‘Mr Cole.’
It was the voice of the ward sister.
‘I think you'd better leave now. If you’d like to call in the morning, say around ten, when Mr Morrison will be on duty.’
‘Will she die?’ He cut through the practical protocol with his words, although he asked the question in a matter of fact manner.
The sister's tired face showed no change of expression. It was a question she had been asked many times of many patients. Experience and her familiarity with death had made her immune to emotional involvement. Inevitably, she had to remain professional.
‘She is in a critical condition, Mr Cole, but we are doing all we possibly can to save her. It's early days yet, but there is all to hope for.’
David nodded. The words didn't really mean anything, but they did have some kind of comforting effect. He turned to leave—as he did so the sister gave him a warm smile and touched his arm.
‘She's in good hands,’ she said simply. David's throat dried and he could hardly force out a reply, he made his way slowly towards the door.
***
Dawn was just stealing into the sky as the door of the Rob Moore’s house opened and Rob stepped out. He breathed deeply, taking in the cool, sharp morning air. He stretched and grinned.
It was good to be alive. Again.
***
‘Honestly, Matron, I'm OK. It was just a nightmare.’
Matron looked down at the pale features of the youngster in her charge. There was something wrong with this Barlow boy, something which was beyond her experience and something which unnerved her.
She'd had to deal with hundreds of boys who for one reason or another suffered from bad dreams; it was a common enough complaint in a boarding school where children were isolated from love, real caring and the family home—but Timothy Barlow was an exception somehow. She could not forget his odd behaviour of a few days ago and the way he had kissed her. Even the recollection of it made her shudder. That was no little boy's kiss, no matter how precocious he may be. There was something evil about it.
‘What was your nightmare about?’ she asked, mixing him a mild sedative.
‘Nothing, really.’
She gave him a hard look. ‘Nonsense. No one screams the place down as you did over nothing. I want to know what your dream was about,’ she said tartly, and added as an afterthought: ‘Then I can help you.’
Timothy examined his feet.
‘Come on, Timothy, you can tell me.’ The voice had softened considerably and now resonated with theatrical sweetness. He looked at her almost in disbelief at the changing tactics, the move from threats to coaxing. He knew, however, he would never escape her, never get back to his own dormitory until he supplied her with some story that would satisfy her. He certainly couldn’t tell her the truth. He didn’t want to share those awful images that invaded his dreams with anyone. To say them out loud might make them come true.
‘I was being chased,’ he said. ‘I was chased by a hairy monster.’ He paused a moment and then warming to his task, he added, ‘It had one eye in the middle of his head, and it trapped me in a dark cave and I couldn't get out.’
By Matron's expression, he could see that she didn’t believe him. She knew he was lying—but how could she prove it? He added a few more gory details to the story before she stopped his flow by putting the drink in his hand.
‘Drink this and then go back to your dormitory. It's nearly time to get up by now anyway.’ She said briskly, all the softness having evaporated her voice. The boy was a nuisance and a liar. Why it bothered her so, she could not tell. She just felt disturbed by him.
‘If you have any more nightmares about big hairy monsters, we shall have to contact your parents.’
‘Parent,’ Tim corrected. ‘My father is dead.’
***
It was almost dawn when David arrived back at the cottage. He made no attempt to go to bed. There was no point: it was too late now, and he certainly wouldn't sleep. He made himself a cup of black coffee and sat in the kitchen watching the fingers of the morning draw pink-red scratches across the sky. The scalding coffee burnt his throat and warmed him but he didn’t feel anything. He was just numbed by the recent events.
All was still and quiet apart from the far-off sound of the sea and the clicking and knocking of the central heating radiators as they warmed up.
David glanced at his watch: it was already after eight. He ought to shower and change. By then it would be nearly time for him to return to the hospital and see the doctor. He wandered up towards the bathroom trying not to think of Kate, but the image, that awful image of her strapped in that monstrous crib, came floating insistently into his mind. He stood for a moment on the landing, screwing up his eyes in some attempt to shake away this vision from his mind. As he did so, a sharp sound caught his attention. His eyes flew open and he held himself tensely as he listened. The noise came again. It was the door of Michael's studio which was flapping open as though caught in some errant draught—except there was no draught.
He was drawn to that damned room once again and without thinking, he entered. It was still a chilling place but he felt no threat here now. The oppression he had experienced before had somehow evaporated. In daylight there seemed no sense of danger anymore. He felt the air leaving his lungs, suddenly realising how tense he had been.
Quietly relaxed now, he began to survey the room with its damaged paintings and then he began to grow angry. Hatred swelled up inside him; a boiling hatred of Michael Barlow, for the misery he had caused Kate and for the happiness he had denied her. And anger, too, for whoever controls our lives; God—or whatever you wanted to call the celestial puppet master. They had been played with, Kate and he, as in some great sneering supernatural game of torture. Build 'em up so's you can knock 'em down. Just as Kate was starting to leave behind the pain caused by that blasted husband of hers, this had to happen.
He clenched his fists. He did not want to give vent to violence. That was foolish... but, yes, he did want to do some hurt, some damage. It wouldn't solve anything but it would give him dome perverse satisfaction. His pent up emotions demanded some release. The painting—yes—the smug portrait of that bastard, Michael. He would rip that malevolent self-satisfied grin from its face.
Scanning the room, his eyes found the portrait which lay on the floor close to the easel. The surface shimmered and glared with the early morning light which fell on it from the skylight above. As David gazed down at it, detail was hard to see. He kicked it with his foot to alter the position, but it made no difference to the surface sheen which seemed to shield the face from David's scrutiny. Faintly through the brilliance, he could just make out the vague outline of Michael's features; as he did so, his anger seemed to dissipate. There was no point in venting his fury on an inanimate canvas. The power of Michael, sick as it was, worked through the memories and minds of the people who knew him, not through a painting of the man.
He picked it up and examined it closely. The painted face stared blankly back at him. It had lost vibrancy and power to menace. The features were now set in innocent repose. Indeed, as the cumulus clouds hurried by outside, shifting the patterns of light in the studio, the expression worn by the face of Michael Barlow, it seemed to David, was one of contentment.
***
The blue car with the scratched paintwork on the offside wing pulled into the car park of 'The Busy Bee' transport cafe. It looked oddly dwarfed by the side of the juggernauts and container lorries already parked there. It was some moments after the engine was switched off that the driver of the blue car emerged. He was still smiling and still taking in gulps of the fresh morning air. He was hungry. It had been over a year since last he'd eaten. The thought of bacon and eggs swilled down with hot tea thrilled him.
With awkward, jerky movements he made his way in to 'The Busy Bee'. The new body was still strange to him, despite the fact that it was a similar build to his own.
Not to worry, he thought, his grin
broadening, this is only a temporary arrangement.
***
As David was buttoning up his clean shirt, he suddenly thought of Tim. What should he do about the boy? If his mother were dying, God forbid, then he ought to be informed. He did not relish the thought of having to do that. But surely these morbid thoughts were premature and certainly it was pointless worrying Tim before there was something definite to tell him. The lad was highly strung as it was - not surprisingly so being the off-spring of such disparate parents. He had his mother's pale delicate features and sensitivity, while inheriting some of his father's moody unpredictability. Certainly since Michael's death this side of the boy's nature had shown itself more.
It was true that in the early days of his relationship with Kate, he had looked on Tim as an encumbrance, a handicap which he had to accept if he were to go on making love to Kate. However, as time passed and he got to know him, he'd grown to like him; although he had never reconciled it in his own mind that this boy was Michael's spawn and there would be forever something alien about him.
What would happen to her son if Kate died, he shuddered to think. But what was worse: what would happen to him if Kate died? That did not bear contemplation.
As he knotted his tie, he looked at himself in the mirror. A pale tired face gazed back at him. A face that was ageing, the charming youthful bloom around the eyes and mouth was fading. Middle-age was marking out a plot development.
He pulled the knot tight and grimaced at himself. Better get back to the hospital. He would decide what to do about Timothy when he'd heard what the doctor had to say and until then he would shut his brain down. No more morbid thoughts. No more thoughts. Normal service will be resumed as soon as possible.
***
Daylight now flooded into the house, exposing each grim horror to clear view. The pool of blood on the living room carpet had crusted over forming a hard crimson base for the severed head which was now a waxy yellow, the skin beginning to pucker. The muscles of the face had slackened letting the jaw drop wide open in a silent scream.
***
Upstairs the torso of Fiona Moore lay on the bed but the remnants of Michael Barlow's corpse had turned into a pile of fine white ash which shifted slightly as the breeze from an open window played with it.
All was silent. Absolute quiet. This was the domain of the dead. The really dead.
***
Jean Wilson pulled Arthur Crabtree upright in the armchair, supporting his body with cushions.
‘There now,’ she said pleasantly, ‘now you're comfortable.’
The white rigid features and dark vacant eyes of the medium looked back at her blankly.
‘When I've seen to the fire, I'll make us a nice cup of tea.’ She leant forward timidly, her heart fluttering as she placed a gentle kiss on the cold flesh of his forehead.
***
Rob swilled back the last of his tea. He felt good. The meal had warmed him and helped to bring suppleness back to the body. He felt more at home in it now—and more agile.
He glanced at his watch. Time he was going. He felt strangely excited. And why shouldn't he: he was going to see his son again.
***
There was no apparent change in Kate. She lay there in the same position as when he'd first seen her, with the hideous tubes still in place. The skin was alabaster white; the eyes closed; the breathing almost imperceptible. The nurse had tried to reassure David that this was a relatively good sign.
Relatively. Better than no breath at all!
‘It shows that her condition is stabilising and she certainly has got no worse since she came in.’
It was a different nurse. She had a pleasant face with a gentle Scottish burr. All very reassuring—but not to him.
He now waited in a cramped little office for the doctor to come and talk to him.
‘Ah yes.’ He heard the words before he saw the owner: a young man with large sensitive blue eyes and thin sandy hair, his hands dug deeply into the pockets of his dingy white coat.
‘Mr...’
‘Cole. David Cole.’
‘You've come about Mrs Barlow?’
He nodded.
‘And you are her...’
‘We live together. Her husband is dead.’ More honesty this time.
The young doctor nodded. Was there, David thought, a gentle roll of the eye, or did he imagine it? Was he being too sensitive?
‘Yes. I see,’ the doctor he said, pulling up a chair to sit by David. When he had done so, David could see how young this chap was. Very young. Surely he was not old enough to be capable of treating a serious case like this. It needed someone older, more experienced, less gauche than this youth.
‘Well, Mrs Barlow's had a heck of a knock. There is some internal damage, but nothing too serious we think; however the accident has been such a shock to her system that it has sent her into a coma.’
A coma. The words echoed like cannon fire around David's brain.
‘Now, don't jump to conclusions, Mr Cole. This is not so bad as it sounds. Her mind has gone into limbo, as it were, in order to protect her body from the pain of the accident. It is not uncommon in such cases and as the body heals and the pain lessens, so the brain realises there is less need to protect itself and then gradually, naturally, the patient comes out of the coma.’
‘Will she live?’ David wanted simplicity. Basic certainties. He was not interested in processes. He just wanted Kate alive.
The doctor gave a nervous smile. ‘I'm afraid I can't deal in guarantees, Mr Cole, but I do believe there is a good chance of her pulling through. The first forty-eight hours are the most crucial.’
The doctor paused for David to make some comment but he remained silent. ‘If I were you, I'd go home and try to get some rest. We will contact you if there is any major change in Mrs Barlow's condition.’
David clenched his fist. Why must he keep referring to her as Mrs Barlow. It was Kate he was talking about. Kate. His Kate. Barlow was dead and buried and no longer had any claim on her.
The young doctor stood up. ‘If you'll excuse me now, Mr Cole, I am rather busy.’
David nodded, ‘Of course. Thank you’. The doctor gave a professional grin of reassurance and left.
So there it was. He must wait. The thing David hated most: waiting. Waiting with all the uncertainty that it brings. That was the shape of his future. And there was nothing he could do to alter the situation.
He must wait.
Lethargically he pulled himself to his feet and left the little office. He spent some moments with Kate, looking down at that immobile pale mask until he could bear it no longer, and began to make his way out of the ward. Before he was able to leave, he was stopped by the pretty Scottish nurse.
‘Mr Cole, here are Kate's things, her belongings and such which were pulled out of the car.’
She had used her name, Kate. Bless her for that. He turned and smiled at her, as she held out a large black plastic bag.
‘Thank you,’ he said taking the bag; and he meant it.
***
Rob Moore pulled his car off the road just before the entrance to the drive. He got out and looked over the hedge at the stark block of buildings half a mile away. St. Austell’s School for Boys. He remembered how he and Kate had discussed Tim’s education—how they had argued about sending him away. Kate had wanted it very much, he knew, so that Tim would be away from his influence and not able to witness his bouts of irrational, violent behaviour.
St. Austell's School for Boys. Very pukka. Still residing in the 19th century. Masters with gowns, ancient traditions and strict rules. Tom Brown would have felt at home here.
Rob Matthew’s face creased into a smile. It had all worked out rather well in the end.
***
Nelson Parker growled in exasperation. What the hell was happening to his workforce?
‘Are you sure?’ he barked down the telephone.
‘I'll try again if you like, but there's no answer.’
Yes. Keep trying.’ Both Rob Moore and David Cole had failed to turn up for work that morning and they weren’t answering their phones. It was worse than trying to raise the dead.
***
The phone was ringing when David got back to the cottage. As he raced to the receiver, he prayed it was not the hospital with bad news. Sudden turn for the worse. Situation deteriorated. Nothing could be done.
Dead.
It was Nelson Parker's secretary.
‘I won't be in today, Gloria?’ he said. ‘Kate's had an accident. She's in... hospital.’
‘Oh, I am sorry,’ replied the tinny voice. ‘Is it bad?’
David did not know how to answer. He didn't want to confirm his thoughts verbally.
‘I'm sorry, I can’t talk now. Explain to Nelson for me will you? I'll be in touch soon.’
‘Yes, of course.’
He hung up and sank into a chair—drained of energy.
Perhaps he should have gone into the office and tried to work, take his mind off things; but he knew he couldn't have written a bloody word with this sword of Damocles hanging over his head. God, life was cruel. If only Kate had not gone after the part. What had she had to drink at last night? Strange—the police had made no reference to drinking—but what else could it be? She was a good driver, a safe driver. She must have been plied with booze at that dinner last night. What kind of idiot was it that would let someone drive off knowing them to be drunk? What was the name of that sodding director? He'd have something to answer for?
Suddenly, he realised that he didn't know the man. He had no idea who Kate had been with last night... or even where she'd been. The shock of this realisation filled him with a sense of panic. He really knew nothing about what Kate did last night.
The Darkness Rising Page 11
