Читать книгу The Straw Men 3-Book Thriller Collection: The Straw Men, The Lonely Dead, Blood of Angels - Michael Marshall - Страница 19

The slot opened. A dim light shone down from above.

‘Hello, my dear,’ the man said. ‘I’m back.’

Sarah could not see his face. From the sound of his voice, it appeared he was sitting on the floor just behind her head.

‘Hello,’ she said, her voice as steady as she could make it. She wanted to shrink away from him, put just an extra inch of distance between them, but couldn’t move even that much. She fought to remain calm, to keep to her plan of sounding as if she didn’t care. ‘How are you today? Still insane, I guess.’

The man laughed quietly. ‘You’re not going to make me angry.’

‘Who wants you angry?’

‘So why do you say these things?’

‘My mom and dad are going to be worried sick. I’m scared. I may not be that polite.’

‘I understand.’

He was silent then, for a long time. Sarah waited.

Perhaps five minutes later, she saw a hand reaching out over her face. It held a glass of water. Without warning, he slowly tipped it. She got her mouth open in time, and drank as much as she could. The hand disappeared again.

‘Is that it?’ she said. Her mouth felt strange, clean and wet. The water had tasted the way she had always expected wine to, from the way grown-ups made such a big deal of it and rolled it around in their mouths like it was the best thing they had ever tasted. In fact, in her experience, wine generally tasted like something was wrong with it.

‘What else were you expecting?’

‘You want me to stay alive, then you’re going to have to give me something more than water.’

‘Why do you think I want you alive?’

‘Because otherwise you would have killed me right off and have me sitting naked someplace where you could look at me and jack off.’

‘That’s not a very nice thing to say.’

‘I refer you to my earlier comments. I’m not feeling very nice, and you’re a sicko, so I don’t have to be.’

‘I’m not a sicko, Sarah.’

‘No? How would you define yourself? Unusual?’

He laughed again, delightedly. ‘Oh certainly.’

‘Unusual like Ted fucking Bundy.’

‘Ted Bundy was an idiot,’ the man said. All humour had vanished from his voice. ‘A grandstanding fool and a fake.’

‘Okay,’ she said, trying to placate him, though privately she thought he now sounded pompous as well as insane. ‘I’m sorry. I’m not a big fan of his either. You’re much better. So do I get some food or what?’

‘Later, perhaps.’

‘Great. I’ll look forward to it. Cut it up small, so I can catch it.’

‘Good night, Sarah.’

When she heard him standing, her pretend calm fled. The plan hadn’t worked. At all. He knew she was frightened.

‘Please don’t put the lid back on. I can’t move anyway.’

‘I’m afraid I have to,’ the man said.

‘Please …’

It was replaced, and Sarah was in darkness again.

She heard his footsteps receding, a door shutting quietly, and then all was silent once more.

She licked frantically around her mouth, collecting as much of the remaining moisture as she could. Now that the initial shock of it was gone, she realized the water tasted different from the stuff she was used to at home. It must be from a different supply, which meant she had to be a long way from home. Like when you went on vacation. That was something, at least, something that she knew. The more she knew, the better.

Then she realized that maybe it was mineral water, something from a bottle, in which case the taste didn’t mean anything. It could just be a different brand. That didn’t matter. It was still worth thinking about. The more ideas she had, the better. Like the fact that when she’d mentioned her parents, the man hadn’t said again how he’d killed them. When he’d captured her he’d been very keen to talk about what he’d done to them. Maybe it meant something. Hopefully it meant that they were still alive, and he’d only said the other things to frighten her.

Maybe not. Sarah lay in the darkness, her hands clenched into fists, and tried not to scream.