In the damp room, Frank stared through the hole he had made in the blind. The 
visitor-whose face he vaguely recognized-was staring up at the house, at his very window, 
indeed. Confident that she could see nothing of him, he stared back. He had certainly set 
his eyes on more voluptuous creatures, but something about her lack of glamour engaged 
him. Such women were in his experience often more entertaining company than beauties like 
Julia. They could be flattered or bullied into acts the beauties would never countenance 
and be grateful for the attention. Perhaps she would come back, this woman. He hoped she 
would.
    Kirsty scanned the facade of the house, but it was blank; the windows were either 
empty or curtained. Yet the feeling of being watched persisted; indeed it was so strong 
she turned away in embarrassment.
    The rain started again as she walked along Lodovico Street, and she welcomed it. It 
cooled her blushes, and gave cover to tears that would be postponed no longer.
    
    3
    Julia had gone back upstairs trembling, and found White Tie at the door. Or rather, 
his head. This time, either out of an excess of greed or malice, Frank had dismembered 
the corpse. Pieces of bones and dried meat lay scattered about the room.
    There was no sign of the gourmet himself.
    She turned back toward the door, and he was there, blocking her path. Mere minutes 
had passed since she'd seen him bending to drain energy from the dead man. In that brief 
time he had changed out of all recognition. Where there had been withered cartilage, 
there was not ripening muscle; the map of his arteries and veins was being drawn anew: 
they pulsed with stolen life. There was even a sprouting of hair, somewhat premature 
perhaps given his absence of skin, on the raw ball of his head.
    None of this sweetened his appearance a jot. Indeed in many ways it worsened it. 
Previously there had been scarcely anything recognizable about him, but now there were 
scraps of humanity everywhere, throwing into yet greater relief the catastrophic nature 
of his wounding.
    There was worse to come. He spoke, and when he spoke it was with a voice that was 
indisputably Frank's. The broken syllables had gone.
    "I feel pain," he said.
    His browless, half-lidded eyes were watching her every response. She tried to conceal 
the queasiness she felt, but knew the disguise inadequate.
    "My nerves are working again," he was telling her, "and they hurt."
    "What can I do about it?" she asked him.
    "Maybe...maybe some bandages."
    "Bandages?"
    "Help me bind myself together."
    "If that's what you want."
    "But I need more than that, Julia. I need another body."
    "Another?" she said. Was there no end to this?
    "What's to lose?" he replied, moving closer to her. At his sudden proximity she 
became very anxious. Reading the fear in her face, he stopped his advance.
    "I'll be whole soon..." he promised her, "and when I am..."
    "I'd better clear up," she said, averting her gaze from him.
    "When I am, sweet Julia..."
    "Rory will be home soon."
    "Rory!" He spat the name out. "My darling brother! How in God's name did you come to 
marry such a dullard?"
    She felt a spasm of anger toward Frank. "I loved him," she said. And then, after a 
moment's pondering, corrected herself. "I thought I loved him."
    His laugh only made his dreadful nakedness more apparent. "How can you have believed 
that?" he said. "He's a slug. Always was. Always will be. Never had any sense of 
adventure."
    "Unlike you."
    "Unlike me."
    She looked down at the floor; a dead man's hand lay between them. For an instant she 
was almost overwhelmed by self-revulsion. All that she had done, and dreamed of doing, in 
the last few days rose up in front of her: a parade of seductions that had ended in 
death-all for this death that she had hoped so fervently would end in seduction. She was 
as damned as he, she thought; no fouler ambition could nest in his head than presently 
cooed and fluttered in hers.
    Well...it was done.
    "Heal me," he whispered to her. The harshness had gone from his voice. He spoke like 
a lover. "Heal me...please."
    "I will," she said. "I promise you I will."
    "And then we'll be together."
    She frowned.
    "What about Rory?"
    "We're brothers, under the skin," Frank said. "I'll make him see the wisdom of this, 
the miracle of it. You don't belong to him Julia. Not anymore."
    "No," she said. It was true.
    "We belong to each other. That's what you want isn't it?"
    "It's what I want."
    "You know I think if I'd had you I wouldn't have despaired," he said to her. 
"Wouldn't have given away my body and soul so cheaply."
    "Cheaply?"
    "For pleasure. For mere sensuality. In you..." here he moved toward her again. This 
time his words held her; she didn't retreat. "In you I might have discovered some reason 
to live."
    "I'm here," she said. Without thinking, she reached across and touched him. The body 
was hot, and damp. His pulse seemed to be everywhere. In every tender bud of nerve, in 
each burgeoning sinew. The contact excited her. It was as if, until this moment, she had 
never quite believed him to be real. Now it was incontestable. She had made this man, or 
remade him, used her wit and her cunning to give him substance. The thrill she felt, 
touching this too vulnerable body, was the thrill of ownership.
    "This is the most dangerous time," he told her. "Before now, I could hide myself. I 
was practically nothing at all. But not anymore.
    "No. I've thought of that."
    "We must be done with it quickly. I must be strong and whole, at whatever cost. You 
agree?"
    "Of course."
    "After that there'll be an end to the waiting, Julia."
    The pulse in him seemed to quicken at the thought.
    Then he was kneeling in front of her. His unfinished hands were at her hips, then his 
mouth.
    Forsaking the dregs of her distaste, she put her hand upon his head, and felt the 
hair-silken, like a baby's-and the shell of his skull beneath. He had learned nothing of 
delicacy since last he'd held her. But despair had taught her the fine art of squeezing