“Nice driving, A.J.,” Catch said. “You going to try for Indy next year?”

Travis was disappointed. He hadn’t really expected to hurt Catch, he knew from experience that the demon was virtually indestructible, but he had hoped at least to piss him off. “Just trying to keep you on your toes,” he said. “A little test to see how you hold up under stress.”

Catch lifted the car, crawled out, and stood next to Travis in the ditch. “What’s the verdict? Did I pass?”

“Are you dead?”

“Nope, I feel great.”

“Then you have failed miserably. I’m sorry but I’ll have to run you over again.”

“Not with this car,” the demon said, shaking his head.

Travis surveyed the steam rising from the radiator and wondered whether he might not have been a little hasty in giving way to his anger. “Can you get it out of the ditch?”

“Piece of cake.” The demon hoisted the front of the car and began to walk it up onto the berm. “But you’re not going to get far without a new radiator.”

“Oh, you’re all of a sudden an expert mechanic. Mr. help-me-I-can’t-change-the-channel-while-the-magic-fingers-is-on all of a sudden has a degree in automotive diagnostics?”

“Well, what do you think?”

“I think there’s a town just ahead where we can get it fixed. Didn’t you read that sign you bounced off of?” It was a dig. Travis knew the demon couldn’t read; in fact, he often watched subtitled movies with the sound off just to irritate Catch.

“What’s it say?”

“It says, ‘Pine Cove, five miles.’ That’s where we’re going. I think we can limp the car five miles with a bad radiator. If not, you can push.”

“You run over me and wreck the car and I get to push?”

“Correct,” Travis said, crawling back through the car window.

“At your command, master,” Catch said sarcastically.

Travis tried the ignition. The car whined and died. “It won’t start. Get behind and push.”

“Okay,” Catch said. He went around to the back of the car, put his shoulder to the bumper, and began pushing it the rest of the way out of the ditch. “But pushing cars is very hungry work.”

ROBERT

Robert Masterson had drunk a gallon of red wine, most of a five-liter Coors minikeg, and a half-pint of tequila, and still the dream came.