Thirteen Phantasms Read Online Free PDF Page B

strange couple with a greenish tinge to their skin. Don’t even want to think about that. Best duck down a bit, avoid being sighted by the old dime lady. Too late.
    “Howdy, ma’am. Can’t tell you how sorry I am for smacking you like that back in the station.”
    “Hmph,” she replies, but seems to be yielding.
    The dwarf, round silver hat low over the left eye, comes peeking over the back of his seat at Monty who nods civilly and tries not to stare at the pointy ears. On impulse the grey lady stands, smiles at the peeping dwarf, and stumbles toward the rear, seating herself across from Monty.
    “Accidents will happen, son.”
    “Yes, ma’am. Don’t I know.”
    “Son?”
    “Yes, Ma’am?”
    “Where are we going? Is this bus going toward the Black Hills?”
    “It may well be, ma’am.”
    “You don’t know?”
    “No, ma’am.”
    The dwarf, head showing above the back of the recliner, fingers gripping the soft velvety fabric, pursing his lips and wrinkling his cheeks, shakes his head in a slow negative. He disappears.
    Now what in the devil did that mean? Must go slowly with these people. Feel them out, so to speak. No more incidents, I’ on vacation here. Permanent vacation. Time to redeem myself with this here lady. Fine person really, I suppose. No use getting off, as usual, on the wrong foot.
    “Excuse me, ma’am. I’ll just go forward and ask the driver. I’m sure he’ll know.”
    “Well, yes. Perhaps you should. I’d be frightfully upset if I were on the wrong bus.”
    “Yes, ma’am.”
    Monty, off up the aisle to speak to the driver. Bus drivers are unusually well informed. Especially about destinations. Barbers, bus drivers, and cowboys; they’ll always know, one way or the other.
    The bus, jerking along the dark highway, across the rolling hills of the midwest like some trackless roller-coaster that may well go on forever. Never circle back around to that dust-settled station; that town of sage barbers and hooting cowboys and nothing at all but the smell of dry wind blowing along stale streets. A steep dipping hill leaves Monty weightless in the aisle, plummeting through deep space. He staggers forward, lunges for the back of a seat to steady himself and sprawls sideways, like a crab washed from its hold by the tides, into Tweedledee whose leg is thrust into the aisle.
    “I say! Here now. What in the world are you doing, boy?”
    “Excuse me sir. Going up to talk to the driver there. It’s about where this bus is going. I’m not sure, and the lady back there might be on the wrong bus.”
    “You might be on the wrong bus you mean,” says the green man, smirking at poor tripped-up Monty. Tweedledee and Tweedledum burst into simultaneous laughter. The dwarf tugs on the bill of his hat and turns to stare out of the window.
    Oh, jeez. Got to watch that. Can’t go stumbling around upsetting things like that. Always comes to no good. Must talk to the driver there, staring out through his tinted window with those yellow eyes glowing in the light of the dashboard.
    “Excuse me sir, but where does this here bus go?”
    “Most everywhere, boy. All over the place mostly, I suppose. Here and there.”
    “Yes, sir, but that lady back there is afraid she’s on the wrong bus. Do we go anywhere near the Black Hills?”
    “More or less,” says the driver, sipping dark coffee from a stained paper cup. “More or less.”
    “Thank you.” Monty, baffled, turns to see the grey lady, seated once more by the dwarf, pointing toward Monty and whispering terrible things. Monty tiptoes carefully past Tweedledee whose eyes have blinked shut. Asleep perhaps. A grey leg darts out into the aisle as Monty stumbles past. Raucous laughter from the man with the green skin.
    Best sit down here near this lady and the dwarf. Try to make conversation. What is this thing I’m kicking about beneath the seat? A shoe, by God. An old, beaten, cast-off shoe. Like at the lake when you walk along the shore in the early