Nowhereville

"Law does not exist this far out in the desert, except for what you do with your own two hands. And with only a handful of us left, it’s not like we can drive them out, or even give them a good scolding,” Moriarty reflected, looking out the window at the desolated piazza. “None of us is younger than fifty years old. Whatever’s left of this shithole will die with us.”

The locale was silent for a few moments, the three men each coming to terms with the abject truth of Moriarty’s gloomy prospect. The fans continued to spin with the hellish repetitive sound. The old woman in the kitchen seemed to have disappeared, since the clangs of her cooking utensils had ceased.

“But you have to know something about these people, right? I mean, they must come round your store to buy supplies and stuff,” I said, addressing Dilworth.

“The thing is, they don’t,” he stated bluntly.

I almost laughed.

“What the hell do they live on, then?” I asked.

“Your guess is as good as ours, mister,” Moriarty interjected. “We have a few theories about them, though.”

“I’d love to hear ‘em,” I replied. More and more intrigued by my company, I offered them both another round of coffee and cigarettes. They took me up on the offer, and once we were again settled down in our booth, the conversation was resumed.

“You see, Morris, the bodies of those who died didn’t have a mark on them. Nothing apparent anyway. I wish I’d had the time to perform at least one proper autopsy on one of them, but there wasn’t any goddamn time, the fuckers kept pouring in.” Moriarty spoke calmly, with a remarkable sense of detachment.

“Now, I’m no expert in this field, but I reckon that whatever it was that killed them did it from the inside,” he said, pondering carefully on each particular word. He gazed out the window. “But you see, Morris, I keep thinking that they had something to with it. Too much of a coincidence, you know? Them moving in right after half the people here died.”

“Oh yeah?” I asked, incredulously. “And how’d you reckon they did it, Moriarty? Black magic?”

“No need to get all sarcastic with me, Morris,” Moriarty retorted. “How’d you feel if half the people you’ve known all your miserable life – including your own two sons, might I add – just dropped dead all of a sudden?”

“It was obviously some sort of pandemic,” I responded matter-of-factly. “Was no one notified of this? The authorities? This could be a genuinely dangerous virus. The town should have been quarantined.”

“Quarantine?” he snorted. “Quarantine, you say? Have you actually seen this town? It has been in quarantine since the mine and the mill were closed down and the railroad was moved a hundred miles west, seventy years ago. This is nowhere, my friend.”

“But if doctors were brought in, they could find out what happened. The epidemic has obviously not died down, since people are still dying. You’re not safe from it; come to think of it, neither am I,” I remarked.

“No one’s coming, boy. It’s just us and them, and I think we all know who’s going to outlive the other,” Dilworth intervened meditatively.

“And we can’t know if it was a disease, like you say it was. Even if it was, they’re the ones who brought it. I know it,” Moriarty said with a somber finality.

“Really? How do you know that? Did your crystal ball tell you that?” I responded.

“Spend one more night in that house, and you’ll know I’m right, Morris.”