D A Novel (George Right)

CAVE OF HORROR





“A carnival is in town,” joyfully exclaimed Jane.

Mike received this news without any enthusiasm. Even in his childhood he hadn't been a fan of carnival rides, especially those that fling their passengers upside down, back and forth, and in other bone-rattling directions. Once, when his classmates dared him to go for a spin on a roller coaster, he very painfully hit his tailbone in the bottom point of the trajectory. There were, of course, calmer rides but Mike found them just boring; actually, usually only little kids rode them. Even an early age he preferred playing board games or assembling model cars or airplanes to visiting an amusement park. All the more he didn't see any sense in visiting a carnival now, at his respectable age of twenty-two.

His girlfriend, alas, had the opposite point of view. And therefore, having indifferently muttered in reply, "So what?" Mike already knew perfectly well what was coming next.

"Let's go there Saturday!" Jane met his expectations.

"Maybe we could go to the movies instead?" Mike offered without any real hope.

"We always go to the movies. And besides, what's playing? Are they showing anything interesting this week?”

"I don't know. I haven't looked yet. Maybe something good is on.”

"I'm sure they're showing the same old junk. Mikey, don't be so boring! I want to go to the carnival! We can go to the movies anytime, but the carnival is here for only a little while.”

"Where are they from?”

"Dunno. From somewhere far away. They must have rides we've never been on!”

"Aha, that's it–'from far away.' These traveling carnivals are even worse than stationary amusement parks. In each new place they put together all these rides, then take them apart them again. As a result, at some point something becomes loose, a screw isn't tightened and... Last year the newspapers reported there was an accident on a ride in Connecticut. Three people were injured and about twenty more dangled on the very top for two hours, waiting until they could be rescued from there.”

"So what, traffic accidents happen much more often–does that mean we shouldn't drive cars?”

"If we don't go by car, we'll have to go on foot. But if we don't climb on some doubtful rotating machinery, we can spend the money for something better.”

"Just admit that you are afraid," Jane continued to badger him. "And not of accidents. You're afraid of the rides!”

"Why do you say I'm afraid? I simply don't understand what pleasure it is to dangle upside down...”

"Well, don't ride with me. Just stand nearby and wait if you are such a little coward," she affectedly sighed. "You can hold my purse.”

"Listen to you being all brave! " Mike lost his patience. "Remember our trip to New York? You dragged me to Coney Island and there–to those, what were they called– 'Air races' with airplanes that flipped over... And who was vomiting even before that ride stopped?”

"I shouldn't have eaten those cakes before I got on the ride," Jane waved away his complaint. "And I took it into account for the future. But does it mean that I should stay off rides the rest of my life because I got sick once?”

Mike had understood from the very beginning that resistance was useless and, as one could expect, two days later–11 a.m. Saturday–he and Jane entered the carnival area, which was enclosed by a high chain link fence.

Long ago in this not too cozy suburban place had been a meat factory combined with a slaughterhouse; however business was bad and it eventually burned out in the most literal sense: one night it was destroyed by flames. There was gossip that the fire had been set either by some animal rights fanatics or by the factory owner himself who decided to cash in at least on the insurance. It was also rumored that there were several casualties, though only one was known for sure–the night watchman. Possibly, rumors were promoted by the large number of charred bones found in the ashes–which was no wonder, considering the type of factory it had been. The burned-out buildings were beyond repair and for a time, despite the fence and strict “keep out” signs, they remained an attractive place for the town's boys who were looking for adventure, creepy stories and dismal souvenirs like chains and meat hooks or the aforementioned charred bones–until one of these boys fell down into the basement and broke his backbone. His friends were frightened and ran away and the boy lay there in dirty ice-cold water for almost a day before the search began. When he was finally rescued, he was still alive and conscious–but the way he looked made even hard-boiled police officers shudder: while the kid was lying there paralyzed and helpless, rats gnawed his face and almost completely chewed off his fingers.

What became of the ill-fated boy was unclear. Some said that he died in the hospital of blood poisoning. Others said that doctors saved him, but, as they added, mournfully shaking their heads, "It would have been better for him if he had died, much better.” It was known for sure only that soon after his accident his family left town.

This terrible story–and the mass outrage of the town's parents caused by it—made the city authorities demolish the scorched ruins at last. The grounds remained vacant for many years, enclosed by a chain link fence; the tin plates fastened to it which promised a penalty for trespassing and for garbage dumping rusted and peeled off so badly that their stern warnings became almost unreadable. Several times the site was offered for sale, but the town's businessmen, knowing its history, weren't eager to set up their businesses there. Over the years, however, the gloomy story of the meat factory was remembered less and less and many young people of the new generation, including Jane (who had just reached her eighteenth birthday), never even heard about it. And now, apparently, the grounds were leased to the traveling carnival.

The idea to come here in the morning also belonged to Jane, as she hoped that mornings would have fewer visitors. And she had been right–the carnival was almost deserted. Most likely, the reason was not so much the almost-forgotten reputation of the grounds as much as the cloudy and windy weather and the lack of advertizing. There were no lines to get on any of the rides, but it was necessary to wait for another reason: the workers didn't want to run their whirligigs and cars half-empty and wouldn't start the rides before a number of customers had gathered.

This didn't discourage Jane. Nothing prevented her from chatting cheerfully with Mike, who of course wasn't content with the role of purse keeper and willy-nilly accompanied her on her dizzying rides. The young people consistently paid their tribute to all spinning and twisting units, excluding only the simplest carrousels for little kids (but, certainly, including "Sky Ship" on the long bar which made the loops so disliked by Mike; at the top point, hanging upside down in an open cabin, Jane shrieked, and then began to laugh loudly; Mike only nervously squeezed the safety bar and thought "when will this end?”); practiced in accuracy, shooting with air-rifles and crossbows and throwing balls in a ring; tried to walk inside transparent plastic spheres floating in a pool (it turned out, naturally, not so much walking as falling); made a "space flight" in a cabin with a screen, which was shaking and heeling in all directions according to the action on the screen; ate cotton candy and popcorn; were photographed dressed as pirates and cowboys with the corresponding scenery in the background; wriggled in front of fun house mirrors and...

"Well, looks like we've done everything here," Mike uttered, glancing towards the exit.

"Wait," Jane objected, once again stopping at the carnival map near the cash booth. "Hmm, it does look like everything," she disappointedly concluded.

"So, let's leave?”

"First I need to pee," declared Jane; she didn't trouble herself with euphemisms like "to powder my nose." Having found the restroom icon on the map, she resolutely moved in the chosen direction.

Mike didn't have the same need. While cola was sold at the carnival, it was ice cold, and on this overcast day Mike hadn't wanted any, while Jane drank up a big plastic cup. So he remained in place, absent-mindedly looking around. By 3 p.m., the carnival gradually had become filled with visitors. They were mostly parents with little children or they were small companies of boys about twelve or thirteen years old. Adult guys with their girlfriends, like Mike and Jane, were still rare–they would come closer to the evening... Reacting to the increase in visitors, disguised barkers appeared in the thin crowd. One of them, a fat clown with a red smile drawn on his white face, seemed to feel Mike's gaze from a distance of several yards and suddenly turned to him, conspiratorially winked and beckoned him with a finger.

Mike politely smiled as if to say, “Thanks, mister, but I already visited your tent.” The clown nodded as if he understood, turned and moved away, but then looked back and beckoned again.

"What does he want from me?" Mike wondered and even looked back, checking whether there was somebody behind him to whom the clown had been gesturing. But he didn't see anybody looking towards the clown. Mike looked towards where the clown had been, but didn't see him any longer–probably the barker had disappeared behind the backs of the walking visitors or entered the nearest tent. Very well, let him disappear. There was something unpleasant about this character, though Mike couldn't say what exactly. However, he had disliked clowns since his childhood, finding their appearance not at all funny but ugly.

Jane had disappeared somewhere, too. Why is she dawdling so long? Probably there is a line waiting to get into the restroom. Mike slowly moved in the same direction his girlfriend had gone–and in the same direction, as he understood a second later, the clown had beckoned him. Mike gazed around in order not to miss the girl and realized he would feel calmer if he could see to which attraction the clown enticed people. Fun house, probably? But it was in the opposite direction... For an instant it seemed to Mike that he saw the clown directly ahead once more, but in the next moment the barker disappeared again.

Without having seen either the red-lipped fat man or Jane, Mike reached the restroom area located in the farthest corner of the carnival. There were mobile booths, not a stationary building. And there was no waiting line there. Actually, there was not a single person.

Mike looked around. Just a moment ago the crowd around him had rustled, rides' mighty electric motors had roared, girls had shrieked as they rose head over heels to the sky, wild buffoonery tunes had played–and suddenly he found himself absolutely alone, in a completely desolate part of the former waste grounds. Actually, why former? Here it didn't look former at all... No, the fun was still near; choral squeals, persuasive melody and the clap of air-rifles reached his ears–but he was separated from all this joy by the wall of a long shed with a stenciled black inscription "Employees only" across the door, a trailer with lowered window blinds nearby, a long truck next to it (probably one of those which carried the equipment), one more behind it... This part of the grounds overgrew with rigid bushes which were cut only partially; toilet booths were, of course, on the cleared patch, but right behind them the thickets shot up above human height. To the left of the booths, a recently embedded wooden post stuck out, which, however, had neither a lamp nor a loud-speaker. In the grass under Mike's feet a plastic bottle unpleasantly crackled–apparently it had lain here for years. Slightly farther a yellowish scrap of an old newspaper could be seen... But where was Jane?!

"Mike!"

He startled and looked about. The girl appeared from behind the booths.

"Good that you came. I knew that we hadn't visited everything here yet!" she stated with a happy look.

"Yeah, exactly, we hadn't visited the toilet," Mike grinned.

"Forget the toilet! Come here.”

The young man took several steps, bypassing toilets at the left, and saw behind them a narrow pass which led somewhere into the thickets. But Jane pointed to the post. Now Mike made out a small sign hanging on it. On a plywood sheet a thick black contour of an arrow was drawn, and inside it it was written in deliberately sloppy red letters: "CAVE of HORROR" Below the arrow was a very naturalistic print of a blood-stained palm. The arrow pointed directly to the pass.

"One more attraction? Here?" Mike skeptically looked at the narrow path between prickly bushes. Usually such paths lead, at best, to a garbage dump.

“Yes. Let's go!" she impatiently grasped his hand and pulled him along.

"What for?" Mike resisted. "Like, you've never seen anything similar before. They'll just ride you in a car through a shed filled by plastic skeletons and vampire dummies, flashing red lights and howling loudspeakers... it seems to me, such a primitive display doesn't affect even children anymore. In the movies all that looks much more plausible.”

"Well, now that we're here, shouldn't we look? Maybe it has some good special effects!" Jane was quite decided about it and the young man, having sighed, followed his girlfriend.

As far as Mike understood, the surrounding fence should have been very close, but the path appeared longer than he expected–for some reason it was wedged through the interlacing prickly branches in a very winding way. But then, at last, bushes parted–and the couple indeed saw a chain link fence. Behind it, the same bushes densely grew, too. But on the inner side a wide spot was cleared, and there stood one more building.

It looked like all of them in any carnival. A long shed decorated with paper-mache stones in an effort to make it look like a cave; the forward wall was covered with garish images of corpses, skulls, bats and freaks with blood-stained hatchets. Above this all–the attraction's name in convex red letters, stylized to blood streaks and obviously highlighted from within in the evening. Below–the rails on which cars enter the "cave" at the left and exit it from the right.

There were only two cars and they were just preparing for departure; the forward one was occupied by a mother with a boy about eleven, who surely was a big fan of horror movies and the initiator of the ride (the woman herself had a displeased look); in the back car a single young guy, swarthy, with long black hair, was taking a seat. The attraction worker–thin, with a loppy dark mustache, dressed in an old-fashioned black suit–a living image of a provincial coffin maker from an old movie–was waiting, with his hand on a knife switch, until the last passenger sat down.

"Wait!" Jane shouted, quickening her pace. "Wait for us! " The cars were four-seater so there still was room for them.

The "coffin maker" raised his head and looked at her and Mike; the girl, approaching, stretched to him a ticket bought at the cash booth which granted the right to ride all attractions in the carnival during this day. But he only shook his head:

"A separate ticket is required for us, miss.”

"Separate? What the hell? We paid for everything..." Jane began to argue, but the worker mildly interrupted her:

"Those are the rules, miss. There are some formalities. You have to sign a paper," he smiled an apologetic mournful smile, clearly showing that personally he, of course, considered all this as nonsense, but this was the will of his bosses. Mike noticed that there was something old-fashioned in his manner of speech, too.

"Paper?" Jane became puzzled. "What paper?”

"You see, our attraction is really frightful," he highlighted the word "really" with his voice. "Some clients consider that it is too frightful. Therefore, in order to avoid complaints...”

"Well, all right," the girl gave up. "Where can we get tickets and sign this paper?”

"At the cash booth, miss," he pointed with his hand, emphasizing that he meant not at all the main cash booth of the carnival. "At our cash booth.”

Jane and Mike turned right and indeed saw a booth with a window. The "coffin maker" meanwhile turned the switch and the cars, having abruptly started, disappeared in the black mouth of the “cave.”

Mike and Jane approached the cash booth and bent to the window. The person sitting inside seemed unpleasant to Mike from the very first look. Unshaven and tousled, he looked too slovenly even for his modest position and his left eye, significantly squinting somewhere aside from under the heavy eyelid, only strengthened the unpleasant impression.

"Twenty dollars," he responded to a request for two tickets. "And you have to sign here," he offered them two sheets of paper.

"I am visiting the attraction 'Cave of Horror' of my own will, having received this warning and assuming all risks," Mike's eyes slid through his copy of the text. "Except for cases of technical malfunction of the attraction, the administration and employees of the carnival bear no responsibility for possible moral, mental or physical damage which may become a consequence of my visit to the attraction, as well as for the case of my disappearance..."

"What kind of bull is this?" Mike exclaimed indignantly.

"Oh, never mind," Jane waved his objection away with the look of a life-wise person. "It's an advertizing gimmick, don't you understand? To frighten us in advance... Do you have a pen, mister?" she addressed the cashier. He gave her a pen with an indifferent gesture.

"Wait a moment, don't sign! " Mike exclaimed. "What do you mean by 'advertizing gimmick?' Do you understand that these pieces of paper relieve them from any responsibility for any accident there inside?"

“Oh, what accidents?" Jane objected. "That's not a roller coaster or a 'Sky Ship' after all. You said yourself–they'll give us a ride in a car between dummies... what can happen to us?”

"You never know! Short circuit, for example. Or some scarecrow could fall on our heads...”

"But it says here–'except technical malfunction!' And also, do you really think that if somebody really disappeared here, they would have gotten away with it, whatever pieces of paper we've signed?"

"And how often here do, well, disappearances happen?" Mike asked the cashier, trying to give a derisive tone to his voice.

"Time to time," the squinty-eyed man unperturbably answered. Jane burst into laughter and put a flourish on the sheet.

"Come on, Mikey," she jabbed her elbow into his side. "Don't be chicken."

"I'm not chicken at all!" Mike was indignant. "I simply don't like this silly piece of paper or all this foolish business. To pay them twenty bucks moreover... it's actually a swindle–when we bought the tickets, we weren't warned that there are rides for which they can't be used..."

"Well, let me pay for you," Jane pulled out her wallet from a pocket of her jeans. The unsaid end of the sentence–"if you are such a cheapskate"–was as clear as if it were written in the air in an oval near her head, like in comics; so Mike muttered "no need" and with an angry look wrote his signature.

At the very same time a heart-breaking scream came from within the “cave.”

The pen jerked in Mike's hand, leaving a virgule on the paper.

"Aha, and you said–even a child wouldn't be scared! " Jane vindictively reminded him.

"Well, of course–recorded screams from loudspeakers," grumbled Mike. "Only it was too loud and unexpected. If it was so loud here, I bet those inside were totally deafened."

Actually there was something else that confused him. The shout full of horror and pain sounded too natural. Well, however, if the owners of the attraction had hired a good actor... Yes, that was the main strangeness–an actor, not an actress. Such cries are always female: the girl in monster's claws is the tritest cliche of the genre... But this shout was male.

Having received the money and the signed papers, the cashier issued them two tickets. On a low-quality gray paper it was printed:



CAVE OF HORROR

You will SCREAM!

We guarantee it.



Below small letters added:



Discount at revisit. Bring your friends!



Mike hemmed, derisively shaking his head, and the young people went towards the building. Just when they approached, the exit doors of the "cave" swung open, and the car rolled out. Only one car.

The one in which mother and son sat. The child's face and rounded eyes shone with excitement. The woman, on the contrary, was deadly pale and looked as if she was barely constraining nausea.

"You shouldn't show such things!" she said between her teeth to the "coffin maker" as she tried to get out from the seat; her long dress hindered her. "Especially to children!"

"Ma'am, you signed the paper that you were warned and have no claims," the worker sadly reminded. "And it seems to me your son doesn't have any complaints, too"

"Wow, it was cool!" the boy immediately confirmed.

"Keep the ticket," the worker smiled at him. "You will be able to ride again at a discount. And if you also bring a friend..."

"No riding again!" the woman angrily interrupted. "And you, Cyril Parker, I'll talk with you at home! About what you read and what you watch if you can like... such..." she, at last, coped with her dress and stepped from the platform to the ground. Immediately after that she turned towards Mike and Jane. "Get out of here before it's too late, you two," she uttered categorically. "It's... disgusting. Now I probably won't be able to eat for several days..."

But Mike didn't look at her. He was looking at the second car which, at last, left the “cave” at high speed, crashed with a clang in the already vacated first one and stopped.

The car was empty. And all splashed with blood.

On the seat where the guy once had sat, sleekly gleamed a whole pool which seemed almost black. And from the board of the car something hung down, long and fibrous... Hair. Black tufts stuck together with blood.

That's not real blood, Mike reminded to himself. Just paint. All this is scenery, part of the attraction. But where did the guy go?

"Ma'am! " Mike called the woman who was already stepping away, without looking back, dragging her child by hand; even her back expressed outrage. "Where is the young man who sat behind you?"

"But isn't he..." she turned back; her glance fell to the second car, and her eyes widened, though from such a distance she hardly could have made out the details. "I don't know what's going on here," she murmured. "You had better demand your money back."

"Didn't you hear his scream? It was he who screamed, wasn't it?" Mike insisted.

"There were many screams... Come on, Cyril!"

And they disappeared among high bushes.

"Okay then," the young man turned to the "coffin maker." "Let's consider that you almost frightened us. Now where did you put that guy after all?"

"I am afraid that he has gone," the “coffin maker” made a helpless gesture with an apologetic smile. "This happens sometimes."

"What do you mean by 'has gone?' Where has he gone?"

"It is a cave of horror, you know. Sometimes people don't come back from there. Especially if the car detaches or gets trapped in the tunnel."

"Bravo!" derisively praised Jane. "'Never break character,' huh?"

The "coffin maker" smiled again, this time silently.

"I don't like all this," Mike muttered.

"Chuck it, Mikey!" the girl exclaimed. "The guy is a shill, don't you understand? He probably exited through a back door. Or stayed inside, quickly put on makeup, and will frighten us now as a 'blood-stained corpse.' A clever idea," she praised the “coffin maker.” "I've seen 'rooms of horror' with live actors, but never those who pretend to be casual visitors."

The worker continued smiling silently.

"Yes, but I don't want to ruin my clothes with that mess," Mike nodded at the "blood-stained" car.

"Do not worry about it," hastily said the “coffin maker.” "We will clean it up. And you meanwhile please sit down in the forward car."

Jane didn't make the worker ask her twice and stepped over a low board. Mike willy-nilly sat beside her. The "coffin maker" lowered the safety bar which latched and pressed them into their seats, as if they were going to ride on steep hills instead of a flat floor.

"Don't try to stand up or to grab anything during movement. Inside it is forbidden to take photos or to make other records," he warned them and turned the knife switch. The car lurched forward, having unmercifully jarred the passengers, and several seconds later dived into thick darkness.

At first they moved in total darkness and silence; the silence was unnaturally dense, wadded, absorbing even the sound of the electric motor. Then suddenly from the darkness ahead a desperate shriek came, this time female; now both Jane and Mike shuddered. Almost immediately from somewhere at the left a groan full of pain and hopeless despair responded to it; it slowly faded away and then on the right someone moaned as if trying to beg for something through a gag–probably, it was a very young girl... or even a child? And then Mike smelled a heavy, sticky stench and at the next moment–still in the same utter darkness–his face plunged into something like a dense web.

Mike had arachnophobia since his childhood and would rather have put his bare hand into a dirty toilet bowl than touch a web; his throat immediately spasmed in disgust and he desperately jerked his head, trying to escape from the nasty thing. As if having caught this movement, the car abruptly stopped, then rolled back a bit and stopped again. At the next instant a bright flash lit up what they had just ridden into.

And it was not a web.

Over the rails a long-ago decayed and dried-out corpse hung heels over head; most likely it was a women, or maybe a young girl–at such stage of decomposition it was difficult to discern an age. In any case, the victim had once had magnificent, voluminous, and long hair. Now only thin, fragile locks covered with dust remained; that was "the web." The victim was tied by barbed wire which deeply gnawed into the decayed flesh; here and there yellowed bones showed through ruptures in the browned skin. But the most terrible was the overturned face covered with a wrinkled parchment of dried-out skin: the mouth, open in a silent scream, showed rotten jaws; in place of the decomposed nose, there was a triangular hole divided by a vertical partition; gaping eye sockets resembled nibbled burrows. And the main thing, everywhere–in the mouth, in the nose, in the eye sockets—writhed small white worms. The head actually swarmed with them.

Yes, they weren't just motionless fake worms as it would be natural for a dummy. They were moving–in those three or four seconds when the light shone, Mike and Jane saw this clearly. And then the car jerked forward again, and they had to pass through her hair once more, now seeing distinctly what it was. And, no matter how they tried to turn their heads away, the dusty locks touched their faces again (mostly Mike's; Jane was only lightly brushed on her cheek). And then the light went out again.

From somewhere of the cave depths new groans sounded.

"Damn"... murmured Jane in the gloom while the car carried them further. "You were right, we shouldn't have..."

Someone's cold and wet hand touched her shoulder. The girl screamed. And the other hand at the same time touched Mike's shoulder.

The car stopped again and then suddenly turned in place–obviously, here the rails passed through a turntable. Again a directional light flashed, pulling out from the darkness what they had just disturbed.

It was a corpse, too, but this time, seemingly, male (though its back was turned to them, so it was difficult to say with full confidence) and not dried out but, on the contrary, inflated. The dead person had been rather fat even during his lifetime, but now his swollen body covered with cadaveric lividities and, apparently, ready to burst and splash out the purulent swill which had accumulated under its skin, looked especially disgusting. It was also suspended heels over head–or, more exactly, heels over neck, because the head was absent. Two meat hooks, hanging down from a ceiling on long chains, pierced its ankles from behind, having snagged the sinews. The dead man hung on these sinews stretched from its flesh by the weight of the bulky body like on terrible slings and long stains of dried-up blood–extending from the hooks covered with brown crust down along his legs which were like huge sausages–showed that he had been still alive when his flesh had been pierced.

His hands, which had touched Mike and Jane, still slightly waved, weaker and weaker. Then they stopped. The car stayed motionless, too. Then the light again went out.

"Move, damn it... " Mike murmured. As if having heard him, the car began to vibrate slightly–and suddenly the motor died again with an unpleasant metal clang. A clear smell of burned insulation added to the cadaveric stench. Engine failure? As if that wasn't enough!

"Hey!" the young man shouted into the darkness. "Hey, there's a problem! Get us out of here!"

The light flashed, lighting up again the headless body hanging ahead of them, absolutely motionless. And suddenly the hands of the cadaver stretched to the terror-numbed passengers, blindly rummaging in the air and narrowly missing their faces. From somewhere above came a grinding noise and the chains shook and began to move, dragging the ugly hulk even closer...

Jane recoiled, then tried to jump out of the stuck car, but the tightly fastened safety bar, as durable as on "Sky Ship," held her to the seat. Mike hammered his fist on the metal nose of the car as if hoping to jolt the motor to life. Certainly, it was useless. But when the hands of the corpse were just about to touch them, gear wheels clanged above, pulling the chains up and the body crept upward, still clenching and unclenching its fingers in vain attempts to seize the people remaining below. Right then the turntable turned the car again and the recovered motor carried them forward.

Only now Mike realized how fast his heart was beating. "Phew, nonsense!" he confoundedly thought. "After all it's just a doll! Very realistic, but..."

Actually, exactly these attempts of "the cadaver" to seize them should have acted to calm him at once. A headless body can't wave hands. At least, not at this stage of decomposition. So, all this is not real. To tell the truth, after the first corpse he had subconscious doubts–that body looked so... natural...

But the stench? Obviously, also a trick. As well as the smell of the burned insulation, intended to convince them that the motor was malfunctioning.

The darkness was pierced by screams again, this time a man's, and light appeared left ahead–not bright white but dim crimson. The light came from a niche inlaid with stones; the car passed it by at reduced speed, but this time without stopping, and the passengers saw a scene which probably represented a torture chamber of the Middle Ages. An emaciated man was stretched on a vertical rack and the executioner, naked from the waist up and in a round red cap hiding his face, methodically ripped off the prisoner's skin with big pincers. And it wasn't a static scene at all... The head of the unfortunate man was already skinned completely, having become a wet-gleaming crimson globe; Mike saw in horror how the absolutely round eyes, deprived of eyelids, were moving in eye-sockets, watching the passing car; from a lipless mouth, together with shouts, blood splashed out–apparently, the man's tongue had been ripped out. The executioner meanwhile flayed the victim's hand, pulling the skin off like a long glove. When the car had almost passed by, the executioner momentarily interrupted his business, suddenly turned back and waved to the passengers with the pincers. Jane screamed, having realized that his red cap actually was the skin just ripped off the head of the victim and turned inside out...

Again they moved in complete darkness with an accompaniment of screams and moans; then from the right, very close to them, came a sound like a dental drill. But, when black curtains opened near the car, it appeared to be a much larger tool.

A young man, probably even a teenager, was nailed to a wooden cross. More precisely, not even nailed. Screwed. He got more than Christ: in his arms and legs not less than two dozen huge screws were fastened. And the one who did it–a well-fed man in blood-splashed coveralls–wasn't going to stop: at that moment he used an electric drill to bore the victim's knee caps. The victim couldn't even shout: a wooden gag was hammered into his mouth and fixed with nails through his bottom jaw.

The car moved further. A new scene: a kitchen table covered with a cheerful cloth, to which a heavily pregnant young woman was tied by thin wire which ripped the skin of her wrists and ankles. Her bottom jaw was completely torn off; the fallen-out tongue–unexpectedly big from the point of view of those who have never seen before a human tongue as a whole–resembled a fat dead mollusk. And a slovenly hairy and bearded man furiously used a long, sharp-ended kitchen knife to stab, stab, stab her huge pregnant belly. With each blow, from the torn-apart hole which once was the woman's mouth a blood clot splashed out. But this was not the most terrible. It was clearly visible as under the skin of her belly, tightly straining it now here, then there, large bulges convulsively moved. The fetus was still alive–though, in principle, even a single stab should have been fatal–and each time when the knife pierced in, the fetus writhed and wriggled. Now a hand, then a foot stretched the mother's belly so much that it appeared just about to burst–especially taking into account that it already had cuts which drew as crimson holes; and at the moment when the car started moving again, Mike distinctly saw through the skin the features of a face with a wide-open mouth, pressing from within...

Nausea was rising to his throat, but the young man still couldn't look away. When they dived into darkness again, Mike closed his eyes and decided not to open them till the exit. But when almost at his ear a strange sucking-squelching sound was heard, he couldn't restrain himself and looked.

At first the beam of light was very narrow, and Mike saw only a tender girl's belly, pierced by a steel spike. This way the girl was nailed to a concrete column. Sweat flowed down her pale skin, mixing with blood below the spike. Then the beam slipped up, and the passengers of the car saw why the victim could neither scream nor even groan: her mouth and nostrils were tightly sewn up with rough thread. In order to let the unfortunate being breathe, her throat was pierced by a tube, like for a tracheotomy; this tube was the source of that sound. She began to breathe faster when she saw that the car stopped very close to her; her eyes looked at Mike and Jane with entreaty. It seemed to Mike, according to the movement of her shoulders, that she tried to stretch hands to them... and then the beam became wider, and the passengers of the car saw with shudder that she had no hands. Her right arm was chopped off almost up to the shoulder, the left one–a little above the elbow. Her legs had been cut asymmetrically as well–only there the longest stump was the right one, reaching the knee. The skin on the ends of the stumps was pulled together by the same rough thread. The victim stretched the remnants of her limbs in a vain attempt to touch Jane who was sitting closer to her; Jane involuntarily recoiled as far as the narrow car allowed. However, the stumps lacked several inches of reaching her anyway.

And then steps were heard from behind. Someone approached in a shuffling plod. Mike and Jane turned their heads round. At first they could not discern anything; then in the gloom a bulky silhouette appeared. From somewhere below smoldering crimson light beamed up; the face of the figure remained shadowed, but it was possible to clearly distinguish heavy boots, dirty jeans under an apron (once white, now covered with brown spots) and, the main thing, an ax on a long handle at the end of a brawny arm. An ax from which something seeming almost black in such lighting was dripping...

Strangely enough, seeing this person who was without any haste approaching the motionless car, Mike felt calmer again. A maniac with an ax, what a trite cliche... they could think up something more original... He looked at the heavy figure with a smile, even when the latter came very close and brought his ax over his head...

And then the ax fell upon Jane.

Everything happened in fractions of a second. The girl desperately screamed. Mike clumsily jerked, moved by opposite reflexes–to intercept the heavy edge falling on his girlfriend and to move as far away from it as possible... but in any case from such a position–pressed to a seat by the safety bar and turning his head back–he could do nothing. A bump, a wet crunch of a split bone, Jane's shriek...

Mike stiffened; his brain refused to process the events. Probably, about three seconds passed until he understood that his girlfriend was still sitting next to him, alive and unharmed. She had shouted just with fear. At the last moment the ax had changed its direction and fallen upon the mutilated victim on the column, having truncated the longer remnant of her leg by several inches. From a stump blood gushed, and from the tube thrust in her throat hoarse hissing came–the only sound that replaced a scream from her...

The butcher turned again to the passengers of the car, raising his ax. Now most of his face got into the beam of light directed at the nailed victim. Mike's eye was first of all caught by grinning big yellow teeth and an unshaven chin. Jane squealed again. She really, really wasn't sure that the next blow would not hit her.

And Mike wasn't confident in it anymore, either.

The ax began to fall again. But at the very same time the car sharply moved ahead. The sound of the blow–this time ringing, as the ax hit the steel rail–came from behind the car.

The butcher hollowly muttered something and ran after them.

He moved not too quickly, but the car also, after the initial jerk, rode only slightly quicker than a fast-walking person. The light was left behind; now around them there was darkness again which was filled with painful groans and agonizing screams, and behind thumped the tread of the butcher who was gradually reducing the distance. At last his steps began to sound very close, right behind where Jane was sitting–it seemed, the ax could crash down from the darkness at any moment. But the car accelerated again, leaving the maniac behind. The latter, however, sped up–his boots began stamping faster, approaching again. "It's all fake," Mike told himself. "He'll purposefully almost catch up to us, and at the last moment fall back again..."

The ax with a clang hit the board of the car only few inches short of Jane's elbow.

"Shit! " she yelled. "That could have been my arm!"

Yes, Mike understood suddenly. After all, everything had happened in the darkness. This man, an actor or whoever, couldn't see that Jane's arm wasn't there...

The car accelerated anew, but then the heavy footfalls began to overtake it again.

"Look!" suddenly cried Jane.

Mike, who had twisted his head back in vain attempts to see the butcher, looked forward–and saw the blood-red letters "EXIT" flashing in the darkness. The car rushed straight towards them. "At last," Mike thought with relief. Then the speed decreased, but only a couple of yards remained to the exit. An instant more–and...

The floor under them yawned, and they flew down.

A second later–a second filled with their joint scream–they understood that it was not a free fall but only a descent on a high-speed elevator. Then a short overload–the pay for zero gravity during the first instant of the descent–pressed them hard to the seats, and the car rolled forward to the bottom of... a pit? a mine? a well? They heard the elevator go up again, having left them in utter darkness.

The slaughterhouse basement, thought Mike who, unlike Jane, had heard this story in his childhood. And he even clearly pictured what they would see when the light turned on again: the paralyzed boy lying in a dirty pool, being eaten alive by rats. The boy, whose body already had been turned into entirely bloody meat– knobby, pitted, bearing only a faint resemblance to a human being–and lots of sharp teeth continuously tearing it, ripping off new small pieces...

But from the darkness no rat peep reached. Only some quiet, spasmodic scraping. And Mike felt–though he couldn't realize why–how this low, subtle sound made his hair move on his head.

Light, unsteady and wavering, came on, and they indeed saw a boy. But not that one–according to the legend, the victim of rats was white, while this boy was black. Tears flowed down his cheeks, but he couldn't scream. He was impaled on a long vertical stake which came out from his mouth. All that he could do was to gnaw this thick round wooden pole covered with blood and contents of his intestines; it was his teeth which made that sound. The stake, more than two yards high, was gnawed starting from the top–but now the boy had slipped down it almost to the floor. However, he had no chance to touch the floor with his feet–the base of the stake was too wide.

The flickering light became more and more bright, eventually lighting up not only the stake, but also the vault around. It was indeed a big vault with high concrete arch and blank walls. There were neither corridors nor doors leading outside. The rails ended only few yards ahead. And on these rails stood... other cars. Of the same design, but very old, rusted, overgrown with dust, dirt, and webs. And these cars weren't empty. In horror Mike and Jane looked at the pale-yellow skulls (on one of them earphones still hung, on another one a baseball cap remained), at the tatter of clothing hanging down from the ribs... it looked like nobody could get out from under the safety bars pressing them to the seats...

"So this is where those who disappear come!" thought shocked Mike... and immediately called himself an idiot. The carnival had arrived in town just a few days ago–how the hell could there be skeletons and rust?! Stage set, everything here is only trickery!

As if in reply to his thought, something began clanging above. The young people jerked up their heads and saw how from the high ceiling of the vault, unwinding on the fly, right upon them heavy chains with hooks on the ends were falling. It seemed that these hooks would fall directly on their heads, but they flew sideways–two at the left and two at the right–and hollowly tinkled against the car boards. And then... then suddenly from under the car bottom an ugly hand leaned out–covered with scars and lacking phalanxes of two fingers (probably, there was a hatch below which had opened absolutely silently)–and began to fasten the hooks to steel loops under the bottom which Mike and Jane hadn't even noticed when they were taking seats in the car. As soon as the last hook took its place, the chains stretched and jerkily dragged the car up. Having come off the floor, it began to rock back and forth, which was only promoted by the uneven movement of the chains. Halfway up, the mechanism got even more out of sync; the left chains began to pull faster than the right ones, tilting the car more and more to one side; Jane who appeared above screamed in fear again, grabbing Mike's hand. The young man looked down and understood that they were rocking right over the stake sticking out below. If the safety bar which held them were to suddenly open...

But the safety bar didn't open. Chains dragged the car upward, into the blackness of the open hatch–and there, at last, leveled and then, having carried the car slightly forward, settled it on the rails. The hooks clanked, detaching. The car rode again through darkness–but not to the exit (the deceptive burning letters weren't seen any more) but to the next victim.

It was again a woman or a girl–it was impossible to say more definitely. She stood, held by braided rubber restraints on a plane slightly slanted back (to Mike's mind came the term "exhibition mount"), spread like a laboratory frog. Comparing to her, the guy who was skinned alive could consider himself lucky. She had no face any more. It was cut off completely, to the bone–while flesh on each side of the head was left untouched; the bared skull in this meat frame looked especially terrible. But worst of all was the fact it was a skull of an alive person. The balls of lidless eyes, all in blood streaks of the burst vessels, randomly moved in bone eye-sockets, vainly trying to avoid the beam of a spotlight striking directly into them; through a hole on the place of her former nose frequent breath was heard; the bottom jaw powerlessly drooped, however, when the car approached, it twitched–the unfortunate being tried to say something, but the remains of her chewing muscles were not enough for this purpose. Her tongue still moved in the mouth, but neither Mike nor Jane could understand the lowing-howling sounds... Her body had been treated the same as her head: all frontal flesh was cut off. In the bright light of the spotlight it was clearly visible through the ribs how her heart was beating and her lungs were inflating and deflating. All abdominal organs were also exhibited; they didn't fall out–probably, due to the back-slanted position of the body. Arms and legs had undergone the same vivisection; the scraped-out white bones glistened in the surrounding of yellowish fat layers and crimson muscles...

Mike saw how some thickening was slowly moving in her intestines, and convulsively bent over a board in a spasm of vomiting. The car jerked and rolled further, without giving him time to finish. The young man tightly shut his eyes and promised himself again, now even more definitely, not to open them until they get outside.

And he honestly kept the promise even when from the right a disgusting smell of burned meat stank (the terrible heartrending groans couldn't muffle the hissing of fat dripping in fire, and Mike felt close heat by his cheek) as well as when on the left children–four or five simultaneously–began to squeal stridently. But when Jane cried "No! No! Stop!" he nevertheless opened his eyes.

This time the victim was neither at the left nor at the right. He lay directly on the rails. A very young fellow–about seven years younger than Mike. His hands and feet were buried in two massive concrete cubes on both sides of the track, and the car was just about to roll its wheels over his stomach and chest. The bleeding furrows indented into the boy's flesh indicated this would not be the first time a car ran over him. Of course, a carnival ride car is not a railway car and not even a road vehicle, so it improbably weighed more than five hundred pounds together with the passengers–but that was also not so little, especially when it rolled over already broken bones and unprotected crushed belly...

The boy raised his head and looked at the car with muddy pained eyes in which useless entreaty was read. Naturally, they had no opportunity to stop. Jane shouted once again "Stop it!" but at the next moment they felt a slight jolt, and under the wheels it disgustingly crunched and squished. The guy screamed–in a thin, absolutely childish voice. They were not just spectators anymore–now, although involuntarily, they became accomplices...

Fortunately, ahead the exit appeared. This time, seemingly, it was the real one–daylight loomed from there. Yes, the gates of the cave were opening to set them free...

But at this moment chains clanged again, and something fell from above. It fell and waggled on chains ahead of them, blocking the way.

It was a girl. More precisely, part of a girl. Mike's gaze slid down her body–from her wrists pierced through by meat hooks, to her face, suffused with tears and framed with sweat-stuck curly locks, but still beautiful, to her dirty bra, and below... below she was not even cut but torn in half. From the bottom ribs a long tatter of skin and shreds of exfoliated meat hung down, and between them was the wet sack of her stomach, similar to a deflated balloon, drawn down by the heavy tangle of her guts. Below it there was nothing at all. And the car was just about to stick its nose in this tangle and then the passengers would have to literally nuzzle into what was above...

But at this moment the car braked hard. Mike and Jane swayed forward; their faces appeared in just two feet from the torn girl.

Her eyelids rose and the bitten lips moved.

"Please"... she whispered. "Help me..."

"How? " Mike squeezed out from himself.

"Kill me..."

"How? " the young man repeated, looking around in embarrassment. But she either couldn't speak more or didn't know the answer. The car started again, but at the same moment the chains rapidly dragged the victim up into the darkness. Her dangling guts missed Jane's face only by inches.

And several seconds later the car rolled out of the cave under the sky of cloudy day, quickly passed along the cave's forward wall and finally stopped.

There was nobody around–neither near the platform nor at the cash booth. There were no new visitors and even the mustached "coffin maker" was absent. Probably he appeared (from where?) only when new clients approached. The safety bar automatically clicked, opening.

Jane stepped out to the platform the first. Mike initially remained in his seat, believing that it was necessary to wait for the worker, but then followed his girlfriend.

Clouds were crawling on the low sky. A gush of cold wind tousled grass, dragged trash over it–a paper cup, a torn plastic bag... some gray piece of paper, too–probably a used ticket. There was still not a single living being around and there was no sound, not even from the "cave" behind them. Jane stood motionless.

"Let's get out of here," Mike said almost dragging her to the path through bushes. In his mouth the sour taste of puke still remained.

"Do you... you think what I think?" the girl asked while they were winding among prickly thickets.

"It can't be real!" Mike exclaimed. "Skillfully made dummies with motors... yes, very skillfully, I've never seen anything like... for a moment I did believe..." considering the vomited lunch, to deny the last would be silly.

"Dummies?! Did you see their faces? Their eyes and everything else?"

"Well, probably, some are dummies, and some are live actors..."

"Actors, sure. Well, blood, ripped skin, screws, the stake–all right, all are makeup and special effects. But the chopped-off limbs? How can you fake that?"

"Mirrors. Especially since it was dark there. We saw only what was illuminated."

"And the last one? We passed directly under her! There were no mirrors there–nothing that would make it possible to hide the bottom half of a woman!"

"Listen", Mike stopped and turned to Jane. "Even assuming that they really do such things in front of lots of witnesses... do you think that anyone can live after being torn in half? Unless he's an earthworm, of course..."

"That's not funny."

"And I'm not laughing. I don't know how this trick was done, but..."

"Well..." murmured Jane after a pause, "of course, yes... it must be some trick... but... it was so real..."

"I told you–we shouldn't have gone in there," Mike muttered. "Now we may have nightmares about it..."

They finally got out of the thickets. No one was visible here either. But once they passed the toilets, a door slapped open behind them.

At another time, Mike wouldn't have looked at the person leaving such a place, but now he shuddered and rapidly turned back.

In front of the booths the clown stood. The same one, with the drawn red smile. He stood motionless and silent, looking at them.

Certainly, there was no reason to stop and it would be more logical just to continue on their way, but Mike suddenly stepped forward.

"And?" he aggressively inquired. "What?"

The clown kept his silence and didn't move. In Mike's mind flashed the foolish thought that he was a dummy, too.

"What are you staring at?" Mike raised his tone and moved ahead with the look of a person ready to fight–though actually he never was combative. Jane turned back, too, stepped after him and grabbed his elbow to prevent a scrap.

The clown with the sudden gesture of a magician took out from nowhere a small notebook and offered it to the girl.

"Oh... thank you very much," she said, taking the notebook and pushing it into a pocket of her jeans. "Let's go, Mike," now she dragged him away to where music rattled, shooting gallery guns clapped and visitors happily squealed on rides. Several seconds had passed and there were already a lot of people around them.

"What did he give you? " Mike asked.

"My notebook! Probably I lost it in a toilet booth..."

"In a booth? Or in the 'cave?'"

"Why the 'cave?' He came out of a booth!"

"Personally, I didn't see he come from there," Mike muttered.

"So what–did you see him in the 'cave?' You think he was lurking after us? Mike, that's ridiculous! He simply found my thing..."

"And how did he know it was yours?!"

"He didn't. He just assumed. He found it, then saw us. So he thought, maybe we just lost it?" It was as if they had traded roles: now Mike was suspicious and Jane looked for rational explanations.

"Not we. You. He gave it right to you."

"Are you jealous?" the girl smiled.

But Mike didn't accept her tone.

"Is there your name there?" he inquired.

"No. But the handwriting is female. You see, everything is simple."

"Yes. As simple as in the 'cave'... Why was he silent? Is he mute?"

"Maybe he is..."

"Hm, by the way," Mike suddenly reflected. "Perhaps they employ disabled people for work in the 'cave?' There were freak shows in the past, so why not now... That is, all violence which we saw is, of course, staged. But maybe the amputated limbs aren't. And... perhaps, I know how the last trick was arranged. A dwarf! Her head is normal, but the body is so small that can be hidden completely inside a rubber imitation of the torso. Maybe she even has no legs... And the guts are, of course, rubber, too."

"I didn't see any seam on her neck. Where the real head should stick out from..."

"With skillful makeup you won't see it even in half an hour. And we looked for just a few seconds, with the light in our eyes."

"Yes..., you're probably right," said Jane without real confidence in her voice.

They passed by a food booth and this time Mike bought cola to get rid of the taste in his mouth.

"But I still don't like that this guy looked in your notebook," he said, throwing the plastic cup into a trash can. "Okay, there was no name there, but what about anything else that would allow him to find you? Address, phone?"

"Mine aren't there, but yours are," Jane smiled. "So now you'll be harassed by mute clown calls."

"Not funny," Mike said. "I really don't like this. Check if he tore out a page as a souvenir?"

"What nonsense! Why would he need it?"

"I don't know. But I don't like this odd guy. By the way, he beckoned to me right before I came to find you... Seriously, check your notebook."

"Well, if you insist... " she pulled out the notebook from her jeans pocket and began to riffle through it. Suddenly, her hand trembled and her look changed.

"What's there? " Mike immediately inquired. "He took out something? Or, maybe he wrote something in?"

"No, simply... here it is," Jane's fingers pulled a gray rectangle from between pages. "CAVE OF HORROR. You will SCREAM..."

"What's that–he gave you a ten-buck ticket for free?" Mike frowned even more.

"Well, maybe a promo action..." said the girl and suddenly interrupted herself: "No, we're idiots! That's my own ticket–see the torn stub?"

"How could it be in the notebook that you lost before we bought tickets?"

"Simple–I put the ticket in my pocket and it got between the pages when I put the notebook in my pocket too."

"Sure. Sounds logical. Only I clearly remember that I had both our tickets. And after that guy tore them, I put them... " Mike dipped his hand into his own trouser pocket–first the left one, then the right, then checked both back pockets which he usually didn't use. The tickets weren't anywhere.

"Damn..." he checked the pockets once again. "I probably lost them somewhere. But I remember that I didn't give you yours."

"But you don't remember where you put it?"

"And you? Do you remember that you took it from me?"

"No"... the girl acknowledged. "Apparently, both of us did it mechanically."

"Give it to me," the young man pulled out the gray piece of paper from Jane's hand. "I think it's not your ticket."

"Then whose is it?"

"I don't know," Mike turned the ticket over. "What do you think is this?"

On the reverse side of the ticket, closer to the torn edge, there was a small red-brown spot, already dried up.

"Are you saying that it's... blood? Real blood?"

"I don't know," Mike repeated. "Perhaps, clown's makeup."

"But he never had this ticket in his hands."

"That's just your assumption. You don't have anything to stain it in your pocket, do you?"

"Perhaps it was sold already in this condition," Jane proposed. "The cashier or the mustached man... could have stained it. Maybe, even with blood. Couldn't one of them have cut a finger after all?"

"They could..." the young man thoughtfully turned the paper again.

Discount at revisit. Bring your friends!

In a resolute gait, Mike returned to the trash can where he had thrown the plastic cup and dropped the ticket there.

"What are you doing?" Jane exclaimed indignantly.

"And why do you need a stranger's... well, let even your own used ticket? You aren't going to go in that damned cave again, are you? Even for a discount..."

"In my opinion," the girl slowly said, looking somewhere beyond her boyfriend, "we haven't seen everything there."

Mike couldn't deny it. He remembered how he had closed his eyes–but he was ashamed to admit it. He had intended to inquire derisively "did you squeeze your eyes shut?"–but right then he remembered how he had vomited in full view of Jane and decided not to ask for trouble. But she apparently meant something different.

"There were more shouts and groans than... those we passed by. Some came as if from far away or through a barrier..."

"A record. And why the hell 'far away?' You saw the building from outside. It's not so big."

"Maybe. But there were switches."

"What switches?"

"Rail switches. Didn't you notice?"

"I hardly saw even the rails in the darkness..."

"But I saw them. Cars can be sent on different routes. I'm sure so they do. Perhaps they show a less terrible version to children. At least to children with parents..."

"Judging by the reaction of that woman who rode before us, I wouldn't say so."

"It seems to me, if she had seen what we saw, her reaction would have been even stronger. And she definitely would have filed a complaint, despite the signed paper. And also... do you remember how he hinted to the boy? Like, come again, only not with your mother but with a friend... then you'll see something really worth..."

"He said nothing like that. He only mentioned the discount, that's all. That's also written on the ticket."

"Exactly. If it is written already, why emphasize it verbally?"

"Advertizing rule. Repetition doesn't hurt."

"But why do you think he didn't repeat the offer to us?"

"Because we had already heard it," Mike answered not too consistently, feeling the increasing desire to end this stupid conversation.

"And then, they have strange concept of advertizing. The ride is so hidden that it's hard to find. It isn't on the carnival map."

"Probably, you simply didn't notice it."

"Look yourself if you are so smart! " Jane set off at once and turned back. They were already near the exit from the carnival and Mike had no wish to return to the post with the map.

"All right, all right, let's assume, it isn't. Then all this is just a part of the concept. A mysterious cave of horror..." Mike, however, understood himself that that sounded unconvincing and offered another version: "Or perhaps they still had trouble with vigilant moms. So they really try to keep a low profile, relying on word of mouth to bring in customers."

"Could you reach many customers that way? And how much, you think, all these fantastically realistic dummies cost? If they are indeed dummies..."

"I don't know. It's not our problem," they finally went through the gate and it seemed to Mike that the air became fresher, which was, of course, total nonsense. "Listen, enough of this idiotic 'cave' for me. I don't want either to speak or think about it anymore. Let's not ruin the rest of our evening."

Jane, it seemed, obeyed and didn't return to the subject again, but during the evening Mike noticed more than once that the girl's thoughts wandered away somewhere. As for himself, the damned "cave" left him a nasty emotional aftertaste which was much harder to get rid of than the sourness in his mouth. He was angry both with himself and with Jane–who had dragged him to this devil's attraction and now was falling into thoughtfulness when it was time just to carelessly relax. As a result, he brought her home even before the10 p.m. curfew set by her strict mother.

They sat in his car in front of Jane's house. The girl didn't hurry to say goodbye, but kept silent. The pause lingered.

"Listen," Mike suddenly said, "you didn't answer my question."

"Which one?"

"You aren't going to go back to that damned 'cave?'"

"Why do you think I am? " Jane asked

"You said yourself–we supposedly didn't see everything there. Though as for me, we saw more than enough. And also you were annoyed when I threw out your ticket."

"Well, and if I did want to get a better view of everything there, so what? The first time around, all that was so unexpected... but now, knowing what to look at, where there should be seams or mirrors as you said..."

"Don't even think about it!"

"Why? You said yourself–none of that can be real?"

"Of course it can't."

"So why not go back?"

"And why do it? Why do you need it?"

"Just curious."

"Curiosity killed the cat..." Mike grumbled.

"But I am not Cat, I am Jane," the girl tried to laugh the matter off. "Well, really. Admit, you also suspect something screwy there?"

"I don't suspect anything! And if I did, I would tell the police, instead of trying to investigate it myself."

"So there is something to investigate?"

"No! That is, nothing in the criminal sense. But magicians don't like it when people try to learn their secrets. There's a reason it's forbidden to photograph and so on there... And," Mike smiled, "I don't want to think that my girlfriend is a pervert who likes such nasty things."

"Afffraid? " hissed Jane in an eerie voice; however, though she also tried to joke, she didn't sound careless. "All right, all right, calm down. I won't go there to sniff anything out. It's just a carnival ride with actors and dummies. Are you satisfied?"

Mike muttered something in reply. To tell the truth, he wasn't completely satisfied with her words.

They spent Sunday together, too, and this time everything went much better, including the weather. They went to a lake and, though the water was still too cold to bathe, they could luxuriate in sunshine ashore all day long. The "cave" and the day before, as if by a silent arrangement, were not mentioned again.

During the weekdays of the next week they didn't meet–only exchanged few short evening phone calls. In the cafe where Jane had a summer job, one of the waitresses fell ill and the other girls had to split her shifts among themselves; Jane wasn't against earning some extra money, but came home late and completely exhausted. Mike, in turn, spent days in his father's auto repair shop where a 1967 Thunderbird had been brought; the car was in very poor condition–the last owner got it almost at a junkyard and the young man was busy with restoring it to life, as enthusiastic as when he assembled glue-together models in his childhood. He didn't think about the carnival any more and thought about his girlfriend much less than she would have liked. Therefore, when late Friday night his phone rang and on its screen the familiar number appeared, Mike's first thought was "Oh shit, we didn't agree on any weekend plans!" Jane always called either from home or from her work phone–she had no cellphone.

But it was not Jane but her mother.

"Mike? Is my daughter with you?"

"N-no, Mrs. Trenton."

"Are you sure? Perhaps she doesn't want me to know that she is with you so late? Tell me the truth, Mike, I'm very worried. It's almost midnight already..."

"No, I really don't know where she is. The last time we talked was Wednesday and she said nothing about Friday plans... Maybe she's still at the cafe? The night shift? You know, they currently..."

"No, I phoned there already. Clare was back to work again today, so Jane had no additional hours anymore. She finished work at six o'clock."

"And she told nobody where she was going?"

"No, she didn't. Mike, have you two quarreled?"

"Quarreled? Not at all. Why did you think so, Mrs. Trenton?"

"Jane was, well, strange this week. I thought that's because she was tired at work... but now it seems to me she was thinking about something that disturbed her. Do you know what it could be? " The last sentence seemed accusatory to Mike.

"No..." he answered, feeling cold spread in his belly. Mrs. Trenton caught at once the uncertainty in his voice.

"Are you sure, Mike? " she asked again, this time in a threatening tone.

"If you suspect that she is pregnant or something like that, my answer is 'no'. At least, not by me," he answered more harshly than he wanted, and right then reflected: what if Jane indeed had someone else? But instead of natural (while unsupported by any facts) jealous rage, he suddenly felt that it wouldn't be the worst option. But, alas–alas!–the matter was not at all a mythical rival. Because actually...

No. It cannot be. It is simply a silly carnival ride, that's all. Not to mention that he threw out her ticket... but why couldn't she have spent ten dollars for a new one?

"Carnival", Mike said, surprised himself by the hoarse sound of his voice.

"What?" Mrs. Trenton, who was expatiating how much she was worrying because Jane never dared to disappear this way, without having warned her mother, and actually there was nobody with whom... –interrupted herself in the middle of a sentence. "What did you say? What carnival?"

"Last Saturday we visited the traveling carnival. There is an attraction there, 'Cave of Horror...' Didn't Jane tell you anything about it?"

"No... and where does it concern...?"

"It seems to me that she went there again. I told her not to do it, but..."

"Went to get some rides? And has not returned till now? When does this carnival close?"

"I don't know. It seems to me that it's not just an attraction. I think you should call the police."

"You don't know those policemen! They won't move a finger until several days pass! Phooey–a girl doesn't come home at night, big deal! They don't realize that Jane never before... What do you mean by 'not just an attraction?'" Mrs. Trenton interrupted herself again. "Is there anything... dangerous? Illegal?"

"Hmm..." Mike was confused, having thought how his story would sound to police officers. Indeed, like a child, he had been frightened by some actors and dummies and imagined devil knows what without any proof... pure nonsense!

But Jane had really disappeared!

"Wait for me," he told the scared woman. "I'll come in a few minutes and we'll go together to the police."

Since Mrs. Trenton's divorce nine years ago, her opinion of men hadn't undergone any noticeable improvement. And though she reconciled, as with an inevitable evil, with the fact that her daughter had a boyfriend, Mike in her company always felt himself under suspicion, like a recidivist thief who looks for a bank security guard job. But now she was subdued by his resolute tone and look and met him as a savior who definitely knew what to do in order to find her daughter safe and sound in the shortest time.

However, the resolute spirit of the young man apparently made no impression on Sgt. Hopkins. The sergeant looked tired and unfriendly, as though all his years of serving law and order weighed as a heavy burden on his shoulders this evening. Having listened at first to Mrs. Trenton who, naturally, couldn't report anything certain, he asked her to wait behind the door and invited Mike to his desk.

"You should hear yourself," Hopkins muttered after listening to the story till the end. “Read too many comics? Are you saying some gang abducts and kills people in a carnival, right before the very eyes of hundreds of visitors?"

"First, not of hundreds," the young man objected. "I've said, most people don't even guess this building is there. And second, that's just the point–nobody would ever think that such things can really happen!"

"What you described indeed can't be real. You know what the term 'fatal injuries' means?"

"Of course. What we saw is certainly a fake. But Jane thought that we didn't see everything. Cars can go by different routes. There may be some special rooms... for special clients... you know, the perverts for whom movies with real murders and rapes are made. There could be something like that! And while we're wasting time here talking..."

"I've heard only your fantasies so far. This carnival has all its proper licenses. All their rides have the corresponding certificates of safety..."

"It is possible to kill and torture even with quite safe objects! Not to mention that documents may mean one thing, while actually something else..."

"Who told you that anyone was killed or tortured there?"

"But Jane went there and disappeared!"

"For now she is only late in returning home. Formally I don't have sufficient grounds to declare her missing. Informally... yes, when a girl for the first time in her life doesn't come home on time, and not only her mother and female friends, but also her boyfriend knows nothing about it–most often it does mean something. And, alas, frequently it means something bad. But even if so–there are no grounds to conclude that it's connected with the carnival. You said yourself that she promised not to go there again?"

"Yes, but..."

"But what? It's eighteen minutes past midnight now. The carnival is already closed. Give me the slightest reason to enter and search private property without a warrant."

"The guy," Mike said. "With long black hair. About twenty five years old. Looked a bit like an Indian. Is he registered as missing? We saw him ride into the 'cave,' but what returned was only an empty car splashed by something red."

"No, he's not", Hopkins immediately answered.

"Are you sure? You didn't even check any records."

"Mike, don't teach me to do my work. Our town isn't very big. Any disappearance here is a rare event."

"So what–during the time when the carnival is here, nobody disappeared in the town? Except for Jane."

"I am not obliged to discuss confidential information with you ."

"So someone is missing! Sergeant, I'm just trying to help!"

Hopkins skeptically looked at Mike for some seconds. Then unwillingly muttered:

"Don't even think of repeating this. If the press kicks up dust, it can spoil the case. Yes, we are investigating one disappearance, but it doesn't fit your description. It's a child."

"A boy of eleven?"

"How did you know?"

"Is his name Cyril Parker?"

"No."

"Is he black?"

"No, white. So you guessed right only the age."

"When did he disappear?"

"No more, that's enough! I told you more than I should as it is. Go home and go to bed. Maybe your girlfriend will show up in the morning. She could even be at home right now."

"And if she isn't?!"

"Then in the morning I'll visit the carnival as soon as it opens and I'll check out what this 'cave' of yours looks like, though I'm absolutely sure that it's a false trail. Are you happy?"

Mike brought the weeping Mrs. Trenton home (her house, of course, was still dark and empty), but didn't intend at all to go to bed himself. He drove back home only to take the auto repair shop keys. In the shop he also didn't stay long and left it with tin snips and impressive-looking sledge hammer. His father had a pistol, but, alas, it was in the locked safe. Having told himself once again that this idiotic heroism was either nonsense if his suspicions were foolish or suicide if they were justified, Mike threw the tools on the right seat and drove to the suburb, to the infamous grounds where the carnival was now settled.

Having exited from the highway, he parked the car on the empty lot in front of the closed gate. The light of a lonely lamp which remained behind still reached here, but the carnival was sunk in the darkness of a moonless night; all multicolored illumination which brightly shone here in the evening was off, and behind the chain link fence, the silhouettes of motionless attractions only vaguely loomed. Symbolizing careless fun in the afternoon, now they caused an uncomfortable feeling of something hostile and ominous. All these metal bars and arms of swings and whirligigs resembled either huge spider legs or monsters' tentacles spread waiting for a victim.

Mike stood for some time in front of the gate, allowing his eyes to get used to darkness. He had a small flashlight in the pocket of his jeans jacket, but he wasn't going to turn it on without an urgency in order not to betray himself. From the darkness behind the gate not a single sound reached; the carnival seemed completely died out. Did the workers live in their trailers or pay for rooms in a local motel? Mike remembered that he saw standing trailers near the "cave"...

He didn't try to cleave through the locked entrance. If there was any alarm or surveillance system, it was for certain exactly here. On the other hand, by cutting the metal fence from the side of the "cave" he would risk drawing attention by noise; moreover, it would be hard to reach the fence in that place, as everything was overgrown with bushes there both inside and outside... so the best option was to break into the carnival somewhere in the middle of the fence. With this thought, carrying the tin snips in one hand and the hammer in another, he went along the fence, trying to step through dry grass as quietly as possible.

Having turned a corner, he started moving away from the road. After passing several dozen yards he stopped. No light reached here, and Mike suddenly felt himself shivering. It would be the simplest to write it off to a cool night, but Mike didn't try to lie to himself–he understood that he was scared... actually, damned scared to meddle here, especially alone and with so imperfect weapons. But if Jane was indeed there and those police goofs weren't going to get off their asses...

He only vaguely imagined what to do when he reached the bloody “cave.” The best would be to find evidence for the police and to call for help... But what if he gets inside and finds out that the dummies are really just dummies? What then? Will it prove that all his suspicions are nonsense or will it mean only that what he is looking for is hidden too well?

He put the sledge hammer on the ground, took the snips handles with both hands and started to cut through the steel fence. The snips clicked, sounding like a shot in the night silence.

And almost immediately a bright light flashed and a grating voice ordered: "Don't move!"

Mike stiffened with a furiously beating heart; only in the next moment he realized that the light beam came not from within the fence but from the right.

"Drop that thing and hold your hands so that I can see them. Now slowly turn to me."

The flashlight now shone directly in the young man's face, blinding him, but Mike still distinguished a silhouette of a man in the uniform and a police peak-cap. However, anyone can put on a uniform...

"Sergeant was right," a voice stated with satisfaction from the darkness. "He was sure that you would imagine yourself Rambo and would go play hero. All right, boy, you are under arrest for attempted trespassing. You have the right to remain silent..."

"Not me! " Mike exclaimed, not even trying to constrain irritation. "Arrest them!"

"Okay, okay", the officer said in a conciliatory tone, unfastening handcuffs from his belt. "I hope, you have enough brains not to resist? And, if you have a gun, you'd better say so right now."

"No gun," Mike muttered. "And are handcuffs necessary? I'll go with you anyway."

"Of course you will. Put your hands here."

Twenty minutes later the young man sat again in front of Hopkins. The handcuffs, at last, were removed .

"Well, what should I do with you? " the sergeant sighed. "Initiate legal proceedings? Or hope that Mr. Dobbins won't find out anything?"

"Dobbins? " this name seemed vaguely familiar to Mike.

"Sure. Robin Dobbins, the owner of the carnival."

"Rob Dobbins! Of course!" Mike exclaimed, shaken. "Sergeant, don't you remember?! The boy who was mutilated by rats in the slaughterhouse cellar! In the very same place! His name was Bob Robins! And don't tell me that's an urban legend!"

"No, it's not," Hopkins slowly said. "I remember that nasty story. So what?"

"What do you mean by 'so what?' Don't you understand? His friends left him there helpless while rats were eating him alive... no wonder, if it blew his mind! And now he's back to take revenge on our town!"

"I repeat–you've watched too many stupid horror films," the sergeant shook his head. "First, his name is Dobbins, not Robins..."

"He slightly changed it, that's all. Have you ever seen him? Or have any of your people?"

"No, we didn't need to. But..."

"I think nobody here saw him!" Mike triumphantly exclaimed. "He is too disfigured to show himself, and besides he can't walk. All contact with the town authorities go through his deputy..."

"And this all, of course, again is not supported by anything except your rampant imagination. All right, boy. You'll sit in the cell until morning and that's for your own good. I understand that you're off your nut because of your girl. But you should chill out if you don't want to spend serious time in jail."

When the heavy cell door slammed behind Mike, he unwillingly stretched himself on a narrow jail bed. He didn't think that he would manage to fall asleep, but the young healthy organism soon prevailed over all ruefulness.

When he was awakened, however, it was still dark in the cell; dawn was just breaking. At first Mike stared with muddy sleepy eyes at Hopkins who stood over him, then jumped up from the bed:

"Has she been found?"

"Not yet," the sergeant shook his head. "But you know what I'm going to tell you? However dumb your story was, you managed to arouse my doubts. I made a call to the missing boy's teacher without waiting for morning. Cyril Parker is the boy's classmate."

"Bring your friends..." remembered Mike. "He was his friend?" he asked aloud.

"Actually, no. We already questioned his friends... The teacher said that John–the missing boy–and Cyril did not get along well. Not that it was a serious hostility. But John periodically teased Cyril and the latter seemed unhappy about it. It never came to fighting. Maybe because John was stronger..."

"Sure. The meek creature got revenge in a different way. He invited his enemy to the carnival..."

"We don't know that yet. We'll question Cyril, but–you know, minors have rights... we can't do it right now. I'll try to get a warrant. Since we still have no proof, I'll take you to our artist. Do you remember the faces of workers at this attraction? Can you describe them?"

"Some of them, yes."

"Great. Let's go. If at least one of them is in our files..."

Mike spent the next hour with the police artist, giving descriptions and correcting the sketches until he was completely satisfied with the similarity of the drawings to the originals. The artist asked him to wait in the room and left with the pictures. Mike believed that now he would be released from the police station, but the expectation lingered.

At last, hasty steps approached from outside and the door swung open. On the threshold appeared Hopkins with a big yellow envelope in his hand. He looked very irritated.

"It seems you're looking for serious trouble, boy.” the sergeant said angrily, approaching Mike who was seated at a table. “You wanted to pull a prank, huh? Do you understand that giving false testimony is a criminal offense?"

"False? Sergeant, everything I told you I've seen with my own eyes, I swear! How can it be a prank if Jane has disappeared!"

"Probably you know a bit more about her disappearance than you're saying, huh? And you try to throw us off the scent, inventing all this nonsense. But you could have thought up something less stupid!"

"I don't understand what you're talking about!"

"You don't understand? " Hopkins pulled two sheets of paper out of the envelope and placed them on the table in front of the young man. The left one was a police artist drawing made from Mike's description, the right–a printer copy of a photo. "Damned similar, aren't they?"

"Sure! The clown! So you know him?"

"Pogo the Clown. His real name is John Wayne Gacy. Tortured, raped and murdered 33 people. And this?" He put another photo on the table.

"The cashier! Spitting image! Even the eye squints the same way!"

"His eye is glass. This is Henry Lee Lucas. The most terrible serial killer in the history of the USA and probably, of the whole world. 11 cases of murder were proven in court, but actually there were at least three hundred. Lucas himself spoke about six hundred."

"So what are you waiting for?! The whole gang is there! Arrest them!"

"There is one little problem," Hopkins stretched his lips in a scornful smile. "Gacy was executed in 1994. Lucas died in prison in 2001. And it's the same story with all the others you allegedly identified. All of them are American serial killers and none of them is still alive. The one you called "the coffin maker," for example, has been dead since 1896. Now admit that you simply found their photos on the Internet and..."

"Sergeant, I don't understand either, but I told you the truth! I never was interested in serial killers! The only one I know about is Jack the Ripper..."

"Actually, nobody knows much about him. There are several versions, but..."

At this moment another police officer with a folder in his hand glanced in the open door of the office and called the sergeant. Hopkins talked to him in a corridor and then returned to Mike who was waiting in perplexity. Now Hopkins also had a perplexed look. He offered to the young man one more photo:

"Recognize him?"

"Yes! " Mike exclaimed. "It's the guy who didn't return from the 'cave!' I didn't invent anything, honest!"

"He's not from our town. He hasn't been heard from for about for a week, but they just started searching now..." for some time Hopkins silently looked at the young man, then continued: "Here's what I think. Over the years of my service, I've seen many liars and if you are one of them, then you must be the most skillful of all. Because I could swear that you really believe in what you say. Though, of course, the men you saw cannot be dead killers. But it can be some sect of crazy imitators copying their idols. I'll try to get the warrant now. And you talk to our artist again–only this time describe the victims to him. Perhaps we'll get more matches..."

This time the artist didn't even manage to complete all adjustments when Hopkins appeared again.

"We've got the warrant. Let's go, we'll take a look at your 'cave.' Actually, civilians are not taken along on police investigations, but you were inside there and your information may be useful. But be careful–if trouble begins, don't even think about getting into it, you understand? Your mixing in won't help us; it'll only create more problems."

Two police cruisers rapidly flew through streets–lit up by the rising sun, but still empty at this too early Saturday hour–and braked to a halt in the parking lot with old crumbled asphalt where Mike's car still stood. The young man and Hopkins got out of one car and the two officers exited the other.

More than three hours remained till opening of the carnival, so its territory looked through the fence as lifeless as at night–though motionless attractions didn't seem like multi-limbed monsters any more. This time the officer who had detained Mike at night (his surname was Lawrence), did himself what he had prevented the young man from doing–cut the chain on which the lock hung and they entered the carnival. Mike immediately darted forward, but Hopkins pulled him back by the shoulder: "Show the way, but keep behind us".

They quickly passed by empty rides, locked buildings and closed booths. Near the post with the carnival map, Mike stopped to make sure again of what he already knew: the "Cave of Horror" wasn't on there. Hopkins paid attention to it, too.

"There," Mike confidently pointed the direction.

They reached the toilets; the policemen glared at the trailers and the "Employees only" shed–no signs of habitability were there either. Mike pointed to the pass through the prickly thickets. The policemen exchanged doubtful glances; then at the command of Hopkins the four men moved in single file on the narrow path (Mike went the third, after the sergeant). Lawrence, going first, pulled out his gun from its holster.

"If shooting begins, fall to the ground at once," Hopkins whispered, for an instant turning back to Mike. Ahead the exit from thickets already loomed. The young man felt an ice lump squeeze in his belly...

"Well, so where is...?" Lawrence's puzzled voice sounded.

Hopkins who had come to the open space after him, again turned back to Mike, and now in the sergeant's eyes there was anger again. But the young man didn't even notice it. In full shock he stared at the sight before his eyes

Right ahead there was exactly what he had expected to see a week ago when he had found this path in the thickets the first time. An illegal dump. The patch free from bushes was filled up with garbage–and, seemingly, this garbage had begun accumulating there long before the arrival of the carnival. Dirty old tires, rusty cans, broken glass and crushed plastic bottles, sodden cardboard, black plastic bags, torn and crumpled paper... Not a single trace of the “cave.”

Mike turned his head to the right, there, where there had been a cash booth. It also wasn't there. In its place only a metal barrel stuck out–rusted through and deeply grown into the ground.

"And how do you explain this?" the sergeant inquired.

"Yes, how do you explain it?" coldly asked a new voice.

All four turned back. On the path behind them stood a lanky gentleman about forty five, dressed in a three-piece suit with a tie. The gaze of his watery-blue eyes passed from one face to another and stopped on Hopkins, having identified in him the man in charge.

"Who are you?" asked the latter not too kindly.

"Robin Dobbins. And if armed police break the lock and trespass on land I've rented, I want at least to know what's the matter."

There was nothing wrong with his fingers, as well as with his legs. His right cheek was lightly marked by a small scar, but it didn't resemble traces of bites at all. It looked much more like a consequence of some fight in his youth.

"Here is the warrant, Mr. Dobbins. May I see, in turn, your ID?"

Dobbins pulled the driver's license card from his jacket pocket. The sergeant studied the document and returned it to the owner.

"So?" the owner of the carnival inquired.

"How long ago was the building here dismantled, Mr. Dobbins?"

"What building?"

"Cave of Horror".

"We have no such attraction. And never had. Did you see the carnival map?"

"We know that it isn't present on the map. But this young man claims that he was there. And moreover–he saw a missing person we are searching for disappear there."

Dobbins contemptuously looked askew at Mike, then again moved his glance to Hopkins:

"And if he tells you that at my carnival he was abducted by aliens, will you also believe him?"

"And why, in your opinion, do I know that missing guy by sight?" Mike exclaimed.

"The police should find it out from you, not from me," Dobbins parried.

The sergeant pulled a photo from his pocket.

"And have you seen this person?"

"I don't remember," shrugged Dobbins. "Quite probably, he might visit our carnival, but, you understand, I don't meet and I don't see off every visitor. You can talk to the cashier when he comes, but I don't promise he'll remember either. Hundreds of faces per day pass before him... and moreover, he looks mostly not at faces but at hands with money."

"And did this man ever work as a cashier for you? In general, was or is anybody from these ones among your employees?"

"N-no, never. In any case, definitely not in recent years. If you want, let's go to my trailer, and I will show you all documentation on attractions and the lists of employees. I have a legal business, and I don't deal with anything shady."

"He's lying!" Mike shouted in despair. "They simply smelled trouble and dismantled the ride!"

"Seems to me, this guy is obviously out of his head," said Dobbins. "Do you see any traces of a ride here? Perhaps we also specially grew this grass?"

The grass, yellowed by the sun, indeed didn't look like yesterday-planted. As well as the dry firm soil did not resemble recently laid turf.

Hopkins looked at the old slumped garbage, then at Mike's confused face.

"Nevertheless let's wait until this place is examined by our dog," the sergeant uttered. "Thomson, stay here. Don't let anybody destroy evidence. And we'll go with Mr. Dobbins to look at the documents."

Again having exited from the bushes on the other side of thickets, Mike paid attention to what he hadn't noticed at once: the wooden pole stood in the same place, but there was no "Cave of Horror" sign on it.

The sergeant followed Dobbins to his trailer, having left Lawrence "to keep an eye on surroundings and on our impressionable young man as well." By his tone and the look which accompanied this remark, Mike understood that now he was suspected in something worse than false testimony.

"Think of me how you want," he fatalistically murmured, "but I really was in this 'cave.' And Jane, too."

"Sure, sure," Lawrence nodded.

Mike sat down on the grass, rested his elbows against his knees, squeezed his temples with his fists, and stared at the ground. He didn't know how much time passed until he heard hasty steps and a dog panting. A big black dog, which probably had been given something of Jane's to smell, virtually dragged a police canine officer after it; the lead was stretched bar-taut. Lawrence made a sign to the canine officer, obviously, wishing the dog to sniff Mike. The dog obeyed the command, but without any enthusiasm–thus confirming that during the last few last days Mike hadn't met the missing girl–and then again pulled the lead towards the path through the bushes. In just seconds the officer and his dog disappeared in the thickets. If it had not concerned his girl, Mike could have looked at Lawrence in triumph.

And then from the bushes a dreadful howl came.

"Shit!" Lawrence muttered, bringing a walkie-talkie to his mouth. "John, what's there?"

"No big deal," reached the voice through the howls. "Just this damned dog... I don't know what happened to him. He refuses even to approach this glade. Balked and no way. Even shat from fear, can you imagine? Never I saw him like that before. Now he just sits and howls."

Hopkins came out of the trailer.

"What's this concert?" he frowned.

Lawrence explained.

"What a damned nuisance... " the sergeant murmured. "All Dobbins' papers are OK, and they don't contain the slightest hint of any 'Cave of Horror.' And... I can't say this guy seemed to me a paragon of courtesy, but, in my opinion, he isn't lying. So it looks like it's time to put handcuffs on our boy again. But there is still something strange. I just got a call from the station. All whom you, Mike, described as victims, are indeed in the lists of missing persons. And their cases usually didn't get much media coverage so it isn't clear where you could learn about them... But you know, Mike, what's the most interesting? All of them disappeared at different times. Some a year ago, some six, and some even thirty years ago. But they look, according to your words, the same as at the moment of their disappearance. How do you explain it, Mike?"

Mike knew how to explain it. He knew it as clearly as the fact that it was useless to din it into Hopkins. He knew that neither dummies nor imitators have anything to do with it, and that he nevermore would see Jane. Because his girlfriend was dead... worse than simply dead. Much, much worse. If THEY are capable of living after death, what could prevent them from dooming their victims to the same? Isn't it the ultimate dream of every sadist–the victim incapable of escaping even through death?

Behind the bushes in the anxiety born of hopeless horror the dog still howled.