'It's a bad place,' Hagarty said. 'It's a sewer. You mean you two guys don't know that? You two guys have lived here all of your lives and you don't know that?'

Neither of them answered. After a little while, Hagarty went on.

9

Until Adrian Mellon entered his life, Don had been planning to leave Derry. He had been there for three years, mostly because he had agreed to a long-term lease on an apartment with the world's most fantastic river-view, but now the lease was almost up and Don was glad. No more long commute back and forth to Bangor. No more weird vibes — in Derry, he once told Adrian, it always felt like thirteen o'clock. Adrian might think Derry was a great place, but it scared Don. It was not just the town's tightly homophobic attitude, an attitude as clearly expressed by the town's preachers as by the graffiti in Bassey Park, but that was one thing he had been able to put his finger on. Adrian had laughed.

'Don, every town in America has a contingent that hates the gayfolk,' he said. 'Don't tell me you don't know that. This is, after all, the era of Ronnie Moron and Phyllis Hous efly.'

'Come down to Bassey Park with me," Don had replied, after seeing that Adrian really meant what he was saying — and what he was really saying was that Derry was no worse than any other fair-sized town in the hinterlands. 'I want to show you something, my love.'

They drove to Bassey Park — this had been in mid-June, about a month before Adrian's murder, Hagarty told the cops. He took Adrian into the dark, vaguely unpleasant– s m e l l i n g shadows of the Kissing Bridge. He pointed out one of the graffiti. Adrian had to strike a match and hold it below the writing in order to read it.

SHOW ME YOUR COCK QUEER AND I'LL CUT IT OFF YOU.

'I know how people feel about gays,' Don said quietly. 'I got beaten up at a truck-stop in Dayton when I was a teenager; some fellows in Portland set my shoes on fire outside of a sandwich shop while this fat-assed old cop sat inside his cruiser and laughed. I've seen a lot . . . but I've never seen anything quite like this. Look over here. Check it out.'

Another match revealed STICK NAILS IN EYES OF ALL FAGOTS (FOR GOD )!

'Whoever writes these little homilies has got a case of the deep-down crazies. I'd feel better if I thought it was just one person, one isolated sickie, but . . . ' Don swept his arm vaguely down the length of the Kissing Bridge. 'There's a lot of this stuff . . . and I just don't think one person did it all. That's why I want to leave Derry, Ade. Too many places and too many people seem to have the deep-down crazies.'

'Well, wait until I finish my novel, okay? Please? October, I promise, no later. The air's better here.'

'He didn't know it was the water he was going to have to watch out for,' Don Hagarty said bitterly.

10

Tom Boutillier and Chief Rademacher leaned forward, neither of them speaking. Chris Unwin sat with his head down, talking monotonously to the floor. This was the part they wanted to hear; this was the part that was going to send at least two of these assholes to Thomaston.

'The fair wasn't no good,' Unwin said. 'They was already takin down all the bitchin rides, you know, like the Devil Dish and the Parachute Drop. They already had a sign on the Bumper Cars that said "closed." Wasn't nothing open but baby rides. So we went down by the games and Webby saw the Pitch Til U Win and he paid fifty cents and he seen that hat the queer was wearing and he pitched at that, but he kept missing it, and every time he missed he got more in a bad mood, you know? And Steve — he's the guy who usually goes around saying mellow out, like mellow out this and mellow out that and why don't you fuckin mellow out, you know? Only he was in a real piss-up-a-rope mood because he took this pill, you know? I don't know what kind of a pill. A red pill. Maybe it was even legal. But he keeps aft er Webby until I thought Webby was gonna hit him, you know. He goes. You can't even win that queer's hat. You must be really wasted if you can't even win that queer's hat. So finally the lady gives im a prize even though the ring wasn't over it, cause I think she wanted to get rid of us. I don't know. Maybe she didn't. But I think she did. It was this noise-maker thing, you know? You blow it and it puffs up and unrolls and makes a noise like a fart, you know? I used to have one of those. I got it for Halloween or New Year's or some fuckin holiday, I thought it was pretty good, only I lost it. Or maybe somebody hawked it out of my pocket in the fuckin playyard at school, you know? So then the fair's closin and we're walkin out and Steve's still on Webby about not bein able to win that queer's hat, you know, and Webby ain't sayin much, and I know that's a bad sign but I was pretty 'faced, you know? So I knew I ought to like change the subject only I couldn't think of no subject, you know? So when we get into the parkin lot Steve says, Where you want to go? Home? And Webby goes, Let's cruise by the Falcon first and see if that queer's around.'

Boutillier and Rademacher exchanged a glance. Boutillier raised a single finger and tapped it against his cheek: alth ough this doofus in the engineer boots didn't know it, he was now talking about first-degree murder.

'So I goes no, I gotta get home, and Webby goes, You scared to go by that queer-bar? And I go, Fuck no! And Steve's still high or something, and he says, Let's go grease some queermeat! Let's go grease some queermeat! Let's go grease . . . '

11

The timing was just right enough so that things worked out wrong for everyone. Adrian Mellon and Don Hagarty came out of the Falcon after two beers, walked up past the bus station, and then linked hands. Neither of them thought about it; it was just something they did. It was ten-twenty. They reached the corner and turned left.

The Kissing Bridge was almost half a mile upriver from here; they meant to cross Main Street Bridge, which was much less picturesque. The Kenduskeag was summer-low, no more than four feet of water sliding listlessly around the concrete pilings.

When the Duster drew abreast of them (Steve Dubay had spotted the two of them coming out of the Falcon and gleefully pointed them out), they were on the edge of the span.

'Cut in! Cut in!' Webby Garton screamed. The two men had just passed under a streetlight and he had spotted the fact that they were holding hands. This infuriated him . . . but not as much as the hat infuriated him. The big paper flower was nodding crazily this way and that. 'Cut in, goddammit!'

And Steve did.

Chris Unwin would deny active participation in what followed, but Don Hagarty told a different story. He said that Garton was out of the car almost before it stopped, and that the other two quickly followed. There was talk. Not good talk. There was no attempt at flippancy or false coquetry on Adrian's part this night; he recognized that they were in a lot of trouble.

'Give me that hat,' Garton said. 'Give it to me, queer.'

'If I do, will you leave us alone?' Adrian was wheezing with fright, almost crying, looking from Unwin to Dubay to Garton with terrified eyes.

'Just give me the fucker!'

Adrian handed it over. Garton produced a switchknife from the left front pocket of his jeans and cut it into two pieces. He rubbed the pieces against the seat of his jeans. Then he dropped them to his feet and stomped them.

Don Hagarty backed away a little while their attention was divided between Adrian and the hat — he was looking, he said, for a cop.

'Now will you let us al — ' Adrian Mellon began, and that was when Garton punched him in the face, driving him back against the waist– high pedestrian ra i l i n g o f t h e b r i d g e . A d r i a n screamed, clapping his hands to his mouth. Blood poured through his fingers.