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.'He's already been.He's already got what he needs.We'll have to hurry.'Kevin was already starting for the edge of the sidewalk, meaning to cut across the town square to LaVerdiere's.Mr Delevan reached out and grabbed him like a conductor grabbing a fellow he's caught trying to sneak aboard atrain without a ticket.'Kevin, what are you talking about?'And then Kevin actually said it: looked at him and said it.'It's coming, Dad.Please.It's my life.' He looked at hisfather, pleading with his pallid face and his fey, floating eyes.'The dog is coming.It won't do any good to justbreak in and take the camera.It's gone way past that now.Please don't stop me.Please don't wake me up.It's mylife.'Mr Delevan made one last great effort not to give in to this creeping craziness.and then succumbed.'Come on,' he said, hooking his hand around his son's elbow and almost dragging him into the square.'Whateverfile:///E|/Funny%20&%20Weird%20Shit/75%20-%20.ing%20-%20A%20note%20On%20The%20sun%20Dog.HTM (102 of 119)7/28/2005 9:22:39 PM The Sun Dogit is, let's get it done.' He paused.'Do we have enough time?''I'm not sure,' Kevin said, and then, reluctantly: 'I don't think so.'CHAPTER 17Pop waited behind the board fence, looking at the Delevans through a knothole.He had put his tobacco in hisback pocket so that his hands would be free to clench and unclench, clench and unclench.You're on my property, his mind whispered at them, and if his mind had had the power to kill, he would havereached out with it and struck them both dead.You're on my property, goddammit, you're on my property!What he ought to do was go get old John Law and bring him down on their fancy Castle View heads.That waswhat he ought to do.And he would have done it, too, right then, if they hadn't been standing over the wreckageof the camera the boy himself had supposedly destroyed with Pop's blessing two weeks ago.He thought maybehe would have tried to bullshit his way through anyway, but he knew how they felt about him in this town.Pangborn, Keeton, all the rest of them.Trash.That's what they thought of him.Trash.Until they got their asses in a crack and needed a fast loan and the sun was down, that was.Clench, unclench.Clench, unclench.They were talking, but Pop didn't bother listening to what they were saying.His mind was a fuming forge.Nowthe litany had become: They're on my goddam property and I can't do a thing about it! They're on my goddamproperty and I can't do a thing about It! Goddam them! Goddam them!At last they left.When he heard the rusty screech of the gate in the alley, Pop used his key on the one in theboard fence.He slipped through and ran across the yard to his back door - ran with an unsettling fleetness for aman of seventy, with one hand clapped firmly against his upper right leg, as if, fleet or not, he was fighting a badrheumatism pain there.In fact, Pop was feeling no pain at all.He didn't want either his keys or the change in hispurse jingling, that was all.In case the Delevans were still there, lurking just beyond where he could see.Popwouldn't have been surprised if they were doing just that.When you were dealing with skunks, you expectedthem to get up to stinking didos.He slipped his keys out of his pocket.Now they rattled, and although the sound was muted, it seemed very loudto him.He cut his eyes to the left for a moment, sure he would see the brat's staring sheep's face.Pop's mouthwas set in a hard, strained grin of fear.There was no one there.Yet, anyway.He found the right key, slipped it into the lock, and went in.He was careful not to open the door to the shed toowide, because the hinges picked up a squeal when you exercised them too much.Inside, he turned the thumb-bolt with a savage twist and then went into the Emporium Galorium.He was morefile:///E|/Funny%20&%20Weird%20Shit/75%20-%20.ing%20-%20A%20note%20On%20The%20sun%20Dog.HTM (103 of 119)7/28/2005 9:22:39 PM The Sun Dogthan at home in these shadows.He could have negotiated the narrow, junk-lined corridors in his sleep.had, infact, although that, like a good many other things, had slipped his mind for the time being.There was a dirty little side window near the front of the store that looked out upon the narrow alleyway theDelevans had used to trespass their way into his backyard.It also gave a sharply angled view on the sidewalk andpart of the town common.Pop slipped up to this window between piles of useless, valueless magazines that breathed their dusty yellowmuseum scent into the dark air.He looked out into the alley and saw it, was empty.He looked to the right andsaw the Delevans, wavery as fish in an aquarium through this dirty, flawed glass, crossing the common justbelow the bandstand.He didn't watch them out of sight in this window or go to the front windows to get a betterangle on them.He guessed they were going over to LaVerdiere's, and since they had already been here, theywould be asking about him.What could the little counter-slut tell them? That he had been and gone.Anythingelse?Only that he had bought two pouches of tobacco.Pop smiled.That wasn't likely to hang him.He found a brown bag, went out back, started for the chopping block, considered, then went to the gate in thealleyway instead.Careless once didn't mean a body had to be careless again.After the gate was locked, he took his bag to the chopping block and picked up the pieces of shattered Polaroidcamera.He worked as fast as he could, but he took time to be thorough.He picked up everything but little shards and splinters that could be seen as no more than anonymous litter.APolice Lab investigating unit would probably be able to ID some of the stuff left around; Pop had seen TV crimeshows (when he wasn't watching X-rated movies on his VCR, that was) where those scientific fellows went overthe scene of a crime with little brushes and vacuums and even pairs of tweezers, putting things in little plasticbags, but the Castle Rock Sheriffs Department didn't have one of those units.And Pop doubted if SheriffPangborn could talk the State Police into sending their crime wagon, even if Pangborn himself could bepersuaded to make the effort - not for what was no more than a case of camera theft, and that was all theDelevans could accuse him of without sounding crazy.Once he had policed the area, he went back inside,unlocked his 'special' drawer, and deposited the brown bag inside.He relocked the drawer and put his keys backin his pocket.That was all right, then.He knew all about search warrants, too
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