Ragged Man

by Ken Douglas

  He was horribly thirsty and the tub was full of warm water, but he was unable to drink. He couldn’t move his head. His neck was in a noose and tied to the hot and cold water handles. The water to quench his thirst was so close and yet so far.

  He tried to scream and discovered that again his mouth was taped. He inhaled through his nose, trying to calm himself, as he studied the bathroom in search of something that could aid in his escape. He found nothing. Then in the soap dish, his eyes locked on a small compact mirror sitting on top of a well used bar of soap. He wondered if it was Ann’s and he wondered if he could break it and use a piece of the sharp glass to cut his way through the ropes.

  Maybe, if he pulled his knees into his stomach, he could straighten his legs, and maybe, just maybe, if he was lucky, he could knock the mirror off its perch, and it would fall into the tub.

  He moved back, pressing his back up against the faucet, tucking in his knees. The faucet dug into his back, but he forced himself to ignore the pain. He straightened his legs and rocked on his behind, thrusting his foot toward the soap dish.

  He missed, but not by much.

  He was getting ready to try again, when he heard the heavy steps coming up the hardwood stairs. He didn’t have to play twenty questions to know who was coming. He lay his legs back down and braced himself for the worst. Then he realized that the Ragged Man was going to see him naked.

  But of course he had already seen him without his clothes on, otherwise how did he get to be tied up naked in the tub. He didn’t like the idea at all. Why did he have to be naked? He didn’t like people to see him naked. He hated it when his mother came into the bathroom when he was in the tub. He always covered himself with a washcloth and pleaded with her to leave. It wasn’t funny, but she always laughed.

  He hoped the Ragged Man wasn’t going to laugh. He hoped the Ragged Man wasn’t going to do anything at all.

  He heard the footsteps as they left the stairs and made their way down the hall, coming toward the bathroom, coming toward him. He heard the doorknob turn and click, sending his heart through his throat. The door opened, a squeaky hinge screeching like chalk on a blackboard, sending shivers of fear along his spine. He wanted to shrink inside of himself, to make himself invisible, to vanish like a ghost in the woodwork, but he couldn’t. All he could do was wait in the tub, naked, and face his fear.

  He stared up at the man as he entered the bathroom. He wanted to close his eyes, but the last time he did that, it made the man mad and that was the last thing he wanted to do.

  “ So, you’re awake.” The man walked over to the washbasin and studied himself in the mirror. Then he turned to look at J.P. “You know how it is, children should be seen and not heard. And I can see an awful lot of you.”

  J.P. turned red.

  “ Ah, embarrassed, are we? What’s the matter? Don’t like showing off your little pecker?” He bent over, so that J.P. could smell his foul breath, and shoved his hand under the water, flicking his finger against J.P.’s limp penis.

  J.P. jumped and squirmed against the noose.

  “ Relax, I’m not a baby raper. I might slit your throat and peel off your skin, but I’ll leave your little peepee alone.” He laughed, a raspy, insincere sound that chalked his spine worse than the squeaky hinge.

  “ I’ll bet you want to know what I have in store for you. Well, you’re about to find out.”

  The man left the bathroom and J.P. heard him go down the stairs and fumble around down there. He felt nothing but dread when he heard the footsteps coming back again. J.P. had no idea what the man had in mind, but he knew it was bad.

  “ What I have here,” the man said, “Is your basic digital timer. I’m setting it to go off at, oh what’s a good time, how about noon, that sound good to you? It sounds good to me.” He plugged the timer into the wall with the bright red read-out facing the tub.

  “ Now, I’m going to plug the extension into the back of the timer.” J.P. watched him do it. “And now, I’m going to plug the radio into the extension cord.” J.P. watched him do it. “And now, the fun part, I turn the radio on.” J.P. watched him do it. “But oh, no,” the man said, feigning surprise, “the radio didn’t come on. Oh, yeah, it won’t come on till high noon, when the timer goes off. Can you guess what I’m going to do with the radio?”

  J.P. opened his eyes wide, telling the man how frightened he was.

  “ Smart boy, I’m gonna put the radio in the tub.”

  J.P. watched him as he set the radio in the tub, two feet from his feet.

  “ At twelve, when the timer clicks on, you can kiss your naked ass goodbye.” the Ragged Man laughed.

  J.P. squirmed, but the noose held him firmly in place.

  “ Who knows. You’re a clever lad. You got away last time, maybe you’ll get lucky.”

  The big man clomped out of the bathroom, closing the door on his way out. J.P. heard him thud down the hallway and down the stairs. He heard the front door slam a few seconds later. He was alone with the radio.

  He wondered what station it was tuned to. Would he be electrocuted by The Rolling Stones, Weezer, The Black Crowes or by Rush Limbaugh? No, probably during the news, then later he would be the news. “Naked boy electrocuted in bathtub, film at eleven.”

  “ Naked,” would be the highlight. They would make it a big deal that he was naked. Policemen, reporters, his mother, strangers, maybe friends, maybe even girls, would all see him naked. He didn’t want to be found naked.

  He didn’t want his friends at school to laugh after he was dead. And he especially didn’t want his teacher to know that he died naked. It was bad enough that he had to die, but it was so embarrassing to be tied up without his clothes on, and he was so humiliated, because that big ugly man had touched him down there, between his legs. Nobody should be able to do that. It was wrong, and he started to cry.

  He was so tired. Nobody could blame him if he just gave up. He was thirsty again and the water in the tub only served to tell him how dry his throat could get. He was hungry and he felt like he was starting to get sick, like the time when he had the two day flu.

  A quick note of terror struck his heart. He threw up when he had the flu. He threw up a lot. If he threw up with his mouth taped, he would die, drowned in his own vomit. Well, he didn’t throw up in the trunk and he’d try not to throw up now. But he wondered, if he was sick, if he had the two day flu, would he be able not to throw up? He was more scared than ever.

  But everything wasn’t as bad as it could have been. The warm water felt good against his aching sides and his cut and bruised feet.

  And the soothing warm water called to him to close his eyes and relax. Maybe Rick would come home in time. Maybe he’d fight and kill the Ragged Man and come upstairs and save him before noon, but maybe he wouldn’t. Maybe the timer wouldn’t work, but it probably would. Maybe he should lay back in the warm water and give up, but maybe he shouldn’t.

  He didn’t want to be found naked.

  He looked down at the radio and stretched his feet toward it till the noose was digging into his neck, choking him. There was no way. The closest he could get was still a foot away, twelve big inches.

  He decided to try for the mirror again. He scooted back, easing the noose and brought his knees to his chest again, rocked on his butt and smashed his feet into the wall. Better luck. His foot banged the wall just under the soap dish, as searing pain splashed up his leg.

  He screamed against the tape, then clenched his teeth. A winner never quits. He pulled his knees back till they almost touched his nose, straightened his legs, bent his foot back, rocked his body and this time, instead of smashing his battered feet into the wall, he faced it, with his foot on the wall above the soap dish. Then he inched it down till his bent back foot was resting on the top of it.

  He closed his eyes and jerked his foot down, managing to just touch the mirror, before the stretching pain caused him to relax and his legs fall back into the tub. He was downhearted. He had given it
his best, his very best effort. Now there truly was no hope. He was destined to die in the bathtub, alone and naked. It wasn’t fair, he thought, to have a means of escape so close. It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t fair. Then he looked at the soap dish and gave a quick gasp of surprise.

  It was empty.

  He had succeeded after all. He started to feel around the tub for the mirror. It didn’t take long for him to discover that it had fallen out of the reach of his bound hands. If he lay his legs out flat against the tub he could feel it between the white porcelain and the back of his right knee. Too far to reach by hand and too close for him to use his feet to pull it toward him.

  But he had come too far to give up. He raised his legs and scooted down as far as the noose would let him. Then he lowered his legs onto the small mirror. This time it was sitting a little higher under his leg and when he scooted back, letting the faucet dig into his back, he dragged the mirror a little closer to his hands.

  He repeated the process, raising his legs, scooting toward the radio, lowering his legs, scooting back toward the faucet two more times, and after the third effort he was able to reach and grasp the mirror.

  He closed his eyes and tensed up as he smashed it against the porcelain, breaking it into several pieces and cutting a deep gash into his right thumb. The stabbing pain and immediate red coloration of the water sent thunderclaps of terror through him. He had seen a movie once where a woman had slashed her wrists and bled to death in a bathtub. The red tinged water in the movie bathtub looked just like the red tinged water in the real bathtub.

  Frantically, he felt around for a piece of glass big enough to saw through the rope and discovered to his horror that there were several tiny, very sharp slivers of glass covering the bottom of the tub and every movement he made sent one of the slivers stinging into his skin, but there were no pieces large enough. He had expended the effort to get the mirror and cut himself for nothing.

  All for nothing.

  Sam Storm went down the stairs with heavy feet and dark thoughts, head bent in sadness. The Black Beauty was dead. When its spirit left its body, Storm felt a sense of loss that killed much of his resolve, and he began to feel uneasy. He had done terrible things, foul unspeakable deeds, things against the laws of God and Man, things that violated his very nature, but they were things he had enjoyed doing, wrong as they were, God help him, he had enjoyed it. Part of him wanted to quit, but he had to go through with what he had started. There was no other way.

  Downstairs, he went to the coffee table in the living room, opened his satchel and took out the Bowie knife. He ran his thumb along the blade as if testing the sharp edge, but a force he didn’t understand made him apply too much pressure and the knife sliced through to the bone, sending a wakeup call of sharp pain from the sharp blade.

  The sight of his own blood snapped him back to his purpose. He wrapped his bloody hand around the hilt and walked through the kitchen, out the back door and down the landing, stomping on every step as he headed toward the pigeon cage.

  The birds quieted their billing and cooing as he left the landing and stopped completely as he neared the cage. By the time he was standing in front of the loft, they were cautiously eyeing him, silent sentinels alert at their posts.

  What was there about him, he asked himself, that made the birds eye him so suspiciously.

  “ I’m not going to hurt you,” he lied.

  The birds responded by cocking their heads, as if listening intently.

  “ I just want a look.” He wondered what it was about pigeons that could fascinate a young boy. When he was a child his parents hadn’t allowed pets and he hadn’t missed them. Not until the Black Beauty had come into his life. The black animal had been the first pet, if he could call it a pet, that he’d ever had. He had been able to understand the animal as he’d never been able to understand a human. The animal had been more friend than any he had ever known, and he missed it.

  Then something bucked up his courage, or rather reinforced whatever it was that caused him to do the horrible things. He eased the door of the loft open and slid into the cage, making sure none of the birds got out.

  With a methodical and mercenary deliberation, he systematically slaughtered all twenty-six of J.P. Donovan’s pigeons, by using the knife, like a giant sword, against their tiny heads. The birds, frozen in place, sat like ducks in a shooting gallery with the motor off, waiting for the blade to fall.

  Then, with the bodies of the headless birds and their heads strewn about the sandy bottom of the loft and his feet covered in their blood, Sam Storm stood and contemplated what he had done and what he was about to do. He had killed so many and part of him wanted to go on killing, but another part wanted to stop, to fade into the sunset. Jamaica maybe, or the south of France. But before he could do any fading, he had to finish Rick Gordon.

  He stepped through the bloody mess and exited the loft, not bothering to close the door, and stalked back into the house, leaving blood-red footprints in his wake. There was plenty of the red stuff left on his shoes for the carpet to soak up when he entered the dining room on his way to the stairs.

  On the second floor, he poked his head into the bathroom to check on the boy. He smiled as the frightened youth looked up at him from bloody bath water with his eyes wide in horror.

  “ I killed your birds,” he said. Then he went back downstairs to wait for Rick Gordon.

  Rick Gordon pulled up the driveway. He wanted to kick the front door down and go in like Bob Dylan’s John Wesley Harding, with a gun in every hand, all of them blazing, but he knew that would be stupid.

  He shut the engine off, looked at the house and listened. It was too quiet. He got out of the car, keeping his eyes locked on the front door, went around to the passenger side, took out the forty-five, ejected the spent magazine, reloading with the fresh one, before shoving it between his Levi’s and the small of his back. He picked up Lincoln Hewett’s thirty-eight and reloaded from a box of shells he’d found in Lincoln’s glovebox, then he stuffed it into a back pocket. Next he picked up the riot gun and jacked five shells into it, also found in Lincoln’s glovebox. Then clutching the shotgun, he started toward the house.

  He approached the front door, alert and cautious, taking the steps up to the porch, like a soldier walking into an ambush. He turned the knob slowly, threw the door open when the latch clicked and leapt into the living room, diving onto the carpet and rolling toward the coffee table.

  He met no resistance. He got up, trying to shake some of the fear. Maybe he had been wrong and there was no killer at home. He started to relax, when he heard a crashing noise from behind, near the fireplace.

  He turned and blasted two rounds out of the pump gun, one into the mirror above the fireplace and one through the adjoining window, blowing the glass out. He jumped back as a small, black kitten darted past and ran through the dining room into the kitchen. The crashing noise had been caused by the cat knocking a soapstone sculpture off the mantle above the fireplace.

  A scraping noise from somewhere in back of him sent a warning tingling up his spine. He turned and pumped a round into Ann’s antique rocker, blowing a twelve inch hole through the straight wooden back, sending splinters and pellets into the wall behind.

  Someone had been in the house. When he left, he had locked it tight. There was no possible way that cat could have gotten in by itself. He turned toward the fireplace, heard a loud tortured cat-kitten scream from behind and once again he whirled around, pumping the shotgun, shooting from the hip.

  The first shell smashed into the dining room table and the second blew apart the television, exploding it in a hail of sound and glass, causing him to pump and dry fire. The riot gun was empty.

  The cat darted across the room and he threw the shotgun at it, missing by five or six feet. He cursed. Somehow the kitten had caused him to empty the riot gun, depriving him of his best weapon.

  The kitten dashed into the kitchen. Rick decided to follow. He drew th
e forty-five and moved across the carpet toward the dining room. He stepped past the damaged rocker and the destroyed television, stepping around broken glass. In the dining room, he smiled at the crystal vase sitting on the center of the badly mauled table. Ann bought the vase in Prague, and during her life, had kept it full of flowers. By some miracle it survived the shotgun blast to the table and he took it as a sign that he would survive, too.

  He skirted the table, eyes on the vase, and something hard, soft, sticky and wet slammed into the side of his face with gale force.

  He jumped back from the headless pigeon as he emptied all thirteen shots from the forty-five into the empty kitchen, screaming louder than the deadly roar of the bucking pistol. When he was out of ammunition and silence again reigned, he realized the kitchen was empty. Whoever threw the bird had used his pitching arm from the back landing, sending the headless Dark Dancer flying in through the back door, through the kitchen, into the dining room.

  He dropped the forty-five onto the carpet and withdrew the thirty-eight from his hip pocket and warily entered the kitchen to find that he had killed both the microwave and the blender and had severely wounded the refrigerator.

  J.P. heard a car pull into the drive downstairs and felt a surge of short-lived relief. His first thought was that his mother had come to save him, but his second thought quickly pushed the first aside. If his mother came into Rick’s house the Ragged Man would get her, and who could tell what horrible things he would do to her. He hoped she would back the car out of the drive and go away. His heart sank when he heard the engine cut off.

  Only moments ago he thought things couldn’t get worse. He sat in the water that wasn’t warm anymore, looking at the digital clock, frozen in fright. At 8:44 the Ragged Man poked his head in the door, stinging him with a quick penetrating stare that scared the living shit out of him, and now his mother had arrived just in time to be the Ragged Man’s next victim.