Words

by John Inman

  A glimpse of yellow light up ahead caught the driver’s attention. Responding to a more careful tap of the brakes, the car crunched to a stop on the frozen earth. The headlights died, and in the sudden darkness, other lights appeared. They were house lights, and they came from up ahead, around a bend in the lane. The lights, filtered through the trees, looked warm and homey and welcoming, like a Walton Christmas special.

  The traveler, nibbling on a final handful of candy corn, quietly eased the car door open while listening for the sound of a dog, maybe, or the bang of a screen door in the distance. But the night was muffled to silence by the snow. The only sound to be heard was the tick and click of the Taurus’s engine, cooling down after the ignition was switched off.

  The air that slipped into the cab when the car door opened made the traveler shiver. Jesus, even with the ski mask and gloves on it was cold. When a long leg swung out to set a foot on the ground, the snow tumbled over the top of the shoe all the way up to the ankle.

  Stepping from the car, the driver lifted a collar against the wind. Having checked out the property the day before, the traveler anticipated no surprises concerning the layout. At the time, the biggest surprise was what a dump the place was. A book critic lives here? the traveler had thought. Unthinkable! But of course, the book critic did live here. And that, of course, went a long way to explaining why he was the miserable son of a bitch he was. After all, poverty and jealousy go hand in hand, do they not?

  The man was probably a failed writer, like so many of them were. Well, the lean traveler thought, if it’s publicity he craves, let’s see what I can do to get his name in the public eye one last time.

  The car was out of sight of the house as planned. There were no other sounds or lights for miles around. It was time to proceed. From the back seat, the traveler retrieved an old pair of coveralls, stolen from a clothesline on the drive down from Indianapolis, and put them on, along with a pair of buckled rubber boots picked up in an Army Navy surplus store on the outskirts of Mooresville. It was the same place the ski mask came from. The clothes would be discarded later, miles from here at some as-yet-unchosen location, where they would lay undiscovered until spring melted the snow, if they were ever found at all.

  Ready now and squinting into the wind, with icy flakes brushing eyelids through the mask, the traveler set off up the winding lane. Sinking ankle-deep again and again, booted feet chuffed through the snow, and spurts of breath sent puffs of fog through chattering teeth and eagerly smiling lips. Considering the weather, the snow, and the stupid flapping galoshes, the traveler’s step had a jaunty spring to it.

  Show time.

  THE TRAVELER didn’t hear the dog yapping from inside the house until setting foot on the first step leading up to the porch. There was no porch light, so the only way to navigate was by the yellow glow of some interior illumination filtering through a limp, gauzy curtain. The curtain was made of what looked like age-yellowed lace, tattered and raveled around the edges.

  By the time the traveler had reached the top step and clomped across the wooden porch, the dog was clawing at the front door and yapping like crazy. It sounded like a little fucker, maybe a shih tzu, or a dachshund, so that was encouraging. Hard to get mauled to death by a dachshund. The porch light came on overhead, and a face peered out through the curtained window on the front door before the traveler could lift a gloved hand to rap on the door.

  The face was older than expected. Older and uglier. Surprisingly, the wizened old face peeked through the curtain at about waist level. The guy must be a munchkin.

  The traveler smiled through the cold and waved a friendly hand at the old man peering out. The curtain fell closed, and the man could be heard mumbling something on the other side of the door, after which the yapping little dog finally shut the hell up. A moment later, the doorknob rattled and the door swung open to reveal a man, crippled up with either arthritis or some other horrendous ailment of decrepitude, sitting crookedly in a battered wheelchair like a starving old crow perched precariously on a limb.

  “BooksOnWheels,” the visitor mumbled near silently. “Of course.”

  The man was eighty if he was a day. He was huddled in a chrome wheelchair that had seen better times. A food-stained tartan spread lay draped over his knobby matchstick legs, and a little Chihuahua sat parked in his crotch, growling at the intruder standing at the door.

  The old man was clearly surprised by his late guest but gathered his wits about him quickly enough. “Yes?” he asked. “May I help you?”

  The visitor offered a reassuring smile, which was barely visible through the mouth hole in the mask. “My car broke down. I saw your lights through the trees. I was wondering if I could use your phone.”

  The old man leaned sideways and gazed out at the falling snow. “It’s really coming down, isn’t it?” He stared back up at his visitor and took a moment to analyze what he was seeing. The visitor got the impression it was more the cold air blowing through the door than any sense of reassurance the old man gleaned by his caller’s appearance that prompted his next words. “You’d best get inside before you freeze to death. Yes. Yes, of course I have a phone. Come inside.” He looked once again out into the night. “Are you alone?”

  “All by my onesies.” The traveler smiled around a shrug and, without waiting for a second invitation, stepped across the threshold. Ignoring the growling little mutt, the traveler stepped around the wheelchair into the room.

  The old man closed the door and awkwardly pivoted the chair around to face his guest. “You must be cold, walking around in those coveralls without so much as a winter coat on your back.” He pointed to a gas fireplace burning in the corner. “Go get yourself warmed up,” he said.

  “Thanks,” the visitor mumbled, stepping toward the fire. With the gloves stripped off and stuffed into the coverall’s icy pockets, standing in front of the fireplace with hands spread wide and shoved up close to the flames was delightful. The heat felt good.

  “Mask too,” the old man said. “You’ll be more comfortable.”

  “No. I’d rather not.”

  “Oh. All right,” the old man said in surprise, then hurriedly shushed himself as if not to be rude.

  Mask still in place, the traveler turned and gazed down at the old gnome and his nasty little dog. Beneath the tartan lap robe, the old dude was wearing a ratty bathrobe with a woolen scarf tucked in around his neck to keep out the cold. The face above the scarf was cadaverous, yet oddly sweet. Just by looking at him, one would never suspect how many writing careers he had destroyed, how many creative hearts he had maimed and mocked beyond repair.

  The visitor’s gaze traveled around the room. There was an ancient Dell computer on a desk in the corner. The desk looked oddly incomplete without a desk chair, but of course the old guy on wheels didn’t need one, did he? Bookcases lined the walls, each and every shelf stacked to overflowing. More books were piled here and there like stalagmites rising up off the floor. Everything in the room was coated with dust and pet hair.

  “Are you out here all by yourself?” the traveler asked.

  “Well, I have my friends,” the old fart said, scratching the Chihuahua’s ears and pointing to a corner.

  The visitor turned to see what he was pointing at and saw a ratty cat lurking under a chair. It looked like it had mange. Another cat appeared perched atop an old chifforobe standing against the wall, and yet another cat was parked in a doorway leading off to some other part of the house. Only then did the ammonia reek of uncleaned cat boxes and pet urine become noticeable. Beneath an old sofa lay a tiny pile of Chihuahua turds. They must have been there for months. They were as dry as dust.

  “Your friends,” the traveler said wryly. “So I see.” And with that, cold eyes came back to settle on the man in the wheelchair, who was still sitting there staring at his unexpected guest. He looked more and more nervous as the minutes passed.

  Seeming confused by the intensity of his visitor’s gaze, the old man asked
, “Can I get you some coffee?”

  “No.”

  “Would you care to use the facilities?”

  “Fuck no.”

  The abruptness of the answer addled the old fart. “Oh,” he said. “Then I guess you want the phone.”

  “No,” the traveler said again. This time a hand dipped into the pocket containing the ice pick. Its slender blade felt cold on fingers now warmed from the fire. Cold and sharp. A chill stuttered through the traveler’s body. It was a pleasant chill. An expectant chill. It had nothing to do with winter nights or falling snow or arctic gusts of frigid air, and everything to do with sheer unbridled anticipation.

  “I’ve read your reviews, Mr. Price. You have quite a way with words.”

  The old man blinked in surprise. “How do you know what I do? And how do you know my name? I thought your car had—”

  “Please be quiet,” the traveler said. “Your voice is really most aggravating.”

  The old man tensed in his chair. “What? What did you say?”

  “My car is fine. I just stopped by to right a few wrongs.”

  “I don’t understand.” But perhaps he did, for suddenly the first flash of fear showed on Price’s wrinkled face. His rheumy old eyes flicked to a table in the corner. The visitor followed his gaze to an old rotary-dial phone—in designer black, straight out of the forties—parked on the table like an antique on display at the Smithsonian.

  “Don’t even think about it,” the traveler lazily said through a smile.

  Casually, as if enjoying the chat, the traveler leaned against a gigantic Mediterranean-style console TV sitting in the corner of the room. With crossed ankles, the visitor stared about the seedy room while speaking conversationally, “You’re like the head lemming, you know.”

  “What?” the old man asked. “What did you say?”

  But the visitor ignored him. “When you write a scathing review, other lemmings follow along. And other lemming reviewers follow along after that, each of you plagiarizing the other just to sound as if you have coincidentally come to the same conclusions, which in its own odd way adds verisimilitude to your original lies. By the time the prospective book buyer finishes reading your conglomerate of cruel comments and poorly-arrived-at criticisms, the unfortunate writer has no hope of making a sale, or advancing his numbers on Amazon, or seeing his beloved book delivered into the hands of people who might actually appreciate it for what it is. The book, the novel, the story, has been irretrievably sullied. And you’re the one who started it.”

  The old man didn’t seem to be listening. His eyes had settled on his visitor’s hand—the one inside the coverall pocket—the one he couldn’t see.

  “What’s that in your pocket?” Price asked, his voice reedier now with a dawning dread, all pretense of conviviality gone. His old Adam’s apple bobbed up and down inside his wattled neck as he swallowed hard. His gaze at last refocused on his visitor’s cool, emotionless eyes.

  The traveler’s smile broadened through the mouth hole in the mask. “Fine, then. If you don’t want to have a reasonable conversation, we won’t.” Pulling the ice pick from the coverall pocket, the guest held it up for the man to consider. “Is this what you wanted to see?”

  “No…,” the old man sighed in a trembling exhalation of fear. “No.”

  The traveler held the ice pick up to better study the sharp simplicity of it and tapped the pointed end with a fingertip. The visitor’s voice took on a dreamy quality. “Are you sure? It’s really quite beautiful, don’t you think?” Cold eyes turned back to the man in the wheelchair. “Sharp as a motherfucker, though. Wanna see?”

  The man shook his head, terror dragging his already drooping face farther downward as he seemed to shrink into the chair.

  The dog in the old man’s lap began to growl again. The old man lifted him and held the wiggling mutt to the side of his face as if seeking comfort. His eyes were as big as chestnuts, rounded with fear. The dog’s eyes weren’t any smaller.

  “Please don’t hurt me,” Price pleaded.

  “Sorry,” the traveler said, that ingratiating smile spreading wide. “It’s time for the head lemming to take his final swan dive over the fucking cliff.”

  Without warning, the visitor took two long strides toward the old man and, standing directly in front of him, slipped the ice pick through the wrinkled skin beneath the quivering chin. With a gentle push upward, the ice pick pierced tongue and palate, then traveled onward and inward into the old fart’s brain. Price’s eyes remained open, but in the time frame between one heartbeat and the one that failed to come next, the light of fear in them departed. His visitor was rather sorry to see it go so quickly.

  The old man’s talonlike fingers relaxed around the Chihuahua, and before the dog could fall, the visitor scooped him up and set him on the floor. As if nothing untoward had happened at all, the little dog pranced off into the shadows of another room. Probably to poop.

  Turning back to the corpse in the wheelchair, clearly unmourned by even his own dog, the traveler slipped the gloves back on and gripped the handle of the ice pick still protruding from beneath the motionless chin. It felt as solidly attached to the old man’s head as a protuberance of bone. But for a trickle of blood from the corner of his mouth, the dead man’s wound was almost bloodless. Gripping the ice pick lightly, the visitor wiped all fingerprints from the handle, but left the implement of murder where it was, thinking it made a rather forceful statement.

  Taking a last look around the house and enjoying its peaceful silence, the traveler, humming softly, moved toward the front door, unlatched it, and stepped calmly out into the freezing night.

  As a final stroke of malice, the door was left open to swing idly in the icy wind.

  Chapter Six

  MILO STARED down at the newspaper clipping Lillian Damons had mailed him. The clipping, taken from the Indianapolis Star, was dated three days previous and took up a mere two inches of column space. It told about a recent murder committed in an Indiana farming community just east of Terre Haute, close to the Illinois border. The article mentioned, rather offhandedly, that the victim, an aged man confined to a wheelchair and living alone in a secluded farmhouse, was a blogger and a book reviewer by avocation.

  What the article failed to mention, and what Milo came to realize after a minimum of research, was that the victim, one Edgar Price, aka BooksOnWheels.com, was well-known on Amazon and several online bookselling sites for leaving a long string of one- or two-star reviews for practically everything he read. Mr. Price, it seemed, had never found a book he didn’t hate. And his followers apparently loved him for it.

  The simple one-line note that Lillian included with the clipping read, “What the hell is going on?”

  Clearly, there was nothing offhanded about the conclusion Lillian had drawn concerning the importance of the victim’s trade, nor in the way the rest of the writing community accepted the news of another book reviewer’s murder. It did not escape Lillian’s attention that both victims had been known for their irascible approach to reviewing. That little tidbit wasn’t lost on the writing community either.

  Having read reviews by both victims, Milo had to agree. Apparently so did everyone else he knew. Rumors began to spread like wildfire. Book blogs lit up across the internet with theories and suppositions and a few downright accusations—blaming authors, blaming the police, blaming the current political climate. Reviewers wrote pieces filled with outrage, claiming they were being victimized—victimized, hell, they were being slaughtered—for exercising their freedoms of speech and press.

  Milo had no idea how the police were investigating the crimes, but in the public eye, in the world of writers and reviewers at least, the killings had been connected immediately. The term serial killer was being bandied about now, and the fact that this serial killer happened to be coming after their own seemed obvious to many. Milo wasn’t convinced they were wrong.

  While poor Grace’s killing had barely roiled the surface o
f the literary waters, the second death of a book reviewer created a tsunami of buzz in Milo’s world of writers, reviewers, and readers. With two reviewers down for the count—quite literally—the situation was getting rather salacious, according to a few who merrily rubbed their hands together in glee, waiting to see what would happen next. The fact that the victims were two of the most feared and roundly hated reviewers in the business ratcheted up their glee.

  It must be said, however, that there were others, many of them reviewers themselves, who failed to find anything merry about it at all. And while some writers were screaming that revenge was sweet, most were disgusted and horrified by what had happened. Milo Cook was one of them. Having known Grace Connor in life brought a certain earthy reality to the proceedings that might not have been present had Milo simply seen her name on a byline now and then while reading her reviews and cringing at the heavy-handed way she dealt with those authors she found less than worthy of praise. The fact that he didn’t particularly like the woman didn’t factor in. He did like Grace’s wife, and that was enough to bring home to Milo the tragedy of what had happened.