The Scape Goat

I looked around for help, but the street was deserted. The best thing, I decided, was to take him home. There Nan, my wife, could patch him up while I found out what had happened. I bent down again and pulled him to his feet. He staggered. I put one steadying hand on his shoulder and gripped his wrist with the other. My spine went cold.

It was his flesh. Not so much that it felt like rubber—but the chill. Here we were in the middle of a heat wave, the thermometer nudging ninety, and the old guy's wrist is like an icicle!

For a second, it threw me. Then I thought of shock. That might explain it. And Nan, having been a nurse, would be the one to know.

I started the old man walking. "See if you can make it to my house," I urged. "It's just around the corner."

Nan switched on the porch light when she heard us on the steps. Opening the door, she drew back with a little shriek. The old man was pretty gruesome-looking at that. But it wasn't just his blood-covered face and matted white beard.

There was something spiderish about him. He was angular, and dark, and skeletal. His eyes, deep-set and brooding, seemed to crouch under his shaggy, jutting brows.

"Take it easy, honey," I said. "The old guy just needs some patching up."