Michael Prescott - Shiver

She had to have that necklace, dammit, simply had to. She ached to clasp it on her neck and feel its sinful weight against her breastbone.

“No,” she said again, but she barely heard herself; she was already walking up to the counter near the display case, where the male sales clerk was installing new batteries in an elderly man’s wristwatch.

She waited restlessly till the watch was ticking and the customer was satisfied. Then the clerk turned inquiringly to her. She asked in a voice that trembled only slightly, “How much is that necklace?”

He smiled. “Two hundred forty-nine dollars. It’s on sale.”

Oh, that was far too much. She couldn’t possibly. Just couldn’t. There was no way.

“I’ll take it,” she said.

The clerk raised an eyebrow. “Would you like to try it on first?”

“No. It’s fine. I’m sure it’s fine.”

He shrugged. “Okay.” He reached inside the display case and removed the necklace. It glittered magically. “Will that be cash, check, or charge?”

“Charge.”

The card was already in her hand. She gave it to the clerk, who ran a scanner over the bar code. Information on her charge account came up on the display screen of his computer terminal. The amber light glinted on his glasses as he briefly checked the file to see if her account was in good standing. It was, of course. She always paid on time.

The clerk smiled, apparently arriving at the same conclusion. “Here you are, Miss Alden,” he said, handing the card back.

A moment later the necklace was in a box, and the box was in a shopping bag, and the bag was in her hand.

“Thank you for shopping at Crane’s,” the clerk said as she walked away.

She nodded in reply, afraid to say anything, afraid to slow down, afraid she might change her mind, ask for her money back, do some crazy thing. And then she was out the door, free of the department store, having made her purchase, and she felt fine.

I did it, she thought proudly. I didn’t chicken out this time. I really for-God’s-sake did it.

When she went back to work, the words came easily. She tapped her foot as she wrote, keeping time to some melody playing in her head, a high, sweet, wonderfully secret melody only she could hear.

After a moment’s hesitation, Delgado selected the copy of the first audiocassette he’d received. He loaded it in the tape recorder. His finger pressed the button marked Play. Tape hiss rose in his ears like the phantom ocean caught in a conch shell. An anonymous official identified the tape as a duplicate before reciting the case number and other details.

Then a louder hiss sizzled through the headphones, signaling the start of the dubbed portion of the tape.

Julia Stern’s voice faded in. She’d stepped out of the bathroom, fresh from her morning shower, and the killer had grabbed her from behind. He must have told her not to scream for help, that the first sound she made above a whisper would mean death. Delgado could picture the young pregnant woman standing just outside the bathroom doorway in her blue terry-cloth towel, drawing shallow scared breaths as the Gryphon hissed in her ear and held the knife-if it was a knife-close to her throat.

Perhaps Julia had tried to reason with him, tried to find out what he wanted. The killer had told her. He wanted her to beg. To plead for her life.

Delgado doubted that the Gryphon had mentioned the tape recorder. But he’d been carrying one, all right-probably a small portable unit, either tucked in his coat pocket or snugged to his belt. It was unlikely that he’d used a handheld microphone; he would have needed one hand to grab Julia and the other hand for his weapon. But a built-in omnidirectional mike, standard in portables, would have worked just fine.

For about five minutes, the killer had recorded Julia’s voice as she asked him to please let her go. Five minutes was not a long time, but it must have stretched to hours for Julia Stern and her pounding heart.

Excerpts from that recording now crackled and hissed in Delgado’s ears.

“… didn’t see your face. So I can’t identify you. We’ve got a lot of nice things here. You can have any of it. There’s silverware in the kitchen. A color TV, a stereo. In the closet I’ve got some birthday presents for my husband: a camera, a watch, a new coat. Oh, God… Please, take anything you want and just go”-her voice cracked on that word-“and you’ll never get caught. I swear. I won’t even tell the police. I won’t tell anybody. Only, don’t hurt me… and my baby…”

Slowly Delgado fisted his hand, then raised his fist to his mouth. He chewed on his knuckles and finger joints. He wanted to turn off the tape, turn it off and throw the goddamned obscene thing in the garbage can and set fire to it, but he couldn’t. He listened. He had to hear it.

The killer’s words had been excised from the tape. The cuts and transitions were neatly done, indicating the use of a mixing board. There were too many audiophiles in L.A. to make it possible to track down the equipment.

Julia was begging now. There was a theatrical quality to her voice, even though her fear was unquestionably genuine. It was obvious that the Gryphon had explained the exact words he wanted Julia to say, words she’d haltingly recited.

“Please don’t kill me,” Julia Stern was saying. “I don’t… want to die. I’ll do whatever you say. I know you’re much more powerful than… than I am. You’re so strong. You frighten me. You’re the strongest and most terrifying person I’ve ever… encountered in my life.”

A momentary drop-off in volume indicated another edit. In the excised segment, the killer must have delivered new instructions. Based on what followed, Delgado assumed Julia had been told to say something personal about herself, her aspirations, her reasons to go on living. That was a particularly cruel aspect of the psychological torture the Gryphon inflicted. He let his victim remember and express, clearly and in detail, all the values life had to offer; then he ended that life.

“I’m only twenty-four,” Julia whispered. “I’ve got a husband, and we love each other; we really do. We got married two years ago this April, and we promised it would be forever, and it will be. And… and I’ve got a baby coming. A boy. We’re going to name him Robert. That’s my husband’s name… If you don’t care about me, at least think about my baby. You wouldn’t hurt a baby, would you? Would you?”

Desperation spiked her voice. Tears were audible, thickening the words to paste. Her breathing was faster, huskier. Perhaps the knife had been pressed closer, the blade drawing blood.

Another edit in the source material. Next came the bad part, the unbearable part. The killer must have let Julia in on his little secret, must have informed her that, despite her compliance with his demands, she was going to die. When she spoke again, Delgado heard her hopeless, helpless terror.

“No…” Less a word than a moan. “It’s not fair. I did what you wanted. I said all those things. You promised…” A sobbing little-girl voice. A whimper. The beginning of a scream: “Please-”

The scream tightened into a gargle. Wet. Rasping. Then faded out. Gone.

In the silence, a new voice, a man’s voice. The voice of the Gryphon.

He had not recorded his commentary at the crime scene. Analysis of the tape had shown a measurable difference in room tone as the recording segued from Julia’s murder to the Gryphon’s remarks.

The killer spoke in a whisper, his mouth apparently pressed close to the microphone, and nothing about his normal speaking voice could be determined except that he had no obvious accent or speech impairment. Occasionally the breathless words were interrupted by sloppy smacking sounds as the Gryphon licked his lips.