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He had not gotten into the house on that occasion, had had to coo, when she was out to dinner and both of his keys were useable But now she was in there, and although she ht not have had the locks replaced, she had turned those special deadbolts froardless of the nu to the corner of the house, where a big arden It was divided into a lot of six-inch-square panes of glass by thin strips of dark, well lacquered wood The book-lined study lay on the other side He took a penlight from one pocket, flicked it on, and directed the narrow beath of the sill and the less visible horizontal center bar until he located the latch, then turned off the penlight He had a roll ofthe small pane that was nearest thelock When the six-inch square was coh it: one hard blow The glass shattered almost soundlessly and did not clatter to the floor, for it stuck onto the tape He reached inside and unlatched the , raised it, heaved hi a hell of a racket when he encountered a s in the center of the study, heart pounding, Frye listened for n that she had heard him

There was only silence

She was able to rise up from the dead and come back to life in a new identity, but that was evidently the limit of her supernatural power Obviously, she was not all-seeing and all-knowing

He was in her house, but she did not know it yet

He grinned

He took the knife froht hand

With the penlight in his left hand, he quietly prowled through every rooround floor

They were all dark and deserted

Going up the stairs to the second floor, he stayed close to the wall, in case any of the steps creaked He reached the top withouta sound

He explored the bedroo of interest until he approached the last roo under the door, and he switched off his flash In the pitch-black corridor only a nebulous silvery line marked the threshold of the last room, but it was more marked than any of the others He went to the door and cautiously tried the knob Locked

He had found her

Katherine

Pretending to be someone named Hilary Thomas

The bitch The rotten bitch

Katherine, Katherine, Katherine

As the nah his mind, he clenched his fist around the knife andher

Stretching out face-down on the floor of the hallway, Frye looked through the inch-high gap at the bottoe piece of furniture, perhaps a dresser, was pushed up against the other side of the entrance A vague indirect light spread across the bedroo its way around the edges of the dresser and under the door

He was delighted by what little he could see, and a flood of optimism filled him She had barricaded herself in the room, which meant the hateful bitch was afraid of hih she kne to co Or maybe she knew or sensed that this ti to be dah than he had been when he’d disposed of the many other women whose bodies she had inhabited Cut out her heart Pound a wooden stake through it Cut off her head Fill her arlic He also intended to take the head and the heart with hirisly trophies in separate and secret graves, in the hallowed ground of two different churchyards, and far away froht be interred Apparently, she are that he planned to take extraordinary precautions this ti him with a fury and a purpose the likes of which she had never shown before

She was very quiet in there

Asleep?

No, he decided She was too scared to sleep She was probably sitting up in bed with the pistol in her hands

He pictured her hiding in there like a , powerful, like an elemental force Hatred boiled blackly within him He wanted her to squirm and shake with fear as she had e to scream at her took hold of him; he wanted to shout her na curses at her He kept control of hiht sweat to his face and tears to his eyes

He got to his feet and stood silently in the darkness, considering his options He could throw hih it, and push the obstacle out of the way, but that would surely be suicidal He wouldn’t get through the fortifications fast enough to surprise her She would have plenty of tiun and put half a dozen bullets into hi he could do ait for her to come out If he stayed in the hallway and didn’t ht wear the edges off her watchfulness By et the idea that she was safe and that he wasn’t ever co back When she walked out of there, he could seize her and force her back to the bed before she kneas happening

Frye crossed the corridor in two steps and sat on the floor with his back against the wall

In a fewsounds in the dark, soft scurrying noises

Iination, he told hi creeping up his leg, under his trousers

It’s not really there, he told hi slithered under one sleeve and started up his ar ran across his shoulder and up his neck, onto his face, so small and deadly

It went for his ether It went for his eyes He squeezed his eyes shut It went for his nostrils, and he brushed frantically at his face, but he couldn’t find it, couldn’t knock it off No!

He switched on the penlight He was the only living creature in the hallway There was nothingon his face

He shuddered

He left the penlight on

At nine o’clock Thursday , Hilary akened by the telephone There was an extension in the guest room The bell switch accidentally had been turned all the way up toservice that she e broke into Hilary’s sleep and made her sit up with a start

The caller was Wally Topelis While having breakfast, he had seen thepaper’s account of the assault and attempted rape He was shocked and concerned

Before she would tell him any more than the newspaper had done, she made him read the article to her She was relieved to hear that it was short, just a se It was based entirely on the iven the reporters last night There was no mention of Bruno Frye--or of Detective Frank Howard’s conviction that she was a liar The press had co the kind of juicy angle that would have put the story at least a few pages closer to page one

She told Wally all of it, and he was outraged "That stupid goddamned cop! If he’d made any effort at all to find out about you, what kind of person you are, he’d have known you couldn’t possibly make up a story like that Look, kid, I’ll take care of this Don’t worry I’ll get some action for you"

"How?"

"I’ll call some people"

"Who?"

"How about the chief of police for starters?"

"Oh, sure"

"Hey, he owes me," Wally said "For the past five years in a roas it that organized the annual police benefit show? Who was it that got so? Who was it got singers and coicians all free for the police fund?"

"You?"