Sentences appropriate for an exit from a shop, but not in any way for a cemetery.
“Thank you for visiting us. See you soon!”
“Probably, some pranksters must have stolen a poster from a shop to hang it here,” Logan thought. “Pranksters, yes. Teenagers having a good time. They got into a cemetery at night, hid in the old abandoned crypt—probably, there is really a fracture in its back wall—and are frightening casual passersby. Now, I suppose, they are rolling with laughter, remembering how I rushed away…”
Oh yes. Only what is the probability, that in a huge desolate cemetery a casual passerby will approach a certain crypt? What, in general, is the probability of meeting a casual passerby here at night? Personally he has not met any. Though, apparently, has heard one…
If that was a passerby.
And the statues. And all the rest. And the fact that on Manhattan there is, and can be, neither such a cemetery, nor such a Broadway, nor such a City Hall…
But then Tony, who at last found himself on the other side of the gate, saw in the street stretching away from the cemetery something that allowed him again to sigh with relief. White-blue letters shone “CHASE.” Though Logan was not a client of this bank, this picture was so natural and ordinary that it was difficult not to believe that the nightmare had ended, he was again in the real world. And, in general, the street along which he hastily walked had a normal appearance at last—no ominous stone slums and decaying wooden wrecks, only the usual multistory buildings with shops and offices in the ground floors… At night, of course, all of them were closed with metal shutters hiding front windows, but signs over many of the shops still had eye-catching neon lights.
Passing by the branch bank—one of few offices where windows and doors were not closed by shutters since ATMs operate round the clock—Tony gave it a captious look. What if it also is like those posters… or the postal service motto… But no, the lit sign differed in no way from the familiar. Through dark glass the hall with ATMs was seen; if Tony had had a Chase plastic card, he could have entered there. For an instant an absolutely wild thought flashed in his mind—to break the glass and to wait for the police to arrive, and let the officers completely return him into reality. Eventually, he would need to contact the police, to tell them at least about the postman with a hatchet. But, no, certainly, this is a silly notion. He simply needs to find a pay phone, since his cellphone does not work right. If he reached normal bank offices, he will reach normal phones as well.
Tony darted a last glance at the dark Chase windows. In the right one there was an employment announcement. “Well,” Logan thought gloomily, “if they kick me off my current job, maybe I can get a job as a bank teller… “—though such a career did not entice him. Or, probably, they have also programmer vacancies here?”
He peered at the announcement—and stood rigid, feeling his belly again fill with sharp ice crystals of fear.
The announcement said not “NOW HIRING,” but “NOW FIRING.” Discharging from employment. And that is the best case. “Firing” can also mean “shooting”.
And, by the way, the literal meaning of “chase” is “pursuit” or “hunting”.
Whom exactly was discharged or shot here, Tony could not discern in the dark and didn’t even especially try. He quickly walked farther, looking around like an animal at bay. Only now he was paying attention to the absence of light in the windows of the upper floors where, normally, there should be inhabited apartments. Certainly, it was a late night, but it never happens that there is not a single lit window anywhere… And signs… with growing despair and fear he read the signs above those offices and little shops that had encouraged him so much.
“Low Office”
“Fool Market”
“General Sore”
“Moans”
“Trash Harm Food”
“MEDICAL SCARE CENTER”
“DECORATION.” At least this sign seemed normal to Logan, but, having looked narrowly at the non-illuminated letters, he understood that actually it was “DEGORATION”. Though behind windows it was dark and no movement could be seen, he hastened to cross over to other side of the street.
Farther ahead, there was a crossroads without traffic lights (for unknown reasons since Logan got out of the subway, he had not seen any traffic lights). Carefully, like a soldier in films about street combat, Tony looked around the corner—and saw on the right in the cross street the lit letters “CAR SERVICE.”
Taxi! And the office was open at night—anyway, there was light behind the windows! Would he really leave this place at last?
Taught by bitter experience, Logan peered closely at the sign. No, “CAR SERVICE,” and nothing else. He turned the corner, crossed the street and walked fast toward the taxi office. His intuition was telling him that at the last moment something would prevent him from leaving, but he drove away these panicky thoughts.
Nothing prevented him from reaching the desired location. Tony belatedly remembered how he would look to the dispatcher—in dirty and torn trousers and one shoe, with hands soiled by the devil knows what… However, don’t night taxis exist to help people who have gotten into trouble? At worst it would be necessary to show in advance his solvency (Logan anxiously touched a trouser pocket: the wallet was in its place). He had already taken hold of the handle of a door with matte glass through which a dim light shone, had already even started to pull this door (it moved easily), but suddenly, obeying an abrupt impulse, once again looked at the sign.
And Tony understood that the office that he so aspired to get to was not CAR SERVICE at all. Over the door was written SCAR SERVICE, but the first letter was not lit.
Slowly and carefully he closed the door and hastened away almost on tiptoe, hoping very much that his attempt to enter had remained unnoticed.
“Though it could be, of course, just a tattoo and piercing parlor behind that door,” Logan thought. “Aha, and all the other signs mean only that in this area business is done by excentric people with a perverted sense of humor. Do you really believe that?”
Something made him to look back. Perhaps, it was the mad hope that now his troubles would vanish, and he would see a normal street with normal signs… or, at least, something that would help him to explain what was going on…
Instead he saw the door into which he had almost entered was opening. It was opening as slowly and silently as he closed it. For some reason this frightened him even more than if it had sharply swung open and on a threshold a huge fat Asian with a curved knife in hand had appeared.
Tony rushed away without waiting until the door opened completely. Fortunately, a crossroads was nearby, not more than twenty yards. Logan dove around a corner to the right and immediately slowed to a furtive walk, sensitively listening to the night.
All was silent. It seemed he was not pursued… however, that door had opened silently and if he had not looked back… Though—was it certain that behind the door there was a real danger?
But Tony was no longer in the mood to argue abstractedly about the logical validity of his fears. He hastily looked around. Right opposite him there was a sign for the next business. “Nails.” Manicure & pedicure salon. There was no light there. Of course—such salons are not open at night. But nevertheless Tony distinguished well enough the dark letters forming the word “Nails”—this time the word was perfectly right, without any surprises. He also saw the classic picture which was always present at the window of such shops—a woman in an armchair, with polished finger- and toenails.
Only the expression on the woman’s face disturbed him.
Tony stepped nearer to the dark glass. Yes, no doubt—the drawn face was deformed by a grimace of an intolerable pain. And only then he moved his gaze again to her nails. Actually, there were no finger- and toenails—they had been pulled out and steel nails had been hammered into the blood-stained meat which he at first accepted as red varnish.