The Hammer of Eden by Ken Follett Read Free Book Online

and rattlesnakes .
    —My car broke down .
    Where? I didn’t see it .
    —I went to take a leak .
    This far?
    Although the morning air was cool, he began to perspire.
    The car passed him slowly. It was a late-model Dodge Neon with a metallic green paint job and Texas plates. There was one person inside, a man. He could see the driver examining him in the mirror, checking him out. Could be an off-duty cop—
    Panic filled him, and he had to fight the impulse to turn and run.
    The car stopped and reversed. The driver lowered the nearside window. He was a young Asian man in a business suit. He said: “Hey, buddy, want a ride?”
    What am I going to say? “No, thanks, I just love to walk.”
    “I’m a little dusty,” Priest said, looking down at his jeans. I fell on my ass trying to kill a man .
    “Who isn’t, in these parts?”
    Priest got in the car. His hands were shaking. He fastened his seat belt, just to have something to do to disguise his anxiety.
    As the car pulled away, the driver said: “What the heck you doing walking out here?”
    I just murdered my friend Mario with a Stillson wrench .
    At the last second, Priest thought of a story. “I had a fight with my wife,” he said. “I stopped the car and got out and walked away. I didn’texpect her to just drive on.” He thanked whatever gods had given him inspiration again. His hands stopped shaking.
    “Would that be a good-looking dark-haired woman in a blue Honda that I passed fifteen or twenty miles back?”
    Jesus Christ, who are you, the Memory Man?
    The guy smiled and said: “When you’re crossing this desert, every car is interesting.”
    “No, that ain’t her,” Priest said. “My wife’s driving my goddamn pickup truck.”
    “I didn’t see a pickup.”
    “Good. Maybe she didn’t go too far.”
    “She’s probably parked down a farm track crying her eyes out, wishing she had you back.”
    Priest grinned with relief. The guy had bought his story.
    The car reached the edge of town. “What about you?” Priest said. “How come you’re up early on Saturday morning?”
    “I didn’t fight with my wife, I’m going home to her. I live in Laredo. I travel in novelty ceramics—decorative plates, figurines, signs saying ‘Baby’s Room,’ very attractive stuff.”
    “Is that a fact?” What a way to waste your life .
    “We sell them in drugstores, mostly.”
    “The drugstore in Shiloh won’t be open yet.”
    “I’m not working today anyway. But I might stop for breakfast. Got a recommendation?”
    Priest would have preferred the salesman to drive through town without stopping, so that he would have no chance to mention the bearded guy he had picked up near the dump. But he was sure to see Lazy Susan’s as he drove along Main Street, so there was no point in lying. “There’s a diner.”
    “How’s the food?”
    “Grits are good. It’s right after the stoplight. You can let me out there.”
    A minute later the car pulled into a slantwise slot outside Susan’s. Priest thanked the novelty salesman and got out. “Enjoy yourbreakfast,” he called as he walked away. And don’t get into conversation with anyone local, for Christ’s sake .
    A block from the diner was the local office of Ritkin Seismex, the small seismic exploration firm he had been working for. The office was a large trailer in a vacant lot. Mario’s seismic vibrator was parked in the lot alongside Lenny’s cranberry red Pontiac Grand Am.
    Priest stopped and stared at the truck for a moment. It was a ten-wheeler, with big off-road tires like dinosaur armor. Underneath a layer of Texas dirt it was bright blue. He itched to jump in and drive it away. He looked at the mighty machinery on the back, the powerful engine and the massive steel plate, the tanks and hoses and valves and gauges. I could have the thing started in a minute, no keys necessary . But if he stole it now, every Highway Patrolman in Texas would be looking for him within a few minutes. He had to be