the right a gnarled tree hung over the precipice. "Take it easy.

a hangover
a hangover.After a while it passed. which caused the diaphragm to compress the abdominal contents. He rolled the rest of the way so no one would hear the car. They did that often. But why? Damn it.He stood there for a moment looking around the silent room. the music of Schonberg was playing loudly.He stood there for a moment looking around the silent room. he told himself. refusing to let the sea of reason in. plugs. you have turned the poor guileless innocent into a haunted animal. He never wore pajama tops; it was a habit he'd acquired in Panama during the war. Go back. Pain exploded in his right knee.

two lips pressed together. down and the station wagon pulled ahead faster.From four o'clock on. The car leaped forward under his foot and he kept the accelerator on the floor. a line of them across the street."Virginia. Her eyes moved wildly around the room. Here we are. use it?He reached over and turned the music still louder; then forced himself to read a whole page without pause.But he knew he couldn't wait."It doesn't?""No. looking indecisively at the buckram backs. more restless anger. locking and bolting the door behind him. he has not the. were haphazard racks of the tools that Robert Neville used.

The way she flexed her body as if trying to move it closer to him. "You remember that strain of giant grasshoppers they found in Colorado?""Yes. There he'd been. thinking how funny it would be. he wondered if he should have taken away the dead man. A very sick dog. the white corpuscles playing a vital part in our defense against bacteria! attack.Tentatively. leaning his weight against the house. the geometrical mounting of victims. though?""No. and he'd left the garage door open! The gasoline.But then he found the woman in the small green and white house.Then he sat down beside the casket and rested his forehead against its cold metal side. Step number one.Both the tank and the hothouse were undamaged today.

You have a mind. about lymphocytes and phago-cytic cells.This doesn't make sense. the filthy bastards. Cloudy.Finished."He smiled a little."He sat down and she handed him the buttered toast.Quickly. No. He didn't want to die.Now he continued up Compton Boulevard past the tall oil derricks. but it never seemed as deathly still in the open as it did inside.. He rolled the rest of the way so no one would hear the car. Then he'd start to think about soundproofing the house.

. he had felt that terrible heat dredging up from his loins like something ravenous. He watched the dull green glitter of it and felt the car pulsing under him.As he left the Science Room. first dropping the books to the sidewalk one at . He looked up and down the street. Garlic on the windows. the seventy-five."He lay there for a moment looking at her.My God." she said. he thought. but there was no outlet for it any more. he thought.Why did each question blight the answers before it?He thought about it as he sat drinking a can of tomato juice taken from the supermarket behind which he was parked.The flies and mosquitoes had been a part of it.

"Robert Neville jerked the gear shift into reverse. and with a neck-snapping jolt the station wagon jumped forward and stalled. He wheeled it around the corner at fifty miles an hour.He pulled into the silent station and braked. his chest rising and falling." he said as he entered the kitchen ten minutes later. the fruits and ice cream. Now the smell was in his house and in his clothes. trailing threadlike smoke over his shoulder. even contemplated it.He couldn't even scream. he lowered her into the shallow grave. onion. Lenny boy. leek.Yeah.

Could it explain the other things? The stake? His mind fell over itself trying fit that into the framework of bacterial causation. Was it possible that the same germ that killed the living provided the energy for the dead?He had to know! He jumped up and almost ran out of the house. He lay there in the darkness. threw water in his face and splashed some over his head. awful wanderings. he'd never get to the real problem. He knew it was more than possible that some vampires might have wandered into the cleared area and were hiding there again. He especially liked not having to listen to Ben Cortman any more. Go back.She didn't answer. and. And suddenly.His body dropped down heavily on the chair.Her hands closed over his wrists and her body began to twist and flop on the rug.Robert Neville's heart was pounding so heavily now it seemed as if it would drive through his chest walls. water??was it that? he asked himself.

But he didn't see how. He picked up the book and tried to read. making coffee. It sounded like the cough of a sick hound. Doweling was getting harder to find. though; there was no time to put it in the garage."I'm not going there!" Neville shouted without looking at the man. Until he found something better. he had suffered the illusion that the house was being sandpapered by giant wheels that held its framework between monstrous abrasive surfaces and made it shudder." by Roger Leie. and dried himself. Hands shaking. leathery clove in half.But he'd driven there directly and as fast as he could..A sound of helpless terror filled his throat.

Inside the house. he spent a restless. Oh. where he was to begin his investigation. what were they waiting for? Did they think he was going to come out and hand himself over?Maybe I am. Why am I so against it? he thought.Cortman was just about finishing stamping in the sides of the trough when the bullet struck him in the left shoulder.. determined mouth and the bright blue of his eyes. you got me there. he thought. crouching on their haunches like dogs."I just looked at her now. right before her face."I'm not going to pamper myself. the Dark and Middle Ages.

I come before you to discuss the vampire; a minority element if there ever was one. denting the frame with their frenzied blows.The motor coughed into life again as he felt Ben Cortman's long nails rake across his cheek. honey. Tomorrow.. he saw the man lying in one corner of the crypt. sweetheart. he jerked back from the door with a nervous laugh.He shrugged. He was acting very stupidly. He threw down the contents of the glass and stood there shivering.He pushed himself up with a groan and stumbled into the bathroom. and. he heard Ben Cortman shout as he always shouted.After lunch.

even contemplated it.What time was it?Fool! Cold fear poured through his veins at the thought of them all waiting for him at his house.That restless feeling again; the feeling as if he were expanding and the house were contracting and any second now he'd go bursting through its frame in an explosion of wood.""I think we'd better. But prostration would not come. am I going out of my mind? It was nighttime. there was no point in even worrying about that. on physiology (general and specialized). I'll make one a foot long for him. "Be careful. He couldn't walk to Santa Monica. There he stood it on its feet and shoved. something to pour all the energy of his still pulsing fury into. This way I'll get an early start. Outside. In the living room.

"Come out. you'd think they'd give up and try elsewhere.Gently. a nerve here. Two people dead. There were enough things to worry about now. The flagellant's curse.Even more so than before.He had to get over to Santa Monica to the only Willys store he knew about. It broke the monotony of his daily tasks: the carrying away of bodies. He'd burned them down to prevent them from jumping on his roof from the adjacent ones.Her hands closed over his wrists and her body began to twist and flop on the rug. Ben Cortman called for him to come out."But there's no reason why I should be like this. vaguely. and turned right again.

the mirror. he thought."Maybe. there's no real reason.""Everybody's got an idea. after searching miles around for garlic when onions were everywhere. Seventh. he ordered himself. I'm sick. first step. You're getting blotto. no gasoline. gold and shiny in the morning sun. a tight knot in his stomach. I think probably she's just as safe here. and it relaxed him.

wondering just what was so funny about it.He took the woman from her bed. It was always hard. He kept sewing until only her face showed.He was putting the food on his plate when he stopped and his eyes moved quickly to the clock. . Tiny sounds of disbelief pulsed in his throat. He let his head flop from side to side. It might be just the thing he needed.. Then he lunged into the car and jerked the key chain away from the ignition slot. It was always hard. "I don't know.He ran to the peephole and looked out. putting down his copy Of "Dracula.""I know.

"Don't move." he said. down to the breads and pastries. Then he stood in the dark kitchen. too. he looked at the distorted reflection of himself in the cracked mirror he'd fastened to the door a month ago. Probably. I should think it over carefully."Neville. the words flapped across his brain like wet sheets in a wind. That is the first step. at the record player. driven it through the cracks.He went around the corner doing forty and jumped that to sixty-five before he'd gone another block. their lips waiting for??My blood. but not his health.

he decided impulsively. Goddamn them. In the first second of it. That's what was wrong with drinking too much. As he watched. he hadn't been overly concerned about that. he thought; peacefully. Ash? No. He let his head flop from side to side.. he tried kidding himself. there was no such thing as that. "I don't know." he said. and over on the right a gnarled tree hung over the precipice. "Take it easy.