She started for the closet but didn’t get far. An arm curled around her neck and a small circle of steel pressed hard against her temple. “Don’t move, don’t fight. If you do, I’ll kill you.”
She tried to pull away and he lashed her upside the head with the revolver’s short barrel. At the same time the arm around her neck tightened. She saw the knife in the fist at the end of the arm that was choking her and stopped struggling. It was Johnny — she recognized the voice — but it really
He marched her into the living room, arm still around her throat, then spun her and shoved her down on the couch, where she flopped, legs splayed.
“Pull down your dress. I can see your garters, you whore.”
He was wearing bib overalls (that alone was enough to make her feel like she was dreaming) and had dyed his hair a weird orange-blond. She almost laughed.
He sat down on the hassock in front of her. The gun was aimed at her midsection. “We’re going to call your cockboy.”
“I don’t know what—”
“Amberson. The one you play hide the salami with in that hot-sheets place over Kileen. I know all about it. I’ve been watching you a long time.”
“Johnny, if you leave now I won’t call the police. I promise. Even though you spoiled my clothes.”
“Whore clothes,” he said dismissively.
“I don’t… I don’t know his number.”
Her address book, the one she usually kept in her little office next to the typewriter, was lying open next to the phone. “I do. It’s on the first page. I looked under
“I won’t, Johnny, not if you mean to hurt him.”
He leaned forward. His weird orange-blond hair flopped into his eyes and he brushed it away with the hand holding the gun. Then he used the knife-hand to pluck the phone out of its cradle. The gun remained pointed steadily at her midsection. “Here’s the thing, Sadie,” he said, and now he sounded almost rational. “I’m going to kill one of you. The other can live. You decide which one it’s going to be.”
He meant every word. She could see it on his face. “What… what if he isn’t home?”
He chuckled at her stupidity. “Then you die, Sadie.”
She must have thought:
He dialed 0 without looking at the address book (his memory for numbers had always been just short of perfect), and asked for WEstbrook 7-5430. Listened. Said, “Thank you, Operator.”
Then, silence. Somewhere, over a hundred miles north, a telephone was ringing. She must have wondered how many rings Johnny would allow before hanging up and shooting her in the stomach.
Then his listening expression changed. He brightened, even smiled a little. His teeth were as white as ever, she observed, and why not? He had always brushed them at least half a dozen times a day. “Hello, Mr. Amberson. Someone here has something to say to you.”
He got off the hassock and handed Sadie the phone. As she put it to her ear, he slashed out with the knife, quick as a striking snake, and sliced open the side of her face.
“Hush, Mr. Amberson.” He sounded amused. Sadie was no longer screaming, but I could hear her sobbing. “She’s all right. She’s bleeding pretty heavily, but that will stop.” He paused, then spoke in a tone of judicious consideration. “Of course, she’s not going to be pretty anymore. Now she looks like what she is, just a cheap four-dollar whore. My mother said she was, and my mother was right.”
“Let her go, Clayton,” I said. “Please.”
“I
“Clayton—”
“I’ll give you three and a half hours. Until seven-thirty. Then I’ll put two bullets in her. One in her stomach and one in her filthy cunt.”
In the background, I heard Sadie scream:
