Moonlit Mind by Dean Koontz Read Free Book Online Page A

the perfectly vertical iron-rung ladders that serve them offer a great many more entrances and exits, including a number of discreet options in quiet alleyways and abandoned factory yards, but four-legged Harley can’t use them.
    For the past year, however, having grown rapidly stronger in his exile, Crispin has been able to lower the fifty-pound dog through a manhole or carry him up a ladder with the help of a device that he has crafted.
    First, there is a sling made of fabric-backed vinyl, customized to the dog’s body, with holes for his four legs to be sure that his weight is evenly distributed and that undue pressure is not put on any of his internal organs. Crispin cut the vinyl andhand-sewed the sling himself. He is confident that neither will the seams split nor the snaps fail under stress.
    When lowering the dog, he employs two lengths of a multistrand nylon rope favored by mountain climbers. He uses carabiners to attach the ropes to a pair of rings on the sling.
    When climbing out of a drain, he wears a harness that he has also fashioned himself. With dog loaded, the sling attaches to the harness, and on his back Crispin carries his best friend up the ladder.
    Before performing that feat, however, he ascends alone to open the manhole. From a city maintenance crew, he has stolen a tool with which he can hook and lift aside the big iron disk. From below, the reverse end of the tool allows him to tilt the cover up and, using leverage, swing it out of the way.
    After poking his head out into the cold night to be sure there are no witnesses, he pushes his backpack through the opening before descending again to get in harness and carry the dog.
    In such manner, they now emerge into a dead-end alley a block from Broderick’s, the largest and oldest department store in the city. Over the past year, they have taken shelter from time to time in Broderick’s, which is an especially welcoming place in winter.
    This night, the moon is lost behind a lowering sky. The icy air cuts at him so that tears bleed from his eyes.
    After freeing the dog, Crispin folds the harness and the sling. He stashes them in a compartment of his backpack, which is larger than the one he carried when he first fled Theron Hall to live wild in the city.
    With the pack on his back, with the dog on a leash, he sets out for the wide service alley behind the department store.
    His breath plumes from him as if he’s exhaling ghosts. Snow is predicted before morning.
    On this first Saturday in December, an hour before closing time, no deliveries are being made to or from the shipping-and-receiving center that occupies the uppermost garage level beneath the huge building.
    At the bottom of the two-lane ramp, the automatic bay door is down, and the man-size door beside it is latched. Latched but not deadbolted.
    Crispin carries with him an expired credit card that he found years earlier in a trash can. He slips it in the gap between door and jamb, puts pressure on the beveled latch bolt, and forces it out of the striker plate. The door opens inward.
    If a guard in the security room happens to be looking at a monitor that provides a view from the camera above the large bay doors, Crispin will find himself in trouble or at least chased out.
    But that never happens. A year previously, the Phantom of Broderick’s explained to him that during shopping hours, security guards charged with monitoring the store’s numerous cameras will be focused 99 percent of the time on store interiors, looking for shoplifters.
    Once through the door, Crispin relies on the wise dog to guide him.
    With the last of the day’s outgoing shipments completed by 5:00 P.M. and the final store-stock deliveries made by 6:00, the employees in shipping-and-receiving have all gone home, with theexception of the department’s assistant manager—Denny Plummer—who works from noon until closing time at 9:00.
    If a dozen employees were busy in this area, Crispin would have little hope of