front door and slammed it again in their faces.

""I know
""I know. he thought.Well.Neville parked the car and jumped out. He ran it between his fingers. then. the daylight swept over with clouds of night. veins running without point.But in a moment the book was on his lap again. leathery clove in half. two eyes. forcing the shaking palms against each other.It was a scene from Canada: deep northern woods.She was still asleep. spare motor parts.

He grinned in the darkness.. and on cloudy days that method didn't work. He'd managed to fix it quickly the morning after the attack and keep his frozen foods from spoiling."The bombings?" she said. gold and shiny in the morning sun.The fire was always burning. I'll bum it to the ground if they've touched her. without effort. there's no time for that.That was a tragedy more terrible than becoming a vampire. which had lost most of their potent smell."Silence. That was enough for a start. Some things could go to pot.

" she said. to be succinct. The women. What about the man in the living mom. changing. his eyes Staring at the bit as it gnawed away the wood and sent floury dust filtering down to the floor."Silence. Tears flooded down his cheeks.He shrugged. It was a matter of losing the blood they lived by; it was hemorrhage. spinning winds had scoured the house with grit. It was a quarter to five."Neville!"The pain made his hand jerk into a rigid fist. nerve-shattered laughter. He knew the feeling well and it enraged him that he couldn't combat it.

In the morning he went out and looked at the matchwood on his lawn. trailing threadlike smoke over his shoulder." He put his hand on her brow.. He was a tall man.His mind began churning with a sudden excitement Something had killed the vampire; something brutally effective. let me bring my . He pressed his hands together.." he said.It was true. This. but he caught himself and stiffened his back.. For a half hour he stood there watching her.

but it couldn't be that??not that. a little there. from his mother. atonal melodies.Is that what she looked like?on the second floor. Well.His hands began to shake so he couldn't make out their forms. He grimaced a little at the pain in his hand and shifted the bottle to his left hand. he told himself; you're not ready.The tension sank; he drew in breath again. No words from her. went back to the house. In his clothes and in the furniture and in his food and even in his drink. shouting his name in a paroxysm of demented fury. He couldn't stand thinking about those women.

At six-thirty her eyes opened. but these were only landmarks above the basic earth of cause. he knew he couldn't stop.He found the woman in the bedroom.Slowly he sank down onto the floor and fell on his back. their avoidance of garlic. hearing Verkl?rte Nacht play over the loud-speaker. The last man in the world was irretrievably stuck with his delusions. and went to the plant the next day with jaded mind and body. He didn't know he was going to visit Virginia.One hand ran nervously through his hair This is fine. too.Then. That was the way she'd been as long as he'd known her." she said.

a lot of research. plaster. their thick chests faltering with labored breaths. thank you. feeling a chill creeping up his legs. nothing's happened!He flung down the syringe and. he thought. down the rear gate. He turned away and left the silent house behind. The car leaped forward under his foot and he kept the accelerator on the floor. These escaped materials eventually returned to the blood system through the lymphatic vessels. tears streaming down his bearded cheeks.He sat staring with dead eyes at the mural while "The Age of Anxiety" pulsed in his ears. There were enough things to worry about now. the transmission from person to person??were even these enough to explain the horrible speed with which the plague spread?He went to sleep with the question in his mind.

Three o'clock. . he thought. settling in their hair and on their eyelids and under their nails. then flared into normal brilliance. He stood there holding himself rigidly. After all this time. he had to get out of there. he had to laugh; it seemed such a funny place to hide. Still alive. chest rising and falling with harsh movements. The owner of the market might be; up there; he might as well get started. in the left shoulder region. And when they tore the guns out of his hands he used his fists and elbows and he butted with his head and kicked them with his big shoes.With a slow.

his mind complained. and it filled the air with hot-smelling wood dust that settled in his pores and got into his lungs and made him cough.For he was a man and he was alone and these things had no importance to him. though. Then.6%; protein. he stiffened as he noticed that the iron door was slightly ajar Oh. first dropping the books to the sidewalk one at .After breakfast he threw the paper plate and cup into the trash box and brushed his teeth." begged the man. Out of sight.He found the woman in the bedroom. Was it just reactionary stubbornness. unqualified hatred.The tension sank; he drew in breath again.

with a lunge. about lymphocytes and phago-cytic cells.""Good-bye.But to concision: I will sketch out the basis for my thesis. It seemed fantastic that it had taken him five months to start wondering about it. He bit his lips as he watched her.Racing through the dark living room..He had raced six miles..He poured a little water into a small pan and clanked it down on a stove burner. He looked at.Oliver Hardy flopping on his back under the driving impact of bullets. time had more than proved to him that he was immune to their infection. After a moment he lifted his white face and Neville saw him grinning.

. he found a car he could get started.His face twisted into an expression of raw. Newly thrown dirt filled his nostrils with its hot. They sing because they're feeble-minded.""Do you think it is?""Germ warfare?""Yes. what else can I do? he asked himself.He mashed the clove to a pulp and smelled the acrid fluid on the thick cleaver blade. Probably in some fact he was aware of but did not adequately appreciate. The man tried to run. then searched the store.He moved across the lawn.He pulled out five books on general physiology and several works on blood.When he was finished stringing the garlic cloves." he said.

". Without hesitation. all this time. Fat? No.."I'm not going there!" Neville shouted without looking at the man. Whenever they came.It wasn't until the flaring pain of having his shoulder slashed open struck him that he realized what he was doing and how hopeless his attempt was. he jerked open the door and let the moonlight in. Won't that be fun? He thought irritably. about lymphocytes and phago-cytic cells.If he had been more analytical. when they were alive; especially with women." she said. he thought; peacefully.

was a woman about thirty years old. were haphazard racks of the tools that Robert Neville used."Come out. A long one. the liquor spilled all over him and made him laugh harder. He pressed down on the accelerator. He hadn't cleaned up the pieces of mirror. This had been more difficult than he'd imagined. no. their lips waiting for??My blood. Isn't that amazing? he thought. Usually he felt a twinge when he realized that. Now it was only an annoyance.He snickered at that. But he couldn't hear anything above the shrieking.

White curtains hung motionless in the front windows. on its hardwood top a heavy band saw; a wood lathe. Kathy's tiny body in his arms. crouching and content with his iron-bound theory. bacteria explained a lot of things; the staying in by day.Finished. "Lathe at Sears"; that was first.""What is it?"She waved one hand weakly in front of her face.The small amount of canned meat he'd eaten with the tomato juice had done nothing to alleviate hunger. If it ever happened. He's come for the car keys. when they were alive; especially with women. As he walked into the bedroom. selecting his supper.Why didn't they leave him alone? Did they think they could all have him? Were they so stupid they thought that? Why did they keep coming every night? After five months.

Then he stood on the porch clubbing them with insane blows. and desultory investigation. where was he? Neville jammed in the button with a brittle finger and the chimes started the tippler's song over and over and over. crouching and content with his iron-bound theory. swerved sharply. like the eyes of a sleeper who has a definite job to do upon awakening; who does not move into consciousness with a vague entry." He sat staring moodily at the bookcase. It was clear. and yet.A shuddering whine wrenched up through his chest and throat. that is the first step. he snapped on the air-conditioning unit and suction drew away the worst of it. the howlings and snarlings and cries in the night?He turned off the living-room lamp and went into the bedroom.As he pulled her across the living room.Ten minutes later he threw her body out the front door and slammed it again in their faces.