How long would it be before the killer stepped through that door and claimed him? He was sure that if the slaughterer didn’t finish him, expectation would.
He heard movement beyond the door.
Instinct took over. Kaufman thrust himself further under the seat and tucked himself up into a tiny ball, with his sick-white face to the wall. Then he covered his head with his hands and closed his eyes as tightly as any child in terror of the Bogeyman.
The door was slid open. Click. Whoosh. A rush of air up from the rails. It smelt stranger than any Kaufman had smelt before: and colder. This was somehow primal air in his nostrils, hostile and unfathomable air. It made him shudder.
The door closed. Click.
The Butcher was close, Kaufman knew it. He could be standing no more than a matter of inches from where he lay.
Was he even now looking down at Kaufman’s back? Even now bending, knife in hand, to scoop Kaufman out of his hiding place, like a snail hooked from its shell?
Nothing happened. He felt no breath on his neck. His spine was not slit open.
There was simply a clatter of feet close to Kaufman’s head; then that same sound receding.
Kaufman’s breath, held in his lungs ‘til they hurt, was expelled in a rasp between his teeth.
Mahogany was almost disappointed that the sleeping man had alighted at West 4th Street. He was hoping for one more job to do that night, to keep him occupied while they descended. But no: the man had gone. The potential victim hadn’t looked that healthy anyway, he thought to himself, he was an anaemic Jewish accountant probably. The meat wouldn’t have been of any quality. Mahogany walked the length of the car to the driver’s cabin. He’d spend the rest of the journey there.
My Christ, thought Kaufman, he’s going to kill the driver.
He heard the cabin door open. Then the voice of the Butcher: low and hoarse.
‘Hi.’
‘Hi.’
They knew each other.
‘All done?’
‘All done.’
Kaufman was shocked by the banality of the exchange. All done? What did that mean: all done?
He missed the next few words as the train hit a particularly noisy section of track.
Kaufman could resist looking no longer. Warily he uncurled himself and glanced over his shoulder down the length of the car. All he could see was the Butcher’s legs, and the bottom of the open cabin door. Damn. He wanted to see the monster’s face again.
There was laughter now.
Kaufman calculated the risks of his situation: the mathematics of panic. If he remained where he was, sooner or later the Butcher would glance down at him, and he’d be mincemeat. On the other hand, if he were to move from his hiding place he would risk being seen and pursued. Which was worse: stasis, and meeting his death trapped in a hole; or making a break for it and confronting his Maker in the middle of the car?
Kaufman surprised himself with his mettle: he’d move.
Infinitesimally slowly he crawled out from under the seat, watching the Butcher’s back every minute as he did so. Once out, he began to crawl towards the door. Each step he took was a torment, but the Butcher seemed far too engrossed in his conversation to turn round.
Kaufman had reached the door. He began to stand up, trying all the while to prepare himself for the sight he would meet in Car Two. The handle was grasped; and he slid the door open.
The noise of the rails increased, and a wave of dank air, stinking of nothing on earth, came up at him. Surely the Butcher must hear, or smell? Surely he must turn —But no. Kaufman skinned his way through the slit he had opened and so through into the bloody chamber beyond.
Relief made him careless. He failed to latch the door properly behind him and it began to slide open with the buffeting of the train.
Mahogany put his head out of the cabin and stared down the car towards the door.
‘What the fuck’s that?’ said the driver.
‘Didn’t close the door properly. That’s all.’