Strangers

Now, disembarking from the elevator and stepping quickly along the short hall to Pablo's apartment, Ginger decided that she would make every effort to control her natural impatience and to settle for making progress en pantoufles, as the magician was determined they would.

The front door was ajar. Assuming he had left it open for her, she stepped into the foyer. Closing the door, she said, “Pablo?”

In another room, someone grunted. Something clattered softly. Something thudded to the floor.

“Pablo?” He did not answer. Moving into the living room, she called out louder than before. “Pablo?”

Silence.

One of the library's double doors was open, and a light was on. Ginger enteredand saw Pablo lying facedown on the floor near the Sheraton desk. He had evidently just returned from his visit to his hospitalized friend, for he was still wearing galoshes and an overcoat.

As she rushed to him and knelt at his side, grim possibilities occurred to hercerebral hemorrhage, thrombosis, or embolism; massive heart attackbut she was not prepared for what she found when she eased him onto his back. Pablo had been shot high in the chest, and bright red arterial blood welled from the bullet hole.

His eyes fluttered open, and although they looked unfocused, he seemed to know who she was. Blood bubbled over his lower lip. He got out a single word in an urgent whisper: “Run.”

Her instinctive reaction upon seeing him prone before the desk had been that of a friend and physician: Anguished, she had gone immediately to his aid. But until Pablo said, "Run, Ginger did not understand that her own life might be in jeopardy. Suddenly she realized that she had heard no gunfire, which meant a silencerequipped pistol. The assailant was no ordinary burglar. Someone infinitely more dangerous. All those considerations flashed through her mind in an instant.

Her heart pounding, she rose and turned toward the door. The gunmantall and broadshouldered, wearing a leather topcoat belted tightly at the waistcame out from behind the door, holding the silencerequipped pistol. He was big, but surprisingly less threatening in appearance than she had expected. He was her age, cleancut, with innocent blue eyes and a face unsuited for menace.

When he spoke, the disparity between his unremarkable appearance and his murderous actions was even greater, for his first words were a tremulous apology of sorts. "Shouldn't have happened. Didn't have to happen, for Christ's sake. I just . . . I was duping those tapes on a highspeed recorder. That's all I wanteddupes of the tapes."

He was pointing to the desk, and for the first time Ginger noticed an open attachs case in which was nestled a compact piece of electronic equipment. Tape cassettes were scattered across the top of the desk, and she knew at once what tapes they were.

“Let's call an ambulance,” she said. She edged toward the phone, but he stopped her by gesturing pointedly and angrily with the gun.

“Highspeed duplication,” he said, torn between rage and tears. "I could've made copies of all six of your sessions and been out of here. He wasn't supposed to be home for another fu**ing hour at least!"

Ginger grabbed a chair cushion and used it to prop up Pablo's head, so he would not choke on the blood and phlegm in his throat.

Obviously stunned by what had happened, the gunman said, "He just comes in so quiet, gliding in here like a goddamned ghost."

Ginger remembered how gracefully and elegantly the magician carried himself, as if each movement was prelude to an act of prestidigitation.

Pablo coughed, closed his eyes. Ginger wanted to do more for him, but the only remedy was heroic surgery. At the moment, she could only keep a hand on his shoulder in a feeble attempt to reassure him.

She looked up entreatingly, but the gunman only said, "And what the hell's he doing packing a gun? A fu**ing eightyyearold man, a gun in his fist, as if he knows how to handle something like this."

Until now, Ginger had not noticed the pistol on the carpet, a few feet from Pablo's outflung hand. When she saw it, a cripplingly sharp pang of horror went through her, and she nearly passed out, for in that instant she knew Pablo had been aware all along that it was dangerous to help her. She had not suspected that the mere attempt to probe at the memory block would quickly draw the unwanted attentions of men like this one in the leather topcoat. Because this meant she was being watched. Maybe not hour by hour or even every day. But they were keeping tabs on her. The moment she first called Pablo, she unwittingly endangered his life. And somehow he had known, for he had been packing a gun. Now, Ginger felt the weight of guilt.

“If he hadn't pulled that stupid .22,” the gunman said miserably, "and if he hadn't insisted on calling the cops, I'd have walked away without laying a hand on him. I didn't want to hurt him. Shit."

“ For God's sake,” Ginger said beseechingly, "let me call an ambulance. If you didn't mean to hurt him, then let's get help."

The gunman shook his head, and his gaze moved to the crumpled magician. “Too late anyway. He's dead.”

Those last two words, like a pair of hard punches, knocked the breath out of her and drew the shadowy curtain of unconsciousness to the edges of her vision. One glance at the old man's glassy eyes was enough to confirm what the gunman had said, yet she resisted the truth. She lifted his left hand and put her fingertips to his thin black wrist, feeling for a pulse. Finding none, she searched along the carotid artery in his throat, but in spite of the remaining warmth of the flesh, there was only an awful stillness where once had been the throb of life. “No,” she said. “Oh, no.” She touched Pablo's dark brow, not with the diagnostic intent of a physician but tenderly, lovingly. Her heart was so painfully constricted with grief that it was difficult to believe she had known the magician only two weeks. Like her father, she was quick to give her heart, and because Pablo was the man he was, the gift of affection and love was even more easily bestowed than usual. "I'm sorry,“ the killer said shakily. ”I'm really sorry. If he hadn't tried to stop me, I'd have walked right out of here. Now, I've killed someone, haven't I? And . . . you've seen my face."

Blinking back her tears, suddenly aware that she could not afford to grieve right now, Ginger rose slowly to her feet and faced him.

As if thinking aloud, the gunman said, "You've got to be dealt with now, too. I'll have to ransack the place, empty out drawers, take a few things of value, and make it look like you two walked in on a burglar." He chewed worriedly on his lower lip. "Yeah, it'll work. Instead of copying the tapes, I'll just take them, so they won't be here to raise suspicions."

He looked at Ginger and winced. "I'm sorry. Jesus, I really am, but that's the way it'll have to be. I wish it didn't. It's partly my fault. Should've heard the old bastard coming in. Shouldn't have let him surprise me.“ He moved toward her. ”Should I maybe rape you, too? I mean, would a burglar just shoot a goodlooking girl like you? Wouldn't he rape you first? Wouldn't that make this look more real?" He came closer, and she began to back away. "God, I don't know if I can do it. I mean, how can I get a hardon and do it to you when I know I've got to kill you afterward?" He kept coming toward her, and she backed up against the bookshelves. "I don't like this. Believe me, I don't. This shouldn't have to happen. I really hate this."

His apparently genuine pity, repeated apologies, and sorrowful selfrecriminations gave Ginger the creeps. He would have been less frightening if he had been pitiless and bloodthirsty. The fact that he had scruples but could set them aside long enough to commit one rape and two murders . . . that made him more of a monster.

He stopped six feet from her and said, “Please take off your coat.”

It was useless to beg, but she hoped to make him overconfident. "I won't give a good description of you. I swear. Please let me go."

“Wish I could.” His face defined remorse. “Take off your coat.”

Buying time while she arrived at a course of action, Ginger slowly unbuttoned the coat. Her hands were shaking, but she exaggerated those genuine tremors and fumbled with the buttons. At last she shrugged out of the coat and let it drop to the floor.

He stepped closer. The pistol was only inches from her chest. He was more relaxed, holding the gun less rigidly than before, thrusting it forward less aggressively, though he was by no means lax with it.

“Please don't hurt me.” She continued to beg because, if he thought she was nearly paralyzed with abject fear, he might slip up and give her an opportunity for escape.

“I don't want to hurt you,” he said, as if deeply offended by the implication that he had any choice in the matter. "Didn't want to hurt him, either. That old fool was responsible for this. Not me. Listen, I'll make it as painless as I can. I promise you that."

Still holding the gun in his right hand, he used his left hand to touch her br**sts through her sweater. She endured his fondling because he might become careless as he grew aroused. In spite of his claims that his empathy would render him impotent, Ginger was certain he'd have no difficulty raping her. Beneath his regret and sympathy, beneath the sensitivity he wished to project more for his own benefit than for hers, he was taking an unconscious savage pleasure in what he had done and would do. In spite of his gentle voice, violence burned in every word he spoke; he stank of violence.

He said, “Very pretty. Petite yet so nicely built.” He slipped his hand under her sweater, gripped her bra, gave it a hard yank that broke it. As elastic snapped, the bra straps dug painfully into her shoulders; the metal clasp at her back bit the skin. He grimaced as if her pain was transmitted to him. "I'm sorry. Did I hurt you? I didn't mean it. I'll be more careful." He pushed aside the ruined brassiere and put his cool, clammy hand on her bare breasts.

Filled equally with terror and revulsion, Ginger pressed back even harder against the bookshelves, which jabbed painfully into her back. The gunman was less than an arm's length away from her now, but he kept the pistol between them. The muzzle was pressed coldly against her bare midriff, leaving her no room to maneuver. If she tried to twist free of him, she would be gutshot for her temerity.

Fondling her, he continued to speak soerly and to express great sadness at the necessity of raping and killing her, as though she simply must understand, as though it would be unthinkably cruel of her not to bestow upon him full absolution for the sin of taking her life.

With nowhere to run, with his monotonous selfjustifications washing over her in numbing waves of words, subjected to his groping hand, Ginger was gripped by a claustrophobia so intense she felt the urge to claw at him and force him to pull the trigger, just to end it. His Certsscented breath had a cloying minty aroma that, by its pervasiveness, gave her the feeling she was closed up in a belljar with him. She whimpered, pleaded with wordless sounds, turned her head from side to side as if trying to deny the reality of the assault. The picture of demoralization and terror that she presented could not have been more convincing if she'd had days to practice, but there was unfortunately little calculation in it.

Further inflamed by her distress, he pawed at her more roughly than before. "I think I can do it, baby. I think I can do it to you. Feel me, baby. Just feel me." He pressed his body to hers and ground his pelvis against her. Incredibly, he seemed to think that, under such stressful and tragic circumstances, his rampant timescence was a tribute to her erotic appeal and that somehow she ought to be flattered.

Her reaction could only have been a disappointment for him.

When he pressed and rubbed himself against her, he was obliged to stop jamming the gun into her belly. Swept away by his own excitement, convinced that Ginger was weak and helpless, he did not even keep the weapon pointed at her but held it to one side with the muzzle aimed at the floor. Ginger's terror was exceeded by her loathing and anger, and the moment the pistol swung away from her, she translated those pentup emotions into action. Turning her head to the side, she slumped against him as if about to faint in fear or in a swoon of reluctant passion, an action that brought her mouth to his throat. In swift succession, she bit him hard in the Adam's apple, slammed one knee into his crotch, and clawed at his gun hand to keep the pistol away from her.

He partially blocked the knee, limiting the damage to his privates, but he was unprepared for the bite. Shocked, horrified, and reeling from the devastating pain in his throat, the gunman pushed away from her and stumbled backward two steps.

She had bitten deep, and now she gagged on the taste of his blood, though she did not permit her revulsion to delay her counterattack. She grabbed his gun hand, brought it to her mouth, and bit his wrist.

A sharp cry of pain and astonishment burst from him. Because she was delicate, waiflike, he had not taken her seriously.

As she bit him again, he dropped the gun, but simultaneously he made a fist of his other hand and with tremendous force slammed it into her back. She was driven to her knees and thought for a moment that he had broken her spine. Pain as bright and scintillant as an electric current shot up her back into her neck, flashed through her skull.

Stunned, her vision briefly blurred, Ginger almost did not see him bending to retrieve the gun. Just as his fingers touched the butt, she frantically threw herself at his legs. Seeing her coming and hoping to jump out of her reach, he whipped upright as if he were a lasheddown sapling suddenly cut loose. When she hit him a fraction of a second later, he windmilled his arms in a brief attempt to keep his balance. Falling backward, he crashed into one of the library's chairs, knocked over a small table and a lamp, and rolled onto Pablo Jackson's corpse.

Equally breathless, staring warily at each other, they were both petrified for a moment. They were on their sides on the floor, curled fetally in reaction to their pains, gasping for breath.

To Ginger, the gunman's eyes seemed as wide and round as clock faces, proof that he was filled with fevered thoughts of his own mortality ticking close. The bite would not kill him. She had not bitten through the jugular vein or the carotid artery, had merely pierced the thyroid cartilage, mangling tissue, severing a few small vessels. However, it was easy to understand why he might be convinced it was a mortal wound; the pain must be excruciating. He put his unbitten hand to his damaged throat, then pulled it away and stared aghast at his own gore dripping off his fingers. The killer thought he was dying, and that might make him either less or more dangerous.

Simultaneously, they saw that his pistol had been kicked halfway across the library during their tussle. It was closer to him than to Ginger. Bleeding from throat and wrist, making a strange wheezinggurgling noise, he scrambled across the floor toward the weapon, and Ginger had no option but to get up and run.