Рэй Брэдбери - The Next in Line

«Coincidence,» she said.

They looked at one another for a few moments.

He looked away. «Plaster saints,» he said, drinking the water down.

After a while she said, «Joseph?» He said, «Yes?» and she said, «Come hold my hand, will you?» «Women,» he sighed. He came and held her hand. After a minute she drew her hand away, hid it under the blanket, leaving his hand empty behind. With her eyes closed she trembled the words, «Never mind. It's not as nice as I can imagine it. It's really nice the way I can make you hold my hand in my mind.» «Gods,» he said, and went into the bathroom. She turned off the light. Only the small crack of light under the bathroom door showed. She listened to her heart. It beat one hundred and fifty times a minute, steadily, and the little whining tremor was still in her marrow, as if each bone of her body had a blue-bottle fly imprisoned in it, hovering, buzzing, shaking, quivering deep, deep, deep. Her eyes reversed into herself, to watch the secret heart of herself pounding itself to pieces against the side of her chest.

Water ran in the bathroom. She heard him washing his teeth.

«Joseph!»

«Yes,» he said, behind the shut door.

«Come here.»

«What do you want?»

«I want you to promise roe something, please, oh, please.»

«What is it?»

«Open the door, first.»

«What is it?» he demanded, behind the closed door.

«Promise me,» she said, and stopped.

«Promise you what?» he asked, after a long pause.

«Promise me,» she said, and couldn't go on. She lay there. He said nothing. She heard the watch and her heart pounding together. A lantern creaked on the hotel exterior. «Promise me, if anything — happens,» she heard herself say, muffled and paralyzed, as if she were on one of the surrounding hills talking at him from the distance, «— if any-thing happens to me, you won't let me be buried here in the graveyard over those terrible catacombs!»

«Don't be foolish,» he said, behind the door.

«Promise me?» she said, eyes wide in the dark.

«Of all the foolish things to talk about.»

«Promise, please promise?»

«You'll be all right in the morning,» he said.

«Promise so I can sleep. I can sleep if only you'd say you wouldn't let me be put there. I don't want to be put there.»

«Honestly,» he said, out of patience.

«Please,» she said.

«Why should I promise anything so ridiculous?» he said. «You'll be fine tomorrow. And besides, if you died, you'd look very pretty in the catacomb standing between Mr. Grimace and Mr. Gape, with a sprig of morning-glory in your hair.» And he laughed sincerely.

Silence. She lay there in the dark.

«Don't you think you'll look pretty there?» he asked, laughingly, behind the door.

She said nothing in the dark room.

« Don't you?» he said.

Somebody walked down below in the plaza, faintly, fading away.

«Eh?» he asked her, brushing his teeth.

She lay there, staring up at the ceiling, her breast rising and falling faster, faster, faster, the air going in and out, in and out her nostrils, a little trickle of blood coming from her clenched lips. Her eyes were very wide, her hands blindly constricted the bedclothes.

«Eh?» he said again behind the door.

She said nothing.

«Sure,» he talked to himself. «Pretty as hell,» he murmured, under the flow of tap water. He rinsed his mouth. «Sure,» he said.

Nothing from her in the bed.

«Women are funny,» he said to himself in the mirror.

She lay in the bed.

«Sure,» he said. He gargled with some antiseptic, spat it down the drain. «You'll be all right in the morning,» he said.

Not a word from her.

«We'll get the car fixed.»

She didn't say anything.

«Be morning before you know it.» He was screwing caps on things now, putting freshener on his face. «And the car fixed tomorrow, maybe, at the very latest the next day. You won't mind another night here, will you?»

She didn't answer.

« Will you?» he asked.

No reply.

The light blinked out under the bathroom door.

«Marie?»

He opened the door.

«Asleep?»

She lay with eyes wide, breasts moving up and down.

«Asleep,» he said. «Well, good night, lady.»

He climbed into his bed. «Tired,» he said.

No reply.

«Tired,» he said.

The wind tossed the lights outside; the room was oblong and black and he was in his bed dozing already.

She lay, eyes wide, the watch ticking on her wrist, breasts moving up and down.

It was a fine day coming through the Tropic of Cancer. The automobile pushed along the turning road leaving the jungle country behind, heading for the United States, roaring between the green hills, taking every turn, leaving behind a faint vanishing trail of exhaust smoke. And inside the shiny automobile sat Joseph with his pink, healthy face and his Panama hat, and a little camera cradled on his lap as he drove; a swathe of black silk pinned around the left upper arm of his tan coat. He watched the country slide by and absent-mindedly made a gesture to the seat beside him, and stopped. He broke into a little sheepish smile and turned once more to the window of his car, humming a tuneless tune, his right hand slowly reaching over to touch the seat beside him…

Which was empty.