“I will,” Lorraine promised, having no desire to see that frightful stranger again.
She listened as the old woman descended the creaking staircase. The sound subsided after a few moments, but then Lorraine heard the very clear sound of the front door being slammed.
She went to the kitchen for a drink of water. A few minutes later, a knock beckoned her to the door, but she stopped in her tracks halfway across the room. Bettina had said not to let anyone inside. What if that bad man had gotten into the building?
“I know you’re in there,” a voice called. “Open the door.”
Lorraine held her breath, not daring to move.
Go away!
“It’s the landlord,” the voice said. “We’ve got a problem I have to check out.”
Lorraine went to the door.
“Are you really the landlord?” she asked.
The man said some words Lorraine didn’t understand, and added in an exasperated tone, “You want to see an ID, kid? Open the door.”
“I can’t,” Lorraine said. “Come back when Bettina is home.”
“Hey, kid,” the man said, “if we wait till Bettina comes home, there ain’t gonna be no home. It’s a gas problem. We traced a leak to this apartment.”
Lorraine tried to understand this, but it didn’t make sense to her.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean the apartment’ll blow up!” the man cried. “Now, are you gonna open the door or do I get my key?”
Lorraine thought: If he has his own key, he’ll get in anyway. She decided to open the door. The landlord was a frail man who seemed nearly ninety years old, but who was, in truth, just fifty. He brushed by her, leaving a trail of tobacco and liquor and after-shave-smells. Lorraine climbed up onto the couch, kneeling on the cushions and resting her elbows on the back while she watched him work at the stove. Pulling tools from a wooden box, he looked over his shoulder.
“Hey, kid,” he said. “You wanna come here and hold something for me?”
“Okay,” Lorraine said, jumping from the couch and bounding over to him. She was glad to have something new to do. “What do you want me to hold?”
“This,” the man said.
He turned, one hand reaching into the unzipped fly of his pants. He took something out.
“Huh?” Lorraine asked, completely confused. She’d never seen anything like the pinkish-purplish thing in his hand.
“Hold it, kid,” the man said. His voice sounded funny, rasping. His eyes had gone sleepy.
Lorraine backed away with a cry. Though many of her memories had been lost in the last few days, something deep down told her this was sick, a bad thing.
“Go away!” she cried. “You get out of here!”
“I said ‘hold this,’ you little . . .”
His hand shot toward her, fingers curled like talons to grab her long dark hair. Lorraine screamed, backing away and stumbling to the floor.
The man was about to shout something, but suddenly his words were obliterated by a sudden cry of pain. His face went completely pale, and his eyes grew so wide the whites showed all the way around. He began to make odd gasping noises, turning his body, with great effort, toward the stove. Confused, the little girl backed away and watched an impossible scene unfold.
The man had been resting his free hand on one of the cold burners of the stove. But now it had somehow changed, to become an iron shackle lined with sharp spikes. Lorraine watched, speechless, and the “cuff” grew tighter and tighter around her assailant’s wrist. He screamed, trying to wrench it free. The more he struggled, the more blood gushed from the circle of wounds.
“Oh, shit!” the man screamed in agony. “Oh, shit!”
The landlord’s view of the apartment faded away, replaced by waving blue and white light. In that light, he knew, lay all the most horrible, dangerous, vile things imaginable. And they were coming to get him. They were going to tear him apart.
I’m gonna die!
“What’s wrong with you?” Lorraine demanded. “Stop doing that! Get out of here!”
The man went on screaming, waiting for the . . . things to get him.
“Go away!” he cried.
“You go away!” Lorraine shouted, not understanding.
At that moment the shackle became the top of the burner again, and the man was free. The blue-and-white mist faded away, but not the sense that the horrors within were waiting for him. But he wouldn’t let them catch him, no sir. Without even looking at the child he’d come here to molest, he raced from the apartment, completely out of his mind.
Lorraine bent over, clutching her stomach to keep the sickness she felt from rising. She heard the man’s screams all the way down the stairs. The door slammed, and seconds later Lorraine heard the man shouting something, followed by a screech of tires.