his turnaround driveway, little more than a ghost in the membranes of blowing snow. Its lights shone out in widening cones that at last disappeared into the storm. For a moment it seemed to Will that someone was behind the wheel, but he blinked again and saw that the car was empty. As empty as it had been when it returned to the garage that night.
Whonk. Whonk. Whonk-whonk.
Almost as if it were talking.
Will's heart thudded heavily in his chest. He turned abruptly to the phone. The time had come to call Cunningham after all. Call him and tell him to bring his pet demon to heel.
He was halfway there when he heard the car's engine scream. The sound was like the shriek of a woman who scents treachery. A moment later there was a heavy crunch.
Will went back to the window and was in time to see the car backing away from the high snowbank that fronted the end of his driveway. Its bonnet, sprayed with clods of snow, had crimped slightly. The engine revved again. The rear wheels spun in the powdery snow and then caught hold. The car leaped across the snowy road and struck the snowbank again. More snow exploded up and raftered away on the wind like cigar smoke blown in front of a fan.
Never do it, Will thought. And even if you get into the driveway, what then? You think I'm going to come out and play?
Wheezing more sharply than ever, he went back to the phone, looked up Cunningham's home number, and started to dial it. His fingers jittered, he misdialled, swore, hit the cutoff buttons, started again.
Outside, Christine's engine revved. A moment later there was a crunch as she hit the embankment for the third time. The wind wailed and snow struck -the big picture window like dry sand. Will licked his lips and tried to breathe slowly. But his throat was closing up; he could feel it.
The phone began to ring on the other end. Three times, Four.
Christine's engine screamed. Then the heavy thud as she hit the snowbank the passing ploughs had piled up at both ends of Will's semicircular driveway.
Six rings. Seven. Nobody some.
'Shit on it,' Will whispered, and slammed the phone back down. His face was pale, his nostrils flared wide, like the nostrils of an animal scenting fire upwind. His cigar had gone out. He threw it on the carpet and groped in his bathrobe pocket as he hurried back to the window. His hand found the comforting shape of his aspirator, and his fingers curled around its pistol grip.
Headlights shone momentarily in his face, nearly blinding him, and Will raised his free hand to shield his eyes. Christine hit the snowbank again. Little by little she was bludgeoning her way through to the driveway. He watched her back up across the road and wished savagely for a plough to come along now and hit the damned thing broadside.
No plough came. Christine came again instead, engine howling, lights glaring across his snow-covered lawn. She struck the snowbanks pushing mounds of snow violently to either side. The front end canted up and for a moment Will thought she was going to come right over what was left of the frozen, hard-packed embankment. Then the rear wheels lost traction and spun frantically.
She backed up.
Will's throat felt as if its bore was down to a pinhole. His lungs strained for air. He took the aspirator out and used it. The police. He ought to call the police. They could come. Cunningham's '58 couldn't get him. He was safe in his house. He was -
Christine came again, accelerating across the road, and this time she hit the bank and came over it easily, front end at first tilting up, splashing the front of his house with light, then crashing back down. She was in the driveway. Yes, all right, but she could come no further, she . . . it . . .
Christine never slowed. Still accelerating, she crossed the semicircular driveway on a tangent, ploughed through the shallower, looser snow of the side yard, and roared directly at the picture window where Will Darnell stood looking out.
He staggered backward, gasping hard, and tripped over his own easy chair.
Christine hit the house. The picture window exploded, letting in the shrieking wind. Glass flew in deadly arrows, each of them reflecting Christine's headlamps. Snow blew in and -danced over the rug in erratic corkscrews. The headlights momentarily illuminated the room with the unnatural