Free Listen to the Shadows by Joan Hall Hovey Page A

they’d had revolving doors. Some of the kids in those places thought just because he was an orphan they could lord it over him. Well, they found out different soon enough. No one ever told on him, either. They knew better.
    Anyway, they probably wouldn’t have been believed. Most grownups liked him. Most told him what a “ lovely, sweet boy ” he was.
    Oh, yes. It was the grownups who were easy. You just had to tell them what they wanted to hear, that was all.
    The dirt path leading up to the house was fairly long, maybe two hundred feet, and he watched, unmoving, as they drew nearer. The taller of the two kids was peering uneasily at him through holes in the sheet he wore, while the little one, a girl, he figured, of about six or seven, adjusted her black witch’s nose. Fine, blonde curls escaped the pointed hat. They stopped a few feet from where he stood.
    “Trick or treat?” came the thin, timid voice from behind the sheet. A boy’s voice.
    The man made no reply, only continued to look down at the two children, enjoying his effect on them. Instinctively, the boy reached out to take the girl’s hand. His feet shifted in dirty, scuffed Nikes. “Is—Is Mrs. Nickerson home?”
    “No. No one’s home.” The man’s voice was barely audible, yet filled with menace. His lips stretched in a slow, cruel smile. “Only me. Now you two move to hell out of here, or I’ll give you a treat you won’t like.”
    For a moment the two stood frozen, caught like a pair of rabbits in the man’s pale, icy stare. Then, as he took a threatening step toward them, they were suddenly off and running, feet flying over the dirt path, back the way they had come.
    He was still chuckling low in his throat long after the two had disappeared from sight. They’d probably squawk to their parents, he thought, but to hell with them. To hell with all of them. He would be moving on in a few days anyway, once he took care of business. Taking the knife from his pocket, he tested its sharpness against his thumb. Just a slight touch of the blade and a bead of blood leapt to the surface.
    The knife felt good in his hand, better than the butcher knife. More authority. He didn’t really want to use it, though; that would spoil things. Unless, of course, she gave him too much trouble.
    Thoughts of her, as they always did, began the blood throbbing hotly through his veins. Slowly, he turned the knife over in his hand, observing how, even in the last light of day, it gleamed like polished silver. Head bent in admiration, it shot up at the sound of a car coming up the road, and he quickly returned the knife to the front pocket of his army jacket and patted down the flap. Fear coiled and stretched and coiled again, cool as a serpent in his bowels, as the full implication of what had just happened struck him. What he had said to those kids was stupid, he now knew. Careless. People knew him around here. They could mess things up. In spite of the cool temperatures, sweat trickled down his sides.
    He was getting impatient, that was all. But he mustn’t. Had to keep it together. He’d waited too long to blow it now, and November fifth was only five days away. Then he would be rewarded for his patience, for his careful attention to detail.
    A frown worked itself between his brows as again the voice reminded him that he had put the plan in jeopardy—had in fact nearly caused the entire plan to backfire.
    But “nearly” was the key word here. It hadn’t backfired. What happened had actually allowed him to complete much of the work without fear of discovery. What happened was, in fact, an improvement on the plan, so it didn’t matter. He figured it was an omen—a kind of sign that the plan was taking on a force of its own. The thought calmed him.
    As did the sight of the brown Chevy moving on down the road, now slowing, the driver taking no notice of him.
    But he must be careful from now on. Very, very careful.
    Taking the coil of rope from his pocket, he