Watchers Read Online Free PDF Page B

static-slashed images. He plugged in a small portable lamp and hooked it to the back of the set.
    The grandfather clock in the hall marked the quarter-hour with a single chime that reverberated hollowly through the house.
    “You watch a lot of TV?” he asked as he unscrewed the dust shield from the set.
    “Not much,” Nora said.
    “I like those nighttime soaps. Dallas, Dynasty, that stuff.”
    “I never watch them.”
    “Yeah? Oh, now, come on, I bet you do.” He laughed slyly. “Everybody watches ’em even if they don’t want to admit it. Just isn’t anything more interesting than stories full of backstabbing, scheming, thieving, lying . . . and adultery. You know what I’m saying? People sit and watch it and cluck their tongues and say, ‘Oh, how awful,’ but they really get off on it. That’s human nature.”
    “I . . . I’ve got things to do in the kitchen,” she said nervously. “Call me when you’ve fixed the set.” She left the room and went down the hall through the swinging door into the kitchen.
    She was trembling. She despised herself for her weakness, for the ease with which she surrendered to fear, but she could not help being what she was.
    A mouse.
    Aunt Violet had often said, “Girl, there are two kinds of people in the world—cats and mice. Cats go where they want, do what they want, take what they want. Cats are aggressive and self-sufficient by nature. Mice, on the other hand, don’t have an ounce of aggression in them. They’re naturally vulnerable, gentle, and timid, and they’re happiest when they keep their heads down and accept what life gives them. You’re a mouse, dear. It’s not bad to be a mouse. You can be perfectly happy. A mouse might not have as colorful a life as a cat, but if it stays safely in its burrow and keeps to itself, it’ll live longer than the cat, and it’ll have a lot less turmoil in its life.”
    Right now, a cat lurked in the living room, fixing the TV set, and Nora was in the kitchen, gripped by mouselike fear. She was not actually in the middle of cooking anything, as she had told Streck. For a moment she stood by the sink, one cold hand clasped in the other—her hands always seemed to be cold—wondering what to do until he finished his work and left. She decided to bake a cake. A yellow cake with chocolate icing. That task would keep her occupied and help turn her mind away from the memory of Streck’s suggestive winking.
    She got bowls, utensils, an electric mixer, plus the cake mix and other ingredients out of the cupboards, and she set to work. Soon her frayed nerves were soothed by the mundane domestic activity.
    Just as she finished pouring the batter into the two baking pans, Streck stepped into the kitchen and said, “You like to cook?”
    Surprised, she nearly dropped the empty metal mixing bowl and the batter-smeared spatula. Somehow, she managed to hold on to them and— with only a little clatter to betray her tension—put them into the sink to be washed. “Yes. I like to cook.”
    “Isn’t that nice? I admire a woman who enjoys doing woman’s work. Do you sew, crochet, do embroidery, anything like that?”
    “Needlepoint,” she said.
    “That’s even nicer.”
    “Is the TV fixed?”
    “Almost.”
    Nora was ready to put the cake in the oven, but she did not want to carry the pans while Streck was watching her because she was afraid she would shake too much. Then he’d realize that she was intimidated by him, and he would probably get bolder. So she left the full pans on the counter and tore open the box of icing mix instead.
    Streck came farther into the big kitchen, moving casually, very relaxed, looking around with an amiable smile, but coming straight toward her. “Think I could have a glass of water?”
    Nora almost sighed with relief, eager to believe that a drink of cold water was all that had brought him here. “Oh, yes, of course,” she said. She took a glass from the cupboard, ran the cold water.
    When she