Final Reckonings by Robert Bloch

things, and give the skull over to the authorities.
    Its evil career — real or imaginary — would come to an end. So be it.
    Maitland sank into slumber. Before he dozed off he tried to focus his attention on something . . . something puzzling ... an impression he'd received upon gazing at the body of the police dog in Marco's room. The way its fangs gleamed.
    Yes. That was it. There had been no blood on the muzzle of the police dog. Strange. For the police dog had bitten Marco's throat. No blood — how could that be?
    Well, that problem was best left for morning too. . . .
    It seemed to Maitland that as he slept, he dreamed. In his dream he opened his eyes and blinked in the bright moonlight. He stared at the table-top and saw that the skull was no longer resting on its surface.
    That was curious, too. No one had come into the room, or he would have been aroused.
    If he had not been sure that he was dreaming, Maitland would have started up in terror when he saw the stream of moonlight on the floor—the stream of moonlight through which the skull was rolling.
    It turned over and over again, its bony visage impassive as ever, and each revolution brought it closer to the bed.
    Maitland's sleeping ears could almost hear the thump as the skull landed on the bare floor at the foot of the bed. Then began the grotesque progress so typical of night fantasies. The skull climbed the side of the bed!
    Its teeth gripped the dangling corner of a bedsheet, and the death's-head literally whirled the sheet out and up, swinging it in an arc which landed the skull on the bed at Maitland's feet.
    The illusion was so vivid he could feel the thud of its impact against the mattress. Tactile sensation continued, and Maitland felt the skull rolling along up the covers. It came up to his waist, then approached his chest.
    Maitland saw the bony features in the moonlight, scarcely six inches away from his neck. He felt a cold weight resting on his throat. The skull was moving now.
    Then he realized the grip of utter nightmare and struggled to awake before the dream continued.
    A scream rose in his throat — but never issued from it. For Maitland's throat was seized by champing teeth — teeth that bit into his neck with all the power of a moving human jawbone.
    The skull tore at Maitland's jugular in cruel haste. There was a gasp, a gurgle and then no sound at all.
    After a time, the skull righted itself on Maitland's chest. Maitland's chest no longer heaved with breathing, and the skull rested there with a curious simulation of satisfied repose.
    The moonlight shone on the death's-head to reveal one very curious circumstance. It was a trivial thing, yet somehow fitting under the circumstances.
    Reposing on the chest of the man it had killed, the skull of the Marquis de Sade was no longer impassive. Instead, its bony features bore a definite, unmistakably sadistic grin.
     

The Bogeyman Will Get You
    T HE FIRST TIME Nancy met Philip Ames he didn't even notice her. Of course you really couldn't blame him. After all, she was only fifteen—just a kid. But that was last year, and this time it was different.
    Nancy's folks went back to Beaver Lake for the summer in June, and she could hardly wait to find out if Philip Ames still had his cottage down the road.
    Hedy Schuster said he was up, all right. She said Mr. Ames lived at the cottage all year. Everybody knows how cold it gets at the lake in winter — practically out of this world. But Hedy Schuster knew, because she talked to Mr. Prentiss down at the store and he said so. That Prentiss was like an old woman. He had his nose in everybody's business.
    The first chance she got, Nancy took a walk up the road past Philip Ames's cottage. The door was closed and there were curtains on the windows, so she didn't see anything. But then, Mr. Ames wasn't around much in the daytime. Practically a hermit. Hedy Schuster said it was because he was writing his Ph.D. thesis for the university. He only shined