Patricia Highsmith - Strangers on a Train

They started off slowly and militantly to “The Washington Post March.” Up, up, up he went and down, down, down went Miriam on her giraffe. The world beyond the merrygo-round vanished in a light-streaked blur. Bruno held the reins in one hand as he had been taught to do in his polo lessons, and ate the frankfurter with the other.

“Yeeee-hooo!” yelled the redheaded fellow.

“Yeeee-hooo!” Bruno yelled back. “I’m a Texan!”

“Katie?” Miriam leaned forward on the giraffe’s neck, and her gray skirt got round and tight. “See that fellow over there in the check shirt?”

Bruno looked. He saw the fellow in the checked shirt. He looked a little like Guy, Bruno thought, and thinking of this, he missed what Miriam said about him. Under the bright lights, he saw that Miriam was covered with freckles. She looked increasingly loathesome, so he began not to want to put his hands on her soft sticky-warm flesh. Well, he still had the knife. A clean instrument.

“A clean instrument!” Bruno shouted jubilantly, for no one could possibly hear him. His was the outside horse, and next to him was a boxed double seat thing made out of swans, which was empty. He spat into it. He flung away the rest of the frankfurter and wiped the mustard off his fingers on the horse’s mane.

“Casey would waltz with the strawberry blonde, while the band—played—aaaaww!“Miriam’s date sang out with vehemence.

They all joined in and Bruno with them. The whole merrygo-round was singing. If they only had drinks! Everybody should be having a drink!

“His brain was so loaded, it nearly exploded,” sang Bruno at the cracking top of his lungs,“the poor girl would shake with alaaarm!”

“Hi, Casey!” Miriam cooed to Dick, opening her mouth to catch the popcorn he was trying to throw into it.

“Yak-yak!” Bruno shouted.

Miriam looked ugly and stupid with her mouth open, as if she were being strangled and had turned pink and bloated. He could not bear to look at her, and still grinning, turned his eyes away. The merrygo-round was slowing. He hoped they would stay for another ride, but they got off, linked arms, and began to walk toward the twinkling lights on the water.

Bruno paused under the trees for another little nip from the nearly empty flask.

They were taking a rowboat. The prospect of a cool row was delightful to Bruno. He engaged a boat, too. The lake looked big and black, except for the lightless twinkles, full of drifting boats with couples necking in them. Bruno got close enough to Miriam’s boat to see that the redheaded fellow was doing the rowing, and that Miriam and Dick were squeezing each other and giggling in the back seat. Bruno bent for three deep strokes that carried him past their boat, then let his oars trail.

“Want to go to the island or loaf around?” the redheaded fellow asked.

Petulantly, Bruno slumped sideways on the seat, waiting for them to make up their minds. In the nooks along the shore, as if from little dark rooms, he heard murmurs, soft radios, laughter. He tipped his flask and drained it. What would happen if he shouted “Guy!”? What would Guy think if he could see him now? Maybe Guy and Miriam had been out on dates on this lake, maybe in the same rowboat he sat in now. His hands and the lower part of his legs tingled cozily with the liquor. If he had Miriam here in the boat with him, he would hold her head under the water with pleasure. Here in the dark. Pitch dark and no moon. The water made quick licking sounds against his boat. Bruno writhed in sudden impatience. There was the sucking sound of a kiss from Miriam’s boat, and Bruno gave it back to them with a pleasurable groan thrown in. Smack, smack! They must have heard him, because there was a burst of laughter.

He waited until they had paddled past, then followed leisurely. A black mass drew closer, pricked here and there with the spark of a match. The island. It looked like a neckers’ paradise. Maybe Miriam would be at it again tonight, Bruno thought, giggling.

When Miriam’s boat landed, he rowed a few yards to one side and climbed ashore, and set his boat’s nose up on a little log so it would be easy to recognize from the others. The sense of purpose filled him once more, stronger and more imminent than on the train. In Metcalf hardly two hours, and here he was on an island with her! He pressed the knife against him through his trousers. If he could just get her alone and clap his hand over her mouth—or would she be able to bite? He squirmed with disgust at the thought of her wet mouth on his hand.

Slowly he followed their slow steps, up rough ground where the trees were close.

“We cain’t sit here, the ground’s wet,” whined the girl called Katie.

“Sit on mah coat if y’wanta,” a fellow said.

Christ, Bruno thought, those dumb Southern accents!

“When I’m walkin’ with m’honey down honeymoon lane…,” somebody sang, off in the bushes.

Night murmurs. Bugs. Crickets. And a mosquito at his ear. Bruno boxed his ear and the ear rang maddeningly, drowning out the voices.

“… shove off.”

“Why cain’t we find a place?” Miriam yapped.

“Ain’t no place an’ watch whatcha step in!”

“Watcha step-ins, gals!” laughed the redheaded fellow.

What the hell were they going to do? He was bored! The music of the merrygo-round sounded tired and very distant, only the tings coming through. Then they turned around right in his face, so he had to move off to one side as if he were going somewhere. He got tangled in some thorny underbrush and occupied himself getting free of it while they passed him. Then he followed, downward. He thought he could smell Miriam’s perfume, if it wasn’t the other girl’s, a sweetness like a steamy bathroom that repelled him.

“… and now,” said a radio,“coming in very cautiously… Leon… Leon lands a hard right to the Babe’s face and listen to the crowd.” A roar.

Bruno saw a fellow and a girl wallowing down there in the bushes as if they were fighting, too.

Miriam stood on slightly higher ground, not three yards away from him now, and the others slid down the bank toward the water. Bruno inched closer. The lights on the water silhouetted her head and shoulders. Never had he been so close!

“Hey!” Bruno whispered, and saw her turn. “Say, isn’t your name Miriam?”

She faced him, but he knew she could barely see him. “Yeah. Who’re you?”

He came a step nearer. “Haven’t I met you somewhere before?” he asked cynically, smelling the perfume again. She was a warm ugly black spot. He sprang with such concentrated aim, the wrists of his spread hands touched.

“Say, what d’you—?”

His hands captured her throat on the last word, stifling its abortive uplift of surprise. He shook her. His body seemed to harden like rock, and he heard his teeth crack. She made a grating sound in her throat, but he had her too tight for a scream. With a leg behind her, he wrenched her backward, and they fell to the ground together with no sound but of a brush of leaves. He sunk his fingers deeper, enduring the distasteful pressure of her body under his so her writhing would not get them both up. Her throat felt hotter and fatter. Stop, stop, stop! He willed it! And the head stopped turning. He was sure he had held her long enough, but he did not lessen his grip. Glancing behind him, he saw nothing coming. When he relaxed his fingers, it felt as if he had made deep dents in her throat as in a piece of dough. Then she made a sound like an ordinary cough that terrified him like the rising dead, and he fell on her again, hitched himself onto his knees to do it, pressing her with a force he thought would break his thumbs. All the power in him he poured out through his hands. And if it was not enough? He heard himself whimper. She was still and limp now.