TH03 - To Steal Her Love Read Free

excitement was about to culminate . But now wasn’t the time for culmination or relief, it was the time for fingers tickling in his stomach and for being on his guard. Tweety looked around, this time without waving his arms about. He carefully scrutinised the street, the cars and the houses, and the windows in particular , but he couldn’t see any lights, not even the old lady who often couldn’t get to sleep and who snuck about peering out at the street so that she wouldn’t have to face death so frightfully alone.
    He crossed the street and hoped that Silkybum lived on that side of the building, but didn’t turn round to look up at the windows just yet, it would have been too soon, and he imagined the lift arriving and the Corpse holding open the accordion door. C HILDREN UNDER TWELVE MUST BE ACCOM AN ED … read the defaced instructions. And now Silkybum was extending the key towards the lock, and perhaps she was annoyed that the smell of next-door’s meat gravy made the entire stairwell smell like sweaty armpits.
    Tweety stopped by the wall of the house opposite and turned around. Silkybum’s house was imposing; five stories high with large, recently replaced windows that gleamed with darkness. He tilted his head; heimagined them walking into the hallway and he sensed that a light would flicker on somewhere very soon, unless her flat really did face on to the courtyard . Still, that wouldn’t be a problem; he could get into the courtyard through the stairwell. Another option would have been to make his way up to the floor where the lift had stopped, and after that it wouldn’t be hard to work out where she lived by listening behind the doors.
    A light came on! It was on the third floor, the window on the far right; something inside him registered this immediately. Already he began envisaging the landing, and he knew that Silkybum’s door would be the last on the left after coming out of the lift. The light shining through from the hallway was pale at first, but soon afterwards a lamp was switched on in the living room. It was one of those rice paper globes that women seemed to like so much, and he had often wondered how a thing like that would blaze if he were to hold a flame to its lower rim as a leaving gift.
    A figure came to the window and pulled down the blinds. Tweety sensed that it was Silkybum; there was something so graceful about the figure and, after all, it was her flat. The Corpse was probably taking off the fabric excrement he was wearing, but Tweety didn’t want to think about him any more. Neither did he want to stand around loitering for too long; someone might ask him what he was doing or at the very least notice him standing there. Besides, he knew from experience that waiting was bad for him; the power might drain away between his toes, and at the moment he set off he didn’t want to be Asko again, the man who forced his way into his skin and took over his body for days at a time, who stole his clothes and used them as if they were his own, leaving him nothing but rags.
    Tweety started walking up the hill. He stared fixedly at the pavement, but in fact he was looking inside himself, examining all that he could uncover in his mind. His mind was an unusual one. Like old sailing ships it had a bridge and a deck and innumerable levels in between which were so dimly lit that you had to carry a lantern at all times. The lowest decks were so far down that the faint smell of formic acid hung in the air and all around came the sound of rustling and whispering, and on Sundays you could hear music that sounded like the insects’ harmonica orchestra.
    On the first deck, a naked woman sat in a glass chair, but Tweety didn’t pay her the slightest attention; he couldn’t very well crawl around outside. He knew exactly what he wanted. After a day at work, he wanted to come home to Wheatlocks.

    ‘Hello, my love,’ said Wheatlocks as she greeted him at the door; she must have heard his Mercedes pull up