inside, centered, for the first time that night. At the intersection, he turned the radio back on.
After a while he began to feel sleepy again, a pleasant drifting. He looked at his watch. If he kept going, he could push through to New Smyrna by three-thirty or so, find a motel, get five or six hours’ sleep before the meeting. It would be enough. Maybe he’d ask Lois out to dinner that night, divorce or no.
He had two free days after that. He could stay down there, figure out what exactly was in that tube, what it might be worth. There didn’t seem to be much of it, whatever it was. Maybe it was just a sample for some larger deal to be made later.
Rain began to spot the windshield, thick heavy drops. He turned on the wipers. They thumped slowly, and on their second arc, he saw that the chip in the windshield was gone. He touched a thumb to where it had been. Nothing there now, the glass unblemished. One less thing to take care of, at least.
He was humming along to the music by the time he reached the on-ramp for 95. What had happened had happened. There was no going back. Not now, not ever. The road and the night were his.