Mountain Madness. Jimmy Dale Taylor

to know. “That don’t make sense.”

      Seth had to admit that Hank was right. He opened his door and said, “I’ll danged sure find out in a hurry. If it’s him, I’ll see that the boss hears about it. Ain’t no excuse for sleepin’ on the job.”

      Seth hurried to the truck door and yanked it open. Mike raised up for a better look. Larry was rubbing sleep from his eyes when a loud noise from within the water truck’s cab shattered the morning stillness.

      The commotion was caused by someone screaming and lunging at Seth. He slammed the door shut and jumped back to avoid being attacked by whatever had taken refuge in the truck. By now everybody was wide awake. Whatever or whoever was behind that truck door was obviously scared to death.

      During those brief moments, Terrie wasn’t the only one who was on the edge of panic. First Terrie screamed at the suddenness of the door opening. But then she screamed even louder because the man who had first looked in and then slammed the door shut looked like Jay.

      Before the four men could make their escape from this wild woman, the truck door flew open again. Terrie rushed out and cried in desperation, “Wait! Don’t go! Please, please don’t leave me. I thought. . . I thought you were someone else. Please don’t leave me here alone. If you do, they’ll kill me.”

      In her panic she grabbed Seth by the arm. He pulled away as though she were crazy.

      She turned to Hank and clutched his arm, determined that he would not leave without her. The two young men in the back seat were watching wide-eyed. Terrie had their undivided attention.

      “Why don’t you stay here and wait on the boss to come along,” Hank suggested to her. She was jabbering away and he had no idea of what she was jabbering about. “He’ll get it all straightened out and I expect he’ll take you wherever you want to go.”

      “No!” Terrie cried. “I’m not about to stay here alone. Please don’t go!”

      “We can’t just leave her here,” Seth said. “Can’t you see she’s scared to death?”

      “Go ahead and put her in the crummy then,” Hank said, not at all happy with this unhappy beginning of their work day. He glared at the young men. “Now you young bucks keep your hands to yourself. Throw her suitcases in the back. She can wait on Frank up at the job.”

      Mike and Larry watched all this silently from the back seat. From the smiles on their faces one could surmise that neither was sorely disappointed when Terrie was told to climb in back. The arrangement suited them just fine.

      Heading south around sharp turns and through mountain passes, the Olds performed like a thoroughbred. Like a horse going to its home barn. Jimmy didn’t pamper the car as Jay had. No more checking the oil every hour or two. No more STP. Try to make it with what gas he had in the tank. All that was in his mind was getting away.

      Sunup now. He was steadily increasing the distance between himself and his nightmare. Jay was surely dead, but Jimmy didn’t want to think about the man. Even so, he found it difficult to forget.

      Visions cramped his muddled mind. Visions of Jay lying face down beside the car. How he had looked rolling him over and pulling him away. He’d pulled like a dead man. If so, whose fault was it? Wasn’t it Jay who had reached for his gun and come up firing?

      Damn fool!

      Where was Terrie now? Over and over in Jimmy’s mind he played out his actions. His lack of choice. He’d done it to save the girl from being raped by some old son of a bitch who had gonorrhea. Worse yet, they both might have been killed and buried on that damned mountain!

      Did she have any idea about the fate that might have awaited her? Had Jay been serious about killing little Terrie? About killing them both? Jimmy felt as though the man would surely have been capable of killing. And now he was surely dead.