Horning dragged himself to his knees, choking and gasping. He caught
a blurred glimpse of the limp figure of the woman who had been his
counterpart's wife. A thin trickle of blood was seeping from her
mouth....
"Get up, I said!" the killer cried in a tight terrible voice.
He kicked Horning in the side.
Horning rolled away, pain stabbing through him. He scrambled to his
feet.
"Climb onto the desk!"
* * * * *
Shaking, Horning clambered up, standing half-crouched with the top of
his head pressing the ceiling. A water pipe lay like a cold knife-blade
against the back of his neck.
His counterpart dragged a coil of insulated wire from the workbench and
threw it to Horning. "Here! Tie a noose!"
In aching silence, Horning looped and twisted the wire.
"You know what happens now, don't you?" The murderer from another world
leered up at him, rocking with laughter, and this time there was no
mistaking the madness in the deep-set eyes. "You're going to anchor
that wire to the water pipe, and put the noose around your scrawny
neck, and jump off the desk! After that"--he laughed again--"I'll take
your wife and go back to my own plane. When they find you here, with my
Myrtle and my gun, they'll say you murdered her and hanged yourself!"
"They wont believe it!" Horning blurted. He groped desperately.
"They--they'll know from the gun. There's no other like it on this
plane--"
"--So, they'll say it's a new development by the renowned scientist,
Doctor Raymond X. Horning--" Abruptly, the man who was Horning's
counterpart broke off. His mirth vanished, replaced by cold, gun-backed
menace. "You're stalling! Anchor that wire!"
A knot of black fear drew tight in Horning's midriff. Numbly, he
fumbled with wire and pipe.
"Anchor it!"
Horning sucked in air.
"Hurry up!"
Horning let the wire drop.
The coil hit the edge of the desk, hung for a moment, and then rolled
off onto the floor.
The other's eyes flicked down to it. He cursed and took one short step
forward, hand outstretched.
Horning dived off the desk, straight at him.
The man from beyond the barrier started back. He jerked up the gun.
His shot went wild. Horning landed on him with bone-crushing impact.
The gun skated off across the room. They crashed to the floor together,
rolling over and over till they hit the workbench. It rocked wildly.
Tools cascaded over them.
Twisting, Horning drove a blow at his counterpart's face.
The other writhed away. His elbow jabbed into Horning's throat.
Horning choked. Before he could recover, a knee found his belly. The
wind went out of him. His adversary broke free and scrambled away,
clawing for the gun.
Horning lunged after him. He caught a foot ... jerked and twisted with
all his might.
The killer sprawled, flat on his face. But his outstretched hand
clutched the pistol.
Horning snatched a Stillson wrench from the litter of tools fallen from
the workbench.
His counterpart rolled, whipping round the gun.
* * * * *
Horning lashed out with the wrench, straight at the other's head. It
struck home with a sound like that of a dropped watermelon bursting on
a concrete sidewalk.
The killer went limp.
Horning sagged back, panting. After a moment, he saw that his
counterpart had stopped breathing.
Horning staggered to his feet. His stomach churned. He lurched to the
wastebasket beside the desk and vomited.
Then a dull, shuffling sound impinged upon him. Swaying, Horning came
erect and peered round behind him.
Myrtle stood in the doorway, eyes blacker and beadier than ever. Her
jaw was set, her greying hair loose and disheveled. She wore a frayed,
ancient kimona and dirty white mules.
Horning choked, "Myrtle, get back--!" and tried to move round between
her and the bodies. But she pushed past without speaking, straight to
his fallen counterpart, and bent as swiftly as her bulk would allow.
When she straightened, she held the murderer's pistol in her hand.
"Myrtle, be careful--!"
She shoved him back with a meaty hand, blocking him with her body, the
gun held behind her. He could not read her expression. When she spoke,
her voice was flat and without feeling, no longer strident: "I heard it
all, Raymond--all the conniving ... how you hate me ... that monster's
scheme to steal his wife's fortune...."
Horning shrugged, not bothering to answer. Squatting down, he began
gathering together the tools spilled from the workbench.
"Raymond...."
Horning glanced up, then stiffened.
Myrtle had brought round the pistol. She was pointing it at him.
In the same flat voice she said: "Put on that outfit, Raymond. That
transdimensional whatever-you-call-it."
Horning let the tools fall. "Are you out of your mind, woman? In this
shambles, with two corpses...." He choked, unable to go on.
Myrtle said: "Put it on." Her face was a mask, an enigma. Her voice
stayed low, completely devoid of emotion. "I'll kill you if you don't."
Horning stared into his wife's eyes. They were inscrutable, hard and
blank and black as twin balls of polished onyx.
Myrtle's lips parted. Her jowls quivered. She steadied the pistol.
Very slowly, very wearily, Horning rose. Wordless, he crossed to the
transdimensional registration unit and strapped it on.
"Go over in the corner," his wife ordered. "Stand with your face
against the wall."
Horning obeyed. He wondered whether Myrtle intended to shoot him in the
back.
Or maybe she'd just gone mad.
Whatever it was, he decided, he didn't much care.
* * * * *
Metal scraped on metal. Something thudded on the floor. The hoarse
wheeze of Myrtle's breathing, the slap and shuffle of her mules,
sounded loud in the stillness.