Bill Pronzini: The Stalker

Kilduff pulled the cold moist air hungrily into his lungs, still staring out at the shed, waiting, a growing weakness beginning to take command of his body, a frustrated helplessness permeating his mind. In that single moment of hesitation, he had glimpsed the limping man’s face clearly through the pelting, stinging rain.

He didn’t know him at all.

20

Andrea had come out of the drainage gulley and had climbed up onto the Preston dock—staring across to where the churning waters of the slough were hammering the skiff’s bow against the upright piling—when she heard the single muffled gunshot.

She swung around, her eyes jerking upward along the straight, slender path leading to the cabin. She could see the shack above and through the swaying vegetation; and all at once, in a sequence of quick, film-like flashes: running figure, Steve, coming through the cleared area at the side of the cabin; thrown forward, flat dive; mud-spray obliterating him, swallowing him; second figure, stopping, gun plainly visible; moving again, backward, up against the wall of the small woodshed standing in the cleared area; no movement at all . . .

The same thoughts, the same fears, the same indecision that Andrea had experienced only a few moments earlier raced through her mind again. Had Steve been shot this time? Was he dead? Was he only hiding beneath the cabin? What should she do? This was so strange, so hallucinatory, there was no reason to any of this, no sense, it was as if she were trapped in a nightmarish world of instant replays.

Steve, Steve, what should I do—?

Suddenly, intuitively, she knew that if she obeyed his command, took the boat to get help, she would return to find a dead man—because this was real, starkly, terribly real.

He would die if she left Duckblind Slough.

Steve would die.

No!

No, he mustn’t die! She had to help him, help him now , try to save him somehow; her eyes roamed wildly over the shoreline, searching for a weapon, anything, and she saw then the length of driftwood lying wedged into the mud just to the right of the dock, thick and gnarled, bark-free. She looked up at the cabin again—still no movement; the limping man was crouched at the side of the shed, peering raptly at the dwelling. I can circle up behind him, she thought, I can hit him over the head, knock him out, yes, I can do that—and before she could think any more about it, before she could examine the ultimate futility of her plan, she was jumping down off the dock, pulling the length of driftwood free of the mire, clasping it tightly in her fingers as she moved forward, going blindly, foolishly, suicidally, to help the man she loved . . .

The limping man stared fixedly at the spot where Orange had disappeared beneath the cabin, holding the Magnum against his right thigh, teeth clamped tightly, painfully together, as if trying to prevent the escape of the fury within his body.

Why won’t he die? he thought. Why won’t Orange die ?

How many times do I have to kill him?

One more time, just one more. He’ll be dead then, I’ll make absolutely certain he’s dead then. I’ll kill him until he’s dead. You won’t get away, Orange, you won’t escape . . .

Soft now. Careful. Does he have a weapon? Maybe yes and maybe no. A gun? No gun. He would have fired at me if he had a gun. No gun. Caution, though, can’t be sure, can’t go after him, have to wait, wait him out. I’ve waited ten years now, I can wait just a little while longer . . .

The knife!

The knife he had put into his overcoat pocket after cutting Andrea loose in the cabin, the fish knife!

The thought struck Kilduff all at once, and his hand groped feverishly at his mud-caked pocket. Had he somehow lost it in the fall when he’d been shot? In the dive beneath the cabin? His trembling fingers probed the sodden material of his overcoat and it was there, it was there ; he traced the outline of the blade, the handle, and then he drew the pocket open and took the knife out and held it in his hand. A small chance, such a pitifully small chance.

But a chance .

Oh you Orange you’re going to really die this time I’m really going to kill you this time you son of a bitch He would have to rush him.

There was no other alternative.

Kilduff held the fish knife tightly in his right hand, its bone handle slick against his palm. He was still unable to see the limping man. Twenty yards to the woodshed; it could have been two thousand. There was pain now in the area above his kidney where the bullet had entered, muted toothache pain, and the weakness had bathed his body in hot, mucilaginous sweat, had sent tiny numbing needles into his good arm and into his legs.

I’m going to die, he thought suddenly. I’m going to die and I don’t know why. I’ll never know why and I’ll never know who he is, this is just like . . . war. Yes, war, the mud and the rain and the cold and the waiting; this is how it was in Europe in 1945 and in Korea in 1953 and in Viet Nam in 1960—you don’t really know your enemy and you don’t really understand why you’re there; oh God, this is all so terribly, horribly futile, so useless , this is war. And because it is, there is no other way except to kill or be killed, and you want so very desperately to live.

Andrea had had enough time to get away in the boat, but it could be an hour or more before she would be able to summon help. He wasn’t sure he could keep from passing out for that length of time. And it was a certainty the limping man wouldn’t wait very much longer. This was the time to attack, then, catch the enemy off guard, the element of surprise; he had to make the first move, the bold stroke, if he was going to have any kind of chance at all.

Now was the time.

Right now.

He got his left leg under him, digging into the soft mud with the toe of his shoe, leaning the upper portion of his body slightly forward, wiping sweat from his eyes with the back of his sleeve, dropping his arm to hold the knife low and in close to his body, ready now, tensing, trembling, knowing instinctively that he would never make it, knowing he had to try, counting five, four, three—And he saw Andrea.

He saw her out of the corner of his eye, just leaving the tangled path which led to the dock, creeping through the grasses and through the slashing rain, holding a long piece of driftwood in both hands, looking frightened, looking determined. He knew instantly why she was there, what she was going to do, and he thought: You damned little fool, you crazy damned little fool! His eyes shifted toward the woodshed, but the limping man was still hidden; he hadn’t seen her yet, no, because if he had he would have shot her, the instant he saw her he would kill her, Christ in heaven, why didn’t she do what I told her to do, why?

Go back, Andrea, go back, go back!

But she kept coming, circling, thirty yards to the rear of the shed now, twenty-five, still coming, holding the length of driftwood clasped very tightly in her small hands, and he knew that the limping man would see her, hear her, any second now, twenty yards, any goddamned second now he would know she was there and he would kill her . . .

Kilduff shoved forward with his left foot, scrabbling on his hands and knees, out from beneath the concealing shelter of the shack’s stairs, lifting himself onto his feet as he emerged into the pelting rain, holding the knife out in front of him commando-style, his mind completely blank, moving on instinct, and in that moment the limping man took a step away from the shed wall, into Kilduff’s vision, turning his body as he saw or heard or sensed Andrea, not seeing Kilduff yet. The gun bucked in his hand, spurting fire like a deadly toy dragon, the sound of it terribly loud in Kilduff’s ears, but Andrea was already falling when he fired, an almost comic pratfall as her feet sluiced out from beneath her on the treacherous ground. She screamed once, a high piercing sound which rose higher and higher as the muted reverberation of the gunshot died away, crescendoing, and Kilduff thought: He’s killed her, he’s killed Andrea! because he hadn’t seen her slip, didn’t know the bullet had passed harmlessly over her head, only heard her scream and saw her fall.