Under the Dome

He wanted his flock scared, but not in an outright panic. Panic wouldn't serve his purpose, which was to establish complete control of the town. And if he let Andy and Bushey stay—where they were for a little while, what harm? It might even do some good. They'd grow complacent. They might fancy themselves forgotten, because drugs were full ofVitamin Stupid.

Friday, on the other hand—the day after tomorrow—was that cotton-picker Cox's designated Visitors Day. Everybody would stream out to the Dinsmore farm again. Burpee would no doubt set up another hotdog stand. While that clustermug was going on, and while Cox was conducting his one-man press conference, Big Jim himself could lead a force of sixteen or eighteen police up to the radio station and wipe those two troublesome stoners out.

Yes. That was the answer.

He called Stewart back and told him to leave well enough alone.

'But I thought you wanted the propane,' Stewart said.

'We'll get it,' Big Jim said. 'And you can help us take care of those two, if you want to.'

'You're damn right I want to. That sonofabitch—sorry, Big Jim—that sonofabuck Bushey needs a payback.'

'He'll get it. Friday afternoon. Clear your schedule.'

Big Jim felt fine again, heart beating slowly and steadily in his chest, nary a stutter or flutter. And that was good, because there was so much to do, starting with tonight's police pep talk at Food City: just the right. environment in which to impress the importance of order on a bunch of new cops. Really, there was nothing like a scene of destruction to get people playing follow-the-leader.

He started out of the room, then went back and kissed his sleeping son's cheek. Getting rid of Junior might become necessary, but for the time being, that too could wait.

16

Another night is falling on the little town of Chester's Mill; another night under the Dome. But there is no rest for us; we have two meetings to attend, and we also ought to check up on Horace the Corgi before we sleep. Horace is keeping Andrea Grinnell company tonight, and although he is for the moment biding his time, he has not forgotten the popcorn between the couch and the wall.

So let us go then, you and I, while the evening spreads out against the sky like a patient etherized upon a table. Let us go while the first discolored stars begin to show overhead. This is the only town in a four-state area where they're out tonight. Ram has overspread northern New England, and cable-news viewers will soon be treated to some remarkable satellite photographs showing a hole in the clouds that exactly mimics the sock-shape of Chester's Mill. Here the stars shine down, but now they're dirty stars because the Dome is dirty.

Heavy showers fall in Tarker's Mills and the part of Castle Rock known as The View; CNN's meteorologist, Reynolds Wolf (no relation to Rose Twitchell's Wolfie), says that while no one can as yet be entirely sure, it seems likely that the west-to-east airflow is pushing the clouds against the western side of the Dome and squeezing them like sponges before they can slide away to the north and south. He calls it 'a fascinating phenomenon.'

Suzanne Malveaux, the anchor, asks him what the long-term weather under the Dome might be like, if the crisis continues.

'Suzanne,' Reynolds Wolf says, 'that's a great question. All we know for sure is that Chester's Mill isn't getting any rain tonight, although the surface of the Dome is permeable enough so that some moisture may be seeping through where the showers are heaviest. NOAA meteorologists tell me the long-term prospects of precip under the Dome aren't good. And we know their principal waterway, Prestile Stream, has pretty much dried up.' He smiles, showing a great set of TV teeth. 'Thank God for artesian wells!'

'You bet, Reynolds,' Suzanne says, and then the Geico gekko appears on the TV screens of America.

That's enough cable news; let us float through certain half-deserted streets, past the Congo church and the parsonage (the meeting there hasn't started yet, but Piper has loaded up the big coffee urn, and Julia is making sandwiches by the light of a hissing Coleman lamp), past the McCain house surrounded by its sad sag of yellow police tape, down Town Common Hill and past the Town Hall, where janitor Al Timmons and a couple of his friends are cleaning and sprucing up for the special town meeting tomorrow night, past War Memorial Plaza, where the statue of Lucien Calvert (Norrie's greatgrandfather; I probably don't have to tell you that) keeps his long watch,

We'll stop for a quick check on Barbie and Rusty, shall we? There'll be no problem getting downstairs; there are only three cops in the ready room, and Stacey Moggin, who's on the desk, is sleeping with her head pillowed on her forearm. The rest of the PD is at Food City, listening to Big Jim's latest stemwinder, but it wouldn't matter if they were all here, because we are invisible. They would feel no more than a faint draft as we glide past them.