"Yes you are! And I know what you want! That wh.o.r.e hired you!"

"Which wh.o.r.e? I know a lot of wh.o.r.es."

He poked me in the chest with the hammer. "She hired you to spy on me! To find out what secrets I had hidden in my parent"s house! Well, now you"ll be privy to those secrets, Mr. Private Eye! Because I"m going to show them to you!"

I checked my bonds, noted he had used the same clothesline he"d purchased at the hardware store. The knots were tight, expert. My legs were bound as well, tied to the steel chair legs of the steel chair, which was made of steel. The bas.e.m.e.nt was unfurnished, concrete floor, I-beams and joists exposed in the ceiling, menacing curtains sectioning off the area we were in.

"Got any aspirin?" I asked. "Some a.s.shole hit me with a hammer."

"Silence!"

"And can you please stop shouting? I"m right here. It"s not like I"m in another part of the house and you"re calling me for dinner."

The freak chuckled, the nostrils on his large nose flaring out.

"Oh, funny you should mention dinner. Because the main course..." He cackled.

"Yeah?" I asked.

"The main course..." More cackling.

"What"s the main course, Emeril?"

"The... main course... is..." Hysterical laughter now.

I interrupted him. "I got it. The main course is me. You"re going to eat me. Scary. What a scary guy you are."

"Not me, Mr. McGlade. You"re going to be a snack," cackle cackle, "for my... zombie wife!"

I waited for the giggles to die down before I said, "Dude, your wife isn"t a zombie."

"Yes she is."

"She"s not even dead. I just saw her like an hour ago."

"Not that hag. I mean my first wife. The love of my life, tragically taken from me after only one year of marriage."

"So what about that ugly chick back at your house?"

"Her? I married her for the money."

I smiled. "Thank G.o.d. I thought you were totally nuts there for a minute."

"No kidding. She"s a real heifer, isn"t she?"

"I said in the first chapter that it was like G.o.d took a dare to make the most unattractive woman possible."

"Yes, that"s Norma."

"Who?"

"My second wife! But now it"s time for you to meet my first wife! And to feed her! Do you know what a necromancer is, Mr. McGlade?"

I shrugged. Not an easy task when tied up. "I meant to look it up."

"It"s someone who has the power to raise the dead. Since Roberta died..."

"Who?"

"My first wife."

"This is a lot of names to keep straight. Can you write them down on a sticky pad for me?"

He didn"t take the bait. I"d hoped he would have gone off in search of a sticky pad, which would have given my time to scoot my chair over to the menacing curtains hanging from the ceiling and hide behind them. He"d never think to look for me there, and would probably go watch TV or something.

But he was too smart to be tricked.

"Since Roberta died, I"ve been searching for a way to bring her back. Now, through a combination of magic and science-something I call sci-magic-I have finally gained mastery over death! Behold, Mr. McGlade, the living dead!"

He cast aside the menacing curtain. Hanging from the ceiling was a dead body.

"Is that her?" I asked.

"That, indeed, is Roberta, my Zombie Wife!"

He spread out his hands, as if waiting for applause. Even if I wasn"t tied up, I wouldn"t have applauded.

"That"s not a zombie," I said. "That"s a dead chick hanging on a rope."

"Really, Mr. McGlade? Really?"

"Yeah. Really."

"Well, watch this then." He turned to face the corpse. "Roberta, my love, come to me!"

Phil grabbed an overhead rope, and Roberta swung forward using a system of weights and pulleys. He made her wave at me.

"You"re b.u.t.t nuts," I said.

"She lives, Mr. McGlade! And she thirsts for your flesh! For nothing else can quell the hunger of the living dead! Isn"t that right, Roberta?"

He tugged another rope, and she nodded. Actually, it was more of a sideways flop then a nod.

"Look, buddy, this has all been tremendously entertaining, but what do you say we untie me, I go to the cops, and you get put in a nice room with soft rubber walls so you don"t hurt yourself?"

"I"m not crazy! Roberta is one of the walking dead!"

"More like the swaying dead."

He got in my face. "Admit she"s undead!"

"No."

"But she moves! See!"

He made her do a little dance.

"You"re making her move using pulleys and ropes, like some strange sad puppet."

He raised the hammer, aiming for the same spot where he hit me before. "Say she"s a zombie!"

"She a zombie," I said quickly. "You"re a genius who has conquered death. I"m in awe of your brilliance."

He stared at me hard, and then spun and yanked the dead chick closer. I realized she was naked, and her b.o.o.bs were missing. I always notice little things like that. Her skin had become dark brown and wrinkly, like a giant raisin. Whack job had also cut some blue eyes from a magazine or poster, and stapled them over her eye sockets. Her teeth were bared, the corners of her mouth turned up. Twist ties, to make it look like she was smiling.

It was kind of endearing, in a raving psychotic way.

"Roberta does seem sort of tired today." He caressed what was left of her cheek. "Perhaps she needs another treatment. I shall fetch the Rejuvenation Ray!"

He scuttled insanely off, and I wondered what time it was, and if his b.u.t.t ugly wh.o.r.e of a second wife had remembered to call Lieutenant Jackie when I failed to check in. Then I remembered I"d given her a bottle full of p.i.s.s and told her it was apple juice, so I probably couldn"t count on that particular horse to come in.

Like it had happened so many times before, the burden of saving my own skin rested on my own skin. I needed to figure out some sort of ingenious plan to escape. If I could only do that, then I"d be free.

Freak boy returned, pushing a wheeled wine cart stacked with electronic equipment. He shoved it in front of his living undead zombie wife who was really just a putrefying corpse.

"Behold the Rejuvenation Ray, Mr. McGlade!"

"How do you know my name, anyway?"

"Your wallet."

"I had eight bucks in there. It better still be in there."

"I didn"t take your money."

"And a Blockbuster Video card. They charge you five bucks if you lose that."

"Silence! Through magnetron technology, I have harnessed the life-giving properties of ordinary microwaves, coaxing the spirit back into the body!"

"That"s a big microwave?"

"Behold!"

He hit a switch, and the stack of electronics hummed and whirred, throwing off an huge amount of heat. Most of it was directed at Roberta, the undead living zombie wife. Some of it came my way, and it hurt like a bad sunburn.

Then the smell hit me. Honey baked ham and bacon strips. I watched through squinty eyes as Roberta sizzled and popped and exuded a scent that was downright mouth-watering.

Now it all made sense. Phil"s sunburn. Why he smelled like ham. Why his first wife"s skin was so brown and wrinkly. Why his second wife smelled like sweaty feet.

Actually, this didn"t explain why his second wife smelled like sweaty feet. But I guessed that to be a hygiene thing.

Blofeld finally turned off the microwave stack, then embraced his hanging wife. The embrace became a kiss. The kiss became a nibble. The nibble became a corn-on-the-cob chow-down, and I realized what had happened to the zombie"s b.r.e.a.s.t.s.

"And now!" He wiped the grease off his mouth with his sleeve. "Now it is time for Roberta to feast!"

Fred reached under the cart, pulled out a meat cleaver. Didn"t see too many meat cleavers, outside of a butcher shop.

"What shall we start with, Roberta? The leg? Yes, I agree. The leg looks delicious. Do you prefer the left on or the right one, dear? Yes, the left one."

He raised the cleaver. There are few things more terrifying than being tied to a chair about to be hacked up by a lunatic so he could feed the pieces to his dead wife who he thinks is actually a zombie and is hanging from the ceiling using an admittedly clever series of weights and pulleys.

"Stop!" I yelled.

Incredibly, he stopped.

"What?"

"Your parents!" I said, speaking quickly. "What would your parents think?"

"Why don"t we... ask them!"

He stepped over to the menacing curtain, and with a flourish drew it back. Mom and Dad were hanging there, roped together so it looked like Dad was giving it to Mom, doggy-style.

"Oops!" Fred said, tugging on ropes and making his parents b.u.mp uglies. "Daddy! Why are you hurting Mommy?"

He pulled the cord again and again, Dad"s hips rising and falling. A shrink would have a field day with this guy. Field days were fun. I liked dodge ball best.

"Say that again, Daddy? You"re wrestling? What wrestling move is that?"

It looked, to my untrained eye, like a sodomyplex. I tore my eyes away and pointed at something with my chin. "What"s that hanging next to them?"

"Fluffy. My cat."

"And those tiny things?"

"My goldfish, BA and Hannibal. Fluffy loves to chase them around. Don"t you, Fluffy?"

More manic pulling of ropes, and the three dead animals knocked into each other. While he was preoccupied, I called out in my best falsetto, "Honey, it"s Roberta!"

John turned his attention back to Roberta the zombie living bacon wife.

"Dearest? Did you say something?"

"I said," I said, "We should let Mr. McGlade go. I"m not hungry right now."

Nut job was buying it. He wrapped his arms around her, nuzzling against her tasty ribs.

"But you need to eat, honey. You"re getting thinner and thinner."