Skull Session Read Online Free PDF Page A

with firewood, which had now spilled forward so that cut sections of log lay on the truck's roof and hood and on the ground on all sides. Judging from the rim of broken glass around the truck's empty rear window, some of it had shot forward into the cab.
    He reached the passenger side and saw a smear of blood on the shattered windshield. An elderly man lay slumped forward, face shoved between dashboard and vent window, plump body pressed against the steering wheel, logs piled against his back. Paul could imagine the savage double impact, the head striking the windshield, the logs shooting forward and battering him from behind.
    Clap, adjust cap, shoot a forefinger at the sky. "Are you all right?" Paul yelled. The old man didn't move.
    "Hi, honey?' Paul said. It was a difficult situation. He could hardly stand on the steep slope, the truck was at an acute angle, the logs still heaped on the back looked as if they could fall if disturbed. The nearest phone was ten minutes away; rescue services out here would take at least a half hour. Depending on how badly the old man was bleeding, there might not be time to go for help. Paul fought down the rising panic.
    The door resisted his first pull, and on his second try he yanked the handle so hard it pulled out of the door. When he used a chunk of wood to smash the window, the logs in the bed shifted and one spun off the roof and struck his face. For an instant he almost blacked out with the pain. Then he reached inside and lifted the inner handle, wrenching at the door with his whole body. The truck rocked on its suspension. The door grated and swung open, then broke off the rusted hinges. Logs fell and bounded down the slope.
    He climbed into the steeply canted cab, tossed away some logs, and grabbed the woodcutter's arm. His breath screaming in his throat, he pulled the old man off the steering wheel and out of the cab. The old guy, wearing a checked hunter's shirt and khaki pants held up by suspenders, was as limp as a washcloth. Paul's hands became slimed with blood as he dragged him up the slope.
    Paul managed to get him up the embankment by a series of all-out heaves. His lungs were burning by the time he reached the road, laid the old man out, and inspected him. Forehead like hamburger with chunks of glass embedded in it, a flap of scalp hanging down near the base of his skull, heavy bleeding, legs making feeble movements. He'd have to get to a hospital, fast.
    The old man stirred and his eyes came open. Paul's hands fluttered around his own head, making the movements of adjusting his hat, which had come off somewhere down the embankment. He clapped his hands in front of him, at arm's length. "Hi, honey! Are you all right?"
    The woodcutter put an arm across his face, flailed it away. "Oh, God," he moaned. He lay, watching Paul with blood-rimmed, frightened eyes.
    "We've got to get you into my car," Paul told him. "Okay?" His hands flew around his head, adjusting the nonexistent cap. Clap! "Hi, honey!" Paul bent toward the old man to help him to the car. He wished the tic voice wasn't so screechingly high.
    The man fought off his hands, terrified.
    Shock, Paul thought. What were you supposed to do? Subdue him somehow, but how? Paul's hands went to his head, made all the quick motions as if they were creatures with wills of their own. "Hi, honey?' he said, trying to think.
    Still on his back, the old man started dragging himself away from Paul, pushing with his heels and elbows. Paul clapped and went after him. They pawed at each other for a moment until one of the woodcutter's flailing hands caught Paul on the bridge of his nose. The pain blinded him and made him sit down hard. Something the matter with his nose. Part of the nose hanging down, onto his upper lip.
    Even the light touch of his exploring fingers was too much to take. The log from the truck must have cut him. A lot of the blood on his hands and shirt must be his own.
    That's what the situation was when the second