Hot Blood: Tales of Erotic Horror

The large restaurant was empty, except for a party of American businessmen over on the far side. As he ate his meal, Gil gradually became aware that one of the businessmen was watching him. Not only watching him, but every time he glanced up, winking at him.

Oh, shit, he thought. Just let me eat my lunch in peace.

He ignored the winks and the unrelenting stares; but after the business lunch broke up, the man came across the restaurant, buttoning up his coat, and smiling. He was big and red-faced and sweaty, with wavy blond hair and three heavy gold rings on each hand.

'You'll pardon my boldness,' he said. 'My name's Fred Oscay. I'm in aluminum tubing, Pennsylvania Tubes. I just couldn't take my eyes off you all during lunch.'

Gil looked up at him challengingly. 'So?' he replied.

'Well,' said Fred Oscay, grinning, 'maybe you could take that as a compliment. You're some looker, I've got to tell you. I was wondering if you had any plans for dinner tonight. You know — maybe a show, maybe a meal.'

Gil was trembling. Why the hell was he trembling? He was both angry and frightened. Angry at being stared at and winked at and chatted up by this crimson-faced idiot; frightened because social convention prevented him from being as rude as he really wanted to be — that, and his weaker physique.

It was a new insight — and to Gil it was hair-raising — that men used the threat of their greater physical strength against women not just in times of argument and stress — but all the time.

'Mr. Oscay,' he said, and he was still trembling. 'I'd really prefer it if you went back to your party and left me alone.'

'Aw, come along, now,' said Fred Oscay, still grinning. 'You can't mean that.'

Gil's mouth felt dry. 'Will you please just leave me alone?'

Fred Oscay leaned over Gil's table. 'There's a fine concert at the Kleine Zaal, if it's culture you're after.'

Gil hesitated for a moment, and then picked up a small metal dish of Indonesian curried chicken and turned it upside-down over Fred Oscay's left sleeve. Fred Oscay stared down at it for a very long time without saying anything, then stared at Gil with a hostility in his eyes that Gil had never seen from anybody before. Fred Oscay looked quite capable of killing him, then and there.

'You tramp,' he said. 'You stupid bitch.'

'Go away,' Gil told him. 'All I'm asking you to do is go away.'

Now Fred Oscay's voice became booming and theatrical, intended for all his business colleagues to hear. 'You were coming on, lady. You were coming on. All through lunch you were giving me the glad-eye. So don't you start getting all tight-assed now. What is it, you want money? Is that it? You're a professional? Well, I'm sorry. I'm really truly sorry. But old Fred Oscay never paid for a woman in his life, and he ain't about to start just for some sorry old hooker like you.'

He picked up a napkin and wiped the curry off his sleeve with a flourish, throwing the soiled napkin directly into Gil's plate. The other businessmen laughed and stared. One of them said, 'Come on, Fred, we can't trust you for a minute.'

Gil sat where he was and couldn't think what to do; how to retaliate; how to get his revenge. He felt so frustrated that in spite of himself he burst into tears. The Indonesian waiter came over and offered him a glass of water. 'Aroo okay?' he kept asking. 'Aroo okay?'

'I'm all right,' Gil insisted. 'Please — I'm all right.'

He was standing on the corner of the street as patient as a shadow as David Chilton emerged from his front door right on time and began walking his cocker spaniel along the grass verge. It was 10:35 at night. David and Margaret would have been watching News at Ten and then South East News just as Gil and Margaret had always done. Then David would have taken down Bondy's leash and whistled, 'Come on, boy! Twice round the park!' while Margaret went into the kitchen to tidy up and make them some cocoa.

He was wearing the same black belted raincoat and the same black beret that he had worn in Amsterdam; only now he had mastered Anna's high heels. His hair was curly and well-brushed and he wore makeup now, carefully copied from an article in a Dutch magazine.

Under his raincoat he carried a stainless-steel butcher knife with a twelve-inch blade. He was quite calm. He was breathing evenly and his pulse was no faster than it had been when he first met Anna.

Bondy insisted on sniffing at every bush and every garden gatepost, so it took a long time for David to come within earshot. He had his hands in his pockets and he was whistling under his breath, a tune that Gil had never known. At last Gil stepped out and said, 'David?'

David Chilton stood stock-still. 'Anna?' he asked, hoarsely.

Gil took another step forward, into the flat orange illumination of the streetlight. 'Yes, David, it's Anna.'

David Chilton took his hands out of his pockets. 'I guess you had to come and take a look, didn't you? Well, I was the same.'

Gil glanced toward the house. 'Is he happy? Alan, I mean.'

'Alan's fine. He's a fine boy. He looks just like you. I mean me.'

'And Margaret?'

'Oh, Margaret's fine, too. Just fine.'

'She doesn't notice any difference?' said Gil bitterly. 'In bed, perhaps? I know I wasn't the world's greatest lover.'

'Margaret's fine, really.'

Gil was silent for a while. Then he said, 'The job? How do you like the job?'

'Well, not too bad,' David Chilton said with a grin. 'But I have to admit that I'm looking around for something a little more demanding.'

'But, apart from that, you've settled in well?'

'You could say that, yes. It's not Darien, but it's not Zandvoort, either.'

Bondy had already disappeared into the darkness. David Chilton whistled a couple of times and called, 'Bondy! Bondy!' He turned to Gil and said, 'Look — you know, I understand why you came. I really do. I sympathize. But I have to get after Bondy or Moo's going to give me hell.'

For the very first time Gil felt a sharp pang of genuine jealousy for Margaret. 'You call her Moo?'

'Didn't you?' David Chilton asked him.

Gil remained where he was while David Chilton went jogging off after his dog. His eyes were wide with indecision. But David had only managed to run twenty or thirty yards before Gil suddenly drew out the butcher knife and went after him.

'David!' he called out, in his high, feminine voice. 'David! Wait!'

David Chilton stopped and turned. Gil had been walking quickly so that he had almost reached him. Gil's arm went up. David Chilton obviously didn't understand what was happening at first, not until Gil stabbed him a second time, close to his neck.

David Chilton dropped, rolled away, then bobbed up on to his feet again. He looked as if he had been trained to fight. Gil came after him, his knife upraised, silent and angry beyond belief. If I can't have my body, then nobody's going to. And perhaps if the man who took my body — if his spirit dies — perhaps I'll get my body back. There's no other hope, no other way. Not unless Anna goes on for generation after generation, taking one man after another.

Gil screamed at David and stabbed at his face. But David seized Gil's wrist and twisted it around, skin tearing, so that Gil dropped the knife on to the pavement. Gil's high heel snapped. He lost his balance and they both fell. Their hands scrabbled for the knife. David touched it, missed it, then managed to take hold of it.

The long triangular blade rose and fell five times. There was a sound of muscle chopping. The two rolled away from each other, and lay side by side, flat on their backs, panting.

Gil could feel the blood soaking his cotton blouse. The inside of his stomach felt cold and very liquid, as if his stomach had poured its contents into his whole abdominal cavity. He knew that he couldn't move. He had felt the knife slice sharply against his spine.