No Glitt here.
She swerved through the doorway. The corridor ahead of her was long and dark.
No sign of Glitt.
He’s gotta be down there. But how come he quit messin with Vince?
At the time Sue had fled from Vince, she’d expected Glitt to continue working on him for another half-hour, at least. Maybe even for an hour or two.
Havin himself a fine ol’ time. How come he quit?
Hope he don’t know we’re here.
Maybe it’s just ’cause Vince up and died on him. That’d take most of the fun out of it, Vince bein dead.
Maybe, or maybe not.
Sue made a quick detour through the guest bathroom, then continued down the hallway toward the den.
Anyhow, Vince didn’t die on him. Glitt polished him off, stuck that screwdriver in his nose.
How come? Why’d he do that when he was havin himself such a grand time?
He knows we’re here.
Does not. How could he?
Don’t matter. Just find him.
In the grayness of the moonlit den, Sue saw the revolver on the carpet where Vince had dropped it.
But no Glitt.
She wondered if he might be hiding behind the bar, the way Vince had done.
Not Glitt.
So she didn’t waste time checking there. Instead, she returned to the hallway and drifted on into the living room. It was somewhat darker than the den. The furniture made black clumps in the gloom.
She saw no Glitt.
Marta looked as if she hadn’t moved at all from her position just outside the glass door. Her silhouette was black against the pale, moonlit drapes.
If he ain’t in the kitchen, I’d better see if I can find his car. Can’t let him . . .
Marta’s right arm came away from her side.
Her pistol looked like a knife.
That’s kinda . . .
Reaching high, Marta used the point of the knife to sweep the curtain out of her way.
Huh?
That ain’t Marta!
Sue hurled herself through the living room, aiming at the back of the dark figure, and slammed into Glitt as he took a stealthy step over the threshold of the sliding door.
He was almost within reach of Marta. Two or three more steps . . .
‘Turn around!’ Sue shouted at her.
But she heard the warning only inside her own mind.
The fingers of Glitt’s right hand ached from their fierce grip on his knife.
‘Marta! He’s right behind you! Turn around! Shoot him!’
Glitt was breathless, his heart thudding fast, his body oily with sweat, his stiff penis pushing against the front of his leather pants.
His mind rambled.
Oh, this is my night, oh yes. Whoever she is, she’s mine. All mine. Stick her in the back? Yeah, yeah. That’ll take the starch out of her. Start with a quick one in the back, then turn her around and go for the goodies.
Hope she’s not a fucking dog.
‘MARTA!’
11.
Marta waited, her back to the open door, her eyes on Sue’s body.
Can’t be very comfortable, lying on the concrete like that.
Come on, Sue. Get back here. What’s taking so long?
Had something gone wrong?
Maybe she went into Glitt and found Neal.
God, I hope not. It’d be better if he never got out of his own body, than . . .
‘LESLIE GLITT!’ Sue didn’t sit up, didn’t open her eyes, just suddenly yelled it at the sky in such a loud, rough voice that Marta, stunned, could hardly believe it had come from Sue. ‘POLICE! DROP THE KNIFE, GLITT! STEP AWAY FROM THE WOMAN!’
Marta whirled around, bringing the pistol up from her side.
She didn’t really expect to find someone behind her.
But she was still in the midst of her turn when she glimpsed a black shape so close to her that it might have been her own shadow.
She squealed with fright.
The knife struck.
She fired.
In the next moment, Glitt was staggering backward as the pistol tumbled toward the concrete and Marta flung her right hand high.
Black against the moonlit night, her fingers were hooked like claws. A hunting knife stuck out of the back of her hand.
She cried out, ‘Shit!’
Glitt had fallen onto his back. He was starting to push himself up.
Marta swung her hand down. She only meant to bring the knife close to her body so she could grab it with her other hand. But she didn’t pay attention and slapped it against her belly. The knife point, jutting from her palm, poked through her shirt and stabbed her.
She yelped. Her hand jumped away from her stomach. Then she clutched the knife with her left hand and jerked the blade out.
Knife clutched in both hands, she raised it overhead and dived at Glitt. She landed on him, her face in his belly, and pounded the blade into the middle of his chest.
He grunted.
‘Marta!’ Sue blurted. ‘Get off him! I got the gun.’
Leaving the knife in his chest, Marta pushed herself off Glitt and scurried backward away from his legs.
He lay sprawled on the concrete. He didn’t move.
Sue didn’t fire. She stood near his feet, her legs apart, her knees bent, her right arm straight out but angled downward, pointing the pistol at him.
‘You’d better do it,’ Marta said.
Sue nodded, but didn’t shoot.
Marta got up and stood beside her. She felt blood spilling down her hand, heard it splashing on the concrete.
Sue glanced at her. ‘Y’all right?’
‘He stabbed me in the hand.’
‘Looks like ya stabbed him in the heart.’
‘Shot him, too. Doesn’t mean he’s dead.’ Keeping her eyes on Glitt, she jerked open her shirt. There were quick, soft popping sounds as several buttons gave way. She pulled the shirt off, wrapped it quickly around her right hand, and clenched her fist to hold it in place. ‘We’d better make sure he’s dead and then get out of here. Somebody might’ve called the cops.’
‘Call ’em for sure if I go ahead and pump him full of holes.’
‘We’ll be gone.’
‘We don’t gotta bother if he’s already dead.’
‘This is Rasputin, remember?’
‘I know. I know, all right. But that don’t mean we gotta shoot him. There’s quiet stuff we can do.’
‘Like what?’
‘Like cut his head off.’
‘You’re kidding.’
‘What’s he gonna do without his head? If he did live through it, which ain’t real likely, he’d be blind as a bat.’
Marta found herself smiling. She couldn’t believe she was smiling at a time like this. She looked at Sue and shook her head. ‘You’re nuts.’
‘Got a better idea?’
‘What would we use, the knife?’
‘How about an axe? I seen one in the garage.’
‘No good,’ Marta said. ‘We can’t split up. And if we both go, we’d have to leave him. He might pull a disappearing act.’
‘Reckon we’ll just have to use the knife.’
‘If we don’t do something quick, the cops are going to show up and bust us.’
‘Yeah. They’ll run you in for indecent exposure.’
‘They’ll run us both in. God only knows what they might charge us with. And they’ll probably end up searching my apartment. When they do that, they’ll find the money. We’ll have a shitload of explaining to do. Plus, they won’t let us keep it.’
‘They won’t?’
‘Are you kidding? Not a chance.’
‘Well,’ Sue said, ‘they ain’t here yet. We better do something.’
‘I wish we had a silencer.’
‘I’ve seen ’em use pillows and stuff in the movies. How about if we shoot him through a sofa cushion? One of us can run into the living room right there, and . .
.’
‘No splitting up,’ Marta said.
‘’Course, if we got us a pillow we wouldn’t have to shoot him. Just smother him with it.’
‘Who needs a pillow, then? Why not strangle him with our bare hands?’
‘Better still,’ Sue said, ‘we got us a pool right here. Why not drown him like a rat?’
‘Drown him like Rasputin.’
‘Yeah!’
‘Give me the gun,’ Marta said. ‘I’ll cover him. You take his boots off.’
After passing the pistol to Marta, Sue squatted at Glitt’s feet, tugged off his right boot, and flung it behind her. Marta kept her eyes on Glitt, but heard the boot splash into the pool. A few seconds later, his left boot followed.
Glitt never moved, never made a sound.
‘Put his feet together,’ Marta said.
While Sue shoved his feet toward each other, Marta clamped the pistol under her right armpit. Then she used her left hand to unbuckle her belt. She spread her legs to keep the shorts from falling down, and whipped the belt out of its loops around the waist of her shorts.
‘Take this,’ she said.
Sue looked over her shoulder, nodded, and grabbed the dangling belt.
‘Strap his feet together.’
Marta drew the pistol out from under her arm and aimed it at Glitt while Sue bound his ankles together.
‘Okay, now let’s drag . . .’
Roaring, Glitt pulled the knife out of his chest and sat up.
Sue yelled, ‘AH!’
Marta yelled, ‘SHIT!’
Glitt slashed at Sue. Lurching back on her knees to escape the blade, she lost her balance. As she fell backward, Marta fired. A moment later, Sue tumbled against her shins.
Marta stumbled backward, jerking the trigger again and again. Her shorts dropped. The pistol jumped in her hand, quick shots slamming through the silence, muzzle flashes lighting the night. Bullets punched into Glitt. He twitched as they hit him, but he was still sitting up, knife in hand, when Marta, tripped by the shorts around her ankles, tumbled backward off the edge of the pool.
12.
Sue, on her back with her knees in the air, heard a tremendous thudding splash and knew that Marta had fallen in. She raised her head. Framed by the V of her spread legs, Glitt sat just beyond her feet. He held his knife high like a mountain man about to attack a grizzly. But he didn’t move. Water rained down on Sue, obscuring her view of Glitt and drenching her.
A couple of seconds later, the shower stopped.
Sue blinked water out of her eyes.
Glitt still sat there and didn’t move.
If he’s dead, how come he just keeps sittin up?
’Cause he ain’t dead. Just playin possum, waitin for a good chance to lay me open.
She bolted up and leaned forward hard, reaching with straight arms between her legs, stretching, going for the belt. With her right hand, she grabbed the buckle. With her left, she grabbed Glitt’s right ankle. Then she flung herself back.
He skidded toward her on his rump.
Yer mine!
She scurried and squirmed her way backward, dragging him.
All the way, he remained sitting up, motionless, his knife raised – like some sort of weird, wax dummy of a wild murderer scooting on his ass toward a corner of Madame Tussaud’s.
The way he looked gave Sue goosebumps.
But she kept on dragging him.
From behind came quiet, splashy sounds. Gasping sounds of Marta catching breaths.
‘Stay back!’ Sue yelled.
Feeling the edge of the pool under her rump, she gave Glitt’s feet a last mighty pull and tumbled.
She saw herself facing the Man in the Moon.
He looked pale and astonished.
Marta shouted, ‘No!’
A moment later, Sue’s back smacked the surface of the pool. The cool water spread open, took her in, closed down over her. The moon dimmed and rippled. Then she heard a muffled splashing sound.
13.
As Sue started to fall backward off the edge of the pool, her feet flying up, Marta saw Glitt on the other side of them. Thinking he was about to plunge the big knife down and bury it between Sue’s legs, she yelled, ‘No!’
But Glitt didn’t strike. Just sat there as if frozen.
At the same moment as Sue’s back struck the water, his rump dropped off the pool’s edge. He plummeted. Marta heard a thunk when the edge caught the back of his head. His head jerked forward as if kicked from behind.
Then he disappeared into the black water.
Except for his right hand.
He held the knife out of the water. Its dripping blade gleamed like silver in the moonlight.
Get that knife away from him!
As Marta went for it, the upthrust hand and knife turned and began gliding toward the deep end of the pool. She held off. She stared.
No sign of Sue or Glitt.
Just the hand, cut off at its wrist by the black surface of the water, taking its knife on a voyage. The wrist glided silently. Behind it was a wake of shiny ripples.
He can’t be alive! Why doesn’t he drop the knife?
He must be alive, Marta told herself.
He doesn’t drop the knife because he still has uses for it.
She pictured Sue down below, towing him by his feet.
He’s just waiting for the right time.
Marta swam in from the rear. Both her hands were empty; she’d been holding Neal’s pistol in her left, and her stabbed right hand had been wrapped with his shirt. The pistol and shirt were lost.
She reached out with both hands.
Her right grabbed Glitt around the wrist. Pain erupted from her wound. She hissed, but held on.
Her left clamped the top of Glitt’s fist and wrenched it sideways.
It twisted easily.
It twisted too easily, and too far. Marta heard crackly sounds.
She opened the limp fingers and took the knife.
He’s dead. Must be.
But what if he isn’t?
That’s his big trick, making people think he’s dead when he isn’t.
Marta let go of Glitt’s wrist. His empty hand glided along, fingers drooping.
She switched the knife to her right hand, gritted her teeth against the pain as she clenched it, then took a deep breath and went down.
Under the water, she was blind.
She reached out with her left hand.
When she found Glitt’s hair, she grabbed it. She pulled herself forward. But couldn’t find the rest of him. Not at first. The water beneath his head felt empty until she leaned backward and brought her legs up.
She realized that he must still be in a sitting position.
She matched it. Felt his shirt against her breasts, the slippery seat of his leather pants against her lap, his leather legs against her thighs.
Sorry, Sue. I don’t mean to scare you,
She spread her legs, raised them, hooked her feet over the top of Glitt’s knees, and thrust downward.
She met resistance.
But not from Glitt; she was sure of that.
The resistance came from Sue, struggling to keep her grip on his ankles.
Marta won.
With Glitt straightened out and latched fast against her body, she punched the knife into his belly. She split him open from belt to chest. Then she slashed his throat.
14.
They climbed out of the pool and stood side by side on its edge. Water ran down their bodies. Gasping for breath, they gazed at the black surface. Its ripples flashed moonlight.
There was no sign of Glitt.
‘Ya think we done him in?’ Sue asked.
‘If he makes it through this,’ Marta said, ‘we’ll start calling him Lazarus.’
‘We better get goin.’
‘Yeah.’
But they didn’t move. They stayed on the edge and watched the pool. Marta held the knife in her left hand. Her right hand dripped blood o
nto the concrete by her feet.
‘He’s a goner,’ Sue said after a while.
‘I’d say so.’
‘We better get goin. The cops’re gonna show up.’
‘Yeah. But I dropped Neal’s gun in there.’
‘So?’
‘I have to get it,’ Marta said.
‘No, ya don’t. What’re they gonna do, arrest him?’
‘I just don’t want to leave it behind. Anyway, we might need it some time.’
Sue scowled down at the pool. ‘But he’s in there. We can’t even see him. What if he grabs ya?’
‘He won’t,’ Marta said, and jumped off the edge. Water splashed up, then rained down on her. Standing in the chest-high water, she began to feel around the tile bottom with her feet.
‘If Glitt grabs ya,’ Sue said, ‘don’t go blamin me.’
‘I won’t.’
‘Back in a sec,’ she said, and hurried off.
Marta continued searching for the pistol, wandering this way and that, sliding her feet around.
Suddenly, the pool lights came on.
Glitt, his bandaged head almost touching her knees, gazed up at Marta through the clear bright water. His wild bush of beard swayed gently in the currents. His teeth were bared as if he’d died snarling, ready to bite. The ragged red edges of the slash across his throat shivered as if stirred by a soft wind.
Marta saw bullet holes in the front of his black shirt. And she saw where she’d sliced him up the middle – guts bulged out through the split.
Though startled to find him so close to her, she hadn’t screamed. She’d flinched and gasped. Then, unable to look away from him, she’d moaned.
She didn’t scream until his left arm swept up from under his side and he thrust the pliers up through the water, their jaws spread.
Screaming, Marta bashed his head with her knee and flung herself backward.
The steel jaws of the pliers clashed shut an inch in front of her left nipple.
Then Marta lost her footing. She fell and went under, but only for a moment. Terrified of Glitt coming for her, she planted her feet on the pool floor and stood up fast.
Glitt was down near the bottom, face up, a couple of yards away.
Sue lurched to a halt on the edge of the pool. ‘What happened? Y’all right?’