The four-room apartment behind him would have raised eyebrows in town, for there was nothing in it-nothing at all. Not a bed, not an appliance, not a single chair. The closets stood open and empty. A few dust-bunnies tumbled lazily across floors innocent of rugs in a slight draft that blew through the place at ankle level.
The only furnishings were, quite literally, window-dressing: homey checked curtains. They were the only furnishings which mattered, because they were the only ones which could be seen from the street.
The town was sleeping now. The shops were dark, the houses were dark, and the only movement on Main Street was the blinker at the intersection of Main and Watermill, flashing on and off in sleepy yellow beats. He looked over the town with a tender loving eye. It wasn't his town just yet, but it soon would be. He had a lien on it already. They didn't know that... but they would. They would.
The grand opening had gone very, very well.
Mr. Gaunt thought of himself as an electrician of the human soul.
In a small town like Castle Rock, all the fuse-boxes were lined up neatly side by side. What you had to do was open the boxes... and then start cross-wiring. You hot-wired a Wilma jerzyck to a Nettle Cobb by using wires from two other fuse-boxes-those of a young fellow like Brian Rusk and a drunk fellow like Hugh Priest, let us say.
You hot-wired other people in the same way, a Buster Keeton to a Norris Ridgewick, a Frank jewett to a George Nelson, a Sally Ratcliffe to a Lester Pratt.
At some point you tested one of your fabulous wiring jobs just to make sure everything was working correctly-as he had done today-and then you laid low and sent a charge through the circuits every once in awhile to keep things interesting. To keep things hot.
But mostly you just laid low until everything was done... and then you turned on the juice.
All the juice.
All at once.
All it took was an understanding of human nature, and"Of course it's really a question of supply and demand," Leland Gaunt mused as he looked out over the sleeping town.
And why? Well... just because, actually. just because.
People always thought in terms of souls, and of course he would take as many of those as he could when he closed up shop; they were to Leland Gaunt what trophies were to the hunter, what stuffed fish were to the fisherman. They were worth little to him these days in any practical sense, but he still bagged his limit if he possibly could, no matter what he might say to the contrary; to do any less would not be playing the game.
Yet it was mostly amusement, not souls, that kept him going.
Simple amusement. It was the only reason that mattered after awhile, because when the years were long, you took diversion where you could find it.
Mr. Gaunt took his hands from behind his back-those hands which revolted anyone unlucky enough to feel their crepitant touch-and locked them together tightly, the knuckles of his right hand pressing into the palm of his left, the knuckles of his left pressing into the palm of his right. His fingernails were long and thick and yellow. They were also very sharp, and after a moment or two they cut into the skin of his fingers, bringing a blackish-red flow of thick blood.
Brian Rusk cried out in his sleep.
Myra Evans thrust her hands into the fork of her crotch and began to masturbate furiously-in her dream, The King was making love to her.
Danforth Keeton dreamed he was lying in the middle of the homestretch at Lewiston Raceway, and he covered his face with his hands as the horses bore down on him.
Sally Ratcliffe dreamed she opened the door of Lester Pratt's Mustang only to see it was full of snakes.
Hugh Priest screamed himself awake from a dream in which Henry Beaufort, the bartender at The Mellow Tiger, poured lighter fluid all over his fox-tail and set it on fire.
Everett Frankel, Ray Van Allen's Physician's Assistant, dreamed he slipped his new pipe into his mouth only to discover the stem had turned into a razor-blade and he had cut off his own tongue.
Polly Chalmers began to moan softly, and inside the small silver charm she wore something stirred and moved with a rustling like the whir of small dusty wings. And it sent up a faint, dusty aroma... like a tremor of violets.
Leland Gaunt relaxed his grip slowly. His big, crooked teeth were exposed in a grin which was both cheerful and surpassingly ugly. All over Castle Rock, dreams blew away and uneasy sleepers rested easy once more.
For now.
Soon the sun would be up. Not long after that a new day would begin, with all its surprises and wonders. He believed the time had come to hire an assistant... not that the assistant would be immune to the process which he had now set in motion. Heavens, no.
That would spoil all the fun.
Leland Gaunt stood at the window and looked at the town below, spread out, defenseless, in all that lovely darkness. m
CHAPTER TWELVE