Somehow, William couldn’t imagine Frosticos simply quitting — going home to bed. Surely Frosticos couldn’t take the chance of William slipping away down a sidestreet, jogging over a block or two, and continuing on. Someone, it occurred suddenly to William, must be shadowing him and had been all along. Then furtive steps in the darkness could easily belong to anyone. To whom? Yamoto? William set his teeth. Of course.
He shined the flashlight down the sewer as if it were a revolver drawn to mow down a gunslinger. Nothing was there — only the same silent darkness. The half-expected white trousers were nowhere to be seen. But how far did his light shine, forty feet? Maybe not even that. He threw his apple core against the far wall of the pipe and got to his feet. He was unspeakably weary, mainly because he’d stopped to rest. He’d lost momentum.
Fifty yards farther along, he spun round again with his light, and again there was no one. Ahead was the mouth of a small pipe leading off to the right. He was suddenly certain that Frosticos was in it — lying in it perhaps. Or that he’d come racing down it toward William on all fours, like a dog, his eyes wide and wild, his teeth sharpened, moving unnaturally fast. William could see it. He knew it was coming. Ten feet away now.
Did he hear footsteps again, shuffling up behind him? Frosticos, perhaps, eyeless, a bleached skull grinning and chattering, sitting atop the white collar. He couldn’t make himself turn. He was two steps away from the tunnel, edging across toward the far side of the pipe. The sight of Frosticos rushing toward him as if up the barrel of a telescope, growing as he rushed, frothing and barking, played against the back of his eyelids like old, scratchy, jumpy film. It would freeze him solid when it came — turn him into a lump of salt like Lot’s unfortunate wife.
Then he was past it. He strode on, his eyes clutched shut, still anticipating the sudden scramble that would announce the end, the sudden touch of a moist hand round his neck. But there was nothing. No one had been in the tunnel. He’d been tormenting himself with imagined fears. He turned and lit the corridor behind to prove it to himself, and saw, he was sure of it, a white patch of moving cloth, just out of flashlight range, disappearing as if someone had stopped suddenly and retreated. It was Yamoto. It had to be. Frosticos was waiting ahead.
William began to run, stopped abruptly, swung around, and once again caught sight of the vanishing white patch like the wisping away of a ghost. If it was Yamoto, William would deal with him. It was one thing for the man to torment him by day in his own home, masquerading as a gardener, clipping the shrubs and peering in at the windows. It was another to follow him into the sewers — quite likely with murderous intent. But William would deal with him. He’d done it before. He grinned at the thought of Yamoto’s screaming terror when he’d surprised William in the cab of his truck. And his gibbering complaint when William pulped the begonias — what had that been but fear? William would show him fear.
There ahead was another pipe leading away. It was time to act, decidedly time. In a moment there would be one less villain afoot in the sewers. He’d use the flashlight on him. He had the spare penlight, after all, and there was every chance that once he was rid of Yamoto, he could give Frosticos the slip. He could as easily jog down to Crenshaw, all the way out to the coast highway. With no one to alert Frosticos, his game would become impossibly complicated.
William switched off his light, plunging the sewer into darkness. He ran his hand along the wall until it slipped into the open pipe, and in an instant he clambered into it, his heart clanging, not allowing himself to think of the waiting Frosticos. There was no sound at all. He strained to hear the quiet pad of approaching feet. It was impossible that Yamoto could have seen him — unlikely that he could have guessed his intent. William crouched at the edge of the pipe and peered out into the larger tunnel. He could see nothing. He was struck with the sudden certainty that a heavy blade, an ax perhaps, would whistle down out of the darkness and sever his head where it poked out. He pulled farther into the pipe.
Who could say what sort of weapon Yamoto carried? A meat cleaver? He’d seen too many movies His elbow struck something solid. He froze in a crouch. It hadn’t been flesh. It felt more like wood — debris, perhaps, wedged into the pipe. He jabbed at it, making out the edge of some rectilinear object with his elbow. There was no sound beyond.
He couldn’t wait in the pipe, that much was certain. Surprise was everything. If Yamoto had stopped to wait him out, William might as well be on his way. Yamoto, after all, might easily have seen the tunnel ahead, might have understood William’s turning off the flashlight. He’d have to take a different tack, perhaps continue on in the darkness, feeling the wall like a blind man until another opportunity presented itself.
Still there was no sound of footsteps. He clicked on his light, poked his head out, and illuminated the empty tunnel. Then he turned and shined the light behind him, at whatever it was that blocked the smaller pipe.
It was a steamer chest, open, standing on end. William screamed in spite of himself, spilling out of the mouth of the pipe and into the stream of water. He was up at once, bathing the chest in light. In it, strapped upright with leather belts, were the remains of something — some fleshy horror. A corpse that might once have been human, but might just as easily have been a beast. It slumped there in its bonds, a ruin of scars and transplanted limbs, its mouth lolling open, nothing but a toothless slit in its face, its nose a black hollow, its eyesockets empty. The thing had no ears, and its arms, strapped across its chest, ended in webbed fingers. William backed away down the pipe, staring at the steamer trunk. It was meant as an advertisement — that much was obvious. He began to run, jogging at first, then racing along, pounding south toward the ocean and the diving bell that would transport him to another world. He didn’t think. There was no use thinking. He couldn’t reason through it. They’d gotten to him again. Who had it been in the trunk? What poor, harmless thing was it that had been reduced to such a state? Certainly not Reginald Peach. The idea of it made him sick. But it couldn’t be. He was too valuable to sacrifice for such a lark. This had been a failure, put to good use despite the failing.
William slowed finally, unable to maintain the pace, and sure once again of the sound of distant footfalls: Yamoto. A voice sounded behind him. William couldn’t make it out above the sound of his own labored breathing and footsteps. He stopped, listening. He had no idea where he was. His pocket watch showed that it was after eleven. He’d been making good time. Perhaps he was nearing his goal and had crossed under the coast highway into Rolling Hills. There was the voice again, calling his name. The footfalls grew louder. It had come down to the final confrontation. He braced himself for it, for the first chill glimpse of whatever it was — Frosticos, Yamoto, Lord-knew-what — that would materialize from the dark, distant tunnel. There it came.
It was Elijah, hairy and wild and ancient. William jerked upright, aiming his light, unbelieving. It wasn’t Elijah; it was William Ashbless, limping. In his right hand was a leather sap. The bastard! It had been Ashbless all along, terrifying him. And here he was, setting out to cosh William into jelly. We’ll see, thought William, setting his feet and glancing over his shoulder in case another attacker approached from up the tunnel. He was dead tired, and his eyes felt as if they were loaded with sand, but he was damned if he couldn’t fight off an ancient poet with a sap.