(You think odd thoughts at times like that. It gets you, being alone in the darkness, never knowing if you’re about to stumble and fall down, or crash into a wall, or knock over a lamp, or bump into someone who wants to slit your throat.)
It would take me hours to write about every stumble and collision, fright and false alarm I had while searching the mansion - the nightmarish scenarios that fumbled through my mind - the terror I felt each time I crept around a corner or entered a new room.
The searching seemed to take hours.
I expected the sun to come up.
To be realistic about it, though, I probably spent no more than an hour sneaking through the place before I found Wesley and Thelma.
I was beginning to think that they weren’t in the house, after all. Maybe they spent their nights on the cabin cruiser. But then, as I climbed the stairs to the third and final story, I detected a quiet, grumbly sound. I stopped moving, and listened. The sound went away, but soon came again. Again, there was silence. Then came a harsh snort.
Some sort of animal snuffling around?
After listening a while longer, I realized that the sounds were probably being made by someone asleep.
Asleep and snoring.
Ever so slowly, I started climbing again. I set my feet down gently and eased my weight onto each tread. Most of them squeaked, anyway. Every time that happened, I cringed, stood still and listened until I heard the snoring again.
At last, I reached the top of the stairs.
I found myself in the middle of a hall, surrounded by walls with open doors. From where I stood, I could see into four moonlit rooms - one near each comer.
The snoring sounds, more distinct than ever, seemed to be coming from the doorway in front of me and over to the right. I stopped beside the newel post, and faced the sounds.
The doorway looked vaguely pale in the darkness.
I snuck carefully toward it.
This had to be Wesley and Thelma’s quarters.
With the entire house at their disposal, why had they chosen to sleep in such an out-of-the-way room? It seemed very strange, especially considering Wesley’s wounds. Why climb three flights of stairs when there were plenty of fine, comfortable rooms on the ground floor?
I stopped at the doorway. I peered in.
The two windows at the other side of the room were bright with moonlight.
Of course!
This is the room with the view.
From this height, they could probably look down through gaps in the foliage and see the cages.
Watch the women.
From here, they probably could’ve seen the glow of my cigarette lighter.
But only if they’d been looking.
The way things sounded, they hadn’t been looking. If they’d seen my light, they sure wouldn’t have gone ahead and turned in for the night.
Along with the snoring, a sound of deep, slow breathing came from inside the room.
Both of them were in there, both asleep.
Apparently.
In a way, I was glad I’d finally found them. The mystery of their whereabouts, at least, was solved.
But part of me wished I hadn’t found them.
What the hell was I supposed to do, now?
I could think of only two possible courses of action.
1. Get the hell out of the house.
2. Enter their room.
To be honest, I ached to get out of there. If I stayed, bad stuff was bound to happen.
I thought about getting out and setting fire to the house. It would be a fairly safe, effective way to kill Wesley and Thelma.
Not a half-bad idea.
Trapped this high up, their chances of escape would amount to zilch.
There was only one drawback. (Seems like there’s always a drawback.)
Wesley had probably taken the cage keys into the room with him. If I burnt down the house, what would happen to the keys? For starters, I might not be able to find them in the rubble. For enders, what if they melted in the heat? I’m no expert on the melting temperature of gorilla cage keys. After going down with the blazing house, they might be reduced to puddles - or at least distorted enough to be useless.
In which case, how would I get the cages open?
If that’s the only drawback, I thought, then what you’ve gotta do is sneak into the room and find the keys. Take the keys, then get the hell out of the house and set it on fire.
It seemed like a very good idea.
It had only one drawback: to get my hands on the keys, I would have to enter the room and look around.
And how could I hope to find them in the dark?
Into my head came a voice that sounded like Kimberly. It said, ‘Quit thinking about all this shit. Just do it.’
She was right.
Or I was right, since the voice wasn’t really Kimberly‘s, but mine.
I didn’t want to do it.
But I’d found Wesley and Thelma. They were sleeping. Asleep, they were helpless. They were in my power. This might be the best chance I would ever get. If I chickened out, I would hate myself forever.
If I blew it, the women would be the ones to pay.
Before entering the room, I slipped the razor out of my pocket. I thumbed open its blade.
By then, I was doing that schizo thing again: standing outside of myself, a critical and worried observer.
You must be outa your ever-lovin’ mind, I thought.
I stepped over the threshold.
The floor squawked.
One of the sleepers snorted. (Wesley, I think.) The other continued to take those long, easy breaths.
They’re dead to the world, I told myself.
Unless they’re faking it
And then I thought, What you oughta do is slit their throats right now.
I knew I couldn’t do that, though. You’d have to be damn cold-blooded to murder people in their sleep. And even if I could bring myself to nail Wesley that way, Thelma was a whole different story.
Being a woman.
How could I slit the throat of a woman?
I couldn‘t, that’s how.
(But I could burn her by setting fire to the house?
Apparently. Even while deploring the notion of slitting throats, I fully intended to burn the house down around those two monsters. Go figure.)
Stopping just inside the room, I saw Wesley and Thelma sharing a bed. At least, I supposed it must be them.
I couldn’t see them very well at all.
On each side of the double bed was a lamp table. The lamp tables and the bed stood against the wall between the windows, so they were bypassed by most of the moonlight.
Wesley and Thelma (at that time, I could only assume it was them) lay side by side - vague, dark shapes on the white sheet.
The body on the left side of the double bed appeared to be larger than the one on the right. The snores came from there. Also, the body had a patch of white that I took to be Wesley’s chest bandage.
Which put him on the left, Thelma on the right.
I made my way toward Wesley’s side of the bed. He was the keeper of the keys. If I were him, I would’ve placed them on the lamp table, where they’d be within easy reach.
I needed a free hand. I wanted to hang on to my razor, though, so the lighter went into my pocket.
Both the sleepers continued to make their usual noises while I crept closer and closer to Wesley’s lamp table.
When I got there, I turned sideways so I could keep my eyes on them.
If you stare at people, though, they seem to feel it.
One or the other of them would wake up, for sure.
So I looked toward the doorway, instead, while I gently patted the top of the lamp table.
Not gently enough.
Searching blindly, I nudged the key-ring with my fingertips. It moved, scraping against the wood. A few of the keys must’ve bumped into each other. They made two or three clinking sounds.
Wesley snored on.
Thelma popped up off her back.
I froze.
She sat there on the mattress on the other side of Wesley, not moving, not saying a word.
I couldn’t tell which way her head was turned.
She had to be staring at me, though.
Could she see me?
I didn’t move. I tried not to breathe.
Maybe I can wait her out.
If she couldn’t see me, and if I made no sounds, she might relax after a while, lie down and go back to sleep.
Pretty soon, I had to breathe. I did it slowly. She probably couldn’t hear me over Wesley’s loud snores.
She still sat there.
I was turning into a wreck. I felt as if I couldn’t get enough air. My heart raced. My whole body trembled - including my hands.
The key-ring was pressed against the tabletop by the fingertips of my left hand. If my trembling got much worse, I might not be able to stop myself from giving the keys another jangle.
I thought about lifting my hand.
But taking it away might cause a jangle.
Maybe I oughta just snatch them up and run like hell.
No no no no no!
Wait her out, I told myself. Any second now, she’ll lie down. Before long, she’ll be sound asleep.
‘Come here, Rupert,’ she whispered.
I flinched and gasped and clutched the keys. They clanked together for a moment before my hand squeezed them silent. Wesley made a choky-sounding snort. Moaning, he rolled onto his side. Which put his back toward me, his face toward Thelma. She stayed silent. After a few seconds that felt like an hour, Wesley resumed snoring.
I stood by the bed, the keys in one hand, the razor in the other.
I stared at Thelma.
Though I couldn’t see her eyes - or even which way her head was turned - I knew she was watching me.
Slowly, I began sidestepping toward the foot of the bed.
She’ll think I’m coming, I told myself. Right up to the instant I bolt for the door.
At the foot of the bed, however, I didn’t bolt.
One step in the wrong direction, and Thelma would let out a shout. I knew it. I didn’t have the slightest doubt. Her outcry would wake up Wesley, and they’d both come after me.
Deal with her alone, or deal with them both.
Also, I was curious. It seemed very strange that she’d whispered, Come here, Rupert. Why had she done that instead of yell?
She continued to sit upright while I crept past the foot of the bed. Wesley continued to snore.
When I rounded the corner, she eased herself sideways and lowered her legs. She sat on the edge of the mattress and waited for me.
A pace or two away from her, I stopped.
She grabbed the front of my belt. Not resisting, I let her pull me until I was standing in front of her. She pulled me closer to her. I stepped in between her knees. Her legs rubbed against mine.
Still gripping me by the belt, she whispered, ‘Give me the keys.’
This time, her whisper didn’t seem to disturb her husband. He kept snoring, and he didn’t move. The way I towered over Thelma’s head, I had a fine view of him. I just couldn’t tell whether or not his eyes were open.
‘I don’t have ’em,‘ I whispered.
‘Wesley?’ Not a whisper. Not terribly loud, either, but enough to make him sputter and give out a moaning noise that sounded like a question.
I had the keys in one hand, the razor in the other.
One quick slash with the razor ...
Even if she deserved such a fate - and she did - I couldn’t do it to her. Not this way, surprising her in the dark. For one thing, she was a woman. For another, it would’ve been cold-blooded to kill her except as a last resort, to save myself.
Wesley’s snoring had stopped.
Instead of slitting Thelma’s throat, I pushed my left fist against her body. It met warm, yielding skin. Her hand fumbled with my fingers. I opened them and she took the keys. They jingled a few times, then went silent.
‘Mmmmm?’ Wesley asked.
‘Nothing, honey.’
‘Mmm.’
A few seconds later, he was snoring again.
I heard a couple of quiet clinks - Thelma setting the keys down somewhere, I suppose. Maybe on the mattress behind her.
Still clutching my belt with one hand, she used her other hand to rub the front of my shorts. Then she slowly slid my zipper down. She reached in.
Something like that should’ve gotten me hard really quick. But I was damn scared, and Thelma wasn’t quite in the same class as the other gals. In fact, I might’ve been just as horny if she’d been Wesley. I was shrunk up so small I’m surprised she could find what she was hunting for.
She found it, though.
And started working on it.
I remembered the time by the campfire, and how she’d tried to split me with a razor.
The same razor I was holding in my right hand while she squeezed and stroked and pulled on me.
I knew she didn’t have a weapon, this time. Not in her hands.
One hand held me by the belt, the other by the dong.
Reaching out with my left hand, I found the top of her head. I caressed her short, damp hair. I slid my fingers in and held on. Then I felt along the side of her head with the wrist of my right hand.
I located her ear.
I put the razor against it - in the valley between the top of her ear and the side of her head.
The hand inside my pants quit trying to arouse me.
It took hold.
‘Let go or I’ll cut you,’ I whispered.
‘I’ll rip your cock off.’
‘Just give me the keys, and I’ll get out of here.’
‘In your dreams, dickhead.’
Wesley was still snoring.
‘I won’t hurt you,’ I whispered. ‘I’ll just go.’
‘Fuck me,’ she whispered. ‘Fuck me, and maybe I’ll let you have ’em.‘
You’ve gotta be kidding, I thought.
‘Right now.’ She gave me a gentle tug.
‘I can’t. Not with him there.’
‘Want me to wake him up?’
‘He’ll wake up anyway if I ... do what you want.’
‘Who knows? Let’s find out.’
‘How about somewhere else?’ I suggested. ‘If we go to a different room ...’
‘Here. Right here beside him.’
‘Just let go of me and give me the keys. Please?’
‘That my razor?’ she asked.
‘Yeah.’
‘Wanta shave me?’
‘NO.’
‘You sure? I haven’t had a nice, close shave since I lost it.’
‘Since you tried to kill me with it.’
‘If you aren’t gonna give me a shave, how about putting it away?’
‘I’m going to cut off your ear if you don’t give me the keys.’
She made a quiet, laughing sound. ‘Go on ahead, then.’ As I started to think about doing it, she said, ‘If you had the guts to go around cutting people, me and Wesley’d be dead right now with our throats slit open. You’re just too nice a fella for that sort of shit.’
‘Think so, do you?’
‘I know so. And anyhow ...’ She gave me a squeeze. Not hard, but hard enough. It made me flinch, gave me a sick feeling. ‘I got you by the nuts, boy. You’re gonna do what I say. Now, take that razor away from my ear, or I’ll scramble your eggs for you.’
I hesitated.
She squeezed harder.
Maybe I should’ve gone ahead and sliced off her ear when she did that. Instead, I groaned and bent over a little, trying to ease the pain.
‘Okay,’ I whispered.
I lifted the blade away from her ear.
The hand holding my belt let go. It brushed against my belly. ‘Give,’ Thelma said.
‘What?’
‘The razor.’
‘How do I know yo
u won’t cut off my whang?’
She laughed softly. ‘You won’t be much good to me without it.’
‘Okay,’ I whispered.
I could hardly believe that Wesley was sleeping through all this. My luck wasn’t likely to continue forever, though.
I tried to concentrate on what I needed to do.
‘The razor,’ Thelma said.
‘Let go of me, and I’ll give it to you.’
‘Think I’m an idiot?’
‘It’ll be a fair trade,’ I whispered.
‘Long as I’ve got hold, you’re gonna do whatever I say.’
‘You’d better let go,’ I said.
‘The razor.’
I let go. I’d been holding a lot more than the razor. It seemed like about a gallon. I opened up on her.
She still clutched me for a second or two. Probably not sure what was going on - what was that hot liquid squirting all over her hand and up her arm? Then she must’ve figured it out. She went, ‘Yuuuuuh!’ Her hand leaped away. You bastard!‘ she shouted.
I was probably catching her in the chest, so I reached down and gave myself some elevation.
‘Wesley!’
She got his name out. A moment later, she began to sputter and spit as I hosed her face.
I backed off fast.
Wesley sat up in bed. ‘What ... ?’
‘Get him!’ Thelma squealed. She sounded as if she’d lost her mind. ‘Kill the little shit!’
I couldn’t wait around to finish what I’d started. I couldn’t manage to quit, either. So I whirled around and ran for the door, still squirting.
The Chase Is On
From behind me, I heard thuds and voices.
‘Who?’ Wesley asked. He sounded mighty damn scared.
‘Who was it?’
‘Rupert!’
‘He’s dead!’
‘My ass!’
Just outside their door, the wet floor sent my feet sliding. I gasped and flapped my arms. My legs flew out from under me. My butt whammed the floor.
Behind me, Thelma was still talking. ‘He snuck right in here. Had my razor. Gonna slit our throats!’
‘You sure?’
‘Yes! He peed on me, the little cocksucker!’
I was still peeing. My shorts were drenched.
My feet stuck out into space. I pushed myself forward. My legs lowered. My feet found a plank of flat, slippery wood, which I figured to be the second stair down from the top.