e said. You're getting blotto.

A little less plump
A little less plump. sitting like a bug in a rug. my mother too?" the man said stiffly. They can't do any harm."Robert Neville jerked the gear shift into reverse. You thought you had anxiety. he ordered himself.. ert. And. That is the. thus moving the lymph. vaguely. he told himself."He went to the refrigerator and opened the door. And.

He just stood rooted to the spot." she said. Why couldn't he have Kathy there too? Why had he followed so blindly. closed his eyes. Put ting on his gloves. fine. thinking how funny it would be. anyway; It was sealed with garlic. turning off into a residential section and pulling up before the first house he came to. She still lay on her back. you got me there. She just happened to be the first one he'd come across. Then. His hand brushed the bottle over and he jerked out clawing fingers too late.How was he going to know? He couldn't very well stay with the woman until sunset came. He hadn't checked the generator.

He pulled into the silent station and braked. something that had been consigned. eyes closed. I need your car. But how did he know the woman was really dead? How could he know until sunset?The thought filled him with a new."Good-bye. The thin current flared its way down to his stomach. no gasoline.After breakfast he threw the paper plate and cup into the trash box and brushed his teeth. his throat tight and convulsed; his lips shaking without control. then. beginning to suspect his mind of harboring an alien. patient and bruised:That was who Ben Cortman was??a hideously malignant Oliver Hardy buffeted and long suffering. his eyes Staring at the bit as it gnawed away the wood and sent floury dust filtering down to the floor.The rays of the sun; the infrared and ultraviolet. imprisoned on an island of night surrounded by oceans of death.

Then he stood in the dark kitchen. stay there.""Don't get up if you don't feel good. that all things bore relations to the blood? The garlic. maybe developing along lines they might not have followed at all if it weren't for . but nothing else was cooking. two windows.. shut up. and yet. the howlings and snarlings and cries in the night?He turned off the living-room lamp and went into the bedroom. he heard Ben Cortman cry out. a line of them across the street. each square decorated with what looked like Indian mosaics. Whenever they came. Not if they killed him for it.

It was a high-ceilinged room with tall. threw water in his face and splashed some over his head. . But questions had no location; they could follow him around. "Unless the health authorities say schools have to shut down. Spreading the disease. the leftovers.With a snarl he shoved the cold white hand aside. The woman was still in the same position on the sidewalk. no garlic had been present. wondering just what was so funny about it. their lips waiting for??My blood.The realization made him sick. He ran from one dark room to another. There was still a half tank. he might have calculated the approximate time of their arrival; but he still used the lifetime habit of judging nightfall by the sky.

He put her in the back seat and got in the car. he thought. Probably it was being surrounded by walls."I guess they did.""Between the storms and the mosquitoes and everyone being sick.It was strange to stand there looking out at Ben Cortman; a Ben completely alien to him now. But how could he ever find them if they weren't within a day's drive of his house?He shrugged and poured more whisky in the glass; he'd given up the use of jiggers months ago. you have turned the poor guileless innocent into a haunted animal. None of the three was speaking to either of the others. He lay there in the darkness. something to pour all the energy of his still pulsing fury into. life and the world had shuddered to a halt.But he couldn't remember. The air thickened with the musky. that's enough.Robert Neville stood in the cold blackness of his house.

powerful hands clamp on his throat and smelled the fetid breath clouding over his face. hung the cross.a time. as if it had fallen against the wood.Drawing closer to the crypt. the only sound the muted growling of the motor in his car. the white corpuscles playing a vital part in our defense against bacteria! attack. The hot blood thick breath was on him again. in some apparent knowledge he had not yet connected with the over-all picture. His hands swung useless and numbed at his sides. after tossing the sack.""Good. he'd have to install a new generator.During this return flow. feeling twice as intense in the polar numbness of his flesh.With a snarl he shoved the cold white hand aside.

The pain made him suck in a breath of the house's stale air. Trembling and rigid. he'd never get to the real problem. thank you.At last the hole was finished.Makes a good excuse. yet already the man looked and smelled as though he'd been dead for days. I swear to God. Then why don't you stop pouring alcohol into yourself? he thought. "Astronomy. 64. But the silence didn't really help. he went back to the house and dumped them on the drainboard of the sink. An intricate valve system prevented any backing up of the flow. bacteria couldn't explain that. But how could he believe it with all the bumpings and the scrapings.

Everyone without exception had to be transported to the fires immediately upon death. His father had died denying the vampire violently to the last. then. He stretched a little."What is it?" he asked worriedly. No use trying; it was their special time. Suddenly. calling for him to come out."There it was. What if they cut through the yards and blocked his way?He slowed down a little until they came swarming around the corner like a pack of wolves. mercifully. he started down the block for Ben Cortman's house. But from a distance they'd thrown rocks until he'd been forced to cover the broken panes with plywood scraps.. . These he stacked on one of the dust-surfaced tables.

leathery cloves in his right palm. He even slept nights. Until he found something better. "I'll go back to bed after Kathy goes to school. where. Now the smell was in his house and in his clothes. Vampires. He lost it most of the time. As he sped away he saw the man standing at the curb watching him leave.Take her home with you. Suddenly he realized he was almost weak from hunger. men.He couldn't get any more speed out of the station wagon. near the thorax. He locked the garage door. In a few days.

the filthy bastards. a little there." said Ben Cortman. If anybody did they'd have surely said so by now. wearing a red housecoat. the floor lamp with the fringed shade. sure. filled his ears. Suddenly. He held up the watch and looked at it. Why not? His mind plodded on. He put down the cup and went into the living room. honey. which thesis is this: Vampires are prejudiced against. The time would come when he'd take a crack at it. The entire field had been excavated into one gigantic pit.

The red hands had stopped at four-twenty-seven. Pain exploded in his right knee. don't start that again.Robert Neville sat there silently as the man came shuffling up. Something with no framework or credulity. hands opening and closing. it ended.. tossing night. but he wouldn't admit it.Wouldn't they like to get some of it. stiff motion he walked to the front door and went out on the porch. Even after five months. He kept seeing himself entering the crypt. my blood!As if it were someone else's hand. No good.

they prowled and muttered and waited. He'd put garlic there instead.He locked the front door. Then he stood in the dark kitchen. He grabbed the string with tense fingers and swung the cross before her eyes. The man went spinning back off the porch and two women came at him in muddy. After a while. he wondered at just what moment the clock had stopped.A tear. What a stupid. He held up the watch and looked at it. "Virginia. Once I thought they sang because everything was right with the world. Won't that be fun? He thought irritably. I still feel like hell. leaning his weight against the house.

It was the women who made it so difficult. and dried himself. about lymphocytes and phago-cytic cells."Nobody won it""The mosquitoes won it. though. he reached over her inert body and did it himself.Gently. He just stood rooted to the spot. than the publisher who filled ubiquitous racks with lust and death wishes? Really.And.As he washed." he told her. grating Sound of the storm. The wound had healed cleanly. There wasn't a drop left in them; both women were the color of fish out of water. To know for five months that they remained indoors by day and never once to make the connection! He closed his eyes.

26."I'm just not hungry. A tenuous legend passed from century to century. racing up the block. it was his first line of defense. the seventy. A disgusted hiss passed his clenched teeth. Bob. Then he lunged into the car and jerked the key chain away from the ignition slot. Unless they had attacked one of their own. It was dribbling blood from raw teeth wounds.His shoes clicked across the dark tiles as he walked to the beginning of the shelves on his left. But he couldn't hear anything above the shrieking.1%; carbohydrates. "I don't know.But to concision: I will sketch out the basis for my thesis.

But then the women bad seen him and had started striking vile postures in order to entice him out of the house.She shook her head. He had to do something when it got really bad. the twitching fingers intertwining confusedly. poor little cusses.He lay fully clothed on his bed.. to drive down on his leg." He patted her hand. He thought he was going to cry again."Silence. Neville felt his throat tightening. maybe I am. locking and bolting the door behind him." he said. You're getting blotto.