The man in the winterized jeep unzipped a window, leaned out and
yelled: "The burgess around here?"
The four soaked men working around the tow truck didn't even answer.
One of them gestured down the road with an arm and they went back to
trying to get a line to a car that had gone off the road. It was now
roof-deep in the torrent that had once been a drainage ditch, and up to
five minutes ago it had looked as though something was moving behind
the windshield.
The man in the jeep spat into the rain and drove on. He finally found
the burgess's car parked with its lights on, along with a couple of
others, a few yards from the edge of the river. That was crazy, he
thought, why didn't they park them up on the highway, twenty-five feet
above the water? Then he remembered that he was on the highway.
"Man wants you, Henry."
The burgess turned around to face his chief of police. "If it's that
Artie Chesbro again, tell him to take his goddamn car and--"
"No. Lloyd Eisele--don't know if you know him, he's got a dairy farm up
in the hills."
"Then why didn't he have sense enough to stay there?"
"His boy's a radio ham, Henry. He's got a message for you."