Trumps of Doom (2 page)

I pushed her out of my mind, again.

I watched the traffic for a time and drank coffee and thought about how I’d first met Luke, in our freshman year, in the Fencing Club.
 
He was unbelievably good.

“Still fence?” I asked him.

“Sometimes.
 
How about you?”

“Occasionally.”

“We never really did find out who was better.”

“No time now,” I said.

He chuckled and poked his knife at me a few times.
 
“I guess not.
 
When are you leaving?”

“Probably tomorrow.
 
I’ m just cleaning up a few odds and ends.
 
When that’s done I’ll go.”

“Where are you heading?”

“Here and there.
 
Haven’t decided on everything yet.”

“You’re crazy.”

“Um-hm.
 
Wanderjahr is what they used to call it.
 
I missed out on mine and I want it now.”

“Actually it does sound pretty nice.
 
Maybe I ought to try it myself sometime.”

“Maybe so.
 
I thought you took your in installments, though.”

“What do you mean?”

“I wasn’t the only one who used to take off a lot.”

“Oh, that.” He dismissed it with the wave, of a hand.
 
“that was business, not pleasure.
 
Had to do some deals to pay the bills.
 
You going to see your folks?”

Strange question.
 
Neither of us had ever spoken of our parents before, except in the most general terms.

“I don’t think so,” I said.
 
“How’re yours?”

He caught my gaze and held it, his chronic smile widening slightly.

“Hard to say,” he replied.
 
“We’re kind of out of touch.”

I smiled, too.

“I know the feeling.”

We finished our food, had a final coffee.
 
. .

“So you won’t be talking to Miller?” he asked.

“No.”

He shrugged again.
 
The check came by and he picked it up:

“This one’s on me,” he said.
 
“After all, I’m working.”

“Thanks.
 
Maybe I can get back at you for dinner.
 
Where’re you staying?”

“Wait.” He reached into his shirt pocket, took out a matchbook, tossed it to me.
 
“There.
 
New Line Motel,” he said.

“Say I come by about six?”

“Okay.”

He settled up and we parted on the street.

“See you,” he said.

“Yeah.” Bye-bye, Luke Raynard.
 
Strange man.
 
We’d known each other for almost eight years.
 
Had some good times.
 
Competed in a number of sports.

Used to jog together almost every day we’d both been on the track team.
 
Dated the same girls sometimes.
 
I wondered about him again—strong, smart, and as private a person as myself.
 
There was a bond between us, one that I didn’t fully understand.

I walked back to my apartment’s parking lot and checked under my car’s hood and frame before I tossed my pack inside and started the engine.
 
I drove slowly, looking at things that had been fresh and new eight years before, saying good-bye to them now.
 
During the past week I had said it to all of the people who had mattered to me.
 
Except for Julia.

It was one of those things I felt like putting off, but there was no time.
 
It was either now or not at all, and my curiosity had been piqued.
 
I pulled into a shopping mall’s lot and located a pay phone, but there was no answer when I rang her number.
 
I supposed she could be working full-time on a dayshift again, but she could also be taking a shower or be out shopping.
 
I decided to drive on over to her place and see.
 
It wasn’t that far.
 
And whatever it was that she had for me, picking it up would be a good excuse for seeing her this one last time.

I cruised the neighborhood for several minutes before I located a parking space.
 
I locked the car, walked back to the corner, and turned right.
 
The day had grown slightly warmer.
 
Somewhere, dogs were barking.

I strolled on up the block to that huge Victorian house that had been converted into apartments.
 
I couldn’t see her windows from the front.
 
She was on the top floor; to the rear.
 
I tried to suppress memories as I passed on up the front walk, but it was no good.
 
Thoughts of our times together came rushing back along with a gang of old feelings.
 
I halted.
 
It was silly coming here.
 
Why bother, for something I hadn’t even missed.
 
Still .
 
.
 
.

Hell.
 
I wanted to see her one more time.
 
I wasn’t going ‘· to back out now.
 
I mounted the steps and crossed the porch.
 
The door was open a crack so I walked in.

Same foyer.
 
Same tired-looking potted violet, dust on its leaves, on the chest before the gilt-framed mirror-the mirror that had reflected our embrace, slightly warped, many times.
 
My face rippled as I went by.

I climbed the green-carpeted stairs.
 
A dog began howling somewhere out back.

The first landing was unchanged.
 
I walked the short hallway, past the drab etchings and the old end table, turned ‘and mounted the second staircase.
 
Halfway up I heard a scratching noise from overhead and a sound like a bottle or a vase rolling on a hardwood floor.
 
Then silence again, save for a few gusts of wind about the eaves.
 
A faint apprehension stirred within me and I quickened my pace.
 
I halted at the head of the stairway and nothing looked to be out of order, but with my next inhalation a peculiar odor came to me.
 
I couldn’t place it-sweat, must, damp dirt perhaps-certainly something organic.

I moved then to Julia’s door and waited for several moments.
 
The odor seemed stronger there, but I heard no new sounds.

I rapped softly on the dark wood.
 
For a moment it seemed that I heard someone stirring within, but only for a moment.
 
I knocked again.

“Julia?” I called out.
 
“It’s me Merle.”

Nothing.

I knocked louder.

Something fell with a crash.
 
I tried the doorknob.
 
Locked.

I twisted and jerked and tore the doorknob, the lock plate, and the entire locking mechanism free.
 
I moved immediately to my left then, past the hinged edge of the door and the frame.
 
I extended my left hand and applied gentle pressure to the upper panel with my fingertips.

I moved the door a few inches inward and paused.
 
No new sounds ensued, and nothing but a slice of wall and floor came into view, with narrow glimpses of a watercolor, the red sofa, the green rug.
 
I eased the door open a little farther.
 
More of the same.
 
And the odor was even stronger.

I took a half step to my right and applied a steady pressure.

Nothingnothingnothing .
 
.
 
.

I snatched my hand away when she came into view.
 
Lying there.
 
Across the room.
 
Bloody .
 
.
 
.

There was blood on tie floor, the rug, a bloody disarray near the corner off to my left.
 
Upset furniture, torn cushions .
 
.
 
.

I suppressed an impulse to rush forward.

I took one slow step and then another, all of my senses alert.
 
I crossed the threshold.
 
There was nothing else/no one else in the room.
 
Frakir tightened about my wrist.
 
I should have said something then, but my mind was elsewhere.

I approached and knelt at her side.
 
I felt sick.
 
From the doorway I had not been able to see that half of her face and her right arm were missing.
 
She was not breathing and her carotid was silent.
 
She had on a torn and bloodied peach-colored robe; there was a blue pendant about her neck.

The blood that had spilled beyond the rug onto the hardwood floor was smeared and tracked.
 
They were not human footprints, however, but large, elongated, three-toed things, well padded, clawed.

A draft of which I had been only half-consciously aware- coming from the opened bedroom door at my back-was suddenly diminished, as the- odor intensified.
 
There came another quick pulsing at my wrist.
 
There was no sound, though.
 
It was absolutely silent, but I knew that it was there.

I spun up out of my kneeling position into a crouch, turning I saw a large mouthful of big teeth, bloody lips curled back around them.
 
They lined the muzzle belonging to several hundred pounds of doglike creature covered with coarse, moldy-looking yellow fur.
 
Its ears were like clump of fungi, its yellow-orange eyes wide and feral.

As I had no doubt whatever concerning its intentions I hurled the doorknob, which I had been clutching half consciously for the past minute.
 
It glanced off the bony ridge above its left eye without noticeable effect.

Still soundlessly the thing sprang at me.

Not even time for a word to Frakir .
 
.
 
.

People who work in slaughterhouses know that there is a spot on an animal’s forehead to be found by drawing an imaginary line from the right ear to the left eye and another from the left ear to the right eye.
 
They aim the killing blow, an inch or two above the junction of this X.
 
My uncle taught me that.
 
He didn’t work in a slaughterhouse, though.
 
Ire just knew how to kill things.

So I spun forward and to the side as it sprang, and I struck a hammer blow at the death spot: It moved even faster than I’d anticipated, however, and when my fist struck it, it was already rushing by Its neck muscles helped it to absorb the force of my blow.

This drew the first sound from it, though-a yelp.
 
It shook its head and turned with great speed then, and it was at me again.
 
Now a low, rumbling growl came up from its chest and its leap was high.
 
I knew that I was not going to be able to sidestep this one.

My uncle had also taught me how to grab a dog by the flesh on the sides of its neck and under the jaws.
 
You need a good grip if it’s a big one, and you’ve got to get it just right.
 
I had no real choice at the moment.
 
If I tried a kick and missed it would probably take off my foot.

My hands shot forward and snaked upward and I braced myself when we met.
 
I was sure it outweighed me and I had to meet its momentum as well.

I’d had visions of losing fingers or a hand, but I got in under the jaw, caught hold and squeezed.
 
I kept my arms extended and leaned into the impact.
 
I was shaken by the force of its lunge, but I was able to maintain my grip and absorb it.

As I listened to the growls and regarded the slavering muzzle a foot or so away from my face I realized that I hadn’t thought much beyond this point.
 
With a dog, you might be able to bash its head against anything hard and handy; its carotids are too deeply buried to rely on direct pressure to take it out.
 
But this thing was strong and my grip was already beginning to slip against its frantic twisting.
 
As I held its jaws away from me and kept pushing it upward, I also realized that it was taller than I was when extended along the vertical.
 
I could try for a kick at its soft underside, but I would probably go off balance as well as lose my grip, and then my groin would be exposed to its teeth.

But it twisted free of my left hand, and I had no choice but to use my right or lose it.
 
So I pushed as hard as I could and retreated again.
 
I had been looking for a weapon, any weapon, but there was nothing handy that would serve.

It lunged again, coming for my throat, coming too fast and high for me to manage a kick to its head.
 
I couldn’t get out of its way either.