The Abominable Man Read Free

opened the first door in and the second out and walked straight across the shadowy corridor and into the lavatory.
    He went to the toilet and rinsed off his hands in cold water and started back, then stopped in the corridor to listen. The muffled sound of the night nurse’s radio could be heard a long way off. He was in pain again and his fear came back and he thought after all he could go in and ask for a couple of painkillers. They wouldn’t have any particular effect, but anyway she’d have to unlock the medicine cabinet and take out the bottle and then give him some juice, and that way at least someone would have to fuss over him for a little while.
    The distance to the office was about sixty feet and he took his time. Shuffled along slowly with the sweaty nightshirt slapping against his calves.
    The light was on in the duty room but there was no one there. Only the transistor radio, which stood serenading itself between two half-emptied coffee cups.
    The night nurse and the orderly were busy someplace else of course.
    The room began to swim and he had to support himself against the door. It felt a little better after a minuteor two, and he walked slowly back toward his room through the darkened corridor.
    The doors were the way he’d left them, slightly ajar. He closed them carefully, took the few steps to the bed, stepped out of his slippers, lay down on his back and pulled the blanket up to his chin with a shiver. Lay still with wide-open eyes and felt the express train rushing through his body.
    Something was different. The pattern on the ceiling had changed in some slight way.
    He was aware of it almost at once.
    But what was it that had made the pattern of shadows and reflections change?
    His gaze ran over the bare walls, then he turned his head to the right and looked toward the window.
    The window had been open when he left the room, he was certain of that.
    Now it was closed.
    Terror overwhelmed him immediately and he lifted his hand to the call button. But it wasn’t in its place. He’d forgotten to pick up the cord and the switch from the floor.
    He held his fingers tightly around the iron pipe where the buzzer ought to have been and stared at the window.
    The gap between the long drapes was still about two inches wide, but they weren’t hanging quite the way they had been, and the window was closed.
    Could someone from the staff have been in the room?
    It didn’t seem likely.
    He felt the sweat bursting from his pores, and his nightshirt cold and clammy against his sensitive skin.
    Completely at the mercy of his fear and unable to tear his eyes from the window, he began to sit up in bed.
    The drapes hung absolutely motionless, yet he was certain someone was standing behind them.
    Who, he thought.
    Who?
    And then with a last flash of common sense: This must be a hallucination.
    Now he stood beside the bed, ill and unsteady, his bare feet on the stone floor. Took two uncertain steps toward the window. Came to a stop, slightly bent, his lips twitching.
    The man in the window alcove threw aside the drapes with his right hand as he simultaneously drew the bayonet with his left.
    Reflections glittered on the long broad blade.
    The man in the lumberjacket and the checked tweed cap took two quick steps forward and stopped, legs apart, tall, straight, with the weapon at shoulder height.
    The sick man recognized him at once and started to open his mouth to bellow.
    The heavy handle of the bayonet hit him across the mouth and he felt his lips being torn to shreds and his dental plate breaking.
    And that was the last thing he felt.
    The rest of it went too fast. Time rushed away from him.
    The first blow caught him on the right side of his diaphragm just below his ribs, and the bayonet sank in to its hilt.
    The sick man was still on his feet, his head thrown back, when the man in the lumberjacket raised the weapon for the third time and sliced open his throat, from the left ear to the right.
    A bubbling, slightly