D A Novel (George Right) - By George Right Page 0,23
weakened. Having gathered all his strength, he jerked once again–and his right leg broke loose with a viscous damp sucking sound. Without a shoe and all bedaubed with mud, but those were insignificant details. Logan jumped up and rushed farther along the street. He did not even try to pick up the postman's hatchet (let alone getting behind the wheel of his truck), as he was not sure at all that the asphalt under him wouldn't break again.
Or that this guy won't come to senses at the most inopportune moment as always happens in movies.
"Well, it's unlikely," Tony told himself (while still maintaining his pace). "His skull was broken in two places at least, and however sturdy he seemed..."
A familiar scratch came from behind. And then–a door slam.
Tony looked back over his in shoulder in panic and saw headlights again. Actually, they were not switched off even when the truck was standing. But now... they, seemingly, were approaching again.
Logan ran to the nearest house and hastily tugged at the door handle. Screws pulled from the mouldering wood, leaving the handle in his hands. The door had been locked. Having rejected his "trophy," as useless as a weapon, Tony rushed off farther along the street. How many seconds are left to him?
From the fog a traffic sign appeared. A rhombus with an inscription "DEAD END." Holy crap!
However, he guessed there was a certain extense of free space beyond the sign. While it still could be nothing. There could be a fence blocking his path...
Without stopping, he threw one more glance back. The headlights were definitely closer. Tony again looked forward and saw a metal fence. But, no, it was not too high. And the main thing–there was a semicircular gate in it and it was open. And beyond the gate something like a town in miniature appeared in the fog: rows of low stone structures stretching into the gloom and silent pale figures erect between them...
Crypts. Tombstones. Monuments.
If this nightmare were in Manhattan, Tony remembered, south of City Hall would be the Trinity Episcopal Church cemetery–the only one active on the island. But it is is apparently much closer and very small, not comparable to this huge necropolis lost in the fog. Here, perhaps, it is not hard to lose one's way, especially at night... And why is the cemetery open at night? Though it is, of course, good that it is open, considering the vehicle which has almost overtaken him already... But still, though Tony did not consider himself superstitious, he, as well as the majority of people, somehow did not find the idea of night visits to cemeteries appealing. Especially–after everything that has already happened this night.
Here truly–dead end. Tony thought again about the literal meaning of this ordinary expression.
And, having run closer to the gate, he got an additional reinforcement to his fears.
It was one more dead bird. A swan, like those populating city ponds and Sheepshead Bay. It was impaled on several rods of the cemetery's fence, piercing it through. Feathers, once white, were stuck together with blood and cadaveric putrilage, shabby wings and the semi-decayed neck hung powerlessly downwards. The rotted head had fallen off and lay near the foot of the fence with a wide open blackened beak.
No "No entrance" sign would have dissuaded Tony from entering more convincingly. But still, choosing between a dead swan and a live maniac with a hatchet... Tony hastily ran in the gate and turned into the first lateral walk, and then–into a narrow passageway between a crypt and a marble angel. Hunkering down, he hid.
All was silent. Indeed–silent, as a cemetery... Probably the maniac had lost his trail or not followed him here at all. Logan remembered some scraps of a horror film in which, contrary to the most widespread genre cliches, the cemetery was the safest place, since the evil spirits could not pursue characters there because of its consecrated soil. Certainly, Tony had never before believed either in evil spirits, or in consecrated soil... But he hadn't believed either in USPS trucks driven by fans of cutting out livers and other body parts.
Fans who could not be stopped even by a broken skull.
Tony waited a little longer, then, trying not to make a sound, slowly stood up, noticing for the first time the discomfort of his right foot being wet and clad only in a sock. He did not dare to go back; such a big cemetery for certain had more than one exit.