Rusty put a finger to his lips and went, “Shhhhh.”
I gave him the finger.
He smirked.
After that, I kept my mouth shut.
Our shoes were almost silent on the dirt road except for sometimes when one of us stepped on a twig. Rusty was breathing fairly hard. Every so often, he muttered stuff under his breath.
A very quiet tune seemed to be coming from Slim. “De dum, de doo, de do-doo....” It blended in with the sounds all around us of buzzing flies and mosquitos and bees, bird tweets, and the endless flutters and rustling scurries of unseen creatures. “De-dum, de do, de doo.”
Rusty made no attempt to shush her.
But suddenly he said, “Wait up.”
Slim halted.
When we caught up to her, Rusty said in a hushed voice, “I gotta take a leak.”
Slim nodded. “Pick a tree,” she said.
He glanced from Slim to me. “Don’t go anywhere, okay?” “We’ll stay right here,” she told him.
I nodded.
“Okay,” he said. “I’ll be back in a minute.” He stepped off the dirt road and made his way into the trees.
“Do you have to go?” Slim asked me.
“Nah.”
“Me neither.” She pursed her lips and blew softly through them. Then she said, “Sure is hot in here.”
“Yeah,” I muttered. I was broiled and drenched and itchy, my clothes sticking to me.
Slim’s short blond hair was matted down in coils against her scalp and forehead. Sweat ran down her face. As I watched, a drip gathered at the tip of her nose and fell. Her white T-shirt was clinging to her skin and I could see through it.
“This vampire better be worth it,” she said.
“Too bad we won’t get to see her.”
Slim gave me half a smile. “If she’s in her casket, we’ll have to bust her out of it. We’re not gonna put ourselves through all this and not get a look at her.”
“I don’t know,” I said.
“Don’t know what?” she asked, and peeled her T-shirt off. In spite of her bikini top, she seemed to be mostly bare skin from the waist up. She wadded her T-shirt and mopped the sweat off her face.
I looked the other way.
“What don’t you know?” she asked.
For a moment, I wasn’t sure what we’d been talking about. Then I remembered. I said, “She isn’t gonna be by herself. I don’t think so, anyway.”
“You’re probably right.” Lowering the shirt away from her face, she smiled and said, “She needs casket-handlers.”
“Right.”
“Probably has a whole crew.” She wiped her chest, her arms.
“And they might not be model citizens,” I said.
Laughing softly, she lowered her head and began to wipe the sweat off her belly and sides. I sneaked a glance at her breasts. The thin pouches of her bikini top were stretched smooth with them. Around the edges of the fabric, I glimpsed pale slopes of skin.
“We’ll have to be careful,” I said.
“Yeah. If they look really scurvy, we’d better forget the whole thing.”
Hearing footsteps, we both turned our heads and saw Rusty trudging toward us.
Slim continued to rub at herself with the balled shirt. I wanted her to put it back on, but I didn’t say anything.
“All set,” Rusty said. I saw him check her out. “What’s going on?”
“Nothing much,” Slim told him. “Just waiting for you.”
“We’re thinking we’ll have to be really careful,” I explained. “Valeria’s gonna have...”
“Casket keepers,” Slim threw in.
Rusty smiled and nodded.
“No telling how many people might be with the show,” I said.
“And it’s likely a scumrvy lot,” added Slim with a bit of Long John Silver in her voice.
“They go around with a traveling vampire show,” Rusty said, “they’ve gotta be at least a little strange.”
“And maybe dangerous,” I said.
Rusty suddenly frowned. “You guys aren’t gonna chicken out, are you?” Before either of us had a chance to answer, he said, “Cause I’m going irregardless.”
“Irregardless ain’t a word, Einstein,” Slim told him.
“Is too.”
She wasn’t one to argue. She just gave him a funny smile, then pulled her T-shirt on. “Let’s go.”
After that, none of us said anything. We weren’t that far from Janks Field, so I think we were starting to get more nervous.