A Killer in the Wind Read Online Free PDF

place, ha ha.
    I popped the first pill the moment I got back to the apartment, before I even took my coat off, before the door even shut behind me. Then I got undressed and lay down on the bed. I looked up at the cherubs on the wall.
    Janks was right. It was powerful shit. It didn’t make you woozy or knock you out or anything like that. It just sort of melted inside you into a fresh, white puddle of new attitude. Then the puddle of attitude spread out all through your body. Within about twenty minutes, I had developed a philosophical approach to the presence of evil in the world. What can you do? I thought. That’s just the way it is . After that, I fell asleep.
    It was a good, sound, peaceful sleep. I only woke up once, near dawn. I had a dream that the apartment was on fire. My eyes flashed open. I smelled smoke. I lifted my head and looked around me to make sure the place wasn’t really burning. I had a sense that someone was standing in the shadows of the bedroom, looking back at me. But I peered and squinted and didn’t see anyone. I was too tired to get up and check it out. I lay down again and closed my eyes. I was philosophical. Such is life, I thought. The next thing I knew it was late morning.
    The thug was outside again, bopping by the bus stop by the wall of the park. I got dressed and went out. He followed me at a discreet distance. I led him downtown to the Sony Building, the big rosy one with the hole in the top and the vast arches and pillars on the ground floor that make it look like a science fiction cathedral. I slipped lobby security a glimpse of my shield and they let me go up to the office floors. I spent forty-five minutes wandering around the halls, then went back down. When I came out of the building, the thug was smoking a cigarette by the revolving doors of the tower across the street. He followed me to the French café where I had lunch on the city. He stuck with me all the way back to the apartment on Fifth. After another hour, he bopped off to the make-believe rhythms in his headset.
    I took another Z pill that night. I grew philosophical and fell asleep around ten. I didn’t remember dreaming, but when I woke up I smelled smoke again. I don’t know what time it was. It felt late. I lay for a few minutes staring up at the ceiling. I could see the cherubs up there, naked except for their white feathery wings, floating in the white feathery clouds.
    Suddenly something moved—something in the doorway. I threw the comforter off me and was up, my heart beating hard as I stared into the shadows. I listened for a sound, a footstep, anything. Nothing.
    My 19 was in its holster on the bedside table. I drew it out: a boxy semiautomatic with a nice solid feel. The weight of it in my hand calmed me.
    I got up. I was wearing shorts and a T-shirt. I padded barefoot to the doorway, the gun down by my thigh. I peeked around the jamb, looked down the hall. It was shadowy, but not pitch black because so much city light was coming in through the living room windows and the glow bled into the corridor.
    That’s when I saw him, the first time I saw him. He was down at the hallway’s end, down by the front door. I could just make out the shape of his body, small and thin: the body of a hungry child. His big eyes glinted in the half-light as he stood staring at me.
    Somehow I knew his name was Alexander. Somehow I knew he was dead. The knowledge made the center of me clutch in helpless, childlike fear. For a long moment, I was paralyzed, my gun hand quivering, the cold barrel tapping against my bare skin.
    The boy just stood there. Silent. Staring. Finally, by pure force of will, I came out of the bedroom. I made myself take a step toward him. Then another step. I could see the end of the hall more clearly now. There was no one there—no dead boy, no one. Of course not. I walked to the end of the hall. I walked through the whole apartment. There was no one anywhere. Of course not.
    I went back to bed. I lay