Sergio brought the knife down and effortlessly split Red’s shirt in half, from the back of the collar down to the small of his back. Red suddenly found his feet and herked and jerked his way up the stairs.

Sergio reached out and caught the back of Red’s khakis. The knife came down again, splitting the fabric covering Red’s bony ass. Red fell forward, grunting and spitting blood, and crawled out of his shredded pants.

The zookeeper said, “Take off your shoes.”

Giulio stepped closer to Frank, nodding at Frank’s clothes. Frank started to unbutton his shirt. He glanced up over Giulio’s broad shoulder into the pale yellow darkness. Snarls, screeches, and howls echoed off the cages, flatbeds, and carnival rides, but he didn’t hear what he wanted—metal on metal.

Up on the catwalk, the zookeeper said, “Take off them socks.”

“Oh God, please. Just listen to me a minute. Just for a—”

The zookeeper jerked out his cattle prod and cracked it across Red’s forehead. “I said, take off them fuckin’ socks.”

Sergio started up the stairs and Frank hoped the catwalk wouldn’t support their weight. The metal moaned a little, but held. Red curled into a ball, drawing his bony knees up to his pale, hairless chest and covering his head with his freckled arms.

“Jesus humpin’ Christ. You pussy.” The zookeeper thumbed the switch and the cattle prod crackled like bitter laughter. Without hesitation, he jabbed Red just under the armpit. Red flopped and wriggled for several seconds, making “Uhhhh-uhhhh-uhhhh” sounds. A dark stain spread across the front of his white underwear and urine ran across his hip, his thigh. Sergio, apparently familiar with the effects of the prod, held off on grabbing Red until the zookeeper withdrew it. He caught hold of Red’s calf and the six-inch blade snickered through Red’s green sock.

But Red wasn’t giving up easy. He kicked out with other leg and caught Sergio square in the balls. Sergio exhaled harshly, took half a step backward, then leaned back in and slammed the blade into Red’s thigh, driving it deep, all the way to the hilt.

Red’s scream even shocked the monkeys into silence.

Then Frank heard what he’d been waiting for—a distant, twanging, metallic snap. It didn’t look like the zookeeper had heard it. In front of Frank, Giulio allowed a flicker of impatience to flash across his emotionless features. He fixed his dead gaze on Frank and pulled out his own knife. Frank didn’t want to get stuck like Red, so he quickly yanked his shirt off, tearing the buttons over the plastic cuffs. He curled his big toe into the top of his one sock and dragged it off.

Up on the catwalk, Red wouldn’t stop his high-pitched screaming. Sergio plucked the knife out of Red’s thigh and grabbed hold of Red’s bleeding nose with his other hand, pinching the nostrils shut with his huge thumb and forefinger. He held Red’s head very still and wiped the blade clean in the red hair. He cut off the other sock with his newly cleaned blade and sliced Red’s underwear in half at the hip.

Giulio nodded at Frank’s boxers. Frank took a deep breath, slid his boxers down to his ankles, and kept watching the darkness under the cages.

Red managed one more “—please—” before the zookeeper and Sergio lifted his naked, bleeding body and dropped him into the tank with a dull splash.

Above and behind him, Frank heard quick, savage movement. A desperate, gurgled shriek. Brittle leather scraped over wet iron. Water, thick with algae, splashed over the rim, slid down the outside of the tank, and dripped onto the top of his head, trickling down the back of his neck. It felt warm, like a used bath.

The zookeeper and Sergio turned to stare down at Frank. He tried to breathe slow, easy, and found that he couldn’t even take a breath. His exposed balls felt cold and shriveled in the night air. He curled his toes, felt the sand and grit underneath. It was time to make his move. He’d stalled long enough. He had to try something, anything. Trouble was, nothing was coming to him. Nothing was left inside. Nothing except the urge to simply bolt, to spring naked between the cages, to flee shrieking into the night.

But the quiet gentlemen would catch him. And they’d make his death last for days. So he started up the stairs, legs feeling weak, like overcooked spaghetti, head down, hands cupped over his dick and balls. It was a funny time for modesty, but ingrained habits died hard. Giulio followed him up the stairs, snicking the knife away.

The surface of the water seethed and boiled as if it was alive. Frank caught a flash of white, a belly maybe. Whatever it was, it wasn’t Red. A flat, tapered tail slapped the surface with eagerness. Something dark rolled several times and disappeared in the roiling water. Bubbles, silver in the yellow light, popped and fizzed. The zookeeper bent over and banged the cattle prod several times against the side of the tank.

Shadows rose to the surface. They were large, maybe eight, ten feet long and nearly two feet across.

Frank finally realized that the tank was full of alligators.

Freezing terror scrabbled up his spine and sunk its fangs into the bottom of his brain. His knees quivered, threatened to collapse completely. He should have known. Should have known that the tank would be stuffed with some kind of goddamn squirming nightmare. He hated reptiles, alligators especially. Ever since he was a little kid in East Texas, playing on the sloping lawn that dropped abruptly into that black canal.

Frank didn’t trust anything that didn’t generate its own body heat.

A single word, “PLEASE” erupted in his throat like the silver bubbles in the tank and nearly popped in his mouth. But he choked it down. He’d be damned if he started begging now. For a moment, under the gassy, rotten smell of the water, he suddenly smelled his father, the sickly sweet smell of his shaving lotion.

“Go ahead. Shoot me. Get it over with,” he said.

The rubbery folds in the zookeeper’s face split into a smile. “Fine. Shoot him then.”

Sergio shook his head. “We can’t. Mr. Castellari gave specific instructions.”

“Just shoot me. C’mon, you spineless fucks. You fucking wop motherfucking cocksucking—Frank’s voice got high and tight, like an overstrung violin, and he screamed, “Shoot, you greasy motherfucking—”

But instead Sergio and Giulio curled their thick fingers around the muscles above Frank’s elbows, and the sudden sense of being powerless, of being forced, slithered into his mind and squatted above the gleaming fangs of terror, enveloping his consciousness in a white, blurry haze of shock.

And just as the two quiet gentlemen started to tilt Frank forward, forcing him to topple face first into the alligator tank, just as all the strength left his knees and he felt his own warm, humiliating piss run down the inside of his left leg, just as the zookeeper played his flashlight over the rolling black water, catching the awful black eyes of the alligators, the lion leapt.

* * * * *

Later, Frank could only guess that the lion had been driven into a frenzy by the smell of the blood and raw greyhound meat in the dust, maddeningly just out of reach, and had somehow forced its cage door open just enough to slip out. After gulping down the few pieces and licking up Red’s vomit, he must have followed the drops of nose blood and the pure, uncut scent of panic, obeying the oldest instinct of all, older than fear.

Hunger.

Frank sensed, rather than heard, the roar behind him, felt the impact of the lion hit the catwalk like a five hundred pound wrecking ball. The lion came down hard on Sergio, claws slicing through the tasteful suit like a plow breaking through the last frost of winter.

Frank grabbed Giulio’s left wrist with both hands as he fell forward and pulled the heavy, quiet gentleman down. They toppled into the tank together, Frank fumbling for the car keys in Giulio’s suit pocket. Frank’s bare feet hit the slimy bottom and he instantly kicked out, driving his heels into Giulio’s chest, pushing himself back towards the catwalk. He heard nothing but a rush of bubbles and the thin, staccato beat of his own heart.