Chapter Nine

" - people miss Lake Michigan? Hee hee - News at Six, Noon, and Eleven interrupts the regularly scheduled commercial to bring viewers this late bulletin: Approximately ninety minutes ago - that's around 7:35 pm Daylight Savings Time or 2:05 am tomorrow morning in Moscow ouch! OK! God that's loud - two residents considered to be possibly violent escaped from State Hospital. They reportedly overpowered the night watchperson and are now running directly to Horace Aeiouaey's apartment to sue him for rape and vehicular abuse because of an incident - "

Horace rubbed his eyes open, yawned and stopped the TV. Four Choc SD's always did the trick. He got up and went to bed.

Man, anthropologically speaking, is all screwed up.

Gravitationally drawn to the black hole of Society by physics, his rebellious soul radiates outward yearning for the ether vacuum of Individuality by metaphysics. This mutually exclusive duality of destination eternally marches through the whole of both creation and anti-creation. For, when the expanding universe at last balances on that knife-edge limit between spent primordial inertia and the tempting invitation back to the dance, the clock reverses; and the stage is set, way back at absolute zero, for (in man's accounting) Big Bang II.

Of course, man is capable of accepting neither an infinite universe nor one which would make the head of a pin (relatively speaking) seem infinite in comparison. In what looks like an unbelievable stroke of luck, man emerged during what is apparently a moment of transition between these two states. And not only that, but this moment, brief as it is, is of sufficient duration to allow man to completely ignore the whole process!

That is the root folly of the whole stinking weed.

But ignorance, a wag presumably ignorant of his own ignorance once warbled, is bliss. By that measure, man careers through life like a pinball in a bally Paradise. He is free to be happy, without knowing what that is; and so, not recognizing happiness when it comes, man turns around and begins looking for it somewhere else. This way, that way, he oscillates continually between physics and metaphysics, society and individuality, massless infinity and Mass Central gravitational Armageddon.

Whee.

What's a mother [cq.] to do? Flying apart in all directions at once, one reflexively gropes for glue. A daub here, a squirt there, a rubber band and some baling wire, and what have we got? Some call it Progress.

The disgruntled majority, though, ignorant that they are already ignoring the real business of the universe, feel they are not yet ignorant enough, and decide to ignore this business of man called Progress. Fixing broken stuff that never worked in the first place, they subconsciously suspect, is the only sure road from Nowhere to Nowhere. Thus arises the closest approximation to pure unalloyed philosophical wisdom extant:

"Fuck It."

When Individuality proves lonely, invent Love. When Sweet Harmony In Connubial Embrace sours, pull out the meat cleaver. If the sight of tortured millions offends, assuage that twinge by inflicting further offense. And if it is you yourself who suffers, for Man's sake don't imagine for an instant that you are truly alive. Instead, whine. Whine loud and long. Whine, whine, whine, whine, as nasally nauseating as is bestially possible; for then, and only then, will you join the welling chorus of Spirituality on its crusade to Heaven. At least, that is where it hopes it is going. And Hope for Direction, it hopes, is the next best thing to Direction itself. Or should be, in a static universe.

In all of this, it can't be denied that chaos creates a sort of contentment of its own. Man sets out to order an already ordered creation, and produces disorder. Man, attempting to solve all his problems while ignoring the fact that he has none, artificially constructs some which are completely inconsequential solved or unsolved, and then blows his own head off in despair when he is ultimately unable to solve them. Man feeds the starving by holding hands on the highway. Turn gold to paper alchemically - they eat that, and turn to gold themselves, which is also turned into paper, and eaten again. So man, massless, becomes paper, a thing of slight mass, by way of gold, massy but uninterested. And all that escapes the cannibalistic frenzy is a high irritated whine, sailing out in search of the soul sailing out in search of infinity. To hear it is to ignore it, or desire to. "Tweet!" To live, though, is to want to hear it - "Tweet!" - to intentionally listen to it for what it is - "Tweet!" - and not merely muffle it by cramming its maw with paper. "Tweet!" It is the sound of life. It does not have to be pleasant - "Tweet!" - and it isn't. But the realization that it doesn't have to be at all, yet is - "Tweet!" - should be enough to make man appreciate its piercing atonality. "Tweet!" Life is Irritation; constant, unending, unendurable - "Tweet!" -

"Shit! What the hell time is it, anyway?" Horace sat up, grumbling to himself, wiping a drop of drool from his chin with one hand and numbly reaching for the phone with the other. "Hell - "

"-ck."

" - o? Shit."

Widow Pavlovna, sitting in her dark apartment with the door open, cocked her head and turned up her hearing aid. It wasn't often anyone used that pay phone in the foyer. She often wondered why it was there in the first place, and what the big objection had been, really, to the Czars.

"The coast is cwear. Awayway's not home."

"Are you sure? How nany tines did it ring?"

"It wang eight times. Stop wowwying."

"I can't helnt it. These dreak-ins always nake ne nerthous." The elevator doors slid shut.

"Do I ring the commissars," widow Pavlovna debated with herself, "or the asylum?"

"Don't be."

"What are we looking thor tonight?"

"This should be a good one. It says he's a bachewor."

"Ooh! nTornograthy, naydy?"

“Maybe. Just wook fow any sign of deviant behaviow."

"Dethiant dehathior. Check."

"Sssh! Hewe it is." The doors slid open again, revealing the foyer.

“Didn't you pwess the button?"

"No. Didn't you ntress the dutton?"

Widow Pavlovna heard the elevator doors slide shut again. "The asylum."

He'd never get back to sleep again. He just knew it. Horace could hear things working all over the building. Blowers. Mr. Agate's rocking chair. Someone's shower. The elevator. A toilet. Who the hell's doing laundry at - he squinted at his alarm - oh. Ten:thirty. Well, shit anyway. He wanted to sleep.

Some tiny creature was scratching to get in. What? He opened his eyes to better concentrate on listening. Gone. He closed his eyes again. It sounded like his door was slowly being opened. He opened his eyes again. Silence. He closed his eyes again. Was that his living room floor squeaking, or was that Mr. Agate's rocker? He opened his eyes again. Nothing. He closed his eyes again. He opened his eyes again. He closed his eyes again. He opened his eyes. He closed his eyes. Somebody whispered. Or was that upstairs? He opened one eye. A chair was drawn across the Agate's kitchen floor. He opened another eye.

.

.

.

. Utter stillness. He opened the other eye. Unusual lights danced across his ceiling. He opened yet another eye. The lights swirled themselves into a sort of 3-D kaleidoscope. The fifth and final eye captured the fatal dive of the griffin, talons glinting in its mad effort to rip out his sixth, twelfth, and eight hundred and forty-third eyes, bobbing on the ends of their respective tentacles and winking naughtily.

While Horace dreamt in his bedroom, his living room was being investigated.

"This guy is bowing! No wettews, no incwiminating video wentaws, no naked postews . . . ."

"I thound a nagazine here. `Nature.' Inntorted thron Great Dritain. Not nuch in the way of ntictures, though."

"Wook in the kitchen. I'ww check that secwetawy."

"This is a little unusual. Cone here."

"What did you find?"

"Look in his rethrigerator. Nust de thour cases oth `Yoo Hoo'!"

"And wook at aww that vodka! Get a pictuwe of that."

"Right."

"The - Door - Is - A-jar - "

"What?" they both hissed.

"Did you say that?"

"No, didn't - "

"`EEEEE(P)' The - Door - Is - A-jar - "

"Whewe did that - "

"`EEEEEEEE(P)' The - Door - "

"It's the rethrig - "

" - Is - A-jar - "

" - erator!"

"Did you get the pictuwe?"

"`EEEEEEEEEEE(P)' The - "

"Not yet!"

" - Door - Is - "

"Huwwy up then!"

" - A-jar - `EEEEEEEEEEEE(P)'

His tentacles torn and bleeding and hopelessly enmeshed in the wings, teeth, feathers and talons of the horrible griffin which, it seemed, was named Chastity, Horace had nevertheless succeeded in strangling it into submission with some five thousand four hundred something of his eyes intact, when it renewed its onslaught by emitting a horrible, droning beeping sort of, well, beep. On the edge of myth he seemed to recall a way to quell this menace, but it didn't make any sense. In the general context of enraged griffins, what did "Shut the door" mean? He struggled to subdue the beast, he struggled to unravel the mystery and his tentacles, and the horrible beeping continued relentlessly. It was torture! On, and on, and on, and -

"Shit! What the hell time is it, anyway?" Horace sat up, grumbling to himself, wiping a drop of sweat from his chin with one hand and numbly reaching for the phone with the other. "Hello? Hello?" The line was dead. There was something eerily familiar happening here.

"`eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee(p)'" he could just hear the refrigerator talking. Someone was in his apartment! Someone, he felt certain, besides himself.

" - A-jar - "

"The canera's droken."

"`EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE(P)'"

"Did you wemembew to wewoad it?"

" - The - Door - Is - A-jar - "

"It has halth a roll letht thron last night!"

"Weww, did you wind it?"

"`EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE(P)'"

"It's suttosed to de autonatic!"

" - The - Door - "

"SSSSH! Maybe the battewies awe dead."

“ - Is - A-jar - `EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE(P)'"

"Did you dring new datteries?"

"You have the camewa!

Horace's palms were sweating. He had a little trouble breathing quietly enough to suit him. Considered-to-be-possibly-violent people were whispering about something in his kitchen. He had this vague dread of flying lions, for some reason. Not cozy, this evening was becoming, he thought. What to do about it? He hung up the receiver to free his hand, so he could scratch his head. OK. Let's try that. Sliding out of bed in slow motion, he made his way on hands and knees out of the bedroom.

"You come in haste," Widow Pavlovna said approvingly. "I am happy not to have rung up the commissars."

"Er - good," one of the men in blue pajamas nodded, a little disorientedly. Their pockets mumbled "State Hosp." in discreet letters. "Can we - " he suddenly whirled 360 degrees around - "come in, for a minute?" His partner smiled reassuringly.

"Yes, it is all right," she said. "They are still upstairs."

The men looked at each other meaninglessly. The little one smiled. They entered her rooms. "I'm glad it's dark," the first said.

"I am Praskovya Pavlovna," she said in welcome, standing in the dim pool of light leaking in from the foyer and delicately holding her cupped left hand out to them palm down. "And your names are . . .?"

The first one whirled around again. "I'm Ed," he introduced himself loudly, then leaned to her ear and whispered, "It's really `Red', but don't say it. Call me `Ed'." He stepped back and announced, "And this is Alph!" putting his arm around the little guy.

Four floors up, Horace had managed to worm his way into the hallway when he got an idea. Breathlessly retracing his wriggles he went back to his bedside phone and punched 9-1-1. A few moments later he was back on his stomach again.

"His name is in actuality then - "

"Don't say it!" rEd grabbed at her, wrapping his hands over her mouth and startling her badly. She emitted an indignant squawk and he quickly let her go. "Alph doesn't like names that start with `R'. Do you, Alph?"

rAlph smiled.

"Ed," widow Pavlovna smoothed her black silk with slightly shaking hands, "Alph, they are upstairs in Mr. Aeiouaey's apartment. 4-F. Shouldn't you - "

"Do you have a car?" rEd asked her suddenly.

" - be getting in the elevator - I beg your pardon?"

"Do you have a car?" rEd slapped away rAlph's hand, which was tugging on the sleeve of his shirt.

"What would a one hundred and thirty-seven year old woman want with an automobile?"

"She could get buried in it. But do you have a car?"

"No!" she starched proudly. "I walk."

rAlph tugged at rEd's sleeve, excitedly pointing at widow Pavlovna.

"Alph wants to know if you are really a hundred and - " rEd was interrupted by rAlph, who was frowning, shaking his head, and pointing up.

"Can Alph not talk?" she asked.

"Yeah," rEd answered, not entirely to her satisfaction. "Alph wants to go up in the elevator. Is that it, Alphie?"

rAlph smiled.

"Granny, does this guy in 4 - what is it?"

"Mr. Aeiouaey. 4-F."

"Does he have a car?"

Phil hastily handed Angie the foam cup of coffee and slammed the door shut, peeling the lid off of his own. "We got it all tonight, don't we?"

"Damn that's hot!" Angie burned her tongue.

"Full moon, Friday night, howling wind . . ."

"At least it's not raining yet."

"Yet." Phil set his cup down and strapped in. "Any calls while I was out?"

"You'll love it," Angie said. "You know those two escapees from the rubber factory?"

"You gotta be kidding!" Phil moaned. "Is this the Thirteenth?"

"Might as well be."

"Can't their trainers handle this?"

"Not after Channel One came on calling them `violent'. The big sticks want the force to be a `presence' at the apprehension. Politics." Angie shook her head.

"Don't get me going on politics," Phil warned half-seriously. "At least we don't have to be `in control'."

"Not even `instrumental'." A gust of wind slightly rocked the cruiser. "Wish we could get a call on those B & E's," she said.

"What for? They never take anything."

"Just seems interesting. Two short perps broadcasting themselves with camera flashes all over the place and always sneaking out just ahead of the call. Might be more than it seems."

"Might be less." Phil blew on his coffee. "Paparazzi."

Angie flicked on the headlights and pulled out into traffic. "Yeah, right. Going to the tabloids for megabucks with all the best dirt on a cabbie, a shoe repairman, a refrigerator salesman, a - what was that other one?"

"Wasn't he a bartender?"

"Bartender. Pretty flashy stuff."

"It's got your attention."

"Hey, it's my job!" They both laughed.

"Now what?"

Umberto set the receiver back in its cradle. "You know that old lady that called a little while ago? The one that calls every other week or so?"

"Yeah, Mrs. Pavlov. I always figured she'd be chunked in here sooner or later. She sounds like a prime suspect. `It was either you or the commissars,' she said. Commissars?!" Un Sung Webster cleaned his nails and laughed.

"Well, this time it looks like she knew what she was doing. That was the police dispatcher. A 9-1-1 came in on rEd and rAlph from someone else in the same building as hers. We'd better go pick 'em up. Tell Louis to take the phone while we're gone."

"No can do, Bert ol' buddy. He's still out at the TV station, `monitoring the situation'."

"Those idiots. There's no situation to monitor. They make it sound like the end of the world and scare a bunch of little old ladies to death." On cue, the phone rang again. Umberto answered. "No, ma'am. They're very nice, really. Well, that's true, they do have some problems, but . . . . No, ma'am. No. No. Not violent. No. Yes. Yes, it is frightening, but I assure . . . . Your doors are locked? Then you are perfectly . . . . that's right. Yes, I know it's a nasty night. Oh? Just let Fluffy in, and lock it again. Of course I'll wait - Holy Jesus Web I swear I'm gonna kill those news idi - yes, I'm still here. You're welcome, ma'am. Right. Yes. Goodbye. Goodbye." He counted to ten, then slowly hung up.

"So you ready to get off the phone?" Web grinned. "Go get Ricky to go with you. I'll take the phones."

"Ricky?" Bert moaned. "Why don't you go with me and let Ricky take the phone? Never mind; bad idea, I know."

"Hey, he might help. rAlph likes Ricky, you know."

"Yeah, but rEd?"

"True," Web commiserated, "but there's nobody else in, anyway."

"You suppose that rEd knew it was down shift on a Friday night when he walked out?"

"What do you think?"

"Shit." Umberto grabbed his jacket and walked out of the room and down the hall, shaking his head. "Hey, Ricky! Ricky, come here!" Web heard him shout to wake up the undoubtedly asleep probationee, and chuckled. One of those nights.

"Good. It's dark in here, too."

rEd and rAlph sauntered into Horace's apartment.

" - The - Door - Is - A-jar - `eeeeeeeeeeeeee(p)'"

rAlph obediently slammed the door shut behind him.

"He's home! Scwew the camewa! Cwose the doow! SSSSSH!"

Horace's heart pounded as he slithered into the living room. How many of them were there? Under cover behind the furniture he hoped to set up a diversionary surprise, circle around, and - think of something then. First, though, the thought "music hath salves to oil the savage breasts" wouldn't leave him alone, and he silently counted through his disc collection in the dark to find a particularly salving selection.

"Where do you keep car keys, Alphie?" rEd stroked his chin rhetorically. rAlph smiled.

"He drought a thriend!"

"He's not awone!"

"Is this the Brahms or the Biederbeck?" Horace wondered.

"On the dresser!" rEd said brightly, snapping his fingers. He began walking toward the kitchen. "Where's the bedroom, huh, Alphie?"

Two figures in the kitchen froze.

rAlph tugged on rEd's sleeve and pointed. "Oh. That way, huh?" rEd said. They turned and headed for the hall.

Two figures in the kitchen thawed.

Horace tried to read a title by the glimmer of some distant lightning, but the angle was wrong.

"We've got to get out of hewe!"

"What thor? They just cane dack thor the car keys."

"What if they didn't?"

"What ith they did?"

"We couwd get awwested!"

"We could get thired!"

"Oh. Wight."

"Let's hide in that closet until they leathe again."

"Whewe is it? I can't see a thing."

"It's deside the thront door. Thollow ne. Hurry! while they're still in the dedroon."

"Ravel's `Bolero'!" Horace exulted. "Perfect! That always puts me straight to sleep." He loaded the machine and wriggled on, remote in pocket.

"Come on!" Angie thought she was being teased. "You actually joined?"

Phil laughed in spite of the weather. He turned up his collar and twisted his hat on a little tighter as he stepped out of the car. "Yeah! It's great! You can get your money back in special member rebates right away if you want, and it's only five bucks anyway. I ordered a `Honk If You're An Asshole' bumper sticker for my Galaxie."

"I can't stand it!" Angie shook her head. "I can't believe how many people actually honk at those things. It's like a plague."

"That's what I thought, too, at first. But it's all harmless. And it's funny. Last week, off duty, I walk into O'Mick's and see a drunk shoving some guy off his barstool, so I yell at him `Hey, you!' you know, to get him to stop. Turns out to be some kind of signal. The whole damn bar stands up all at once and shouts `Yeah, YOU, Asshole!' at the top of their lungs and bust out laughing like crazy. I felt like I'd just been beamed down. After talking to a couple of them I found out they were all members. It's fun. You oughta join." He tugged at the door and pulled it open for her as the wind rushed in. She let him, tonight.

They stood in the foyer for a minute shaking the rain from their hats and looking for the elevator. "Do you suppose they're here from the hatchery yet?" Angie asked.

"I doubt it. We were a lot closer."

"Pssssst!"

"So you think I'd make a good asshole, eh?"

"O-ho! I'm not touching that question!" Phil laughed.

"Pssssst! Commissars!"

"What was that?" Angie suddenly sobered.

"Pssssst!"

"That door over there is open a little." Phil pointed, unsnapping his holster. Angie peered and advanced a couple of steps. "Be careful! It looks dark inside."

"You are a woman?" a small but firm voice said in surprise. "No!" Lightning flashed through the foyer windows.

"Open your door wide, please," Angie directed. The door swung open as if by magic. As they squinted through it and their eyes adjusted, a petite, elderly lady in a black silk gown seemed to materialize in the darkness. "They are here," she intoned, as rumbling thunder rattled the windows.

Phil's spine arched in a preternatural shiver. "Jesus!" he gasped involuntarily.

"Who is here, ma'am?" Angie had the presence of mind to ask the ghost.

Widow Pavlovna stepped forward into the light of the hall. Angie relaxed visibly.

"Jesus!" Phil took a step backwards.

The widow fixed an ethereal stare at the wonder of a woman commissar. "The asylum men. They are here. I sent them up."

Phil jumped as another flash of lightning more brilliant than the last distorted their features for an instant. "You," he gulped, "you . . . sent them up?"

Mrs. Pavlovna slowly turned her eyes to him for the first time. "Yes. I sent them up - " they felt the thunder shake the building for a long second - "to Mr. Aeiouaey's apartment. 4-F."

Angie laughed. "Thank you, ma'am." She turned and slapped Phil's shoulder with the back of her hand. "She sent them up in the elevator, asshole! Ha, ha - oh! Excuse me, ma'am. Good night." She pulled Phil down the hall by the arm.

"Jesus!" Phil muttered again, not yet fully recovered, when the doors slid shut. "You sure this isn't the Thirteenth?"

“No," widow Pavlovna said to herself decisively, stepping back into the gloom. "That can not be a woman."

"It's nice and dark in here, isn't it, Alphie? Feel around for those keys." The two of them bumped around in Horace's bedroom, fumbling with laundry, coins, books, towels, and wadded tissue in an effort to cop Horace's keys. rAlph put a pungent sock in his pocket and smiled.

"Watch youw ewbow! What awe they doing in thewe, anyway?"

"They can't thind the keys."

"Weawwy? They didn't even turn on the lights."

"He likes it dark, it sounds like."

"Wemember that. I can't see to wwite it down."

"That's not worth renendering. Lots oth nteontle like the dark."

"Wots of what?"

"nTeontle. nTeontle. Hunan Deings."

"Oh, peopwe! Sowwy."

As Horace crawled around the perimeter of the room, he could hear whispering in the front closet, but couldn't make it out. His pajama shirt pockets were bulging with remote controllers, and he was making for the old sofa next to the door, from behind which he could wield his wands in relative invisibility.

rEd thought of something. "Hey, Alph. Do you know what car keys look like?" He looked at his partner's face in time to see a knowing smile illuminated by a flash of lightning.

"Why's the door shut?" Phil was shining his flashlight on the "4-F" on the door even though the hall was lit.

Angie listened intently. "It's awfully quiet in there," she whispered. "Do you suppose they've been and gone already?"

"I don't see how. They shouldn't even be here yet if you ask me," he whispered back, frowning.

"Do you suppose that old lady was wrong?"

"I'm not even sure she was really there." A low rumble rolled somewhere overhead.

"I can't bweathe. Wet's get out of hewe."

"OK. Just de carethul." They slowly swung the closet door open and hesitated, surveying the room.

"I know!" rEd slapped himself on the forehead. "On top of the refrigerator! Let's look for the kitchen, Alph." rAlph followed into the hallway, contentedly squeezing his bulging pockets and sniffing the bouquet.

"Do we stand here all night, or what?" Angie was getting irritated. This was silly.

"I'd say we are a `presence', wouldn't you?"

"I'd say we're a couple of assholes."

"I knew you'd join up."

"Don't get funny. Let's check out the apartment."

For a scant few seconds, Horace held his breath. Everything seemed to go absolutely dead silent all of a sudden. Button in hand, he was ready for anything but the end of the world, which seemed to have come. Even Mr. Agate's rocker was still. But then, the distant whirr of the elevator started up, and the wind whooshed outside, and the front door slowly opened, bumping into the open closet door behind it, which magically closed itself immediately. Two figures wearing heavy shoes stepped into his apartment. He was ready.

Fire one.

" - But I'm so embarrassed, Jackie - won't people miss Lake Michigan? Hee-hee-hee! Hee-hee-hee - "

"TEE VEE!" rAlph shouted, running over to the set, reciting the words along with the announcer. "New Ultra-Comfy Femina-Slim Hyper-Absorbant Lunar Pads," he sang out. "Don't touch one with your tongue. Not available where prohibited. Some restrictions may apply."

Phil shone his beam on rAlph. "Are you - what was it?"

"Are you Horace Ayeyiyoyoowayewhy?" Angie demanded slowly. RAlph smiled at them and turned back to the television.

"It's the powice!"

"The ntolice!"

"sssssh."

"sssssh. Right."

"Alphie!" Umberto stepped through the open door. "There you are! What have you been doing?" rAlph smiled.

Fire two.

All the lights in the room came on instantaneously. Everyone not in a closet blinked and rubbed eyes at the same time.

"Jesus!" Phil jumped again. "Where's Rod Serling?"

"NO!" screamed Umberto.

rEd grabbed the first thing he could lay his hands on, which was a copy of this book. A wild look came into his eyes. "Who?" he shouted, running into the room from the hall. "Where - Is - Who?!"

"Nobody, Ed!" shouted Umberto, rushing to restrain him, "nothing! Nobody said anything!"

rEd threw the book wildly at the cops, and picked up an Art Deco-ish statuette.

"Submitted for your approval," said rAlph, in synch with the TV, "by way of the Twilight Zone!"

"Jesus!" said Phil, switching off the torch.

Angie looked at Umberto. "Are you Horace Ayeyiyoyoo - "

rAlph was shouting and jumping up and down just like the man on the screen. "SEVENTY-FIVE PERCENT OFF AS LONG AS INVENTORY LASTS! IF YOU HAVEN'T SEEN IT YOU'LL NEVER BELIEVE IT! IN-N-N-N-N-N-CREDIBLE!" He smiled at the officers and took a breath, and in doing so noticed a movement behind them in the hallway. Obviously excited, he ran toward the door.

"Stop him!" yelled Umberto, himself occupied with an irate rEd.

"Time to settle things down," thought Horace from his hideout.

Fire three.

DUM DUM DUH DUMP-DUM! The stereo deafeningly blasted off with not Ravel, but Sousa, precisely as a tremendously, blindingly brilliant strobe of lightning turned the scene into its own negative and back. DUH DUMP-DUMP-DUMP-DUMP‚ DUMP!

"Ricky!" screamed rAlph ecstatically.

KKSSSHH!! Sousa's cymbals crashed.

"Who!!!!" demanded rEd in delirium.

b- b- b- b- b- b- b- B- B- B- B- B- BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMMMM- M- M- M- m- m- m- m- m- m- m- m- m- m- m- m- m- m- m- m- m- m- m- m- m- m- m- m- m- m- m- m- m- m- m- m- m- m- m- m- m. The thunder felt like an earthquake.

"It's me!" said Ricky cheerfully. "Ricky!"

The lights went out for forty blocks in every direction.

"Jesus!"

"Kill!" screamed rEd. "Blood! Guts! Get him! Kill! Kill! Kill!" He swung the statuette at everything that moved, or would have, if he could have seen anything in the absolute cavern-like blackness of the apartment. He managed to successfully render Umberto unconscious with a stray but powerful swing. Phil took a dive at him without being exactly sure of his whereabouts, and missed. Angie decided to guard the door, having already inadvertently let rAlph through. "Kill!" rEd shrieked, slavering, as he ran full tilt and head first into the frame of the door, having misjudged its location by half.

"Oh!" Angie blurted in surprise, as rEd's body fell upon her feet.

"I'll get him!" yelled Phil, having shaken off the effects of his own collision with the dark. He neatly tackled Angie at a half-trot, tripping over the senseless rEd and pinning her against the hall wall opposite.

"We'll have to go down the steps," Ricky was telling rAlph. "The elevator won't work when the lights are off."

"That's too bad," rAlph said sadly.

"Get off me!" Angie pushed Phil in irritation. "Quick! They're going down the stairs!"

"Oh!" rEd sat up slowly, rubbing his head. "It's nice and dark here." He made his way out into the hall as the closet door opened quietly, pushing the front door out of its way.

"The coast is cwear! Evewybody's gone!"

"How can you tell?"

"Just wisten!"

It was quiet.

"Let's get out oth here! I don't care ith we do get thired!"

"Shhh! Wet's go." They tip-toed around the two doors and groped their way down the hall.

When everything was still at last, Horace stiffly stood up behind the sofa. Desperately necessary: one - scratch that - three Choc SD's. He worked his way into the kitchen, and carried the soothing balm back to his bed.

Umberto woke up shortly with what seemed to be a second head sprouting out of his original one. It appeared, also, that he had been blinded. No, he remembered with relief, the lights went out in the storm. Somehow he managed to find the open doorway and staggered down to the elevator. He pushed the button. Nothing happened. "Ouch," he thought. "I'll wait."

About fifteen minutes later, the lights came on, the elevator came up, and Umberto went down, to the rousing strains of "The Stars And Stripes Forever." When the elevator doors slid open at the foyer, he stepped up behind a crowd of familiar people, standing in the hall to the door with their hands up over their heads.

"Aha!" a voice piped from somewhere out in front. "Fresh meat! You, Jose! Your money or your life!"

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