The Collector

 Anyway I got the chemist in Lewes to give me something he said was very good for congestion and special anti-flu pills and inhaler, all of which she took when offered. She tried to eat something at supper, but she couldn't manage it, she was sick, she did look off-colour then, and I can say that for the first time I had reason to believe there might be something in it all. Her face was red, bits of her hair stuck on it with perspiration, but that could have been deliberate.

 I cleaned up the sick and gave her her medicines and was going to leave when she asked me to sit on the bed, so she wouldn't have to speak loud.

 "Do you think I could speak to you if I wasn't terribly ill? After what you've done."

 You asked for what I did, I said.

 "You must see I'm really ill."

 It's the flu, I said. There's a lot in Lewes.

 "It's not the flu. I've got pneumonia. Something terrible. I can't breathe."

 You'll be all right, I said. Those yellow pills will do the trick. The chemist said they're the best.

 "Not fetching a doctor is murder. You're going to kill me."

 I tell you you're all right. It's fever, I said. As soon as she mentioned doctor, I was suspicious.

 "Would you mind wiping my face with my flannel?"

 It was funny, I did what she said and for the first time for days I felt a bit sorry for her. It was a woman's job, really. I mean it was a time when women need other women. She said thanks.

 I'll go now then, I said.

 "Don't go. I'll die." She actually tried to catch hold of my arm.

 Don't be so daft, I told her.

 "You must listen, you must listen," and suddenly she was crying again; I could see her eyes filling with tears and she sort of banged her head from side to side on the pillow. I felt sorry for her by then, as I say, so I sat on the bed and gave her a handkerchief and told her I would never not get a doctor if she was really ill. I even said I still loved her and I was sorry and some other things. But the tears just kept on coming, she hardly seemed to listen. Not even when I told her she looked much better than the day before, which was not strictly true.

 In the end she grew calm, she lay there with her eyes shut for a while and then when I moved she said, "Will you do something for me?"

 What, I asked.

 "Will you stay down here with me and let the door be open for air?"

 Well, I agreed, and we turned out the lights in her room, with only the light from outside and the fan, and I sat by her for quite a time. She began to breathe in a funny quick way like she'd just run upstairs, as she said she was stifled, and she spoke several times -- once she said, please don't, and another I think she said my name but it was all blurred -- well, I felt she was asleep and after I said her name and she didn't answer, I went out and locked up and then set the alarm for early the next morning. I thought she went off to sleep so easy, I wasn't to tell. I thought it was for the best, and I thought the pills might do the trick and she would be better the next morning, with the worst past. I even felt it was a good thing, her being ill, because if she hadn't there would have been a lot of trouble of the old kind.

 What I am trying to say is that it all came unexpected. I know what I did next day was a mistake, but up to that day I thought I was acting for the best and within my rights.

2

    _October 14th?_

 It's the seventh night.

 I keep on thinking the same things. If only they knew. If only _they_ knew.

 Share the outrage.

 So now I'm trying to tell it to this pad he bought me this morning. His kindness.

 Calmly.

 Deep down I get more and more frightened. It's only surface calm.

 No nastiness, no sex thing. But his eyes are mad. Grey with a grey lost light in them. To begin with I watched him all the time. I thought it must be sex, if I turned my back I did it where he couldn't spring at me, and I listened. I had to know exactly where he was in the room.

 Power. It's become so _real_.

 I know the H-bomb is wrong. But being so weak seems wrong now too.

 I wish I knew judo. Could make him cry for mercy.

 This crypt-room is so stuffy, the walls squeeze in, I'm listening for him as I write, the thoughts I have are like bad drawings. Must be torn up at once.

 Try try try to escape.

 It's all I think of.

 A strange thing. He fascinates me. I feel the deepest contempt and loathing for him, I can't stand this room, everybody will be wild with worry. I can sense their wild worry.

 How can he love me? How can you love someone you don't know?

 He wants desperately to please me. But that's what madmen must be like. They aren't deliberately mad, they must be as shocked in a way as everyone else when they finally do something terrible.

 It's only this last day or two I could speak about him so.