Read Online Twinkle, Twinkle, "Killer" Kane by William Peter Blatty - Free Book Online Page A

things like feet! Give us padding things like feet! They’re a disgrace! An anomaly! A disaster area, Hud! If God exists, he is a fink!”
    “A fink.”
    “Or a foot. Yes, a foot. An omniscient, omnipotent Foot! Do you think that is blasphemous?”
    “Yes,” said Kane, “I do.”
    “I believe I capitalized the ‘F.’”
    “I believe you’re referring to the problem of evil.”
    “I am referring to the problem of feet! Christ, don’t complicate the argument; it’s tawdry enough already!”
    “Let’s go back to animal suffering.”
    “No, let’s not,” said the astronaut, making a clearly abortive effort to wrap a leg around his neck.
    “But isn’t it all the same thing? What you’re saying about feet? Namely, how can there be evil coexistent with a good God?”
    “Hud, kindly stick to feet.”
    “You think they are ugly.”
    “I know they are ugly.”
    “But without them how could you walk?”
    “Good Foot, you are dumb! Give me wings so I can fly! ”
    “Ahh,” breathed Kane, leaning back in his chair. “So we’ve come to the heart of the matter. At last we’ve come to flying.”
    Cutshaw leaped up out of the sofa and Grouchoed to the door. “Want my opinion, Colonel Caribou? You are a quack nonpareil!” He opened the door, swooped outside and disappeared from Kane’s sight.
    Kane clasped his hands under his chin and began to ponder. Fell looked in. “How’s it coming?” asked the medic.
    “Is Cutshaw Catholic?”
    “I’m not sure. I think he was. Yeah, maybe he was.”
    “That seems to figure,” murmured Kane.
    “Why do you ask?” inquired Fell.
    “It seems to be very much on his mind. Perhaps it’s related to his problem.”
    “The latest con,” mumbled Fell.
    “What?”
    “Nothing. See you around the campus.” Fell quietly closed the door.
    Kane returned to his study of the men’s dossiers. When that was completed, he went to the bookshelf, plucked out the elementary psychology text that Fell had noticed earlier. Kane opened it to the bookmark and immediately was immersed in very deep study. Now and again he would underline. At times he would flap open a dictionary and look up a word.
    *   *   *
    The inmates’ dormitory was neatly lined with footlockers, cots and washbasins. In a corner of the massive room a fireplace blazed with flame, logs crackling merrily. The inmates were gathered around Cutshaw.
    “What’s the plan?” asked the one named Zook. He was a wiry and dark-complexioned man, and had eyes that probed like death rays, deep-set and close together.
    “We’ll start with ‘D,’” responded Cutshaw. “‘Acts of insolence much too insolent to be recognized as insolence.’ Then from there we go to letters and from—”
    “Wait a minute, wait a minute,” Corfu interrupted. “Why are we trying to get rid of him? The man seems very gentle; not at all like Colonel Ryan.”
    Cutshaw pinned him with scorn. “He is also a psychologist—a very top psychologist. He knows too much, you horse’s nose!”
    “I like him,” said Corfu.
    Cutshaw eyed him for a moment, and his expression, it seemed to Corfu, spoke of a tugging inner conflict. Then Cutshaw turned to Zook. “Are you ready, my little star?”
    “No,” said Lieutenant Dorian Zook. “What’s my motivation?”
    “Fear,” said Cutshaw, “fear. Stark, staring fright. This boy Kane is Foxy Grandma, Zook, the type that’s really dangerous. Plays it dumb right up to his teeth. So keep your guard up every second!”
    That evening Kane met Zook. His eyes red from study, the new commanding officer was ascending to his quarters when the former pilot approached him.
    “You!” rasped Zook.
    Kane halted, blinked his eyes. “What do you want?” he asked wearily.
    “Wrong!” stabbed Zook.
    “I’ll ask you again—what do you want?”
    Zook bowed his head, mopped his brow with a sleeve and muttered, “Boy, oh, boy— another one!”
    Kane looked down at his shoes. “I’m your new