Night Howl by Andrew Neiderman Page A

“He’s dead.”
    “Oh no. What happened? Heart?”
    “She didn’t know any details.”
    “My God! It’s like something terrible has descended onto this street.”
    “Now Clara, you can’t let your imagination run wild. Mr. Strasser was into his eighties and . . .”
    “It’s not imagination.”
    “I know,” he said quickly.
    “I’m tired too,” she said abruptly. “I want to go to bed.”
    “All right.” He turned off the television, checked the lock on the front door, and turned off the living room lights. He followed her to the bedroom, darkness falling behind them in the house. Now the only light was the small lamp by the side of their bed. When they were beside each other, she snuggled up to him and embraced him. He put his arm around her shoulders and she pressed the side of her face against his chest. They lay like that for a long moment, both silent.
    “He was just down here the other day,” she said.
    “He stopped during his walk and talked to King. King never barked at him. Did you ever notice that?”
    “No, but I guess he sensed the old man was no danger. That dog—” He stopped himself. He had started to say that dog was pretty smart. He was smart, dammit, and well-trained and well-fed and loved. . . . “Maybe, maybe when I’m in Boston, I’ll have a chance to talk to someone who knows more about these things.” He expected Clara to chastise him at any moment, to bawl him out for still lingering on it. But she surprised him.
    “Good,” she said. “I want to know now,” she said. “I want to understand.”
    He kissed her, held her tightly, and then put out thesmall night light. Darkness dropped over them like a black shroud.
    Downstairs, he awoke from his sleep abruptly. It was as though the same darkness that had fallen around Sid and Clara had come crashing down around him. He raised his head slowly and listened to the silence. Moving his gaze from one end of the ceiling to the next, he slowly inspected the floor above the signs of life. It was as though he could see through walls, but it was only his superior sense of hearing that guided him. He concluded that the people were gone from this side of the house, and he rose up from the carpet. He had been so still that when he finally did lift his body, he looked like some stuffed animal magically come to life. He paused and then moved cautiously to the foot of the stairs.
    On the street outside, Leon Clark paused in his patrol car and snapped on the spotlight. He ran the beam along the edges of the woods and down the shoulder of the road to the start of the Kaufmans’ front lawn. Then he edged the car forward and directed a beam of light to the side of the house, keeping it low so as not to shine it into an upstairs window. Some light did spill through the basement window.
    Inside, he was already on the first step by the time the policeman’s light pierced the darkness. He growled instinctively. He did not continue up the stairs after the light was gone. He remembered the previous patrol car and the light that it had shone.
    So he retreated from the steps and went back to his comfortable place on the carpet. He spread himself out, listened keenly, and then lowered his head. He was satisfied that for the time being there was no immediate danger. In a few moments he was asleep again.
    Upstairs, Sid had difficulty falling asleep. Clara was already deep in slumber. He recognized that for her, sleep was an escape, a panacea. He was jealous of it; he wished he could get the same quick relief. But he couldn’t. Instead, he lay there battling against an ominous feeling of danger. It made no sense to him. There was no one battering at their door. All was quiet; all was still. And yet, it was that same quiet and stillness that unnerved him. Was it his imagination or were all the sounds that he had grown used to gone tonight?
    He decided it was his imagination and he turned over to press his face into the pillow. When he closed his eyes,