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On, Off
Colleen McCullough
For Helen Sanders Brittain With fond memories of the old days, and much love.
Table of Contents
PART ONE October & November, 1965
PART THREE January & February, 1966
PART FOUR February & March, 1966
PART FIVE Spring & Summer, 1966
JIMMY WOKE UP GRADUALLY, conscious at first of only one thing: the perishing cold. His teeth were chattering, his flesh ached, his fingers and toes were numb. And why couldn’t he see? Why couldn’t he see? All around him was pitch darkness, a blackness so dense he had never known anything like it. As he grew wider awake he realized too that he was imprisoned in something close, smelly, alien. Wrapped up! Panic set in and he began to scream, to claw frantically at whatever was confining him. It ripped and tore, but when the stygian coldness persisted after he managed to free himself, his terror drove him mad. There were other things all around him, the same smelly kind of restraints, but no matter how he shrieked, ripped, tore, he couldn’t find a way out, couldn’t see a particle of light or feel a puff of warmth. So he shrieked, ripped, tore, his heart roaring in his ears and the only noises his own.
Otis Green and Cecil Potter came into work together, having hooked up on Eleventh Street with a broad grin for each other. Dead on 7
