Someone Is Bleeding by Richard Matheson Read Free Book Online Page A

If I made the idea horrible, and she went anyway . . .
    Thoughts. No end to them. And no resolution.
    As I turned up 26th I saw Albert’s Dodge in front of the house. And another car too. Jim’s Cadillac.
    I pulled up to the curb. Jim got out of his car and came quickly over to mine. He opened the door on Peggy’s side.
    “What is it, Peggy?” he asked.
    She shook her head.
    “Come here,” he said.
    By the time I got out of the car, he’d led her to his Cadillac and tried to make her get in it.
    “I don’t want to go!” I heard her say, her voice edging on hysteria again.
    “Stop it, Peggy,” Jim said. “I just want to talk to you.”
    Then she was in. And I came up to the car. I looked in and saw their dark forms. I heard Jim’s muffled voice.
    Steig got out of the car and walked around to where I stood.
    “This is private,” he said. Guttural. Thick German accent.
    “Miss Lister is . . .” I started to say and found that one of his beefy hands had clamped on my arm. The strength of his grip pressed pain into the flesh.
    “Let go of me,” I said, gasping.
    “You go,” he said.
    He started to lead me to my car. I couldn’t do a thing. He was too big, too strong.
    “God damn you!” I said, suddenly raging. “Get your fat hand off me!”
    I wanted to call for Peggy but I didn’t. She was in no state to come to my aid. Besides, I felt like a fool being led around like a baby this way. Struggling with teeth-gritting frustration. I was shoved against my car.
    Steig stood by the door he had just slammed shut.
    “You get out of here,” he said.
    “Listen, you ignorant Kraut.” I said, more angry than sensible.
    His face hardened, the pig eyes blazed at me. “You get out of here before I break your little neck with my hands.”
    He glanced at the Cadillac. Then, under his breath, he said something that covered my flesh with ice water. “If you did not know Mr. Vaughan,” he said, “you would be dead . For snooping.”
    I gaped at him, my hands shaking. I saw his brute white face in the light of a street lamp. And I was afraid. No one had ever threatened my life personally. And it comes as a shock to a man to suddenly learn that another individual wants to kill him.
    “Get out,” Steig said.
    My fingers shook as I slid the ignition key in. They shook on the gear shift. My legs trembled on the clutch and the accelerator. My heart pounded violently as I pulled up the street, afraid to look back.
    I got out.
    * * *
    I jolted up on the bed with a gasp.
    There was a dark figure standing over the bed.
    My heart lurched. “No!,” I gasped, throwing one arm up toward off the expected blow.
    “Davie, what is it?”
    I fell back on the pillow, panting. My throat clicked. I lay there heaving with breaths.
    “Davie?”
    “You s-scared me,” I said. “I’m . . . I was dreaming.”
    “Oh. I’m . . . sorry. It’s Albert,” she said quietly.
    “What . . . ?”
    Then the light was on. She was over at the sink, back. She pressed a wet cloth on my skull. To my surprise I saw her wearing a different outfit. She had a dark pair of slacks on and a tight black turtleneck sweater. She’d taken a shower too. I could tell from the fresh smell of her, from the dampness on the lower part of her hair where it had come out of the shower cap. Her only makeup was a little lipstick.
    She looked very calm.
    “What about him’” I said.
    “When I went in the house tonight,” she said.
    “Yes?”
    “I . . . I went to brush my teeth and I met Albert in the hall.” she paused.
    “Well . . . !” I asked.
    “His face was all scraped off,” she said.
    “Albert,” I said.
    She turned the cloth over with her gentle, unshaking fingers.
    “What did you do?” I asked. I wanted to tell her what Steig had said to me but I couldn’t, get to it. Things were happening that fast.
    She stroked my hair gently. “I left,” she said.
    “You took a shower first?”
    “No,” she said, “I took that before. It was after