A corridor door slammed shut, and everyone jerked, spun toward the corridor, and gazed.
No one walked by.
Before long, Sarah slung Adam’s arm toward the corridor.
“Go on,” she said. “Have a look.”
He gulped. “Give it minute.”
“In a minute, a killer may corner us, idiot.”
“You don’t know if anyone killed Ron.”
She folded her arms. “So, Ron pushed himself down a staircase, ay?” She shook her head. “Geez, you’re dumber than you look.”
“But not dumb enough to stick my neck out ahead of you.”
“You might as well—you’ve not much to lose.”
Ruth slapped a finger against her lips. “Shhh!” she said. “Lower your voice.”
Sarah jammed a thumb at Adam. “That’s this air head!”
Ron shook his head.
“Quiet,” Ruth said. “I’m headed out.” She tiptoed past splintered chairs, cracked side tables, and bent floor lamps to a lopsided piano. She glimpsed over a shoulder toward Sarah and Adam – who gaped, hunched behind a spring-exposed sofa—and peered into the corridor.
No footsteps.
She slipped to the door peeked left. Three rooms down, an open door stood, moonlight plastered against a room wall. She peeked right, jolted, and threw herself against a wall, palm slapped over her mouth. Bit by bit, she turned toward Sarah and Adam who peered.
“What is it?” Sarah said.
Ruth shook her head and threw a hand at Sarah, and Sarah hunched down. Before long, footsteps echoed in the corridor, thumping louder.
Adam waved at Ruth. “Get over here…” he whispered. “Hurry…”
Back mashed to a wall, Ruth shook her head, slid closer to the piano. Suddenly, a bulky man stepped into the doorway. He wore ragged overalls and a bandage wrapped around his eyes and dragged a naked man’s body. Ruth pinched her eyes shut. She listened to footsteps thump to the piano’s opposite end and then heard sniffing sound and opened her eyes. Nose jetted forward, the bulky man snorted, sounding like a bloodhound searching for a scent, faced Ruth, and inched toward her, dead man dragged alongside him. Fists balled, Ruth shuddered as the bulky man crept around a piano bench and arrived one stride away and leaned, face to face. He lifted his free hand, and reached toward her, but before he touched her:
CRAAASH!!!
Over his shoulder, a chair crashed into a wall, and the bulky man wheeled and heaved the body toward it.
THUUUMP!!
The body slammed into broken chair pieces, and the bulky man rammed through drawer-less dressers and spiderweb-wrapped coffee tables to the chair which shattered against the wall and picked-up a fractured leg. He smelled it, seized the dead body, and placed the leg to its skinless nose.
“Humm?” the bulky man said and held the leg to the dead man’s noise. “Humm??” Before long, he made the dead body shake its head and then the bulky man shook his head as well. “Akkkay…”
Suddenly, the bulky man stood upright, turned his head about (as though he somehow scanned the room), and ambled toward the door, dragging the body by hair on its head. Both hands pressed to her mouth, back pressed against the wall, Ruth watched him reach the corridor doorway, turn his head (as through double-checking for something he’d missed), and amble rightward into the corridor. She listened to footsteps thump away until she no longer heard them and then slid against the wall to the floor, hands over her face.
Sarah and Adam raced to her.
“You okay?” Adam said.
“Of course, she’s not ‘okay’: she just came face-to-face with the killer, his dead accomplice, and his bad breath! Would you be ‘okay’?”
“Not if it evolved your bad breath,” he said.
Sarah slapped his arm. “Just help her up, numb-nuts.”
Adam lifted her upon her feet, and she nodded.
“Many thanks. Down the corridor, three doors leftward, I saw an open door.”
The others stared at her.
She sighed. “On an inner wall, I saw moonlight.”
Adam gasped. “An open window.”
Ruth nodded.
“Let’s go,” he said, slinked to the corridor door, and peeked leftward, and across the corridor, three doors down, the open door stood. He glimpsed over his shoulder. “I can see the open door.” He peeked rightward up the corridor and staggered backward against the opposite door frame.
“Aggh!”
Ruth dashed to the doorway, peered rightward, and saw dead man’s body slumped against a corridor wall. “Something tells me he’ll be back for this, and we shouldn’t be here when he does. Come on.” Ruth crept down the corridor to the open door and peeked inside. Scattered throughout, sofas and chairs covered by white sheets lay in shadow, and on an opposite wall, a torn curtain dangled back and forth over a window. She waved at Adam, and he and Sarah skulked across the corridor and into the room.
Sarah stared through the doorway into the corridor. “Shouldn’t we close the door?”
“No,” Ruth said. “Don’t touch anything. We have to evaluate our next move.” She turned to Adam. “If we keep down the corridor in this direction, wouldn’t we run into—”
“An elevator shaft,” he said. “But remember ventilation grate we’d peered through—the shaft pullies had no cables and tracks had rusted which means no elevator.”
Ruth rubbed her chin. “But didn’t we see a door beside the elevator door?”
“We may’ve. So?”
“So, I’ll bet two-to-one that other door was a staircase.”
“Could’ve been. We can only try.”
Sarah sighed. “No, we can also run into that ogre and become naked ragged-dolls.” She ambled to the curtain. “But if the odds suit you, be my guest, but from here out, I’m going to try to create my own luck.” She threw the curtain aside, and moonlight shone half through shattered window glass and half through the open window itself and spilled throughout the room.
“Sarah!” Ruth said and shut the door.
Sarah chuckled. “What’s wrong, Ruth? Afraid you’ll turn into a werewolf?”
“She asked us not to touch anything.”
“Oh Adam, ever the trained dog. One of these days, you’ll learn to walk upright and chest out as a man should.”
“Tell that to the naked man in the corridor.”
“Who perhaps at least tried to think for himself. Shame I can’t say as much about you.” Sarah stepped to the window, leaned on chipped sill, and peered throughout silhouetted treetops. “We must be seven, eight stories up.”
“Careful,” Ruth said.
“Quiet, were-woman, I don’t plan to jump.” Sarah poked her head outside. “Stone terrace, nine o’clock.” She poked further. “Extends to a building corner and wraps around, as well. So, either we’re next door to the grandest of master bedrooms or the next couple rooms may be interconnected which could present some options.” She returned inside the room. “One, in fact, I’m keen on.”
“What?” Adam said.
“The pool: One side of this building faces it. If it’s the side the other terrace portion hangs over, we may be able to jump.”
Ruth and Adam stared at her.
“What? Say something!”
Adam gestured toward Ruth. “Ladies first.”
Ruth shrugged. “The staircase door was my idea, so I’ll go check to see if it’s legit. If I’m not back in ten, you know what to do.”
Sarah gashed her teeth. “Adam??”
He watched Sarah clench her fists and become stiff as a board and then peered at Ruth, sighed, and nodded. “Go on,” he said. “I’ll stay with Sarah.”
“Really??” Sarah said. “So, we aren’t even going to discuss my idea??”
Ruth glanced at the door and shushed her. “Keep your voice down.”
“Shut up! Adam may walk in lockstep with you, but I have my own mind and down need you!”
“But you need to lower your voice.”
“Again, with the commands! Didn’t you hear?? I don’t cater to you!” Sarah stamped her foot into the floor, and suddenly, the shattered window plummeted down its track and slammed shut and glass crashed to the floor.
Everyone threw their back against a wall, and Ruth shook her head, hands pressed to her face.
Adam bit his lip. “Perhaps no one heard it.”
“Impossible,” Ruth said. “The echo rang throughout the manor. Someone or something’s on its way.” She glimpsed at her wristwatch and recovered her face. “Can’t imagine it’d take more than fifty seconds.”
“So, what do we do?”
Ruth didn’t answer.
“Ruth,” she Adam said, snatched her hands off her face, and turned her toward him. “We need you. Come on, you’ve brought us this far. So, what’s are move?”
She sighed and nodded.
“So, what is it? Make a run for the staircase?”
She glimpsed at her watch. “No.” She dashed to the window peered out and then pointed at the door. “Adam, you and I create a barricade with as much furniture as possible, and Sarah—” She noticed Sarah was frozen against the wall, mouth gaping, seized her shoulders, and shook her, and Sarah peered at her.
“Sarah,” Ruth said. “Use the curtain fabric to sweep as much glass off the sill and ledge as possible.”
Sarah gasped. “Did you say, ‘ledge’?”
“Yes,” Ruth said, seized a sofa’s base, and lifted. “A ledge stretches to the terrace. This is your plan and it may just save our lives. So come on, thirty seconds.”
Sarah bit her lip, snatched the curtain, and slapped willow sill shards away and then threw a hand outside the window and brushed the ledge, as well. Head outside, she peered at the ledge which stretched to the terrace along a manor wall, down at a statue garden below, and gulped.
“Fifteen seconds!” Ruth said, and Sarah sighed, yanked herself back inside, and peered at the others.
Ruth and Adam stacked a second sofa and a third chair behind the door, and Ruth glimpsed at Sarah.
“Is the window clear?”
On the floor, below the window, shards laid, and Sarah kicked them aside. “All clear.”
“Okay.” Ruth tore a sheet off a wooden chair. “Both of you head for the terrace.” She stamped on it, ripped a screw-spiked leg off, and lifted it upon her shoulder as though it was a bat.
Gaping, Sarah and Adam glanced at each other and watched her march near the door and gazed at it. Before long however, Ruth glimpsed over her shoulder.
“Why do you both stand there??” she said. “Head across!”
Sarah stepped forward. “We don’t want to leave you.”
“You’re not leaving me—cross the ledge, and we’ll meet on the terrace.”
“But what if, they come and—”
“Five seconds!”
Adam grabbed Sarah’s arm. “Come on!”
“No, I’m not leaving her!”
“Sarah—!”
The door’s knob rattled and twisted and then the door buckled and shuddered, and Ruth lifted the spiked leg higher. Suddenly, a hand punched through the wood and reached in every direction, and Sarah screamed and then staggered backward with Adam near the window. A second hand smashed through, and Ruth battered them both, but when the door broke open a foot, revealing a half-dozen skinless men, she jerked back.
Sarah reached for her. “Ruth!”
Ruth lifted the bat and peered at snarling beings, reaching inside, thrusting on the door. “Go across!”
“We won’t leave you!”
“Go!!”
Adam snatched Sarah to window. “Hurry!”
Sarah stepped a leg outside, glimpsed throughout shadowy treetop, and stepped back inside. “I can’t—it’s too high!” She started to peer over her shoulder at Ruth but Adam turned her toward the window.
“If you want to live, pay attention: head out, first foot out, lean back, second foot out, eyes on the ledge only. Now follow me.” Adam put his head outside, then a foot, then leant back. He stepped his second foot on the ledge and then ambled quarter-way across. “Sarah, come on!”
She peeked out, and he ambled across the ledge to a stone handrail, climbed over it, and stood on the terrace, gesturing for her. She nodded and put her head out, then a foot, leant back, and sidestepped twice.
“Come on!” Adam said.
Sarah shook her head, face full of tears. “I can’t!”
Suddenly, a skinless man leaned out the window and seized her leg, and she screamed.
“Sarah!” Adam said, climbed over the terrace handrail, and slipped halfway back.
Just then, hands behind the man seized his shoulders and tugged him back inside where snarling and rumbling ensued. Before long, the room went hushed, and Sarah wailed and screamed Ruth’s name. Sarah inched toward the window when out of the blue the skinless man crashed through the window—wood, glass, and all—and plummeted into darkness below, and Ruth, clothes ripped and face bloodied—stepped out upon the ledge.
“Go!” Ruth said to the others.
A skinless man climbed out the window, and Ruth swung the club and bludgeoned its skull, and it toppled to the ground. Suddenly, a hand broke through the brick wall and reached for Ruth but ducked beneath. Another smashed through and seized Sarah’s hair, and Sarah shrieked, voice echoing into the night. Ruth flung the club and the hand, and soon, screws stabbed it, and the hand dashed back inside. Soon after, Adam climbed over the terrace railing and then helped Sarah and Ruth over has well, and all collapsed to the stone floor and panted.
Sarah shook my head. “Ruth,” she said. “The next time my feet leave firm ground, feel free to club me. Ruth eyebrows elevated. “Promise?”