The House at the End of the World


 
 
 
 ALSO BY DEAN KOONTZ
 
 The Big Dark Sky · Quicksilver · The Other Emily · Elsewhere · Devoted · Ashley Bell · The City · Innocence · 77 Shadow Street · What the Night Knows · Breathless · Relentless · Your Heart Belongs to Me · The Darkest Evening of the Year · The Good Guy · The Husband · Velocity · Life Expectancy · The Taking · The Face · By the Light of the Moon · One Door Away from Heaven · From the Corner of His Eye · False Memory · Seize the Night · Fear Nothing · Mr. Murder · Dragon Tears · Hideaway · Cold Fire · The Bad Place · Midnight · Lightning · Watchers · Strangers · Twilight Eyes · Darkfall · Phantoms · Whispers · The Mask · The Vision · The Face of Fear · Night Chills · Shattered · The Voice of the Night · The Servants of Twilight · The House of Thunder · The Key to Midnight · The Eyes of Darkness · Shadowfires · Winter Moon · The Door to December · Dark Rivers of the Heart · Icebound · Strange Highways · Intensity · Sole Survivor · Ticktock · The Funhouse · Demon Seed
 JANE HAWK SERIES
 The Silent Corner · The Whispering Room · The Crooked Staircase · The Forbidden Door · The Night Window
 ODD THOMAS SERIES
 Odd Thomas · Forever Odd · Brother Odd · Odd Hours · Odd Interlude · Odd Apocalypse · Deeply Odd · Saint Odd
 FRANKENSTEIN SERIES
 Prodigal Son · City of Night · Dead and Alive · Lost Souls · The Dead Town
 MEMOIR
 A Big Little Life: A Memoir of a Joyful Dog Named Trixie
 
 
 
 This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental. Text copyright © 2023 by The Koontz Living Trust All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher. Published by Thomas & Mercer, Seattle www.apub.com Amazon, the Amazon logo, and Thomas & Mercer are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc., or its affiliates. ISBN-13: 9781662500442 (hardcover) ISBN-10: 1662500440 (hardcover) ISBN-13: 9781662508073 (paperback) ISBN-10: 1662508077 (paperback) Cover design by Damon Freeman Interior illustrations by Edward Bettison First edition 
 To Gerda. To mark fifty-six years of marriage—the halfway point! 
 
 
 
 CONTENTS
 
 ONE ALONE
 THE LAST LIGHT OF THE DAY
 A LITTLE FORTRESS
 A WORK OF ART
 DEPTH CHARGES
 TURNING DOWN THE BED
 AN ARTIST IS A MATHEMATICIAN WHO KNOWS THE FORMULAS OF THE SOUL
 SHADES
 DINNER WITH DAPHNE
 SCANNERS
 THE MYSTIC
 A MESSAGE FROM THE DEAD
 JUST IN CASE
 3:26 A.M.
 AN INQUIRING MIND
 TWO VISITORS
 GUNNER LINDBLOM
 EVIDENCE
 BEFORE JACOB’S LADDER: THE THERAPIST
 FOXES
 THE GROTTO
 A SLIGHT INCONVENIENCE
 THE GULLS AND THE FOX
 BEFORE JACOB’S LADDER: THE ATTORNEY
 KEEPING WATCH
 THREE MEN
 THEIR NAMES
 THREE LOCKDOWN
 THE LONG WAY HOME
 A YOUNG MAN’S ACCOMPLISHMENTS
 FEVERISH CALCULATION
 ONE LESS OPTION
 A USELESS APPLE
 SHOW NO FEAR
 THE CRY
 LUPO AND HAMAL TOGETHER
 HAMPTON RICE
 WITHOUT TEA AND TABLE
 ALONG FOR THE RIDE
 MOTHER, ARE YOU THERE YET?
 FOUR STORM
 IN MEMORY OF THE DOG
 AN ERROR OF TIMING
 MEANWHILE, ON OAK HAVEN
 THE SOUND THAT IS NOT THUNDER
 GOODBYE TO ALL THAT
 WHISPERING
 TO GO DOWN IN HISTORY
 BELOW
 THE HARD WAY OUT
 HIS HANDS ARE INSTRUMENTS OF JUSTICE
 FIVE PURPOSE
 KITCHEN
 TO THE BOATHOUSE
 THE CALL
 CONTROL
 DOWN THE DRAIN
 RALEIGH CONSIDERS MOLOCH
 THE CROSSING
 THE WHY OF IT
 THE DEVIL OF THE STAIRS
 A KNOCK ON THE DOOR
 RALEIGH ANSWERS RALEIGH
 AN EXCHANGE IN THE HALLWAY
 SIX BRINK
 COFFEE
 SIX YEARS BEFORE THE CRISIS ON RINGROCK
 MOLOCH
 RALEIGH RECEIVES THE DEMAND
 WHAT WALKS THE NIGHT
 INTO THE OUTER DARK
 BEFORE JACOB’S LADDER: 
 
 
 ONE
 ALONE
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 THE LAST LIGHT OF THE DAY
 
 
 
 Katie lives alone on the island. She lives less for herself than for the dead.
 This is just another day in April, a Tuesday defined by isolation and hard-won serenity—until it isn’t.
 Built in the 1940s, her small house is a sturdy structure of stone. In addition to a bath, the residence has a kitchen, bedroom, living room, armory, and cellar.
 The house is on a knoll, surrounded on four sides by a yard, on three sides by woods beyond the yard. The front door faces a slope to a shingle shore, a dock, a boathouse, and open water.
 Her domain is a quiet refuge. She has not heard any human voice but her own in a few months, and she rarely speaks aloud.
 Lacking television, radio, or internet, she hoards seven CD players with six-disc magazines, which are no longer manufactured. For a few hours a day, she has music, always classical—Mozart, Beethoven, Brahms, Chopin, Haydn, Liszt.
 She has no interest in pop tunes or American standards. Regardless of how beautiful the voice, the lyrics too poignantly remind her of all that she has lost and all that she has forsaken.
 Having found peace in isolation, she won’t put it at risk.
 Set into the hillside, a flight of concrete stairs with a painted-iron railing leads