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  Something screeched. Not Morrant. It was an ungodly, inhuman sound. It was a sharp, penetrating eruption of rage and hatred and alien need that belonged in a science fiction movie, the hideous cry of some creature from another world.

  Until this moment, Vince had assumed that Morrant was being beaten and tortured by other people, competitors in the drug business, who had come to waste Vince himself in order to increase their market share. But now, as he listened to the bizarre, ululating wall that came from the kitchen, Vince wondered if he had just stepped into the Twilight Zone. He felt cold all the way to his bones, queasy, disturbingly fragile, and alone.

  He quickly descended two more steps and looked along the hall toward the front door. The way was clear.

  He could probably leap down the last of the stairs, race along the hallway, unlock the front door, and get out of the house before the intruders came out of the kitchen and saw him. Probably. But he harbored a small measure of doubt, and because of that doubt he hesitated a couple of seconds too long.

  In the kitchen Morrant shrieked more horribly than ever, a final cry of bleak despair and agony that was abruptly cut off.

  Vince knew what Morrant's sudden silence meant. The bodyguard was dead.

  Then the lights went out from one end of the house to the other. Apparently someone had thrown the master breaker switch in the fuse box, down in the basement.

  Not daring to hesitate any longer, Vince started down the stairs in the dark, but he heard movement in the unlighted hallway, back toward the kitchen, coming in this direction) and he halted again. He wasn't hearing anything as ordinary as approaching footsteps; instead, it was a strange, eerie hissing-rustling-rattling-grumbling that chilled him and made his skin crawl. He sensed that something monstrous, something with pale dead eyes and cold clammy hands was coming toward him. Such a fantastic notion was wildly out of character for Vince Vastagliano, who had the imagination of a tree stump, but he couldn't dispel the superstitious dread that had come over him.

  Fear brought a watery looseness to his joints.

  His heart, already beating fast, now thundered.

  He would never make it to the front door alive.

  He turned and clambered up the steps. He stumbled once in the blackness, almost fell, regained his balance. By the time he reached the master bedroom, the noises behind him were more savage, closer, louder — and hungrier.

  Vague shafts of weak light came through the bedroom windows, errant beams from the streetlamps outside, lightly frosting the eighteenth century Italian canopy bed and the other antiques, gleaming on the beveled edges of the crystal paperweights that were displayed along the top of the writing desk that stood between the two windows. If Vince had turned and looked back, he would have been able to see at least the bare outline of his pursuer. But he didn't look. He was afraid to look.

  He got a whiff of a foul odor. Sulphur? Not quite, but something like it.

  On a deep, instinctual level, he knew what was coming after him. His conscious mind could not — or would not — put a name to it, but his subconscious knew what it was, and that was why he fled from it in blind panic, as wide-eyed and spooked as a dumb animal reacting to a bolt of lightning.

  He hurried through the shadows to the master bath, which opened off the bedroom. In the cloying darkness he collided hard with the half-closed bathroom door. It crashed all the way open. Slightly stunned by the impact, he stumbled into the large bathroom, groped for the door, slammed and locked it behind him.

  In that last moment of vulnerability, as the door swung shut, he had seen nightmarish, silvery eyes glowing in the darkness. Not just two eyes. A dozen of them. Maybe more.

  Now, something struck the other side of the door. Struck it again. And again. There were several of them out there, not just one. The door shook, and the lock rattled, but it held.

  The creatures in the bedroom screeched and hissed considerably louder than before. Although their icy cries were utterly alien, like nothing Vince had ever heard before, the meaning was clear; these were obviously bleats of anger and disappointment. The things pursuing him had been certain that he was within their grasp, and they had chosen not to take his escape in a spirit of good sportsmanship.

  The things. Odd as it was, that was the best word for them, the only word: things.

  He felt as if he were losing his mind, yet he could not deny the primitive perceptions and instinctive understanding that had raised his hackles. Things. Not attack dogs. Not any animal he'd ever seen or heard about.

  This was something out of a nightmare; only something from a nightmare could have reduced Ross Morrant to a defenseless, whimpering victim.

  The creatures scratched at the other side of the door, gouged and scraped and splintered the wood. Judging from the sound, their claws were sharp. Damned sharp.

  What the hell were they?

  Vince was always prepared for violence because violence was an integral part of the world in which he moved. You couldn't expect to be a drug dealer and lead a life as quiet as that of a schoolteacher. But he had never anticipated an attack like this. A man with a gun — yes. A man with a knife — he could handle that, too. A bomb wired to the ignition of his car — that was certainly within the realm of possibility. But this was madness.

  As the things outside tried to chew and claw and batter their way through the door, Vince fumbled in the darkness until he found the toilet. He put the lid down on the seat, sat there, and reached for the telephone. When he'd been twelve years old, he had seen, for the first time, the telephone in his uncle Gennaro Carramazza's bathroom, and from that moment it had seemed to him that having a phone in the can was the ultimate symbol of a man's importance, proof that he was indispensable and wealthy. As soon as he'd been old enough to get an apartment of his own, Vince had had a phone installed in every room, including the john, and he'd had one in every master bath in every apartment and house since then. In terms of self-esteem, the bathroom phone meant as much to him as his white Mercedes Benz. Now, he was glad he had the phone right here because he could use it to call for help.

  But there was no dial tone.

  In the dark he rattled the disconnect lever, trying to command service.

  The line had been cut.

  The unknown things in the bedroom continued to scratch and pry and pound on the door.

  Vince looked up at the only window. It was much too small to provide an escape route. The glass was opaque, admitting almost no light at all.

  They won't be able to get through the door, he told himself desperately. They'll eventually get tired of trying, and they'll go away. Sure they will. Of course.

  A metallic screech and clank startled him. The noise came from within the bathroom. From this side of the door.

  He got up, stood with his hands fisted at his sides, tense, looking left and right into the deep gloom.

  A metal object of some kind crashed to the tile floor, and Vince jumped and cried out in surprise.

  The doorknob. Oh, Jesus. They had somehow dislodged the knob and the lock!

  He threw himself at the door, determined to hold it shut, but he found it was still secure; the knob was still in place; the lock was firmly engaged. With shaking hands, he groped frantically in the darkness, searching for the hinges, but they were also in place and undamaged.

  Then what had clattered to the floor?

  Panting, he turned around, putting his back to the door, and he blinked at the featureless black room, trying to make sense of what he'd heard.

  He sensed that he was no longer safely alone in the bathroom. A many-legged quiver of fear slithered up his back.

  The grille that covered the outlet from the heating duct — that was what had fallen to the floor.

  He turned, looked up at the wall above the door. Two radiant silver eyes glared at him from the duct opening. That was all he could see of the creature. Eyes without any division between whites and irises and pupils. Eyes that shimmered and flickered as if they were
composed of fire. Eyes without any trace of mercy.

  A rat?

  No. A rat couldn't have dislodged the grille. Besides, rats had red eyes — didn't they?

  It hissed at him.

  “No, “ Vince said softly.

  There was nowhere to run.

  The thing launched itself out of the wall, sailing down at him. It struck his face. Claws pierced his cheeks, sank all the way through, into his mouth, scraped and dug at his teeth and gums. The pain was instant and intense.

  He gagged and nearly vomited in terror and revulsion, but he knew he would strangle on his own vomit, so he choked it down.

  Fangs tore at his scalp.

  He lumbered backward, flailing at the darkness. The edge of the sink slammed painfully into the small of his back, but it was nothing compared to the white-hot blaze of pain that consumed his face.

  This couldn't be happening. But it was. He hadn't just stepped into the Twilight Zone; he had taken a giant leap into Hell.

  His scream was muffled by the unnameable thing that clung to his head, and he couldn't get his breath. He grabbed hold of the beast. It was cold and greasy, like some denizen of the sea that had risen up from watery depths. He pried it off his face and held it at arm's length. It screeched and hissed and chattered wordlessly, wriggled and twisted, writhed and jerked, bit his hand, but he held onto it, afraid to let go, afraid that it would fly straight back at him and go for his throat or for his eyes this time.

  What was it? Where did it come from?

  Part of him wanted to see it, had to see it, needed to know what in God's name it was. But another part of him, sensing the extreme monstrousness of it, was grateful for darkness.

  Something bit his left ankle.

  Something else started climbing his right leg, ripping his trousers as it went.

  Other creatures had come out of the wall duct. As blood ran down his forehead from his scalp wounds and clouded his vision, he realized that there were many pairs of silvery eyes in the room. Dozens of them.

  This had to be a dream. A nightmare.

  But the pain was real.

  The ravenous intruders swarmed up his chest, up his back and onto his shoulders, all of them the size of rats but not rats, all of them clawing and biting. They were all over him, pulling him down. He went to his knees. He let go of the beast he was holding, and he pounded at the others with his fists.

  One of them bit off part of his ear.

  Wickedly pointed little teeth sank into his chin.

  He heard himself mouthing the same pathetic pleas that he had heard from Ross Morrant. Then the darkness grew deeper and an eternal silence settled over him.

  PART ONE

  Wednesday, 7:53 A.M.-3:30 P.M.

  Holy men tell us life is a mystery.

  They embrace that concept happily.

  But some mysteries bite and bark

  and come to get you in the dark.

  — THE BOOK OF COUNTED SORROWS

  A rain of shadows, a storm, a squall!

  Daylight retreats; night swallows all.

  If good is bright, if evil is gloom,

  high evil walls the world entombs.

  Now comes the end, the drear, Darkfall

  — THE BOOK OF COUNTED SORROWS

  CHAPTER ONE

  I

  The next morning, the first thing Rebecca said to Jack Dawson was, “We have two stiffs.”

  “Huh?”

  “Two corpses.”

  “I know what stiffs are,” he said.

  “The call just came in.”

  “Did you order two stiffs?”

  “Be serious.”

  “I didn't order two stiffs.”

  “Uniforms are already on the scene,” she said.

  “Our Shift doesn't start for seven minutes.”

  “You want me to say we won't be going out there because it was thoughtless of them to die this early in the morning?”

  “Isn't there at least time for polite chit-chat?” he asked.

  “No.”

  “See. the way it should be… you're supposed to say. “Good morning, Detective Dawson.” And then I say. “Good morning, Detective Chandler.” Then you say. “How're you this morning?” And then I wink and say—”

  She frowned. “It's the same as the other two, Jack. Bloody and strange. Just like the one Sunday and the one yesterday. But this time it's two men. Both with crime family connections from the sound of it.”

  Standing in the grubby police squad room, half out of his heavy gray overcoat, a smile incompletely formed, Jack Dawson stared at her in disbelief. He wasn't surprised that there had been another murder or two. He was a homicide detectives; there was always another murder. Or two. He wasn't even surprised that there was another strange murder; after all, this was New York City. What he couldn't believe was her attitude, the way she was treating him — this morning of all mornings.

  “Better put your coat back on,” she said.

  “Rebecca—”

  “They're expecting us.”

  “Rebecca, last night—”

  “Another ward one,” she said, snatching up, her purse from the top of a battered desk.

  “Didn't we—”

  “We've sure got a sick one on our hands this time,” she said' heading for the door. “Really sick.”

  “Rebecca—”

  She stopped in the doorway and shook her head. “You know what I wish sometimes?”

  He stared at her.

  She said, “Sometimes I wish I'd married Tiny Taylor. Right now, I'd be up there in Connecticut, snug in my all-electric kitchen, having coffee and Danish, the kids off to school for the day, the twice-a-week maid taking care of the housework, looking forward to lunch at the country club with the girls…”

  Why is she doing this to me? he wondered.

  She noticed that he was still half out of his coat, and she said, “Didn't you hear me, Jack? We've got a call to answer.”

  “Yeah. I—”

  “We've got two more stiffs.”

  She left the squad room, which was colder and shabbier for her departure.

  He sighed.

  He shrugged back into his coat.

  He followed her.

  II

  Jack felt gray and washed out, partly because Rebecca was being so strange, but also because the day itself was gray, and he was always sensitive to the weather. The sky was flat and hard and gray. Manhattan's piles of stone, steel, and concrete were all gray and stark. The bare-limbed trees were ash-colored; they looked as if they had been severely scorched by a long-extinguished fire.

  He got out of the unmarked sedan, half a block off Park Avenue, and a raw gust of wind hit him in the face. The December air had a faint tomb-dank smell. He jammed his hands into the deep pockets of his overcoat.

  Rebecca Chandler got out of the driver's side and slammed the door. Her long blond hair streamed behind her in the wind. Her coat was unbuttoned; it flapped around her legs. She didn't seem bothered by the chill or by the omnipresent grayness that had settled like soot over the entire city.

  Viking woman, Jack thought. Stoical. Resolute. And just look at that profile!

  Hers was the noble, classic, feminine face that seafarers had once carved on the prows of their ships, ages ago, when such beauty was thought to have sufficient power to ward off the evils of the sea and the more vicious whims of fate.

  Reluctantly, he took his eyes from Rebecca and looked at the three patrol cars that were angled in at the curb. On one of them, the red emergency beacons were flashing, the only spot of vivid color in this drab day.

  Harry Ulbeck, a uniformed officer of Jack's acquaintance, was standing on the steps in front of the handsome, Georgian-style, brick townhouse where the murders had occurred. He was wearing a dark blue regulation greatcoat, a woolen scarf, and gloves, but he was still shivering.

  From the look on Harry's face, Jack could see it wasn't the cold weather bothering him. Harry Ulbeck was chilled by wh
at he had seen inside the townhouse.

  “Bad one?” Rebecca asked.

  Harry nodded. “The worst. Lieutenant.”

  He was only twenty-three or twenty-four, but at the moment he appeared years older; his face was drawn, pinched.

  “Who're the deceased?” Jack asked.

  “Guy named Vincent Vastagliano and his bodyguard, Ross Morrant.”

  Jack drew his shoulders up and tucked his head down as a vicious gust of wind blasted through the street. “Rich neighborhood,” he said.

  “Wait till you see inside,” Harry said. “It's like a Fifth Avenue antique shop in there.”

  “Who found the bodies?” Rebecca asked.

  “A woman named Shelly Parker. She's a real looker. Vastagliano's girlfriend, I think.”

  “She here now?”

  “Inside. But I doubt she'll be much help. You'll probably get more out of Nevetski and Blaine.”

  Standing tall in the shifting wind, her coat still unbuttoned, Rebecca said, “Nevetski and Blaine? Who're they?”

  “Narcotics,” Harry said. “They were running a stakeout on this Vastagliano.”

  “And he got killed right under their noses?” Rebecca asked.

  “Better not put it quite like that when you talk to them,” Harry warned. “They're touchy as hell about it. I mean, it wasn't just the two of them. They were in charge of a six-man team, watching all the entrances to the house. Had the place sealed tight. But somehow somebody got in anyway, killed Vastagliano and his bodyguard, and got out again without being seen. Makes poor Nevetski and Blaine look like they were sleeping.”