He ran forward through the trees, no longer certain where he was going or what he would do when he got there. The ground underfoot was stonier than it had been, and he felt the sharper pieces cutting into him. The pain was a distant thing, however, something that nagged him like a forgotten errand or residual guilt. Much more immediate was his fear.
His breath came like liquid fire, burning his lungs, setting all his insides ablaze. His stomach was a glowing coal. There was a bellows in his head that kept providing a draft for the internal flames. Tiny red tongues burned in his feet, and the constant slap of them against the ground did not seem to help dampen the fire.
He burst through the end of the orchard almost as if a gossamer net had been strung as a barrier, stood at the bank that overlooked the winding creek, trying to think, desperately in search of some plan that would salvage what seemed to be beyond reclamation: his life.
He turned once, expecting the worst, expecting the killer to be looming over him, bringing up its brass finger for the last flash, but he could see nothing in the darkness of the apple trees. He held his breath so there would be no noise for the enemy to hear, picked up the crash of the other man's feet as he made his way through the brush. He found he had to breathe again and that, no matter how hard he tried, he could not draw breath quietly.
In desperation, he came up with a plan of sorts, the only thing that might work. He scrambled down the embankment and worked his way out on the ledge that led to the cave where he had found the three trunks and where he had slept for two weeks. Halfway along it, he stopped and looked overhead. There were rocks, roots, and branches of scrub brush to cling to. It didn't look like the easiest of plans, but it was all he had. He grabbed some protruding rocks and started climbing up.
Three minutes later, gasping, his hands raw from the climb, from skinning them on rocks, burning them on branches, he was perched eight feet above the ledge, only a foot from his head to the top of the embankment. If the killer did either of two things, Salsbury's plan might work. If he did neither, Victor knew his worries would be finished anyway, finished by a sharp, sparkling blade of yellow light
If the killer followed Salsbury's trail perfectly in some mysterious fashion, he would go down the rain cut and onto the ledge. In that case, Victor would drop on him from his higher perch, feet first. Hopefully, both feet ploughing into the stranger's head would weigh any subsequent fight in Victor's favor-and just might crush the man's skull straight away. If, instead, the killer came to the embankment and searched along it, standing near the edge, Victor could reach up with one hand, holding to the rocks with the other, grab an ankle, and attempt to topple his adversary into the creek thirty feet below. There were a lot of sharp, lovely rocks in that creek. And even if the fall did not kill him, it should sure as hell slow him down some.
Victor waited.
In a few moments, he heard the stranger coming out of the trees onto the smoother surface near the bank. He walked to the edge some ten feet to Victor's left and stood looking across the creek to the black wood beyond. Even in the darkness, here away from any light source but the thin moon, his eyes glowed dully.
Salsbury pressed himself flat against the cliff, hoped he looked like a rock. The killer began walking along the embankment, examining the far shore of the creek where several feet of mud would have left a trail of his escaping prey. He stopped a foot to the right of Salsbury's position, making it awkward for the man to reach up and grab his ankles. But he would move away, Salsbury realized, making contact even more difficult. Tensing, holding tightly to a branch with his left hand, Victor reached up quickly to grasp the killer's ankle.
For a moment, all seemed lost. His hand brushed the stranger's leg too lightly to gain a grip. The man jerked in reflex but moved closer instead of farther away. Salsbury grabbed again, yanked, felt the man's foot going out from under him. He risked a glance up, saw the killer flailing for balance. He pulled harder, almost lost his own hold, and sent the man crashing over the side into the water and rocks below.
Salsbury wasted no time in launching himself up, pulling over the cliff edge and kicking onto level land. He crawled back and looked into the creek. The killer was lying face down in the water, very still. Salsbury laughed; his throat was so dry that the laugh hurt, made] him cough. He sat up, watched the stranger for a few more moments, then started to get up with the idea of going down and examining him to see if he could learn anything. Then he saw the killer was starting to move
His face had been under the water long enough to ensure his death, but here he was kicking again. He rolled onto his back, his flat blue eyes staring up at Victor with malevolent intent.
Salsbury turned and ran back toward the house, his mind swelling like a balloon ready to burst. He wondered how long he could hold onto his sanity in this nightmarish scene where the pursuing monster could not be killed. His only chance now was the gun, still in his room, loaded.
The back door was locked. He screamed at it, rattled it, then knew that was no good.
He started around toward the front of the house, remembering that the intruder must have come out of the house that way to get in the car, then looked down toward the orchard.
The killer was coming.
Fast.
Salsbury had only seconds to spare.
The porch door was open, but the front door was locked.
He fancied he could hear the pounding feet of the killer closing on him.
Grabbing a patio chair, he smashed the window in the door, reached through, unlocked it, and went inside. He took the stairs two at a time, though his legs were ready to buckle. He glanced down once, saw his pajama top was a bright red and punctured with fragments of the car window. He had a moment of dizziness, stopped to hold the railing and shake away the vertigo that sought to claim him.
Then he heard the killer's feet on the front porch.
As he went by the master bedroom, Intrepid began barking again. Salsbury called out a word of encouragement, went into the other room and picked the pistol and shells up from the nightstand. When he came out into the corridor again, the stranger had just reached the top of the stairs.
He raised the pistol and fired twice. The boom of each discharge slammed against the walls and echoed through the big house as if all the doors were being slammed simultaneously. Two holes appeared in the stranger's chest, and he fell sideways against the railing. His face was still passive, as if he were watching a boring motion picture or contemplating the lint in his navel.
Slowly, he raised his firing arm.
Salsbury emptied the other four slugs into him in quick succession. The impact knocked the stranger backwards. He rolled over and over to the bottom of the steps, six chunks of lead in him.
Salsbury went and looked down on him.
Slowly but surely, the killer started to get up.
Die, damn you! Salsbury shouted hysterically.
The pistol clicked several times before he realized there were no more bullets. By then, the killer was starting back up the steps; he aimed his brass finger at Salsbury. A golden thread of light smashed the railing, threw a cloud of wooden chips into the air.
Salsbury retreated through the corridor to a point where he could not be seen until the killer topped the stairs again. He went down on one knee, fumbled shells out of the box and loaded the pistol again. When his target lumbered off the last riser, he placed six more chunks of metal in his chest.