'Yes, it'll be nice,' he said politely. 'For both of us. I'll talk to Sylvia about it this weekend.'
'Will you, really?' Euphoric relief in her tone, her slim fingers coming across the table in search of his. 'I knew I hadn't made a mistake about you, Eric. I confess that at one time I thought that maybe I was just your once-a-week woman, a bit on the side and then shelved for another week. I know now that I was wrong. Let's treat tonight as a celebration because everything's working out. When we go upstairs tonight I really will feel that I'm Mrs Atkinson at long last.'
Mrs Marlene Atkinson! There was a glisten of perspiration on Eric's forehead as they went up in the elevator after dinner. Mr and Mrs Atkinson! Jesus Christ, he wouldn't be able to stall this one for long. I've spoken to Sylvia, Marlene, and she says that's fine but we've got to straighten a few things out first. It won't take long. Marlene wasn't the kind to hang about. Everything was going to blow up in his face, one way or the other, very soon.
Her naked body didn't look so alluring tonight and he knew he had got to put on another act, the clandestine lover who has finally got his woman for keeps. She was eager for him, helping him off with his clothes, her sensuous fingers straying all the time, then pulling him down on the bed with her.
'Just think, Eric, it'll always be like this with us from now on. And maybe you can get another job so that you won't have to be away from home all the time.' Not that I don't trust you but I want you all to myself.
She was good, very, very good. Any other night it would have been sheer ecstasy but tonight he had to struggle to keep up with her. You are getting fat. So he let her do all the work but she did not appear to notice because she was doing everything she wanted to do. Astride him, gyrating like an eastern belly-dancer, teasing him, tiring both of them so that finally they sank down exhausted, not bothering to retrieve the sheets off the floor because the night was too warm, anyway.
Eric Atkinson was dimly aware that it was light, a kind of guilty feeling that it was time to be up and doing. Sitting up, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes.
He didn't know where he was, didn't even try to work it out, just accepted the fact that he was in some strange place with four symmetrical walls around him and a hole through which the daylight shafted in. Frightening, suddenly.
Then he sa.w the woman, She was lying on her stomach, head buried in the pillow. Sleeping. He grunted, forgot his claustrophobia, reached out a thick coarse hand and touched her buttocks. She stirred slightly. His head hurt, a throbbing pain behind the eyes which distorted his vision but he fought against it. An urgent need had to be satisfied, a priority in any situation.
The woman was not fully awake but he had no reason to wait. His hands slipped beneath her thighs, dragged her up into a kneeling position, her head still resting on the pillow. She seemed to understand, parted her legs without disturbing her position, half-kneeling now, gave a kind of low whine which was interpreted as willingness, not that it would have mattered to him anyway.
He caught a glimpse of his reflection in the long mirror, almost shied away from it; not because he saw his own naked body matted with coarse fair hair like some subtropical tree-dwelling species but because for a moment he thought that a rival was contesting for his mate. Then he seemed to understand, did he not see his own features when he stooped to drink from a clear pool? He did not investigate further because he had other things on his mind.
He pushed hard with his thighs, thrust fiercely to penetrate her, pulling her back on to him as he found her entrance. A minute, possibly two, and then he was arching his back, shuddering, coming out of her because it was all over and there was no point in remaining coupled.
He sprang from the bed, rushed to the window. He saw towering bare brickwork interspersed with windows that had the misfortune to look out on to the rear of these buildings. An untidiness thirty feet below, an array of dustbins and empty cardboard cartons, litter everywhere.
Eric stretched out a hand, jerked it back with a cry of surprise as he touched the glass, an invisible barrier which frightened him. His teeth were bared in a snarl of defiance, glancing back towards Marlene as though she had the answer. She cringed, whined, would have offered herself to him again for he was the male of the species and it was his right. But he was satisfied in that respect, his uppermost desire right now to find some means of escape from this terrible place which he did not understand, a prison which denied him the freedom of the open spaces.
Throaty noises: 'What is this place and why are we here, woman?'
*I do not know.1 Cowering. If he flew into a rage he might strike her.
He prowled the room, knocked over the flimsy bedside table and stooped to examine it, half-afraid of an obstacle which he did not understand, backing away. His bulk caught against the door handle, sprung it. With a howl he leaped away, stared in disbelief as the door swung slowly open. Through the gap he spied dazzling white walls, the long carpeted corridor. Hesitating, again looking to his mate for support. There is a way out.' 'Where you go, I go.'
He nodded, aware how fast his heart beat, realising for the first time that his skin smarted. He held out his hairy arms, examined them; the thick hair was patchy, uneven, and he saw toe redness of his flesh, how it burned, itched in places. The discomfort angered him, but the need to escape from here dominated his limited instinctive powers of thought.
Stealthily, a stalking beast of prey, he crept out of the room, Marlene close behind him. A fluorescent tube flickered badly, hurt his eyes, decided him upon which way to go,
And then he saw the other woman! She was old, her blotched flesh wrinkled, her hair grey and sparse. Her breasts sagged, empty milk bags that were of no further use, legs skinny and weak. The head was almost bald, the mouth shrunken and toothless, gnarled hands clutching a stick, an extra artificial limb upon which she had been leaning to support her frail body.
She saw them and her eyes widened, toothless mouth opening to emit a scream of terror, the stick raised to protect herself.
Eric went into a crouch, saw a weapon which threatened them, this hag barring their escape route, one of the old ones seeking to strike them down. Fat had tautened into muscles, his reflexes were as sharp as any animal of the wild for his life depended upon them.
Powerful short legs springboarded him into action, had him airborne, mouthing unintelligible hatred for the old woman, spittle frothing down his shaggy beard. A killing cry, an arm brushing aside the wielded stick, clattering it against the wall so that it thudded to the floor. A clenched fist raised, coming down.
Just one blow, that was all that was necessary. He scarcely felt the impact, heard only the sharp snap as the brittle skull cracked, the head jerked right back. Something broke. His adversary was dead even as she fell, never felt the weight of his feet as they landed on her abdomen, ballooned her intestines into a tight ball so that the stomach wall split and spewed them out, blood and matter spraying the ceiling. He slipped in the slimy mess, fell headlong in the human offal. One bound and he was upright again, a stinking hairy thing fleeing for the stairs with its mate close behind. Steps going down, not knowing where they led but it was dangerous to remain here. A landing; down another flight, then stopping as he saw people below him in the halt, slippery bloody fingers clutching the stair-rail until the wooden struts threatened to snap. His wide nostrils flared, smelled death and fear in the stuffy indoor atmosphere.