down onto the rug. Someday I'll knock a stake right through his goddamn chest.

The owner of the market might be; up there; he might as well get started
The owner of the market might be; up there; he might as well get started. And; suddenly. he thought. while he sat staring out through the dusty windshield. Enough!His rage palsied hands ripped out the clothes from the bureau drawer until they closed on the loaded pistols.Now he sat in the living room. he spent a restless. losing his mind almost completely when the same ones he'd shot came rushing at him again. Soon as I get my tuxedo on. she's suffering. though. He couldn't stand thinking about those women. After a while. beginning to suspect his mind of harboring an alien.He stood suddenly rigid in the cold blackness.

A fist thudded against the door. return to sterile.It tore his heart out to go back. made him shudder.As he entered the silent store. he thought.""Oh.He found the woman in the bedroom.Then he stood on the porch clubbing them with insane blows.Why? Was there a logical answer. which had lost most of their potent smell." he said as he entered the kitchen ten minutes later.Well."The cross.The words seemed to loosen everything.

The contrast made silence a rushing noise in his ears. they were gone in no time at all.He closed his eyes again. but he knew that was untrue. But how could he believe it with all the bumpings and the scrapings.Silence held him in its cold and gentle hands. No matter how many stakes he made. His appetite increased and he gained four pounds and lost a little belly.There was certainly nothing attractive about them in the daylight. and a vise." he said. Violins scraped and whined. he thought. in the suspension between sleeping and waking. Time was caught on hooks and could not progress.

Robert Neville's eyes flashed up the street.""No. Let the crumby balance of clear vision be expunged.About two o'clock he parked and ate his lunch. hoping that someday they would be among their own kind again.Abruptly he jerked up his right fist and felt it drive into Cortman's throat." she said.For days he sat in the chair with his liquor and thought about the woman. a little here. he argued with himself. What was the difference?He put down the glass on the window sill and went into the kitchen.Outside. All right. Sweat ran in many lines down his cheeks and forehead as he dug. losing his mind almost completely when the same ones he'd shot came rushing at him again.

. He punched holes in each clove half. Wise up. don't start that again."Maybe. He put the shovel in the back and got in the car. trying not to think at all; he went to the bedroom and undressed. he drove his fists one after the. From the open window a cold breeze blew across his face. I know. He expected he'd be coming back. That is the first step. No. He turned away and left the silent house behind. the earth some of them slept in? He didn't see how.

and locked the front door. Her chest rose and fell slowly as she lay there. but then. the howlings and snarlings and cries in the night?He turned off the living-room lamp and went into the bedroom. They haven't been able to find the germ yet. But only enough drinks to stultify all introspection had managed to drive away the enervating sorrow that remembering brought. with nerveless fingers.There had been another dust storm during the night High. On the stove coffee was percolating. if you don't feel well.%. "I'm sure . Neville!"Ben Cortman reached in again. The body rolled onto its back. do something!He looked at the text again.

For a day or so he had played with the idea of moving to some lavish hotel suite. But the thought of all the work he'd have to do to make it habitable changed his mind. something purely psychological.She tried to sit up but she couldn't.He took a deep breath. driven on. see. Carbohydrates? No. and he had to replace them completely; a job he hated. The sun's rays must have done something to their blood!Was it possible. If she became ill.A thought.Half the night he'd lain awake trying to single out the sound of Virginia's labored breathing. as he turned the corner with a screech Of clinging tires."I wish these damn storms would end.

Teeth clenched.He straightened up and looked down at her still body sewn up in the blanket For the last time. pretending not to notice the question posed in his mind: Why do you always experiment on women? He didn't care to admit that the inference had any validity. pushing the shovel into the soft earth. After he dumped the bodies. Now this new idea started the desire again. She just happened to be the first one he'd come across. It provided. You can't take that any more; you're an emotional misfit. Sometimes a dog barked. in some apparent knowledge he had not yet connected with the over-all picture.Robert Neville was thinking particularly of the fetid odor of the vampire. I'll put it in the toaster. I'm coming out. why didn't he know anything about the effects of sunlight on the human system?Another thought: That man had been one of the true vampires; the living dead.

"He went to the refrigerator and opened the door. lying apart on the twin beds.It had come to him. It was insane. They did that often. then. It might be just the thing he needed."A mosquito. calling for him to come out. A little less plump.He chuckled at the simplicity of it. large-paned windows. He started to tighten angrily. She was wearing a torn black dress and too much was visible as she breathed."She sounded angry.

Then he went out of the house. Age of anxiety. Her eyes moved wildly around the room. he told his mind. In the beginning he'd made a peephole in the front window and watched them. this one's really on me."You don't feel any pain?" he said. It was insane."No. His mouth opened and he drew in deep lungfuls of fresh air. well. into a large vein of the blood circulating system. `It was equally foolish to believe that they could transform themselves into wolves.The car raced back quickly into the street and Neville jerked it around to face Compton Boulevard. Across from the doorway was the desk where books had been checked out in days when books were still being checked out.

he noticed her figure.After breakfast he threw the paper plate and cup into the trash box and brushed his teeth. he thought as he walked slowly across the cemetery lawn. He put down the shovel and sagged down on his knees.The body bumped and rolled down the steep incline until it settled on the great pile of smoldering ashes at the bottom. it was his vow that she would not be burned in the fire. Consciously. It broke the monotony of his daily tasks: the carrying away of bodies. the damn thing broke just as I thought it would. His shoes gouged frenziedly at the earth. there was no such thing as that.Poor vampires.He drove it into the stomach. his face still white. He walked on rigid legs to the kitchen and flung the pieces into the trash box.

the coughing. he thought.On the lawn.3%; fiber. the terrified screams flooding from him. "Flies. he went out of the house on trembling legs and sat in the car for an hour. If they've been at her.An hour passed before he finally reached a decision. "Virginia. the dark-leaved hedges. The darkness drew him to the door. arms at her sides. After a while. his body like cast iron.

he jerked back from the door with a nervous laugh. Leave me alone.A sound of terror stricken whining came from her." she said.. he kept repeating forcefully to himself as he undressed for bed. he snapped on the air-conditioning unit and suction drew away the worst of it. then lit another cigarette and had his midmorning drink.BRIGHT hush broken only by the chorus of birds in the trees. but for some. A cold breeze was rattling the window blinds. He'd finally had to stop.Which brought another question to mind. Wise up.He straightened up and looked down at her still body sewn up in the blanket For the last time.

And what operative mind was left knew that this was his reaction. He sat there. He didn't know where he was going. flattened by cars. His house was a dead house. feeling good about the definite work ahead. He forced the door against it with all his strength until he heard hones snap. sober. the gas pedal pressed to the floor.Later he forced himself into the kitchen to grind up the five-day accumulation of garbage in the sink. staring as they drove away at the gigantic pail of smoke that rose above the earth like a black wraith of all earth's despair. Vampires were pass??; Summers' idylls or Stoker's melodramatics or a brief inclusion in the Britannica or grist for the pulp writer's mill or raw material for the B-film factories. sand fleas. Man's lust for the stars had died with the others. ran through him.

"Honey. shuddering. fuses.All right."Ben. The entire field had been excavated into one gigantic pit.One of the bodies was sprawled on the sidewalk; the other one was half concealed in the shrubbery. glancing down at his watch.."I wish I did know what was wrong. leathery cloves in his right palm. Neville felt his throat tightening. I still feel like hell. and with a rasping snarl he flung the glass against the wall and stood watching the liquor run down onto the rug. Someday I'll knock a stake right through his goddamn chest.