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forgot her purpose, because she detoured into the bathroom.
           Vic removed the remaining shoe, then went into Melinda's bedroom to get the plaid lap rug that was always lying somewhere in the room. Now it was on the floor at the foot of the unmade bed. The lap rug had been one of Vic's presents to Melinda on her birthday about seven years ago. Seeing it reminded him of picnics, of a happy summer they had spent in Maine, of one winter evening when for some reason there had been no heat and they had lain under it on the floor in front of the fireplace. He stopped a moment, vaguely debating taking the green woolen blanket from her bed instead of the lap rug, then decided that was meaningless and he might as well take the lap rug. Melinda's room, as usual, was in a state of disorder that both repelled him and interested him, and he would have liked to stand there a few moments looking at it—he almost never went into Melinda's bedroom—but he did not permit himself even a complete glance around it. He went out and closed the door behind him. He heard the water running in the bathroom as he passed the door. He hoped she wasn't going to be sick.
           Ralph was sitting up now with unfocusing eyes, his body shaking as if he had a chill.
           "Would you care for some hot coffee?" Vic asked him.
           Ralph said nothing. Vic draped the lap rug around his shaking shoulders, and Ralph lay back feebly on the sofa and tried to drag his feet up. Vic lifted both his feet and tucked the blanket under them.
           "You're a good egg," Ralph mumbled.
           Vic smiled a little and sat down at the end of the sofa. He thought he heard Melinda being sick in the bathroom.
           "Shoulda thrown me out a long time ago," Ralph murmured. "Anybody who doesn't know how much he can take—" He moved his legs as if to get off the sofa, and Vic casually leaned on his ankles.
           "Think nothing of it," Vic said soothingly. "Ought to be sick—ought to die." There were tears in Ralph's blue eyes that made them look even glassier. His thin eyebrows trembled. He seemed to be in some self-flagellant trance in which he might really have enjoyed being hurled out of the house by the seat of his pants and his collar.
           Vic cleared his throat and smiled. "Oh, I don't bother throwing people out of the house if they annoy me." He leaned a little closer. "If they annoy me in that way—with Melinda—" he nodded meaningly toward the bathroom—"I kill them."
           "Yes," Ralph said seriously, as if he understood. "You should. Because I do want to keep you and Melinda as friends. I like you both. I mean it."
           "I do kill people if I don't like them," Vic said even more quietly, leaning toward Ralph and smiling.
           Ralph smiled, too, fatuously.
           "Like Malcolm McRae, for instance. I killed him." "Ma'colm?" Ralph asked puzzledly.
           Vic knew he knew all about Mal. "Yes. Melinda's told you about McRae. I killed him with a hammer in his apartment. You probably saw something in the papers last winter about it. He was getting too familiar with Melinda."
           Whether it was sinking very far in or not, Vic couldn't tell.
           Ralph's eyebrows drew slowly together. "I remember ... You killed him?"
           "Yes. He began flirting with Melinda. In public." Vic tossed Melinda's cigarette lighter up and caught it, two, three, and four times. It was sinking in. Ralph was up on one elbow.
           "Does Melinda know you killed him?"
           "No. Nobody knows," he whispered. "And don't tell Melinda, will you?"
           Ralph's frown deepened. It was a little too much for Ralph's brain to cope with, Vic thought, but Ralph had grasped the threat and the hostility. Ralph clenched his teeth and jerked his feet suddenly from under Vic's arm. He was leaving.
           Vic handed him his shoes without a word. "Like