Read Online A Pleasure to Burn by Ray Bradbury - Free Book Online

steps also and stood, looking at the sky. He looked as if he was going to speak at any moment. He fumbled in his pockets, took out a packet of cigarettes.
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    T HEY STOOD OUTSIDE THE MORGUE TOGETHER, THE TALL pink, white-haired man, and Lantry, hands in their pockets. It was a cool night with a white shell of a moon that washed a house here, a road there, and further on, parts of a river.
    â€œCigarette?” The man offered Lantry one.
    â€œThanks.”
    They lit up together. The man glanced at Lantry’s mouth. “Cool night.”
    â€œCool.”
    They shifted their feet. “Terrible accident.”
    â€œTerrible.”
    â€œSo many dead.”
    â€œSo many.”
    Lantry felt himself some sort of delicate weight upon a scale. The other man did not seem to be looking at him, but rather listening and feeling toward him. There was a feathery balance here that made for vast discomfort. He wanted to move away and get out from under this balancing, weighing. The tall white-haired man said, “My name’s McClure.”
    â€œDid you have any friends inside?” asked Lantry.
    â€œNo. A casual acquaintance. Awful accident.”
    â€œAwful.”
    They balanced each other. A beetle hissed by on the road with its seventeen tires whirling quietly. The moon showed a little town further over in the black hills.
    â€œI say,” said the man McClure.
    â€œYes.”
    â€œCould you answer me a question?”
    â€œBe glad to.” He loosened the knife in his coat pocket, ready.
    â€œIs your name Lantry?” asked the man at last.
    â€œYes.”
    â€œ William Lantry?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œThen you’re the man who came out of the Salem graveyard day before yesterday, aren’t you?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œGood Lord, I’m glad to meet you, Lantry! We’ve been trying to find you for the past twenty-four hours!”
    The man seized his hand, pumped it, slapped him on the back.
    â€œWhat, what?” said Lantry.
    â€œGood Lord, man, why did you run off? Do you realize what an instance this is? We want to talk to you!”
    McClure was smiling, glowing. Another handshake, another slap. “I thought it was you!”
    The man is mad, thought Lantry. Absolutely mad. Here I’ve toppled his Incinerators, killed people, and he’s shaking my hand. Mad, mad!
    â€œWill you come along to the Hall?” said the man, taking his elbow.
    â€œWh-what hall?” Lantry stepped back.
    â€œThe Science Hall, of course. It isn’t every year we get a real case of suspended animation. In small animals, yes, but in a man, hardly! Will you come?”
    â€œWhat’s the act?” demanded Lantry, glaring. “What’s all this talk?”
    â€œMy dear fellow, what do you mean?” The man was stunned.
    â€œNever mind. Is that the only reason you want to see me?”
    â€œWhat other reason would there be, Mr. Lantry? You don’t know how glad I am to see you!” He almost did a little dance. “I suspected. When we were in there together. You being so pale and all. And then the way you smoked your cigarette, something about it, and a lot of other things, all subliminal. But it is you, isn’t it, it is you!
    â€œIt is I. William Lantry.” Dryly.
    â€œGood fellow! Come along!”
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    T HE BEETLE MOVED SWIFTLY through the dawn streets. McClure talked rapidly.
    Lantry sat, listening, astounded. Here was this fool, McClure, playing his cards for him! Here was this stupid scientist, or whatever, accepting him not as a suspicious baggage, a murderous item. Oh no! Quite the contrary! Only as a suspended animation case was he considered! Not as a dangerous man at all. Far from it!
    â€œOf course,” cried McClure, grinning. “You didn’t know where to go, whom to turn to. It was all quite incredible to you.”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œI had a feeling you’d be there at the morgue