5

“Jake? Are you okay?”

“Fine. You?”

“I got bumped by the door and I’ll probably have a bruise on my shoulder, but otherwise, yes. If we’d hit that post, I probably wouldn’t have been. You, either. Who was the note for?”

“Whoever tows the Chevy.” And I hoped to God Mr. Whoever would do as the note asked.

“We’ll worry about that part when we come back.”

If we came back.

The next bus pole was halfway up the block. Three black women, two white women, and a Hispanic man were standing by the post, a racial mixture so balanced it looked like a casting call for Law and Order SVU. We joined them. I sat on the bench inside the shelter next to a sixth woman, an African-American lady whose heroic proportions were packed into a white rayon uniform that practically screamed Well-to-do White Folks’ Housekeeper. On her bosom she wore a button that read ALL THE WAY WITH JFK IN ’64.

“Bad leg, sir?” she asked me.

“Yes.” I had four packets of headache powder in the pocket of my sport coat. I reached past the gun, got two of them, tore off the tops, and poured them into my mouth.

“Taking them that way will box your kidneys around,” she said.

“I know. But I’ve got to keep this leg going long enough to see the president.” She broke into a large smile. “Don’t I hear that. ” Sadie was standing on the curb and looking anxiously back down the street for a Number Three.

“Buses runnin slow today,” the housekeeper said, “but one be along directly. No way I’m missin Kennedy, nuh- uh!”

Nine-thirty came and still no bus, but the ache in my knee was down to a dull throb. God bless Goody’s Powder.

Sadie came over. “Jake, maybe we ought to—”

“Here come a Three,” the housekeeper said, and rose to her feet. She was an awesome lady, dark as ebony, taller than Sadie by at least an inch, hair plank-straight and gleaming. “How-eee, I’m gonna get me a place right there in Dealey Plaza. Got samidges in my bag. And will he hear me when I yell?”

“I bet he will,” I said.

She laughed. “You better believe he will! Him and Jackie both!” The bus was full, but the folks from the bus stop crammed on anyway. Sadie and I were the last, and the driver, who looked as harried as a stockbroker on Black Friday, held out his palm. “No more! I’m full! Got em crammed in like sardines! Wait for the next one!” Sadie threw me an agonized look, but before I could say anything, the large lady stepped in on our behalf. “Nuh-uh, you let em on. The man he got a bum leg, and the lady got her own problems, as you can well see. Also, she skinny and he skinnier. You let em on or I’m gonna put you off and drive this bus myself. I can do it, too. I learned on my daddy’s Bulldog.” The bus driver looked at her looming over him, then rolled his eyes and beckoned us aboard.

When I reached for coins to stick in the fare-box, he covered it with a meaty palm. “Never mind the damn fare, just get behind the white line. If you can.” He shook his head. “Why they didn’t put on a dozen extra buses today I don’t know.” He yanked the chrome handle. The doors flopped shut fore and aft. The air brakes let go with a chuff and we were rolling, slow but sure.

My angel wasn’t done. She began hectoring a couple of working guys, one black and one white, seated behind the driver with their dinnerbuckets in their laps. “Get on up and give your seats to this lady and gentleman, now! Can’t you see he’s got a bad pin? And he’s still goin to see Kennedy!”

“Ma’am, that’s all right,” I said.

She took no notice. “Get up, now, was you raised in a woodshed?” They got up, elbowing their way into the choked throng in the aisle. The black workingman gave the housekeeper a dirty look. “Nineteen sixty-three and I’m still givin the white man my seat.”

“Oh, boo-hoo,” his white friend said.

The black guy did a double take at my face. I don’t know what he saw, but he pointed at the now-vacant seats. “Sit down before you fall down, Jackson.” I sat next to the window. Sadie murmured her thanks and sat beside me. The bus lumbered along like an old elephant that can still reach a gallop if given enough time. The housekeeper hovered protectively next to us, holding a strap and swaying her hips on the turns. There was a lot of her to sway. I looked at my watch again. The hands seemed to be leaping toward 10:00 A.M.; soon they would leap past it.

Sadie leaned close to me, her hair tickling my cheek and neck. “Where are we going, and what are we going to do when we get there?”

I wanted to turn toward her, but kept my eyes front instead, looking for trouble. Looking for the next punch. We were on West Division Street now, which was also Highway 180. Soon we’d be in Arlington, future home of George W. Bush’s Texas Rangers. If all went well, we’d reach the Dallas city limits by ten-thirty, two hours before Oswald chambered the first round into his damned Italian rifle. Only, when you’re trying to change the past, things rarely go well.

“Just follow my lead,” I said. “And don’t relax.”

6

We passed south of Irving, where Lee’s wife was now recuperating from the birth of her second child only a month ago. Traffic was slow and smelly. Half the passengers on our packed bus were smoking. Outside (where the air was presumably a little clearer), the streets were choked with inbound traffic. We saw one car with WE LOVE YOU JACKIE soaped on the back window, and another with GET OUT OF TEXAS YOU COMMIE RAT in the same location. The bus lurched and swayed. Larger and larger clusters of people stood at the stops; they shook their fists when our packed bus refused to even slow.

At quarter past ten we got on Harry Hines Boulevard and passed a sign pointing the way to Love Field. The accident occurred three minutes after that. I had been hoping it wouldn’t happen, but I had been watching for it and waiting for it, and when the dump truck drove through the stoplight at the intersection of Hines and Inwood Avenue, I was at least halfway prepared. I’d seen one like it before, on my way to Longview Cemetery in Derry.

I grabbed Sadie’s neck and pushed her head toward her lap. “Down! ” A second later we were thrown against the partition between the driver’s seat and the passenger area. Glass broke. Metal screamed. The standees shot forward in a yelling clot of waving limbs, handbags, and dislodged for-best hats. The white workingman who’d said Boo-hoo was bent double over the fare machine that stood at the head of the aisle. The large housekeeper simply disappeared, buried under a human avalanche.

Sadie’s nose was bleeding and there was a puffy bruise rising like bread dough under her right eye. The driver was sprawled sideways behind the wheel. The wide front window was shattered and the forward view of the street was gone, replaced by rust-flowered metal. I could read ALLAS PUBLIC WOR. The stench of the hot asphalt the truck had been carrying was thick.