Danger Stalks the Highway

With the next flash of lightning, I knew the car following us was not Drake’s. The silhouette was different. It was more square-topped with darkened windows. It appeared black in the eerie light. Something else seemed odd about the car. The windows looked recessed. But why would a car have recessed windows unless it was an armored vehicle? It looked like pictures of limousines used to protect dignitaries and government officials. Were we being followed by an armor-plated, bulletproof sedan? If so, for goodness sake, why?

If the other car was not carrying an important personage, why was it so equipped? Who else would need such a vehicle? With a quiet certainty, a word popped into my mind: mobsters. The sophisticated explosive device yesterday, the three murders committed while leaving no clues to the murderer, this bulletproof car behind us, all pointed to one suspect — a member of the underworld. The only organized crime figure who had visited Levi lately, to my knowledge, was Ray Drake, alias Cub Mathers.

But why drive a car so heavily protected if the driver’s enemies were two widows? My mother and I were not known to be dangerous, but that car would have been worthy of the likes of Al Capone. Whoever our pursuer was, he must be paranoid.

The headlights following us which at first had seemed friendly now seemed ominous and threatening.

Mom twisted around to look behind us again. “Oh, no, Darcy! It is coming too fast. It’s going to hit us!”

The big car nudged my back bumper. Mom cried, “Oh, my Lord, help us!”

The Passport fishtailed across the highway and I wrestled with the steering wheel until I finally got back into the right lane. My face felt stiff and I tasted blood where I had bitten my lip. Gritting my teeth, I muttered, “I can’t let him pass.” Newspaper articles of people being forced off the road raced through my mind.

The pursuer’s headlights grew larger in my rearview mirror. The car was coming at us again.

“Hang on!” I hissed and hit the accelerator. The Passport responded and we surged forward. A road sign cautioning that the speed limit was twenty-five miles per hour passed in a blur.

Behind us, our tormentor came so quickly that we seemed not to be moving at all. The car was going around me, despite my best efforts. But then, I saw that the driver had no intention of passing. He pulled into the lane beside me. Now even with us, nose to nose, the sedan was pacing me.

The heavy car edged ever closer to the center line. Its passenger door was perilously close to my driver’s side door.

Scooting farther toward the ditch, I glanced at my mother. She was praying as she clutched the dashboard.

A bolt of lightning slivered the sky, hovering long enough to make trees beside the highway stand out for a split second like some eerie black and white photograph. In that instant, I saw inside the metal hulk beside us. The car contained not one man, but two.

Struggling to stay on the pavement, we careened around the first curve down Deertrack Hill. Tires screamed. The guardrail was only a few inches away and below that was the Ventris River.

The other driver closed the gap between his passenger door and my door. The first bump was a dull thud as he struck and we skidded. Then, he whammed us again. Sparks flew as metal struck metal and my Passport slid. We hit the guardrail with a rending sound.

My forehead connected with the rearview mirror and Mom gripped her door handle as if it were a lifeline.

Terror settled into a cold, hard knot of fury in the pit of my stomach. I would not continue in this crazy race that we could not win, but I would not be at the mercy of this evil being who was playing with us as if he were a cat and we were the cornered mice. We had one chance, a slim one. Praying that we would join the ranks of those who survived a tumble down Deertrack Hill, I determined that we would indeed go over; not sideways, but nose first.

“Hang on!” I yelled. Stomping the accelerator, I wrenched the steering wheel to the right. The Passport lurched up and over the guardrail. The last thing I heard was the sound of that reinforced rail snapping like a popsicle stick.

This was one of my favorite parts of The Cemetery Club. As I remember, I needed a few cups of coffee after Darcy’s car went over the guardrail.