Last Rites Read Online Free Page B

The sail was down—that struck him as odd, but the ship was still safely in midstream, and the two dead people were just listening to music. It wasn’t like Truman to get all excited over nothing.
    “What? What is it?” Will asked.
    “That’s right, New Sparta!” a frenetic male voice answered Will from the radio. “That was Duran Duran—definitely one for you old-timers, really old school! When those guys tell you they’re ‘Hungry Like the Wolf’—they mean they really want to get with a lady!”
    The man stopped talking and the sound of rapidly squeaking bedsprings came from the radio. Then the man laughed. “Someone says that today, they probably don’t mean anything so nice!”
    A moan rose from the radio, like dozens of dead people, followed by the sounds of shattering glass and screaming. The man laughed again. “You’re listening to Crazy Man Kaufman! How about one more song before we send some news and announcements your way? Here’s one not quite so old!”
    Another song started, this time with a female singer. Will thought it sounded familiar, but wasn’t sure.
    Lucy turned the radio down some. Will could hardly believe it. Over the last couple days he’d nearly given up. He hadn’t really slept, and he gnawed down his fingernails, thinking of what he might have to do if Rachel didn’t make it, steeling himself for the event. Now all that fear suddenly evaporated at the words of this goofy radio announcer, calling out to listeners in—what was the name of the city? New Sparta? That sounded funny. Will knew it meant something else, but all he could remember was, way back in the old world, the only place you’d hear the word “Spartan” would be in the name of high school and college sports teams. But who cared now? They had named it whatever they wanted to.
    “A radio station?” Will asked, beaming at Truman and Lucy. “There are people somewhere near here who have a radio station!” He gave Truman’s shoulder a smack. “They’ve got to have medicine and doctors, then! You can’t have a city that big and not have other stuff, like doctors. How will we find them, though? We can’t have passed them upriver, I don’t think, or we would’ve heard the broadcast before. But if they’re not right on the river, we might sail past them and not know it.” Will frowned.
    Truman pointed down the river. Will considered the wisps of cloud there. “Yeah, you’re right, Truman—that may be them. It doesn’t look like just regular clouds.”
    Truman then pointed to the storm advancing from the west.
    “Oh, yeah,” Will said. “Is that why you reefed the sail?”
    Truman and Lucy both nodded.
    “Good job, guys. We’ll have to deal with the storm tonight. Oh damn, the boat rocking makes Rach feel even sicker.” He felt bad for her, but still confident the worst was over. They might even make it to this city before nightfall. Who knew? Anything good seemed possible, and nothing bad seemed real or threatening anymore, but more like just a nuisance.
    The song ended and Crazy Man Kaufman started talking again. “Turn it up,” Will told Lucy, taking a step toward her.
    “Hey, everybody—the city council is glad to announce that work is almost done on the Victory Amphitheater on the riverfront!”
    There was the sound of saws and hammers in the background.
    “We’ll announce the first concerts there real soon!”
    Applause.
    “The place was supposed to be done earlier, but, well, you probably remember it got pretty messed up. Really big cleanup before they could even start rebuilding. But until it’s done, check out the Dead End—that’s always open!”
    There was the moaning of the dead again, but it ended with laughter this time instead of screams.
    “Just outside the north wall you got all your favorite carnie games, shows, something for everyone! Come on by!”
    More laughter and some kind of strange pipe music that Will didn’t really recognize, he hadn’t heard it in so