The Year's Best Horror Stories 8 by Karl Edward Wagner

Author:Karl Edward Wagner [Wagner, Karl Edward]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2012-02-12T18:36:42+00:00

End of the tape

“Such a man should be permanently kept under medical care,” the police officer said abruptly. “It is irresponsible to let him walk around free. He should be locked up somewhere.”

“Come on, he isn’t really dangerous,” Dr. Fred Hildeblink said calmingly. “You can trust my word on it. After all, I’ve been treating him close to three years, since the car crash. This is the first time he’s done anything like this. He’s just an old and very unhappy man; he wouldn’t hurt a fly.”

“So they said about the Boston Strangler, and, if I recall correctly, so said Anthony Perkins at the end of a movie in which he stabbed quite a number of innocent people to death.”

“This isn’t a Hitchcock movie, officer.”

“No. But he attacked a young girl, and did quite a filthy thing in front of a middle-aged lady with about ten other people around to watch it. If you ask me, he’s a spooky, demented little man—crawling around in the dark between the fair booths and doing who knows what else there.”

“He didn’t attack that girl; he touched her by the shoulder only to ask if she’d seen Cathy. He’s asking everybody for her. The policeman will take him home, and there’ll be no more trouble.”

“I certainly hope not. Next time he’ll be spending the night here for indecent exposure. And what’s the truth about this whole idiotic story of his Cathy? What did you show him to make him go so willingly? My men had some trouble getting him in here—he’s much stronger than you’d expect for such an old man.”

“He looks so old, but he isn’t, not really,” Dr. Hildeblink said softly. “And Cathy … doesn’t exist. It was very good of you to call me as soon as you found my card. He’s been in my care since the first symptoms developed after the accident. I suppose he told you about that? He’s sixty-two now. Three and a half years ago he held a good job with a mail-order company, where he’d been working for about fifteen years. He’s never been married.

“Then one day he met a girl who came with a complaint about an order which had never arrived. A very ordinary girl—she worked in some factory or other, putting nails in boxes the whole day through. She was very beautiful … and very young, barely seventeen. Her name was Catherine … Cathy for short. He invited her for a cup of coffee, and they met a couple of times afterward, went for a drink or to a movie. He’s a very well-read man, you know, and a very fascinating and interesting man to talk to. That must have been the only thing Cathy saw in him, but he fell in love with her. It went bad, of course, when she realized that he wanted more from her than just some company and a chat. She threw a scene and kicked him out. He kept pursuing her with presents and letters, and finally her parents went to his employers and had him fired.

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