Night of Light

“He’s lying again,” Abdu shouted savagely. “He’ll say anything to put off the inevitable, the justified inevitable, I’ll swear.”

Mrs. Fratt reached out, touched Abdu, slid her hand along him, and gripped his hand. “You didn’t do all these terrible things, did you? You didn’t kill his wife and that man, did you? Or try to kill Carmody and rob me of him?”

“I’m telling you the truth, Mrs. Fratt. I think you’d better quit listening to him. He could talk a hungry snake away from a bird.”

He looked at his watch. “Mrs. Fratt, we’ve ten hours before the last ship leaves. We’d better get started. You didn’t want this to be a short thing, remember?”

“Oh, I made a mistake not getting eyes before I did this!” she said. “I want to see him suffer! But there wasn’t time to do it!”

“Never mind, you can hear him. And feel him.”

“Mrs. Fratt,” Carmody said, unable to keep his voice from going hoarse, “I’m making one last appeal. You spoke of God a little while ago, thanked Him. Do you really believe that He’ll approve this? If you are a Christian, then for the sake of God don’t do this! Even if I were the man who wronged you so. He would not want you to torture me. Revenge is mine, saith the Lord. But I am not...”

“Revenge is mine, saith the Lord.” Mrs. Fratt almost hissed. “The Devil may quote scripture, and I guess that is true! But go ahead! Whine, beg, plead for mercy! I begged, for my son’s sake, and you laughed at me! Laugh now!”

Carmody fell silent. He was determined that he would at least try to die with dignity. They would get no pleas or screams of pain until he could stand it no longer. Nevertheless, he could not control the quivering of his body.

He said, “Mrs. Fratt, while I can talk and think rationally, I want to tell you that I forgive you. I hope you have a chance for God to forgive you, too. So, no matter what I say later, remember that this is my true feeling. God grant you grace.”

Mrs. Fratt had risen to her feet. She started to walk slowly toward him, with Abdu holding her hand. She stopped and put her hand to her heart. She was silent so Abdu said, “It’s just another trick, Mrs. Fratt.”

“Help me, Raphael,” Mrs. Fratt said in a low voice. “Help me.”

“I’ll be your strength,” Abdu said. He went to the table and lifted the cloth aside. Steel glittered under the light. Long sharp knives, surgeon’s scalpels, a surgical bit and drill, a saw. There were also splinters of the Kareenan duurl, a bamboolike wood; a rubber syringe with a long, slightly curved beak; several wires; a pair of scissors; a pair of pliers with broad thin edges; a club, and a hammer.

Abdu picked up a scalpel, walked to Mrs. Fratt, placed the scalpel in her hand.

“I think he ought at least to have his face marked up a little bit. He ought to feel something of the pain you felt, Mrs. Fratt.”

She touched the scalpel gingerly, then drew her hand back.

“If you get faint-hearted now, Mrs. Fratt, you’ll have wasted all those years. Have you gone blind for nothing?”

She shook her head. “Let me feel his face. I can’t see, but maybe if I can see it through my fingers, I can hate as much as I did when I first saw it. God! I never thought I’d shrink from this! I used to cry because I couldn’t have him in my power.”

She walked close to Carmody. Her right hand went out, touched his forehead. It jumped back, then returned, moved over his features.

He closed his teeth on her hand. She cried out and tried to jerk back her hand, but his jaws held her. He brought his feet up; though taped at the ankles, they had not been tied to the chair. They came up together between her legs and in a spasm of power he lifted her a few inches. She cried out again at the blow. Abdu yelled and started to run up to help her.

Carmody pulled his legs up against his chest in a contortion that cost him pain. His mouth opened; the woman jerked her hand loose and staggered back. His legs straightened; his feet caught her in the pit of the stomach. Doubling over, she reeled against Abdu. Then she straightened and fell to the floor.

Abdu stared at the bloody scalpel in his hand and at the blood spurting from her back. He dropped the knife and went down on one knee beside Mrs. Fratt.

He called to her vainly, listened to her heart, and finally rose.

“The scalpel didn’t go in deep enough to kill her. You killed her when you kicked her, you bastard!”

“I didn’t want to,” Carrnody gasped. “I wouldn’t have had to except for you. But I was damned if I’d just sit here and let her cut me up.”

“You’re damned anyway,” Abdu said slowly. “That trick won’t work twice.”

He picked up the scalpel and moved to one side of Carmody.

“What’s your interest, Abdu? You’ve made a good living from her. Isn’t that enough? Why should you want to torture me?”

“Sure, I led her on, and I lived like a king. But I was fond of the old lady, even if she was a sucker. Besides, I always wanted to see what kind of stuff you’re made of.”

Behind the chair now, he crooked his left arm around Carmody’s head to hold it steady. The scalpel nicked into Carmody’s cheek and cut downward.

“Does that hurt, Carmody?” Abdu said in the priest’s ear.

“Enough,” Carmody whispered.

“Let’s see how tender the skin of your lips is.”

The scalpel slashed the corner of his mouth. Carmody went rigid, but clamped his teeth together to keep from crying out.

Abdu placed the blade against Carmody’s jugular vein. “One slash and it’d be all over. How’d you like that?”

“I’m afraid I’d like it very much,” Carmody said. “God forgive me.”

“Yeah, it’d be a kind of suicide, wouldn’t it? Well, if there is a Hell, I hope you go to it. But don’t get eager.”

Abdu walked back to the table and picked up several of the bamboolike splints. “Let’s try a few of these burning under your toenails. Did you ever use these on anybody?”

Carmody swallowed and said, “God forgive me again.”

“Yeah? Well, you thought all that was behind you, didn’t you? Just goes to show we can’t ever get away from our evil deeds; they follow us like a dog scenting an old bone.”

Abdu approached from the side, kneeled, and then leaned his weight on Carmody’s legs. He pulled one shoe and the sock off. Carmody tried to writhe, but he could not move his legs. He screamed as the splinter was driven up under the nail of his big toe.

“Go ahead and yell,” Abdusaid. “Nobody can hear you through these walls.”

He took out a box of Kareenan matches and lit one on the bare stone floor. When he had touched off the splint, he arose.

“That wood’s soaked in oil,” he said. “It burns like hell, doesn’t it?”

The knocker clanged. Abdu whirled and drew his gun from a holster beneath his cloak. The clanging continued for a moment, then stopped. Abdu breathed out a sigh of relief, only to jump when the phone rang.

The priest watched the smoke rise from the slowly creeping fire. Although he had stopped screaming, he felt that he was going to faint. He could not imagine a pain more intense than the one he now felt, but he knew it would not compare with what he would experience when the fire reached the nerves.

“Stop ringing, damn you!” Abdu said.

“I think they’re looking for me,” Carmody groaned. “They must have found the officers you knocked out. And they know I haven’t left the hotel.”

“Well, we’ll just let them look. They can’t get in here as long as the door’s bolted.”

Carmody hissed with pain, then said, “And what’re you going to do afterward? They’ll be waiting for you. Besides, they know this is Mrs. Fratt’s room and she’s not answering. Also that you are missing from your room. And that you haven’t left the hotel. A check is made of everybody entering and leaving, you know.”

Abdu frowned and glanced at the phone. He walked to the table and tore off a strip of tape. After securing this over Carmody’s mouth, he went to the phone.