national law.
And the knife. He would be carrying a long, sharp knife - more of
a machete, actually, the sort of knife that could strike off a person's
head in a single sweeping stroke.
And he would be grinning, showing those filed cannibal-teeth.
Kinnell knew these things. He was an imaginative guy, after all.
He didn't need anyone to draw him a picture.
'No,' he whispered, suddenly conscious of his global nakedness,
suddenly freezing all the way around his skin. 'No, please, go
away.' But the footfalls kept coming, of course they did. You
couldn't tell a guy like this to go away. It didn't work; it wasn't the
way the story was supposed to end.
Kinnell could hear him nearing the top of the stairs. Outside the
Grand Am went on rumbling in the moonlight.
The feet coming down the hall now, worn bootheels rapping on
polished hardwood.
A terrible paralysis had gripped Kinnell. He threw it off with an
effort and bolted toward the bedroom door, wanting to lock it
before the thing could get in here, but he slipped in a puddle of
soapy water and this time he did go down, flat on his back on the
oak planks, and what he saw as the door clicked open and the
motorcycle boots crossed the room toward where he lay, naked and
with his hair full of Prell, was the picture hanging on the wall over
his bed, the picture of the Road Virus idling in front of his house
with the driver's side door open.
The driver's side bucket seat, he saw, was full of blood. I'm going
outside, I think, Kinnell thought, and closed his eyes.
Will We Close the Book on Books?
BY STEPHEN KING
From: Visions of the 21st Century
Time Magazine, June 2000
Book lovers are the Luddites of the intellectual world. I can no
more imagine their giving up the printed page than I can imagine a
picture in the New York Post showing the Pope technoboogieing
the night away in a disco. My adventure in cyberspace ('Riding the
Bullet', available on any computer near you) has confirmed this
idea dramatically. My mail and the comments on my website
(www.stephenking.com) reflect two things: first, readers enjoyed
the story; second, most didn't like getting it on a screen, where it
appeared and then disappeared like Aladdin's genie.
Books have weight and texture; they make a pleasant presence in
the hand. Nothing smells as good as a new book, especially if you
get your nose right down in the binding, where you can still catch
an acrid tang of the glue. The only thing close is the peppery smell
of an old one. The odor of an old book is the odor of history, and
for me, the look of a new one is still the look of the future.
I suspect that the growth of the Internet has actually been
something of a boon when it comes to reading: people with more
Beanie Babies than books on their shelves spend more time
reading than they used to as they surf from site to site. But it's not a
