“You’re overreacting, Roz,” said Eleanor, reaching for her coat as she stood up. “Can you imagine anyone tackling me?” She murmured something about next week for the house as she gathered up her belongings and got out the door. She walked toward the parking lot in a less frolicsome mood, however, than she had assumed for her friend’s benefit a few minutes before. In the fading twilight houses, trees, and bushes melded into a single threatening mass, out of which suddenly emerged a tall, broad-shouldered man. Eleanor found herself stiffening, and moved rapidly toward her car, her heart pounding. When he passed her, she realized that he was just a boy, doubtless come to whirl one of the girls away for a dizzy Friday evening. “El, you idiot,” she muttered, as she tried to put the key into the lock with trembling fingers.

Chapter 3

He drove slowly through the narrow streets that made up the center section of the subdivision, accelerating steadily and smoothly to compensate for curves, slowing down and braking without any sudden movement or jerkiness. That was how cops drove, he thought with satisfaction, and professional chauffeurs in their long black limousines. No one noticed you if you drove like that, as long as you didn’t go too slow. Those were the ones they looked at—the slow ones. And the fast ones. Never the ones whose vehicles moved with fluidity and grace. “Fluidity and grace”—he had had a teacher who used to say that all the time. Funny expression, but he liked the feel of it on his tongue. He realized with a start that he had been waiting for too long at the stop sign. That was very bad. Someone might notice him if he waited too long at a stop sign. Nervously he shifted his foot from brake to accelerator with a jerk and swore as the engine roared in response.

He accelerated onto Highway 401 but stayed in the collector lanes. Only two exits and he would be leaving again. Then the wheel lurched involuntarily in his hand as he caught sight of the bright yellow of a police cruiser in his side window. Damn! But they were after other suckers today, not him. Not him—they would have no reason to be after him. They passed, and he flicked on his right-turn indicator. Yonge Street was relatively uncluttered at ten o’clock on Monday morning, and he got to Lawrence Avenue faster than he had anticipated. His mouth was dry with fear; his hands slimy on the steering wheel. He slowed down as he came closer to the intersection, hoping that an amber light would force him to stop. Damn these timed lights. They dragged you downtown before you wanted to get there. Then it changed and he stamped hard on the brake. A mistake. He looked at his watch; it was only 10:20. He had planned to get there at 10:30. That was the time he had written down in his operations book in the glove compartment. Should he drive around for a while? There were too many dead ends and one-way streets around here to do that. He might get lost and then he would be late—and that could be dangerous. The roaring in his head distracted him. It took a honk from the cab behind to make him realize that the light had changed again. Shit! Another mistake. He pretended he was looking for an address on a piece of paper so that his hesitation would be perfectly understandable to anyone looking at him. No one was.

He made a fluid and graceful left turn into the tiny street by the park and followed its twisting route into a quietly solid and expensive neighbourhood. The park was on his right. According to the map, it should disappear soon behind a line of houses and then reappear for a long stretch. A tallish woman in flat shoes and a pale spring coat walked confidently toward Yonge Street. With a single, competent flick of the eye he took in her height, her speed, and the number of houses around him. That would be poor strategy. His self-confidence returned. He congratulated himself on the dispassionate and cool manner in which he had been able to classify her as impossible. “Dispassionate.” That was a wonderful word, too. He continued on, slowly, but not too slowly. “Dispassionately the enforcer surveyed the scene and coolly chose the most strategic opponent.” Some day he would write a book.

Suddenly he realized that he had passed the built-up area and that there was nothing to his right but parkland shading off into ravine. His throat constricted in panic again, and the roaring started once more in his ears. Up ahead he saw a girl—a short girl with darkish hair, walking slowly along a path in the park—all alone. She was so obvious. Maybe she was a trap. If he were a cop, that would be what he’d do. But there wasn’t any place for one to hide. So she was alone, Christ, were these bitches stupid. He brought the vehicle to a standstill very gently. With practised ease he slid rapidly over to the passenger side and glided out, leaving the door open; holding his map in his hand, visible to all, he composed his face into a puzzled frown.

“Excuse me, miss,” he said, in his pleasantest tone, with a grin that his social worker used to describe as “engaging”—he liked that term, and used to practice looking engaging in front of his bathroom mirror—“but could you—” A sharp growl cut him off. He jumped back. A monstrous Doberman plunged out of the undergrowth on the edge of the ravine. Its face was contorted in rage, showing its long yellowish teeth. Christ! He hated dogs. Vicious, filthy creatures. They made him shiver in disgust and fear.

The girl laughed. “Sorry, but Caesar gets a bit over-eager about protecting me. If you don’t come any closer, he won’t do anything. You were saying?”

His mind cleared for a second. “Oh, I wondered if you knew where”—he grasped for a name—“Hawthorne Crescent is? I seem to be a bit lost.”

“Sorry,” she smiled. “I don’t know the neighbourhood that well. I’ve never heard of it.”

“That’s okay,” he mumbled backing toward safety. “I’ll just check my map again.” He jumped back onto the passenger seat and slammed the door, almost faint with terror. As the girl and the dog moved down the street, though, anger began to flood in to replace the fear. The next time he’d look and listen more carefully. But he had failed here. A second failure, now. That last time he had panicked like some stupid kid and run—all because of a bloody old lady and another dog. Perhaps he should move back out to more remote areas again, until he had polished his technique sufficiently to be good enough for inside the city. The city took nerve, determination, and skill.

John Sanders was sitting in the back booth of a small rather grubby restaurant with a cup of cold coffee in front of him. As he glanced irritably at his watch a small dark woman slipped into the seat across from him. She smiled, then turned and gestured at Jerry, the morose proprietor. “What’s fattening, Jer?” she called. “Bring me a Danish if you have one.”

“No more Danish, Dr. Braston. I got a honey bun if you want. No one else likes them.”

“Great. Can you heat it up and put some butter on it?”

Sanders looked incredulously across the table. “Haven’t you ever heard of cholesterol, Melissa?”

“Look, the people I’ve been cutting up recently could have lived on goose fat and brandy and it wouldn’t have made any difference. They all seem to have been scraped up off the highway or bashed in the head by psychos. Besides, I didn’t have any breakfast this morning. They called me in early. Don’t nag, John. You remind me of my husband. Never marry a heart man; they spend all day nagging people and find it hard to turn it off when they get home.” She took the hot, extremely buttery bun from Jerry and began to attack it with vigour.

“What did you want to see me about, anyway? I can guess that this isn’t a pass, is it? No one seems to be turned on by the smell of formaldehyde these days—except my husband. I think he gets a secret thrill, imagining me down in the morgue. You know, a closet necrophiliac.”