All You Love Will Be Carried Away              
                       By Steven King                       

                       (part 1 of 7)                        

It was a Motel 6 on I-80 just west of Lincoln, Nebraska. The
snow  that  began  at  mid_afternoon had  faded  the  sign's
virulent yellow  to a kinder  pastel shade as the  light ran
out of  the January dusk.  The wind  was closing in  on that
quality of  empty amplification  one encounters only  in the
country's  flat  midsection,  usually  in  wintertime.  That
meant  nothing but  discomfort  now, but  if  big snow  came
tonight__the weather  forecasters couldn't  seem to  make up
their  minds__then  the interstate  would  be  shut down  by
morning. That was nothing to Alfie Zimmer.

He got his  key from a man  in a red vest and  drove down to
the  end of  the  long cinder_block  building.  He had  been
selling in the  Midwest for twenty years  and had formulated
four  basic rules  about securing  his night's  rest. First,
always reserve  ahead. Second, reserve at  a franchise motel
if possible_your Holiday Inn,  your Ramada Inn, your Comfort
Inn, your Motel 6. Third, always  ask for a room on the end.
That way,  the worst  you could  have was  one set  of noisy
neighbors.  Last, ask  for a  room that  begins with  a one.
Alfie  was  forty-four, too  old  to  be fucking  truck_stop
whores, eating  chicken_fried steak, or hauling  his luggage
upstairs.  These days,  the rooms  on the  first floor  were
usually  reserved for  non_smokers.  Alfie  rented them  and
smoked anyway.

Someone  had taken  the  space  in front  of  Room 190.  All
the  spaces  along the  building  were  taken. Alfie  wasn't
surprised. You  could make a reservation,  guarantee it, but
if you  arrived late (late  on a day  like this was  after 4
P.M.), you had  to park and walk. The cars  belonging to the
early birds were nestled up to the gray cinder block and the
bright_yellow doors  in a  long line, their  windows already
covered with a scrim of light snow.

Alfie drove  around the corner  and parked with the  nose of
his Chevrolet pointed at the  white expanse of some farmer's
field,  swimming deep  into the  gray of  day's end.  At the
farthest limit of vision he could  see the spark lights of a
farm. In there,  they would be hunkered down.  Out here, the
wind blew  hard enough  to rock the  car. Snow  skated past,
obliterating the farm lights for a few moments.

Alfie was a big man with  a florid face and a smoker's noisy
respiration. He was wearing a topcoat, because when you were
selling that  was what  people liked to  see. Not  a jacket.
Storekeepers sold  to people wearing jackets  and John Deere
caps, they  didn't buy from  them. The  room key lay  on the
seat  beside him.  It was  attached  to a  diamond of  green
plastic. The key was a real key, not a MagCard. On the radio
Clint Black  was singing "Nothin'  but the Tail  Lights." It
was  a country  song.  Lincoln  had an  FM  rocker now,  but
rock_and_roll  music didn't  seem  right to  Alfie. Not  out
here, where if you switched over  to AM you could still hear
old men calling down hellfire.

He shut  off the engine, put  the key to 190  in his pocket,
and checked to make sure he still had his notebook in there,
too.  His old  pal."Save Russian  Jews," he  said, reminding
himself. "Collect valuable prizes."

He got  out of  the car  and a  gust of  wind hit  him hard,
rocking him back on his heels, flapping his pants around his
legs, making him laugh a smoker's surprised rattlebox laugh.

His samples  were in  the trunk, but  he wouldn't  need them
tonight. No, not  tonight, not at all. He  took his suitcase
and his briefcase out of the  back seat, shut the door, then
pushed the black button on his  key fob. That one locked all
the  doors. The  red one  set off  an alarm,  what you  were
supposed to use  if you were going to get  mugged. Alfie had
never been mugged.  He guessed that few  salesmen of gourmet
foods were,  especially in this  part of the  country. There
was a market for gourmet  foods in Nebraska, Iowa, Oklahoma,
and Kansas;  even in  the Dakotas,  although many  might not
believe it. Alfie  had done quite well,  especially over the
last  two  years as  he  got  to  know the  market's  deeper
creases-_but it  was never  going to  equal the  market for,
let's say, fertilizer. Which he  could smell even now on the
winter wind that was freezing his cheeks and turning them an
even darker shade of red.