"Death Trance" - читать интересную книгу автора (Masterton Graham)

'I wonder if Daddy's seen the factory yet,' John said. 'I can't believe that Bill Douglas got killed.'
'Well, he said he would call before midnight,' Marmie told him.
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'Can I have one of these lemon Danishes?' Mark wanted to know.
'They were supposed to be for breakfast,' Marmie said. 'But, well, okay, if you're that hungry.'
She came back to the living room. John had stacked more logs on the fire and for the moment, it was subdued and smoky.
'Why don't you use the bellows?' she suggested.
It was then that they heard three distinct clumping noises outside the front door, as if someone had stepped up onto the veranda. They froze and stared at each other.
'Don't tell me that's a squirrel,' Issa said.
'A squirrel in hiking boots?' Mark asked.
'John, did you lock the door?' Unconsciously Marmie laid her hand across Mark's shoulders and tugged at his green shirt to draw him closer.
John said nothing but stepped cautiously towards the door, listened for a moment and then turned the key to lock it.
'Do you think there's anybody out there?' Marmie asked.
John shook his head slowly. 'Probably one of the chaises fell over.'
'All the same,' Marmie instructed him, 'go to your father's closet and get the gun and the box of shells.'
John went through to the bedroom and Marmie heard him rattling around among the hiking shoes and tennis rackets and other equipment that always seemed to accumulate at the bottom of Randolph's closet. She had been trying for the whole of their married life to organize Randolph. Tonight she would have given anything to have him here, as disorganized and untidy as he wanted to be.
There was another bump. John came back into the living room carrying the .22 rifle over his arm, the way his father had taught him to carry it when they were out hunting. He looked at his mother with a serious face and put the box of shells on the table.
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'Do you know how to load it?' Marmie asked.
'Sure, Daddy showed me.'
Mark came over and watched as John carefully took the shells out of the carton, one by one, and slid them into the rifle's magazine. 'John's a rotten shot,' he said with sudden cheerfulness.
'I am not,' John retorted.
'You are too. You couldn't even hit that duck when it was practically sitting on the end of the barrel.'
'Will you stop arguing?' Marmie demanded. 'There could be somebody prowling around out there and this could be serious.'
'Maybe we ought to call the ranger station,' Issa said. There was no telephone of course, but in Randolph's study there was a radio transmitter with which they could summon either the forest rangers or the company that took care of Randolph's seaplane.
'Well, we don't know for sure that it's a prowler,' Marmie said. 'After all, we're a long way out from anywhere. We haven't heard a helicopter, have we? Or a seaplane? And it's nearly twenty miles to route one sixty-nine. I think maybe we're just letting ourselves get a little jumpy because Daddy isn't here.'
'I think it's spooky,' Issa said. 'I vote we go back to Memphis tomorrow.'
Til make some hot chocolate,' Marmie volunteered.
She had nearly reached the kitchen when there was a sharp, earsplitting crack and the blade of an axe penetrated the outside door close to the lock. Issa screamed and jumped off the sofa. John picked up the rifle and chambered a round with a quick, flustered jerk. Mark stepped back and stared at his mother wide-eyed.
Marmie tried to shout out, 'Who's that? What do you think you're doing?' but somehow her vocal cords failed to work. The axe blade cracked into the door a second time, then a third.
'John, shoot!' Marmie gasped. John aimed the rifle at the door and pulled the trigger but nothing happened.
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'It's jammed,' he said desperately. 'It's all jammed up.'
The axe chopped into the door with regular, powerful strokes, as if it were being wielded by a woodsman. Marmie thought wildly of going into the kitchen for a carving knife but a tiny voice of logic and self-protection asked what good that would be against a man carrying an axe and with the strength to chop down a heavy wooden door.
With a hideous, splintering groan, the door was forced open. Four bulky men in white ice-hockey masks and black track suits pushed their way into the living room. One of them was swinging a long-handled axe; the others were carrying sawed-off shotguns. Marmie screeched at them, 'Get out! What do you want? Get out!' and gathered the children close, but the men took no notice and strutted into the room, systematically kicking over tables, tugging down pictures and overturning chairs. They were faceless and menacing, like malevolent puppets.
'What do you want?' Marmie breathed, her voice choked with fear.
The man with the axe came up and regarded them with expressionless eyes.
'Who are you?' Marmie demanded. 'What right do you have to come bursting into our house?'
The man said nothing, although Marmie could hear him breathing harshly behind his mask. The other three men circled around behind them and stood with their feet apart, arrogant and stiff, holding up their short-barrelled shotguns as if they were symbols of authority. Marmie glanced nervously over her shoulder at them and then back at the man with the axe.
'There's no money here,' she said, her voice trembling but firm. 'You can have my credit cards if you want them. There's a gun there; it's jammed but you can have it. Just take what you want and leave us alone. Please. We're on vacation, that's all.'
The man with the axe beckoned to one of his associates and pointed to Mark. With his finger he made a throat-cutting gesture across his own neck.
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Marmie screamed, 'No!' but another man stepped up behind her and gripped her arm, so tightly that the sleeve of her dress tore. He pressed the muzzle of his shotgun to the side of Marmie's head; its roughly filed-off edges dug into her temple, and it was then she suddenly realized that these men in their bland ice-hockey masks had come not for money, nor for shelter, nor for anything else she could possibly offer them. They had come to kill, and that was all. Because who would travel twenty miles through the forests of the Laurentide Provincial Park, to a cabin that stood by itself, armed with sawed-off shotguns and disguised with masks, but killers?
Marmie said, 'I beg mercy of you.' Her voice was proud and clear. Issa whimpered and covered her face with her hands, but John stared at Marmie as if amazed that she was not able to protect him from these intruders. Mark looked up at the man standing over him and with a strangely hypnotized sense of obedience, stood up and followed him to the other side of the room.
The man with the axe pointed to the arm of the sofa; his colleague forced Mark to kneel so that his head was resting on top of the arm, like an executioner's block.
Marmie half rose and said falteringly, 'You can't do that. Listen, that's my son. He's only eleven. Please, if you have to kill somebody, kill me. But not my children. Please.'
The man with the axe stared at her. Then he looked around at his colleagues, but it was clear that he was in charge and that the others had no say in what he was about to do. None of them spoke. They could have been deaf and dumb for all Marmie could tell.
'Listen,' she insisted, 'my husband is a very rich man. If you leave us alone, if you save our lives, I will personally guarantee that he pays you very well. Just leave my children alone and I will personally guarantee you a million dollars. I mean that. A million dollars. And you can take me as hostage to make sure the money is paid.'
The man with the axe said nothing but grunted when
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