Die a Little Longer

“Don’t try to humor me!” he said harshly. “There’s nothing the matter with me that I have to be humored.” His voice developed an edge of forced patience. “Please don’t be afraid of me. I have no intention of harming you.”

She could make no reply. She could do nothing but continue to stare at him, the ghastly grin frozen to her face.

He spaced his words carefully, as though it were important she understand each one. “All I wanted at first was a drink of water. But when you practically insisted I owned the house, I took advantage of it. Why shouldn’t I have? They’re patrolling every road and I had to stay somewhere. I’m a human being, not an animal to be kept in a cage. I’ve as much right to a normal life as anyone.”

She knew her warped grin was beginning to irritate him, hut it had set like cement and there was no way for her to get rid of it. As she continued to stand without speaking or changing expression, his face grew darker and the vein in his forehead bulged slightly.

With a final effort she broke the shackles of her terror and found her vocal chords and body would again obey her will. A residual bit of reason whispered safety lay in simply calming herself, but every nerve in her body screamed for flight.

In a cracking falsetto she said, “I have to go upstairs,” and circled around him with her heart trying to pry apart her jaws.

He made no move to stop her, but as she started to climb the stairs, he was only one step behind. In spite of herself she quickened her pace until she was nearly running. When she reached the top. she continued straight ahead into the bathroom. He came to a halt, then turned quickly and moved back to the stair head.

She closed the door gently, shutting out the sight of his watchful face, noting as she did that it had darkened angrily. Hidden from him. she sank to her knees and dropped her face to her palms, while violent trembling shook her body. How long would it take Tom to drive twenty miles? Oh, Lord, how long would it take?

When his voice came through the door, it had thickened coarsely. “If you’re just hiding, don’t do it. I said I wouldn’t hurt you.”

Struggling to her feet, she turned the water in the sink on full blast. She tried to think of some method of blocking the door, but the bathroom contained nothing movable. She opened the linen closet to stare at the bare shelves, started to close it again, then stopped with her hand on the tiny knob. A pulse of hope throbbed through her as she examined the heavy shelves.

She put her fingers under one and pressed upward. It lifted slightly. They were not nailed in!

Estimatingly she compared the length of the shelves with the distance from the edge of the sink to the bathroom doorknob. Then she quietly removed the center shelf.

It was heavy and cumbersome, as all things in this house were heavy and cumbersome, but she managed to get it resting on the edge of the sink without making so much noise that it would be audible above the running water. Bracing one end against the hot water faucet, she slowly lowered the other end toward the door, and felt a surge of relief when it touched just above the knob.

The knob rattled, there was silence for a minute, and then the door shook as the man outside rammed his shoulder against it. Her heart pounded terrifically as the door trembled twice more, but gradually subsided as she saw the brace was going to hold.

She was safe! Almost calmly she turned off the water and leaned against the sink to await Tom’s arrival. Twenty miles, ten of it dirt road. Say ten minutes to get the police — for surely he would bring police— ten minutes to make the first ten miles and twenty minutes to make the second. Forty minutes altogether, and nearly half of that must have passed already.

Only silence came from the other side of the door. She bent to examine the wooden shelf, then, satisfied of its security, walked to the open window and looked out. A robin perched on the burglar’s walk cocked his head at her and flew away.

A splintering crash swung her around. And when she saw the corner of an axe blade protruding through a gash in the door’s upper panel, all her previous terror rushed back in supersaturated strength to batter against her mind in wave after panicking wave. The axe head sawed back and forth, then wrenched free. For the space of a pulse beat there was complete silence, and then with an oddly quiet crunch, the axe broke through.

Twice more the heavy blade gashed chunks of paneling from the door, until a hole the size of a man’s head appeared. A face showed through the hole, but it was not a face she recognized. The features were blood-red, and a huge vein bulged beneath the damp fringe of hair falling haphazardly across his brow. The eyes were no longer colorless, but blazed with the intensity of burning oil, and the lips were spread wide over clenched teeth, through which a spray of spittle hissed.