The items on sale in the tiny store area didnt amount to much, and most of them were auto parts or accessories of one sort or another. There were cans of motor oil, wiper blades, engine additives. He grabbed up a pair of six-foot bungee cords, thinking they might come in handy sometime, though he couldnt guess for what. Remsen sold all manner of snacks, too, packages of chips and Slim Jims and those cracker-and-peanut-butter sandwiches, and he thought those might come in handy, too, and then decided to pass. All of the snacks looked as though theyd been there since the Carter administration. He left them where they were.
A door led to a bathroom, which was about as bad as hed expected. He closed it quickly and opened another door, which led to a ten-by-twelve room that had evidently served as Remsens living quarters. There was a stack of magazines, all involving guns or hunting or fishing, and there were three hardcover Ayn Rand novels, and, most disconcertingly, there was, in Remsens bed with its head on one of the two pillows, an inflatable doll, which the man had outfitted with a rubber mask. The face was vaguely familiar, and after a moment Keller realized it was supposed to be Ann Coulter. Keller thought that was just about the saddest thing hed ever seen in his life.
Something else was bothering him, and it took him a minute to realize what it was. Not the fact that hed killed the man hed killed any number of men, and none of them for a more compelling reason. This guy had it coming, which was more than he could say for a lot of the men and women whose names belonged in the memoir Keller would never dream of writing. Often in the past hed used a trick of mental gymnastics in order to diminish the memory of a killing, but he wouldnt have to do that in Remsens case because it wouldnt bother him a bit.
But what did bother him was something he had never done before. He was robbing the dead.
Keller had always wondered what was so terrible about robbing the dead. Compared to, say, robbing the living. Once you were dead, how could you possibly care what became of the watch on your wrist or the ring on your finger? There were, as the song said, no pockets in a shroud, and it was pretty generally acknowledged that you couldnt take it with you, so why not rob the dead? It wasnt like necrophilia, which was flat-out disgusting; it was simply a matter of making use of that which was no longer of any use to its owner.
It was still stealing, of course, since the dead might be presumed to have heirs, so youd be stealing
from them. That said, there were men of whom it was said that they would steal a hot stove, who would draw the line at going through a dead mans pockets. Keller didnt get it, and now that he thought about it he decided society had imposed the taboo out of necessity; if it werent such an awful thing to steal from the dead, why, everybody would do it.
So it gave him a turn, but once hed had a chance to sort out his thoughts, it stopped bothering him. And he wasnt taking a watch or a ring, nothing personal. Just some cash and a credit card, both of which he needed desperately.
Outside, he went to his car and filled the tank, and he didnt stop at the twenty-dollar mark, either. The Sentra drank deeply and settled down on its tires, like a heavy man sitting back after a big meal.
Remsens sign was still hanging on the pump, advising cash and credit customers alike to pay before they pumped their gas. He replaced it with one hed lettered at the counter, using what was very likely the same Magic Marker Remsen had used. CLOSED FOR FAMILY EMERGENCY, hed printed in block caps. HELP YOURSELF AND PAY ME LATER. He somehow doubted that anyone who knew Remsen at all well would believe hed display such trust in his fellow man, but who was going to argue with a free tank of gasoline? Theyd all help themselves, he figured, and some of them might even pay for it later.
Back inside, he flipped the sign in the window from OPEN to CLOSED. He turned off lights, rearranged the scene behind the counter so that the body would not be visible from outside, walked to the open door and pushed the button that would lock it, and stepped across the threshold. And stopped there, one foot outside and one foot in, because it was almost as if he could hear Miller Remsens voice, halting him in his tracks.
Hold it right there, son. Where do you think youre going?
He didnt want to go back behind the counter, but he knew he had to. Hadnt he already established that he wasnt squeamish? So why draw the line now?
He braced himself, then reached for the Homer Simpson cap. He didnt have to remove it from Remsens head, it had already fallen off on its own, so all he needed to do was pick it up, which wasnt really all that hard, and then put it in place on his own head, which wasnt all that easy.
In the car he checked his reflection in the rearview mirror. It seemed to him that the cap helped. The adjustable strap was a little loose, hed noticed that Remsen had a pretty large head, and he tightened it a notch, and that was better. And he tugged at the brim so that it covered a little more of his forehead, and that was better, too.