Rules of Prey

confronting the prospect for the first time.
    I won’t change, he thought. No need to, really. There were better than a million women in the Twin Cities. Probably a quarter of a million fit his “type.” A quarter-million prospective Chosen women. From that point of view, the description of a “type” was meaningless. The police wouldn’t have a chance. He felt a surge of confidence: the whole thing was meaningless. Having been fought off by one woman, having been seen at the Brown killing by another witness, he realized the police had less than he had expected. If they were telling everything.
    The microwave beeped at him and he took the dinner out and carried it to the table. If they catch me, he thought as he ate the lonely meal, I could use the microwave defense. Like the guy who claimed he was driven crazy by excess sugar from an overdose of Twinkies. The Twinkie defense; his would be the Tater-Tot defense. He speared one of the potato nubbins and peered at it, popped it in his mouth.
    Tonight, he thought. I can’t wait any longer.
     
    He called the cripple’s house a little after six but there was no answer. He called again at seven. No answer. At eight there was an answer.
    “Phyllis?” he asked in his highest-pitched voice.
    “You must have the wrong number.” It was the first time he’d heard her voice. It was low and musical.
    “Oh, dear,” he said. He sounded dainty in his own ears;like anything but a killer. He gave her a number with one digit different from her own.
    “That’s the wrong number,” she said. “I’m five- four - seven-six.”
    “Oh. I’m sorry,” he said, and hung up. She was home.
    He prepared carefully, the excitement growing but under control. A hunter’s excitement, a hunter’s joy. He would wear his best tweed sport coat, the black cashmere overcoat, with black loafers. Snap-brim felt hat.
    The overcoat had big pockets. They would take the potato—the potato had worked so well last time. He went to the closet, took a Kotex pad out of the box he’d bought three months before. Tape. Latex gloves under his leather driver’s gloves. A scarf would partially cover the bottom of his face, giving him more protection against recognition: this was new, after all, a collection in his own neighborhood. Had to be ready to abort, he thought. If anyone sees me outside her door, forget it.
    Knife? No. She’d have one.
    When he was ready, he went through the side door into the attached garage, got in the car, punched the button on the remote garage-door opener, backed into the street, closed the garage, drove two blocks, and parked the car. He reached into the back seat and got a brown business envelope, opened the flap, and looked inside. A half-dozen forms, procured from a bin on the first floor of the Government Center. Applications for employment.
    As he walked down to the door, the excitement became almost unbearable. I am coming, he prayed, I am coming for the Chosen; the One is coming. He felt the cold wind on his face and exulted in it, the smell of the Northwest, the expectant winter.
    He walked briskly to her house, a businessman on business, and without breaking step turned down her sidewalk. The door had four small panes set in the center, just at head height, partly covered by a small curtain. He looked into her kitchen. She was not in sight. The maddog rapped on the door.
    And waited. Rapped again. A noise? Then he saw her, rolling down the linoleum floor in her wheelchair. Not a wealthy woman, but such a face; such a fresh face, for one who had been so badly injured. An optimist.
    She half-opened the inner door, left the outer one closed.
    “Yes?”
    “Miss Wheatcroft? I am Louis Vullion, an attorney with Felsen-Gore. I’m on the Minnesota Bar Association scholarship committee.” He reached under his coat, took out a business card, opened the outer door, and handed it to her. She looked at it and said, curiously, “Yes?”
    He held up the brown envelope. “I was just talking to Dean Jensen at the law school. Actually, I was over there picking up applications for the Felsen Legal Residencies and Dean Jensen said you must have neglected to submit yours. Either that, or it was lost?” He waved the brown envelope at her, started to fumble out the white application forms.
    “I don’t know about that,” she said. “I never heard of them.”
    “Never heard of them?” The maddog was puzzled. How could she not have heard of them? “I’m sorry, I