At the thought of Kate, he trembled with emotion. Passion and fury merged into a searing sensation which shook his frame and thundered in his head. The power of it made him wince. His future, he thought, was like that bleak October sky out there—a grey void, an empty nothingness.
A new thought struck him and caused him to move. He walked purposefully, but with an easy relaxed motion and he found himself almost smiling. At the door of his studio, he hesitated for a moment before entering. This had been his domain. It was here that he had achieved some kind of fulfilment. Had. Past tense. He felt no joy in this room now; now it seemed like some ghastly hall of mirrors. Distorted reflections of life as he once had observed it stared back at him in mute enmity.
He fingered some of the canvases with mistrust. Their surfaces were cool to the touch. Stretching his damaged hand onto the face of one painting, he forced the gnarled fingers apart until they splayed wide. He flinched with the pain of it, but he did not relax his muscles. Now with his hand flat on the canvas, he slowly curled his fingers until the nails found purchase on the paint-roughened surface and then calmly, deliberately he pressed hard until one by one, his nails punctured the surface of the painting.
He gave a grunt of satisfaction.
Then with a sharp pull and tug of his hand, he viciously snatched away a portion of the canvas in his grasp, leaving a jagged aperture at the heart of the picture. As he stood back, his hand throbbing with the strain, he smiled in grim satisfaction at the damage he had caused. It was, for him, a supreme moment of creation.
***
Rob approached the cottage as dusk was seeping into the sky. There were lights on in nearly all the rooms. Michael's Kawasaki was abandoned in the drive, tilted at a drunken angle, but there were no other vehicles there.
All seemed strangely still.
What was he doing here? Rob asked himself. Why was he getting mixed up in other people's lives, other people's problems? Why should he care a toss about Michael? Damn the man, he had nearly strangled me a few hours ago. Rob knew that he couldn't answer these questions logically. Logic and emotions (not to mention drink) are strange bedfellows. It was a strong irrational compulsion that had driven him to seek Michael out. He felt it in his bones that the stupid bastard was about to do something drastic; the clown needed saving from himself.
Rob Moore to the rescue!
The house seemed empty.
He moved from the hall into the kitchen and then into the living room. He hesitated a moment before calling out Michael's name. As he did so, it reverberated in the silence, losing itself somewhere in the recesses of the cottage.
There was no response.
The Studio.
Of course, Rob mused, that's where the bastard will be skulking.
When he reached the landing, he found the door to the studio half open. Entering, Rob gasped at the scene of mutilation that greeted his eyes. Canvasses shredded, torn and slashed lay strewn around the room. Portraits and seascapes now mangled and maimed formed small twisted heaps littering the floor.
Few paintings had escaped the carnage. One that had was propped on the easel, remarkably still upright, standing alone amongst the debris and aloof directly under the skylight. It was a portrait. His portrait. The face of Michael peered out on the scene of destruction with cool disdain. As Rob caught the eyes, he sensed they were focussed on him, accusingly. Their icy stare held him, driving a hole into his mind. Fierce bursts of pain exploded in his head and his limbs stiffened with an irrational fear. He felt revulsion for that painted face that glared at him from the lifeless canvas. He had to get away from those eyes which, like dark pokers, were singeing their way through his flesh. He turned sharply to move away, but his feet were slow to respond and he staggered backwards as they became tangled with a large broken frame. In panic, he lost his balance and fell, cracking his elbow on the floor. He cried out and clamped his eyes shut as fierce pain shot up his arm.
When he opened his eyes again, they were misted with tears caused by the sudden hurt. He wiped them away with his sleeve and as his vision cleared, he looked up to see the portrait of Michael louring over him. His moan of pain gave way to a dry gagging croak of terror as he saw the expression on the painted face of Michael Barlow change. The features subtly shifted in the grey light, eyes twinkling with malicious glee while the mouth formed a tight smile.
Rob fled the room.
Flinging open the landing window, he leaned out and took in large gulps of cold, fresh air. Somewhere out in the growing night, he heard lull of waves beating against the rocks. It was a soothing, restful sound. Slowly he felt a sense of reality return and with it the increased throbbing ache in his arm.
Closing the window, he gave a sardonic grin. His imagination had been working overtime, he reasoned. However, as he cast a furtive glance back towards the studio, he was sure that he did not want to go back in there, imagination or not. What he needed was the bathroom and then he would get the hell out of that damned house. Sod Michael! Sod him to death!
But what Rob Moore did see when he went into the bathroom had nothing to do with his imagination. It was real—horribly real. Michael lay in the bath, his head resting between the taps as though it were jammed there. His eyes were closed but his mouth gaped as though emitting a silent snore. The bath was empty except for two dark pools of blood forming around his limp wrists, each of which was ruptured with a jagged gash, still dripping with the red syrup of life.
A blood-spattered kitchen knife lay in his lap.
On meeting this sight, Rob Moore froze with mind-numbing shock. He just stared in silent horror while the grisly scene carefully and vividly etched itself on his mind for ever.
And then...
And then, like a nightmare, Michael's eyes opened, and his mouth relaxed.
‘Hello, Rob,’ said the voice from the edge of the grave.
***
Sebastian Riley was losing again. He didn't mind. He just enjoyed the fun of the game. And fun was low on the agenda at St Austell's. As it was in any prison camp, he supposed. Saturday tea-time gave him his best moments of the week. It was the free recreational period with no brutes of masters hanging around, eager to impose extra work on their ill-used charges.
As Sebastian counted out the numbers, he could see Park Lane looming up. Oh, well, he thought, if I'm going to be wiped out what better address than this.
‘Mine.’ cried Timothy Barlow with avaricious glee. ‘That's mine. Oh Sebby, you've had it now. He consulted his property card. ‘Park Lane with a hotel—that'll be fifteen hundred, please.’ He held out his hand for the money.
‘What? Fifteen hundred?’
‘C'est ça.’
Sebastian examined his diminished riches. ‘I can't pay. Can I owe you?’
‘No chance. You'll have to sell something off. What about your stations?’
‘Oh, they're my only money makers.’
‘I know.’ Timothy beamed.
Sebastian knew that he was only delaying his inevitable bankruptcy, but he agreed. After the transaction had been completed, Timothy, with a smirk of satisfaction, took up the shaker for his go and then suddenly, with a sharp intake of breath, he threw it down as though it were on fire. He gave a cry of pain and fell back in his chair, the colour draining from his face and eyes staring wildly about him.
‘What is it? What's wrong?’ asked Sebastian, not sure whether his friend was being serious or not.
‘Pain,’ gasped Timothy. ‘Awful pain.’
‘Where?’
‘In my wrists.’ Timothy held out his hands as in an act of supplication and Sebastian could see angry red bruises marked across each wrist.
***
‘Emergency, which service do you require?’
There was a pause and then a man’s voice said, ‘There’s been a terrible accident. A man has been wounded… badly. His wrists… Needs medical assistance urgently.’
‘Where? What address?’
The voice, hesitant
and strained, gave the details and then hung up before more information was required.
***
It was nearly midnight when Kate got to the hospital. It had taken the authorities some time to trace her and from what the doctor had said on the telephone, she knew she might well be too late. As she pushed open the swing door and moved out of the cold night air into the hushed and temperate atmosphere of the hospital, she asked herself—too late for what? Too late to be in at the kill? It was certainly too late for anything else.
After the initial shock she received at the news of Michael's suicide attempt, her emotions had gone into a kind of limbo. The thought of Michael dying had an anaesthetising effect on her sensibilities. She really did not know how she felt. If anything, she was angry—but angry about what or with whom she couldn't say.
A sympathetic night sister took her to Michael's room.
‘He is unconscious. I'm afraid...’ she began.
‘Yes, I know,’ said Kate quickly, saving the sister the task of telling her that Michael would never regain consciousness again, that there was no hope, and that he would be dead within hours.
She moved to the bed and looked down at the gaunt yellowish face lying on the pillow. In the muted light, his skin seemed to have the texture of wax, like wax fruit—lifelike but not real.
Kate began to cry. She didn't really know why. Was she weeping for Michael, for herself, or for the dream that had died? Here was the man she had once loved and the ache in her heart increased as she knew with a chilling bitterness that despite everything, she could feel no love for him now—not even as he lay dying. That was her tragedy.
‘Oh Michael,’ she said, almost in a whisper.
At the mention of his name, the pale mask of a face flexed itself slightly: the eyelids twitched and the forehead puckered.
Using it like a magic charm, Kate chanted his name again. This time his eyelids prized themselves open and gradually his bleary eyes focused on her, the pupils dilating into large dark circles. She moved closer and spoke his name for a third time. Recognition sparked in his eyes and almost without moving his lips, he spoke to her, his voice faint and distant.
‘Kate. I've been waiting for you to come. I've been hanging on.’ There was a long pause and the lids crept down over his eyes but Kate could tell that he hadn't finished, that he had more to say, so she waited quietly. Eventually, he summoned up enough energy to speak again. And for the last time.
Turning his head towards her and almost smiling, he said: ‘I will come back to you.’
By the time Dr Muncaster had arrived minutes later, Michael Barlow was dead.
SIX
‘Why didn't you say anything about this before?’
Rob shook his head. ‘I don't know. I was somehow frightened. When I found Michael in the bath like that... I just phoned for an ambulance without giving my name and then I ran—ran as though my life depended on it.’
‘What had you to be afraid of?’
‘Guilt, I suppose. My own guilt. In some way I contributed to Michael’s death.’
David shook his head sadly. Not you, too, he thought.
‘Look, David, please don't tell Kate... or anyone about this, all right?’
David nodded in agreement. Nothing could be gained by that now, not a year after Michael’s death. Nothing would be solved by adding further disturbing details of the man's demise. Rob's revelation didn’t alter the facts anyway. The bastard was dead and the sooner he was forgotten the better. Now that Kate had finally come to terms with the situation, he had no wish to reopen the wound.
‘I won't say a word. But why, after all this time have you felt it necessary to tell me?’
For a fleeting moment the gaunt and haggard features of Rob Moore softened into a little mirthless smile. ‘He's been haunting me, David. In my dreams. He won’t leave me alone. He wants me. He’s come back to take his revenge. Crazy isn’t it? A man of my age frightened to go to sleep—but I am. You've no idea... how real the dreams are. Oh, I can guess what you are thinking. It’s my own conscience at work—the air drawn dagger of the mind, right?’
David did not reply.
‘It's not remorse that keeps me awake; it's fear. I just feel scared. My whole life has lost its balance. My waking moments are like a dream and those damned nightmares are my new reality.’
‘Rob, you have got to stop this now before it gets out of hand. No matter how real these dreams seem to you, they are only tricks of your own subconscious. Just dreams. Life is real. Here and now is life. Dreams are only shadows in the imagination. Michael Barlow is dead; he's buried six feet under. He can't come back; it's you that's resurrecting him in your dreams.’
Rob closed his eyes and shook his head vaguely.
‘You need a psychiatrist, Rob. He'd straighten you out. Do something soon. Nip this obsession in the bud before it blossoms into something really dangerous. I know a man who's very good. I could arrange an appointment for you.’
Rob stared blankly. David was being very kind—rational. But he just didn't realise. He just didn't know.
‘Rob,’ David prompted sharply.
‘OK, OK. Organise an appointment with your shrink,’ Rob replied with a trace of the old sarcasm in his voice.
‘Fine, I'll do that today. We’ll soon have you sorted out.’ He gave his friend a reassuring pat on the arm and smiled. ‘Tell me, these dreams—they only started recently?’
‘Yes.’
‘Why do you think this is? I mean Michael's been dead for nearly a year—why should you start having nightmares about him now?’
‘It is a year. One year exactly. One year today. It's Michael's anniversary today.’
***
When Arthur Crabtree returned to his tiny terraced house, Jean Wilson was waiting for him on the doorstep, pale and stick-like. It was she who for the last three years had helped Crabtree with his work. Her only reward for this labour was to spend some time in close proximity of the man who she hoped one day would ask her to marry him. Through her thick pebble lenses Arthur Crabtree loomed as a graceful saviour, a spiritual hero. He was seen as he himself wanted to be seen. However, Jean held no such attraction. For him she was a scraggy, thin, simpering old maid whose gullibility and vulnerability had been useful to him in his trade, especially since the decline in his natural powers.
‘Oh, Arthur, at last,’ she smiled at his approach, clutching her handbag in both hands.
He granted her a greeting and strode past her to fit the key in the lock.
‘Is there a meeting tonight?’ she asked, following him into the dingy hallway that smelt of dampness and stale cooking fat.
‘Indeed there is. A very special one.’
‘Oh.’ A tremor of excitement ran through her. ‘In what way 'special', Arthur?’
He turned to her, his face sheened with perspiration, his eyes flickering with mixed emotions. He was half-afraid and half-excited.
‘I'm in real contact again,’ he said softly. ‘Real contact. And I've got to unburden someone. Someone here.’ He tapped his forehead. ‘In my head. He won't leave me alone. Tonight, the powers willing, I will release him. If I don't, he will drive me mad.’
***
It took David sometime to settle down to work that afternoon. The talk he'd had with Rob had unnerved and depressed him. It wasn't the facts about Michael's death that were disturbing; it was what was happening to Rob. Easy-going laconic Rob. He had disappeared to be replaced by a frightened, nervous replica. It was though Michael had powers beyond his death to screw up other people's lives. It had happened with Kate—thankfully that was over—and now it was Rob.
With chilling clarity, he saw that logically he would be next. Surely he was stronger and far too rational to be influenced by memories of a dead man. It was the mind only that weakened and became susceptible to such fancies. But not with him. He felt no guilt or sorrow for Michael Barlow's death. Good riddance. He was not about to become a member of some guilt-hallucinating c
oterie.
And then he remembered that night in Michael's studio. And the portrait, Michael's face. A living face.
Suddenly he felt sick.
The internal phone buzzed and half in a dream he picked it up. Nelson Parker's incisive voice reverberated in the plastic earpiece. ‘David. I liked what you said this morning about V and S. Creative thinking—a rare commodity in TV at the moment.’ He paused for David to respond but he remained silent. ‘In connection with that, I'd like you to call in at my office around four this afternoon for a chat. OK?’
‘Yes, that'll be fine,’ said David flatly.
‘Good. See you then.’
The call brought David out of his reverie and he began to draft out the episode in which Margo's husband would return, as it were, from the grave.
***
Jean Wilson drew the curtains in Arthur Crabtree's parlour. It was a dull day and although it was around three in the afternoon it was quite dark.
‘I want none of the fake stuff tonight, Jean,’ Crabtree said, as he sat hunched up over the meagre fire in the grate. ‘Tonight's for real.’
‘For real.’ There was a thrill of pleasure in Jean's voice as she repeated the words. As long as she had been helping Arthur with his work, she had never witnessed a meeting when he didn't use some of his 'artificial aids' in contacting the other side. Some of them were very spectacular: the cheesecloth ectoplasm and the disembodied head of his familiar (controlled by Jean) had startling effects on his clients who were usually anxious and gullible widows and widowers more than eager to accept the sideshow trappings that accompanied the messages from their loved ones.
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