"Yes. On the Ohio, about a hundred and fifty miles downriver from
Cincinnati."
"What time is it?" Matt asked Captain Bascom.
The captain glanced at his watch. "Twenty-three after ten. We've got
time."
"Mark this road," Matt warned them. "We want to be able to find our way
back."
"I've been making a map in my notebook," Lynn informed him.
"Good girl."
He turned into the highway and speeded up. There were no cars anywhere,
except one in the ditch with a grinning skeleton in the front seat.
The houses were closer and after a few miles they passed through a
small town. The sign at the edge of town read:
OKALONA
POP. 766
SPEED LIMIT 20 MILES PER HOUR
There was no one in the streets, no one in the houses. They passed a
grocery store through whose broken glass show windows they could see
shelves and shelves of canned goods. The telephone poles were festooned
with wires like tangled broken cobwebs.
Matt suddenly slammed on the brakes. The car squealed to a stop before
a hardware store.
"What's wrong?" Lynn cried.
"Nothing. It just occurred to me that an ax might be a handy thing to
have along." He jumped out of the car and went through the gaping door.
The store inside was thick with dust and cobwebs. Leaves had eddied
across the floor from a broken show window. He found the axes, selected
a medium-sized, double-bitted one, scooped up three more and returned
to the car.
Just before he climbed back inside, he glanced up and saw the buzzards.
There must have been a hundred of them, sweeping in lazy spirals like
grotesque black gliders.
"Turkey buzzards!"